No. 11998 Sgt. Phillip Fitzroy Kirkham

Phillip Fitzroy Kirkham, Roy to the family, was born on 18 January 1891 at 1 Raglan Street, Waterloo, the second son of Robert and Jane Kirkham. He was not quite five when his father died in Johannesburg, South Africa, and thus had few memories of him. He was brought up by his mother with close ties to his mother’s side of the family, the Kellys, living for a time next door to them on Moonbie Street, Summer Hill.

At age fifteen, perhaps influenced and helped by his Uncle William Kirkham, a railway man, Roy entered civil service in the New South Wales Government Railway. He began as a telephone boy on 5 November 1906 at five shillings a week. Three weeks later he was earning ten shillings a week. There followed positions as junior porter and junior clerk at Burwood and then Summer Hill. He continued to work his way up the ladder till he was appointed clerk in the Sydney Booking Office at Central Station, on 18 August 1914, taking care of booking tickets on country trains.

Within a year his life had changed dramatically. On 3 August 1915, at Warwick Farm, New South Wales, at the age of twenty-four years eight months, he enlisted in the Australian Imperial Expeditionary Force for overseas duty during World War 1 and was assigned initially as a private to the 8th Company Infantry, but five days later to the Australian Medical Corp Field Hospital, Liverpool, a western suburb of Sydney. By February 1916 Roy had attained the rank of corporal.

After training lasting nine months at the Field Hospital, Roy was assigned to the 9th Field Ambulance, (NSW) [Third Division] under the command of Lt. Col. F.S. Maguire, which sailed along with the 7th and 9th Field Artillery Brigades, from Woolloomoolloo Bay, Sydney on His Majesty’s Australian Troopship “Argyllshire” on 11 May 1916, bound for England. In all there were 1764 men on board. By 3 June 1916 they had reached Durban, on the east coast of South Africa, where they were given shore leave. The next day all gathered for church parade on the docks of Durban. The following morning the “Argyllshire” left port and was sailing towards Cape Town. Shore leave was granted from 11 am to 4.30 pm upon arrival at Capetown, on the south west coast of South Africa, on 8 June 1916, but the weather was cold and wet. The following day the ship anchored in the Bay for eight days. One other shore leave opportunity was given at the conclusion of a voluntary “route march”. The “Argyllshire” left Cape Town 16 June 1916 joined by three other troop ships, “Benalla”, “Beltana” and “Marathon”, and escorted by the cruiser “Kent”. The last port of call before England was Dakar, Senegal, on the north east coast of Africa, then a French naval station, and terminus of the Western Sarahan Caravan Route. The convoy reached Dakar 29 June 1916. After refueling and adding another escort, the “Swiftsure” the convoy headed directly to England.

After sixty days in transit from Sydney the journey came to an end at Plymouth, the famous port of Devon, England, which had been the place of so many departures for Australia in previous years. From there they went by train to Amesbury, stopping at Exeter for tea and buns provided by the ladies of the city, and at Yeovil Junction for a spell. From Amesbury the troops were moved to Larkhill Camp, in the Salisbury Plains, not far from Stonehenge.

Roy’s service in the 9th Field Ambulance was seen in France and Belgium. He left Southampton for his tour of duty in France 23 November 1916. He was promoted to Temporary Sergeant on 30 January 1917 and was confirmed in the rank on 6 April 1917. The 9th Field Ambulance gave support to the Third Division at the Battle of Messines and the Battle of Passchendaele, also known as the Third Battle of Ypres in 1917. They also gave support during the German Offensive in 1918, particularly the defence of Villers-Bretonneaux in the Somme Valley. At the conclusion of the War Roy left France from Le Havre on 21 April 1919 to go to London. He sailed from England on the 4th of June 1919 as a member of the nursing staff of the hospital ship “Mahia” and disembarked in Sydney on 20th July 1919, having served four years and 35 days in the armed forces, of which three years and 72 days was served abroad. Perhaps because he was a gentle man and hated violence he never liked to talk about the experience much. A letter from one of his officers, Sam Watson, written at the time of Roy’s death, however, spoke of the high regard in which he was held by his unit during the war, and of the lasting friendships he had made among the men. Each Anzac Day eve he would attend the reunion of his unit in a Sydney restaurant, but rarely march the next day.

Two of Roy’s immediate Kirkham family who served in the Great War – his brother Walter Edward and his uncle Ernest – did not return. Both were killed in action.

Roy was discharged from the army at Sydney 4 September 1919 and took up residence at Gordon Crescent, Stanmore. Upon his return to civilian life Roy re-entered the State civil service as a clerk for the New South Wales Government Railways, resuming his old position in the booking office of Central Station, Sydney. His youngest brother, Reg, joined his in the Sydney Booking Office in December 1920. They worked together for three years and developed a fund of stories which they related to one another during family visits. Reg left the railways but Roy stayed on and held his job through the great depression of the 1930’s, grateful to have both a steady position and income.

In the mid 1920’s Roy purchased a newly built home at 54 Rutledge Street, Eastwood, a developing suburb about fifteen miles out of Sydney on the northern rail line to Hornsby. It was a modest two bedroom bungalow with a separate dining room and living room. Across the back of the house was a closed in porch which was later doubled in size and fully enclosed to make a family room. With his purchase of this home his mother, Jane moved in and lived with him until he married in 1935.

Roy’s wife was Mary Anne (Mollie) Henry, youngest daughter and fourth child of William Henry and Melinda Ann Langsford of South Singleton, a nurse at St. Edmund’s Private Hospital, Eastwood, where he had recently undergone surgery for diverticulitis.

Roy and Mollie were married on 5 January 1935, at Wesley Chapel, Sydney, by the Reverend R. J. Thomas, former minister of the Methodist Church, Singleton. Mollie was given away by her father and attended by Matron McKay of St. Edmund’s Private Hospital, Eastwood. Roy’s best man was his brother, Reg. The reception was held at Hilliers, Sydney, and the couple honeymooned in Melbourne.

In 1941, during the Second World War, when it looked to some as if Australia might be vulnerable to Japanese attack, Roy sought and obtained from the New South Wales Government Railways a transfer to the country, to Orange, a town on the Western railway line, about 150 miles from Sydney, where his young family might be safe. Here Roy worked in the ticket office of the town railway station. After two years Roy was transferred to a similar position in Wagga Wagga, on the Murrumbidgee River, a larger town on the south west rail line from Sydney to Melbourne, where the family stayed three years. In early 1946, after the war was over, Roy received a transfer back to Sydney to join the staff of the Challis Office of the NSWGR in Martin Place, opposite the General Post Office, where he was placed in charge of corporate accounts for season tickets. The family returned to their home on Rutledge Street and Roy commuted into the city daily. He remained in this position until he retired, at age 60 after a mild heart attack, having completed forty-five years and one month of service in the Railways.

After a short time Roy decided that retirement was not for him and he obtained a position in the accounting department of Berger Paints at Rhodes, a suburb on the rail line towards Sydney. This was a less demanding position than with the railways, but Roy could use his mathematical skills with figures.

Roy suffered a series of heart attacks in 1965 and died at home on 27 June 1965. The funeral service was held two days later from the family church, Eastwood Methodist Church, with the Reverend Robert Bell, minister of the church, officiating, and over two hundred and fifty relatives and friends attending. Following a brief committal service at the Northern Suburbs Crematorium, Roy’s body was cremated and his ashes placed within the brick columbarium in the rose gardens, section FM45, niche 220.

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