by Ian Uys
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Charles Dunn’s recovery was miraculous. “After being kept at this dressing-station for three days, I was then conveyed by barge down the river to another large town called Abbeville and then taken to a hospital. I was put in a tent and I can’t say that much was done for me here. The doctor did not bother himself about me, he only said that as soon as I got stronger he would mark me out for Blighty. I was in this hospital only three days when my wound started to discharge. I was also spitting blood for two weeks. What caused the wound to discharge as it did was because of the dirt and metal in the wound — it was causing an abscess on the lung. The smell was something!”
He was invalided to England where his mother, who lived in Cambridge, visited him. A serious operation on 9 August saved his life. Dunn returned to South Africa where he married Alice Rechner, 17, in 1921. They were to have a son and a daughter. He worked for Kodak for the next 40 years, at Cape Town, Durban, Bloemfontein and Port Elizabeth. He was manager of the photo-finishing plant in Port Elizabeth, and died there in 1958, aged 62 years.
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Dunston received a bullet wound in the foot on 19 July. He was awarded the MM for Delville Wood and promoted to acting lance-corporal in May 1917. Dunston married Dorothy Beatrice May on 15 August 1917. He was discharged in February 1918 as unfit.
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Frederick Dromgoole was evacuated to England suffering from multiple gunshot wounds. He was discharged in February 1917 and placed on the strength of the Cavalry Command Depot, eventually rejoining his battalion in July. After the Third Battle of Ypres Dromgoole suffered from boils and general debility. He was killed at Marrieres Wood on 23 March 1918.
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Joel Emanuel was taken as a POW to Dulmen Camp, then to Hammelburg and to Silesia. He was repatriated in January 1919 and demobilised at Wynberg in May 1919. Emanuel then ran an African trading store in Northern Natal. He married and had a son and a daughter. In 1939 he lied about his age in order to join the army and became a staff-sergeant before the end of the war. Emanuel retired to Durban in 1962, where he died, aged 84, in September 1982.
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The award of the Victoria Cross to Faulds was gazetted on 9 September 1916. In October 1916 he was promoted to corporal, in April 1917 to sergeant, and commissioned the following month. He served briefly in the Transport Dept in Egypt, then returned to France. Faulds was wounded and taken prisoner in March 1918. The award of the MC followed.
In March 1921 Faulds married Thelma Windell in Kimberley and they had a son and a daughter. He was employed as a mechanic at De Beers Company. On resuscitation of the Kimberley Regiment Faulds re-enlisted and served as a captain. He was in charge of guards of honour during royal tours and was one of the King’s guard, all being men who wore the VC, at the coronation of King George VI.
Faulds then moved to Bulawayo. During the Second World War Faulds enlisted as a private in the Mechanical Service Corps and served in Abyssinia and Egypt. After the war he was appointed government industrial inspector, in which position he was transferred to Salisbury, where he died in August 1950, aged 55 years.
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Eddie Fitz and Henry Oldfield were taken by hospital train to Rouen and then to Richmond Hospital. Douthwaite, Fitz and Mitchell were awarded the brigade’s first Military Medals for their bravery at Bernafay Wood. Douthwaite was killed in action on 12 April 1917.
Fitz returned to stacking supplies in “hellish freezing weather” near Rouen. From there he was sent to Arras. On 20 September 1917, he reconnoitred the front line at Ypres with Capt Garnet Green. He lost Green while running through a barrage but found him later having tea in a pill-box with other officers. Fitz was sent to a cadet school in Cambridge and commissioned in March 1918.
After Marrieres Wood there was a surplus of officers in the brigade so he transferred to the RAF and did flying training at Dublin. After qualifying he was awaiting a posting when the war ended. He was mentioned in despatches twice during the war. On 20 November 1918 Fitz married Edeline Moore, and they had two children, Phillip and Marion. He became a director of an electrical company in East London. Their daughter died at eight years of age shortly before the Second World War.
During the war Fitz was personal staff officer to Major-General Frank Theron in the Middle East. After attending staff college at Haifa he returned to South Africa. Major Fitz MM was attached to the combined HQ at Cape Town for a year then transferred to GHQ in Pretoria. Afterwards he returned to East London, then in the early 1960s moved to Johannesburg. Edeline Fitz died in 1974. Eddie Fitz is a student of ancient history and an expert on the old Egyptian and Hebrew tribes.
