Profile

HAROLD, Frank Robert
(Service number 6/469)

Aliases	Born Robert Francis HAROLD
First Rank	Private	Last Rank

Birth

Date	25/07/1893	Place of Birth	Timaru

Enlistment Information

Date		Age
Address at Enlistment	Otipua Road, Timaru; from 24 March 1917 2 Takuta Avenue, Bucklands Beach
Occupation	Salesman
Previous Military Experience
Marital Status	Single
Next of Kin	T. R. HAROLD, care of Canterbury Farmers' Co-operative Association (Limited), Beswick Street, Timaru
Religion	Anglican
Medical Information

Military Service

Served with	NZ Armed Forces	Served in	Army
Military District

Embarkation Information

Body on Embarkation	Main Body
Unit, Squadron, or Ship	Canterbury Infantry Battalion
Date	16 October 1914
Transport	Tahiti or Athenic
Embarked From		Destination

Other Units Served With
Last Unit Served With

Military Awards

Campaigns
Service Medals
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		Reason

Hospitals, Wounds, Diseases and Illnesses

Post-war Occupations

Death

Date	31 May 1985	Age	91 years
Place of Death
Cause
Notices
Memorial or Cemetery	Purewa Crematorium, Auckland
Memorial Reference
New Zealand Memorials

Biographical Notes

Frank Robert Harold was the son of William and Sarah (née Steele) Harold, and a brother of Kenneth William Harold who also served in World War I. Frank was educated at Waimataitai School.

Responding to the first call for men, Frank was one of many keen and determined applicants at the Drill Shed on 11 August 1914. He was not one of those rejected, mostly for defects to the teeth and one or two on account of height; he passed the medical exanimation and was sworn in. The successful applicants were liable to be called up at any moment, and it was quite probable that they would leave Timaru in a matter of days for the central camp at Christchurch as part of the 2nd South Canterbury Regiment's quota. A great nephew recounts:

"My great uncle trained in Egypt, fought at Gallipoli and later in France ... Frank had a well developed sense of humour. Before embarking for Gallipoli, there was a celebratory dinner at the mess, from memory of his retelling a shilling a head, each to pay separately. Frank arranged to be second last to leave his table and directed the waiter to collect all moneys from the remaining officer. He heard an eruption on the way out. On the beach at Suvla Bay the British officers had stores of foodstuffs the enlisted men did not, Frank liberated some marmalade, allegedly delicious."

After the war Frank married Mary Patricia Sutherland in 1921 at St Mary's, Timaru. In 1928 the couple had a son, Bruce, who died in infancy.

Sources

Auckland War Memorial Museum Cenotaph Database [21 April 2019]; NZ BDM Indexes (Department of Internal Affairs) [21 April 2019]; School Admission record (South Canterbury Branch NZSG) [21 April 2019]; Purewa Crematorium record; Timaru Herald, 12 August 1914 (Papers Past) [02 December 2013]; SCRoll web submission by B Harold, 23 December 2023

External Links

Researched and Written by

Teresa Scott, 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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