Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Henry John Pont

Henry John Pont was born in Tambo Queensland on 7 July 1878. Some sources have his year of birth as 1879 and 1880.  Pont enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force on two separate occasions.  He enlisted at Enoggera in Brisbane on 5th August 1916.  At the time of his enlistment he stated his age as 37 and married to Matilda Louisa and they lived in James St, off Gladstone St, Rockhampton.  It’s not clear if that is the same James St in The Range between Wiseman and Brecknell St.  He listed his occupation as a labourer.  Henry and Matilda had five children at the time.  On enlistment he was six feet tall (180 cm) and weighed 11 stone, 11 pounds (75kg).  He had brown eyes, black hair, was of dark complexion and listed his religion as Church of England.  He was posted to the 2nd Light Horse Regiment Reinforcements training in Enoggera.

On 28 September 1916, whilst still in Brisbane, he was granted six days home leave.  He stated the reason as arranging an insurance matter and “seeing relatives”.  He was granted six day as there was two days travel each way and 2 days at home.  He provided details of the travel in support of his application for leave as follows:

Train leaves Brisbane at 10.10pm and arrives in Rockhampton at 4am.  Coach leaves Rockhampton 6am, arrives Marlborough 4pm.  Coach leaves Marlborough 6am, arrives Rockhampton 4pm.  Train leaves Rockhampton 12am, arrives Brisbane 6am.  I have also to ride 30 miles each way.

So, on this leave he was travelling to Marlborough, not just to Rockhampton.  It’s not clear whether his wife and children had moved to a property 30 miles outside of Marlborough or that the ‘relatives’ that he was travelling to see were different ones to his immediate family.  Alternatively, he may have not told the truth about the destination in order to get a longer leave approved.

On the 16th October 1916, his wife wrote the Army authorities in Brisbane with a request not to send her husband away.  She said,

I have a big family and I think it is a shame for the children not to have their father to rule over them and they are taking it very hard, they are only little and I am not very strong myself and I think it will break my heart if he has to go to the other end of the world where we will never see him again and the children to be left without a father is very hard.

On 24 October 1916, henry wrote to his Commanding Officer asking to be discharged from the AIF.

 In accordance with my wife’s wish, I beg to apply for my discharge for the reason stated in her letter to the Camp Commandant, I have five children whose ages range from two years up to ten.  My wife is far from strong at present and is in a very indifferent state of health.

Accordingly, Henry John Pont was discharged “at own request” from the AIF on 27 October 1916, 85 days after enlisting.  A sixth child, Norman was born in January 1917, so it is likely that the trigger for Matilda’s desperate letter to the Army to get her husband home was the discovery of her pregnancy with their sixth child.  It is probable that when Henry enlisted in June 1916, they were not aware that she was pregnant.  And also that his description of his wife as ”far from strong and is in a very indifferent state of health” was not the whole truth.

However, this is not the end of the story.  On 8th October 1917, just a few months after Norman being born, Henry Pont again joined the AIF in Rockhampton.  This time he was allocated to the 30th Reinforcements of the 5th Light Horse Regiment in Brisbane and was now 39 years old.  While this is older than many of the young men who joined up, it was not unusual for men of this age to join. By now he had six children and he allocated ‘three-fifths’ of his wage from the Army to his wife and children.  This time there was no desperate plea from Matilda for her husband to stay at home and no six-day leave pass.  He trained in Brisbane and embarked on the RMS Ormonde on 2 March 1918 arriving at Suez on 6 April 1918.  He entered the Reinforcement Camp at Moascar on the same day.  He underwent training in this camp until 18 May 1918 when he was transferred to the 11th Light Horse Regiment.  On 22 June he was temporarily transferred to “4 LHTR” (not exactly sure what this is – 4th Light Horse TR?  Possibly a transport unit). He was back at 5 Light Horse but it seems that he was back at 11 LHR the same day.  During July the unit conducted patrols against the enemy (Turkish Army) but no major battles occurred.  

On the 3rd of August he was admitted to hospital with malaria and transferred to another hospital in Cairo the following day. He was discharged from hospital on 7 September and went to a rest camp to recover from the malaria.  He rejoined 11 Light Horse Regiment on 5th October but was back in hospital on 9 November.  During October 11 Light Horse Regiment was conducting patrols looking for elements of the Turkish Army, but at this time, the hostilities had all but finished in the theatre of the War.  An epidemic of flu had hit 11 LHR and virtually took it out of the war.  The Regiment had moved to a town on the western side of the Homs-Allepo Railway.  In November 1918 the unit moved to Zgarta and were there on 11 November when the Armistice with Germany was declared.  An entry in the unit diary records the news “1730 News of GERMAN ARMISTICE received with great enthusiasm”.  

It seems that Henry Pont spent Christmas of 1918 in Cairo, most likely in a rest or training camp and returned to 11 Light Horse Regiment on 8 March 1919.  He embarked on the Dorset in Port Said on 29 April to return to Australia arriving on 9 June 1919.  He was discharged on 17 September 1919 for the second time.  This time he got to the War but saw no action arriving near the end of the War and spending much of his time in hospital.

Henry John Pont was awarded the 1914/15 Star, The British War Medal and the Victory Medal. The award of the 1914-15 Star is puzzling as he did not join up until 1916, at the earliest.

After the War, Pont and his family lived at 21 River St. 

Trooper John Henry Pont died in Rockhampton on 3 July 1943.  It’s not clear whether he was 65 or 63 as his birthday is given as 7 July 1878 and 28 February 1880. He is buried in the North Rockhampton Cemetery and the funeral notice in the paper contained notices from the AWU (Australian Workers Union) of which he was Life Member and the RSSAILA (RSL) requesting members to attend the funeral of their “late Comrade HENRY JOHN PONT”.  His wife Matilda died on 19 November 1963.