Not Forgotten, 2838A Private Albert George BROADBENT, 5 Pioneer Battalion AIF, World War 1

Private Albert Broadbent, the son of Harry and Agnes Broadbent (née Mackereth) was born at Cherry Gardens, South Australia in 1879 and attended Cherry Gardens Public School before the family moved to Western Australia. At the time of his enlistment at Dowerin on 4 March 1916 at the age of 36 he was a single man, a farm labourer, well sinker and miner, living in Dowerin. Albert was allocated to the 6th reinforcements to the 5th Pioneer Battalion which embarked at Fremantle on 30 October 1916 on HMAT A16 Port Melbourne.
In March 1917 Albert and ‘Don’ Company, 5th Pioneer Battalion took over a camp occupied by the 2nd Pioneer Battalion near Bapaume, France. On the night of 9/10 May 1917 the Second Battle of Bullecourt was underway and artillery shells hit the camp. A shell made a direct hit on one of the ‘Don’ Company tents. Twelve members of the Company were killed and another 23 wounded. Among the dead was Albert Broadbent.
Albert was buried in the Vaulx Hill Cemetery, 4 miles north east of Bapaume. His name is on the Dowerin War Memorial and also on the Cherry Gardens War Memorial, on the Cherry Gardens Methodist (now Uniting) Church roll of honour and on a stained glass window in the Cherry Gardens Methodist (Uniting) Church, as well as three other honour rolls in the Dorset Vale district.

He was awarded the 1914/15 Star, the British War Medal and the Victory Medal

After the war Albert’s parents left Dowerin to live in Southern Cross. Albert’s brother, Sapper Harry Franklin Broadbent MM, of 2nd Division Signal Company, returned to Australia on 28 February 1919 and died in an explosives accident at the Golden Horseshoe mine near Kalgoorlie in 1940.