CHAPTER 5

Officers and Men

The commands of each of the brigade’s three regiments were given to officers with previous long service in the militia. Lieutenant Colonels Albert Miell and Noel Brazier of the 9th and 10th Light Horse were both commanding militia regiments when they received their AIF appointments, while Alexander White of the 8th Regiment was a brigade major with a light horse brigade in Victoria. They had all been quick to offer their services soon after the war started. White might have been able to find a place in the first contingent, but his only child was born at the same time as his new appointment, so he was held back and engaged in staff work at Victoria Barracks to allow him to organise his family affairs. Brazier and Miell were 48 and 44 years old respectively, and Miell was a veteran of the South African War. White was considerably younger, aged 32.

Alexander Henry White had been born in Ballarat and in civilian life had recently taken up a position in the family business of Joe White and Co. Pty Ltd, Foster Maltings at Collingwood, Melbourne. He was the third son in his family and the company was the main provider of malt to most of Australia’s leading breweries.¹ He began his military service as a private in the Victorian Mounted Rifles and received his first commission in 1904, in the light horse. After seven years he was promoted to captain. Early in 1914 he rose another rank and was made brigade major of the 5th Light Horse Brigade. His transfer to the AIF brought with it promotion to lieutenant colonel and command of his own regiment. His wife later said that his ‘whole heart and soul was in his military work from the time he joined the old Mounted Rifles in Ballarat after leaving school’.²

White was an astute, likeable and popular officer. Both his superiors and those under his command respected him, while his letters to his wife reveal him to have been a gentle and decent man. He took with him to the war a Bible in which he had placed a newspaper clipping titled “A Creed”, part of which said:

Let me be a little braver
When temptation bids me waver,
Let me strive a little harder
To be all that I should be.
Let me be a little meeker
With the brother that is weaker
Let me think more of my neighbour
And a little less of me.³

As unlikely as these sentiments seem for someone about to go off to lead men in war, they may well have expressed White’s personal creed.

In an interview in 1984, Jack Dean recalled his old commanding officer: ‘A wonderful man: an officer and a gentleman. He was popular throughout the regiment. Everybody would have followed him anywhere.’⁴ Lionel Simpson, who saw White wounded on Gallipoli and was among the casualties when White was killed, agreed that he was ‘a good man’.⁵ Fellow officers spoke of him as ‘very keen and energetic’.⁶

Comradeship and the possibility of adventure in far off places blended with White’s idealism. Only after he left his home did he begin to discover a conflict between his new military obligations and those to the young family he left behind.

Brazier of the 10th Regiment was perhaps a more complex character. He had been born in Victoria, the son of a clergyman. His mother had died young, so he was largely brought up by an elder sister. He began working in a newspaper office but by hard study managed to qualify as a surveyor. This profession was in demand when he arrived in Western Australia and soon he was able to afford to take up a property he called ‘Capeldene’, at Kirup. He was attracted to the place because the hills reminded him of the Gippsland district of Victoria. Although not a particularly good farmer, he did have a strong interest in horses and a good eye for them.

In the decade before the war Brazier had purchased the champion trotter, General Tracey, from New Zealand. The arrival of his famous stallion marked Brazier as a notable breeder and contributed to the improvement of the blood lines in Western Australia.⁷ This involvement with horses may have led Brazier into the light horse. The mount he took to war was named General Panic, a six-year-old son of the famous sire. It was regarded as the best horse of the light horse in the west.

Brazier had an interesting and unusual association with his second-in-command, Major Alan Love. Not long after Brazier was first commissioned in the local militia light horse the regiment had come under Love’s command.⁸ Major Love, a city accountant in civil life, retired a few years later, transferring to the Unattached List in January 1911. He came off the Retired List to join the AIF, this time to serve under Brazier, who had once been his junior. Some of the other officers in the 10th Regiment also knew both men from their own time in the militia.

