Next of Kin Plaque : Lieutenant E B McKay, 22 Battalion, AIF

Bronze next of kin plaque, showing on the obverse, Britannia holding a laurel wreath, the British lion, dolphins, a spray of oak leaves and the words 'HE DIED FOR FREEDOM AND HONOUR' around the edge. Beneath the main figures, the British lion defeats the German eagle. The initials 'ECP', for the designer Edward Carter Preston appear above the lion's right forepaw. A raised rectangle above the lion's head bears the impressed name 'ERIC BRODIE McKAY'. A checker's mark, '37', is impressed behind the lion's rear right paw and tail.

The original naming, in raised lettering, was incorrectly spelt 'ERIC BROODIE McKAY'. It was ground down and impressed with the correct spelling before being issued to McKay's mother.

Born in Sydney in 1895, Eric Brodie McKay moved with his family to Melbourne in 1911. He was studying medicine at Melbourne University when he enlisted in the AIF on 12 May 1915, with his father's permission. He had already served in the senior cadets and the 63rd Infantry Battalion (East Melbourne Regiment). Five days later McKay sailed for Egypt aboard RMS Mooltan as a private, service number 193, with the special reinforcements for 1st Australian General Hospital. Such was the haste of his departure that his initial medical examination was actually completed aboard ship.

Mackay was commissioned a second lieutenant and posted to 6th Brigade Headquarters the day before he arrived at Gallipoli on 29 August. In November he was evacuated from the peninsula suffering from influenza but returned two weeks later. After the evacuation at Gallipoli in December, the brigade headquarters reached Alexandria on 7 January 1916. McKay was briefly posted to 21st Battalion in March before being transferred to XII Platoon, C Company, 22nd Battalion a few days later, shortly before the battalion sailed for France.

On the night of 29/30 June McKay was one of a large party of men who took part in a night time raid on enemy trenches. 22nd Battalion's first major action on the Western Front was at Pozieres in August, where it suffered 651 casualties. Slightly wounded at Sausage Valley on 5 August, McKay elected to remain in the line. Later in the day he sustained a serious bullet wound to the head. He was conscious and cheerful and able to walk when he was evacuated to 44 (British) Casualty Clearing Station.

Diagnosed with a depressed fracture to the frontal zone and severe injury to the brain, McKay was transferred to No 2 Red Cross Hospital at Rouen on 6 August. He died there at 3.45 am on 10 August. The hospital reported that he was entirely conscious to the end and did not realise he was dying. He left no message for his people. He did not suffer pain 'but was inconvenienced by continual vomiting'.

McKay was buried at the St Sever Cemetery, Rouen. One of his soldiers wrote to the Red Cross that he was 'the best liked officer in the Battalion; his men would do anything for him'.

At the time of his death McKay would not have received the news that his father, George Alexander McKay, the Commonwealth Commissioner for Taxation had died on 14 July. This commemorative plaque was sent to his mother, Addiez, in 1923.