Charles Frederick Ball new biography by Brian Willan – Kew Gardens, Glasnevin, Dublin and Gallipoli WW1

 

A new biography of Charles Frederick Ball, gardener at Kew Gardens and Glasnevin (Dublin Botanic Gardens) has just been published by Brian Willan of Devon, who kindly sent me a copy of this book.

Leicester born C.F. Ball or ‘Fred’ enlisted in The Royal Dublin Fusiliers and was killed at Gallipoli in 1915 during WW1.

Pictured in uniform in Garden Illustrated magazine 1915

Private Charles Frederick Ball, service number 16445, 7th Battalion, Royal Dublin Fusiliers (Pals Battalion), died at Gallipoli on 13/09/1915, aged 36.

C.F. Ball  featured on our Kew in WW1 blog post, amongst  the many names on  staff war memorial at Kew Gardens and remembered in the  plant variety name of  the popular and colourful Escallonia ‘C.F. Ball’.

https://worldwarzoogardener1939.wordpress.com/2013/07/19/such-is-the-price-of-empire-the-lost-gardeners-of-kew-in-the-first-world-war/

Not every gardener named on the Kew Gardens staff war memorial (C.F. Ball’s entry, above) gets a full and well illustrated biography like this, although many of them received a short obituary notice in the Kew Guild Journal.   

https://worldwarzoogardener1939.wordpress.com/2015/09/13/remembering-c-f-ball-of-kew-glasnevin-killed-gallipoli-13-september-1915/

The story of Fred Ball will have to stand in for many less fortunate names of his generation. 

 

This interesting well illustrated book is based on family letters and photographs recently discovered in 2018 and inherited by Brian Willan, who is grandson by marriage of C.F. Ball’s widow Alice.   

It is published by the Liffey Press  www.theliffeypress.com   and should be available (to order)  in all good bookshops. 

https://theliffeypress.com/charles-frederick-ball-from-dublin-s-botanic-gardens-to-the-killing-fields-of-gallipoli-by-brian-willan.html

I will write a fuller review when I have finished reading this fascinating book.

Blog post by Mark Norris, Newquay Zoo – World War Zoo gardens research project occasional blog post 15 July 2022 

VJ Day 75 on 15th August 1945 2020

VJ Day – A day to be thankful and thoughtful 

This is what I wrote on VJ Day 70 in 2015

https://worldwarzoogardener1939.wordpress.com/2015/08/15/remembering-vj-day-2015/

 

Remembering the zoo and botanic garden staff who were FE POWs (Far East Prisoners of War) https://worldwarzoogardener1939.wordpress.com/2015/01/23/remembering-zookeeper-and-gardener-far-east-pows-70-years-on-2015/

More about VJ Day 1945:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/august/15/newsid_3581000/3581971.stm

 

Blog posted by Mark Norris, World War Zoo Gardens Project, Newquay Zoo, VJ Day 75, 15th August 2020.

Flattened by a flying bomb: Overseer Walter Leney at ZSL London Zoo 25 November 1944

We have just passed the 75th anniversary of 25 November 1944, a sad event for the staff of London Zoo.

Walter Leney’s name appears on the ZSL London Zoo staff war memorial, killed at home by a Flying Bomb in WW2 whilst still employed working for London Zoo.

Overseer William Walter Thomas Leney and his wife Kate were both killed by a V1 flying bomb which fell on their house at Regent’s Park, very near the Zoo where Leney had worked his way up from the lowest rank of Keeper in 1901 to Overseer by 1944.

Walter Leney’s staff card (ZSL Archives)

Using information from his staff record card in the ZSL archive, we can see how Leney (b.19.10.1879) started life as a Helper on 12 February 1901, promoted to Junior Keeper by 1917, then Senior Keeper by Jan 15 1917.

By this time many of his keeper colleagues who had enlisted had already been killed.

leney

He entered Army service on September 17 1917 and was demobbed early in June 1918, wounded.

Despite his injuries, Leney had been made a 2nd Class Keeper by 1923, 1st Class Keeper by  1924 and became Acting Overseer by 1927, full Overseer by 1929 in charge of the Small Mammal House. This was the role he held for the next 15 years of his working life to his potential retirement age of 65.

On the back of his record cards (which chart pay rates and war bonusses) are his addresses – like many keepers living close to the zoo, Princess Road, 116 Gloucester Regent’s Park, then from 1928 onwards King Henry’s  Road, Hampstead NW3.

