Can you help find John Henry Alonza Black?

John Henry Alonzo Black, known as Henry, was born on 18 January 1898 at Glanville, Port Adelaide, South Australia, the only son of John (Jack) Black and Mary Louisa Waltke, who had married in 1886, Norwood South Australia. It is believed that Henrys' dad was Greek - Yani (John) Mavros (Black), who arrived in Australia in the month of August and therefore became John August Black, he may have been a ship’s crew or stowaway, according to family story passed down. Henry grew up in a family with seven sisters, with twenty years separating the eldest and youngest:

Port Wakefield was an important railway connection that extended to Kadina, Wallaroo and Moonta by 1891, it supported both the copper boom and the agricultural and fishing industries. Henry’s father may have been a fisherman, as there is a note in Henry’s Roll of Honour Circular stating that he helped his father with fishing.

The children attended the local Public School. The school had frequent mentions of the Black family in races and events and Henry’s parents celebrated their silver wedding anniversary there.

As the only son among eight children, Henry carried both his family’s hopes and their greatest risk when he enlisted.

When war broke out, Henry was still only 17, but he was keen to sign up and he added a year to his age on his enlistment papers. He did have his parent’s approval and on 1 July 1915, he joined the AIF at Keswick, South Australia.

Soon after this, the 32nd Battalion was formed at Mitcham, South Australia. A and B Companies were made up of recruits from South Australia and C and D Companies came from Western Australia. Henry was initially assigned to A Company, but later was moved to B Company. There was much fanfare about this new battalion in South Australia, with gatherings, community support, such as the Cheer-up Society and reviews of the troops by the Premier. The men from WA who had been at the Blackboy Hill Camp near Perth arrived in Adelaide at the end of September and the whole battalion was assembled at the Cheltenham Racecourse Camp.

Training continued until the battalion departed for Egypt on 18 November 1915, with the unit being split between two troop ships HMAT A2 Geelong and HMAT A13 Katuna. Henry was on the Geelong.

As reported in The Adelaide Register:

The 32nd arrived in Suez on 14 December 1915 and moved to El Ferdan just before Christmas. A month later they marched to Ismailia and then to the major camp at Tel-el-Kebir where they stayed for February and most of March. Tel-el-Kebir was about 110 km northeast of Cairo and the 40,000 men in the camp were comprised of Gallipoli veterans and the thousands of reinforcements arriving regularly from Australia. Their next stop was at Duntroon Plateau and then at Ferry Post until the end of May where they trained and guarded the Suez Canal. Their last posting in Egypt was a few weeks at Moascar.

One soldier’s diary complained of being “sick up to the neck of heat and flies”, of the scarcity of water during their long marches through the sand and he described some of the food as “dog biscuits and bully beef”. He did go on to mention good times as well with swims, mail from home, visiting the local sights and the like.

Source AWM C2081789 Diary of Theodor Milton PFLAUM 1915-16, page 29, page 12

During their time in Egypt the 32nd had the honour of being inspected by H.R.H. Prince of Wales.

After spending six months in Egypt, the call to support the British Expeditionary Force on the Western Front came in mid-June. The 32nd left from Alexandria on the ship Transylvania on 17 June 1916, arriving at Marseilles, France on 23 June and they then immediately entrained for a three-day train trip to Steenbecque. Their route took them to a station just out of Paris, within sight of the Eiffel Tower, through Boulogne and Calais, with a view of the English Channel, before disembarking and marching to their camp at Morbecque, about 30 kilometres from Fleurbaix.

Theodor Pflaum (No. 327) and Wesley Choat (No. 68) wrote about the trip:

They were headed to the area of Fleurbaix in northern France which was known as the ‘Nursery Sector’ – a supposedly relatively quiet area where inexperienced Allied troops could learn the harsh realities of Western Front trench warfare against the Germans. But the quiet times did not last long. Training continued with a focus on bayonets and the use of gas masks, assuredly with a greater emphasis, given their position near the front. The 32nd moved to the Front on 14 July and they were into the trenches for the first time on 16 July, only three weeks after arriving in France.

On the 17th they were reconnoitering the trenches and cutting passages through the barbed wire, preparing for an attack, but it was delayed due to the weather. D Company’s Lieutenant Sam Mills’ letters home were optimistic for the coming battle:

The overall plan was to use brigades from the Australian Fifth Division to conduct a diversionary assault on the German trenches at Fromelles. The 32nd Battalion’s position was on the extreme left flank, with only 100 metres of No Man’s Land to get the German trenches. As they advanced, they were to link up with the 31st Battalion on their right. However, their position made the job more difficult, as not only did they have to protect themselves while advancing, but they also had to block off the Germans on their left, to stop them from coming around behind them.

