Branch of Service

Army

Conflict

World War I (1914-1918)

Date of Enlistment

12/07/1916

Date of Discharge

30/09/1916

Place of Enlistment

Armidale NSW

Gender

Male

Place of Birth

Cowra Creek NSW

Address (at enlistment)

Hawarden Public School, Manilla NSW (previously Canberra ACT)

School(s) Attended

Queanbeyan Public School

Occupation

Teacher

Next of Kin

John Murray (father), 'Glebe', Canberra ACT

Service Number

40079

Final Rank

Trooper

Final Unit

Imperial Camel Corps AIF

Queanbeyan RSL Wall of Remembrance, Crawford St, Queanbeyan NSW
Roll of Honor Queanbeyan Public School, Isabella Street, Queanbeyan NSW

Roland Murray was born at Cowra Creek near Bredbo, the younger brother of Ernest, Harry and John Cade Murray. He grew up at Cowra Creek where his father had a gold mine but moved to Canberra in 1909 when his father established Canberra's first bakery. He attended school at Queanbeyan, was a member of the Canberra Rifle Club and for several years helped his father with the bakery but, by the time he enlisted on 12 July 1916 he was teaching at Hawarden near Manilla. Defective vision however saw Murray discharged in September 1916. He returned to teach for a while at Brooklands near Hall but then joined his father's bakery again. Shortly after the bakery was destroyed in a fire in 1923 Murray moved to Sydney with his wife and son.

Description - height 5 feet 7 inches, weight 138 pounds, chest 33-35 inches, dark complexion, brown eyes, dark hair, Church of England.

National Archives (A202) 1913/1807 Use of RMC [Royal Military College] Rifle Range by Canberra Rifle Club
NAA RecordSearch - Series B2455 (First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920)
Lyall Gillespie, 'Early Education and Schools in the Canberra Region', 1999
James Murray, 'Canberra's First Anzac', (unpublished monograph, Canberra & District Historical Society)
John Cope, 'If only these stones could speak : a history of Queanbeyan Public School 1864-2001', 2001