Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Son of Richard Edward and Louisa Dale of Murgon, QLD

Medals: British War Medal, Victory Medal

#412  DALE Herbert Henry  41st Battalion
 
Herbert Dale was born in Warwickshire, England to parents Richard and Louisa Dale. The family emigrated to Queensland in 1911 and took up farming in the Boat Mountain area near Murgon.
 
Herbert presented himself for enlistment in Brisbane on 14th March 1916. He was 20 years old and stated he was a farm labourer. His attestation papers record that he was of above average height with a fair complexion and very fair hair. Herbert was accepted into “B” Company of the 41st Infantry Battalion at Bell’s Paddock, Enoggera. He named his mother, Louisa, of Cloyna Bore, Boat Mountain as his next of kin.
 
The 41st Battalion journeyed by train to Sydney in May and boarded the “Demosthenes” on 18th May. The embarkation roll records that Herbert allocated 4/- of his daily pay of 5/- to his mother. The battalion docked in Plymouth on 20th July 1916, having sailed via Durban and Sierra Leone to avoid possible enemy submarine activity. The battalion travelled by train to the 3rd Australian Division Training Camp at Lark Hill on Salisbury Plain.
 
At the beginning of 1916, the Australian Government, at the urging of the British Government, resolved to expand the size of the AIF from 2 divisions (which had served in the Gallipoli campaign in 1915) to 5 divisions. This expansion would be mainly achieved by splitting existing battalions to create a core of experienced men that would then be supplemented by enlistments. An additional division was to be raised entirely in England and was to be made up of units such as the 41st battalion that had been recruited in Australia and then sent to England for further training.
 
This “English” Division was commanded by Major General John Monash, who had been in command of a brigade on Gallipoli. With the exception of a few senior officers, none of the compliment of the 3rd Division had any combat experience. It would be Monash’s task to train his division up to the standard of the other four divisions which spent all of 1916 engaged in the Somme campaign. Monash and his men had become quite famous in Britain at the time, and Monash himself was of great interest to the British public, given that he was not a regular army officer but was instead a lawyer and engineer. The King, George V, wanted to see this citizen soldier and his division of volunteers so he travelled down to Lark Hill on his private train to inspect the 3rd Division. Monash organised a marchpast of the 22,000 men in his division which took several hours to pass the saluting dais while the King and Monash chatted amicably. Herbert no doubt found this a thrilling experience.
 
The entire 3rd Division crossed the English Channel in the last week of November 1916 and went into billets in the area around the French city of Armentieres, on the border of France and Belgium. The 41st battalion had its first taste of trench warfare when it went into the front line on Christmas Eve. For the next six months, the division continued to train interspersed with short periods in the line.
 
Monash had trained his division to be prepared for a huge summer offensive in the Ypres Salient in Belgium. The first part of this offensive was to push the enemy off a ridge which ran from near Ypres south through the village of Messines and on to the French border. The opening of the campaign, the Battle of Messines began with the blowing of 19 underground mines beneath Messines Ridge on 7th June, followed by a massive infantry assault. The 41st Battalion was in reserve for that operation but was soon put into the frontline where the battalion had to endure a record 18 days in the front trenches while being hammered by  constant artillery barrages. When the battalion was finally relieved and back in their billets on 14th July, Henry was promoted to Lance Corporal.
 
In the last week in July, the 41st was put back into the line to hold out against continued counterattacks from artillery. On 2nd August, Henry received a severe shrapnel wound to his back and neck. He was taken out to the 11th Field Ambulance and then on to the 2nd Casualty Clearing Station where he died from his wounds that same day.
 
Henry’s mother was informed very promptly of her son’s death and she asked the secretary of the Murgon Red Cross to write to base records in Melbourne a fortnight after Henry’s death seeking information on the circumstances surrounding his death. Surprisingly, there would not appear to have been any formal request to the Red Cross Wounded and Missing Service in this regard. It is possible that Louisa was able to receive some details from another source.
 
Henry was buried in the Trois Arbres Cemetery at Steenwerck. The Trois Arbres Cemetery contains the graves of some 1700 soldiers, 470 of which are Australians. The cemetery also contains the graves of four deserters from the British Forces who were executed.
 
Louisa Dale was granted a pension of 14 shillings a fortnight. When medals were being distributed to next of kin, Richard and Louisa were living at Indooroopilly in Brisbane.