Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Leslie Gordon   #326 2nd Light Horse and #3038 42nd Battalion/ 25th Machine Gun Company
 
Leslie Gordon enlisted on the 15th August 1914, just ten days after war was declared. At the time he was living at Greenmount between Toowoomba and Warwick and worked as a road contractor. He named his father, Alexander Gordon of the same address as his next of kin.
 
Leslie presented himself for enlistment at Enoggera and reported that he was born at Balmain and had 18months previous military experience in the 14th Light Horse Citizens Forces. On the strength of his obvious horsemanship, Leslie was drafted into the 2nd Light Horse on the 25th August. Barely one month later, and with very little time for training, the 2nd LHR embarked on the “Star of England” from Brisbane to join the first contingent of troops being despatched as part of the Australian government’s promise of 20,000 men for the defence of the empire.
 
Upon arrival in Egypt on the 9th December, the ANZAC forces were greeted by the news that Turkey had entered the war on the side of the Alliance. Training continued in the desert but when the Light Horse were deployed to Gallipoli just two weeks after the first landing, they did so as infantry.
 
The conditions on the peninsula during the summer of 1915 were extremely difficult, with disease rampant due to lack of water for washing and plaques of flies. Unsurprisingly Leslie was evacuated from Gallipoli to the 15th General Hospital with dysentery on 30th August 1915. After a period of convalescence, he returned to his unit on Gallipoli on 9th November where he remained until the whole front was evacuated in December.
 
In Egypt, the Light Horse were reunited with their horses and put into action against an uprising of Sensussi Arabs who were pro Turkey and threatening the Nile Valley.
 
In the middle of February, Leslie was admitted to 2nd Australian General Hospital with rheumatism. He rejoined his unit in early March but by the end of that month was back in hospital suffering from influenza. On 13th May, Leslie was again in hospital, this time diagnosed as arthritis. It is highly likely that the rheumatism, flu and arthritis were all symptoms of a single cause such as rheumatic fever. Medical authorities decided that the best cure was a “Change to Australia”. Consequently, Leslie departed Suez on 24th June 1916. His war was apparently over.
 
July and August 1916 saw some of the heaviest Australian casualties reported from the Western Front. The battles at Fromelles, Pozieres and Mouquet Farm had decimated the four Australian Divisions in the field. In an attempt to make good the losses, the Australian government, at the urging of the British government, wanted to introduce conscription. This could have been done by executive decree as it was in New Zealand but the Prime Minister, Billy Hughes, decided he needed a mandate by way of a plebiscite. The first of the conscription plebiscites, held on the 28th October 1916 was narrowly defeated.
 
It was perhaps in the context of the events described above that Leslie Gordon, having been discharged as medically unfit earlier that year, presented himself for re-enlistment.
 
At his second enlistment, Leslie advised that his address was Mount Gravatt, Queensland. His father’s address was stated as “Camby”, Mount Gravatt.
Leslie freely admitted that he had been discharged medically unfit earlier that year; but the examining medical officer passed him as fit, with the exception of some minor dental work being required.
 
Leslie was given a new regimental number (3038) and joined reinforcements for the 42nd Battalion on the “Wiltshire” which sailed from Sydney on 7th February 1917. Upon arrival in England, Leslie was sent first to the 11th Training Battalion but then was drafted into the 25th Machine Gun Company. Machine Gun Companies were attached to infantry battalions on a rotating basis. Generally, they operated the heavy Vickers Machine Gun in support of infantry operations, whilst the lighter and more versatile Lewis Machine Gun was operated by gun teams within the infantry battalion.
 
Leslie departed for the front in September 1917 and his MG Company was involved in actions at Menin Road, Polygon Wood, Broodseinde and Passchendaele. Together these actions are often referred to as the Third Battle of Ypres and the battlefield was accurately recorded by the Australian photographer, Frank Hurley, in some of his most famous photographs.
 
The winter of 1917/18 was spent by the 25th MGC in rest and support areas with little action in front line areas. Most work recorded in the Company War Diary describes fatigue work and use of the machine guns in an antiaircraft role against enemy artillery spotters.
 
When the German spring offensive of 1918 began on 21st March, initially two Australian divisions were rushed to the Somme. The 25th MGC in support of the 4th Division accompanied the 12th and 13th Brigades. Just before the company was rushed into the line at Dernacourt, Leslie reported sick. His records indicate that this was trench fever; a common disease with symptoms similar to influenza, that was caused by infected bites by body lice (which soldiers called “chats”). By May of 1918, Leslie was in a convalescent depot; and then posted to overseas to rejoin his unit on 23 July 1918.
 
While Leslie had been in England, significant successes had been achieved by the Australians at Villers Bretonneux in April 1918 and Hamel in early July. As Leslie rejoined his company, preparations were being made for the battle which would finally swing the advantage in the British and French favour. The Battle of Amiens on the 8th August 1918 saw the German forces
soundly beaten. The 25th MGC supported infantry that captured the famous Amiens railway gun; the barrel of which is now at the Australian War Memorial. Ludendorff described the 8th August as “the blackest day of the German army.”
 
The Australians were being driven hard by Monash while the Germans continued to withdraw, losing large numbers of men who surrendered, as well as vital equipment. The Germans were close to collapse but so were the Australian infantry. After almost four years of conflict, battalions were down to less than half strength. Men who were not fully recovered from wounds or illness were sent back to their units. Risks that in 1917 would have been considered too great were now being taken as a matter of course.
 
In late September 1918, Leslie reported to a Casualty Clearing Station sick. The initial diagnosis recorded was NYD (Not yet diagnosed). By 13th October he was in Norfolk War Hospital where it was confirmed that Leslie was suffering from “shell shock”. Leslie was still at Norfolk when the armistice was declared.
 
After discharge from hospital, Leslie spent time at Harefield and Sutton Veney before embarking on the “Lancashire” for return to Australia on 7th February 1919. Leslie Gordon was discharged from the army in Brisbane on 4th May 1919. His combined period of enlistment was almost four and a half years, the majority of which he had served overseas. In 1967, Leslie Gordon wrote to the Army to apply for the Gallipoli Commemorative Medallion, which had belatedly been struck to mark the 50th anniversary of Gallipoli. Leslie gave his address as Reynolds Avenue, Labrador. He was 75 years old.