Lance Corporal Hedley Davidson

Lance Corporal Hedley Davidson, 45th Battalion, Australian Infantry. He was killed in action in Belgium, aged 27, on the 20th October 1917 during the Third Battle of Ypres. He had been born in Southdean and was the son of John and Catherine Davidson of Temple Hall, Bonchester Bridge, Roxburghshire. He had been working as a shepherd when in 1912 he and his brother Ralph emigrated to Australia. He enlisted at Tooraweenah, New South Wales in January 1916 and arrived in France in August 1916. He was wounded in June 1917 and re-joined his Battalion in September when he was promoted Lance Corporal. ( His brother Ralph won the Military Medal in July 1918 and survived the War ). He is commemorated on the Menin Gate Memorial, Ypres, Flanders, Belgium. The photos show the atrocious state of the Flanders battlefield where the incessant shelling had destroyed the fragile drainage systems.