The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of Private Fredrick William Tickle, 1st Battalion AIF, First World War.

The Last Post Ceremony is presented in the Commemorative area of the Australian War Memorial each day. The ceremony commemorates more than 102,000 Australians who have given their lives in war and other operations and whose names are recorded on the Roll of Honour. At each ceremony the story behind one of the names on the Roll of Honour is told. Hosted by Richard Cruise, the story for this day was on Private Fredrick William Tickle, 1st Battalion AIF, First World War.

Private Fredrick William Tickle, 1st Battalion AIF
DOD 22 July 1916

Today we remember and pay tribute to Private Fredrick William Tickle.

Fredrick Tickle was born in Melbourne in 1893, to John and Caroline Tickle. He was their only son and he had four sisters.

Tickle was 22 years old and working as a labourer in Sydney when he enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force in August 1915. He was assigned to the 1st Battalion and set sail for Egypt in early October.

Following a period of training in the desert camps outside of Cairo, Tickle and his battalion were sent to join the fighting on the Western Front in late March 1916.

The battalion’s first major action was at Pozieres in July 1916. The small village in the Somme valley was the scene of bitter and costly fighting for the 1st, 2nd and 4th Australian Divisions. Over six weeks there were 23,000 Australians casualties: killed, wounded or missing. Charles Bean, Australia’s official war correspondent, wrote in that the area was “more densely sown with Australian sacrifice than any other place on earth”.

Tickle was part of the attack to capture the village of Pozieres. The attack was successful, but came at a significant cost: in the first 36 hours of shelling and skirmish, the 1st Battalion alone recorded more than 70 soldiers killed, about 200 men wounded and several dozen missing. Private Tickle was among the missing.

It is not clear what happened to Tickle, nor the exact date of his death. An official reply to a letter from his mother, seeking information about her son’s death, states that Tickle was “killed in action (somewhere in France) between the 22nd and 25th July, 1916, and no further details are available.” There is also a note on his service record that states he was buried in the vicinity of Pozieres.

In the years after his death, moving tributes from his parents and four sisters were placed in the The Sydney Morning Herald. The notice from his parents on the first anniversary of his death read:
No one you loved, dear Fred,
Was by your side to hear your last faint sigh,
Or whisper just one loving word
Before you closed your eyes.
Sleep on, my dear son, in a far off land,
In a grave we shall never see;
But as long as life and memory last
We will always think of thee.

Private Tickle was 24 years old. His name appears on the Australian National Memorial at Villers-Bretonneux, and is listed on the Roll of Honour on my right, among more than 60,000 Australians who died while serving in the First World War.

This is but one of the many stories of service and sacrifice told here at the Australian War Memorial. We now remember Private Fredrick Tickle, who gave his life for us, for our freedoms, and in the hope of a better world.

Emma Campbell
Researcher, Military History Section