In yesterday’s Times there was an article on Australia cut from the Berliner Tageblatt entitled “Poor Australia”. This went on to show how Australian troops were being ruthlessly murdered so that the English could walk over them, & it also pointed out that the Australians were more often mentioned in Army Reports than any other group in the British Armies. A certain amount of this is true but of course the main object of this sort of thing is to cause ill feeling among the Colonies & England. If the old Hun thinks this sort of piffle will do any harm he is greatly mistaken.
4th September. The war news still continues splendid & things look very promising. I believe everyone in France has got their tails sky high & are as enthusiastic & anxious to get at old Fritzie as if they were going to a picnic. The morale of the British Army was never better & this is what counts. Certainly they are fighting now as they have never fought before, & from all appearances nothing seems to check them.
6th September. One or two of the English papers of late have been making very foolish remarks about Australia, the Chronicle in particular. It galls them to think that Australia hasn’t got Conscription & they talk about Australia failing to rise to the occasion. I should like to see a comparison list published showing the real war efforts of the Colonies, Canada in particular & England. We have seen a few & we show out extraordinarily well no matter from what point of view they are looked at from, & unlike England nearly every man we raise is a fighter. When we say we have raised 300 or 400 thousand as the case may be, they are fighting troops & do something towards winning the war, but not so with England’s boasted numbers. Why half of her so-called soldiers couldn’t open the breech of a rifle let alone shoot. London & for that matter all provincial towns stink of khaki, but no, they are not line soldiers but simply work in some office factory or anything to do with Government work, & of course England puts a uniform on them & calls them soldiers, then every now & again she will skite as to how many men she has raised. If her troops only fought one half as well & as consistent as our few despised Aussies this war would have been over long ago.
It’s very foolish of English papers talking in the Chronicle strain for it only sows resentment among the Colonies. That little article which appeared in this morning’s papers has set the whole camp talking nasty things, & speaking for myself makes me boil with rage, for it is such an untrue & false statement.
15th September. Had a very quiet Sunday. Went out for a stroll & on arriving home found a telegram waiting for me but the address & number was a bit out. At any rate I decided to open it & have a look. I got a bit of a shock for it was from Harefield to say that Bill Barwick was “dangerously ill” & would I come at once. I couldn’t get away that night for all the offices were shut up so I had to rest content till morning.
16th September. Paraded to the Adjutant as soon as he set foot on the parade ground this morning. I only showed him the wire which was sent by the Sister. He granted me 48 hours straight off & in a few minutes I had my pass.
On arrival at Denham I got a ride out to the hospital in the Red Cross cars which meet all trains & once there I soon found 29 Ward. Bill was in bed & looked very thin & white on it. His knee, which he had smashed at Meteren by a German bullet, is just about healed but pleurisy had attacked him in a bad form. According to Bill the Drs have been taking a lot of water from his chest.
I stayed a couple of hours with him & I believe I cheered him up a lot. Before leaving the Sister took me into her room & told me the full strength of it all. She said the Drs were of opinion that the whole trouble was the cause of underfunding while Bill was in an English hospital — he reckons he was starved to death nearly. She also said that he stood a jolly good chance of going under, for from all accounts he is far worse than he looks or thinks he is, but she says he fights well & there is a chance that if they can get him to a warmer climate he will recover. He is booked for Australia on the 28th provided he is strong enough to travel. I am going to write & tell his mother, for Bill has a job to write at all.
20th September. Rain seems to have set in this evening & it is blowing & howling outside a treat, but I am quite comfortable sitting in our well-appointed billiard room in a nice easy chair beside a good coal fire. I am just counting the days now till we get our trip home to Aussie.
I see the 1st & 4th Divisions have just put up another splendid stunt & the papers are giving our troops great praise. I wonder how Len is getting on; he will be in all this heavy fighting.
22nd September. At last the papers are beginning to publish the true accounts of the fighting during March & April when the Australians so splendidly acquitted themselves & saved Amiens, yes & the British Army, when things looked their blackest. How proud the people in Australia will be when they read of how their boys stood up to Fritzie & fought him to a standstill when the other troops had chucked it in. It does one’s eyes good to read the accounts so long withheld from the public. I don’t know what they must think of the Aussies now after what they have been reading & it’s only the truth, for the diggers rose to the occasion & fought as only Australians can. The papers agree that the palm goes to our lads & they point out also what they have done of late, so Australia at present is very much in the boom, but no more than she deserves.
29th September. When I woke up this morning hanged if it wasn’t raining steadily. Never saw such a country in my life — you can’t tell 2 hours in advance what the weather is going to be.
The old war is taking some dramatic turns nowadays; nobody can tell what is going to happen from day to day. It’s easily to be seen that a master hand is at work & if ever a man has justified the confidence placed in him well old Foch has. He has pulled this war out of the fire with a vengeance for no doubt when he took things over we were in a very bad state, far worse than the general public have any idea of.
1st October. This book opens with a piece of the best news that I have received for many long days, namely a letter from Len saying that he was on his way home to Aussie. I am more pleased than if it had been myself that was going. How lucky he has been & all I hope is that he is the same through all his life. Just fancy during these 4 years that he has been in the Army he has never been wounded — that’s a bit of a record for a front line soldier I should think.
