- Entry type: Person
- Entry ID: AWE6428
Perry, Florence
- Birth name Eckersley, Florence
Married name Rigby, Florence
Married name Holland, Florence
- Born 25 April, 1886, Manchester England
- Occupation Mother, War widow
Summary
Florence Eckersley, born on 25 April 1886 in Manchester, England, married Manchester-born Joseph Perry (birth name Rigby) in 1907 and had two children. The family arrived in Australia before World War I and Joseph Perry was employed as a groom at Duntroon Military College, Canberra. Immediately war was declared, he was recalled to England, embarking on 17 October 1914 to join his battalion in Manchester. Florence and her two children were left behind living in Sydney where, two years later, she heard that her husband had drowned on 18 November 1916 while on active service. She was left a widow with two children then aged four and three. She remarried in Sydney in 1919.
Read a longer essay on Florence Perry in the online exhibition War Widows of the ACT: A Forgotten Legacy of World War I.