This was the address where the V1 fell; the CWGC records for him and his wife Kate Jane list him as “of 59 King Henry’s Road. Husband of Kate Jane Leney. Died at 59 King Henry’s Road.”

There are CWGC records as Civilian dead for W. W. T. Leney and wife

http://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/3130745/LENEY,%20WALTER%20WILLIAM%20THOMAS

http://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/3130744/LENEY,%20KATE%20JANE

Other Zoos like Maidstone Zoo (now closed) were in ‘Bomb Alley’,  the South of England corridor or route followed by many of the Flying Bombs.  Chessington Zoo was unlucky enough to be both bombed during the 1940 Blitz and also hit by a Flying Bomb V1 in 1944 (Newsreel footage here)

https://worldwarzoogardener1939.wordpress.com/2018/09/07/the-blitz-begins-7-september-1940/

London Zoo’s Walter Leney and his wife Kate Leney, remembered 75 years on.

Blog posted by Mark Norris, World War Zoo Gardens Project, Newquay Zoo, 25  November 2019 

 

 

 

Remembering E.H. Robson, Kew Gardens Coventry Parks Department died 23 October 1944 Italy WW2

 Captain E H Robson’s name on the Kew Gardens staff war memorial WW2 section

E.H. Robson, gardener, died 23 October 1944, Italy.

Born in 1912, Edward Herbert Robson entered Kew Gardens for training in 1935 after working in private estate gardens and became foreman in the Temperate House at Kew  until 1938 when he moved to work in the parks of Coventry.

He had already joined the Royal Berkshire Regiment in October 1940 by the time Coventry was bombed in late 1940 and 1941.

Autumn  1944 was a bad year for the Robson family. His brother Major John Elliott Robson of the same regiment was also killed in Italy on 7th October 1944 and a third brother was injured and taken prisoner at Arnhem.

His Kew Guild Journal 1946 obituary notes him as collecting and sending back plants and seeds throughout his service in Palestine, Egypt and Italy.

CWGC records list him as Captain ROBSON, EDWARD HERBERT
Service Number 203877
Died 23/10/1944, Aged 32
Royal Berkshire Regiment (attd. 5th Battalion. Queen’s Own Royal West Kent Regiment)
Mentioned in Despatches
“Son of Reginald Herbert and Mary Eliott Robson, of Bloomsbury, London. His brother John Eliott Robson also fell.”

Service headstone inscription chosen by family-
DEAR SON OF REGINALD H. AND MARY E.ROBSON

https://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/2379343/robson,-edward-herbert/

His grave is now in Florence War Cemetery in Italy.

https://www.cwgc.org/find-a-cemetery/cemetery/2036800/florence-war-cemetery/

Edward Robson and family, and the lost gardeners of Kew, remembered 75 years on on 23 October 2019.  

Blog posted by Mark Norris, World War Zoo Gardens project, Newquay Zoo, 23 October 2019.

Remembering Georges Henri Larsen Kew Gardens exchange student died 13 September 1944 75 years ago

 

G.H.Larsen 13 September 1944

Born November 25 1914 in France, Georges Henri Larsen came to Kew on exchange from the Luxemburg Gardens, Paris 1935-36.

Georges Larsen died serving with Corps Franc d’Afrique and Free French forces in Normandy,  killed in the fighting at Epinal in 1944. 

Remembered 75 years on at the Kew Gardens Staff War Memorial.

Larsen is one of the many casualties of zoos and botanic gardens that we have been researching since 2009 as part of The World War Zoo Gardens project on how zoos and botanic gardens were affected by wartime challenges.

https://worldwarzoogardener1939.wordpress.com/2013/04/06/the-lost-gardeners-of-kew-in-world-war-two/

Blog posted by Mark Norris, World War Zoo Gardens Project, Newquay Zoo  September 1944 / 2019.

Richard Bartlett WW1 casualty of the famous London Zoo family 23 October 1914

Having no known grave, Richard Bartlett’s name should be up on the walls of this Menin Gate Ypres memorial, home to the last post each evening. Image: CWGC 

Lance Serjeant Richard Bartlett 10029, died in action on 23 October 1914 aged 28, serving with the 1st Battalion, The Loyal North Lancashire Regiment . He has no known grave and is remembered on Addenda Panel 57 of the Ypres  (Menin Gate ) Memorial.

