In the First World War, Alfred Leonard Rawlins volunteered to serve overseas with the Australian Imperial Force (AIF). He enlisted on 19 February,1917, and  embarked at Melbourne, Victoria, aboard HMAT Themistocles on 4 August 1917. He was placed in the 3rd Pioneering Battalion as a late replacement. He was then 26 years and eleven months old, a single man, five feet six inches in height, with brown hair and grey eyes. By religion he belonged with the Church of England. He was to serve 101 days, before being returned to Australia as medically unfit, having been invalided to hospital on 11 November 1918, but returned to the No, 1 Australian Hospital in Engalnd with syphillis.

His war service must have been onerous phusical labour.  On 5 May, 1917, he was  with the Miners' Reinforcements, but on 21 May, was re-allocated to the Tunnelling Corps. On 3rd November, 1917, he was listed as a sapper and served at the western front until he was wounded. On 26 May, 1918, he was wounded in action (gassed) and returned to England. 

There is no other information about his life back in Australia. His war record showed no family, and he named as his next of kin, his friend, James Wood of 181 Simpson St, East Melbourne in his war record. He died  in May 1940 at Forbes, New South Wales.His war medals and certificate were sent to Base Records in Canberra.