1914-15 Star : Private K D Hean, 26 Battalion, AIF

1914-15 Star. Impressed on reverse with recipient's details.

1914-15 Star issued posthumously to 2842 Private Keith Doctor Hean, a farm hand of Sorrell, Tasmania. Hean, who enlisted on 16 August 1915 aged 25. He embarked from Hobart aboard the transport 'Ulysses' as part of the 4th Reinforcements to 26 Battalion, but was transferred to 12 Battalion at Zeitoun, Egypt on 1 March 1916. He landed with his battalion at Marseilles for service on the Western Front on 5 April.

Private Hean was killed in action on 19 June 1916 and appears to have been 12 Battalion's only casualty for the day. The Battalion War Diary records that the battalion was in the line in the Petillon Sector, regarded as a quiet part of the lines some 3 to 4 kilometres south of Fleurbaix, as part of their acclimatisation to the Western Front, and states: 'Weather dull, our artillery carried out a bombardment of the enemy trenches and were in front of our lines otherwise enemy very quiet. 1 casualty.'

Hean's father, Alexander, received a small packet containing his son's effects (an identity disc, a pouch, badge, knife, scissors, a prayer book, a letter, a card and a coin) in late February 1917. Hean is buried in the Rue-Petillon Military cemetery at Fleurbaix.