The Australian Boer War Memorial
Anzac Parade Canberra

 
 
Sergeant William Johnson

Ancestor Details

Name of Ancestor: William Percy Johnson

Ancestor's date of birth: 1854

Ancestor's date of death: Detail not provided

Cause of Death: Not stated

Service Number: 34194, 4498

Colony or State of enlistment: Not applicable, Place of Enlistment: Cape Town, South Africa

Unit: Brabant's Horse, Kitchener's Horse

Rank attained in Boer War: SGT, Date Effective: Detail not available

Highest Rank attained (if served after war): No evidence of post Boer War Service

Murray Page: Not applicable - did not serve in an Australian unit

Contingent: Not applicable

Ship: Travelled privately to South Africa

Memorial details: Detail not provided

Decorations: Queen's South Africa Medal with Johannesburg, Diamond Hill, Wittebergen and Cape Colony calsps; King's South Africa Medal with SA 1901 and SA 1902 clasps..

Personal Characteristics: Adventurous, perhaps unreliable as he left his wife and seven children at the time. Said to have served with Kitchener in the Sudan.

Reasons to go and fight: Detail not provided

Details of service in war: On 5 November 1899, Major-General Sir Edward Yewd Brabant, KCB, CMG raised the Light Horse regiment known as Brabant's Horse. The top strength of the unit was 600, all ranks, including South African colonials, Australians, British, Canadians. The unit saw much action against Boer commandos. Brabant's Horse was disbanded in Cape Town on 31 December 1901. He also saw service in: Kitcheners Horse 11 months, Rhodesian Police 10 months. Total service two and a half years.

Service and life after the Boer War: Returned to Australia on "Sophocles" February 1902, deserted his wife and children who lived in Sydney, and disappeared. No details of his death are known.

Descendant Details

Name of Descendant: Arthur Johnson, Narrabeen NSW
Relationship to Ancestor: Grandson

Name of Descendant: Patricia Smith, Wollongong NSW
Relationship to Ancestor: Great-granddaughter

 


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RUSI of NSW Boer War Battlefields