Group portrait of seven members of the 9th Reinforcements, 32nd Battalion who embarked from ...

Group portrait of seven members of the 9th Reinforcements, 32nd Battalion who embarked from Adelaide on 21 September 1916 aboard HMAT Commonwealth for Plymouth, England. Back row, left to right: 3769 Private (Pte) John Brewster ; 3816 Pte William Martin Hayes and 3814 Pte Algernon Hurst. Front row, left to right: 3806 Pte Lawrence Henry Fitzgerald; 3807 Pte Henry Faust; 3778 Pte Clifton Alfred John Crouch and 3767 Pte Albert Henry Burford. Pte Burford, a labourer from Yacka, South Australia, prior to enlistment, was taken on strength of the 32nd Battalion on the Western Front near Montauban, France, on 21 January 1917. He was wounded in action on 16 February 1917 as the result of a gas shell attack near Albert, France, and died five days later in the 1st South Midland Casualty Clearing Station. Pte Burford is buried in the Dernancourt Communal Cemetery Extension, France. He was aged 33 years. Pte Fitzgerald, a farmer from Moorook, South Australia, was admitted to the Fovant Military Hospital while still on training in England and died of pneumonia on 12 January 1917. He is buried in the Baverstock (Saint Edith) Churchyard, Wiltshire, England. He was aged 28 years. Of the other five members Ptes Brewster and Crouch returned to Australia medically unfit and were discharged in June 1917 and April 1918 respectively. The remaining three members served for the remainder of the war and returned to Australia in 1919.