Summary

Alternative Name(s): Turkish Flag

Ottoman Empire flag, crimson with white star and crescent moon. Collected as a war souvenir by Private Thomas Baird (809 A.I.F.), while serving with the 3rd Light Horse Field Ambulance, at Gallipoli, Egypt, Suez and Palestine, 1915-19.

Thomas Baird enlisted as a private with the 14th Battalion A.I.F. at Broadmeadows on 1 October 1914 (service number 809). He was 29 years old at the time, born in Glasgow, Scotland, and was listed as having the occupation of a warehouseman. He had previously served for over two years as a volunteer with the Garrison Artillery No. 6 Company, Royal Australian Garrison Artillery. On 15 October 1914 he was transferred to the 3rd Light Horse Field Ambulance. On 2 February 1915 he embarked with the 3rd Light Horse Brigade, 3rd L.H. Field Ambulance at Melbourne on the transport ship HMAT 'Chilka' (A51). On 3 August 1915 he proceeded to the Dardanelles and was seriously wounded on 8 August, and was evacuated on 11 August to the First Australian General Hospital at Heliopolis (Cairo), Egypt, with a shrapnel wound to the right knee. He returned to active service on 29 August 1915. He was promoted to sergeant on 15 December 1916. Further hospital transfers during his service were required for influenza, dysentery, pyrexia (fever), enteritis (inflammation of the small intestine) and synovitus (inflammation of joints). He departed Cairo on the Hospital Transport Ship 'Ceramic' on 9 February 1919, and was discharged on reaching Melbourne on 23 March 1919.

Physical Description

Crimson red flag with white crescent moon and star.

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