Clarence Smith Jeffries, VC (26 October 1894 – 12 October 1917) was an Australian mining surveyor, soldier and a recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest decoration for gallantry "in the face of the enemy" that can be awarded to members of the British and Commonwealth armed forces. He was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross following his actions in the First Battle of Passchendaele during the First World War, in which he led several parties of men in an attack that led to the capture of six machine guns and sixty-five prisoners, before being killed himself by machine gun fire.
Born in a suburb of Newcastle, New South Wales, Jeffries was employed as a surveyor at a mining company where his father served as general manager. Joining a militia battalion in 1912, he was commissioned as a second lieutenant upon the outbreak of war and tasked with the instruction of volunteers for the newly raised Australian Imperial Force. Transferring into the Australian Imperial Force himself in 1916, Jeffries embarked with the 34th Battalion for service on the Western Front. Wounded at Messines, he was promoted to captain before being killed fourteen days short of his twenty-third birthday.
Early life
Jeffries was born in the Newcastle suburb of Wallsend, New South Wales, on 26 October 1894. He was the only child of Joshua Jeffries, a colliery manager, and his wife Barbara, née Steel. Jeffries attended Dudley Primary School before moving onto Newcastle Collegiate and High schools. Apprenticed as a mining surveyor at the Abermain Collieries on the state's northern coalfields, where his father was general manager, Jeffries was noted as a cricketer and a keen horseman who took a particular interest in breeding thoroughbreds. In July 1912, Jeffries joined the 14th (Hunter River) Infantry Regiment, Citizens Military Force, as a private under the compulsory training scheme. He was promoted to sergeant a year later. Arriving in late June, the battalion spent the next five months training in England, during which time Jeffries was promoted to lieutenant.
alt=Victoria Cross awarded to Captain Clarence Smith Jeffries|thumb|left|150px|Jeffries' Victoria Cross at Christchurch Cathedral, Newcastle
Severely affected by the unknown fate of his son's body, Joshua Jeffries set out for Belgium in 1920 in an attempt to discover his son's "lost grave". He returned to Australia disappointed, only to learn in January 1921 that Clarence's body had been exhumed from a battlefield grave on 14 September 1920, and re-buried in Tyne Cot Cemetery, Plot XL, Row E, Grave 1. The body had been identified by a set of captain's pips, Australian numerals and the penciled initials "C.S.J." found on the ground sheet in which the body was wrapped. Three years later, Joshua Jeffries returned to Belgium once again; this time to pay his last respects to his son. As a debt of gratitude to the late Lieutenant James Bruce, MC, DCM, who as a sergeant had assisted Clarence at Passchendaele before being killed himself on 17 July 1918, Joshua employed Bruce's two eldest sons as trainee mining surveyors at the Abermain Collieries.
Following a campaign by the citizens of Abermain, the Capt. Clarence Smith Jeffries Memorial Park was established in 1947, and upon Barbara Jeffries death in 1964, she bequeathed her son's medals to the Warriors Chapel at Christchurch Cathedral, Newcastle, New South Wales where they are currently on display.
Jeffries is also commemorated by photographic portraits in the Abermain Memorial and Citizens' Club and by a carved chair presented to Abermain Holy Trinity Anglican Church by his uncle and aunt in 1918. The pair are also commemorated by the Capt. Clarence Smith Jeffries (V.C.) and Pte. William Matthew Currey (V.C.) Memorial Wall located in the grounds of Sandgate General Cemetery, Newcastle, which was unveiled in an official ceremony on 16 April 2000. The Clarence Jeffries Housing Estate at Bullecourt Army Barracks in Adamstown is also named in his honour.