Charles Henry SHEPPARD

Regimental number3321
Place of birthCootamundra, New South Wales
SchoolTumut Public School, New South Wales
ReligionChurch of England
OccupationLabourer
AddressTumut, New South Wales
Marital statusSingle
Age at embarkation36
Height5' 9.5"
Weight168 lbs
Next of kinFather, J Sheppard, Tumut, New South Wales
Previous military serviceServed for 1 year in the 3rd Imperial Bushmen's Contingent in the Boer War, 1902.
Enlistment date15 July 1915
Date of enlistment from Nominal Roll13 July 1915
Rank on enlistmentPrivate
Unit name20th Battalion, 7th Reinforcement
AWM Embarkation Roll number23/37/2
Embarkation detailsUnit embarked from Sydney, New South Wales, on board HMAT A29 Suevic on 20 December 1915
Rank from Nominal RollPrivate
Unit from Nominal Roll56th Battalion
FateKilled in Action 26 September 1917
Place of death or woundingPolygon Wood, Belgium
Date of death26 September 1917
Age at death37
Age at death from cemetery records37
Place of burialNo known grave
Commemoration detailsThe Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial (Panel 29), Belgium

The Menin Gate Memorial (so named because the road led to the town of Menin) was constructed on the site of a gateway in the eastern walls of the old Flemish town of Ypres, Belgium, where hundreds of thousands of allied troops passed on their way to the front, the Ypres salient, the site from April 1915 to the end of the war of some of the fiercest fighting of the war.

The Memorial was conceived as a monument to the 350,000 men of the British Empire who fought in the campaign. Inside the arch, on tablets of Portland stone, are inscribed the names of 56,000 men, including 6,178 Australians, who served in the Ypres campaign and who have no known grave.

The opening of the Menin Gate Memorial on 24 July 1927 so moved the Australian artist Will Longstaff that he painted 'The Menin Gate at Midnight', which portrays a ghostly army of the dead marching past the Menin Gate. The painting now hangs in the Australian War Memorial, Canberra, at the entrance of which are two medieval stone lions presented to the Memorial by the City of Ypres in 1936.

Since the 1930s, with the brief interval of the German occupation in the Second World War, the City of Ypres has conducted a ceremony at the Memorial at dusk each evening to commemorate those who died in the Ypres campaign.

Panel number, Roll of Honour,
  Australian War Memorial
163
Miscellaneous information from
  cemetery records
Parents: James and Rachel SHEPPARD, Tumut, New South Wales
Family/military connectionsAn indefinite number of nephews and cousins, some of whom were killed and others wounded, some of whom returned to Australia.
Other details

War service: taken on strength, 56th Bn, Tel el Kebir, Egypt, 16 February 1916. Admitted to 14th Field Ambulance, Ferry Post, 28 May 1916, thence to Casualty Clearing Station (enteritis); discharged to duty, 29 May 1916; rejoined unit, 31 May 1916.

Proceeded from Alexandria to join the British Expeditionary Force, 19 June 1916; disembarked Marseilles, 29 June 1916.

Admitted to 5th Divisional Rest Station, 14 September 1916 (influenza); discharged to duty, 9 October 1916.

Admitted to 5th Field Ambulance, 5 December 1916, and transferred to Anzac Corps Rest Station (sore feet); discharged to duty, 11 December 1916.

Detached for duty with French Mission, 7 May 1917; rejoined Bn from detachment, 10 July 1917.

On leave to United Kingdom, 25 July 1917; rejoined unit from leave, 9 August 1917.

Killed in action, 26 September 1917.

Medals: 1914-15 Star, British War Medal, Victory Medal

Miscellaneous detailsPlace of birth given on Attestation Form as Tumut, New South Wales.