Locket

As young men left their homes in Western Australia to fight in World War I, their loved ones held their images close to them. This locket belonged to Barbara Gugeri, whose fiancé Private Waldemar Beck is the handsome young man who looks out from these photographs. He served in the 16th Infantry Battalion of the Australian Imperial Force, and like most West Australian troops, he joined the convoy in Fremantle, Albany in 1914. He died from wounds suffered on the battlefields of France in 1918, at age 29.