ANZAC Sons

by Allison Marlow Paterson

  Later letters explain that Allan wrote home to Sarah and Charles on the day their eldest son was killed and wrote further letters throughout the month, although only those written to Jim were found in the collection. Perhaps Sarah kept the letters she received elsewhere and they have now been lost; perhaps her grief was so great she could no longer hold on to what had given her hope. Others also wrote home of Charlie’s death. The author of this letter is unknown; it was possibly sent to Myrtle Stone’s sister Lilly.

  In the field

  27/4/18

  Dear Lilly

  As I have a few spare moments I want to give you some news which is very sad to us here I can well imagine what your district will feel, when you get the sad news of the death of Serg Charlie Marlow he was killed on 26 April at 6 oclock in the morning, shot through the nose by a sniper and was dead almost instantly for he never spoke a word, no one got a bigger surprise than I did, for it was only 3 minutes before it happened, that he came to my dug out and gave me my breakfast, and we were joking with each other, and it was a few minutes after that I heard a cry for a stretcher bearer and was on the spot in about 2 minutes but he had passed away by then. We got him on the stretcher right away and had him down to the Dr in twenty minutes for we had to carry him some about 2 1/2 to 3 miles to the R.a.p. some of the track we had to travel was very rough, and as the country is so level, we ran a big risk getting him out in day light, but we chanced it, and got through allright of course it was our luck. His two brothers were away at the time, Pips [Percy] is in Blighty and Allan was back somewhere (where I can’t say) I know Allan Lieut will take it very bad, and his poor mother & wife will. I can’t say how I feel for them, it will be a terrible blow when they receive the news, and every lad in the Coy and also other Coys nearly cried when it happened; Charlie was so well liked when we were getting him out there was of course enquirers from every one for miles along who it was and when we would say Serg Marlow there would be all sorts of comments. One Serg of C Coy asked the said question, and when he was told he wouldn’t believe it, for he had been in the trench with him making some arrangements not long before. Poor Charlie is and will be missed very much for a better N.C.O. among his men there never was and as for Allan well he is very near worshipped among his platoon as he comes from up your way I just thought I would let you know a little about it as I was on the spot and practically seen it all happened…

  While others mourned the death of a mate, Allan’s grief had led to an expression of his own fragile sense of mortality. To live every day under threat of death had hardened this young soldier. Allan shared his fatalistic sentiment with Jim, revealing that, in the darkest moments of coping with the death of yet another much-loved brother, he could see the time when destiny would end his own life. The hand of fate was ever-present. As Jack Lockett would explain years later, ‘… if a bullet had your name on it you were gone’.

  France

  30-4-1918

  Dear Jim,

  Well dear Jim by the time you get this letter you will have heard of the death of our dear Charlie. Well Jim it is terrible to think that those three boys are gone but that saying What must be will be. Well I attended dear Charlies service it was very very sad indeed. All of the boys were there also Mr Angus and Harry Street. Poor old Harry was terribly broken up but Jim know one knows how I feel it. I can just picture my time, oh my dear mum & dad. Jim do try & cheer them up. Jim do what you can to brace them up a little. I am doing my best to get Percy sent home you do your best that end. Dear Jim I received your loving letter to night also the one dear mum wrote when she was in Bendigo. I do hope dear dad is better now. What trouble we have had. I hope that is the last of it. Dear Jim I am out of the line at present but don’t know how long for. I am only about 500 yds away from dear Charlie grave. He is buried along way from the line. Well dear Jim try & cheer up a little. Percy is still in England. Well dear old boy I will say good bye and best love to all

  I remain

  Your Loving Brother

  Allan S

  Albert Sinclair wrote home to his wife with news of Charlie’s death. He was also about to suffer at the hands of fate. He was wounded just three days after his wife wrote to Sarah. He survived his wound but saw no further action.

  Roselin Farm

  Durham Ox

  July 14th 18

  Dear Mrs Marlow,

  A few lines as promised. I had letters from my husband on Thursday. The one dated 29.4.18 he told me of your sons death. This is how he wrote it. Charlie came up to our post, which was an advanced one, as he regularly did every morning, to see us and have a chat with us all and this morning a sniper had been at work on us and made us keep our heads under cover. The trench was very shallow & one either had to sit or crouch down when in it. Charlie was talking to us & just had his head above the trench & he had a word half uttered, when the bullet hit him about ¾ inch below the eye & the poor fellow just dropped dead & didn’t even breathe so it was a painless death. It was a terrible shock to us all & I thought a great deal of Charlie. I hope this will be a comfort to you to know he did not suffer. So trusting you and all are well.

