SERVED 8TH NZMR BOER WAR WW1 AUSTRALIAN MEDAL 3365 PETER ROY 41ST BATTALION AIF

Offered is a British War Medal impressed named 3365 PTE. P. ROY. 41-BN.A.I.F. Comes with a copy of Australian service records and Boer War medal roll.

Peter Roy was born in Dunedin, New Zealand on 10/1/1880, a farmhand by trade, he enlisted into the 8^th Contingent New Zealand Mounted Rifles (G Squadron, South Island, service number 5964) on 13/1/1902. The unit sailed from the South Island 8/2/1902 on the S.S. Cornwall. The unit had a bad railway accident on 12/4/1902 at Machavie and suffered 14 killed and an equal number injured. He was hospitalized with bronchial pneumonia on return to NZ, having been taken ill on T.S. Britannia in July 1902.

Whilst the 8^th was only in South Africa for a short period (February – July 1902) it saw heavy service and was well regarded for actions such as: Every night while the sweep was in progress these troops dug one redoubt to hold 20 men every 100 yards of their front of six miles. The redoubts were so solidly constructed that they would have afforded perfect cover from artillery fire, and the intervals between them were closed by wagons linked together with barbed wire. The commander of each group of columns had his own particular system, and it may be interesting to note that General Walter Kitchener's force held the line assigned to it by similar works, constructed to hold seven men each, and placed at intervals of 50 yards apart. The work done by the troops under Colonels Sir Henry Rawlinson, Kekewich, and Rochefort was equally satisfactory, barbed wire and obstacles being freely made use of to close the points at which the enemy would be most likely to breakthrough.

Roy emigrated to Australia at some stage prior to WW1 and was living in Brisbane, Queensland working as a boilermaker when he enlisted into the 8^th reinforcement 41^st Battalion (service number 3365) on 23/4/1917. He left Australia on the 14/6/1917 landing at Liverpool 26/8/17, after a short stay in hospital with mumps followed by a training battalion (including a farrier’s course), he landed in France 16/4/1918 and was taken on strength on the 41^st Battalion 18/4/1918. Just in time to face the German spring offensive.

On 23/8/1918 he was evacuated with influenza to England remaining there until returning to France on 22/11/1918 and rejoining the 41^st on 3/12/1918. Transferred to the 5^th Australian Motor Transport Coy on 25/4/1919 (possibly the 3^rd A.M.T.C. as the records conflict), to England on 10/6/1919 and Australia on 2/9/1919 for discharge in Queensland on 12/10/1919 being medically unfit. Peter Roy died in Qld on 21/12/1961.

Also entitled to the Victory Medal (1914 - 18) and the Queens South Africa Medal (1899 - 1902) with 3 clasps Cape Colony, Transvaal and South Africa 1901.