He has got a start on me but I don’t think we will be long before we are pushing off, for this afternoon all the 1914 men were fallen in & all particulars taken of them, so there must be something doing & I hope it comes quick so as we can be home for Xmas.
Everyone has been very pleased today over the fall of Bulgaria. Seems to be a rot setting in at last.
9th October. Our 1914 stunt is getting very close now; all going well a fellow can begin to get a sight of Aussie now. They have taken all our particulars again. I don’t know how many times this makes & I expect there will be a lot more of it yet before we eventually get clear from the red tape sins.
All sorts of rumours have been flying round tonight about Austria having surrendered to the Allies. It is supposed to have come through the Post Office at Warminster but this evening I was down at the pictures & they threw the latest war news on the screen: “Nothing official about Austria yet”, “Germans beaten all along the line”. These announcements were greeted with much handclapping & a running fire of remarks. These are great times; one never knows what’s going to happen from day to day & no one seems to be able to fathom old Foch’s scheme.
13th October. A lucky day for me. This afternoon as I was sitting at my table the Orderly Sgt rushed in & shouted out my name & sung out that I was to report to No. 10 Camp immediately to go to Australia. I was writing a letter home at the time so you can guess how pleased I was. I packed up my things at once & took them over to the camp.
In the afternoon Charlie Tonkin came across & we went for a walk. It was a glorious afternoon & the countryside looked simply splendid, everything so calm & beautiful, & the leaves were practically every colour imaginable. It was the first autumn that I had seen in England &
I can quite believe now all the lovely tints in the old English pictures.
What a day this has been. I went over to the O.T.B. to say goodbye to a lot of our lads & then Charlie & I went down to the pictures & there happened the incident that millions of people have been longing & waiting for these 4 long years. A funny picture was being screened when all of a sudden it stopped & the crowd started to go out when an officer jumps on to the stage & sings out, “Wait on, boys, I have some good news to tell you,” & he sings out the following: “Germany admits defeat, has accepted President Wilson 14 points, & an armistice starts immediately.” Well if you could only have heard the shout of joy that went up; I shall never, never forget it as long as ever I live. Needless to say no one bothered to see the rest of the picture but out they tumbled cheering & yelling. I was excited myself & practically ran all the way home to break the news & then a lot of them wouldn’t believe me. In fact I could hardly believe it myself but it seems to be true.
As I write this the bands are playing “Apres La Guerre Fini” & a lot of old tunes while I believe down in Warminster there were great scenes of excitement, but I suppose one will have to wait in patience till the morning papers come. We will know the full strength of things then & then only.
14th October. What a sell, not a word scarcely in the papers about Peace this morning. I’ll bet I won’t be had so easily the next time such rumours come through. I was that sure of it last night that I would have wagered any money that it was true. I’ll be a bit more cautious next time believe me.
Before leaving the Command we all marched over to our Furlough Office, where all rolls were properly checked & pay books collected. Then we loaded our gear on to a G.S. waggon & set off for Warminster headed by an original 4th Batt piper with one of the old pipes brought from Aussie.
It was a dull heavy morning but nevertheless it was a morning I shall never forget. 4 long years have we been looking forward to this memorable day & now it has come at last. Everyone was in the best possible spirits & the march to Warminster was a pleasure. We arrived there in nice time, collected our kits & hopped in the train. 3 extra carriages had been provided for us of which there were 150 all told.
We had a pretty slow trip to Bristol. The country on the way down looked simply glorious. I never saw so many shades before in my life & everything looked so green & peaceful. All the way through Somerset we passed beautiful little villages perched on hills with flowers colouring everything & fine rivers & creeks with swollen waters for there had been a lot of rain of late. In fact the country looked almost perfect.
We eventually pulled into Devonport towards evening. We had about a mile to march to our camp which, like all military turnouts, lay fair on top of a hill overlooking the town. Plymouth & Devonport are almost the same town for only a mile or so separates them & the scenery round about is very beautiful.
15th October. 800 men marched in late last night from France. They are camped just over the road opposite us so I expect there will be quite a number of old faces among them. After things are fixed up I am going over to have a look.
Old Birdwood came down to see the 1914 men & he got the reception of his life. I believe old Birdie broke down completely & cried with joy, & the diggers broke loose & carried him shoulder high all over the place & finally down to his car where they had chalked all over it “Birdwood the King of the Diggers”. Old Birdie reckoned it was the proudest day of his life & he would never forget it nor the Australians either. They formed a ring round his car & sang “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow”, “Auld Lang Syne” & etc before they let him go, so you can see old Birdie is still very popular with the A.I.F. & needless to say he thinks that our lads are the finest troops in the world. He has said so often, & it nearly broke his heart when he had to leave us to take over what was left of the British 5th Army after the German breakthrough at Cambrai last March. I should like to see him visit Australia after the war — what a reception he would get, he would hardly hit the ground. It’s very seldom that you hear of a General getting the affection of men like old Birdie has of the diggers, for although he is no longer with us, the boys think the world of him, especially the ones who were on Anzac with him.
