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#3630  SCHEFE  Henry Christy                                    31st Battalion
 
Henry Schefe was born at Bergen the 10th child in a family of 15 children. His parents, Frederick and Maria were among the first group of German immigrants to Queensland, arriving in the colony in 1863 from Hamburg. The family established a profitable farming enterprise at Bergen just outside Goombungee, which was renamed Murra Murra to erase the German name of the district during WW1. Henry attended Bergen State School and it is likely that a good number of the pupils at the school were his siblings.
 
Henry presented himself, accompanied by his elder brother Norman, to the Darling Downs Recruiting Centre in Toowoomba on 20th January 1916. Henry was 21 years old and Norman 25. Both young men were of above average physique being over six feet tall and weighing around 13 stone. Anti German sentiment in the Australian Community had not reached the fever pitch of later years and there appears to have been no objection to accepting two men with obvious German heritage into the AIF.
 
After being accepted by the medical officer, the brothers went back home with instructions to report to Enoggera on 22nd February 1916 where they were accepted into a depot battalion. In April, Henry and Norman were assigned to 8th reinforcements for the 31st Battalion. The brothers were assigned consecutive regimental numbers. The 8th reinforcements embarked on the “Boorara” in Brisbane on 16th August 1916. Each brother had allocated 3/- of their 5/- daily pay to a bank account in Toowoomba. The “Boorara” called at Port Melbourne and Fremantle to take on more troops before sailing to Durban, Capetown and then Sierra Leone; finally arriving at Plymouth Harbour on 13th October.
 
The reinforcements were transferred to the 8th Training Battalion at Codford for two months before receiving orders to embark on a channel ferry at Folkstone for the crossing to France. Henry and Norman were taken on strength by the 31st Battalion on Boxing Day 1916. The 31st, part of the 8th Brigade of the 5th Division AIF was at that time going through a rebuilding after suffering enormous casualties at Fromelles the previous July. The entire 5th Division was so crippled by the events at Fromelles that it would not be fit for frontline deployment for over a year.
 
The winter of 1916/17 was one of the harshest on record and the Australians were pitifully equipped to deal with the bitter weather. Diseases such as influenza and bronchitis were laying many men low. Troops who were rotated into the forward areas had to endure freezing conditions and if the temperature did rise above freezing, the knee deep mud in the trenches and approach tracks caused many cases of trench feet. Trench foot was serious because if untreated could lead to amputation of toes and even entire feet. Henry was evacuated from the frontline area around the Ancre River with a bad case of trench feet on 21st January 1917. He had been in France less than a month.
 
Henry was taken by ambulance train to a hospital at Rouen before being assessed as requiring a prolonged stay in hospital in England. He was placed as a stretcher case on a hospital ship and transferred to the City of London Hospital, being admitted on 25th January. Henry was not discharged from hospital until the 15thJune when he was granted a two week furlough before reporting to a Training Brigade at Perham Downs. On 4th August, Henry was in Folkstone again for another channel crossing. He marched into the 31stbattalion lines on the 21st August to discover his brother Norman had been promoted to corporal.
 
The latter half of 1917 had seen a change in strategic direction on behalf of the British command. The Somme battles of 1916 and early 1917 had not achieved any worthwhile outcome and attention shifted northward to Belgian Flanders and the Ypres salient. The campaign had begun in June at Messines and once that position had been consolidated, a series of advances were planned heading east from the ruined city of Ypres towards the Broodseinde Ridge and the village of Passchendaele. The five AIF divisions had important roles during the campaign with the 3rd and 4th Divisions having a role at Messines and the 1st and 2nd Divisions engaged in the Battle of Menin Road in September.
 
The 5th Division was to enter the Ypres Campaign at Polygon Wood on 26th September, the first time in action for the division since Fromelles. Some time during the advance under the protection of a creeping artillery barrage, Henry sustained a shrapnel wound to his leg. He was brought out by stretcher bearers to the 17th Casualty Clearing Station before being moved on to the 20th Canadian General Hospital at Poperinghe. For the second time, Henry was carried onto a hospital ship on a stretcher and transferred to the #2 War Hospital in Birmingham. Upon discharge on 12th October, Henry was granted a furlough before reporting to the infantry base at Dartford. He was still at Dartford when the Ypres Campaign ended in failure in the mud at Passchendaele, thus bringing offensive operations for 1917 to a close. Henry remained in England until May. By the time Henry was reacquainted with the 31st Battalion, the Australians were back on the Somme holding back a concerted German advance aimed at splitting the French and British Forces for a march on Paris. The AIF command encouraged constant harassment of the enemy through what was called peaceful penetration while plans were drawn up for a major counterattack.
 
A major battle, planned by Lieutenant General John Monash, took place on the 8th August 1918. The 5thDivision in partnership with the 4th Division advanced the line a distance of almost 12 kilometres. The German Army never recovered from this “black day” as General Ludendorff described it. The success of Amiens was followed up by relentless pursuit of the withdrawing German forces along the Somme, often at considerable cost. With the capture of Peronne and Mont St Quentin in early September, the way lay open to advance to the formidable Hindenburg Line.
 
The Hindenburg Line was a series of fortifications supported by bands of barbed wire and concrete blockhouses. Northeast of Peronne, the Line was constructed adjacent to the St Quentin Canal. The canal had been built during the reign of Napoleon 1 and at Bellicourt it passed through a five kilometre long tunnel. Two AIF Divisions, the 3rd and 5th, in conjunction with two American Divisions were to attack over the high ground at Bellicourt on 29th September 1918. The American troops had only been at war for a relatively short time and were not as seasoned as the Australians who had been on the Western Front for two and half years. When the assault began, the American troops raced forward almost up to the artillery barrage that would protect them. In doing so they passed over dugouts in which German troops were sheltering. As the advance progressed, the Germans emerged and began firing into the advancing infantry from behind, causing high casualties. During this battle, Henry Schefe was killed. His body was carried from the battlefield and buried in the Bellicourt British Cemetery.
 
When headstones were erected by the Imperial War Graves Commission, Henry’s family chose the following inscription: HE LIVES FOREVER IN THE HEARTS OF THOSE WHO LOVED HIM.