Contributed by Ron Inglis, October 2021:
Private Henry James Jackson, a ‘native of Auburn’, was the first Auburn Memorial man to die on the Western Front. A labourer, Jackson had enlisted at Liverpool, NSW, in the record surge in enlistment in Australia in July/August 1915. When Jackson enlisted on 2 August 1915, he declared his age as ’22 yrs 2 mths’.
Jackson embarked on the Argyllshire on 30 September 1915. There is no record of him serving on Gallipoli and he was likely too late for the Dardanelles campaign. In his service file it is recorded that, in Egypt in November 1915, Jackson was ‘confined to barracks’ for three days for ‘absent afternoon parade and tattoo’. The following month he was again ‘confined to barracks’ for three days for ‘leaving rifle range without permission’. Having reached Egypt by 31 December, he was awarded the 1914-1915 Star.
At the Tel-el-Kebir camp in Egypt, Jackson was allocated to the 19th Battalion in the 2nd Australian Division and he moved off with them to France at the end of March 1916.
Jackson was killed in action on 28 May 1916, less than a year after enlistment. He was buried in the Brewery Orchard Cemetery, located in the far north of France in the village of Bois Grenier. This cemetery contains 344 identified casualties of the First World War (UK 205, Australia 125, New Zealand 13, Germany 1).
Among the 125 Australians are four Auburn Memorial men: Henry James Jackson, Herbert Aiken, Henry Ernest Horton, and Harold Hahn. All members of the 2nd Australian Division, they had taken up positions in the Nursery Sector, an area of the Front in the France/Belgium border region that had seen little action since the beginning of the war. All four Auburn Memorial men died in minor actions and random shellfire before any major attack was launched by Australian forces. Henry James Jackson and Herbert Aiken lie in adjacent graves. For his grave his parents chose the inscription: THE THOUGHTS THAT CAUSE A SILENT TEAR FOR HE THAT IS GONE WAS DEAR
Auburn Memorial men 4455 Carlisle Jackson and 2276 Henry Jackson were not related.
Henry Jackson is honoured on the following memorials in Australia:
- Auburn War Memorial
- Municipality of Auburn 1914-1919 Honour Roll
- Roll of Honour Australian War Memorial Canberra
His decorations:
- British War Medal
- 1914-20 Victory Medal
- 1914-1915 Star
