Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Trumpeter and Captain George John Margrie was a serviceman in the 4th Light Horse Brigade who fought in the Palestine campaign during WW1 in famous battles such as the Charge of Beersheba. He also enlisted during WW2, where he served in the Australian Imperial Force in the Australian Ordnance Corps from 1939 to 1948 achieving the rank of Captain[i]. His honours include the British War Medal and the Victory medal, for his WW1 service, which was officially received by his next of kin, and mother. [ii] Upon enlistment for the First World War examination records show, Private Margrie as an average young adult, standing at 5 feet 7.5 inches (~170cm), weighing approximately 57kg with a fair complexion, blue eyes, a chest measurement of 29.3 inches(~75cm) but no other distinctive physical marks[iii].

John Margrie, also known as Jack Margrie, was born in Demondrille, NSW, on the 7th of July in 1899 to parents Mr. Henry W Margrie and Mrs. Evelina Margrie[iv]. John Margrie was the youngest son in his Anglican family of six which consisted of his father, his mother, his three brothers who both enlisted, and himself. His older brother Harry Ashburn Margrie was an unmarried 30-year-old male bank accountant who enlisted as a Driver on the 24 of August 1914 with a regimental number of 622 in the 1st Brigade Ammunitions Column. Brother Harry returned to Australia on the 3rd of February 1915, being unable to further serve due to medical complications[v]. His second youngest brother Maxwell Horace Douglas Margrie enlisted at the minimum age for enlistment at 21, leaving behind his job as a dairyman to join the 7th Field Artillery Brigade Ammunitions with the service number 19323 and returned to Australia on the 11th of May 1919 [vi]. His second eldest brother, Eric William Margrie, a single 26-year-old male [vii], enlisted with the service number 15680 on the 1st of May 1916 in the 3rd Battalion Liverpool, died 2 months later of pneumonia, at Garrison hospital, during rifle training before he could serve[viii].

John Margrie first attended boarding school in Brisbane and then came to Sydney Technical High School[ix] in 1913, two years after the founding of the school where he studied under first Headmaster J A Williams[x]. His first year in Sydney Technical High School was extremely successful as he received high grades and came 11th in his year of at least 111 students in one semester and 3rd in his year in the next semester of the same year. He excelled in STEM subjects often doing better than most in his year in subjects such as Mathematics, Technology (Woodwork and Metalwork), Science and German [xi]. Indeed, so well that he earned a prize at the 1913 Sydney Technical High school annual speech day [xii]. His second year at Sydney Tech in 1914, was less successful with him coming 111th in his year of at least 200 students in the first semester, however, his second semester that year was far more fruitful with him achieving marks earning him 12th position in his year[xiii]. This success once again earned him a prize at the annual school speech day of that year, 1914, his first intermediate year of high school [xiv].

John Margrie’s family were pro-war, with all three of his elder brothers enlisted each year of the war; the eldest almost immediately as the war began. Little is known of John Margrie after 1914 as Sydney Technical High School records do not continue to mention him and his schooling, but it is most likely that he remained at Sydney Technical until his enlistment on the 22nd of January 1917 in Brisbane [xv]. He was 18 years and 6 months upon enlistment, which was below the minimum age of enlistment, of 21 years, meaning he enlisted masquerading as Marks Earnest Walters [xvi] born in Vancouver, Canada [xvii]. His false claim was soon discovered by the enlistment officer, however his father wrote a letter acknowledging his son’s fraud yet still granted permission for his son to remain in service [xviii] which was approved by the enlistment officer, most likely as a result of the letter, as well as a distinct lack of new recruits and fighting men due to the horrors of industrial warfare realised by the Australian public in regards to the ANZAC landing at Gallipoli a year earlier and the tremendous loss of life incurred as a result.