Brazier worked hard to bring his regiment together, travelling through the state’s settled regions to personally select men and horses. It eventually fought on Gallipoli and in the Sinai and Palestine campaigns, earning an impressive list of battle honours, which were passed to a later citizen force regiment that was re-numbered to perpetuate the deeds of the old ‘Tenth’. The title of ‘Father of the Regiment’ has been conferred on him.⁹

Albert Miell was well known in pastoral, Masonic and business circles from Adelaide to Broken Hill, and was the most experienced of the three commanding officers. He could trace his military involvement back to 1888, when he joined the local forces, and by 1914 had risen to command of the 24th (Flinders) Light Horse. Illness had held him back from going to the South African War until 1901, when he served as a lieutenant in the 5th South Australian contingent. Like White and Brazier, Miell was married with a family. His son, Gordon, was old enough to enlist in the AIF in 1918 and served in Palestine in the regiment that had been raised under his father’s command four years earlier.

Most of the brigade’s officers also came from the militia. To the likes of Antill, the professional soldier, these were amateurs who would have to learn quickly. Where they were available, permanent soldiers from the Administrative and Instructional Staff were accepted to serve on the headquarters, or to stiffen the ranks of warrant officers and senior NCOs. There were also several officers who had recently graduated from the new Royal Military College at Duntroon, in what had been designated the future national capital.

The bearing and experienced military manner of the Duntroon officers belied the fact that these 20-year-olds were the youngest officers in their regiments. Three of them, Lieutenants Charles Dale, Leo Anderson and Charles Arblaster, had joined the 8th Light Horse in camp during November. Another Duntroon boy, Horace Robertson, was posted to the 10th Regiment. Dale and Anderson were to die at The Nek, while young Arblaster would go on to be a hero of the attack at Fromelles in France the following year and die of wounds received there. Robertson survived the war and eventually retired from the army after a lifetime of active and colourful service, during which he became famously known as ‘Red Robbie’, with the rank of lieutenant general and a knighthood.

Anderson and Dale had joined the Royal Military College in March 1912, after having been in the Victorian cadets and, for a brief time, the militia. Dale was active and athletic and excelled at Australian Rules football. Anderson was more studious and won several study prizes at the college, including the Australian National Defence League’s gold medal for the highest marks. Fair, and small in stature, he had difficulty concealing his youth. A friend who saw him on Gallipoli reported that ‘little Anderson is trying to look the old trench soldier with a six-haired beard’.¹⁰ Still, few who watched him doubted that he should one day be a general. The brigade’s Duntroon officers had been granted their commissions after accelerated training to allow them to accompany the troops departing for the war.

Many of the men in the AIF’s early ranks had had some experience under the compulsory military service scheme, a few had been in the British army, and there were some older men who had seen active service and displayed medal ribbons. The official historian estimated that three-quarters of the early light horse enlistments had some training,although this is not borne out by the experience of the 3rd Light Horse Brigade.¹¹ Men joining the light horse often came from areas well away from the drill halls and army depots and so had not been obliged to participate in the compulsory training scheme. The 9th Light Horse claimed that little more than one-third of the men first enlisted came from the militia and a similar figure seems to have been evident in the 10th Regiment.¹²

Some of those enlisting in the ranks had already made a mark in life. Gresley Harper was a 32-year-old solicitor and a respected professional man in Perth. He and his younger brother, Wilfred, who was a farmer, enlisted on the same day in A Squadron of the 10th Light Horse. Despite his university education, maturity, and friendship with the Brazier family, Gresley did not seek a commission and the brothers served together in the ranks. Nine members of the influential Perth City Club volunteered for the regiment; only three were accepted as officers.

Another from the legal profession was Mervyn Higgins. A strong and good-looking young man, he came from one of Victoria’s distinguished and privileged, if sometimes controversial, families. His father was Justice Henry Bourne Higgins, who, while a member of parliament, had opposed the sending of troops to the South African War as unnecessary and unjust. In 1906 he was appointed a judge of the High Court of Australia and is remembered for his landmark Harvester Judgement, in which he set a minimum wage for unskilled workers.

