Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Clive Hobart Butler was born in Prahran, Melbourne, Victoria, in 1881 to Spilsbury and Louisa Butler. He attended school in Victoria before becoming a clerk and later moving to Western Australia.

In 1903, Clive married Dora Smallwood in Claremont where they settled in Hulbert Street, South Fremantle, having five children.

Clive enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force in March 1916, at Fremantle. Initially allotted to No. 53 Depot, undertaking his training at Blackboy Hill, he was assigned to the 18th Reinforcements for the 11th Battalion. He trained with the battalion until May, when he transferred to the 13th Reinforcements for the 28th Battalion.

After attending a machine gun course, Clive was transferred to the 3rd Reinforcements for the 4th Machine Gun Company where departed Fremantle aboard HMAT Seang Bee in July 1916. After arriving in England, he marched into the Machine Gun Training Depot on Salisbury Plain, where he remained until the end of November.

In December 1916 he proceeded for France arriving at the Machine Gun Corps Depot at Camiers, where he underwent further training before officially joining the 4th Machine Gun Company on 14 December 1916.

On 30 January 1917, Clive was wounded in the leg and evacuated to the 13th Field Ambulance before being transferred to No. 45 Casualty Clearing Station. He was then admitted to hospital at Le Havre and, in February, moved to No. 4 Convalescent Depot.

By March of 1917 he had recovered to return to the Machine Gun Depot at Camiers. After several weeks there, he re-joined the 4th Machine Gun Company in May 1917. With his time away from the front had missed the 4th Division's disastrous assault at Bullecourt.

However, the division was given little time to recover before taking part in the Battle of Messines.
He spent the following months in the vicinity of Messines and Warneton, and by September the 4th Machine Gun Company had moved to the Ypres Salient to participate in the offensive operations there.

Throughout September and October 1917, the 4th Division played a major role in the fighting, with the machine gunners providing vital supporting fire. Clive survived the division's principal assaults against the German positions during that time.

It was on the 22 October 1917; Clive was asleep in a dugout on Zonnebeke Ridge when a German artillery shell penetrated the entrance and exploded inside the dugout. Private Gill, who was also in the dugout, survived the blast, but Clive received the full force of the explosion and was killed instantly. Privates Ellis and Reddin were also killed in the same explosion.

Sergeant Dwyer VC of the 4th Machine Gun Company supervised the burial and later recorded that Butler was buried at map a specified map reference with the three men buried together. Private Ellis is the only one that has a known grave at Hooge Crater Cemetery.

Private Clive Hobart Butler, No. 236 of 4th Machine Gun Company, was killed in action on 22 October 1917 at Zonnebeke Ridge. He was 36 years of age.  

With no known grave, Clive is commemorated on the Menin Gate Memorial at Ypres and is remembered with honour.

Clive's youngest son, Private Neil Ormonde Butler, WX3569 enlisted in the Australian Army in May 1940. Serving with the 2/16th Battalion in the Middle East and Syria before deploying to New Guinea, where he fought on the Kokoda Track. He was killed in action on 8 September 1942 and is buried at Bomana War Cemetery, near Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea.