Service Details
- Branch of Service
- Army
- Conflict
- World War I (1914-1918)
- Date of Enlistment
- 05/11/1915
- Date of Discharge
- 22/08/1919
- Place of Enlistment
- Casula NSW
Personal Details
- Gender
- Male
- Date of Birth
- 04/07/1890
- Place of Birth
- Ivanhoe, Victoria
- Address (at enlistment)
- Ivanhoe, Victoria (previously the Bachelor Quarters, Acton ACT)
- Occupation
- Clerk
- Next of Kin
- James Willis (father), Ivanhoe, Victoria
Unit and Rank Details
- Service Number
- 5782
- Final Rank
- Sergeant
- Final Unit
- Australian Army Pay Corps AIF
Commemoration
Ainslie Cricket Club Honour Roll (refer Queanbeyan Age, 28 January 1916)
Notes
Les Willis worked in the Accounts Branch of the Department of Home Affairs in Canberra from June 1914 up to the time of his enlistment in November 1915. He was a prominent local cricketer with the Ainslie club and a foundation member of the Canberra Rifle Club. He served with the 1st Battalion in France from September 1916 and was wounded at the Second Battle of Bullecourt in May 1917. After leaving hospital he was transferred to the Australian Army Pay Corps at Weymouth in England. He returned to Australia in March 1919 and was discharged in August 1919. Willis returned to Canberra and worked for the Federal Capital Commission. He married Minnie Weston, the daughter of T.C. Weston, in 1929. Willis died in Melbourne in 1967.
Description - height 5 feet 5½ inches, weight 125 pounds, chest 33 inches, fresh complexion, brown eyes, brown hair, Church of England.
Sources
Val Emerton, 'Past Images Present Voices', 1996
Ann Gugler, 'The Builders of Canberra 1909-1929', 1994
National Library of Australia: Canberra Rifle Club Minute Book 1914-1939 (manuscript call no. NLA MS 3996)
National Library of Australia: Country Women's Association of NSW (Canberra Branch) History, 1959 (manuscript call no. NLA MS 734)
National Archives (A207) G1915/125 Leased Property in the Federal Territory
Peter Procter, 'Biographical Register of Canberra and Queanbeyan', Canberra, Heraldry and Genealogy Society of Canberra, 2001 (p.339)
A.W. Edwards, 'My War Diary', 1920 (AWM PR89/050)
Stories from the ACT Memorial, 'Ainslie Challenges the Kultur Club', ACT Heritage Library www.library.act.gov.au/find/history/stories_from_the_act_memorial
Queanbeyan Leader - 18 October 1915
Queanbeyan Age - 26 January 1916, 2 June 1916
NAA RecordSearch - Series B2455 (First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920)