Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Son of Roderick William McLeod and Maria McLeod of Rome Street, Newton, Toowoomba, QLD formerly of Drayton Road, Toowoomba, QLD

Medals: 1914-15 Star, British War Medal, Victory Medal

# 768 McLEOD Ronald                        15th Battalion
 
Ronald McLeod was born in the small farming district of Caralulup between Ballarat and Maryborough Vic. He was the only son of Roderick and Maria McLeod. The family moved north to the Darling Downs Region of Queensland where Ronald took up work in the rural areas around Dalby and Bell. His mother described him as a bushman. Ronald’s married sister, Mrs Walker, was living at “Darriwell” Bell.
 
Ronald enlisted in the AIF in Dalby on 24th September 1914, only a few days after recruiting began. He was 26 years old at the time and named his mother, by that time a widow, of Drayton Road Toowoomba. Ronald journeyed by train to the Enoggera Camp where he was drafted into “B” Company of the 15th Infantry Battalion.
 
The 15th Battalion was composed of eight companies; six coming from Queensland and two from Tasmania. The Queenslanders, under the command of Lieutenant James Cannan, a well known Brisbane businessman and officer of the volunteer defence force, travelled by train over several days to Broadmeadows near Melbourne where the Tasmanian companies joined the battalion; which then joined the other three battalions to form the 4th Brigade of the AIF commanded by Colonel John Monash. The 15th boarded the “Ceramic” in Port Melbourne on 22nd December 1914 and sailed for Egypt, arriving in Alexandria on 3rd February 1915.
 
The first contingent of the AIF, comprising three brigades, had been in Egypt since December. It was decided that the 4th Brigade would join with the New Zealand contingent to create the New Zealand and Australian Division. The 15th marched into the Aerodrome Camp at Heliopolis, a suburb of Cairo and began intensive training for the next two months. On 14th April 1915, the 15th boarded two troop ships, the “Australind” and the “Seang Bee” for the voyage to the Greek island of Lemnos where the invasion force of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force was being assembled in preparation for the assault on the Gallipoli peninsula. There was insufficient room for all of the Australian and New Zealand force to be billeted on shore and so the late arrivals remained on board the transports while practicing boat and landing drills.
 
At dawn on the 25th April, the 15th Battalion set sail for the beaches of Gallipoli. Those on board the “Australind” stood off the beach at Cape Helles and observed the British landings there before sailing north to Gaba Tepe where the “Seang Bee” was waiting. The entire battalion was disembarked during the night of the 25th/26th April and bivouacked in a gully until dawn when the troops moved up the gully to relieve the exhausted men at Pope’s Hill who had been holding the precarious position since the previous morning.
 
The 15th remained in the front line mainly at Quinn’s Post with only occasional relief for the next few weeks. Sometime between the 11th and the 13th May (the records are unclear) Ronald McLeod sustained a gunshot wound to his leg. He was taken down to the beach and evacuated to the #1 Stationary Hospital on Mudros, which was the major base for reinforcement and supply for the campaign. Ronald was discharged from Hospital on 29th June 1915. It is unclear if he was posted back to the Anzac Front or whether he remained on Mudros convalescing but on 4th July, Ronald reported sick to the 15th Stationary Hospital on Mudros. Five days later he was listed as dangerously ill with enteric (typhoid) fever. On 10th June 1915, Ronald McLeod died of enteric fever. He was buried in the cemetery at Mudros.
 
Ronald’s file contains numerous items of correspondence from his mother, Maria, who was concerned about the care of her son’s grave. She wrote offering to have a large headstone erected and the grave surrounded by a low white picket palisade. At the early stages of the war, very little thought had been given to uniform treatment of deceased service personnel. When the Imperial War Graves Commission began to consolidate gravesites in the Mediterranean theatre, Maria McLeod chose the following inscription:
IN MEMORY OF MY ONLY
LOVED SON RONALD
THY WILL BE DONE
 
Maria McLeod was granted a war pension of two pounds per fortnight, about half of the value allotment that Ronald had set aside when he embarked for overseas. Maria also received a parcel of her son’s belongings; letters and cards, a wallet, notebook, rubber stamp, badges and coins. It is most likely that Ronald’s sister, Mrs Walker, was responsible for including Ronald’s name on the Bell War Memorial.