V is for Cyril Hughes remembered at Villers-Bretonneux
Anzac day and April 2025 A to Z challenge
Today, 25 Apr 2025, Australia and New Zealand celebrate Anzac day. On this day every year we are encouraged to call to remembrance Australians and New Zealanders who served in their countries’ military forces. One Anzac soldier, of many hundreds of thousands, was Cyril Hughes (1875-1916), my first cousin four times removed, who was killed in the Great War on 18 August 1916.
Cyril, the youngest of the six children of Henry Hughes and Mary Hewitt, was born on 10 February 1875 in Beechworth, Victoria. His birth was announced in the local newspaper three days later:
Ovens and Murray Advertiser (Beechworth, Vic.), Saturday 13 February 1875, page 4
BIRTH.
HUGHES. — At Beechworth on the 10th February, the wife of Mr H. Hughes, of a son.I have found no official registration of his birth. The omission may have to do with the circumstances of his father, Henry, in prison for three years from later that year. An accountant with the Bank of New South Wales, Henry had been prosecuted in April 1875 for breach of trust.
While Henry was in prison the Hughes family moved to Springhurst, a small town 25 miles to the north-west, and Cyril was educated at home.
In 1895 Cyril purchased a firewood saw-milling business in partnership with his brother Harry Wynn Hughes.
Cyril Hughes enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force on 17 July 1915 in Melbourne, and was given the service number 4347. At the time of his enlistment he stated that he was 40 years old, a railway employee (labourer). He was 5 feet 11 ¼ inches tall.
Private Cyril Hughes was assigned to the 7th battalion. After a few weeks training at signal school, on 29 December he sailed from Melbourne on HMAT Demosthenes with the 13th Reinforcements.
In March 1916, the 7th Battalion sailed from Egypt for France and the Western Front and entered the front line trenches for the first time on 3 May. For a couple of weeks Cyril was at the Commonwealth base camp at Étaples, then, on 17 June, he rejoined the 7th Battalion.
The battalion’s first major action in France was at Pozières in the Somme valley where it fought from 23 to 27 July and 15 to 21 August.
n the Pozières battles the Australian Imperial Force lost as many men over a few weeks as it had over eight months in Gallipoli. In less than 7 weeks fighting at Pozières and Mouquet Farm, three AIF divisions suffered 23,000 casualties. Six thousand eight hundred men were killed or died of wounds.
On 18 August 1916 Cyril Hughes was reported missing. On 16 June 1917, nearly a year later, a court of enquiry found that he had been killed in action. No body was found.
This photograph was attached to his Australian Red Cross Wounded and Missing Enquiry Bureau file.
Portrait of 4347 Private (Pte) Cyril Hughes, 7th Battalion. A labourer of Beechworth, Victoria, he enlisted on 17 July 1915 at Springhurst, Victoria, and sailed from Melbourne with the 13th Reinforcements on HMAT Demosthenes on 29 December 1915. He was killed in action on 18 August 1916, aged 41, near Albert, France and is commemorated on panel 50, Villers Bretonneux, France.Cyril Hughes was initially reported missing in August 1916. On 17 July 1917 he was certified as having been killed in action on 18 August 1916.
Lance Corporal A. T. Tomkin 3955 was an informant on 17 May 1917 at Boulogne and stated "I knew him. I have seen his name down in the Battalion as killed. This happened at Pozieres, but I have no details to give you." Private Cyril Hughes, 13th Reinforcements, 7th Battalion, C Company, 2nd Infantry Brigade, 1st Australian Division. Age 41, height about 5-10 or -11. Clean shaven, very grey hair, dark grey eyes. Was a qualified signaller attached to his battalion. Last letter written August 2nd. Reported "missing" as from August 18th. Said report received from Defence Department September 23rd. Home address Rotheley, 22 Marouthra Road, Toorak. Address when enlisted 37 Fairbairn Road, Toorak. W Phillips, Armadale, Melbourne.Once he was certified as killed in action, his effects were returned to his mother.
Cyril Hughes is named on the Villers-Brettoneux Memorial in France with a death date of 18 August 1916.
After the war Roll of Honour circulars were sent to next of kin of men who had been killed. Information about the men who had lost their lives was being sought and compiled. Cyril’s sister Mabel completed the forms, stating that Cyril had been educated at home and had had various occupations before his enlistment.
The modest local Springhurst war memorial does not list soldiers who served. It has the inscription:
This memorial is dedicated to all men and women of the Springhurst District who served in the defence of their country in all wars in which Australians served.
“Lest We Forget”
Erected in 1994 by Springhurst Progress Assoc.
(Plaque donated by 34th District Board RSL)
Cyril Hughes’s name is located at panel 50 in the Commemorative Area at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra (as indicated by the poppy on the plan).
Today, Anzac Day, solemn gatherings will be held at dawn to remember the war dead, flags will be flown at half-mast until noon, and in the morning marches and speeches will mark the occasion. We will all have had, as they say ‘a day off’, a national one-day holiday to remember Cyril Hughes and his comrades.
Related posts
Henry Hughes (1838–1907) and a breach of trust: Cyril’s father
World War 1: index page of posts I have written about those who served in World War 1
V is for Villers-Bretonneux: William Stanley Plowright (1893-1917) was my husband Greg’s first cousin twice removed. He was killed in action at Lagnicourt on 27 March 1917 and is listed on the memorial at Villers-Bretonneux
Wikitree: Cyril Hughes (1875-1916)
This post first published at https://anneyoungau.wordpress.com/2025/04/25/v-is-for-cyril-hughes-remembered-at-villers-bretonneux/
These posts on ANZAC day always make me feel very sad. I had a family member also who was killed at Pozieres