Sapper William Eric Shirres German, South African Engineer Corps, died at Johannesburg on May 1st 1945, through injuries received on service in Italy, at the age of 29.
He was educated at Shebbear College, N. Devon, from 1930 to 1934, and studied at the Camborne School of Mines from 1934 to 1937. Immediately after completing the course he went to Malaya in the service of Gopeng Consolidated, Ltd., but returned to England in the following year. After only five weeks in England he sailed for South Africa on joining the staff of the Griqualand Exploration and Finance Co., Ltd., as assistant manager of their asbestos mines at Kuruman, Cape Province.
In August, 1940, he volunteered as a sapper in the South African Defence Force, subsequently going through the campaigns in Italian Somaliland, Abyssinia, North Africa and Italy. In North Africa he was one of the last to leave Tobruk when it fell in June, 1942, and was posted missing for five days. He was injured on the Italian front in October, 1944, and was operated on in the following January and then taken to Johannesburg, where he died in a military hospital.
He was elected a Student of the Institution in 1937.
Vol. 55, Trans IMM 1945-6, p.568
