8/3846 Corporal Francis Luke Fry, (7/5/1895-15/9/1916). "another hero gone"

 The weather broke fine on the morning of September 15th. Zero hour was fixed at 6.20 am., and by 6 o'clock all ranks had breakfasted and were fortified by a stout issue of rum. In order as far as possible to conceal from the enemy the hour of attack there was no increase of our artillery fire immediately before the assault was timed to commence. Shortly after 6 o'clock three distinct lines of troops of the 2nd Battalion of Otago, which in conjunction with the 2nd Battalion of Auckland was to open the New Zealand Division's attack, had formed up in front of the new Otago Trench at intervals in depth of about 50 yards, and a fourth line was in Otago Trench itself.

Zero hour, 6.20 a.m., was the common signal for a mighty effort on the part of infantry and artillery. An intense and hurricane-like barrage of field artillery instantaneously broke out along the line; the great howitzers in the rear, hitherto firing but intermittently, now burst forth in extreme violence, and the anxiously awaiting lines of infantrymen stepped forward as in one accord and moved straight to their task. But the advancing waves had not proceeded far before officers and men began to drop from the ranks, for heavy machine gun fire was coming from the left and from the front of High Wood.  -Official History of the Otago Infantry Regiment. 

For the September 15th assault on German positions during the Battle of the Somme the 2nd Battalion of the Otago Regiment fielded 836 men. It lost 460 killed, wounded and missing.  Francis Fry was one of those casualties. He has no known grave.

FOR THE EMPIRE'S CAUSE

DEATHS

FRY — On September 15, 1916, killed while in action in France, Corporal Francis Luke Fry, youngest son of Geo. R. Fry, Pleasant View, Waikouaiti; aged 21 years.

Another hero gone. He went to do or die.  -Otago Witness, 1/11/1916.

Corporal Francis Luke Fry (killed in action on September 15 in France) was the youngest son of Mr George R. Fry, of Dunedin. He was born at Hawksbury, and was educated at Waikouaiti Public School. He joined the railway service, and after spending some time in Dunedin was transferred to Clyde, from where he enlisted, leaving with the Tenth Reinforcements. He was twenty-one years of age.  -Lyttelton Times, 2/11/1916.

Waikouaiti Cemetery.