CWGC lists him as the “Son of the late Clarence Bartlett, of Zoological Gardens, Regent’s Park, London“.

The war affected not only the staff of London Zoo who joined up (as we have covered in previous London Zoo WW1 blog posts) but also the sons,  grandsons and wider families of zoo staff.

The Bartlett Society www.zoohistory.co.uk was set up by Clinton Keeling to link people with an interest in zoo history together. It is named after Richard Bartlett’s grandfather, Abraham Dee Bartlett,  the great nineteenth-century superintendent of the Zoological Society of London’s gardens at Regent’s Park – a post which Abraham held from 1859 until his death in 1897 at the age of eighty-four.

70 years later  on from Richard’s death, The Bartlett Society, named in honour of Abraham Dee Bartlett, was founded by the late C. H. Keeling on 27th October 1984. It is devoted to promoting the study of zoo history or ‘yesterday’s methods of keeping wild animals’.

Hopefully the following Bartlett family history is correct – I’m sure the Bartlett Society members will correct me if I’m wrong. 

In between a strange career as a publican, Abraham’s son Clarence also lived at the London Zoo or zoological gardens as its deputy superintendent and briefly superintendent on his father’s death. http://www.lemsfordhistory.co.uk/the-crooked-chimney.hem

http://www.lemsfordhistory.co.uk/Article_Chequers.html

Born in St. Pancras in  1887, his son Richard enlisted in Preston, which is probably why he enlisted in a Lancashire regiment. Richard is listed with his Lancashire Regiment in the 1911 census at the Bhurtpore Military Barracks, Bhurtpore Barracks, South Tedworth, Hants.

As a result of his prewar soldiering, Richard was able to get overseas quickly in the few weeks after war was declared, whilst many others were still enlisting in recruiting offices.

Richard appears to have been by trade a butcher when he enlisted, a slightly different animal-related career than his famous grandfather. His effects and will went to his brother Joseph.

By reading regimental diaries and histories, we get a glimpse of Richard Bartlett’s war and how he died.

http://www.loyalregiment.com/on-this-day-23rd-october-1914/

The 1st Battalion were part of the BEF (2nd Brigade in 1st Division) and landed in France on 13th August 1914. The 1st Battalion of the Loyal North Lancashire Regiment sailed to France on the newly built S.S Agapenor on 12 August 1914.

They embarked at Southampton, but having started to cross over they ran into another ship on the Solent, giving her ‘a nasty bash’. One man was injured. That night they continued their crossing to La Havre.

The Battalion originally comprised regular pre-war soldiers. They were the only LNL battalion at Mons, and subsequently were part of the ‘Great Retreat’. They were present at; Marne, Aisne, Ypres, Langemarck 1914, Gheluvelt, Nonne Bosschen, Givenchy 1914, Aubers, Loos …  The 1st were the only LNL battalion to qualify for the 1914 Star, the majority of recipients also being awarded the clasp ‘5th Aug.-22nd Nov. 1914’ for being under-fire at Mons.

On the excellent Loyal Regiment website, there is a diary of a Private in Richard’s battalion: it mentions the day that Bartlett died during

“Chapter 7: THE FIGHT ON THE BIPSCHOOTE-LANGEMARCK ROAD, OCTOBER 23RD, 1914”

“Thus ended the Langemarck engagement so far as we were concerned. On October 26th, 1914, General Headquarters issued the report, a copy of which appeared in the current account of The Times of November 17th, 1914, as follows:”

THE GALLANT NORTH LANCASHIRES
SPECIAL 2ND BRIGADE ORDER
26TH OCTOBER, 1914

In the action of the 23rd of October, 1914, the 2nd Infantry Brigade
(less the 2nd Royal Sussex Regiment left at Boesinghe) was allotted the task of reinforcing the 1st Infantry Brigade and retaking the trenches along the Bipschoote-Langemarck Road, which had been occupied by the enemy.

In spite of the stubborn resistance offered by the German troops, the object of the engagement was accomplished, but not without many casualties in the Brigade.

By nightfall the trenches previously captured by the Germans had been
reoccupied, about 500 prisoners captured, and fully 1,500 German dead were lying out in front of our trenches.

