Branch of Service

Army

Conflict

World War I (1914-1918)

Date of Enlistment

04/04/1916

Date of Discharge

24/01/1920

Place of Enlistment

Royal Military College, Duntroon ACT

Gender

Male

Date of Birth

19/02/1896

Place of Birth

Manly NSW

Address (at enlistment)

Royal Military College, Duntroon ACT

Occupation

Soldier

Next of Kin

Frank Oakes (father), William Street, Gordon NSW

Final Rank

Lieutenant

Final Unit

Australian Flying Corps

Oakes entered the Royal Military College, Duntroon on 12 March 1914 and graduated on 3 April 1916. He was appointed a Lieutenant the following day and embarked as a Lieutenant with the 11th Machine Gun Company, disembarking in England in July 1916. A few months later he transferred to the Australian Flying Corps with whom he graduated as a Flying Officer in May 1917. He flew regular anti Zeppelin patrols over England and later became a flying instructor before returning to Australia in June 1918 when he was appointed to the Central Flying School at Point Cook, Victoria.

Oakes married in 1921 and resigned his commission in 1922, taking up farming in Wellington district of New South Wales and marrying. At the outbreak of World War 2 he was appointed as a Major with the 2/19 Battalion and then was given command of the 2/26 Battalion (with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel) just as the Japanese invaded Singapore island in February 1942. With the fall of Singapore a week later, Oakes became a prisoner of war and was sent, in May 1943, as second in command of 'H' Force, to Thailand to work on the Thai-Burma railway at Hellfire Pass. Oakes died on 10 July 1986 in Normanhurst, Sydney.

Description - height 5 feet 10 inches, grey eyes, medium complexion, brown hair, Methodist.

Colonel J.E. Lee, 'Duntroon: The Royal Military College of Australia 1911-1946', 1952
NAA RecordSearch - Series B2455 (First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920)
Pratten, Garth - 'Oakes, Roland Frank (1896-1986)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/oakes-roland-frank-15826/text27025, published first in hardcopy 2012, accessed online 29 April 2015
AWM collection record : DASEY1624