Contributed by Ron Inglis, October 2021:
Seaman Thomas Baker 25 was one of the first Auburn Memorial men to enlist, signing up on 31 August 1914. Private Baker embarked on the Afric in October 1914. The Afric joined the first convoy assembling in Albany, Western Australia. The convoy set sail in November 1914 arriving in Egypt a month later. Thus Baker was in the Mena Camp, in the shadow of the pyramids, for some four months prior to the landing at Anzac Cove.
AIF authorities did not record when Baker arrived on the Gallipoli Peninsular nor did battalion staff have precise details of deaths in those early, chaotic days of the Dardanelles campaign. A Court of Inquiry held in Egypt in 1916 declared that Baker had been killed in action on 2 May 1915 and it was presumed that he had been buried somewhere in N°2 Outpost Cemetery.
However also on Baker’s file is the following Red Cross report of February 1916: Informant states that on April 25 at Anzac Bay on a ridge overlooking Shrapnel Gully, he saw Baker shot dead. He was shot through the head … None of the men shot there were buried.
Thomas Baker is honoured on the following memorials in Australia:
- Auburn War Memorial
- Municipality of Auburn 1914-1919 Honour Roll
- Roll of Honour Australian War Memorial Canberra
His decorations:
- British War Medal
- 1914-20 Victory Medal
- 1914-1915 Star
