Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Harold Scarce was the only son of Emily Sophia Wippell and Thomas Scarce.  Harold was farming on his parent’s property at Melton when he enlisted in the A.I.F. on 18 September 1916.  Prior to his enlistment, Harold had been a member of one of the volunteer Light Horse Regiments that had been formed in Australia because of the Kitchener Report of 1910.  On enlistment he is described as being 5 feet, 10 inches tall and weighing 170 pounds.  He had blue eyes and brown hair.  Harold was almost twenty-three years old. 

Harold was assigned to the Australian Army Service Corps (AASC), and he undertook training at Broadmeadows before embarking on HMAT Ulysses (A38) on 25 October 1916, bound for Plymouth, England.  While waiting for transport to France, Harold was transferred to the 5th Division Machine Gun, 1st Company, as a driver.  This unit was eventually known as the 25th Machine Gun Company, and it was formed in England from reinforcements.  After the Gallipoli campaign, the A.I.F. recognised the need for increased fire support for its infantry battalions.  While the troops were organised and reinforced in Egypt, the machine gun sections within each infantry battalion were combined into companies and assigned at brigade level.  In 1917, it was decided that each division should have four machine gun companies, so the 25th Machine Gun Company was formed and assigned to the 5th Division, which at the time only had three.  The company embarked for France in September 1917. 

The heavy fighting in France convinced the military hierarchy that more machine guns with better command and control were needed.  In March 1918, the machine gun companies from each divisional brigade were combined into one battalion and placed under divisional control.  The 5th Machine Gun Battalion was formed from the 8th, 14th, 15th, and 25th machine gun companies, and it was placed under the control of the 5th Division command.  The battalion was equipped with 64 Vickers medium machine guns, with sixteen per company.  The water-cooled Vickers machine gun was serviced by a crew of at least three, but often a crew of eight was used, especially if the gun was required to be moved regularly during offensive operations.  The Vickers was famous for its reliability.  In 1916, one British unit was able to keep ten guns in constant engagement with the enemy for twelve hours, firing 1,000,000 rounds.  Burning out and replacing 100 barrels.  All without a single breakdown!  Before the development of aerial and tank warfare, machine guns and artillery were the cornerstones of any effective defensive or offensive operation.  Using barricades and obstacles, an attacking enemy could be funnelled into a kill zone of machine gun fire; this tactic was known as enfilade fire.  In an attack, machine guns were used to provide indirect, long-distance, plunging fire into the enemy’s defensive positions.  New Zealand gunners were especially fond of this tactic, engaging pre-marked targets at night out to 4500 yards!  Machine guns were also used to provide defence against counterattacks when units were advancing against enemy positions.  Because of their effectiveness machine gun positions were targeted by mortar and artillery fire.  The positions were also attacked by raiding parties of grenadiers using the cover of darkness or smoke.  The Vickers was not easily moved and was particularly vulnerable.  Losses among machine gun battalions were heavy.

In July 1918, Harold was promoted to temporary sergeant, but shortly after, he was injured in a gas attack.  Returning to the field, he was promoted to sergeant on 24 August, but once again he was the victim of a gas attack and had to be evacuated.  By the end of September 1918, the depleted 5th Division was withdrawn from the front line, and Harold was sent on leave to England, rejoining his unit two days before the armistice.  Harold returned to Australia onboard the HMAT Port Melbourne (A16), arriving in Melbourne on 20 August 1919.

In 1922, Harold married Lucy May Hardy, and the couple settled down on the family farm in Melton.  By 1931, the couple had relocated to a farm in RosIynmead, near Echuca, where their four children:  Norma, Elva, Rodney, and Lily were born.  In the early 1950’s, Harold and Lucy moved to a farm in Walwa, near Corryong where they remained until their deaths.  Lucy died in 1970, and Harold died in 1975.  They are buried side by side in Corryong Cemetery.