Branch of Service

Army

Conflict

World War I (1914-1918)

Date of Enlistment

13/02/1915

Date of Discharge

10/09/1919

Place of Enlistment

Claremont, Tasmania

Gender

Male

Place of Birth

Beaufort, Victoria

Address (at enlistment)

Queenstown, Tasmania (previously Acton ACT)

Occupation

Assistant surveyor

Next of Kin

Lily B. McDuff (wife), Queenstown, Tasmania

Service Number

424

Final Rank

Staff Sergeant

Final Unit

3 Field Company Engineers AIF

McDuff probably arrived in Canberra in 1911 to work on survey parties in the Territory. He was attached to surveyor Drury Reid as an axeman before the war. He moved to Tasmania in 1914 to manage a copper mine near Queenstown.

McDuff served with the 3rd Field Company Engineers on Gallipoli from 1 June 1915 until 8 August when he was evacuated with pleurisy, concussion and a gun shot wound to the leg. After treatment in England he returned to Australia to be discharged with 'shell shock'. McDuff re-enlisted on 12 April 1917 at Claremont, Tasmania but while training in Sydney in January 1918 he fell ill and was discharged as medically unfit on 22 April 1918.

He enlisted a third time in Melbourne on 23 May 1918 and served out the war based at the 5th Australian General Hospital where he reached the rank of Staff Sergeant. McDuff died aged 76 years in 1964 at Heidelberg in Melbourne.

Description - height 5 feet 9 inches, weight 136 pounds, chest 34-37 inches, medium complexion, blue eyes, fair hair, Church of England, tattoos on his left and right arms and on the back of his left hand.

National Archives (A202) 1914/4381 Full names of Officers and Employees, Federal Territory Salaries Register
NAA RecordSearch - Series B2455 (First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920)
AWM First World War Unit Embarkation Rolls
Queanbeyan Age - 6 June 1911
The Hobart Mercury - 30 September 1914