COREY, Ernest Albert

Service Details

Branch of Service:	Army
Conflict:	World War II
Date of Enlistment:	23/09/1941
Date of Discharge:	11/10/1943
Place of Enlistment:	Paddington NSW

Personal Details

Gender:	Male
Date of Birth:	20/12/1892
Place of Birth:	Numeralla NSW
Address (at enlistment):	34 Westlake (Yarralumla) ACT
Occupation:	Labourer
Next of Kin:	Patricia Corey (daughter)

Unit and Rank Details

Service Number:	N280612
Final Rank:	Private
Final Unit:	2 Garrison Battalion

Notes

Corey came from the Numeralla area and also served in World War 1, enlisting as part of the Men from Snowy River route march. He served as a stretcher bearer in the 55th Battalion and was the only soldier in the war to be awarded the Military Medal and three bars. That is, he was awarded the Military Medal four times.

The Military Medal (MM) was awarded for his actions at Queant, near Bullecourt, in May 1917. He earned the first bar to the MM at Polygon Wood in September 1917, the second bar at Peronne in September 1918 and the third bar at the Hindenburg Line near Bellicourt on 30 September 1918. On all four occasions it was for rescuing wounded men. His medals have been on display in the Hall of Valour in the Australian War Memorial.

He arrived in Canberra in the early 1920s and lived at Westlake and later Braddon and Downer. He served with the 13th Garrison Battalion at North Head in Sydney from September 1941 until discharged medically unfit with asthma. Corey died on 25 August 1972 and is buried in the ex-service's portion of the Woden Cemetery.

Sources

WWII Nominal Roll http://www.ww2roll.gov.au
NAA RecordSearch – Series B884 (Citizen's Military Forces Personnel Dossiers, 1939-1947)
AWM Honours & Awards
Reveille, The Returned Sailors and Soldiers’ Imperial League of Australia, March 1931
Ann Gugler, ‘True tales from Canberra's vanished suburbs of Westlake, Westridge & Acton’, 1999
Stories from the ACT Memorial, ‘Men from Snowy River’, ACT Heritage Library www.library.act.gov.au/find/history/stories_from_the_act_memorial
The Canberra Times - 25 April 2007, 28 April 2007, 14 May 2008