Duncan, Ernest William (5495)
Place of Birth: Broken Hill, NSW
Age: 24 years 5 months
Enlistment Details: Thursday, 22 October 1914 – Melbourne, VIC
Service Number: 5495 view online service record
Address:
115 Clark Street
Port Melbourne, VIC
Next of Kin:
William Field Duncan (father)
115 Clark Street
Port Melbourne, VIC
Embarkation Details:
Date: Tuesday, 2 February 1915
Ship: HMAT Chilka A51
Port: Melbourne, VIC
Unit: Light Horse Brigade Train 3 – 3rd Reinforcements
Fate:
RTA: Thursday, 12 June 1919
Discharged: Wednesday, 20 August 1919
Brother: Archibald Bert Duncan (V80097)
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Robyn Watters
ERNEST WILLIAM DUNCAN
Born 12 May 1890 Broken Hill, New South Wales
Died 5 May 1953 Port Melbourne, Victoria
Buried 7 May 1953
ERNEST WILLIAM DUNCAN
Ernie Duncan was the son of two other occupants of the Coburg Pine Ridge Cemetery, William Field Duncan and his wife Sarah Jane Duncan (CO-COE*C***718 and CO-COE*C***718 Burial). Ernie was the fourth child of nine born to that couple.
Ernie was thirty when he married the widow forty-one year old Lydia Johanna Stratton in 1920. Lydia brought seven children from her first marriage to Arthur Douglas Davis (circa 1879 – 16 January 1915; CO-RC*B***457) and she and Ernie had another three of their own.
The descendants of their second child Lyla Maud Duncan (10 December 1920 – 26 August 2014; FA-NLA*C*G**48 Burial) are in contact with each other today.
Who was Ernie? He was a labourer living in Port Melbourne most of his life and undertook World War 1 Army service.
He was generous enough to marry and take on a significantly older widow with seven children. Instant family life no doubt helped by being brought up in a large family himself.
Ernie appeared well thought of by his siblings. His sister (my grandmother Gertrude Knox Duncan) gave her son the same names. She did however reverse the order of the names to ‘William Ernest’. It is unlikely she would have done this without having a close relationship with Ernie.
Ernie appeared to have been a product of his time. Modest education, aspirations and a working-class upbringing with attendant struggles but apparently enjoying a happy family life. He clearly made other people happy too.