Cornelius William Rowley (SN 4303) had attended the Mt Pleasant and Eureka Street State Schools and was 18 years old, single, and a labourer when he enlisted in Ballarat on July 7th 1915. He was initially allocated to the 14th Battalion and embarked from Melbourne in late December 1915 on board the Demosthenes. After training in Egypt where he was transferred to the 46th Infantry Battalion, he arrived in France in June 1916. On April 11th 1917 he was killed in action at Bullecourt and, with no known grave, his name is recorded on the Australian Memorial at Villers-Bretonneux, France.

His brother Ernest was killed in action in France in 1918 and is also honoured with a tree in the Avenue.

Lucas’s Staffs Appreciation of Brave Men, the original Avenue register, records his name as William C. Rowley