Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

# 5070  LOVEJOY George Henry         49th Battalion
 
George Lovejoy was born at Goombungee near Acland on the Darling Downs to parents William and Annie Lovejoy. At some time in George’s young life the family moved to the Bell district where their address was “Spring-grove” Bell.
 
George attended the Toowoomba recruiting office on 7th January 1916. He stated his age as 19 years and gave his occupation as labourer. George’s father had died some years before and George named his mother, Annie, as his next of kin. It is quite possible that George’s enlistment inspired another young man from Bell, Will Hutchinson, to also join the AIF as the two young men experienced almost parallel journeys to war.
 
George and Will travelled by train down to Enoggera where they were placed in a depot battalion before being allocated to the 13th reinforcements of the 26th Battalion in April. On 4th May, the reinforcements boarded the “Seang Choon” in Brisbane and disembarked at Tel el Kabir in Egypt a month later. The 26thBattalion, part of the 2nd Division AIF, had left Egypt a month earlier and was already stationed in the northern sector of the Western Front near Armentieres. George, Will and the rest of the reinforcements remained in Egypt while the authorities decided what to do with them. Eventually the reinforcements were sent to the Australian camps at Rollestone on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire. While in camp, George was charged with being absent without leave from a church parade and was fined 7 day’s pay.
 
The great Somme offensive of 1916 began on the 1st July and by the beginning of August, the Australians of the four divisions in France had faced enemy action for the first time. The 2nd and 4th Divisions in particular sustained heavy casualties at Pozieres and Mouquet Farm, and the 5th Division was so badly mauled at Fromelles that it was ruined as a fighting force for the next 12 months. To make good the losses, the reinforcements in England were sent to the large British depot at Etaples on the French coast just south of Boulogne. George and Will arrived at the 2nd Division Base at Etaples on 2nd October where they were reassigned to the 49th Battalion, part of the 4th Division AIF.
 
George and Will had to journey north into Belgian Flanders to join up with the 49th which was in billets near Ypres. Soon after marching in to camp on 17th October, they were on the move again when the 13thBrigade, which included the 49th Battalion, was ordered south to the Somme where they went into the line near Bapaume in late November 1916.
 
Douglas Haig’s great Somme offensive had spluttered to a halt in the mud and frost of the approaching winter. Haig wanted to push the front forward from Flers towards the high ground of Bapaume to get his men out of the mud. During an attack against entrenched German defenders at Flers, it was reported that Will Hutchinson was killed in action. George continued to endure the harsh winter in the trenches on the Somme. He was charged with losing his rifle due to neglect and had the cost of the weapon, five pounds ten shillings, deducted from his accumulated pay.
 
During the lull in fighting that winter, the Germans took the opportunity to construct a 150 kilometre long defensive barrier, which they named the Seigfreid Position but the British labelled the Hindenburg Line, some distance to the east of their previous positions astride the Somme. Once the roads were again passable, the German forces began a strategic withdrawal to this new position. The British forces cautiously followed, taking the town of Bapaume along the way. By the first week in April, elements of the 5th British Army under General Gough, which included two Australian divisions, came up against the Hindenburg defences at Bullecourt and Noreuil.
 
During an attack by the 49th Battalion on a railway cutting near Noreuil, it was reported that George Loveday had been killed in action. There was no burial report and it is likely that George’s body was never recovered. His sister, Edith, wrote to the authorities on behalf of George’s mother asking for any personal effects to be forwarded to Annie who was grieving for the loss of her son. The file does not indicate that any items were ever forwarded to her.
 
 
In 1938, some 20 years after the end of the First World War, the Australian Government constructed the Australian National Memorial at Villers Bretonneux. The memorial was dedicated by the newly crowned King George VI. The memorial records the names of over 10,000 Australian soldiers who lost their lives in France and have no known grave; George Lovejoy among them.