John Cecil Neil Adcock was one of six children of Southland miner William Stark Adcock and his wife Jane Nesbit Adcock (nee Neill). He was born in Gore on 4 May 1914 but the family moved around the Southland and Otago region frequently, possibly following employment for his father.
John’s mother Jane, died when he was 10-years-old, and his father remarried several years later to Maude Isabella McCulloch.
By 1938 24-year-old John was living in Mangatoki, South Taranaki, working as a farmhand. He married Manaia woman, Mildred Franklin, in February 1940 and the same year enlisted as a private with the 22 Wellington Infantry Battalion as part of the 2nd NZ Expeditionary Force.
On 30 March 1940 John - along with four other Opunake servicemen among the first to depart for Europe - were honoured at a special community gathering and were gifted a wristlet watch each in recognition of their upcoming service. The local newspaper commented that; “From that duty, which they had accepted willingly and freely, and with a readiness which all would admire, it was the common hope that they would return well in mind and in body, and with all the laurels of victory.”
John, who was a Driver with the 5 Field Ambulance, NZ Medical Corps, departed for Europe later that year but by December 1941 he was listed as captured and became a Prisoner of War and spent the following three-and-a-half years in Stalag XVIII-A, in Wolfsberg, Austria and P.G 107, Torviscoa, Udine, Italy. He either escaped towards the end of the war and evaded capture, or was freed when the camps were liberated by American or Russian troops in May 1945.
By July 1945 he had arrived home and settling back into life in Taranaki.
After the war John and Mildred lived on Carrington Rd, New Plymouth and John worked as a watersider. They had six children, Dorothy, Barbara, Shirley, David, Jenny and Joss. John died on 19 May 1999 and is buried in New Plymouth’s Awanui Cemetery.
Documents
Taranaki Daily News, 20 July 1945 Russians are not easy on Germans, Taranaki man
Auckland Museum Online Cenotaph
LinkPlease do not reproduce these images without permission from Puke Ariki.
Contact us for more information or you can order images online here.
