Stanley Christopher Wallis "Wallie" Hicks (SN 871) from Kent Street in Sebastopol was educated at the Redan State School before enlisting on July 19th 1915. He was a 19 year old carpenter. He served with the 70th Infantry and trained at Flemington before being allotted to the 31st Battalion. He sailed from Melbourne on the Wandilla on November 9th and disembarked at Suez on December 7th. After further training in Egypt he moved to France in June 1916. On July 1st he was hospitalised with a dislocated knee, the cause of which is not noted in his service record. On July 20th 1916 he was wounded in action at Fromelles, sustaining a gunshot wound to his chest. Evacuated to hospital in England, he did not return to France until April 1917. On September 26th 1917, shortly after being promoted to Lance Corporal and aged just 21, he was killed in action in Belgium. He has no known grave, although it is recorded that he was buried ‘in the vicinity of Polygon Wood’. He is commemorated on the Menin Gate Memorial at Ieper in Belgium.

Lucas’s Staffs Appreciation of Brave Men, the original Avenue register, records his name as Wallace Hicks