William Maxwell (12 April 1882 – 12 October 1917) was an

Australian rules football Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by k ...

er who played with

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

in the

Victorian Football League The Victorian Football League (VFL) is an Australian rules football league in Australia serving as one of the second-tier regional semi-professional competitions which sit underneath the fully professional Australian Football League (AFL). It ...

(VFL).

Family

The son of Charles Frederick Maxwell (1849–1889), and Eliza Jane Maxwell (1852–1925), née Mooney, William Maxwell was born at

Caulfield, Victoria Caulfield is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, south-east of Melbourne's Central Business District, located within the City of Glen Eira local government area. Caulfield recorded a population of 5,748 at the 2021 census. It is bound ...

on 12 April 1882.

Education

He was educated at Scotch College, in St Kilda, formerly known as the ''Hofwyl School'', an entirely different institution from the ''Scotch College'', then in East Melbourne, now in Hawthorn.

Football

Recruited from

Collegians Collegians are an Australian rugby league football team based in Wollongong. The club are a part of Country Rugby League and compete in the Illawarra Rugby League premiership. Originally known as CBC Old Boys, the Club was founded in 1933. The ...

in 1909, he played his first match for Melbourne against Essendon on 10 July 1909. His second, and last match for Melbourne, in which he kicked his only VFL goal, was against Geelong on 21 August 1909.

Military service

Maxwell served as a lieutenant with the 38th Battalion during World War I. He left Australia on 20 June 1916 on the HMAT ''Runic'' (A54). He was wounded in the

Battle of Messines Battle of Messines may refer to: *Battle of Messines (1914) *Battle of Messines (1917) The Battle of Messines (7–14 June 1917) was an attack by the British Second Army (General Sir Herbert Plumer), on the Western Front, near the village of ...

on 7 June 1917, but recovered from his injuries and rejoined his battalion three months later.

Death

Maxwell was killed in action on 12 October 1917 at the

First Battle of Passchendaele The First Battle of Passchendaele took place on 12 October 1917 during the First World War, in the Ypres Salient in Belgium on the Western Front. The attack was part of the Third Battle of Ypres and was fought west of Passchendaele village. T ...

in Belgium. He has no known grave, and is commemorated at the Menin Gate Memorial to the Missing in

Ypres Ypres ( , ; nl, Ieper ; vls, Yper; german: Ypern ) is a Belgian city and municipality in the province of West Flanders. Though the Dutch name is the official one, the city's French name is most commonly used in English. The municipality co ...

, Belgium.Commonwealth War Graves Commission.

Notes

References

*
World War One Embarkation Roll: Second Lieutenant William Maxwell
collection of the ''Australian War Memorial''.
World War One Nominal Roll: Lieutenant William Maxwell
collection of the ''Australian War Memorial''.
World War One Service Record: Lieutenant William Maxwell
''National Archives of Australia''.
Australian Red Cross Society Wounded and Missing Enquiry Bureau files, 1914-18 War: 1DRL/0428: Lieutenant William Maxwell
in the collection of the ''Australian War Museum''.
Australia's Roll of Honor: 317th Casualty List: Severely Wounded: Victoria, ''The Age'', (Tuesday, 3 July 1917), p.6.

359th Casualty List: Killed in Action, ''The Herald'', (Thursday, 29 November 1917), p.9.

Lieutenant William Maxwell
''Commonwealth War Graves Commission''.
Roll of Honour: Lieutenant William Maxwell
''Australian War Memorial''.

External links

* *
Bill Maxwell
at ''Demonwiki''. {{DEFAULTSORT:Maxwell, Bill 1882 births 1917 deaths Australian rules footballers from Melbourne Australian Rules footballers: place kick exponents Melbourne Football Club players Australian military personnel killed in World War I People from Caulfield, Victoria Military personnel from Melbourne Collegians Football Club players