Private Fred 'Snow' McGorrery was a member of the 2/11 Battalion, Service Number WX304. He was captured in Greece and transported to Stalag 18A at Wolfsberg in Austria. From there he was sent to the Klagenfurt POW camp. His POW number was 656.
From the AWM website: In early April 1941 the 2/11th were deployed to assist in the defence of Greece. The Allied forces, however, were unable to hold back the attacking Germans. The 2/11th withdrew from its initial positions at Kalabaka and remained on the move until it occupied rearguard positions at Brallos Pass a week later. It fought and slowed the Germans there on 24 April and then continued its withdrawal to Megara, where it was evacuated by sea on the night of 25 April. The battalion landed on Crete the next day. It was subsequently deployed with the 2/1st Battalion to defend Retimo airfield, which was held tenaciously for ten days following the landing of German paratroops on 20 May. German successes elsewhere on Crete, however, made surrender inevitable. Many 2/11th soldiers attempted to escape from Crete but only a relatively small number ultimately succeeded; most were taken prisoner.
Fred McGorry was born in North Fremantle, WA on 30 Jan 1918. Nothing further is known however Ancestry shows that a man by the same name died in Queensland in 1960.
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