Next of Kin plaque : Lance Corporal Arthur Thomas Daft, 19 Battalion AIF

Bronze next of kin plaque, showing on the obverse, Britannia holding a laurel wreath, the British lion, dolphins, a spray of oak leaves and the words 'HE DIED FOR FREEDOM AND HONOUR' around the edge. Beneath the main figures, the British lion defeats the German eagle. The initials 'ECP', for the designer Edward Carter Preston appear above the lion's right forepaw. A raised rectangle above the lion's head bears the name 'ARTHUR THOMAS DAFT'.

Born at Rookwood in Sydney, Arthur Thomas Daft was employed as a timber carter when he enlisted in the AIF on 14 December 1915. After initial training he was assigned as a private, service number 4386, to the 11th Reinforcements to the 19th Battalion. He left Sydney on 9 April 1916 aboard HMAT A71 Nestor, and after further training in England, joined D Company of his battalion in France at the end of September.

Daft was evacuated to hospital in England in mid-November, suffering from severe trench foot. Treatment and convalescence, followed by leave and training as a machine-gunner meant that he did not rejoin 19th Battalion until 14 October 1917. Dash was promoted lance corporal on 25 August 1918. At 5am on 31 August, the battalion's D company, by now depleted to only 44 men, took part in the successful assault on Mont St Quentin. At 3pm, as the men rested in a captured German trench, Daft was about to fire a burst from his machine gun when he was killed outright by a German sniper. He, and seven others, were buried in a disused dugout further down the trench, and a large cross was erected over the grave. Only 18 men remained in D Company after the battle.

Daft's body was exhumed in 1919 and reinterred in the Peronne Communal Cemetery Extension. This commemorative plaque was sent to his mother, Mary Eliza Daft, in June 1923.