Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

William George Grass was born in Trentham, Victoria, in 1884. At enlistment, he lived in Perth with his wife, Annie Mathilda Grass. His occupation at the time of enlistment was as a farmer. He was aged 33 when he enlisted on 31 July 1917.
According to his attestation papers, William had previously joined the AIF but was discharged after 82 days due to disciplinary reasons.

He embarked from Fremantle, WA, with the August 1917 Reinforcements on board HMAT A73 Commonwealth on 9 November 1917. He disembarked at Suez on 10 December 1917 and was Taken on Strength (TOS) with the Australian Base Depot at Abbassia the next day. On 24 February 1918, he was posted to Brigade Details and then Taken on Strength (TOS) with 4th Battalion Imperial Camel Corps (ICC) the next day. Whilst 1st and 3rd Battalions of the ICC were entirely Australian, the 4th was a mix of Australians and New Zealanders.

He was admitted to hospital in Jericho on 30 March 1918, then transferred to Kantara in Egypt on 6 April 1918. He was sent to the Light Horse rest camp at Port Said on 24 April 1918 and, after two weeks, was sent to the Australian Base Depot at Abbassia on 8 May. He returned to the 4th Battalion, Imperial Camel Corps on 25 May 1918. However, his time with the unit was very short, and six days later, he was admitted to the Australian Camel Field Ambulance, suffering from malaria. He then proceeded along the evacuation chain, being admitted to the 36th Stationary Hospital on 5 June 1918, then to Kantara on 6 June 1918 before arriving at the 14th Australian General Hospital at Port Said on 7 June 1918. He remained in the hospital until August. On 6 August, he moved to the rest camp, staying there for eight days before marching out to Moascar on 14 August 1918. While William was in hospital recovering from malaria, he was transferred to the Light Horse Details on 1 July 1918 due to the Imperial Camel Corps being disbanded. As the Imperial Camel Corps (ICC) moved into the northern region of Palestine, its effectiveness decreased. The camels required more fodder and water than an equivalent number of horses, and in areas without desert terrain, horses could travel at a faster speed. The Australians of the ICC were transferred to the Light Horse.

On 1 September 1918, he was marched out to the 3rd Training Regiment and was then taken on the strength of the 10th Light Horse on 3 September 1918. Having enlisted in Western Australia, it was appropriate that he join Western Australia's Light Horse regiment. On that day, the war diary for the 10th Light Horse stated, "Training as per syllabus. Experienced some difficulty with new cavalry training owing to having no instructors and no one with training recent enough to give proper interpretation of training manuals." The regiment was located at Ludd, the city of Lod in Israel today.

On 18 September, the regiment received orders to move to Shrona. On 19 September, the first phase of the final Allied operation of the war in Palestine began. The operation would become known as the Battle of Meggido. Twelve thousand mounted troops and 57,000 Allied infantry would be used in the operation, resulting in a crushing defeat for Ottoman forces. The bombardment began at 0430. At 0830, the 10th Light Horse received orders to move at once as the infantry had broken through at Tabor. The regiment was on the move 30 minutes later as the advance guard for the Australian Mounted Division. The regiment was moving throughout the day, reaching Lesson at 1145, when it watered the horses with buckets from water found in a spring.

On 20 September at 1635, the regiment received orders to attack and occupy Jenin. This attack included part of the regiment attacking 1000 Turkish soldiers in a cavalry charge with swords drawn. The attack was made with such force that after several Turkish soldiers were wounded, the rest surrendered. Another sword-drawn cavalry charge was made later in the day after the roads and tracks running north and northeast were cut. This charge completely demoralised the defenders, which included German soldiers, and the commandant of the town formally surrendered Jenin to the 10th Light Horse with 3000 enemy prisoners taken.

On 30 September, at 2000, orders were received for the regiment to bivouac for the night and be ready to move at daylight the next day to be the first troops to enter Damascus on 1 October. Throughout the night, the 10th Light Horse could hear explosions coming from the city as the Ottomans destroyed their stores of ammunition. They could also see the fires from the enormous dumps of oil that were being destroyed to deny them to the British. In the 10 days of operations in which the regiment had taken thousands of prisoners, it had suffered just three men killed or died of wounds and 13 wounded requiring hospitalisation.

On the morning of 1 October, elements of the regiment captured a troop train at Dumar railway station full of Turkish troops, as well as 800 more Turkish soldiers standing opposite the station. These men surrendered without firing a shot. On entering Damascus, the regiment found a 'huge cosmopolitan crowd cheering the Light Horsemen and firing weapons in the air.' The town's residents were overjoyed at the occupation of the city by British troops and an end to 400 years of Ottoman rule.

On 6 November 1918, with the war with the Ottoman Empire now over after the signing of the Armistice of Mudros on 30 October, William was admitted to hospital in the field whilst the regiment was north of Damascus. He was then evacuated to Abbassia in Egypt, arriving there on 14 November. He was sent to the 2nd Stationary Hospital at Moascar on 2 January 1919 and, whilst in hospital, went Absent Without Leave for two days until apprehended by the Military Police.

On 11 March 1919, he returned to the 10th Light Horse. This return coincided with the Egyptian Uprising, in which men of the Australian Light Horse were used to restore order. On 17 March 1919, the war diary recorded that the regiment was on a train to Zagazig, which was delayed for four hours after three sections of the track were torn up. Fifty men of the regiment were sent to stop Egyptians from carrying out further destruction of the train line. An original member of the regiment, No 443 Sergeant John Mathieson, was killed during this operation, as were several Egyptians. The next day, Sergeant Mathieson was buried at 1600 in the European Cemetery at Zagazig with full military honours. Before the burial, the entire 3rd Australian Light Horse Brigade had marched through the city as a demonstration in force. The regiment's men were used as train guards and picquets on the railway line. At about 1900, the post eight kilometres down the line from Zagazig was attacked by 300 Egyptians. Four men were guarding the post, and only two escaped. Second Lieutenant Robert Wolfred Middleditch and six other ranks were dispatched via a railway bicycle. At the post, they found 272 Corporal James Maxwell Ferguson battered but still alive. The other missing member of the 10th ALH, 3478 Trooper Miles McDonald, had been picked up down the line by a mounted patrol of the 8th Light Horse. The remainder of March 1919 consisted of detachments being sent on other railway line guard duties, including multiple incidents when men of the regiment fired on Egyptians, who were attacking the trains or destroying the tracks. These seemed to be one-sided affairs. For instance, on 21 March 1000 Egyptians attacked a train from Cairo approaching the Zagazig train station. They also threw stones at the men of the 10th Light Horse. The Light Horsemen fired upon the Egyptians for one minute, leaving 39 dead and 25 wounded. 2895 Trooper William Robert Montague was wounded in the neck and shoulder by a shotgun. Similarly, ten Egyptians were killed on 23 March when they were caught tearing up the tracks five kilometres south-west of Dondit. There were no 10th Light Horse casualties.

William Grass remained in Egypt until August 1919. He returned to Australia aboard HT Oxfordshire on 4 August 1919. He was discharged in Perth on 6 November 1919.

Post-war, William and Annie lived in the suburbs of Perth, where he worked as a labourer. He died on 1 July 1955.

He received the British War Medal and Victory Medal for his First World War service. His British War Medal is impressed with 3936 PTE. W.G. GRASS. CML. CPS. A.I.F.