A WWI Anniversary

Today, 30th April 2018, is the 100th anniversary of the wounding of my paternal grandfather, Samuel Charles Spencer, on the Western Front.

My grandfather was born 8th January, 1896, in Broadford, Victoria (Australia) where he grew up. He did not speak much about his youth. We can imagine him as a boy and young man living a peaceful life in a small country town in Victoria, Australia. The seminal experience for him and all people of his generation was the outbreak of War in 1914.

When Britain declared war on Germany the Labor Australian Prime Minister, Andrew Fisher, pledged that Australia would "stand beside the mother country to help and defend her to the last man and the last shilling." It was natural that grandfather was enthusiastic to enlist. The photograph was taken before he left for Europe.

My grandfather served during the World War I which until 1939 was called the Great War. During 1915, along with many other young men, he attempted to enlist. The physical qualifications standards were very high. He was rejected because his chest expansion was not sufficient. To remedy this he used exercises with dumbbells and was successful in his second application and was inducted on 4th April 1916, when he was 20 Years old. His best friend and neighbour, Dave Newnham, was rejected because he had flat feet.

He initially joined the 12 training battalion at Broadmeadows military camp. He embarked in Sydney on the “Borda” on 5th June 1916 with the 3rd reinforcements of the 46th Battalion. He arrived in France on 16th September 1916 and joined the 46th Battalion in the field on 24 November 1916.

Conditions were horrific on the Western Front and along with many other soldiers he suffered from illness. The main illness was Dysentery. These periods of illness were so serious that he spent time in English military hospitals, in Birmingham, Aldershot and Barton-on-sea. These hospitalisations occurred in the early part of his service from 17th November 1916 to 25th April 1917. After this bout of illness he was granted furlough and returned to duty on 17th May 1917.

The 46th Battalion was rotated in and out of the line during the rest of 1917 and early 1918. Grandfather did not talk much about his war experiences but did mention an experience in March 1918, near Doullons. This was during the last great German offensive of the war. There was often a need to shore up the defences, and grandfather talked about being transported by train and a forced 20 mile route march at night to get to the front. This involved carrying a full pack of equipment. After his return in May 1917 grandfather was with his battalion for almost a year.
Another incident he described occurred when a German shell exploded on the parapet of his trench causing the trench wall to collapse. He was buried alive in the collapse but was saved by his fellow soldiers digging him out with their bayonets.

The following is a quotation from a book detailing the history of the 46th battalion called We Were the 46th. The passage describes the action in which he was wounded.

On the morning of 27th April 1918, news finally came through that the 46th was to take over the line in front of Villers-Brettoneux, and under cover of darkness relieved a unit of the 5th division. The fighting in this area had been particularly savage and after the 46th had made its move into the new positions it was noted … that the ground was still thickly littered with the dead from both sides of the recent battle.

It was also in this area that the 46th employed its version of “Peaceful Penetration”, this practice being of great importance at the moment as the allies only had a small foothold in front of Villers-Brettoneux. In order to gain themselves more ground the men would push their advance posts closer to the German lines during the night; as per usual, the enemy would send down his “Artillery Hate” first thing in the morning, but as the positions kept moving, his shots were mostly ineffective. Patrolling was also undertaken to find out the enemy’s strengths and weaknesses and on one such occasion on April 30, Lieutenants Muriel and Colson of A and D companies respectively, took a platoon each of approximately 25 men to reconnoitre a farm house that the higher powers wanted taken. It was known that the farm itself was not strongly garrisoned, but behind it lay a strong line of enemy trenches. The patrol set out well enough, but after some distance were lit up by a couple of airplane hangers that had been set ablaze earlier in the day. Despite this difficulty they went on towards their objective but were evidently seen in the glow of the fires. A withering barrage of machine gun fire came from the enemy positions and was startling to inflict casualties on the Australians, forcing them to retire to their lines with Lieutenant Murial being severely wounded in the process. Sometimes, “Peaceful Penetration” didn’t work too well, and when that happened the attacking force usually paid dearly.”

Photo from Official History of Australia in the War 1914 – 1918, C.E.W. Bean , Volume V page 508


Caption Reads:
One of the hangers on the Aerodrome east of Villers-Bretonneux

This photograph was taken on 23rd June 1918. In April the hangars were still covered with fabric, until they were burned.

Grandfather was one of the soldiers in the raid of 30th April described above. He said that some of the defending Germans were hidden in a line of haystacks leading up to the farmhouse, and he was shot by one of the German soldiers in one of the haystacks. Although he was severely wounded, he said that he walked back to the lines which were not far distant.


