World War One – Parramatta Soldiers – Charles Gapes

Private Charles Gapes, copy from Parramatta Soldiers, Cumberland Argus, 1920

Private Charles Gapes embarked from Sydney on the 25 November 1916 aboard HMAT Beltana A72. He was a carter and lived at “Hillview” Nobbs Street, Granville, NSW. Charles disembarked at the HM Naval Base, Devonport, Plymouth late January 1917. He proceeded to Etaples, France, in April and fought on the Western Front. In May he was reallotted to regiment No.3456a. He was killed in action in Belgium, September 20, 1917, and buried at the Belgian Battery Corner Cemetery, 1 mile west of Ypres, France.

His loving mother inserted these thoughts in his roll of honour:

Only a bundle of letters

All that is left for me;

But my darling who died for his country

Still lives in my memory.

Only a few lines from the trenches

With the hand of the writer grown cold;

But each word on that paper

Is graven in letters of pure gold.

In May 1923 Charles Gapes received the Victory Medal.

Caroline Finlay, Research Facilitator, Parramatta Heritage Centre, 2015