Profile

ROBERTS, Daniel
(Service number 23/581)

Aliases	Donald
First Rank	Rifleman	Last Rank	Lance Corporal

Birth

Date	19 February 1885	Place of Birth	Waimate, New Zealand

Enlistment Information

Date	29 May 1915	Age	31
Address at Enlistment	Paynestown, Waimate, New Zealand
Occupation	Labourer
Previous Military Experience
Marital Status	Single
Next of Kin	Mrs E. Roberts (mother), Painstown, Waimate, New Zealand
Religion	Church of England
Medical Information	5 foot 5 inches, blue eyes, fair complexion, brown hair, weight 140 lbs, chest 32-34 1/2 inches, fairly good teeth

Military Service

Served with	NZ Armed Forces	Served in	Army
Military District

Embarkation Information

Body on Embarkation	1 NZ Rifle Brigade
Unit, Squadron, or Ship	B Coy, 1 NZRB
Date	9 October 1915
Transport	Maunganui, Tahiti, Aparima, Navua or Warrimoo
Embarked From	Wellington, New Zealand	Destination	Suez, Egypt

Other Units Served With
Last Unit Served With	1 NZ Rifle Brigade

Military Awards

Campaigns	Egyptian & 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	9 February 1919	Reason	End of war

Hospitals, Wounds, Diseases and Illnesses

2 February 1916 - Alexandria Hospital - enteric fever (transferred to UK 14 May 1916); 26 November 1917 - gun shot wound, France (transferred to UK); 6 October 1918 - gun shot wound in leg - transferred to UK 19 October 1918

Post-war Occupations

Labourer

Death

Date	5 October 1971	Age	86
Place of Death	Waimate, New Zealand
Cause
Notices	Internal Affairs 20 Oct 1971
Memorial or Cemetery	Waimate Lawn Cemetery, New Zealand
Memorial Reference	Block 15, Plot 97
New Zealand Memorials

Biographical Notes

Daniel (birth name Donald) was born at Waimate on 19 February 1885, son of John and Ellen Roberts.

Enlisting under the name of Daniel, aged 31, on 29 May 1915 he gave his occupation as labourer, address Paynestown, Waimate, and his birth date as 1 February 1884. He was described as being Anglican, 5 foot 5 inches tall, blue eyes, of fair complexion, brown hair, weighing 140 lbs, chest measuring 32 to 34 ½ inches and having fairly good teeth. His mother, Mrs E. Roberts of Painstown, Waimate, was nominated as his next of kin. Rifleman Roberts embarked with his unit, B Company, 1 NZ Rifle Brigade, from Wellington on 9 October 1915, aboard either the SS Maunganui, Tahiti, Aparima, Navua or Warrimoo, and arrived in Suez, Egypt on 15 November.

Whilst serving in Egypt, Daniel contracted severe enteric fever and was admitted on 2 February 1916, to the 21st General Hospital at Alexandra. He was then transferred to the Royal Victorian Hospital at Grey Towers in England on 14 May 1916, discharged from there on 20 July to Hornchurch, then onto Codford until his discharge from hospital on 11 November 1916. A posting to France followed on 15 November 1916. On 26 November 1917, he received a gunshot wound and admitted to hospital in France followed by transfer to NZ General Hospital Brockenhurst on 11 December. He was again transferred to NZ General Hospital Hornchurch on 15 February 1918, then to Codford on 15 April. Arriving back in France on 24 August 1918, he was promoted to Lance Corporal. Wounded again in the leg on 6 October, he was transferred to hospital in England on 19 October, where he remained until his return to NZ on Draft 204, embarking from Liverpool aboard SS Tahiti, on 3 December 1918. Arriving home at Port Chalmers approximately 11 January 1919, he received his discharge from the army on 9 February 1919. For his service, Daniel was awarded the 1914-1915 Star, British War Medal and Victory Medal.

Daniel remained in the Waimate district, living at Painstown working as a labourer, until his death on 5 October 1971. On the electoral roll from 1963, he was using his birth name of Donald and is buried in the Waimate Lawn Cemetery, Plot 97, Block 15, under the name of Donald Dan Roberts. Mrs S. Shaw of Painstown Road, Waimate is given as his next of kin.

Sources

Timaru Herald, 27 May 1915, p2, 29 October 1917, p11, 23 October 1918, p7, New Zealand Herald, 14 December 1917, p6, Sun 6 January 1919, p7, & Dominion, 6 January 1919 cia Papers Past at http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz; Birth, Death and Marriage Historical Records at https://bdmhistoricalrecords.dia.govt.nz

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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