The personal motive to join the war, mentioned by his father in his above-mentioned letter “... left a good comfortable home...”[xix] may have been a lie told to the enlistment officer as records show John Margrie to be living in separate states to his parents[xx], him in Queensland, his parents in NSW meaning it is likely that his father did not know the financial or domestic status of his son first hand nor did he most likely have any control over said statuses. This is furthered by records showing a possible contrary perspective to that of John Margrie’s father’s letter, which stated that before enlistment, John was a single adult without occupation[xxi], and therefore income, which also likely meant that his domestic situation was unstable, contrary to his father’s claims of “...  a good comfortable home...”[xxii]. This idea also suggests that due to John Margrie’s unstable domestic situation and lack of income, he enlisted to fight as the weekly pay rate was relatively high, standing at 5 pounds sterling per week[xxiii], which would provide both a stable monetary foundation for him upon his return from war. It also provided an escape from his potential problems as military men were well fed, clothed and provided shelter, as well as a chance to travel abroad to the Middle East and Europe free of charge, which was exotic compared to the life of an 18-year-old single, unemployed male[xxiv] living interstate away from his parents, as John was. This situation may have been the real catalyst for John Margrie’s enlistment.

The now Trooper John Margrie, or as he was alternatively known Trooper Jack[xxv], enlisted with the regimental number 2376 in the 4th Light Horse Brigade, 11th light horse regiment, 19th reinforcement of the AIF[xxvi]. His unit partook in the campaigns in the Middle East which included Gaza, Es Salt, and above all the legendary charge of the 4th Light Horse at Beersheba[xxvii]. Trooper Margrie’s finally military examinations occurred on the 29th of April 1917 and departed from Sydney aboard the HMS A15 Port Sydney on the 9th of May 1917[xxviii], 10 days after his final examinations.

Trooper “Jack” Margrie as he was known to his unit joined the 4th Light Horse on the 22nd of January 1917, mere days after the War Office passed a military order to allow for the reformation of this Brigade. The original 4th Light Horse Brigade was formed in 1915 on the 4 of March in response to Australia’s promise to muster 20,000 infantry, artillery and cavalry collectively in aid of Britain. The original 4th Light Horse Brigade embarked on the May and June of 1915 to Egypt, where it received additional training at the Heliopolis camp, and its numbers supplemented by continuous recruits “shipped” from Australia until it was ready to be moved to the war theatre at the Dardanelles, for the now legendary Gallipoli campaign. However, after Gallipoli, the 4th Light Horse was dis-brigaded until early 1917. The order of the War Office to reform the 4th Light Horse Brigade meant that the Brigade also had to join with the 3rd Light Horse and the 5th and 6th mounted Brigades to form the Imperial Mounted Division, later known as the Australian Mounted Division.

Trooper Margrie’s first battle, having embarked too late in May 1917 to fight in the Second Battle of Gaza in April, was the famous “4th Light Horse Charge at Beersheba” which remains to this day as one of very few successful mounted charges in the history of Industrial warfare. The town of Beersheba lies near the city of Gaza, the site of a previous unsuccessful campaign involving the 4th Light Horse in the Second Battle of Gaza, which was a paramount defensive line for the Ottoman Turks who have been pushed back in the Middle East constantly and now, therefore, cannot afford to cede more territory. The 4th Light Horse Charge itself was only the coup de grâce of the entire campaign which became known as the Third Battle of Gaza in which the Australian forces of the AIF, under General Sir Edmund Allenby of the British Egyptian Expeditionary Force[xxix], fought to break the Ottoman Turk defensive line, stretching 46 kilometers from Gaza near the coast of the Mediterranean Sea to the strategically paramount town of Beersheba in the south-east, consisting of continuous heavily fortified Ottoman garrisons that barred the Entente advance into Palestine and victory in the Middle East. The Allied plan was for the 20th Corps infantry, under Lieutenant-General Sir Philip Chetwode, to mobilise south-west of Beersheba, and mounted divisions of the Desert Mounted Corps under Lieutenant General Sir Harry Chauvel, including the 4th Light Horse Brigade, attack Beersheba from the east whilst maintaining the guise of a planned attack on Gaza where both allied and Ottoman Forces remained heavily distributed[xxx].

Immediately as the plan was carried out by the Desert Mounted Corps, its commanding officer, Lieutenant General Sir Harry Chauvel, saw that the towns west of Beersheba lacked sufficient water supply, which was vital to maintain the health of the horses and the men, specifically in the Egyptian heat, with the only possible town of Esani being too far west for an effective surprise attack. However, after further investigation and questioning of local Arabs, Chauvel realised the larger towns west of Beersheba had an existing water supply to allow for their size[xxxi]. After searching, Chauvel found and repaired existing water wells of the town of Asluj under the cover of night, which allowed the planned mounted offensive against Ottoman-held Beersheba a feasible option.

