First Contingent 1899 · Boer War · Canterbury Infantry · Died of wounds, Belgium 1917
Sergeant Alfred Hedges
Alfred Hedges, a Manawatū farmer's son born at Sandon, sailed on the Waiwera in 1899, rose to lance corporal in South Africa, and came home to a career as a stationer, railway works clerk and registrar at Taihape, then as secretary to the Anglican Diocese of Nelson.
He enlisted in 1916 at 41, a married man, and sailed in June 1917 with the 26th Reinforcements. He was wounded in Belgium and died on 13 December 1917; he is buried at Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery.
His story
Manawatū beginnings
Alfred Ernest Hedges was born on 13 December 1874 at Sandon, Manawatū, the son of George and Sarah Hedges; his mother later lived at Barnard Street, Timaru. He was a Church of England man and by 1899 a farmer, listed in the Manawatu Mounted Rifles contingent.
Source: Online Cenotaph C6725; NZ War Graves Project Cenotaph 6725; Papers Past, New Zealand Herald 16 Oct 1899Sailing on the Waiwera
Private Hedges, number 60, embarked at Wellington on the Waiwera with No. 1 Company of the First Contingent. He was 24 and single. The New Zealand Herald's list of accepted men names Trooper Hedges among the Manawatu Mounted Rifles.
Source: Online Cenotaph C6725; Papers Past, New Zealand Herald 16 Oct 1899South Africa
Hedges was promoted lance corporal on 9 January 1900. In February 1900 he was at Kimberley, detached for duty on fit horses. His service is recorded under the Queen's South Africa Medal clasps Relief of Kimberley, Paardeberg, Driefontein and Transvaal. He left South Africa on the S.S. Orient as a lance corporal.
Source: Online Cenotaph C6725 (citing Stowers, Rough Riders at War, p. 165)Taihape and Nelson
Hedges settled at Taihape, where the Cenotaph records him as a clerk of public works on the Central Railway, a stationery emporium proprietor and registrar of births, deaths and marriages. A stationer, A. E. Hedges, advertised at the A.B.A. Corner, Taihape in 1907-08. He later moved to Nelson as Secretary to the Diocese, succeeding Mr R. I. Kingsley, and was a leading worker in the Nelson National Reserve.
Source: Online Cenotaph C6725; Papers Past, Wanganui Chronicle 24 Aug 1907 (advertisement); Nelson Evening Mail 24 Dec 1917Enlisting at 41
With leave from the Church authorities, Hedges enlisted on 26 July 1916 at Nelson (address Shakespeare Wharf) and went into camp that month with the 26th Reinforcements, Canterbury Infantry Regiment, C Company. He was 5 ft 11½ in tall.
Source: Online Cenotaph C6725; Nelson Evening Mail 24 Dec 1917 'Sergt A. E. Hedges'Embarkation
Hedges embarked at Wellington on 9 June 1917 on the Willochra (HMNZT 85), listed as a sergeant major in C Company, 26th Reinforcements, Canterbury Infantry Regiment, bound for Devonport. He was a married man: his wife Grace was his next of kin, at 118 Dixon Street, Wellington, and the Nelson paper later said she had been living at Tasman.
Source: Online Cenotaph C6725; NZ War Graves Project Cenotaph 6725; Papers Past, Nelson Evening Mail 24 Dec 1917; Marlborough Express 27 Dec 1917Wounded and died in Belgium
Now a sergeant of the Canterbury Infantry, 1st Battalion, Hedges was wounded on the Western Front and died of wounds on 13 December 1917 at No. 2 Canadian Casualty Clearing Station. News reached Nelson by cable on a Monday, a few days after he was reported wounded, and a memorial service followed in January 1918.
Source: NZ War Graves Project Cenotaph 6725; Papers Past, Nelson Evening Mail 24 Dec 1917 and 7 Jan 1918; Marlborough Express 27 Dec 1917Burial and remembrance
He was buried at Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery, Poperinge, Belgium (grave XXVII. DD. 12). He is remembered on the Cenotaph at Anzac Park, Nelson. The Nelson paper recorded that he had served in the Boer War and that his wife was spending Christmas with her father at Taihape.
Source: Online Cenotaph C6725; Nelson Evening Mail 24 Dec 1917
Rank and insignia
The rank he held, and the badge a soldier of that rank wore. These are simplified illustrations.
His medals
“Documented” means a source we name says he received it. “Listed on the Online Cenotaph” means the museum’s record lists the medal but we could not confirm it elsewhere. “Entitled” means his service dates qualified him, but we have not seen a record of the medal itself. The drawings are simplified illustrations.
His ships
Afterwards
Hedges did not come home. He is buried at Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery near Poperinge, Belgium, and is named on the Cenotaph at Anzac Park, Nelson. He left a widow, Grace, and his mother, Sarah, then of Timaru; no children are recorded.
His sign
This is the Service Record sign as we would make it from his record: his rank, name, regiment, number and date of embarkation. The medals on the sign are worked out automatically from the embarkation date, so the medals listed above are the ones to rely on.
Photograph
We haven’t hosted a photograph here
Rather than copy someone else’s image onto our own site, we’d rather send you to see it where it’s properly held: his full record at the Auckland War Memorial Museum’s Online Cenotaph.
Sources
- Alfred Ernest Hedges, Online Cenotaph, Auckland War Memorial Museum.
- NZ War Graves Project, Cenotaph 6725
- Papers Past: The New Zealand Contingent, New Zealand Herald 16 Oct 1899
- Papers Past: Sergt A. E. Hedges, Nelson Evening Mail 24 Dec 1917
- Papers Past: Roll of Honor, Marlborough Express 27 Dec 1917
- Papers Past: Memorial Service, Nelson Evening Mail 7 Jan 1918
- Papers Past: A. E. Hedges stationer advertisement, Wanganui Chronicle 24 Aug 1907
What we could not confirm
Marriage date: the Cenotaph shows 'married 9 June 1917', which is the embarkation date (the field records his status at embarkation). He was described as a married man in December 1917, but when and where he married was not found.
Age at death: Cenotaph and the War Graves Project say 41, but a birth date of 13 December 1874 makes him 43 on the day he died. His enlistment age (41, July 1916) is consistent with the birth date.
Rank: embarkation record says Sergeant Major; the Cenotaph last rank, the war graves record and the Nelson papers say Sergeant. We use Sergeant; he may have reverted on reaching England.
The Cenotaph lists South Canterbury Mounted Rifles and Manawatu Mounted Rifles among his earlier units; dates not given. His mother lived at Timaru.
The Taihape stationer advertisements (1907-08) carry only the initials A. E. Hedges; the link to this man comes from the Cenotaph's Taihape stationery emporium entry. His dates in Taihape and the move to Nelson are not established.
The date and place of his wounding, and which unit action, were not found (probably the Ypres sector, Dec 1917). Marriage place not found.
Medals are as listed on the Cenotaph; Papers Past did not confirm issue. Archives NZ file R20520713 not viewed.
South Canterbury Roll of Honour (museum.timaru.govt.nz) and Lives of the First World War pages were blocked to automated access.