Profile

LYONS, Denis Patrick
(Service number 10/103)

Aliases
First Rank	Private	Last Rank	Private

Birth

Date	5 March 1893	Place of Birth	Timaru, New Zealand

Enlistment Information

Date	17 August 1914	Age	21
Address at Enlistment	Care of W. Jackson, Burnside, Takapau, Hawkes Bay, New Zealand
Occupation	Farmhand
Previous Military Experience
Marital Status	Single
Next of Kin	Mr T. Lyon (father), Winchester
Religion	Roman Catholic
Medical Information	Height 5 foot 7 inches, weight 162 lbs, chest 32 inches, dark complexion, blue eyes, dark hair, decaying teeth

Military Service

Served with	NZ Armed Forces	Served in	Army
Military District

Embarkation Information

Body on Embarkation	Main Body
Unit, Squadron, or Ship	1st Battalion, Wellington Infantry Regiment
Date	16 October 1914
Transport	Arawa or Limerick
Embarked From	Wellington, New Zealand	Destination	Suez, Egypt

Other Units Served With
Last Unit Served With	1st Battalion, Wellington Infantry Regiment

Military Awards

Campaigns	Egyptian, Gallipoli, & Western Europe
Service Medals	1914-1915 Star, British War Medal, Victory Medal
Military Awards

Award Circumstances and Date

No information

Prisoner of War Information

Date of Capture
Where Captured and by Whom
Actions Prior to Capture
PoW Serial Number
PoW Camps
Days Interned
Liberation Date

Discharge

Date	16 January 1919	Reason	End of war

Hospitals, Wounds, Diseases and Illnesses

31 July 1915 - ANZAC Cove Hospital - later transferred to St Andrews Hospital Malta.

Post-war Occupations

Factory Foreman

Death

Date	4 March 1931	Age	37
Place of Death	Palmerston North, New Zealand
Cause	Cerebral spinal syphilis
Notices
Memorial or Cemetery	Palmerston North Cemetery
Memorial Reference	Block 82, Plot 53
New Zealand Memorials

Biographical Notes

Denis was born at Timaru on 5 March 1893, one of six sons of Timothy and Mary (nee O’Keefe) Lyons, of Winchester. Mr Lyons was born in Co Kerry, Ireland, in 1859, and was a well known farmer in the Winchester district and successful competitor in field events at the South Canterbury and Temuka Caledonian sports.

Denis joined up for service in World War One at Masterton on 17 August 1914, and gave his address as care of his employer, W. Jackson of Burnside, Takapau, Hawkes Bay, where he was working as a farmhand. He gave his father as his next of kin. Described as being aged 21, single, 5 foot 7 inches tall, weighing 162 lbs, having a 32 inch chest, blue eyes, dark hair, teeth having no decay and of the Roman Catholic faith, Denis was posted to the 1st Battalion of the Wellington Infantry Regiment as a Private. After training, he embarked from Wellington on 16 October 1914, with the Main Body on the SS Arawa or Limerick, and arrived in Suez, Egypt, on 3 December 1914. He sailed for the Dardanelles on 18 April 1915, where, on 31 July, he was admitted to hospital sick at Anzac Cove and later, in August, transferred to St Andrews Hospital Malta. By 8 October he was back at Mudros and on 19 December he disembarked at Alexandra.

On 1 January 1916, he was appointed to the position of cook and embarked for France on 6 April. He relinquished his cook position on 22 July 1916 and returned to his old unit. Late 1918 he was back in England where, on 7 November, he embarked on the SS Ulimaroa for return to New Zealand. Denis was discharged from the army on 16 January 1919. His war service earned him the 1914-1915 Star, British War Medal and Victory Medal. In later years his family received his Gallipoli Medallion.

In 1919 Denis was found playing cricked for Takapau. In 1924 he married Hyacinth Kathleen Rodgers and in 1928 he was living at Eden, Auckland, where he was employed as a factory foreman. The couple later moved to Palmerston North where he died on 4 March 1931, one day short of his 38th birthday. Denis’s early death was attributed to his war service and he is buried in the Roman Catholic Section of the Palmerston North Cemetery.

Sources

Auckland Museum Cenotaph database (June 2015); Archives NZ (Personnel Record); ancestry.com.au; NZSG Index V5; Papers Past; NZBDM Historical Records

External Links

Military personnel file

Researched and Written by

Ted Hansen (SC branch NZSG)

Currently Assigned to

Not assigned.

Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License unless otherwise stated.

Tell us more

Do you have information that could be added to this story? Or related images that you are happy to share? Submit them here!