The Brigadier-General congratulates the 1st Loyal North Lancashire
Regiment, Northampton Regiment, and the 2nd K.R.R.C. (King’s Royal Rifle Corps), but desires specially to commend the fine soldier-like spirit of the 1st Loyal North Lancashire Regiment, which, advancing steadily under heavy shell and rifle fire, and aided by machine-guns, was enabled to form up within a comparatively short distance of the enemy’s trenches.

Fixing bayonets, the battalion then charged, carried the trenches, and occupied them; and to them must be allotted the majority of the prisoners captured.

The Brigadier-General congratulates himself on having in his Brigade a battalion which, after marching the whole of the previous night without food or rest, was able to maintain its splendid record in the past by the determination and self-sacrifice displayed in this action.

The Brigadier-General has received special telegrams of congratulations from both the G.O.C.-in-Chief, 1st Corps, and the G.O.C., 1st Division, and he hopes that in the next engagement in which the Brigade takes part the high reputation which the Brigade already holds may be further added to. Signed B. PAKENHAM, CAPTAIN, Brigade Major 2nd Infantry Brigade.

The area is also covered on  http://www.loyalregiment.com/diary-of-a-second-lieutenant-1st-battalion/

Remembering Richard Bartlett, grandson of Abraham Bartlett, one of those “many casualties in the Brigade” on that day.

Blog posted by Mark Norris, World War Zoo Gardens project, Newquay Zoo, September 2019

 

Remembering Cecil George Last of Kew Gardens died Italy WW2 22 June 1944

C.G. Last, 22 June 1944 MM, Military Medal
Corporal 9900V, Cecil George Last served with the South African Medical Corps, attached First City / Cape Town Highlanders, South African Forces.  Cecil died aged 36 and is buried at Assisi War Cemetery, Italy.

He is remembered on the Kew Gardens staff war memorial WW2 section.

Assisi CWGC War Cemetery, Italy (Image source: CWGC)

 

Assisi War Cemetery  is mostly made up of burials from June to July 1944 from battles with the Germans who were trying to stop the Allied advance north of Rome.

Born October 12, 1910,  he was the son of William G. and Beatrice Last of Letchworth, Hertfordshire.
His Kew Guild obituary notes that he was killed at Chiusi in Italy whilst attempting “under heavy shell fire … to bring to safety one of his native stretcher bearers who was wounded and exposed to heavy fire.”

He was previously noted for gallantry and awarded the Military Medal whilst wounded in the Desert campaign. He served as a medic with the South African Highlanders until after El Alamein.

Cecil was one of several Kew Gardens staff killed in the fighting in Italy in WW2 in 1944. You can read more about the lost gardeners of Kew in WW2:

https://worldwarzoogardener1939.wordpress.com/2013/04/06/the-lost-gardeners-of-kew-in-world-war-two/

Cecil George Last of Kew Gardens, died 22 June 1944 WW2 – remembered 75 years on. 

Blog posted by Mark Norris, World War Zoo gardens project, Newquay Zoo, 22 June 1944 / 2019. 

Remembering J. G. ‘Jack’ Mayne 16th May and the Kew Gardens casualties of 1944

Kew Gardens Staff War memorial WW2 section – Jack Mayne’s panel / entry, along with fellow 1944 casualties Sutch and Thyer. 

Remembering Jack Mayne  (J.G. Mayne) of Kew Gardens killed on active service in Italy on 16 May 1944 

Image Source / Copyright: TWGPP / Steve Rogers 

Jack Mayne is one of 14 Kew trained gardeners and staff remembered on the Kew Gardens staff war memorial WW2 panels.

Kew Gardens Staff war memorial (Kew website)

J.G. Mayne, 16 May 1944
Lieutenant, 48th Highlanders of Canada, Royal Canadian Infantry Corps.
Buried at the Cassino War Cemetery, Rome.

Monte Cassino loom over the Monte Cassino Cemetery where Jack Mayne, Kew Trained Gardener lies buried. Photo: TWGPP / Steve Rogers 

Monte Cassino was finally captured from the Germans two days after Mayne’s death.

Born on January 1st 1914, ‘Jack’ was the son of Robert Furlong Mayne and Kathleen Mayne. He attended Kew from 1938 to 1939 before leaving for an exchange post at the Ontario Agricultural College in Canada.  He married Mary (Mayne) of  Frimley, Surrey in England in 1943 and his only daughter was born after his death.

Jack Mayne’s headstone is located  amongst this  a stone sea of Canadian headstones tells its own story about the hard-won victory at Cassino, 1944. 