  I remain

  Yours sincerely

  Daphne Sinclair

  Further accounts from the men who witnessed Charlie’s death arrived months later via the Red Cross. Their recollections varied as some were written over six months since Charlie’s death. I doubt they provided much comfort to Sarah, whose grief must have been overwhelming.

  Australian Red Cross Society

  Information Bureau

  Melbourne

  28th August, 1918

  Mr J.W. Marlow

  Mologa P.O.

  Via Bendigo

  Dear Sir

  Re L/Sgt C.E. Marlow No. 2123 38th Battalion

  We have now received from our London Agents the following reports in regard to the above named soldier who is officially stated killed on the 26th April, 1918.

  Pte. W. McMillan No. 2605, 38th Battalion on the 27th June stated – He was a Sgt. And in D. Company. I saw him killed at Mericourt, on the Somme, when death was instantaneous, he having been hit through the head by a bullet, in early morning. He was going up to a post he was in charge of, and just as he reached it he was hit. I knew him well, and he came from Victoria. I did not see his grave, but he was buried I’m sure, for his body was taken back to Heilly for burial. He had a brother a Lieutenant in the same company who knows all the particulars.

  Pte. W. Anderson No 3021 on the 27th June stated – he was killed instantly about 100 yards from me by a bullet between his eyes from a German sniper while carrying rations to the front line one evening about the end of April or the beginning of May. It happened about ¼ mile in front of Ribemont. I saw his body which was taken back and buried. He had a brother Akers Marlow who is now Lieutenant in 38th A.I.F. Hqrs. Lewis Gun and who was very much cut up about it. He has all the particulars. Marlow’s initials were C.E. and name Charlie. He was a Sgt. In D. Coy. A very nice man who would do anything for another. All the boys loved him. He was about 25 and 5’8 1/2” broad and darkish.

  Mr J.W. Marlow

  Our Agents have written to Lieut. Marlow asking him to let us have all the information he is able to supply in regard to the death of the above named soldier, but you will no doubt have heard from him in the meantime and be in possession of all details.

  Yours faithfully

  Beacham Kiddle

  Hon. Secretary

  Australian Red Cross Society

  Victorian Division

  Information Bureau

  Melbourne

  2nd October 1918

  Mr J.W. Marlow

  Mologa Post Office

  Via Bendigo

  Dear Sir

  Re L/Sgt. C.E. Marlow, No. 2123, 38th Btn.

  Since writing to you on the 28th August we have received from our agents the following further reports concerning the above named soldier who was killed in action on the 26th April, 1918

&
nbsp; Cpl. Whipp, No 1329, has stated:- “ That is Sgt. Marlow of D. Coy. He is one of five brothers who have been sent out there and he is the third to be killed. He was taking out rations from the Dump to the front line at Buire. He just looked over the parapet and was shot dead through the head. I was in charge of the next post at the time and so did not see him. His brother Lt. A.S. Marlow now at the base was with the Battalion at the time and has the full particulars.”

  Pte. P. Owens, No. 116, has stated:- “He was a Sergeant. I have lived alongside of him all my life, at Pyramid Hill, Victoria, and I knew him well. He was visiting pals in the early morning before breakfast at Buire when he was sniped through the head. He was the brother of an Officer D. Coy. with the Battalion now. He told me when we were talking afterwards that he had been at his brother’s funeral. I am not certain where the Sgt. was buried.

  Pte. G. Collison, No. 2183, has stated:- “I was with Sgt. Charlie E. Marlow, 2123 (38.D.) when he was killed instantly by a bullet in April at Ribemont near L’Ancre. Just at Break of day he came round just to see how we were getting on and walked into our bay – a L.G. Post.[Lewis Gun Post] There were a few bullets about so we told him to keep down. He was going to sit down when he was hit in the eye. He never spoke a word. I was quite close to him, we were sitting down and he was standing up. I think he was taken away by the stretcher bearers to Battalion Headquarters. There were 4 brothers in the same Coy. Percy Marlow was away with Trench Fever, but another brother Alan Marlow was at Battalion Headquarters and I think he went up to bury him. He would know all about it. Description :- Mologa, married, one child, out about 18 months.”