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Gordon Forbes survived Delville Wood to fight at Vimy Ridge in September, of which he wrote: “Yes, I have heard a lot about Vimy Ridge and was a little curious to see it. I am not anymore. I want to go home”.
He joined the Royal Flying Corps, as did his brothers, Duncan and Haldane. On his first operational flight Gordon Forbes was shot down and wounded in the head. He was taken prisoner, however died on 18 October 1917 and is buried in Belgium.
Gordon’s brother, Haldane, was to win the Croix de Guerre and was mentioned in despatches during the war.
His war diary was found by Haldane on their Burgersdorp farm many years later. His nephew and namesake was to become one of South Africa’s most famous tennis players.
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Garnet George Green was awarded the MC for his exemplary conduct at Delville Wood. On 12 April, 1917, he won a bar to his MC for voluntarily reconnoitring ground under heavy machine-gun fire. On 20 September he again reconnoitred front lines, on this occasion with Cpl Eddie Fitz MM. Green was promoted to captain in January 1918. Three months later Capt Green commanded B Company at Gauche Wood. There was no chance of withdrawing and he was killed, fighting to the last.
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Lovell Greene was recommended for the DSO, however he received the MC. In April 1918 he was awarded the DSO when as a captain he took command of the 2nd SAI at a critical stage and threw back repeated enemy counter-attacks.
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John Greggor, bandsman, was wounded at Vimy Ridge later in the war. He sounded the Last Post when the 4th SAI cross was unveiled in Delville Wood by Padre Hill. His uniform, kit and bugle are on display at the Transvaal Scottish Museum, and he at present lives near Kimberley.
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Stan Griffiths was to see many of his friends killed in France during the following two years. Among them were the three Magennis brothers from Uitenhage. After returning to South Africa he worked on a Constantia farm before taking over management of a farm at Elands River, Uitenhage. In 1929 his first wife, Doris Vermaak, died in childbirth. In 1931 Griffiths married Maude Meyer and had two sons and two daughters. After his father died he took over from him as messenger of the court, a position he was to hold for the next 44 years. He is now retired and lives at Uitenhage.
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After four months in hospital Harold Hall was sent to Eastbourne for convalescence. While there he met Mary Stamp. He was attached to A Coy in November 1916, then invalided out of France in April 1917 and returned to South Africa as permanently unfit for duty.
After the war he returned to marry Mary Stamp at Portslade on 2 August 1920 and had a son and a daughter. They set up home at Port Elizabeth, then several years later transferred to Cape Town with the SAR and in 1944 moved to Germiston where he retired in 1958. He was secretary to the Germiston Industries Medical Aid Association for five years. Hall died on 27 May 1981.
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John Hall was awarded the MM for Delville Wood. He was promoted to corporal in November 1916 and sergeant on 24 March 1918. He was discharged in May 1919 whereupon he was employed by the Chamber of Mines in Johannesburg.
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Frederick Louis Hampson was promoted to lance-corporal in January 1917 and by 20 September was a sergeant. He served through the war and was discharged at Maitland in June 1919. He has retired and lives at Sedgefield, Knysna.
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Frank Henry Heal of the 1st SAI was in command of the Transport at Delville Wood. On 8 August 1916, he wrote a letter to Capt Rawbone of the Cape Peninsular Rifles which was published. On 17 July, as there were no senior officers left in the 2nd SAI Heal was given command. When Lieut-Col Dawson succeeded Gen Lukin as commander of the Brigade, Heal succeeded him as CO of the 1st SAI. He led the regiment at Arras, the Third Battle of Ypres and the Somme Retreat.
Lieut-Col Heal was wounded twice at Marrieres Wood, on 24 March 1918, but insisted on remaining with his men. He kept cheery despite a terrific shell fire until he was killed at about 3 pm.
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On 19 July William Healy was promoted to lance-corporal and on 6 October 1916 to corporal, shortly after he was awarded the DCM for Delville Wood. He was killed in action on 17 April 1917 and is buried at Athies Military Cemetery, near Arras.