Mervyn Higgins was not as intellectual as his father, but he was regarded as quiet, personable and athletic. He was an only child and the focus of loving parents. At school he had been called ‘Frenchy’ because of the superior French accent he had acquired from his governess. At university he was ‘Buggins’. A friend fondly described him:

A cow’s lick and a happy grin
Broad shoulders and large feet,
A sunburned nose and stubborn chin.
And Mervyn is complete.¹³

He attended Oxford, where he was remembered more as a sportsman than a scholar; the Oxford Eight beat Cambridge in 1910 with Higgins in the crew. He came home in 1912 and was a barrister when the war began. His father, who was in London, received a cable: ‘Anxious volunteer service. Uncle John willing manage your affairs if you are agreeable.’¹⁴ He had had some military training in Britain and was an enthusiastic soldier. He joined the 8th Light Horse as a lieutenant shortly before the regiment left Australia.

Higgins was socially far removed from most of the light horse rank and file, among whom there were some ‘hard cases’. Several of these enlisted in the heady early days of the war, but the dull routine of training and the restrictions of military discipline soon left them discontent. They simply left the camps and did not return. In 1914 it was still possible to fill these empty ranks and the efforts to locate deserters were often half-hearted.

Among those who stayed long enough to achieve an inglorious record was a driver in the 10th Light Horse. This troublesome soldier was courtmartialled for insubordination on Gallipoli, a serious offence at the front. He was sentenced to 35 days Field Punishment No. 1 and then sent to the Abassia detention barracks. This probably saved him from sharing the same fate as many of his mates. Eventually, he was diagnosed as suffering from venereal disease and ordered back to Australia, where the civil police awaited him. He was discharged in Perth, probably as glad to be rid of the army as it was to be of him.

There were also some men of mystery, such as London-born teenager Rollo Alban. The son of a former officer in the Indian army, he had entered the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, where he stayed for a year before being withdrawn. He had obtained sufficient examination marks but appears to have been failed for other unrecorded reasons.¹⁵ He was sent out to Australia to try farming, although his occupation was shown as ‘labourer’ when he enlisted in the 8th Light Horse in October 1914. He had not been able to match the success of his elder brother, who also served in the war, was repeatedly decorated, and became a lieutenant colonel and a holder of the Distinguished Service Order with two bars. Young Rollo was killed at The Nek, aged 19, simply a trooper in an Australian regiment.

Men were enlisted between the ages of 18 and 35 years, although senior officers and some of the warrant officers and NCOs were often older. Soon the upper age limit was raised, allowing more South African War veterans to join without having to falsify their ages. The oldest man in the 8th Light Horse appears to have been Major James O’Brien, the second-in-command, at 52 years. His counterparts in the 9th and 10th Regiments, Carew Reynell and Alan Love, were 31 and 42 respectively. The average age of the officers in the 8th and 10th Regiments was 32.5 years. Among the other ranks, this average was 25.5 and 26.8 years.

The men came from a variety of backgrounds. In many respects the brigade was a representative gathering of Australian males. Noticeable variations from the national averages were the understandably very high proportion of unmarried men, and a higher number who claimed adherence to the Church of England. Not surprisingly, the membership was even more typical of the AIF overall. Even here the brigade had a higher proportion of single soldiers. More importantly, there was a demonstrably higher ratio of primary producers and men in rural employment. This was most pronounced in the 10th Light Horse.

All three regiments drew the majority of their members from the agricultural and primary producer groups, including more than half of those in the 10th Light Horse. In these regiments, the proportions are far in excess of both the national average (which was 25 per cent) and the various state averages. Similar occupations are noted in all regiments: pastoralists, farm labourers, farmhands, stockmen, jackeroos, horse-breakers and graziers. These are the occupations of men usually quite used to horses. At least one occupation – pearler – was possibly unique to the western state. The 8th Light Horse also drew heavily (30 per cent) on men working in the industrial sector.

