Branch of Service

Army

Conflict

World War I (1914-1918)

Date of Enlistment

11/08/1914

Date of Discharge

14/01/1917

Place of Enlistment

Liverpool NSW

Gender

Male

Place of Birth

Berrima NSW

Address (at enlistment)

Newtown NSW (also Ainslie ACT)

Occupation

Tram conductor

Next of Kin

Agnes Lawson (mother), 'Peteonis' via Ainslie ACT

Service Number

8912

Final Rank

Driver

Final Unit

Australian Army Service Corps AIF

Lawson was born in 1887 at Berrima and enlisted on 11 August 1914 in the Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force serving in New Guinea. He was discharged from the ANMEF in March 1915. He gave his address on embarkation as the same as his mother's; Mrs. Agnes Lawson of 'Peteonis', Ainslie via Queanbeyan. She was the daughter of William and Mary Ginn, the original residents of what is know known as Blundells Cottage. The Ginns lived there until 1874 when they moved to Canberra Park. Agnes married Thomas Lawson in Goulburn in 1886.

William Lawson enlisted for the second time on 11 May 1915 and served in France as a Driver with the 20th Company, Australian Army Service Corps from April 1916 but had suffered a bout of malaria in Egypt on the way to England. In May 1916 he was hospitalised with rheumatic fever and returned to Australia in October with fibrositis and cardiac enlargement. He was discharged in January 1917. Lawson died on 18 January 1978 at Toongabbie in Sydney.

The AWM photograph is a group portrait of 14 men (including Lawson) belonging to the 2nd reinforcements, 17th Battalion taken in 1915.

Description - height 5 feet 5 inches, weight 148 pounds, chest 32-35½, dark complexion, brown eyes, dark hair, Presbyterian.

NAA RecordSearch - Series B2455 (First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920)
AWM WW1 Embarkation Rolls
AWM Collections Record : P00996.002
Beth Knowles, 'The Cottage in the Parliamentary Triangle' CDHS 1990
NSW Births, Deaths & Marriages - http://www.bdm.nsw.gov.au/familyHistory/search.htm