John TRACEY

Regimental number3122
Place of birthNew South Wales
ReligionRoman Catholic
OccupationMiner
AddressIpswich, Queensland
Marital statusSingle
Age at embarkation22
Next of kinMother, Mrs D Tracey, Ipswich, Queensland
Previous military serviceServed in the Senior Cadets, Ipswich, Queensland.
Enlistment date23 June 1915
Rank on enlistmentPrivate
Unit name9th Battalion, 10th Reinforcement
AWM Embarkation Roll number23/26/3
Embarkation detailsUnit embarked from Brisbane, Queensland, on board HMAT A69 Warilda on 5 October 1915
Rank from Nominal RollCorporal
Unit from Nominal Roll49th Battalion
FateKilled in Action 26 September 1917
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
149
Other details

War service: Egypt, Western Front

Allotted to and proceeded to join 49th Bn, Tel el Kebir, 29 February 1916.

Proceeded from Alexandria to join the British Expeditionary Force, 5 June 1916; disembarked Marseilles, 12 June 1916. Promoted Corporal, 29 January 1917. On leave to England, 9 February 1917; rejoined Bn from leave, 17 February 1917.

Wounded in action, 5 April 1917 (gun shot wound, left leg); admitted to 6th General Hospital, Rouen, 7 April 1917; transferred to 2nd Convalescent Depot, 9 April 1917; to 6th General Hospital, 18 April 1917; marched in to 4th Australian Division Base Depot, Etaples, 7 May 1917; rejoined Bn, 17 May 1917.

To School of Instruction, in the field, 31 May 1917; rejoined Bn, 30 June 1917.

Promoted Sergeant, 12 August 1917.

Killed in action, Belgium, 26 September 1917.

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