Robert WILLIAMS

WILLIAMS, Robert

Service Number: 2252
Enlisted: 31 August 1914, Melbourne, Victoria
Last Rank: Gunner
Last Unit: 12th Field Artillery Brigade
Born: Warragul, Victoria, 5 September 1891
Home Town: Warragul, Baw Baw, Victoria
Schooling: Not yet discovered
Occupation: Labourer
Died: Natural causes (coronory occlusion), Heidelburg Military Hospital, Victoria, 23 March 1949, aged 57 years
Cemetery: Coburg Pine Ridge Cemetery, Victoria, Australia
Memorials:
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World War 1 Service

31 Aug 1914: Enlisted AIF WW1, Private, 2252, Melbourne, Victoria
19 Sep 1914: Involvement AIF WW1, Driver, 2252, 3rd Field Artillery Brigade , Enlistment/Embarkation WW1, --- :embarkation_roll: roll_number: '3' embarkation_place: Melbourne embarkation_ship: HMAT Geelong embarkation_ship_number: A2 public_note: ''
19 Sep 1914: Embarked Driver, 2252, 3rd Field Artillery Brigade , HMAT Geelong, Melbourne
25 Apr 1915: Involvement AIF WW1, Driver, 2252, 3rd Field Artillery Brigade , ANZAC / Gallipoli
31 Jan 1919: Discharged AIF WW1, Gunner, 2252, 12th Field Artillery Brigade

THE CHARGE OF THE 3rd BRIGADE

Written by ROBERT WILLIAMS – 3rd Field Artillery Brigade, A.I.F.
GALLIPOLI 1914 – 1918

All on a Sabbath morning before the break of day
Australian and allies ships had anchored in the bay
As hard a task as yet was put to any bayonet blade
Was on that Sabbath morning before the 3rd Brigade.

With bayonets fixed they lowered gently in the waiting boat
And gently, firmly, bravely the remaining distance float
When near the shore their destiny, the enemy opened fire
But what is that to those who have but one desire.

With one and all they leaped ashore shouting as with glee
Shouting they ran before the fire to meet the enemy
Bayonets flashed, thrust and tore no enemy did they spare
As cries of surprise and agony before them rent the air.

And at that awful moment all hell seemed loosed on earth
Hell and its awful vision seemed their very end to girth
For neither Turk or German escaped that awful blade
That right, left and front swept all before the 3rd Brigade.

Right, left, before, behind their bayonets thrust and flashed
Still dripping with the running blood, the Turks they bravely thrashed
Socrates of ages past believed the Turk a cur
And stuck beneath the piercing blade to them is but a blur.

Defences of the weeks that pass like a crumbling block
As in the Turkish trenches the Australians bravely flock
The Turks they hardly realize as in that ghastly fray
They are at last the victims of a very famous day.

Slowly yet surely the enemy’s falling fast
And though our lads have suffered great this would not be the last
And months of pent up feelings they dispersed in those few hours
And add to that the bravery it made the trenches ours.

Nothing yet is impregnable the trenches they thought were
But bravery and daring have made a perfect stir
And when the morning sun rose up over the bloody dale
It revealed the last few hours work in a famous awful tale.

And those who gave their very life of victor and of foe
Lay peacefully unheeding in the valley down below
And the Turks when fast retreating knew the greatest charge was made
By the boys in khaki of the Australian 3rd Brigade.

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Incidents on Gallipoli

FIRST WORLD WAR 1914 – 1918
WRITTEN BY ROBERT WILLIAMS
3rd Field Artillery Brigade, A.I.F. (Australian Infantry Force)

Five of us lived in the same dugout in a gully along the beach on the extreme right of Anzac Cove. We were about 100 yards from the main unit. The names of the five are as follows, J.E. Day, K. Tout, E.J. Sexton, C. Densly and myself and a happier crowd under the conditions at that time would be hard to find.

We took everything as a matter of course as they call it. We each took a turn everyday at cooking our rations, the fire place was a kerosene tin laying flat with one side cut out of it which served the purpose very well too. When we were not working we would be hanging around, some of us with glasses and others with rifles trying to snipe the sniper that was always sniping at us.

One evening about 5 o’clock we were out on the beach, handy to our dugout, arguing on war and different things as was our custom at times, when three 15 M/M Turkish shells burst directly over our heads, shrapnel pellets splattered in the sand in between and all around us. If you had seen us run to our dugout, it put me in mind of many bunnies scampering to their burrows when the hunter had fired his gun. Anyway after getting to our burrow I called the roll and found everything correct, total number of men, five. Lucky after a hairbreadth escape from death.

Indian meal was stacked in sacks on the beach blown about by shells. We used to duck down with little bags and fill the, come back to our dugout, boil it up and make porridge then when we started to eat, the first or second mouthful I took I struck a piece of shell about one inch long by half an inch thick, others got shrapnel bullets and all sorts of curious things. It was like looking for three pence in a Xmas pudding.

One afternoon we five and Co. were having a half day off after a heavy nights work and after having a dip in the briny thought that we would hold a concert. Densley and I were the actors, the others were the audience and had dug stalls in the cliff on the opposite side of our dugout. Looked dinkum too. Well we actors got going with a Turkish rifle each and a Turkish bayonet on the end of them showing a fine display of Australian and Turkish warfare. Things were going along famously for a while until Densley had driven me back a little and was just on the point of running me through with his bayonet and this was more than the audience could stand who were worked up to such a pitch that they let themselves go at that moment and opened fire on us with clods of dirt and pebbles. I stopped a clod on the napper and ducked into the dugout for ammunition. When I emerged again the first one I met was Fat Day so I let fat have about a 7 lb lump of rotten cheese right behind the ear hole which sent him down and out for about for about thirty seconds, after that things seemed to quieten a bit and finally we finished up singing and turning into bed.

