Edward Martin was born in Tunbridge Wells, England, in late 1888. He worked on the railways before migrating to Australia in late 1910 and within a month of arriving had found employment with Western Australian Government Railways in Geraldton, as a porter.
Edward pulled on the red shirt of Geraldton Town for the second season of the Geraldton British Football Association, playing as a forward. A week after the final league game, he enlisted in the 11th Battalion as a Private; his WA Government Railways service record reads “Absent from duty without leave”.
Soon after landing at Gallipoli on 25 April, 1915, Edward received shrapnel wounds to the left knee and back. Five days later he was admitted 1st Australian General Hospital in Heliopolis, Egypt and by August he had been invalided home to Australia suffering nervous debility. His discharge from the military came through the following month.
Edward returned to working as a porter the WA Government Railways at Midland Junction. In mid-1926 he transferred to Perth where he was cautioned more than half a dozen times over a series of minor indiscretions. That was followed by a ongoing lengthy periods of leave due to sickness, including 9 months without pay from April 1927.
The following year Edward married Eleanor White, who was 13 years his junior, in Perth. In 1934 the couple welcomed the arrival of their only child, Margaret Martin. Unfortunately, Edward continued to be plagued by poor health and at the age of 52 his ailments forced him into retirement from the railways.
Edward Martin passed away on 2 January, 1956, in North Perth.