On the morning of the 18th, A Company and C Company went into the trenches to relieve B and D Companies, who rejoined the next day. Private Frederick Stolz described the calm before the storm:

The Zero Hour for advancing from their front-line trenches was to be 5.45 PM, but the Germans knew this attack was coming and were well-prepared. They opened a massive artillery bombardment on the Australians at 5.15 PM, causing chaos and many casualties. The charge over the parapet began at 5.53 PM. A and C Company were in the first and second waves to go, Henry’s B Company and D Company were in the third and fourth. They were successful in the initial assaults and by 6.30 PM were in control of the German’s 1st line system (map Trench B), which was described as “practically a ditch with from 1 to 2 feet of mud and slush at the bottom”.

Source AWM4 23/49/12, 32nd Battalion War Diaries, July 1916, page 11

Unfortunately, with the success of their attack, ‘friendly’ artillery fire caused a large number of casualties because the artillery observers were unable to confirm the position of the Australian gains. They were able to take out a German machine gun in their early advances, but were being “seriously enfiladed” from their left flank.

By 8.30 PM their left flank had come under heavy bombardment with high explosives and shrapnel. Return bombardment support was provided and the 32nd were told that “the trenches were to be held at all costs”.

Source - AWM4 23/49/12, 32nd Battalion War Diaries, July 1916, page 12

Fighting continued through the night. The Australians made a further charge at the main German line beyond Trench B, but they were low on grenades, there was machine gun fire from behind them from the emplacement at Delangre Farm and they were so far advanced that they were getting shelled by both sides. In the early morning of the 20th, the Germans began a counterattack from the Australian’s left flank, bombing and advancing into Trench A (map). Given the Australian advances that had been made earlier, the rear Trench E had been left almost empty, which then enabled the Germans to regain that trench and envelop the men of the 32nd.

At 5.30 AM the Germans attacked from both flanks in force and with bombing parties. Having only a few grenades left, the only resistance they could offer was with rifles:

What was left of the 32nd had finally withdrawn by 7.30 AM on the 20th. The initial roll call count was devastating – 71 killed, 375 wounded and 219 missing, including Henry.

To get some perspective of the battle, when Charles Bean, Australia’s official war historian, attended the battlefield two and half years later, he observed a large quantity of bones, torn uniforms and Australian kit still on the battlefield. The final impact was that 228 soldiers of the 32nd Battalion were killed or died from wounds sustained at the battle and, of this, 166 were unidentified. Lieutenant Sam Mills the battle. In his letters home, he recalls the bravery of the men:

When the guns fell silent at Fromelles, Henry was listed as missing in action. His family at Port Wakefield endured months of uncertainty, clinging to the hope he might still be alive. The Army and the Red Cross conducted extensive searches of their records, witnesses, POWs, etc, but this took time. With nothing coming from the Army, his mother and sister issued an appeal for information in the Adelaide Chronicle in February 1917:

Unfortunately, there are no witness statements or POW records to know what happened to Henry. It wasn’t until 12 August 1917 that a Court of Enquiry held in the field finally declared Henry’s fate as “Killed in Action, 20 July 1916.” The newspapers reported the official confirmation in September 1917:

Years later, the family was still struggling with not knowing exactly what had happened. In September 1919, his sister Ruby came come across a newspaper article with a vague reference to a soldier named Black, so she wrote the Army to see if this could possibly have been her brother.

Ruby’s letter:

The Army politely replied that they had no knowledge of the information she had sent and they regretted that there was no reason to doubt the authenticity of the court of enquiry findings. Although Henry has no known grave, in 1922 his mother, Mary Black, submitted a chosen inscription for his commemoration:

His father received Henry’s British War Medal, the Victory Medal and the 1914-15 Star Medal at the end of 1921, signed with his “X” mark, which may explain all correspondence having been written by Henry’s mother and sisters. The family’s grief endured for decades. In July 1933, 17 years after his death, his mother and sisters placed another In Memoriam notice in The Advertiser:

Today, Henry’s name is inscribed at:

His family remembers him - the only son among eight children and a boy of 18, forever young. His parents Jack and Maria lived on for some decades, Jack died in 1932 aged 86, while Mary died in 1940. A memorial notice reads “BLACK.—On the 3rd of July, at her daughter's residence, Minnes, Mary Louisa. Aged 75 years; widow of late John Black, leaving eight daughters to mourn their sad loss.”

Source - Family Notices (1940, July 4). The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA : 1931 - 1954), p. 5. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article47201677

Henry’s remains were not recovered, he has no known grave. After the battle, the Germans recovered 250 Australian soldiers and placed them in a burial pit at Pheasant Wood. This grave was discovered in 2008 and since then efforts have been underway to identify these soldiers by DNA testing from family members. As of 2025, 180 of the soldiers have been identified, including 41 of the 166 unidentified soldiers from the 32nd Battalion.

We welcome all branches of Henry’s family to come forward to donate DNA to help with his identification. If you know anything of family contacts, particularly those with roots in Port Wakefield and Adelaide, South Australia please contact the Fromelles Association. We hope that one day Henry will be named and honoured with a known grave.

Please visit Fromelles.info to follow the ongoing identification project and Henry’s story.