Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Thomas Craike Rentoul (Rintoul) (1882-1945), Methodist clergyman, was born on 23 November 1882 at Metcalfe, Victoria, one of eleven children of Alexander Rintoul, schoolteacher, and his wife Margaret Macdougal, née Craike, both Victorian born. He was educated at Deniliquin Grammar School, New South Wales. After employment as a grocer's assistant at Deniliquin and Kensington, Melbourne, he began his ministry in 1908 at Neerim South, where a former parishioner described the tall, young home-missionary as 'like a sapling with a head on it'. He was accepted into the ministry in 1910 and appointed probationer at Goroke; next year he trained at Queen's College, University of Melbourne, where he won the William Quick oratorical medal. Probationer assistant at Yarraville in 1912-14, he served at Barkers Road, Hawthorn, in 1914-16 and was ordained in 1915.

Embarking as chaplain in March 1916, Rentoul served in France with the 59th Battalion, Australian Imperial Force. He established a soup-kitchen on the Somme River front and frequently crawled over the battlefield through heavy shell-fire to recover the personal belongings of men killed before writing to next-of-kin at home. Suffering from the effects of gas, he was invalided back to Australia late in 1917. Two of his brothers were killed in action.

Appointed to the Malvern, Melbourne, circuit in 1919, Rentoul served at the new Epping Street Peace Memorial and Darling Road churches, visiting the many ex-servicemen who built their homes in the area. On 23 April 1921 he married Ivy Victoria Comben at Wesley Church, Melbourne. Next year he was appointed assistant director to Rev. A. T. Holden, general superintendent of the Methodist Home Mission Department, and took over Holden's position in 1932; in that year Rentoul became resident principal of Otira Home Mission Training College at Kew. In 1937 he was appointed director of the Methodist Federal Inland Mission where he inaugurated and edited The Inland Link. He travelled widely throughout the remote areas of northern, central and western Australia.

Rentoul's vision, judgement, conviction and speaking and debating ability led to high appointments as leader and administrator in church and community. His influence in social reform, housing and soldiers' welfare extended beyond the bounds of the Methodist Church. He was a thinker and a tireless administrator, with a keen sense of humour. In 1940 he became president of the Methodist Conference of Victoria and Tasmania, and in May 1945 was elected secretary-general of the Methodist Church of Australasia.

In 1937 Rentoul had been appointed Methodist chaplain general with the rank of major general, and he saw service throughout World War II in Australia and overseas. In 1945 he was appointed to an inquiry into offences against military law, courts martial and detention systems.

In his youth he was a competitive road cyclist; later in life he enjoyed reading, carpentry, gardening and fishing. At the time of his death at Heidelberg on 28 December 1945 Rentoul was planning the establishment of peace memorial homes for children at Burwood. He was cremated with full military honours; his wife and two daughters survived him.

http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/rentoul-rintoul-thomas-craike-8185

From How We Served

The final resting place for; - V503497 Chaplain-General The Reverend Thomas Craike Rentoul ED of Metcalf, Glenferrie and Kew, Victoria, had been ordained in 1915, and volunteered for Active Service Abroad with the 1st AIF on the 1st of March 1916.
Thomas was appointed a Methodist Chaplain 4th Class before embarking for England on the 21st of March as a Captain with the Chaplains Department.

By the 17th of February 1917 Thomas had been appointed to the 15th Infantry Brigade and was present for the Second Battle of Bullecourt during May 1917, with which he served with the 59th Battalion until he was wounded in action due to have been gassed whilst in the frontlines administering to the spiritual welfare of those of his Battalion.

Thomas was returned to England for hospitalization and convalescence before being returned to active service with the 15th Brigade as of the 6th of June.
By the 5th of August Thomas was attached to the 10th Training Battalion in England, and due to the death on service of his two brothers, Lieutenant Douglass Rentoul of the 2nd Division Signal Company (Killed in Action at Bullecourt on the 3rd of May 1917) and Private John William Rentoul of the 4th Field Ambulance (Killed in Action in Belgium on the 8th of June 1917), and the lingering effects of having been gassed on duty, Thomas was availed to be returned to Australia, departing England on the 10th of September.

Following his arrival back in Melbourne his appointment with the 1st AIF was terminated on the 16th of March 1918.

With the end of the War in November 1918, Thomas re-enlisted with the 1st AIF on the 25th of March 1919, and embarked for England on the 10th of April, and then accompanied those troops being returned to Australia after being demobilized in England, and embarked for his return to Australia where he arrived on the 1st of September 1919.

Thomas’s official appointment with the 1st AIF was terminated the day following his arrival back in Melbourne.

During the decades of peace that followed the end of the ‘Great War’, Thomas was heavily involved with the Methodist Church, and as of 1937 he had been appointed Methodist Chaplain General with the Australian Military Forces.

With the outbreak of a Second World War, Thomas again volunteered for Active Service abroad on the 5th of November 1942, and was appointed as Chaplain General with the Australian Army Chaplain Service.
Thomas would go on to serve in the Middle East and the South West Pacific Area, with his service during World War Two being continuous, aside brief periods due to illness, followed by recovery on multiple occasions.

With the War having reached its conclusion, Thomas was still on service with the Australian Military Forces but due to illness was evacuated to the 115th Australian General Hospital (Heidelberg), on the 5th of December 1945.

Whilst still under medical care, Thomas succumbed to sickness on the 28th of December, and was aged 63 at the time of his passing.

Having served throughout World War One and World War Two, Chaplain General Thomas Rentoul ED, was accorded a funeral with full military honors, when he was laid to rest within Springvale War Cemetery, Victoria.