Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

"Eric Kingsley Abraham, born 20 April 1898 at Hemmant, was the 7th child of Jabez and Elizabeth Abraham. His parents arrived in Queensland from England in 1886. Jabez was a schoolteacher and was a member of the Teachers Reserved Army Corp. When he died in 1908 he was the headmaster at Hemmant State School. It was Eric’s spirit of adventure that motivated him to join the Dungaree recruitment march when it passed through Boonah in 1915. He was 18 and 7 months and over 6 feet in height when he enlisted in Ipswich on 26/11/1915. At this time Eric was working as a postal assistant. By the time he had finished his training the Gallipoli campaign had ended and he was sent to the Western Front. His was a private in the 5th Division Signals Company, 5th Australian Division, and 1st A.I.F. He was one of five brothers who enlisted in the course of the war. Sadly, brothers Jabez Jnr and Cyril died of wounds and were buried in France. Eric saw service in the Somme, Polygon Wood, Passchendaele, Villers Brettoneaux and Peronne. He was hospitalised for some months in 1917 in England with bronchitis and pleurisy and he was later gassed. He returned to Australia on the Orita, departing from England on 23 June 1919 arriving in Sydney on 9 August 1919. He was discharged in Brisbane on 2 October 1919. Eric was awarded the 1914/15 Star, the British War Medal, the Victory Medal. In 1998 he return to France for the commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the Armistice, on this occasion he was awarded The Legion of Honour of France in recognition of his service to liberty and the freedom of the people of Europe.

Eric did not shy away from the fear and anguish that he and his mates experienced and it left him with a deep abhorrence of war that he carried for the rest of his life. Like his fellows he did his duty and did it well. Eric did not consider himself a hero and nor did his friends. They left us a legacy of courage, mateship and loyalty. After the war, Eric was appointed to the New Guinea Public Service in 1923. He worked at the Post Office and in 1929, became a qualified accountant and worked for the Taxation Office, Prices Commission, National Insurance Commission and retired as Executive Officer of the Commonwealth Department of Health in Canberra. As later generations have come to know Eric personally and through the media, he showed he was a true gentleman but a bit of a rogue, much to his delight. He rarely refused invitations to attend public events. Eric was proud to be the last surviving Dungaree Digger and one of the last of the generation of Queenslanders who served during World War I." - READ MORE LINK (www.balmoralcemetery.com)

Eric Abraham was one of four surviving WW1 diggers to travel to France in 1998 for a eries of ceremonies, beginning with the interrment of a 27th Battalion soldier, Russell Bosisto, whoe remians were discovered by a farmer adjacent to the 'Windmill' site at Pozieres.

Other ceremonies included the opening of the Australian Corps Memorial at Le Hamel and the Fromelles Memorial Park.  Eric and his three colleagues, Ted Smout, Howard Pope and Charles Mance were presented with the Frnch Legion of Honour at the Australian National War Memorial to the Missing in France at Villers Bretonneux on the 4th July 1998.

Steve Larkins June 2021 Guard Commander for the Ceremonies (1998) and founder of the Virtual War Memorial Australia (2012).