Eli Ernest Saunders (SN 989) was a 20 Year old farm labourer from Warrenheip at the time of his enlistment on April 4th 1916. He trained in Ballarat as a reinforcement for the 39th Battalion before sailing from Melbourne aboard the Ascanius on May 27th. In November of 1916 he joined the 39th Battalion in France. It seems he avoided illness, injury or trouble until August 30th 1918 when he sustained a relatively minor gunshot wound to his neck when the 39th Battalion was subjected to heavy, overnight shelling near Clery-sur-Somme. His wound was serious enough that he was evacuated to the Southern General Hospital in Oxford, England, from where he saw out the remaining weeks of the war. He returned to Australia on the Orsova and, after clearing quarantine in Portsea, he disembarked at Melbourne on February 27th 1919.

His brother Charles was killed in action in Passchendaele and is also honoured with a tree in the Avenue.