Map from Bean Volume 5 p 645.


This is a map of the position on April 27th a few days before grandfather was wounded. The aerodrome is clearly marked and note a haystack is also indicated. The position of the 46 battalion is also on the outskirts of the town.

This photo is reproduced from Bean Volume VI, p 57.



This is a view of the Villers-Bretonneux village.
The caption reads:
This view from the rear lines North West of the village indicates the nature of the country around it. (One man has just been wounded by a shell. Two of his comrades wear civilian hats from the village. A third is sleeping under a salvaged parasol.)

A photograph taken from We Were the 46th .


Although this was taken in September 1918 after grandfather was wounded it illustrates the conditions of trench warfare. The soldiers shown in the photograph were from the 46th Battalion. We are all familiar with the horrors of WWI, but to me this picture is important as it contains members of grandfather's battalion.

The day after he was wounded, 1st May, grandfather was admitted to the Australian Field Ambulance with a gunshot wound.

Then he was moved to six different hospitals.

• 2nd May he was transferred to the 4th General Hospital in France


• 12th May he was transferred to England


• 14th May he was admitted to Cambridge Military Hospital, Aldershot


• 25th June transferred to 3rd Australian Military Hospital Dartford


• 28th June transferred to No. 3 Command depot Hurdcott


• 7th September transferred to No 1 Command Depot Sutton Veny

One month after the end of the war, on 11th December, he left England for the return journey to Australia via hospital transport Saxon, and arrived in Melbourne on 30th January 1919. He was discharged as medically unfit on 12 April 1919.

Soon after, grandfather returned to Broadford where he was met at the station by a deputation of Victorian residents and marched with them to the Mechanics Institute where a welcome back ceremony was conducted.

Although the war was over its effects continued for many years. Sergeants were very important during the war as supporters and confidants to the lower ranks, and Sergeant “Lem” fulfilled this role with grandfather. My grandfather was forever grateful for his support in the harrowing conditions of the war. The war experience obviously took a great toll on “Lem”. He took up a soldier settlement farm after the war. The land was unsuitable for farming and he struggled unsuccessfully to make a living. The strain was too much and he had a severe nervous breakdown. He was admitted to Mont Park Mental Asylum. He was engaged to Sue, grandfather’s sister. My father remembers her taking him to visit Lem in Mont Park. Lem was sitting on the veranda at the front and my father doesn't remember him saying a word. He was obviously very ill.

The photograph below was taken in 1920. It is the occasion of the wedding of grandfather's fiancee's brother. Grandfather is the man standing on the right of the photo. Compare this photo with the one at the beginning of the post. They were taken only four years apart and starkly display the war's legacy of ill health that plagued grandfather for the rest of his life.



The Australian "diggers" of WWI are famous for their physical strength and vigour. It is something of an irony that I am alive to write this post in part because my grandfather did not have a strong constitution. This meant that he did not arrive in France until 18 months after the war started and then was ill for almost a year. I can also thank some anonymous German soldier for his poor shooting! Nine and a half years after his close brush with death grandfather and his wife produced a son who 22 years later fathered me.


Margaret and I visited France in 2013. Our main objective was to see Villers-Bretonneux, in remembrance of my Grandfather. It was quite an eerie feeling to be in the area that he fought in and was wounded in 95 years earlier.

The main Australian war memorial in France is located at Villers-Bretonneux. The photograph below shows the two major features of the memorial, the cross and the tower.



The photo below is taken from the War Memorial and shows Villers-Bretonneux across the valley.



The school in the village houses a museum and the school yard has a sign "Do not forget Australia" as can be seen in the photo below. Click on the photo to see a larger version, click on the "X" in the top right of the enlarged picture to return to this post.



We visited many more locations on the battlefields tour, including some where trenches had been preserved.

Edna's 84th Birthday

Both of my parents are now living at Colton Close.

Last Wednesday, 13^th April, Edna, my mother turned 84.

We had a party for her in the colton Close recreation room.

Many members of her family attended inclucing her husband (Eric) and her brother (Bill).


After eating Cameron played a cornet solo ...


... ane then we were regailed by a family ensemble playing some of mum's favourite hymn tunes.


Dad gave her a timbrel, so she played it while the ensemble played some tunes.

(The point of the timbrel is that one of the many activities at Colton Close is band practice where residents play percussion instruments while one of the staff plays the piano. Mum now has her own timbrel for band practice.)


Mum certainly enjoyed her party.



Here is a link to the photos.

