Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Walter Henry Gunn was born on the 31st of January 1870. He was born in the Adelaide Hills town of Mount Lofty. Walter was the son of Francis James Gunn and Eliza Gunn, nee Vick. Walter lived in Mount Lofty for the first few years of his life before moving to Norwood, a suburb east of Adelaide.

Before enlisting for the war Walter had two occupations. One was as a labourer and one was as a storeman.

Walter enlisted for war on the 2nd of August 1915. He joined camp on the 5th of August and started his training on the 6th of August. All this happened at the Australian Army Barracks in Keswick, a suburb located just south west of the Adelaide CBD. He was one of the 416,809 men that enlisted for World War I from Australia.             While in training Walter got married to Elizabeth Ann Johns.  After 5 months of training in Adelaide Walter, along with the rest of the troops, boarded the HMAT Medic A7 on the 12th of January 1916.

The ship arrived at the war on the 12th of May 1916. Walter was placed in the 7th Reinforcement for the 27th Infantry Battalion. When Walter and his troopmates arrived most of May was spent training. This happened every day except for the 17th which was a brigade march. When Walter arrived at war, the 27th Battalion had only spent just over a month in the front-line trenches meaning that there wasn’t very much experience in important battles. This is what some of the training was spent working on.  The 7th Reinforcement were some of the first troops that went straight onto the 27th Battalion front line as before the 7th of April 1916 they had mainly been back up troops for the forces at Gallipoli.

Not long after entering the trenches Walter was admitted to hospital with a case of Pyrexia. Where he got this disease from is unknown as nobody else in camp had it before Walter. This was the first-time Walter went to hospital while being involved with World War I, including training.  

On the 26th of August, 1916, about 3 and a half months into his stay, Walter was admitted to hospital with terrible pains in his lower back. That day would be the last time he would be in the trenches. This wasn’t new to Walter because he had experienced back problems before he enlisted and arrived at war. He was admitted to a French hospital but it wasn’t long before he moved to an English hospital. On the 4th of September, 1916 Walter travelled to England for special treatment, as his back problems weren’t recovering. He received treatment there for just over a month. On the 6th of October 1916, he was discharged from hospital but remained in England. The only bad thing about being discharged was that he received the lower fitness rank, C.3. This meant that he had mainly sedentary service in the home camps, not abroad where he served previously.

Walter spent many days, weeks and months trying to get his back up to military service standard again but by the 29th of December 1916, his time was nearly up. He was told unless he was fit for service again by the 22nd January 1917, he would be returning home. During his time Walter tried to get fit again but his back just wasn’t up to the challenge. On the 25th of January 1917, he was told by the number 2 command depot that he would be returning home.

Between Walter being told he was returning and him departing for Australia was almost 2 months meaning there was a lot of time where Walter couldn’t do much but help the home camps. Finally, on the 17th of March 1917, he boarded the H.S Beltana to return home to Australia. The first person notified that he would be returning home was his next of kin, Elizabeth Ann Gunn. However, she wasn’t notified until the 1st of May 1917, only 2 weeks before Walter arrived back in Australia.

On the 15th of May 1917, Walter disembarked at Adelaide. When he arrived in Adelaide he was readmitted to hospital where he wasn’t discharged until the 22nd of June 1917. In total Walter’s total military service was 1 year and 322 days with 1 year and 124 days being spent abroad.

Walter died on the 24th of July 1924, at the age of 54.

Bibliography

Australian Imperial Force Unit War Dairies 2017, Australian War Memorial, accessed 5 March 2017, <https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/AWM4/>.

RSL Virtual War Memorial 2017, RSL, Canberra, accessed 20 February 2017, <https://rslvirtualwarmemorial.org.au/explore/projects/5388/edit?t=1489963534082>.

Search for a Person 2017, Australian War Memorial, accessed 6 March 2017, <https://www.awm.gov.au/people/roll-search/all/?preferred_name=&service_number=&unit=&conflict=0&op=Search>.

Walter Henry Gunn 2016, AIF, Canberra, accessed 24 February 2017, <https://www.aif.adfa.edu.au/showPerson?pid=121417>.

Walter Henry Gunn 2017, accessed 6 March 2017, <http://graememoad.com/family/PS200/PS200_360.HTM>.

Your story, our history 2001, National Archives of Australia, accessed 22 February 2017, <https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/SearchScreens/BasicSearch.aspx>. 

See National Archives of Australia

See photo of Walter's enlistment paper.....

He has lowered his age by 5yrs in order to enlist and it would seem that he should never have passed his medical in the first place !!!

"Opinion of the Medical Board" on Discharge states:

"Unfit for general or home service for 6 months on account of rhuematism from which he suffered prior to enlistment, and which he says he has never been free from".