PRIVATE E.W. DUKES, 29TH AND 46TH BATTALIONS AUSTRALIAN IMPERIAL FORCE, WOUNDED IN ACTION

PRIVATE E.W. DUKES, 29TH AND 46TH BATTALIONS AUSTRALIAN IMPERIAL FORCE, WOUNDED IN ACTION PASSCHENDAELE OCTOBER 1917 AND REPATRIATED TO AUSTRALIA IN DECEMBER 1917, SUFFERING FROM SHELL SHOCK. Two: British War and Victory Medals (both officially impressed: 2895 PTE. E.W. DUKES. 29-BN. A.I.F.). British War Medal attractively toned, Extremely Fine and mounted court style for display.

Group accompanied by 13 pages copied service papers.

Edgar William Dukes was born in Bruton, Somerset, in October 1892. He enlisted at Warrnambool, Victoria, on 3/2/1916. At the time of enlistment Dukes was 24 years old, gave his trade as labourer and his next of kin as his mother, Martha Dukes, of Bath Road, Keynsham, Somerset (later of Avon Cottages, Galford, near Bristol, England). Dukes was posted for service with the 29th Battalion on 23/2/1916 and first saw active service in Egypt, disembarking at Alexandria on 8/5/1916. Dukes almost immediately re-embarked for England, on 6/6/1916, disembarking at Plymouth on 16/6/1916. He was posted for service in France on 8/9/1916, joining the 29th Battalion in the field on 22/9/1916. Hospitalised with trench foot on 2/11/1916, Dukes was invalided to England on 25/12/1916, but returned to France on 25/4/1917 and was taken on the strength of the 46th Battalion on 26/5/1917. Dukes was briefly posted for duty with the no. 12 Australian Machine Gun Corps, on 5/6/1917, but rejoined the 46th Battalion on 10/6/1917. Whilst serving with the 46th Battalion Dukes was wounded in action on 12/10/1917, during the Third Battle of Ypres, Passchendaele. With shrapnel wounds to the back and suffering from shell shock, he was invalided to England on 14/10/1917 and subsequently repatriated to Australia on 20/12/1917, suffering from shell shock, where he was discharged on 8/4/1918.

Dukes’s Soldier’s Papers contain a record of his being court martialed on 10/7/1917.

During Dukes’s period of service with the 29th Battalion, September – December 1916, that battalion saw service with the 8th Brigade, 5th Australian Division and during his period of service with the 46th Battalion, May – October 1917, that battalion saw service with the 27th Brigade, 4th Australian Division.