  Pte. J. Flower, No 2214, has stated:- “I saw Charlie Marlow who was a Sgt. being carried out he having been killed on the right of the R. Ancre to the right of Buire. I was told by one of the chaps in the line that he was killed by a bullet early in the morning, it was about lunch time when I saw him. I can’t say where he is buried but probably about Heilly. I came over in same reinforcements 3/30th leaving … [page missing]

  Pte. Cameron, No. 2540, has stated: “I think Marlow was in B.Coy, he lived somewhere near Melbourne, had another brother in the same Battalion as a Lt. And was the third brother to be killed. He was killed about April when we were in the line, in the Amiens district near a place Buire. We were holding the front line, and he was skilled by a Sniper being hit by a bullet, which went through his nose. I did not see him killed but I saw his body later, and put him on a cart to go to burial. I am not sure, but I think he was buried at Heilly…

  * * *

  FRANCE, 2011

  It is 26 April 2011. Ninety-three years ago, on this day, Charlie Marlow was killed. It is a crisp, clear and breezy spring morning; it is easy to imagine that, on the day Charlie died, the weather was not dissimilar to the glorious day of our pilgrimage. We join our Somme battlefields guide Martin Pegler and drive some 30 kilometres to Ribemont Communal Cemetery Extension where Charlie is buried. It is small in size and attached to a local cemetery. Charlie was originally buried at Heilly No 2 Cemetery in the grounds of Heilly Chateau. His body was exhumed after the Armistice as the Commonwealth War Graves Commission began consolidating the hundreds of small cemeteries scattered the length of the Western Front. We search for his grave and, to our consternation, Charlie is not buried in the plot as listed. We continue to search and, with relief, soon find that his resting place has been recorded incorrectly. It is only a matter of the difference between Row A and Row H; possibly an error between the handwritten records made on site and later records compiled during the exhumation process.

  Ribemont Community Cemetery Extension, France (author photo 26 April 2011).

  The final resting place of Charlie Marlow.

  As we stand by Charlie’s grave, we reflect on a life cut short and the sacrifice he made. He left behind his young wife and the daughter he never knew, a little girl who would never meet her father.

  Later, the Red Cross reports in hand, Martin drives us a few kilometres to Buire-sur-Ancre. Somewhere to the east of the village is the place where Charlie lost his life. Today it is green and lush, grasses shimmer in the breeze and tall trees line a stream which makes its way to the nearby Ancre River. It is remarkably peaceful. There are no cars, the only sounds the trees rustling in the breeze and the low calls of contented cattle on a land long healed.

  I try to imagine the early morning of 26 April. I picture Charlie joking with his mates on his route through the trenches and yarning with his brother, Allan, at headquarters. He gathers the morning’s rations, carted in before dawn from the Quartermaster’s Store at Heilly. He makes his way back through the crowded lines to the welcome greetings of his platoon. These were shallow trenches and the sniper was alert. For just a few seconds Charlie forgot to keep his head down. Then the shot, the cries from his mates for the stretcher-bearers, the dangerous journey in broad daylight to the aid post in a cellar west of the village, someone racing through the trenches to find Allan. Then comes the moment when Allan has to say goodbye to his brother who was his mate, his confidant, his keeper. His grief must have been crushing.

  The simple cross that marked Charlie’s original burial place at Heilly.

  ***

  South-west of where Charlie lies buried is the village of Villers-Bretonneux. This village was strategically important to the German forces as a vantage point in the taking of Amiens. On Anzac Day 2011 we drive from the dawn service at Polygon Wood and the later service at Tyne Cot Cemetery in Belgium to the French village of Villers-Bretonneux to commemorate the great sacrifice that the Australians, including the Marlow family, made in this region of France. We are surprised by the rolling hills, the patchwork of yellow canola, lush green grasses and the blended browns of fallow. My father, who farmed the Mologa land, remarked how similar it was to the countryside around Mologa in a favourable season. He thought the boys would have felt at home. Of course by 1918 this country had been much fought over, churned to dust and mud, pockmarked with shell holes and scarred by a maze of trenches. Perhaps in the rear areas in the early spring of 1918 there may have been moments when the similarity with home provided comfort.

  The Australian Memorial, commanding the high ground just a few kilometres from Villers-Bretonneux, is an imposing white stone tower that has stood sentinel across the valley since 1938. We take some photos and look across the fields in an attempt to envisage the battles that had taken place on the ground where we stand. Then we arrive at the memorial. Hundreds of floral tributes form a bright sea at the base of the Cross of Sacrifice as we walk forward to lay our wreath. The dawn ceremony is long over.

