Studio portrait of half-brothers 611 Private (Pte) Theodore Rooke (left) and 128 Pte Edward James ...

Studio portrait of half-brothers 611 Private (Pte) Theodore Rooke (left) and 128 Pte Edward James Gibson. Prior to their enlistment, Pte Gibson, the elder of the two, was a farmer at Tenterden, WA, and Theodore, a labourer at Fremantle. Pte Gibson enlisted in the 44th Battalion on 12 January 1916; Theodore one day later. They embarked together from Fremantle with the battalion on 6 June 1916 aboard HMAT Suevic (A29) and spent several months training at Larkhill Camp, England, before arriving in France in November of that year. During this time, Pte Gibson was promoted to Lance Corporal, and subsequently Acting Sergeant (A/Sgt) in April 1917. Pte Rooke was reported missing in action on 14 May 1917, following a raiding party at Armentieres on the night of the 13th. According to Rooke's Australian Red Cross Missing and Wounded file, it was reported by a fellow soldier that "In the Armentieres Sector at 11.30pm, we attempted a raid on German Trenches. Some of us reached the parapet and then owing to severe shelling were ordered to retire; Rooke was last seen leaving the German trench". A/Sgt Gibson, by later that year a Sergeant, is also recorded in the same file stating "thank you for the trouble you have taken in the hope of gaining information of my brother". Sgt Gibson was wounded in action on 4 July 1918 and invalided to England, then Australia. He arrived in Perth in February of 1919, but was never released from the Perth Base Hospital and died of his wounds on 15 May 1919. Two other brothers, 3422 Pte Ernest Reubin Gibson and 3423 Pte George Crosby Gibson enlisted together on 16 April 1917 and embarked with the 29th Reinforcements of the 10th Light Horse Regiment on 30 June 1917. Both returned to Australia at the end of the war.