Adolf Ignatieff Mishkinis

Alias Adolph      Russian spelling Адольф Игнатьевич Мишкинис

Born 15.01.1889     Place Novoaleksandrovsk (now Zarasai), Kovno (Kaunas), Lithuania     Ethnic origin Lithuanian     Religion Roman Catholic

Father -      Mother Mishkinis, Redviga

Residence before arrival at Australia lived in America

Arrived at Australia

            from America      on 09.1915     per Gpoun     disembarked at Melbourne

Residence before enlistment Melbourne

Occupation seaman, engineer

Service

service number 4540   enlisted 8.11.1915 POE Melbourne

unit 5th Battalion, 46th Battalion   rank Private, Lance Corporal

place Western Front, 1916-1917      casualties WIA 1916, 1917

final fate RTA 24.01.1918       discharged 10.09.1918 MU

Naturalisation 1919

Residence after the war Ballarat, Vic

Family wife May Mishkinis (née Curtayne), married ca 1922, separated in the early 1930s; sons Vincent & Francis

Died 19.10.1957, Ballarat

Materials naturalisation (NAA)

digitised service records (NAA)

Investigation Branch file (NAA)

From Russian Anzacs in Australian History:

With ten siblings, Adolph Mishkinis had little choice but to leave his Lithuanian village in search of work: ‘At about 13 years of age he was urged by his parents to leave home and make his way to the coast to seek employment on a ship, which he succeeded in so doing. … Adolph reached America and learned to speak English … Adolph worked with the lumberjacks in Canada for a time, where he serviced and maintained the donkey engines in use there. He joined the American merchant ships and sailed around the world three times and became a third class marine engineer.’ After arriving in Australia, in September 1915, he left his ship and joined the AIF.

    [...] Adolph Mishkinis was wounded at Ypres and after 27 operations on his head still suffered for years from severe headaches.

    [...] When war broke out, Australia started processing flax fibre to manufacture canvas and military webbing. Mishkinis, as his son Vincent remembers, ‘noticed that the flax fibres grown in Ballarat were inferior in quality, being grossly discoloured, a dirty grey. He proceeded to experiment with flax, firstly growing it in our back-yard, then on a friend’s property.’ From Vincent’s description, it is obvious that Adolph was drawing on the centuries-old technology he would have observed in Lithuania as a child. And the results were impressive: ‘A bundle of fibres held by outstretched hand shimmered in the sun like a young girl’s blonde hair. His sample was entered in the Melbourne Show and won 1st Prize.’ Unfortunately, however, Adolph was annoyed at not receiving his expected financial reward from the government and destroyed ‘his notes on his work with flax in disgust’.

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