Profile

ROBERTSON, Henry
(Service number 8/2114)

Aliases
First Rank	Private	Last Rank	Lance Corporal

Birth

Date	15 February 1895	Place of Birth	Herbert, North Otago, New Zealand

Enlistment Information

Date	13 February 1915	Age	19
Address at Enlistment	Sutton, North Otago, New Zealand
Occupation	Blacksmith
Previous Military Experience	E Coy, 10th North Otago Regiment
Marital Status	Single
Next of Kin	Mr George Robertson (father), Waianakarua, North Otago, New Zealand
Religion	Presbyterian
Medical Information	5 foot 9 inches, hazel eyes, dark complexion, black hair, weight 12 stone, chest 34-37 inches, teeth fair

Military Service

Served with	NZ Armed Forces	Served in	Army
Military District

Embarkation Information

Body on Embarkation	7th Reinforcements
Unit, Squadron, or Ship	Otago Infantry Battalion
Date	13 June 1915
Transport	Maunganui
Embarked From	Wellington, New Zealand	Destination	Suez, Egypt

Other Units Served With	No.1 NZ Div Employment Company
Last Unit Served With	No.1 NZ Div Employment Company

Military Awards

Campaigns	Egyptian, Balkans (Gallipoli), & Western Europe
Service Medals	1914-1915 Star, British War Medal, Vicotry 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	13 April 1919	Reason	End of war

Hospitals, Wounds, Diseases and Illnesses

14 Aug 1915 - wounded Gallipoli - admitted Alexandria Hospital

Post-war Occupations

Labourer

Death

Date	26 July 1937	Age	42
Place of Death	Herbert, North Otago, New Zealand
Cause
Notices
Memorial or Cemetery	Herbert (Otepopo) Cemetery, New Zealand
Memorial Reference	Row F, Plot 91
New Zealand Memorials

Biographical Notes

Henry, second son of George & Jane or Jeannie (nee Swallow) Robertson, was born at Herbert, North Otago, on 15 February 1895. He was educated at the Sutton School and had passed the 4th standard of education.

Employed as a blacksmith by Mr H. McGrath of Sutton, Otago, he enlisted as a Private into the Otago Infantry Battalion on 13 February 1915. He was described as being aged 19, Presbyterian, single, 5 foot 9 inches tall, having hazel eyes, a dark complexion, black hair, weighing 12 stone, his chest measuring 34 to 37 inches and his teeth being in fair condition. He listed his father, Mr George Robertson of Waianakarua, North Otago, as his next of kin. Having had previous military experience with E Company, 10th North Otago Regiment, Henry left for Suez, Egypt, with the 5th Reinforcements from Wellington, aboard SS Maunganui on 13 June 1915.

By 9 August Henry was serving on Gallipoli with his unit but was wounded in the thigh on 14 August, and evacuated to hospital in Alexandria. He returned to Gallipoli from Alexandria on 15 September and re-joined his unit at Lemnos on 21 September. After his return to Egypt ex- the Gallipoli campaign, he embarked for France on 6 April 1916. On 17 August 1918, he was promoted to temporary Corporal and posted to No.1 NZ Divisional Employment Company but soon reverted back to Lance Corporal. Except for a couple of minor bouts of sickness in France, he survived to return to NZ aboard SS Hororata ex London, leaving 1 February 1919. For his service he was awarded the 1914-1915 Star, British War Medal and Victory Medal and was discharged from the army on 13 April 1919, after having been in uniform for 4 years and 60 days.

Harry returned to his home town of Herbert where he was employed as a labourer, and in 1921, married Miss Ida Helen Ure. He died there on 26 July 1937, and is buried in the Herbert (Otepopo) Cemetery in Row F, Plot 91.

Henry’s elder brother (no.8/281) Lawrence Robertson, who served with 2 Battalion Otago Infantry Regiment, was not so fortunate to survive the war and was killed in action in Belgium on 7 June 1917.

Sources

Ancestry.com.au at http://search.ancestry.com.au/cgi-bin/sse.dll?gl=allgs&gss=sfs63_home&new=1&rank=1&msT=1&gsfn=henry&gsfn_x=1&gsln=robertson&gsln_x=1&MSAV=1&cpxt=1&cp=14&catbucket=rstp; Birth, Death and Marriage Historical Records at https://bdmhistoricalrecords.dia.govt.nz; University of New South Wales, Canberra NZEF Project "New Zeland Anzacs in ther Great War 1914-1918" at http://nzef.adfa.edu.au/showPerson?pid=218605; NZSG Index V5

External Links

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.

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