CLIFF, George Bruce
(Service number 7/829)
| First Rank | Trooper | Last Rank |
|---|
Birth
| Date | 14/10/1893 | Place of Birth | Winchester, Canterbury |
|---|
Enlistment Information
| Date | 12 December 1914 | Age | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Address at Enlistment | Winchester | ||
| Occupation | |||
| Previous Military Experience | |||
| Marital Status | Single | ||
| Next of Kin | Mrs Mary Violetta Cliff (mother), Winchester | ||
Military Service
| Served with | NZ Armed Forces | Served in | Army |
|---|
Embarkation Information
| Body on Embarkation | 3rd Reinforcements | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Unit, Squadron, or Ship | Canterbury Mounted Rifles | ||
| Date | 14 February 1915 | ||
| Transport | Maunganui or Tahiti or Aparima | ||
| Embarked From | Wellington | Destination | Suez, Egypt |
| Other Units Served With | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Last Unit Served With | |||
Military Awards
| Campaigns | Balkans (Gallipoli), Western Europe | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Service Medals | |||
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 |
Death
| Date | 25 August 1965 | Age | 71 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Place of Death | Masterton | ||
| Cause | |||
| Memorial or Cemetery | |||
| New Zealand Memorials | |||
Biographical Notes
Great niece D Watson recounted that when George Bruce Cliff was born on 14 October 1893 in Winchester, Canterbury, his father, George, was 63 and his mother, Mary Violetta, was 26.
On 12 December 1914 George joined the Army. He was wounded in right leg on 27 August 1915, while serving in the Dardanelles, and later was wounded again in the shoulder on 15 September 1916 in France. George served in France, Malta and Egypt.
Geirge was finally discharged on 3 February 918 as no longer fit for service due to wounds. He had married Ethel Florence Carthew in December 1917, in Newton Abbot, Devon. George came back from the war to discover that the farm at Winchester had gone (the family story is that a lawyer somehow gained possession of it). This apparently left George bitter, and he moved to Masterton to begin again. Ethel and George went on to have ten children in 18 years.
George died on 25 August 1965 in Masterton, Wellington, at the age of 71, and was buried there.
Sources
Auckland War Memorial Museum Cenotaph Database (October 2014); SCroll web submission from D Watson, 4 September 2017
External Links
Related Documents
No documents available.
Researched and Written by
Carol Bell, SC branch NZSG
Currently Assigned to
Not assigned.
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License unless otherwise stated.