Pte G Cairncross

by Sheila Byard

The World War One Honour Roll from the former West Melbourne State School (now housed at the City of Melbourne Library in Errol St, North Melbourne)  also shows G. Cairncross as a past student who enlisted.  This the family believes to be Gordon Cairncross, tailor, born in Ballarat, whose next of kin on the attestation form is shown as his father  William Cairncross, 88 Tennyson Street. 

William Black Cairncross, born in Beechworth, was father to a number of children including Gordon and Herbert. His brother Ebenezer Cairncross was living at Canterbury Street in the 1890s.

Private Gordon Cairncross,  a Methodist,  is shown as going overseas with the 6^th reinforcement of the 64^th Infantry in 1915, and was 20 at the time of embarkation. He enlisted with his parents' consent.  An Anzac from 5/8/1915 serving with the 5^th Division, he was hospitalised on Lemnos on 18 September 1915 because of ‘teeth’ and by 12 March 16 was in the Ras-el-Din Hospital in Alexandria having contracted enteric fever on 21 January 1916.

After convalescence in Malta, by 20 May 1916 he was serving at Etaple,  France. On 25 February 1917 he was once again judged fit for service and attached to Ist Division Anzac HQ. By the end of that year he was listed for return to Australia. His discharge on medical grounds in Australia was completed on the 9 April 1918. According to Ian Cairncross, for a time  ‘he was “Missing believed dead” but later located by the Red Cross, badly shell-shocked and possibly gassed, in a hospital in France. His record shows that he was on a charge in November 1917 for being AWL while on active service and had to forfeit a total of 5 days pay. He died on 30 January 1937 aged 43.

Many years later, ‘Aunt Lil’ Cairncross had tailor’s equipment that belonged to her brother.

[Based on records of Gordon Cairncross online at the National Archives of Australia, and information supplied by Heather McKay and by  Ian Cairncross (grandnephew of G. Cairncross, oral communication 0407). Herbert Cairncross, Gordon’s brother was living at 88 Tennyson Street at the time of his marriage on 27 February 1915. Herbert’s son, Gordon Munro Cairncross (Ian’s father) was the child of this marriage.]