Another day when we were observing and sniping we saw a Turk coming a long way off round the beach. Now the beach at this point ran a half moon shape from where we were to a sort of point a mile and a half further along, only it was in hostile country. On this point was an old ruined fort which our battleships had smashed up on the day of landing and it was from there we saw the Turk running. Well we had no sooner sighted him than I dived on to my rifle, my mates said “shoot” and while I was shooting Sexton had the glasses to his eyes observing my shots. I had 14 hundred yard range on but only fired two shots when Seco observed a small white flag in his hand so I had to cease firing and wait developments. He came right along to our barbwire entanglements and was met there by some of our officers who in the meantime had come down from H.Q. to see who he was and what he wanted. Of course we five had our frames stuck well in to have a good look as usual. I must state here that this happened about ten in the morning. Well we found out that he was a Turkish captain and had given himself up. He said the German officers were treating them cruelly and for something he had done contrary to them, they had him put under arrest and he was to have been shot later that day, but by killing one of his guards he made good his escape and gave himself up (a wise man I think). I heard later that our heads pumped him and got some pretty valuable information from him and then packed him off on one of the boats somewhere.

19th May I will never forget it in a hurry. I was awakened about 3 in the morning by the roar of guns from the ships and our own batteries. Turkish shells were screaming over our heads and bursting anywhere about our dugout. Hundreds of rifles were cracking and the zip zip and the whistle of the Turkish bullets around about us did not make things any more pleasant. I was wondering whether to cock my head out and have a look or not when we heard a peculiar buzzing sound and before I could wonder any longer, a fuse cap from a Turkish shell had crashed clean through my dixie which was standing on the kerosene tin fire stove. Now this was only two feet from the foot of my bed so it can be easily imagined what kind of a shock I got, so the best thing to do we thought was to crawl as far into the corner of our dugout as possible and there we were safe for about five minutes when we had a call out to carry ammunition, and a very risky job it was, but we soon forgot all danger and set to with a will. We were working like niggers for about two hours when the attacked eased off a lot and we were relived. It turned out to be one of the biggest attacks we had while I was there. Our 18 pounders were firing at the enemy point blank as fast as the gunners could load.

The Turks were swarming onto our trenches in thousands, so one can guess what a loss of life our guns and rifle fire inflicted among them. Well a few days after this attack the enemy wanted a holiday to bury their dead so they were granted an eight hours armistice, this was the24th May. I remember the day well, light misty showers early in the morning had made the ground sticky and the underground was sopping wet. Only our A.M.C. and stretcher bearers were allowed out in front of the trenches among the deaduns and they were to help bury the dead. We could not stand being out of the kill so we got some white cloth and tied it around our arm the same as the stretcher bearers and went too. This was a little after 8 in the morning, we hopped out of the trenches and it was a funny sensation when one thought how exposed he was and perhaps hundreds of Turks dying to pull the trigger of their guns while they had such an open chance but nothing happened so we made our way down a bit of a slope down from our firing line of trenches into a sort of gully, here in places were Turks lying dead, four and five deep, hundreds of them, blood stained rifles and bayonets and pieces of Turks scattered everywhere it looked like a dirty backyard of a butchers shop.
We pushed on from there a bit further and got on to a sort of table land called Lone Pine, it has since been captured by our fellows. Anyway on this day it was a sort of half way between our trenches and the other birds. Along here were figures of our men and a Turk with him, another 50 yards were two more and so on, right along this half way line we could collect all the ammunition, rifles and bayonets and had to bury the dead on our half, they had to do the same, they could not come on our half nor we on theirs, but I made my way up to the line and had a good look at the Turks burrowing. They were digging holes about 6 foot square and about 1 foot deep. Into there they would through about 7 or 8 deaduns and cover them over in a sort of way, it was a common thing to see a leg or an arm sticking out of the ground. By this time I was wet through to the waist from the wet undergrowth and the sun was beginning to pierce down through the clouds which were now fast disappearing, with this came a horrible stench rising from the dead, I had seen all I wanted to see so thought that I would make back again and this was a scene which struck me. I had got onto a little rise and below me was a small valley on the slope and in the bed of it was green grass about knee deep and red and white wild poppies, everlasting flowers and numerous others that

I had never seen before, it looked better than many a nice flower garden I have seen, but the gruesome part of it was, it was peppered here and there with the remains of dead Turks.

I have since got a photo of that lot which I call the valley of death. After surveying this scene for a few minutes I finally arrived back at my dugout and tried to wash events off with a swim in the briny, but I think it must have been about a week before I got rid of the horrid smell out of my nostrils. We got over those effects alright and we are all well, but the Turks are not well, reckon we’ve killed millions of the, haven’t got the V.C. yet. There’s a ship load coming next week for the kangaroo boys I’ll give mine to the [?] for a broach when I get back. I think I’m liking the life here except for the bullets that generally kill a fellow if you are not too careful, there are no undertakers out here. When we want a new kit we generally borrow the clothes and boots of a dead fellow.

We all live in little holes or dugouts as we call them like rabbits and the old Turks keep throwing nasty things call bombs, they are not too nice. One blew a fellows head off last night, poor chap and he had such a nice pair of trousers, I’ve got them on now. The snipers are nasty fellows, darned annoying as my mate would say, one keeps hitting my dugout but I’m going to have the old rascals blood tonight.

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