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“Senussi Bill” Helfrich was wounded in the knee, left arm and head and invalided to England. He was awarded a Silver War Badge, a King’s Certificate and mentioned in despatches (Gazetted 4.1.1917). He returned to South Africa because of his wounds in January 1918.
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Tom Heunis was taken with other prisoners to Cambrai. He remained there with the original dressing on for 14 days before he was attended to. Then he was transferred to the Hammelburg laager hospital where a German doctor operated without anaesthetic on his back. The wound spouted when the dressing was pulled off. In another two days he would have died of gangrene.
After recovering Heunis was sent to work on Bavarian farms. He was permitted the freedom to do beer deliveries as well. He recalled that some prisoners, especially the French, took to consoling the lonely wives of absent soldiers. Heunis was jailed twice, once for refusing to work on a Sunday and once for leaving his place of work.
After the war he could find no work so went to the Makwassie diamond diggings, but had no luck. From April 1920 he worked at the ERPM Gold mine at Boksburg. In 1923 Heunis married Blanche McGreevly from Durban and they had three sons and a daughter. After 36 years underground he worked in the mine compound for eight years before retiring. Mrs Heunis died in 1973, and Tom in April 1982, aged 84.
Four months earlier he said to the author “I’m very proud of our people. This is the finest country in the world. I saw how far the Afrikaner ‘Volk’ has gone in a short space of time. Be proud of your nation”.
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Bill Hewitt was wounded in the leg at the Butte de Warlencourt on October 24 when his Lewis gun section was wiped out. He was to meet his future wife at the Tooting Hospital. He returned to the battalion in April 1917. In September he took part in the Third Battle of Ypres where, for his bravery in single-handedly destroying a strong German pill-box, he was awarded the Victoria Cross. He was badly wounded in the throat by a German hand-grenade.
He married Lily Olett in October 1918 then returned to his farming in Natal.
In 1925 the Hewitts moved to Kenya where he bought a coffee farm. They had four daughters, one of whom died as a baby. He sold the farm in 1939 and during the Second World War Major Hewitt was an Asst Provost-Marshal at Mombasa. In 1950 he retired to a seaside cottage at Hermanus, Cape.
His health deteriorated and pieces of shrapnel were removed with his larynx. He learned to speak without it. Hewitt then contracted Parkinson’s Disease. In 1961 his wife took him to England for specialist treatment. He died there in 1966, aged 82. Mrs Hewitt returned to South Africa in 1972 and again in 1974 when she came to scatter his ashes on the Hermanus cliffs. She died there, was cremated and her ashes scattered at the same spot by her daughter, Pamela.
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Bert Higgins limped out of Delville Wood on 18 July. He returned to France in November 1916 and remained with the 4th SAI until he was captured in March 1918. He returned to visit Delville Wood in 1963. Higgins died early in 1982 at Kensington, Johannesburg, aged 84.
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Padre Eustace Hill was miraculously unscathed at Delville Wood, however, at the Butte de Warlencourt he was severely wounded by machine-gun bullets while employed in rescuing wounded men. His shattered foot healed, but it was found necessary to amputate his right arm. He was awarded the MC for gallantry, a decoration he never wore as he felt it belonged rather to St John’s College.
He returned to France in April 1917 to assist at No 32 Casualty Clearing-Station. Taking communion for casualties, writing letters for them and officiating at funerals filled his days. The war ended for him when he and his soldier servant were taken prisoner in March 1918. His health suffered in the POW camps and he was weak and ill when he was released after the war.
Padre Hill received a hero’s welcome in Johannesburg. He returned to his great love, St John’s College, where he was the headmaster from 1922 to 1930. His war wounds had left him slightly deaf, a condition he took advantage of when he did not want to hear something!
His eccentricities and absent-mindedness grew worse but his self-discipline and courage remained unimpaired. When he left the College he hid his MC behind the Crucifix which hung on the wall of the school Sacristy.
Hill’s last years were spent in a monastery in Hampshire. He retained his great love for St John’s and South Africa and corresponded regularly with old Johannians and veterans he had known. He died on 12 February, 1953, aged 80 years.
