The young digger had written home just weeks before to say he was well, had passed his shooting and was ready for the front. He arrived in Marseilles from Egypt on March 25, and soon marched off towards the Western Front. He did not live to see his 21st birthday.

His parents changed the name of one of the blocks of the property: Silver Hills became Bailleul, after the cemetery that hosts his headstone, Bailleul Communal Cemetery Extension (Nord), Lille, Nord Pas de Calais, France.

His parents had other children, including Patrick Michael who also went to the Great War. Unlike his brother, Patrick came home and married. Ten years after his brother died, Patrick had a son, whom he named Clement John. Clem McGrath still lives in Yass with his wife Bev. One of their daughters, Debra, was born on the anniversary of her great-uncle’s death.

One hundred years after Private McGrath died of gunshot wounds to the head, the McGrath family still commemorates the date. Last year they laid a wreath in Bowning when the Kangaroo March Centenary Re-enactment went through. This year, to mark the centenary of his death, they laid a wreath at the Cenotaph on April 15, and fingered again the treasured bag of his mementos.

There’s his diary, a small pocket book that tells of marching through Paris with the 18th battalion. There’s his crucifix, his ring and his service medals. There are war service records that speak of his time with the mumps and of his two-days in a military hospital after being shot. 

Just a few tokens of a short life, but the love and care with which those mementos are kept attest to the fact that the sacrifice of Clement Joseph McGrath has not been forgotten.

Lest we forget.