Family History: Henry and Elizabeth Trevithick

Henry Trevithick, was one of my maternal great-great grandfathers. He was born in Sithney in SW Cornwall on 4th August 1811. In Sithney he married Elizabeth Pascoe, who was born on 3rd December 1814 in nearby Helston. Henry and Elizabeth were married on 30 April 1836. Elizabeth gave birth to eleven children, one of whom was my great-grandmother Harriet.

The Google Map below shows Cornwall where the Trevithicks were born. Double click near the blue place indicator to zoom in. If you zoom enough you will see two blue place indicators, one for Sithney and the other for Helsotn. Click on each indicator for more information including pictures of Henry and Elizabeth in later life.


View Larger Map

The family migrated to Australia in the mid to late 1840s. There was a major emigration from Cornwall between 1946 and 1848 caused by potato blight and economic hardship. Henry’s family settled in Burra in South Australia. It is hardly surprising that this family of miners lived in Burra as it was one of the major mining centres in South Australia at the time. Copper had been discovered in 1845. The town began as a single company mining township that, by 1851, was a set of townships (company, private and government owned) collectively known as “The Burra”. The Burra mines supplied 89% of South Australia's and 5% of the world’s copper for 15 years, and the settlement has been credited (along with the mines at Kapunda) with saving the economy of the struggling new colony of South Australia.


From the beginning the township was a company town, built at low cost and with insufficient housing, which forced many miners to dig makeshift homes. In the census of 1851 over a third of the population were living along the creek and the Census compiler took time to note :

There are no houses, the swellings being excavated in the banks of the Burra creek.

The photograph shows some of these “homes”. Henry’s family initially lived in this type of primitive accommodation by the Burra creek.

It might have been the trying, frontier conditions of Burra that prompted Henry to look for “greener pastures”. Another possibility was the gold rushes in Victoria in the early and mid 1850s. He traveled on his own to Ballarat in Victoria. The family tradition goes that he was assisted by the aborigines; moving from “tribe to tribe” on his journey. Of the towns that he passed through in Victoria, he was particularly impressed with Avoca. With its Court, police station, gold wardens, churches, and schools it would have seemed a far more civilised place to live, earn an income and bring up a large family than Burra. He returned home to convince his family and friends to move to Avoca. He eventually took about 12 families with him to settle in Avoca.

The family had shifted to Avoca by 1854 as Henry Trevithick is mentioned in the Mount Alexander Mail(Castlemaine) of 13th October 1854. It seems that he was living in a “tent close to the police camp” in Avoca. My great-grandmother, Harriet, was born in there on 24th August 1857.

Henry made a living in the mines but quickly turned to other pursuits as well. He eventually owned two hotels, the Locomotive and the Commercial. The Locomotive was situated opposite the court building. A residential house now stands on the block. The Locomotive was probably not a large hotel, we cannot find a picture of it in the family records or in the Avoca records. It is described as “the house and premises known as the Locomotive Hotel” in a notice in the “Avoca Mail” of 1865. It seems that in that year Henry sold it to Joseph Henry Gawith. Henry also bought a fair amount of land in the town and owned shares in two of the large mines in the area. One of his money making ventures eventually led to a tragedy, in May 1859. Henry and a friend, Henry Knott, had a beer selling booth at the local race track.

The following is Henry’s testimony to the subsequent inquest:

I am a Publican residing at Avoca. Yesterday, I was driving the deceased home from the Race Course in my spring cart, he was not sober, the wheel went into a small rut in the road and the deceased fell out and pitched on his head. I did not fall out myself, the accident happened near the Park Hotel. I called out for assistance. Mr Holmes came to me and helped me to put the deceased in the cart. I then sent for a Doctor. The deceased was holding my arm as I drove along to keep himself steady in the cart. The deceased must have died instantly after he fell out, the hour was five o’clock.

Henry was probably “gilding the lily” as another witness claimed: “… I saw the deceased and last witness driving in a spring cart they were driving fast they were neither of them sober.”

It seems fairly clear from the Inquest that Henry was drunk and speeding in his cart. He was probably quite lucky not to be charged.

His friend, the deceased, Henry Knott had been another influential citizen who was also a member of the Avoca council. Not long before his death he gave some land to Avoca for a cemetery. His grave was one of the first in the new cemetery, and his wife had to pay 20 pounds for the grave site.

Henry made quite a success of his new life in Avoca. He was elected to the local council, and became quite well off financially. Not all of his financial ventures were necessarily successful. For instance, he owned a mine, for a while, and the family tradition is that he lost money in that venture.

