DICK, Archibald Henry
| Service Number: | PM/1160 |
|---|---|
| Enlisted: | Not yet discovered |
| Last Rank: | Not yet discovered |
| Last Unit: | Not yet discovered |
| Born: | Port Lonsdale, Victoria, Australia, 22 November 1899 |
| Home Town: | Brighton, Bayside, Victoria |
| Schooling: | Not yet discovered |
| Occupation: | Steel worker |
| Died: | Illness , Durban, South Africa (Addington Military Hospital), 12 June 1941, aged 41 years |
| Cemetery: |
Durban (Stellawood) Cemetery, South Africa |
| Memorials: | Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour, Brighton War Memorial |
World War 2 Service
| 3 Sep 1939: | Involvement PM/1160 |
|---|
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Add my storyBiography contributed by Anthony Vine
PETTY OFFICER STOKER ARCHIBALD HENRY DICK RAN/RANR 6894/PM 1160
Archibald Dick was born in Point Lonsdale Melbourne in November 1899, the son of Alexander and Elizabeth Dick. He enlisted in the RAN in October 1918 as a Stoker 2nd Class, he was a small man, only 5 feet 4 and a half inches (1.62M) at age 19. He served on the Light Cruisers HMAS Melbourne and HMAS Sydney and the sloop HMAS Geranium before purchasing his discharge in 1921.
On leaving the navy Archibald took employment as a steel worker and living with his mother Elizabeth in Caulfield. In 1928 he married Zoe Jamieson in Melbourne, and the couple lived in Brighton.
From the early 1930s, Archibald had been a member of the RANR, regaining his rank of Stoker in 1931 and being advanced to Leading Stoker in 1934. He was mobilised for service on the 1st of September 1939 and rated as an Acting Petty Officer Stoker the following day.
In November 1939 he joined the Armed Merchant Cruiser HMS Kanimbla. Kanimbla was a twin screw merchant navy motor ship employed on the Australian Coast and although she was initially commissioned as a Royal Navy ship, her crew were almost exclusively Australian. Her Commanding Officer was Frank Getting, a member of the first intake of the Royal Australian Naval College, who would later lose his life on HMAS Canberra at the Battle of Savo Island. In June 1943 she would become HMAS Kanimbla.
In the first half of 1940 Kanimbla operated in far Eastern waters off Hong Kong, Japan and Indochina (Vietnam). Later in the year the ship deployed to Singapore and then to the Indian Ocean undertaking convoy escort duties. Archibald was confirmed in rank as a Petty Officer in September 1940.
In January 1941 the ship was operating off East Africa when Archibald was landed in Durban (Port Natal) on medical grounds, his Service Certificate is indistinct, the reason may have been a “ruptured abscess”. He was a patient at the Addington Military Hospital in Durban from late January until he passed away on the 12th of June 1941. It would have been a lonely last four months of his life, separated from Zoe and their two children in a bleak and austere military hospital.
Petty Officer Stoker Archibald Dick is buried in the Commonwealth War Graves Plot of Durban’s Stellawood Cemetery in Natal South Africa.
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