Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

William Earnest Ottaway was a fair-haired blue eyed fit young farmer from Port Germain in South Australia standing at 5'7 tall. At the age of 18 and 8 months, he had a medical exam in Port Pirie to join the Australian Imperial Forces. William was considered fit for service and was appointed Private to the B Company in the second Battalion Barracks in Mitcham in Adelaide.  The Barracks were established in April 1915 because the first barracks in Morphettville had become full.  By the time William arrived the tent city had evolved to resemble a small town similar to an early mining town.  There were galvanised iron huts, a hospital, a barber, a post office, churches of various religions a YMCA run recreation centre, camp headquarters and sealed roads. it would have been quite different from life on the farm at Port Germain.  Over 4000 Soldiers did their basic training and William would have spent his days learning the skills of war. His training included Field patrol, bayonet fighting, bomb-throwing and trench digging.  

At the end of training on the 23rd of June 1916, William embarked on the HMAT BULLA to Plymouth England as part of the 27th Battalion.  It took the ship 2 months to get to England. Life at sea would not have been much fun, the ship was not only full of soldiers but carried horses as well, quite often the horses got sick and had to be buried at sea, the smell was bad, and it was very cold at night a lot of the time. The ship William was on was originally a German ship, but it was captured by Australia when it sailed into Melbourne not knowing World War 1 had started. It was originally called the SS Hessen, but Australia named it the "Bulla". 

After arriving in Plymouth in August 1916 William was sent to France near the Belgian border to join the forces there, one month later in September William was taken on Strength to Belgium.  After only 4 months of service, he became ill with influenza and was sent to Hospital in Rouen France.  William was quite ill with the disease as he was hospitalised from December 1916 to the 10th of February 1917. Influenza was common during the war due to the conditions of the battlefield and the proximity of the soldiers to each other, many people got sick and many even died from it.  In February 1917 William was well enough to rejoin the Battalion in France however after only about 3 weeks he was wounded in action and sent back to hospital. William remained in a dangerously ill condition in hospital in France before being transferred back to England a month later to have his right leg amputated at the thigh. 

William had his right leg amputated on the 23rd of April 1917; he had only been the A.I.F. for just over a year. 

In August 1917 William was listed as on enforced leave and he was finally shipped back to Australia in September 1917.  William was officially discharged from the Australian Imperial Forces in May 1918. There are no records showing anything more about William.  All we know of his date of death from a handwritten note in red pen on his Military papers. William died on the 12th of October 1962 aged 64.