They reckon this demonstration in favour of old Birdie caused quite a flutter in the military circles, for it was practically an unheard-of thing before for the soldiers to show their appreciation in such a forcible way as the diggers did, but that’s just the Aussie way — it’s got to come out & they wouldn’t care if it was the King. I’ll bet the other Generals are a little envious of Birdie after this outburst & wish they were as popular with their troops.
18th October. 4 years today since leaving Aussie & to me it seems like 20, but thank goodness we are on our way back.
20th October. Sunday & a most miserable day. A cold wind has been blowing all the time & it looks like rain. I wish to goodness they would get us across & on to our boat. Influenza is raging round here & a lot of the boys are down with it. One chap has just died with it, how stiff is he. They reckon we are likely to stop here for a while until it dies down, for they are frightened we might bring it aboard & give it to the rest of the patients. Everyone is getting fed up & some are taking their 10 weeks in Blighty through so much messing about.
25th October. The boat that loaded up the other day has gone & we are left on our own & Heavens only knows how long they are going to keep us. We were to have gone some days ago but for the outbreak of flu. They then decided to put fewer men on each boat so that’s how we came to be stranded. Everyone is fed right up to the neck; if they would only tell us how long we are here for & let us make our plans accordingly it would not be so bad but as it is now we don’t know what to do. Some say we are likely to be here till the 19th of next month, that’s a nice piece of news to be sure.
A few days ago a submarine got a big transport just outside the harbour. A good many lives were lost, but yesterday they got even with them & bagged the submarine. There were only 3 survivors & one of them said that they were 380 feet down when the depth charge got them.
29th October. London seems to be taking the war news very calmly, just an ordinary occurrence it now seems to be, but underlying all the masked indifference you can see how glad & pleased they are over the prospect of an early & victorious peace.
The flu seems to have got them all thinking far more than the war, for people are dying like flies & so suddenly too. Rich & poor go the same way; people are inclined to think it is some sort of plague. In lots of towns they are dying far faster than they can be buried, so you can see it’s pretty serious. A chap gets it this morning & he’s dead the following day. According to last night’s paper the Government are going to take a hand in the matter; they have already released a lot of Drs to help fight the disease.
1st November. Great news this morning: both Turkey & Austria seem to be finished for good. There’s no doubt the war is nearly over. We are beginning to wonder if they will send us off now or not, or send us back to our units & send the lot home together.
I heard yesterday that Len & all his mob are held up in Cairo. I wonder if it’s true. If so I rather envy him for Cairo is a lovely place to visit.
3rd November. They are starting to inoculate all the troops here for flu. They are not going to get me if I can possibly help it. I don’t believe in their experiments & it’s nothing more nor less than this at the present time. I will take a risk if I can dodge the Drs. Besides it’s about spent its fury & is dying down according to the papers.
I have dropped in rather lucky here in one respect, for the girl whom I take out occasionally is a real good sort. She speaks French fluently & sings & plays nicely & is in all ways a real refined girl, but she has a rather sad thing in her life — her fiancé was killed over 2 years ago but she has never forgotten him. She told me all about it last night & I felt real sorry for her.
Thank goodness there are still some girls left who are true to the ones they loved & don’t go gadding about all over the place as if no
thing had ever happened. That’s one of the worst parts of this war — the thousands of young people that have been parted for ever & the homes that have been left so empty & sad. It’s very bad over here, for practically everyone has lost someone near & dear to them. I have often thanked my lucky stars that if ever I happened to get knocked out for good no one would ever grieve over me with the exception of perhaps Mother. Sometimes I have often wished that it were otherwise, for a chap is very lonely at times & craves for someone to confide in, but I suppose one of these days all will come right as I have said before. The reason I am keeping on the straight track is on account of a girl who lives many miles from this country.
5th November. Anniversary of our most disastrous stunt at Flers 2 years ago when our Company C & D were pretty well wiped out & I got a dig in the leg with the bayonet. There’s not many of the lads left now who took part in that mix up; I am the only representative from our Coy who is here.
6th November. Have had a rotten day. Our Coy had been detailed to attend the funeral of 2 of our chaps who had just died. We done the slow march as far as the church, where the coffins were picked up & carried on shoulders draped with the Union Jack to the graveside. I wonder who would have thought of such a thing as 2 Australian soldiers being laid to rest in this pretty little churchyard & 200 of his mates there as a guard of honour a short 5 years ago, yet it has happened. The service to us seemed very sad & I was quite glad when the firing party had finished & the bugler had sounded the “Last Post”. The notes died faintly away in the distance & beautiful sunlight, for the day was a perfect one.
There were a fair number of civilians present, which added to the sadness of the thing, & it was with a heavy heart that I turned away when we marched out & left 2 of our mates lying in that lonely little spot. I often think if it should be my fate to die over here without seeing Aussie I should never rest but should wander in my spirit to the Sunny South, for love of our land is very strong in the Aussies for to us there is no land comparable that we have seen.
In Great Spirits Page 34