This is one of a series of posts to mark the international Rugby players who died during The Great War. If anyone has further information on the men concerned, I’d be most grateful if it could be added to the thread. Gareth George, Harold Wesley played for Australia Internationals: 8 : 1910 NZ- NZ+ NZ- ; 1912 US+ ; 1913 NZ- NZ+ ; 1914 NZ- NZ- Harold George was born in 1887 Played as a Prop for: Eastern Suburbs, NSW. He first played for Eastern Suburbs in 1907; at the time of his death he held the club record of 95 club matches. He was a club selector when picked to play for NSW v Queensland (NSW won the series: 6-8, 11-3 and 21-8) and v New Zealand in 1910 (8-21). He played 20 times for NSW. An outstanding player in Australia’s first win against New Zealand in 1910 (11-0). He toured America in the 1912 Wallabies, and played in the Test won by Australia 12-8. He played for NSW 20 times. Profession: Clerk Remarks: One of three Eastern Suburbs RFC International players killed in the War, the others being Clarence Wallach and Fred Thompson. War service: 1660, Private, 13th (New South Wales) Infantry Battalion, Australian Imperial Force; he enlisted on 21 January 1915, and departed Sydney with the 3rd Reinforcements on board HMAT A49 Seang Choon on 11 February 1915. He was mortally wounded at Pope’s Post, Gallipoli. Australian International player T J ‘Rusty’ Richards wrote that George: “got the axe for a very brave action. It appears that he was one of five to go at midday and attempt to locate a machine gun and Turkish trenches. The sergeant got a rough time and was finally shot. Harold, after a while, found the corner too hot and taking the sergeant’s body he made it back under heavy fire to the trenches. When he was preparing to get into the trench himself a bullet passed through his body low down.” He died of wounds at sea on 10 May 1915, after evacuation from Gallipoli, and is commemorated on the Lone Pine Memorial, Turkey [Panel 37]. His brother, 2520 Corporal Roy Wesley George, 45th Battalion, was killed in action at Dernacourt, France, on 5 April 1918.
Harold Wesley George served with the 13th battalion in WWI. He was killed by a Turkish sniper at Gallipoli on May 10 1915
In Memory of Private HAROLD WESLEY GEORGE 1660, 13th Bn., Australian Infantry, A.I.F. who died on 10 May 1915 Remembered with honour LONE PINE MEMORIAL The site saw some of the fiercest fighting in the Anzac sector and overlooks the front line of May 1915. After it was captured in the initial landings of April, the plateau was retaken by the Turks in May and held until the beginning of August when the position was stormed by the 1st Australian Brigade. It then remained in Australian hands until the entire Gallipoli campaign was abandoned in December. The Memorial commemorates more than 4900 Australian and New Zealand servicemen who died in the Anzac area - the New Zealanders prior to the August fighting - whose graves are not known. Others named on the memorial died at sea, either in battle or on hospital ships, and were buried in waters off the Peninsula
