Pau Street - named in honour of a French General

Pau Street  in Coburg North was created in 1919 and named after General Paul Pau, leader of a French Mission to Australia in October 1918, just before the Armistice. 

Group portrait of Lieutenant General Sir John Monash KCB, with General Pau and members of the French Mission about to leave for Australia, in the grounds of Corps Headquarters. Back row, left to right: Major Burr; Captain Simonson; unidentified; Brigadier General T. A. Blamey CMG DSO; unidentified; unidentified. Front row: unidentified; unidentified; Gen Monash; Gen Pau; unidentified. Taken July 1918, Picardie, France. Image EO2751. Courtesy Australian War Memorial.

During their visit to Victoria, the French Mission visited the Coburg State School Infant School for the planting of a memorial avenue of honour in memory of 35 old boys of the school who lost their lives during World War One.

You can read about that here.

No one lived in Pau Street for many years. In fact, its first Sands and MacDougall Street Directory entry was not until 1951. Here it is on the 1930 Melbourne Metropolitan Board of Works (MMBW) map - no buildings in the street.

MMBW detail plan 3497, Coburg. Date 1930. Index map 12E. State Library of Victoria online collection.

(Courtesy street-directory.com.au)

Near Pau Street are other streets named after other World War One figures and places, including:

Allenby Street, named after Field Marshall Sir Edmund Allenby.

AWM image H15646. Cairo, WW1. General Sir Edmund Allenby on the steps of the YMCA Anzac Hostel. On Allenby's left George Willliam Thomas Shapley, manager of the hostel.

Elliott Street, named after 'Pompey' Elliott.

AWM image E02855. Picardie, Somme, Amiens Harbonnieres Area, France, 9 August 1918. Brigadier General H. E. 'Pompey' Elliott, General Officer Commanding (GOC), 15th Australian Infantry Brigade, standing at the door of a captured German Divisional Headquarters near Harbonnieres.

French Street, named after Field Marshall John French.

AWM image H12244. France. 19 August 1915. Field Marshal Sir John French who had been appointed on 4 August 1914 as Chief of the British Expeditionary Force to France. (Donor Imperial War Museum Q28858)

Lens Street, named after a town in northern France where Australian troops fought. It's where the Canadians fought the Battle of Hill 70. You can read about that here.

AWM image H09627. Lens, France. c. 1918. The northern area of the town showing severe war damage. (Donor British Official Photograph L1804)

Louvain Street, named after a Belgian town ravaged by the Germans. You can read about it here.

From The Irish Story website. Read more about the sacking of Louvain (Leuven) here.

The destroyed city of Louvain in 1915. Read more about it here.

Mercier Street, named after Cardinal Mercier, a Belgian clergyman and figurehead of civil resistance to the German occupation of Belgium during World War One.

Image from Cardinal Désiré-Joseph Mercier's Wikipedia entry.

Roosevelt Street, named after President Theodore Roosevelt, US President and supporter of the allies during World War One. It was to be called Mannix Street, but Coburg Council rejected this suggestion. Read more about that here. 

Image of President Theodore Roosevelt from Wikipedia.

Sturdee Street, named after Admiral Doveton Sturdee, a WW1 naval commander.

Vice Admiral Sir Doveton Sturdee, Flag Officer Commanding the Fourth Battle Squadron, on the quarterdeck of HMS HERCULES, 1916/17. Wikipedia.

(The basic information on the origins of these street names comes from the 1993 edition of Street Names of Coburg)