Doing our bit, Mosman 1914-1918 -- Frank Duncan Robertson †

confirmed

Born: 6 June 1893

Died: 4 April 1919

Died in England as a result of suicide. He was given a full military funeral and buried at the Brookwood Military Cemetery, Surrey, England.

The following newspaper account of the coronial inquest is in his dossier.

4.30 A.M. LEAP IN RIVER

“PURPOSELESS SUICIDE”

“It is astonishing how often these motiveless suicides crop up,” said Mr S. Ingleby Oddie, the Westminster coroner inquiring yesterday into the death of Frank Duncan Robertson, 25, an Australian soldier.

Miss Hilda Kent, a travelling lady’s maid, of Parkgate, near Southampton, said she was introduced to Robertson in February 1918, when she was in the W.A.A.C. They were engaged to be married. At the end of last month they were staying with her relatives at Southsea and went to the Isle of Wight. On April 3 she saw him off to London from Bembridge Station. Next day she received a note which he had written in the train and posted at Portsmouth:

My own Darling.-Just a line to let you know I am well. Will write a long letter to-morrow. All my love.-Your loving FRANK

W. Brown, a postman, said that at 4.30 a.m. on April 4 he saw a young woman standing on the pavement on Vauxhall Bridge in front of a heap of khaki clothing. When within ten yards of the woman he heard a splash in the water, but on looking over the parapet could see nothing. The tide was running very swiftly. He asked the woman what had happened, and she replied, “A man has committed suicide.” When asked whether she was with him she made no reply. She was not near the parapet when the splash occurred, and Brown had heard no quarrelling. He was again looking over the parapet when the woman disappeared in the direction of Vauxhall. There was a cap on top of the khaki overcoat and a haversack near it.

Other evidence showed that the body was found floating in the river off Somerset House on Monday. It was clothed, and the man was wearing boots and spurs.

The coroner said that it was clear that the strange woman had nothing to do with Robertson’s death. What was he doing on the bridge at 4.40 a.m. and why did he go there? There was nothing to support a theory of accident, and he was satisfied that the man was not the victim of assault or foul play.

Soldiers who had been fighting went through strenuous times, and their nerves unconsciously suffered. He thought that in that fact lay the explanation of many of these purposeless and motiveless suicides, through the sudden giving way of the nervous system.

He certified that Robertson killed himself while insane."

Source: Undated British newspaper clipping in NAA dossier. [JSB]

***NOTE: NSW Births Deaths & Marriages have his birth registered in 1893. ****COMMEMORATIONS (listed below) are wrong.... Frank Duncan Robertson is named on the Mosman War Memorial. Another soldier - Fergus Diack Robertson, from Mosman is also named on the Mosman War Memorial. **According to information provided for the Roll of Honour by his mother - Frank Duncan Robertson attended school Public School at Junee, NSW & also Grammar School at Wagga Wagga, NSW. The Mosman School reference is probably the other soldier - Fergus Diack Robertson. ***Also - Frank Duncan Robertson is NOT named on the Scots Kirk Presbyterian Church Mosman Roll of Honour pictured - Fergus Diack Robertson is. Frank Duncan Robertson is named on the St. Kirk Presbyterian Church Honour Board, Mosman - see link https://vwma.org.au/explore/memorials/6657

Name recorded