| Fred Wimbridge | |
| Fullname: | Fredrick John Wimbridge |
| Birth Date: | 9 March 1893 |
| Birth Place: | Broomehill, Western Australia |
| Death Place: | Perth, Western Australia |
| Height: | 188 cm |
| Weight: | 82 kg |
| Position: | Utility |
| Club1: | Perth |
| Years1: | 1911–16, 1919, 1928–29 |
| Games Goals1: | 105 |
| Club2: | West Perth |
| Years2: | 1920–1924 |
| Games Goals2: | 47 (56) |
| Club3: | South Melbourne |
| Years3: | 1925 |
| Games Goals3: | 8 (12) |
| Statsend: | 1929 |
Fredrick John "Fred" Wimbridge (9 March 1893 – 4 December 1977) was an Australian rules footballer who played in the West Australian Football League (WAFL) and with South Melbourne in the Victorian Football League (VFL).[1]
The son of David Arthur Wimbridge (1860–1926),[2] and Eliza Wimbridge (1863-1934), née Gorman,[3] Fredrick John Wimbridge was born at Broomehill, Western Australia on 9 March 1893.
He married Robina Vera Millikan (1898–1959) on 10 August 1920.
Wimbridge started his career at Perth and was their leading goal-kicker in 1915 when he kicked 36 goals.[4]
He then spent two seasons away from the League on war service but returned to Perth in 1919.
The following year he joined West Perth and topped their goal-kicking in 1921 with 30 goals.[4] Despite playing as a forward that season, he made two appearances for Western Australia at the Perth Carnival as a fullback.[4] He represented Western Australia on one further occasion.[4]
He was already 32 when he made his way to South Melbourne, with whom he would play eight games in the 1925 VFL season.[5] His best performance was a five-goal haul in a win over Footscray at Lake Oval.[5]
After two years playing elsewhere in Victoria, Wimbridge returned to his original club Perth.[4] He participated in the 1928 and 1929 seasons and then retired, having played 105 games for Perth.[4] [6]
He enlisted in the First AIF in October 1916, served overseas, and returned to Australia in June 1919.[7] [8]
Wimbridge was awarded a Bronze Medal by the Royal Humane Society of Australasia in 1925, for conspicuous bravery when he risked his life in assisting the eventual rescue of four women from drowning.[9]
The four women, none of whom could swim, had been swept out to sea by the strong undertow of a rip at a beach in Mandurah, south of Perth, on Sunday, 23 March 1924. Three men were involved in the rescue: Wimbridge, Arthur Donald Lakeman (1896-1924), and Redvers Henry Buller Huxtable (1899-1985).[10] Lakeman drowned in the process of the rescue; one of the four women rescued was his wife, another was his sister.[11] [12] [13]
He died at Perth, Western Australia on 4 December 1977.