On the Eve of the 30th of October 1917, Sir Harry Chauvel ordered the ANZAC mounted division under Major General Chaytor to cut of the Beersheba road at Sakati to prevent Turkish retreat and reinforcements. Once the Beersheba road was secure, Major General Hodgson and the Australian Mounted Division was to charge the town of Beersheba to capture it before nightfall on the 31st of October under the insistence of General Sir Allenby.

At 1 pm on the 31st of October, the Turks began shelling the 4th Light Horse, which was scattered over a large area to prevent collateral damage from artillery, this meant the 4th Light Horse received minuscule casualties and thus did not affect morale nor fighting strength. At 1700 hours, the 4th Light Horse, under Brigadier General William Grant, was moved by Chauvel to charge Beersheba, with Grant himself rallying the 4th Light Horse with the lines “men you’re fighting for water. There’s no water between this side of Beersheba and Esani. Use your bayonets as swords. I wish you the best of luck”[xxxii]. Rather than the normal operation employed by the Light Horse to charge in close mounted, then dismount and fight as infantry, Grant’s order to “use your bayonets as swords” allowed the 4th Light Horse to employ a more cavalry-like charge, which may have been the deciding factor for allied victory, one of the few rare successful mounted charges during World War 1.

The Charge itself followed suit with the Trooper himself writing in a letter published in the Queanbeyan Age and Queanbeyan Observer, “… Imagine 2000 men strung abreast, crouching low in their saddles, in proportion to the stomach they had for the game, and galloping madly down on the little Jackos {Turks} as they threw away their rifle and gear and ran in utter astonishment at the men who they always treated as mounted infantry were prepared to be cavalry if the need arose. Good Lord wasn’t there a scatter.” “… We hardly fired a shot, we just galloped and galloped right into the town {Beersheba}...”[xxxiii]  It is noted that the dates the Trooper mentions are slightly different from other sources of the Australian War Memorial website, however, this is most likely due to misjudgment of the date on the trooper’s part as the events described by the trooper are concise with events described by the Australian War Memorial website[xxxiv].

After the successful capture of Beersheba, the Turkish lines were broken and the Turks forced to retreat allowing the allies to march into Palestine and encircle Gaza. On November the 7th 1917, the raid on Sheria began in which the 4th Light Horse faced heavy machine gun fire from the Ottoman Turks and was forced to dismount and charge on foot but were forced to withdraw after continuous casualties from enemy munition. However, Sheria eventually fell, with it, later that November, so did Gaza. During this period between the fall of Sheria and Gaza, Trooper Margrie received a foot wound on the 14 of November 1917, by a bullet, which rendered him temporarily invalid and therefore had him sent to “...No. 14 A.G Cairo Hospital, Egypt”[xxxv]. In the news publication containing Trooper Margrie's letter, he also mentions his desire to see Jerusalem but was rendered invalid and “...may not get a chance now”[xxxvi]. This further strengthens the idea that Trooper Margrie enlisted due to his longing for adventure and escapism rather than a sense of loyalty.

The 4th Light Horse, including Trooper Margrie, after the surrender of the Ottoman Turks, was sent to Egypt to quell riots that arose, only returning to Australia in 1919. Upon return to Australia, Trooper Margrie returned on the 29th of April 1919[xxxvii] aboard the “Dorset” after serving in Palestine for almost 2 years, the 4th Light Horse was subsequently dis-brigaded and its members returned to their original statuses.

Not much is known about former Trooper Margrie after 1919, however, it is most likely that he returned to his normal life and lived as an average Australian citizen, finding himself a job and possibly a spouse, however, records do not mention Margrie after his return from WW1 until 20 years later.

The former Trooper John Margrie, now aged 38 once again enlisted for WW2 with the service number NX9303 in the Australian Army Ordnance Corps on the 22nd of December 1939, at Paddington NSW[xxxviii], 3 months after Australia joined the war. The Ordnance Corps was mainly concerned with supplying the fronts with supplies and organisation of the homefront in its production of ammunition and shipment to the war theatre. Margrie was discharged on the 27th of November 1947, 2 years after WW2 ended, achieving the final rank of Captain[xxxix], however receiving no military decorations.