On the other hand there is a report in the Avoca Mail, September 9th 1873, which states:

Many of our readers will be pleased to hear of a slice of good luck which occurred to Mr Henry Trevithick in his claim on the Deep Lead, on Saturday last, when a welcome nugget of about 30 oz was unearthed.

Certainly there is a family story that at times he lit his pipe with 5 pound notes.

Henry was obviously a “rough and tumble” sort of man, but late in his life he turned to matters of religion. My mother has his bible in her care.

He died in 1887 as described by the Avoca Free Press:

Another of the links binding the past to the rising generation has been severed by the death of Mr Henry Trevithick, long and favourably known in former years as the landlord of the Locomotive Hotel, opposite the Court House. Deceased, who was in the 77th year of his age, has suffered for some considerable time from a general breaking up of the system. The funeral, which took place on Wednesday afternoon, was numerously attended.

Valuing Old Folks

The second half of the 20th Century was the era when youth was celebrated. This has meant that older people have been devalued, as doddery and uninteresting. The first two decades of life are very formative. For instance my basic attitudes to life were largely formed by the time I was 20 and I expect this is true of most people.

Those born in the 1920s lived through a period of very spectacular world history in their first two decades. I will give some examples of a 79 year old that I know quite well, my father who was born in January 1928.

He was born into the long shadow of the Great War (WW1). Dad was constantly reminded of the reality of that devastating conflict as his father had been wounded towards the end of the war, and never fully recovered his health . Dad reminds me that the prosperity of the "Jazz Age" was really an American phenomenon and that times were tough when he was young. This was compounded by the Great Depression, which might be dated from 1929 to 1933, but in his experience persisted throughout the 1930s. But, the thirties weren't all "doom and gloom" in his recollection. He has always been interested in Science and Technology and as a boy was fascinated by the new technologies that were developing. fROM THE 1920S His father had built radios (Dad still calls them wirelesses). Changing the station on the radio required changing coils, which were separate and had to be inserted into the "wireless". Dad was also interested in the new "talkie" movies, and would hang around the hall where they were shown watching the projectionist set up for a show.

Much entertainment in the 1930s, though, was still of the old fashioned type. Community singing was very popular. It was also quite organised. Entertainers would tour the country side organising and leading community singing sessions. My father attended elocution lessons (somewhat under sufferance) and so was asked to recite a poem at a community sing. He remembers being gently mocked by the compare after his presentation.

In recollecting the Second World War he says: "For many people the declaration of War in 1939 is the stuff of books and films. For me it is a memory of a particular Sunday evening. One of our major entertainments was listening to radio plays. On Sunday nights the show was Lux Radio Theatre. On the night of 3rd September 1939 the show was interrupted by a 'grave announcement', from Prime Minister Robert Menzies's that Australia had declared war on Germany". Socially Australia was a very different country than today. Ethnically it was largely Anglo-Celt, and consequently very homogeneous. In those days it was usual to speak proudly of Britain and the Empire, though by 1942 that was starting to change as Britain could not help Australia with resist the Japanese and the new PM, Curtin, appealed to the Americans for help. Dad remembers that the American soldiers were quite unpopular during the war: "over paid, over sexed and over here." Empire loyalty died slowly.

He lived in a country town that was at the junction of two major railway lines, Seymour. Dad describes the concern that the Japanese might bomb the town to damage the communications infrastructure. Zig zag slit trenches were dug in the school grounds and were used for "air raid practices". He also remembers that his father started to build an air raid shelter in the back yard of their house.

Although there were many changes in the first five decades of the 20th Century some remained largely unchanged from the 19th century. My father joined the State Savings Bank in the mid 1940s. He remembers banking chambers being similar to the offices described by Charles Dickens. All writing was done by hand (there were not typewriters), figures were added manually, and the only bank employees visible to the public were the tellers, the rest worked behind a large partition. He describes on of his tasks as follows: "... filling the ink wells and checking that the pen nibs were working and scraping the nibs clean, in the public area. Biros had not yet been invented and most writing was done with pens that were dipped in ink wells".

I was born , in 1950, at the beginning of the economic "golden age". My formative experiences were very different to those of "old" people born in the 1920s of 1930s and their recollections are very interesting. Although like all men of my age I was threatened with conscription into the Army, Australia has never been threatened by invasion during my lifetime. The "old people's" generation did face invasion as a serious possibility in the early years of the war and such an experience would change your outlook on the world permanently. Although the business cycle has had some "down periods" during my lifetime, my generation has not had to face economic conditions as devastating as the Great Depression.
Whenever you have the opportunity to talk to an "old" person about their life experiences, do not pass up the opportunity, for sadly there is only limited time to do it.