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Thomas Holiday was evacuated to No 4 General Hospital, Denmark Hill, London, where he was treated for shell-shock. He was awarded the MM for Delville Wood.
He transferred to the RFC in May 1917, where he was commissioned as a lieutenant. He returned to South Africa after the war and in March 1941 re-enlisted in the SAAF as a temporary-lieutenant. Holiday was used as an administrative officer, but released in July 1943 on medical grounds. In September 1965 he was living at the St James Hotel near Cape Town.
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Norman Arthur Horne, 20, was severely wounded in the early stages of the battle and was taken to a field hospital. At first he was regarded as being beyond help, then an Australian nurse found that he still had a pulse and summoned a doctor. She pleaded with him to “give this young soldier a chance” and offered her blood for a transfusion.
Horne miraculously survived and was sent to England where he spent the next three years in hospitals and had several major operations. He returned to live in Belville, Cape. His wife, Lily, died in March 1982 and he died on 20 September 1982, aged 86.
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Major Donald Hunt’s diary provides a personal record of his experiences in Delville Wood. He remained in command of the 4th SAI until MacLeod’s return. Hunt fought through all the battalion’s battles in France until January 1918, then served in Mesopotamia, Persia and Russia.
After the war Hunt returned to his position as Native Commissioner, from which he retired in 1931. He and his family then went to live at Blackridge, near Pietermaritzburg. In 1940 Hunt was appointed lieutenant-colonel commanding the 3rd Native Military Corps. He was released in May 1942 on account of his age. Lieut-Col Hunt died at Pietermaritzburg in May 1949, aged 74 years.
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John Hurlin was evacuated to the City of London Hospital, Clapton. He returned to the front in time for the Battle of Arras where he was killed on 12 April 1917. Hurlin is buried at Brown’s Copse military cemetery, four miles east of Arras.
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Charlie Ingram emerged unscathed from Delville Wood. He was wounded at Arras on 12 April 1917 and sent to hospital in England. He rejoined his regiment in September 1917 as a corporal and served in every engagement thereafter. Ingram was buried alive during shelling at Paschendaele but was dug out. At Marrieres Wo
od he and two others evaded capture on Saturday, 23 March 1918. The following day one was killed, the other wounded and he was captured. He was repatriated in January 1919 and discharged four months later.
Ingram joined the Uitenhage SAR Mechanical Engineers office. He represented Uitenhage and district at the 1926 Delville Wood Memorial Unveiling. In July 1930 he married Dorothy Marsh and they had two sons. He enlisted in May 1940 and served in East Africa, being demobbed in July 1945. Ingram was one of 25 Delville Wood veterans to attend the 50th Anniversary in France in 1966. He died at Uitenhage on 29 July 1979, aged 83.
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Herbert Jenkins rejoined his battalion on 17 September 1916. He was wounded on 18 October at the Butte de Warlencourt in the left thigh and hip. In 1918 Jenkins was promoted to temporary major and temporary lieutenant-colonel and was awarded the DSO.
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Lieut-Col Frank Jones was buried in Peronne Road cemetery, Maricourt (Plot 1, Row G, Grave 2). He was awarded the CMG posthumously. He had won the DSO for his bravery during the Battle of Paardeberg in 1900.
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Angus Murdoch-Keith received a minor shrapnel wound to his knee. He remained with the brigade until October 1917 when he went on a bridging course in England. Keith joined the Royal Engineers in March 1918 and was commissioned. During the final advance he won the MC.
After the war he returned to complete his apprenticeship on the Ferreira Deep mine. Keith was sent to the United States to study under the Goodrich Rubber Company. He returned to South Africa as a technical adviser on conveyor belting, etc. During the Second World War he was employed in the UK munitions industry. From 1948 onwards he went into business for himself. Today he has interests in a number of companies and lives in Johannesburg.
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Walter Kirby was wounded and his brother, L/Cpl H G Kirby, killed at Delville Wood. Kirby had served as a trooper in the Natal Light Horse in SWA and was wounded at Gibeon in April 1915. He joined the 4th SAI and served in Egypt and France. He was wounded on four occasions and awarded the MC. By the end of the war Kirby was a captain.