Branch of Service

Army

Conflict

World War I (1914-1918)

Date of Enlistment

13/11/1914

Place of Enlistment

Melbourne, Victoria

Gender

Male

Date of Birth

11/02/1887

Place of Birth

Parish of Allandale near Ballarat, Victoria

Address (at enlistment)

Anketell Street, Coburg, Victoria (previously the Home Affairs Camp, Duntroon ACT)

Occupation

Plumber

Next of Kin

Husband of Glenora Love and father of Essie Love of Anketell Street, Coburg, Victoria

Burial Place

Quinn's Post Cemetery, Gallipoli, Turkey

Service Number

1375

Final Rank

Corporal

Final Unit

14 Battalion AIF

Died (killed in action), Gallipoli on 27 April 1915 aged 28 years

AWM Roll of Honour Memorial Panel 73, Canberra ACT

Love was employed as a plumber with the Department of Home Affairs in Canberra in 1913 and lived with his wife and daughter in the camp near Duntroon. A baby son had died shortly before they moved from Melbourne. Love was the secretary of the Royal Federal Lodge of the Grand United Order of Oddfellows and acted as Santa Claus at a Christmas party for local children in 1913 attended by the Commandant of the Royal Military College, William Throsby Bridges.

Love and his wife returned to Melbourne in early 1914. He enlisted in the 14th Battalion in November 1914 and served in A Company as a Corporal, landing on Gallipoli on 25 April. His unit was held in reserve until 27 April when they were marched up to Monash Valley. His Company was sent to what became known as Quinn's Post and he wrote in his diary: "Arrived at firing line at 10 o'clock this morning. Having a very bad time of it so far. Machine gun played hell on our men for a start they were getting killed all around me but I escaped so far." It was the final entry. Love was killed in action soon after. On the back cover he had written: "In the event of my death I wish this book to be sent to my Dear Wife to let her know that my last thoughts were of her and Essie my darling daughter."

Description - height 5 feet 9½ inches, weight 178 pounds, chest 37-40½ inches, medium complexion, hazel eyes, brown hair, Methodist, vaccination mark on his left arm.

All Those Empty Pages by Patsy Adam-Smith (La Trobe Library, Journal 4, No.14, Oct. 1974 pp 28-33)
Patsy Adam-Smith, 'The Anzacs', 1978
DVA nominal rolls - WW1
NAA RecordSearch - Series B2455 (First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920)
Newton Wanliss, 'The History of the Fourteenth Battalion AIF', 1929
Patricia Clarke, ‘War Widows of the ACT’, https://www.womenaustralia.info/exhib/widows/love.html 
Stories from the ACT Memorial, 'The Love Story', ACT Heritage Library www.library.act.gov.au/find/history/stories_from_the_act_memorial
Queanbeyan Age - 4 July 1913, 22 July 1913, 2 January 1914, 9 January 1914, 8 June 1915
The Argus (Melbourne) - 2 June 1915, 5 June 1915