  We linger for a while and look down the seemingly never-ending list of soldiers who have no known grave. We raise our eyes to study the tower, riddled with bullet holes, the scars of World War II. Further down the valley, just 15 kilometres or so, lies Amiens and its magnificent cathedral. We stand on the ground that German forces sought to capture, to pave their way to Amiens and onward to victory. The Australians fought a desperate battle here, bloody and brutal, to ensure that their enemy would not attain his objective. German forces captured Villers-Bretonneux on 24 April and, that very night, the 13th and 15th brigades stormed the burning village and pushed the Germans back to their starting line. It was a turning point. The Australians, with courage, determination and aggression, had halted the enemy advance and prevented a potential catastrophe. Ludendorff’s Operation Michael had failed.

  Charlie Marlow had died as the Australians doggedly held the line that protected Amiens. In the defence of the city, Sarah and Charles had lost another son. Allan, Percy and Jim lost another brother. Pearl would no longer feel the loving touch of her husband and baby Beatrice Eva would never know her father.

  Pearl Marlow and baby Eva.

  TWENTY ONE

  I HAVE LOST A REAL FRIEND AND

  COMPANION, TO SAY NOTHING

  OF THE BEST N.C.O. I EVER KNEW.

  APRIL, ENGLAND

  In England, Percy had returned f
rom leave and wrote a lengthy letter to Jim. Percy had yet to hear that Charlie had been killed just two days before. It would be some weeks before he received the dreadful news that yet another brother had given his life. Percy’s letter displays little of the enthusiasm with which he had departed Australian shores. He had mentally finished with the war, preferring instead to consider his prospects on his return.

  Hurdcott

  England

  28-4-18

  Dear Jim

  I received three letters from you, two of them came while I was on leave, glad to hear you are well, but sorry you did not have a holiday for I am sure you would need one, I fully thought Mum & Dad, would have a month or two at the coast, that is what Mum wants after so much trouble. I have just come back from leave; the weather was terrible all the time I was away but all the same I had a good time. I went to Leicester first; put in most of the time there, it’s a very nice place; was at Paynes saw Flo pretty often Jim, a real nice girl, while I was there Ida had a letter from you dated March, it came a lot quicker than ours. I went to Drayton & Middleton Corby, so had a little riding about, they were very pleased to see me. I intended to going to Scotland but the weather was so wet. We used to have some fun at Leicester; there were three or four girls here at times of course me being so shy, had to take a back seat. It was hard coming back from leave to sleep on boards again, and the first mornings breakfast was stew, a bit hard to take. We get good meals here as a rule. I don’t expect to be here much longer; spose I will be shifting to Sutton Veny in a few days; that’s the last stage. The last time I heard from the boys they were well. You seem to reckon you are on the shelf, make a strong one and both of us will be able to get on it. As you were mentioning that all the girls were booked I had better look for one for myself as well as for you. If I should send one back for you, see you have a strong body of police on the pier to see that she gets a safe landing, what I have heard of others, they have fared badly. You want a motor car Jim, that takes their eye, see the office [offers] you got from one. But wait a minute Jim, you had a nice tea at the Jones didn’t you, that right get in with the old Lady first. This last few days it has been quite warm, was just my luck to strike bad weather while away. There is very few here I know. Fred Perry is the only one from up our way, you would know him dare I say, he played football for Lagoon, one of their best players; at present he is marked C.I. home service in England he had a bullet through the hand, left some of his fingers stiff. The war news has not been the best, but I think we [will] stop him, I hope he takes a tumble before I get there, I have not too much of the fighting spirit left. I tell the boys I am only going over just to see them; if I stop as long there, as I did when I went back from leave, it will do me; should not talk like that should I make you think I don’t like playing soldiers, which you know I do, after a twelve month or so in France. When I was at Paynes, I was a little social, and a girl’s friend of Paynes gave me a half penny for luck, it was bent about a bit. I believe it was true, wouldn’t part with it for something. I got a 1918 farthing in the YMCA but lost it, I was going to send it to you. Things are getting a little dear now, and one of them appeals, “note the mistakes Jim” that’s cigarettes a packet of ten ordinary, are 5 1/2 used to be 4 1/2 a week ago in France 2 1/2 now, there is no duty to pay over there funny isn’t it, made in England sold cheaper in France, well it’s a good thing for as regards myself I smoke more over there, they are like a comfortor when shells are playing a tune over your head. Today is Sunday, I was on a job, washing spuds we never peel the spuds now mash them skins and all allright, as long as there is not too much dirt on them; and to night I am on picket, in a little village near by; about ten of us I think. Yes Jim, Mrs Stone can spin a fair tale, I wonder can she sing, never want to take any notice of the tales. Was at a good concert here in the YMCA last night that’s all there is to go to here …