Branch of Service

Army

Conflict

World War I (1914-1918)

Date of Enlistment

17/08/1914

Date of Discharge

03/12/1915

Place of Enlistment

Sydney NSW

Gender

Male

Other Name(s)

Sometimes spelt as 'Willfred'

Date of Birth

13/08/1894

Place of Birth

Canberra ACT

Address (at enlistment)

Royalla ACT

School(s) Attended

Tuggranong (Tuggeranong) School

Occupation

Block porter

Next of Kin

John and Sarah Monk (parents), Tuggeranong Siding ACT

Service Number

342

Final Rank

Private

Final Unit

4 Battalion AIF

Wilfred Monk was born in 1894 at Canberra, probably at his mother's family property Briar Farm (site of the Canberra Yacht Club in Yarralumla). The family moved to Tuggeranong, where he attended school, and lived near the Tuggeranong railway siding where his father owned a small block of land and worked for the railways. At the opening of the Tharwa Bridge in March 1895 Monk won one guinea in a baby show, presented by Hayes & Russell of Queanbeyan, as the best baby born east of the Murrumbidgee River.

Monk worked as a block porter and enlisted soon after the outbreak of war in August 1914. He served with the 4th Battalion, landing at Gallipoli on 25 April 1915. However, he had developed muscular rheumatism at Mena Camp in Egypt before leaving for Gallipoli and shortly after the landing developed a pain in his groin. A later medical report report says that he "looks much older than his age" and that he walked with a stoop. This resulted in his return to Australia and discharge (as medically unfit) on 3 December 1915. Monk was welcomed home in October 1915 and presented with a wallet. He died in the Repatriation Hospital at Concord in Sydney on 19 October 1967.

Description - height 6 feet 4 inches, weight 210 pounds, chest 40 inches, fair complexion, blue eyes, brown hair, scar on left wrist, Church of England.

NAA RecordSearch - Series B2455 (First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920)
Rex Cross and Bert Sheedy, 'Queanbeyan Pioneers: First Study', 1983 (photo p.47)
Sydney Morning Herald - 21 October 1967
Sydney Mail - 11 August 1915
Queanbeyan Age - 30 March 1895, 8 October 1915, 19 November 1915