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First Aussie to die in WWI recognised

The name of the soldier who may well be the first Australian killed in World War I has been added to the Australian War Memorial's commemorative roll, nearly 100 years after he was killed in action.

Australian-born Lt William Malcolm Chisholm was serving in a British uniform when he was wounded in the Battle of Le Cateau, on August 26, 1914, just three days after arriving in France, and died the next day, aged 22.

The AWM said yesterday that the first Australian uniformed troops to be killed were members of the Australian and Naval Military Expeditionary Force, and they died at Bita Plaka in German New Guinea on September 11, 1914.

AWM director Brendan Nelson said the memorial had recently been approached about adding Lt Chisholm to the commemorative roll and had collected the supporting evidence needed.

Also added to the roll yesterday was Capt. Charles Antoine De Guerry Dalglish, who was killed on September 8, 1914, in France, while a member of The Black Watch (Royal Highlanders).

Lt Chisholm was born in Sydney in 1892 and commissioned in the NSW Scottish Rifles before his family moved to England.

He was gazetted into the 1st Battalion, East Lancashire Regiment, and embarked for France in August 1914.

Capt. Dalglish was born in Goulburn, NSW, in 1883, and the family moved to Britain in 1888.

Senior historian in the military history section of the AWM, Aaron Pegram, wrote in the memorial's magazine Wartime that it may never be known how many Australians had served in the British army, but a search of Commonwealth war graves records indicated that as many as 1500 had some connection with Australia.