Jack Mayne was one of several Kew trained gardeners killed in 1944, most of them like him killed in the Italian Campaign. Others died following D-Day in June 1944.

The dates, regiments  and cemeteries or death places on the Kew Gardens Staff War Memorial in WW2 is a miniature war atlas or history timeline of the events and campaigns of WW2. 

P.E.or R.E. Thyer, 17 June 1944
Lance Corporal 589614V, Royal Natal Carabineers, South African Forces, Bolsena War Cemetery, Italy.

Born July 5 1911, Percy Ernest Thyer he was the son of William H. and Kate Thyer, Glastonbury, Somerset. (Listed on the cwgc.org.uk site as R.E. Thyer and in the Kew Guild Journal as P.E. Thyer). Thyer was at Kew between 1936 and 1937. He transferred to South Africa as an Exchange student at Government House Gardens, Pretoria in 1937 until he enlisted in 1943 after part-time service whilst still employed as a gardener. Thyer died aged 32, in action at Belvedere Farm, Citta d’Pieve, Italy. Many of the burials in this cemetery are related to a tank battle between the 6th South African Battalion and the Hermann Goering Panzer Division in Italy.

C.G. Last, 22 June 1944 MM, Military Medal
Died aged 36, Corporal 9900V, Cecil George Last served with the South African Medical Corps, attached First City / Cape Town Highlanders, South African Forces, buried at Assisi War Cemetery, Italy. This is mostly burials from June – July 1944 from battles with the Germans who were trying to stop the Allied advance north of Rome.

Born October 12, 1910 he was the son of William G and Beatrice Last of Letchworth, Hertfordshire.
His Kew Guild obituary notes that he was killed at Chiusi in Italy whilst attempting “under heavy shell fire … to bring to safety one of his native stretcher bearers who was wounded and exposed to heavy fire.” He was previously noted for gallantry and awarded the Military Medal whilst wounded in the Desert campaign. He served as a medic with the South African Highlanders until after El Alamein.

E.H. Robson, died 23 October 1944, Italy 

Born in 1912, Edward Herbert Robson entered Kew in 1935 after working in private estate gardens and became foreman in the Temperate House until 1938 when he moved to work in the parks of Coventry. He had already joined the Royal Berkshire Regiment in October 1940 by the time Coventry was bombed in late 1940 and 1941. 1944 was a bad year for the Mayne family – his brother Major John Elliott Robson of the same regiment was also killed in Italy on 7th October 1944 and a third brother was injured and taken prisoner at Arnhem. His Kew Guild Journal 1946 obituary notes him as collecting and sending back plants and seeds throughout his service in Palestine, Egypt and Italy. His grave is in Florence War Cemetery in Italy.

D-Day and its aftermath 1944 also affected Kew Gardens staff

J.W. Sutch, 8 August 1944
Royal Armoured Corps, Trooper, 1st Northants Yeomanry. John Wilfred Sutch was born on November 8 1923 and served at Kew as a “Gardens boy” from 1939-1942. He is buried in the Banneville La Campagne war cemetery, Calvados, France. Sutch was a tank driver and died during the battle for the Falaise Gap in the Normandy campaign after D-Day.

G.H.Larsen 13 September 1944
Born November 25 1914 in France, Georges Henri Larsen came to Kew on exchange from the Luxemburg Gardens, Paris 1935-36. Serving with Corps Franc d’Afrique and Free French forces in Normandy, Larsen was killed in the fighting at Epinal.

You can read more about the Kew Gardeners lost in WW2 here 

https://worldwarzoogardener1939.wordpress.com/2013/04/06/the-lost-gardeners-of-kew-in-world-war-two/

Jack Mayne and the Kew Gardeners of WW2 – Remembered 

Blogposted 75 years on 16 May 1944 / 2019 by Mark Norris, World War Zoo Gardens project.

Remembering ANZAC Day 2019

Helles memorial to the missing British and Empire  soldiers of Gallipoli (Image: CWGC) 

Remembering the Australian and New Zealand  zoo staff and gardeners who served in  WW1 and WW2 

https://worldwarzoogardener1939.wordpress.com/2015/04/25/remembering-the-lost-gardeners-of-gallipoli-2015/

As well as Australian and New Zealanders, many Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh staff and those of Kew Gardens serving in WW1 were heavily involved in the Gallipoli campaign in 2015 which is commemorated on ANZAC day.

