Pair of brass 'A' Gallipoli service badges : Warrant Officer Class II (CSM) F G Jurd, 5 Pioneer Battalion, AIF Accession Number: REL30226

Description

Pair of brass 'A' Gallipoli service badges authorised for wear by Gallipoli veterans on each colour patch in 1916. Originally embroidered, they took the form of brass letters from 1917. The badges, which appear to have been cut from a shoulder title such as 'RAMC', each have a pair of attachment lugs brazed on at the top and bottom of the letter 'A's broader leg.

Contextual Description

Frederick George Jurd was born in London in 1870, and enlisted in the Royal Marines at the age of 19. He emigrated to Australia some time after 1910. On 15 August 1914, aged 43, Jurd enlisted in the naval contingent of the Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force as an Able Seaman serving with it until January 1915. In May 1915, he enlisted as a private in 2 Infantry Battalion AIF. He joined the Battalion on Gallipoli and served with it until the evacuation. In 1916, he was posted to 5 Pioneer Battalion, and served with it for the remainder of the war, rising to the rank of warrant officer. Jurd was decorated three times in 1918, receiving the Distinguished Conduct Medal, the Military Medal and the Belgian Croix de Guerre. He returned to Australia in February 1919, and was discharged medically unfit due to a gun shot wound to his right leg, suffered at Bellicourt. Frederick Jurd died in Sydney in 1939.