Profile

QUAID, William Silvester
(Service number 36486)

William (Bill) Quaid, circa 1917 — (Courtesy of P Mulvey )

Woodbury War Memorial, pictured in 2010 — (South Canterbury Museum 2013/155.37 (#1))

William (Bill) Murphy and his cousin(?) William (Bill) Quaid, circa 1917 — (Courtesy of P Mulvey )

Pleasant Valley Hall memorial & flag, pictured in2021 — The memorial tablets recorded those from the district who served, as well as those who fell. The flag was won, in the First World War, by the district that raised the most money for the war effort. (South Canterbury Museum )

Aliases
First Rank	Rifleman	Last Rank	Private

Birth

Date	05/08/1877	Place of Birth	Geraldine

Enlistment Information

Date		Age
Address at Enlistment	Pleasant Valley, Geraldine
Occupation	Labourer, for Edward Murphy of Geraldine
Previous Military Experience
Marital Status
Next of Kin	Kyran Quaid (father), Pleasant Valley, Geraldine, Canterbury, New Zealand
Religion	Roman Catholic
Medical Information

Military Service

Served with	NZ Armed Forces	Served in	Army
Military District

Embarkation Information

Body on Embarkation	New Zealand Rifle Brigade
Unit, Squadron, or Ship	21 Reinforcements, G Company
Date	19 January 1917
Transport	Waitemata
Embarked From	Wellington, New Zealand	Destination	Plymouth, England

Other Units Served With	2 Battalion, Auckland Regiment 2 Battalion, Canterbury Regiment 3 Compnay, New Zealand Entrenching
Last Unit Served With	2 Battalion, Canterbury Regiment

Military Awards

Campaigns
Service Medals	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		Reason

Hospitals, Wounds, Diseases and Illnesses

28 May 1917 - Admitted to No.3 NZ General Hospital, Codford - mumps; 12 June 1917 - discharged.

Post-war Occupations

Death

Date	5 April 1918	Age
Place of Death	Somme, France
Cause	Killed in action
Notices
Memorial or Cemetery	Serre Road Cemetery No 1, Pas-de-Calais, France
Memorial Reference	II. B. 7.
New Zealand Memorials	On Memorial wall, Timaru; Geraldine War Memorial; Woodbury War Memorial

Biographical Notes

William Quaid was born in Geraldine on 5 August 1877, to Mr and Mrs Kyran Quaid of Pleasant Valley, Canterbury, New Zealand.

Prior to his enlistment in 1916 William weas employed as a labourer for Edward Murphy of Geraldine. His last address was initially living at Pleasant Valley.

William was posted to 21 Reinforcements on 20 September 1916. After arriving in the United Kingdom, he was posted from 5 Reserve Battalion, 3rd Rifle Brigade, to 15 Company, 3 Battalion Auckland Infantry regiment in April 1917 at Sling Camp. At the end of May William spent about two weeks in No.3 NZ General Hospital with mumps.

On 6 July 1917 William was posted overseas – to the front in France and Belgium. There he joined 2 Battalion, Auckland Regiment until being transferred to 2 Battalion, Canterbury Regiment in early August 1917. From 20 November 1917 until 23 February 1918 he was detached to 3 Company, New Zealand Entrenching battalion. About six weeks after returning to his unit, 2 Battalion Canterbury Regiment, Quaid was killed in action on 5 April 1918, in the field in Flanders.

After the war William’s medals, a British War Medal and Victory Medal, was forwarded to his brother, Thomas Quaid, at Westerfield, Ashburton. Quaid had served in New Zealand from 20 September 1916 until 19 January 1917, when he proceeded overseas.

Sources

Auckland War Memorial Museum Cenotaph Database [4 Jan 2014]; Military Record - Archives New Zealand, Wellington Office Item ID R20803525

External Links

Researched and Written by

John Sutherland, SC branch NZSG; Tony Rippin, South Canterbury Museum

Currently Assigned to

Not assigned.

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