The now-former Captain Margrie’s mother Mrs. Evelina Margrie’s funeral transpired on the 7th of September 1938[xl], and his father, Mr. H.W Margrie’s death occurred on the 26th of January 1949[xli]. After his father’s death John Margrie moved to Queensland, where he too eventually died in the Brisbane Metropolitan area in 1971[xlii], aged 72, with family unknown.

By Huy Nguyen

Sydney Technical High School

[i] K.Stevenson, email, 20 June 2018

[ii] AIF, War Medals Receipt, 16 September 1923

[iii] Examining Medical Officer, Certificate of Medical Examinations of G J Margrie, 29 April 1917

[iv] K.Stevenson, op.cit.

[v] Australian Commonwealth Military Forces records, Harry Ashburn MARGRIE

[vi] Australian Commonwealth Military Forces records, Maxwell Horace MARGRIE

[vii] Commandant of 2nd Military District, death notice, 29 July 1916

[viii] Examining Medical Officer, Certificate of Medical Examinations of E W Margrie, 2 May 1916

[ix] K.Stevenson, op.cit.

[x] Sydney Morning Herald, Technical High School, Tuesday 16 December 1913, paragraph 2

[xi] STHS School Records, 1913

[xii] Sydney Morning Herald, Technical High School, Tuesday 16 December 1913, paragraph 5

[xiii] STHS School Records, 1914

[xiv] Daily Telegraph, Sydney, Wednesday 3 February 1915

[xv] K.Stevenson, op.cit.

[xvi] Certificate of Medical Examinations of G J Margrie, op.cit.

[xvii] K.Stevenson, op.cit.

[xviii] H.W Margrie, letter, 13 February 1917

[xix] Ibid.

[xx] K.Stevenson op.cit. state G J Margrie to be living in Brisbane, Queensland, while his mother was living in Chatswood, NSW. Harry Ashburn Margrie op.cit. shows G J Margrie’s father to be living in Tenterfield, NSW

[xxi] Australian War Memorial Collections, https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/R2053508/

[xxii] H.W Margrie letter, op.cit.

[xxiii] Australian War Memorial, op.cit.

[xxiv] Ibid

[xxv] Queanbeyan Age and Queanbeyan Observer, Capture of Beersheba by an Australian Trooper, Friday 8th March 1918

[xxvi] Australian War Memorial, op.cit.

[xxvii] Australian War Memoral, op.cit., https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/U51045

[xxviii] K.Stevenson, op.cit.

[xxix] Australian War Memorial, op.cit., https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/blog/the-charge-of-the-4th-light-horse-brigade-at-beersheba

[xxx] Ibid

[xxxi] Ibid

[xxxii] Ibid

[xxxiii] Queanbeyan Age and Queanbeyan Observer, op.cit.

[xxxiv] Australian War Memorial blog, op.cit

[xxxv] Queanbeyan Age, op.cit

[xxxvi] Ibid

[xxxvii] K.Stevenson, op.cit.

[xxxviii] Ibid

[xxxix] Ibid

[xl] Sydney Morning Herald Death Notice, 7 September 1938

[xli] Sydney Morning Herald Death Notice, 27 January 1949

[xlii] Queensland death index

References

Awm.gov.au. (2018). The charge of the 4th Light Horse Brigade at Beersheba | The Australian War Memorial. [online] Available at: https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/blog/the-charge-of-the-4th-light-horse-brigade-at-beersheba [Accessed 22 Aug. 2018].

Drive.google.com. (2018). Jack - Google Drive. [online] Available at: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1g9G5Tkx78DNM8kN0M021R4wGerrZSpX- [Accessed 22 Aug. 2018].

En.wikipedia.org. (2018). Battle of Beersheba (1917). [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Beersheba_(1917) [Accessed 22 Aug. 2018].

Memorial, T. (2018). George John Margrie. [online] Awm.gov.au. Available at: https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/R2053508/ [Accessed 22 Aug. 2018].

Memorial, T. (2018). 11th Australian Light Horse Regiment. [online] Awm.gov.au. Available at: https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/U51045 [Accessed 22 Aug. 2018].

S3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com. (2018). [online] Available at: https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/awm-media/collection/RCDIG1066936/large/5366184.JPG [Accessed 22 Aug. 2018].