Sydney Lucas

Infobox Military Person
name= Sydney Lucas
born= birth date|1900|9|21


caption=
nickname=
placeofbirth= Leicester, England
placeofdeath=
allegiance= flagicon|UK United Kingdom
flagicon|Australia Australia
branch= British Army
Australian Army
serviceyears= August 1918 – ?
1940 – 1941
rank= Private
unit= 45th Sherwood Foresters
2/1st Machine Gun Battalion
commands=
battles= World War I
World War II
awards=
relations=
laterwork=

Syd(ney) Maurice Lucas (born September 21, 1900) is, at age 108, one of three remaining British Tommies of the First World War (along with Harry Patch and Netherwood Hughes), although the war ended before he was sent to fight. He was born in Leicester, England, and conscripted into the British Army's Sherwood Foresters while a teenager in August 1918. He is also, along with seamen Claude Choules and Bill Stone, one of the three remaining veterans in the world to have served in both World Wars. Like Choules, he now lives in Australia, in Rosebud, Victoria, the same state as the last Australian veteran John Campbell Ross.

Lucas shipped to Australia in 1928. On June 13, 1940, he volunteered for the 2nd Australian Imperial Force, enlisting at Caulfield, Victoria, with a locality of Coburg, Victoria, both suburbs of Melbourne, and listing Gladys Lucas as next of kin. Lucas was allotted service number VX26480 and posted to the 2/1st Australian Machine Gun Battalion. [ [http://www.ww2roll.gov.au/script/veteran.asp?ServiceID=A&VeteranID=438166 WW2 Nominal Roll] ] He was sent to join his battalion in Palestine, but a bout of appendicitis resulted in him having an operation on his gallbladder on arrival, and so he was not medically fit to join the battalion when it sailed for Greece in early April 1941. Lucas was transferred to prisoner-of-war duties, guarding Italian and German prisoners of war being shipped to Australia on the "RMS Queen Mary". [cite web |url=http://www.theage.com.au/news/National/Veteran-of-two-armies-to-ride-in-Chevy/2005/04/20/1113854258522.html |title=Veteran of two armies to ride in Chevy |publisher=The Age |accessdate=2007-05-30 |last=Shtargot |first=Sasha | date=2005-04-21] He was discharged from the Australian Military Forces on November 7, 1941, with the rank of private. His posting at discharge was Headquarters, Guard Battalion. [http://naa12.naa.gov.au/scripts/ItemDetail.asp?M=0&B=6203239]

ee also

* Surviving veterans of World War I

References