Driver A.W. Bugg from Melbourne Botanic Gardens is commemorated by a staff memorial tree, a Box Brush planted in the Gardens by his brother.

https://worldwarzoogardener1939.wordpress.com/2015/02/02/buggs-life-and-death-royal-botanic-gardens-melbourne-staff-memorial-tree/

You can find out about ANZAC day here:

https://www.awm.gov.au/commemoration/anzac-day/traditions

Not forgetting the lovely ANZAC biscuit tradition with recipes here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anzac_biscuit

Remembering the Australian and New Zealand zoo staff and gardeners who served in WW1 and WW2

Posted by Mark Norris, World War Zoo Gardens project (Newquay Zoo)   on ANZAC Day 2019 25 April 2019 

 

Remembering Ernest Joseph Hiskins Melbourne Botanic Gardens RAAF died 15 April 1944 WW2

 

RBG Melbourne staff memorial tree plaque (Photo by Graham Saunders via Monuments Australia website)

Remembering Flight Sergeant Ernest John Hiskins of the Royal Australian Air Force who died 75 years ago on 15 April 1944, formerly staff of the Melbourne Botanic Gardens, where he is commemorated on their staff memorial tree. 

His RAAF records list him as a Botanist and we know he worked at the Melbourne Botanic Gardens as he is listed alongside A.W.  Bugg, a WW1 casualty on the tree plaque.

This memorial Lophosternum or Brush Box tree was planted on 10 September 1945

Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne staff memorialLophosternum or Brush Box  tree (Photo by Graham Saunders via Monuments Australia 

His CWGC records list him as Flight Sergeant Ernest Joseph Hiskins, Royal Australian Air Force, 410058, who died on active service against the Japanese on the 15th April 1944.

He is remembered on Panel 9 of the Northern Territory Memorial, alongside his pilot H.S. Ashbolt. He is listed as the son of Ernest Barton Hiskins and Alice Mary Hiskins, of Brunswick, Victoria, Australia.

Hiskins and his crew member RAAF pilot Ashbolt are remembered on the Northern Territory Memorial, Australia (Image CWGC website)

Hiskins and Ashbolt flew Bristol Beaufighters with 31 Sqaudron RAAF / RAF. There is much about  31 Squadron on the Australian War memorial website, including photographs.

It mentions that No. 31 Squadron, based at Coomalie Creek (near Darwin, Australia), flew ground attack sorties against the Japanese in Timor and the Netherlands East Indies, as well as anti-shipping patrols and convoy protection missions.

On 15 April 1944, there is an entry:
“Damaged by Japanese Anti Aircraft Fire which knocked out starboard engine. After flying for 20 minutes on port engine, aircraft lost height and crashed into the Timor Sea.”
The crew Pilot Flight Sergeant H.S.Ashbolt, and Navigator Flight Sergeant E.J. Hiskins were in action as part of formation of 31 Squadron Beaufighters attacking Japanese positions at Soe village in Timor.

According to his ADF Gallery / RAAF file, his Beaufighter developed a starboard engine oil leak from Japanese anti aircraft fire:
“the aircraft was seen to lose speed and height and strike the water 60 nautical miles off the South Coast of Timor. The only wreckage was part of a fin, wing, dinghy and three fuel tanks. There was no sign of the crew.”

The original photograph and now vanished 1996 web page for the Royal Botanic Gardens, Melbourne.

His RAAF air force records list him as a graduate of a Crown Horticulture Scholarship at Burnley Horticulture School (still open today) in 1937-39 and working at Lands Department (State) Treasury Gardens Melbourne.

Sadly Ernest’s brother Wireless Officer K.J. Hiskins was also killed flying in Wellington bombers with 70 Squadron RAF on 26 June 1944. He is buried in Budapest Cemetery.

You can read more about both these two WW1 and WW2 Melbourne Botanic Gardens casualties:

https://worldwarzoogardener1939.wordpress.com/2015/02/02/buggs-life-and-death-royal-botanic-gardens-melbourne-staff-memorial-tree/

Posted on the 75th anniversary of Ernest Hiskins and pilot  H.S. Ashbolt’s deaths – 15 April 1944 / 2019 – Remembered. 

Blog posted by Mark Norris, World War Zoo Gardens project, 15 April 2019

Post script – I will put a link and details onto this online memorial

https://vwma.org.au/explore/people/47094