Branch of Service

Army

Conflict

World War I (1914-1918)

Date of Enlistment

02/12/1915

Place of Enlistment

Cootamundra NSW

Gender

Male

Date of Birth

28/01/1881

Place of Birth

Canberra ACT

Address (at enlistment)

'Uabba' via Lake Cudgellico [Cargelligo] NSW (previously Duntroon ACT and Tharwa ACT)

Occupation

Station hand

Next of Kin

Husband of Mrs Florence J. Mayo of Lake Cudgellico [Cargelligo] NSW and father of Ada and Mabel Mayo. Son of John Mayo (deceased) and Wilhelmina Ellen Mayo (nee O'Donnell) of Duntroon, Jerrabomberra, Tharwa and Queanbeyan.

Service Number

5402

Final Rank

Private

Final Unit

54 Battalion AIF

Died (killed in action) at Bullecourt on 15 May 1917 aged 36 years

AWM Roll of Honour Memorial Panel 159, Canberra ACT
26 Villers-Bretonneux Memorial, Villers-Bretonneux, Picardie, France
Memorial plaque to Ernest Frederick and John Charles Mayo in Christ Church, Queanbeyan NSW
Memorial plaque in porch of Christ Church, Queanbeyan NSW
World War 1 Memorial, corner of Lowe St and Farrer Place, Queanbeyan NSW
Queanbeyan RSL Wall of Remembrance, Crawford St, Queanbeyan NSW

There is no Roll of Honour Circular for this man. Charlie Mayo was born in Canberra and worked on the Duntroon estate. He married Florence Roberts at St. John's in Canberra on 15 February 1905. In 1908 he and his family moved to Tharwa where he worked for George Circuitt, the manager of 'Cuppacumbalong'. When Circuitt and his partners sold the property in 1912 Mayo followed him to Uabba Station near Hillston from where he enlisted on 2 December 1915 at Cootamundra. He was taken on strength with the 54th Battalion in August 1916 and served with the 5th Division in the trenches near Gueudecourt on the Somme during the winter of 1916/17. Mayo was killed in action on 15 May 1917 during the Second Battle of Bullecourt - a month after his younger brother Ernie was killed at the First Battle of Bullecourt. He had gone to the aid of a mate wounded during a barrage when, according to a witness, a bomb landed between the two of them, killing them instantly. The community of Lake Cargelligo and Queanbeyan raised funds to erect a house for his widow and daughters in Campbell Street, Queanbeyan in his memory.

Description - height 5 feet 7 inches, chest 32-36 inches, weight 134 pounds, dark complexion, grey eyes, brown hair, Church of England, no civil convictions.

AWM Roll of Honour Database
AWM Red Cross Wounded and Missing files
First World War Unit Embarkation Rolls
Peter Procter, Biographical Register of Canberra and Queanbeyan, Canberra, Heraldry and Genealogy Society of Canberra, 2001 (p. 194)
Rex Cross, 'Bygone Queanbeyan', 1980
Wendy McLennan, 'The Mayo Connection', 1996 (p.38)
Our Queanbeyan 'Boys' No.2, Howard & Shearsby, Yass (postcard)
Patricia Clarke, ‘War Widows of the ACT’, https://www.womenaustralia.info/exhib/widows/mayo.html
Queanbeyan Age - 17 February 1905, 5 January 1912, 8 June 1917, 12 June 1917, 24 July 1917, 31 August 1917, 15 January 1918, 29 October 1919
NAA RecordSearch - Series B2455 (First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920)