The 10th Regiment had a higher proportion of unskilled single immigrant men on its roll. There was still a pioneering quality about life in the rural west. That, and the allure of the goldfields, had attracted migrants from overseas and interstate seeking work. British-born men were noticeable. More than one in every eight in the original regiment claimed as their next of kin a relative, usually a parent, living in the United Kingdom. Typically these men were in their early or mid-twenties.¹⁶

Although there were a couple of university-educated men in the ranks, the force was not as egalitarian as legend would have it, with most officers coming from the pastoral sector or the professions. Major Reynell noted that an officer in his regiment was a tradesman: ‘Cook is a conscientious, well intentioned fellow with a good deal of common sense and energy but lacks the power of controlling others. His age – 44 – and his civil occupation have been heavily against him.’¹⁷ Social position was not to count for so much on Gallipoli. Major Alfred Cook, the master butcher from Semaphore, South Australia, and veteran of the South African War, died in hospital from wounds received on 12 June 1915. The news of his death, it was reported, ‘cast a gloom over the regiment, as he was respected and loved by all ranks’.¹⁸

Although it was said that the light horsemen generally were not highly motivated in a religious sense, it is noticeable that very few in the brigade declined to state adherence to an organised religion.¹⁹ There may have been a tendency for some men to say that they were Church of England simply because it was the largest, and therefore the most acceptable, religious group in Australia. Membership of an organised church in 1915 could be an indication of national origin (as in the strong Irish-Catholic population), social status or even political beliefs. The 8th Light Horse showed a remarkably high proportion (26 per cent) of Presbyterians, which included the commanding officer. All the three regiments had low numbers of Roman Catholics.

While the 8th Light Horse was recruited from across the state, it always claimed a strong association with the Victorian Western District. In this region at least two-thirds of the pioneering settlers had been of Scottish origin and their descendants now joining the light horse had retained the Presbyterian faith.²⁰ While the number of Roman Catholics in the brigade was low, the proportion rose to 16 per cent among the private soldiers. The working-class Irish were more likely to be city men seeking to join the infantry.

In the first year of the war, the overwhelming majority of men enlisting were single. There was an obvious reluctance by married men to leave their families and their jobs. Even among the officers, who tended to be older, there were many who were single. In the 8th Regiment only about one-third of the officers were married. While married men tended to delay their enlistment, some of the single men who had joined up took the opportunity to wed before they went overseas. At least four of the officers who were destined to die at The Nek were married shortly before the brigade sailed: Charles Dale, Edward Henty, Thomas Redford and Vernon Piesse. Dale’s young wife was in the first weeks of her pregnancy when he departed.

Lieutenant Ted Henty personified the Victorian Western District’s contribution to the 8th Light Horse. He was the grandson of Stephen Henty who, with his pioneering brother, belonged to the first European family to settle in Victoria. Henty lived all his short life around Hamilton. He was the leader of the district’s pre-war light horse troop and this was described as ‘his only hobby’. He commanded a mounted guard for the first departing local volunteers not long before he, ‘with a sort of enthusiastic pleasure’, also enlisted. Before leaving he was married in the same church in which he had been baptised and confirmed.²¹

Some men were able to use their civilian trades and special skills in the army. A brigade needed its own saddlers, shoeing-smiths and farriers, so blacksmiths and others employed in these trades made an easy transition. There was a financial bonus as well, because most of these were paid an extra shilling per day. Some cooks found that their former occupation was now their rank, and there were some telegraph operators who quickly became signallers.

Some of the transitions were not so easily explained. There were instances where a baker became a trumpeter, a hairdresser became a sergeant, a clergyman was now a troop corporal, and one officer’s batman had previously been a teamster. But the majority of men, whatever their civilian callings, were now ‘private’soldiers (although it has been said that anything less private is hard to imagine). From April 1915 the light horse privates were called ‘troopers’.

After embarkation a private was paid six shillings each day; one shilling was deferred until the termination of his service. Married men were told they must sign over at least two-fifths of their money to their wives, and three-fifths if there were children. Spouses also became entitled to a separation allowance. Pay increased with rank. For example, a lieutenant colonel received £1 17s 6d per day, and a lieutenant 17s 6d.

The pay rates were generous by soldiers’ standards of the day. Once overseas, the Australians soon gained a reputation as free-spenders and were quickly targets for touts and vendors. In comparison, the British soldier was still tied to the old ‘King’s shilling’. The AIF pay reflected the pre-war belief that members of a citizen army should receive fair pay for a day’s work. In many respects the armies were quite different in social attitudes and there were some penalties and restrictions on the British soldier which did not exist for the Australians. Certain characteristics attributed to the AIF had been carried over from peacetime.

It was not possible to assemble the whole brigade before its departure for overseas, so Hughes and Antill had to travel in order to meet the officers and inspect the regiments. Jack Dean remembered his unit’s first view of Antill at Broadmeadows. ‘He had a reputation as a fire-eater. A big fierce-looking joker,’ he recalled.²²

The two officers made the journey to Western Australia separately. Hughes was there first for a few days in October 1914, and inspected Brazier’s regiment, reporting on his return that he could only express his admiration for the troops there. ‘Very hardy and tough,’ he said. ‘They were men who had resided in the country, and who knew how to put up with rough usage.’²³ Antill met Brazier for the first time in early January and inspected the regiment.

Antill’s visit to the 9th Light Horse in November at Morphettville, South Australia, before it had moved to Broadmeadows, had not gone so smoothly. The officers and NCOs had received one of his notorious tongue-lashings. He was apparently unbowed by the reaction to the trouble he had caused at Liverpool camp 18 months earlier. Antill made no concessions for these men who were still very aware that they had offered their services voluntarily. His remarks were ‘resented by every man in camp … [and] the officers had the greatest difficulty in keeping the men in hand.’²⁴ Next morning the NCOs paraded before Lieutenant Colonel Miell and asked to be discharged. The officers also placed their protests before him. The situation could have quickly become ugly, but somehow Miell was able to bring things under control, and no more seems to have been said about it.²⁵ A local newspaper reporter tried to obtain a statement from Antill at the railway station as he was preparing to go back to Melbourne. This time he was more tactful. He would only say that ‘the troops are a fine type of men’.²⁶

It may have been the trouble in South Australia, or possibly some similar incidents at Broadmeadows, that caused the Melbourne Punch to report in February: ‘Everybody does not like the Antill manner when he is met for the first time as a trained capable man instructing others whom he at least regards as untrained and incapable.’ Seemingly unaware of the Liverpool uproar, the report added: ‘In New South Wales nobody minds it. They are used to it. In other states … Antill’s tongue comes as a new discovery.’²⁷

By January 1915 all ranks were becoming impatient to leave the austere training camps and dull routine to get off to the war. Late in the month the two regiments at Broadmeadows were able to farewell Melbourne by marching fully equipped on horseback through the city. Officers and men rose early and rode to the Haymarket, where horses were fed, watered and briefly rested. Then they set off in column of route. Crowds assembled for more than half an hour in front of Parliament House where the governor-general took up his position to receive the salute.

A parade of hundreds of mounted men stretching the entire length of the city blocks, with horses’ hoofs clattering on the roadway, marching behind their band, also mounted, was a thrilling sight. As the clocks struck midday the long noisy column turned from Collins Street into Spring Street. There were cries of ‘Here they are!’, and the excited crowds pressed forward, cheering.

Colonel Hughes’s old heart must have nearly burst with pride as he led his brigade up to the saluting base. Following him was Antill, then came the band, with White and his regiment. Miell was next, leading the 9th Light Horse, then the brigade train, signallers, and ambulance. The Herald reported that the men appeared to be a better physical type than previous parades and estimated that 80 per cent must be countrymen.²⁸ ‘Simply magnificent’, declared the governor-general. The brigade camped the night at Heidelberg before returning to Broadmeadows. A few days later the Western Australians held a parade for their Sunday visitors.

Not long after these final appearances the first troops boarded the transports to take them to Egypt. By the end of February 1915 the whole brigade had left its home shores.