Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

#2850 MULLER George          41st/42nd Battalions
 
George Muller was born in the Ipswich suburb of Booval and probably attended school there before his parents, George snr and Maria relocated to Wondai. There is some evidence that Maria was described as a “fruiterer” and it may have been that she, and perhaps her husband, had a fruit shop in Wondai. George Muller, on some documents, signed his named with an umlaut above the U in Muller, indicating recent German heritage.
 
George reported to the recruitment office in Adelaide Street, Brisbane, on 11th July 1916. He gave his age as 19 and stated he worked as a plumber. George stated his address as c/- George Muller, Wondai. Young George spent some time in a depot battalion at Enoggera before being allocated to the Depot Signals Company and then as part of the 6th reinforcements of the 41st Battalion.
 
The reinforcements sailed from Sydney on the “Demosthenes” on 23rd December 1916 and arrived in Plymouth, England, after a long sea voyage via South Africa to avoid the threat posed by German submarines. The reinforcements marched out to the 11th Training Battalion at Perham Downs for further training and acclimatisation. It is likely that George continued with his training as a signaller while in camp.
 
On 2nd September, George transferred to the 42nd Battalion, another Queensland battalion in the same brigade of the 3rd Division of the AIF. Six days later, as part of a party of reinforcements for the 42nd, George sailed from Southampton for France. He joined his battalion in Belgium on 10th September 1917. The 42ndhad taken part in two major battles in the preceding months; Messines in June and Warneton in July. When George joined the battalion, it was enjoying a period of rest and training before going back into the line.
 
On 4th October, elements of the 2nd and 3rd Divisions of the AIF attacked German positions on Broodseinde Ridge, not far from Passchendaele. Broodseinde was the last successful action in the Ypres campaign as soon after the Broodseinde battle, the rains turned the battlefield to a sea of mud. During the advance up the slope at Broodseinde, George received a gunshot wound to his left arm. He was transferred by ambulance train to a hospital at Etaples on the French coast and once sufficiently healed was transferred to a convalescent camp at Tronville before rejoining his battalion on 2nd November.
 
The battalions of the 3rd Division spent the winter in camps providing warm accommodation in Nissen Huts, alternated with short periods in the front line near Messines and visits to divisional baths for clean clothes. The collapse of the Russian Front and subsequent peace treaty of December 1917 provided the German command with a force of up to 60 divisions which could be retrained and equipped during the winter in readiness for a spring offensive, in which the Germans would have a numerical advantage. The British Commander, General Haig, expected the main thrust of the offensive to be directed against Ypres and the Belgian ports and he had kept his most experienced and battle-hardened force, the AIF, in Belgium to meet the expected threat.
 
On 21st March 1918, the Germans launched their offensive with most concentration of forces not in Belgium but on the Somme in France. Within days, all of the gains paid for so dearly with British and Dominion blood on the Somme in 1916 were back in German hands. General Haig, feared that if the important city of Amiens capitulated the Germans would win the war. To meet the threat, Haig rushed his most dependable troops, the bulk of the AIF, south to the banks of the Somme and Ancre Rivers.
 
The day after the German assault code named Operation Michael began, the 11th Brigade including the 42ndbegan a move south from Belgium by train, bus and forced march. The 42nd battalion took up a defensive position between the German advance and Amiens on the north bank of the Somme at Sailly le Sec. The only defensive constructions there were old French trenches and dugouts which had not been used since 1915. The 42nd established a number of forward posts manned by machine guns and rifles as a screen while the posts were joined up by new trenches. The signallers were busy laying telephone cables between headquarters and the forward posts and much of that work was carried out while being bombarded by enemy artillery.
 
Reports provided to the Red Cross Wounded and Missing Enquiry Service stated that on 30th March 1918, Signaller George Muller and Company Sergeant Major Stanley Wilson were killed when a 5.9 howitzer shell landed on them as they were repairing a phone line. Both were killed instantly and were hastily buried together in an old French dugout, with the graves marked by wooden crosses.
 
Once the situation on the Somme had been stabilised in May and June 1918, the authorities turned their efforts to returning the personal effects of those men who had been killed in March and April. A package consisting of cards, letters, a pocket book and photos was wrapped up to be despatched to George’s mother in Wondai. The Australian authorities were having difficulty obtaining a ship which would take back to Australia the personal effects of some 15,000 men who had died. In August 1918, the S.S. Barunga became available. The Barunga had originally been owned by a German shipping company and had been commandeered while unloading in Sydney at the outbreak of war. The Barunga, as well as its cargo of mementos, was also carrying a number of servicemen who were being sent back to Australia due to illness or wounds. Not far out from Plymouth Harbour, the Barunga was torpedoed by a German submarine. All passengers and crew were rescued but the old ship went to the bottom with all of its cargo.
 
At the conclusion of the war, the Imperial War Graves Commission and the Australian War Graves Commission began to consolidate the scattered graves across France and Belgium into dedicated war cemeteries. The remains of George Muller and Stan Wilson were exhumed and reinterred in a new cemetery at Villers Bretonneux, across the Somme from where they had been killed. George and Stan were two of four 42nd Battalion men killed on 30th March. In an embarrassing tying error, George was incorrectly shown on the cemetery records as having been awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal, the second highest award for valour. In fact, the DCM had been awarded to CSM Stan Wilson. George and Stan are listed consecutively on the cemetery register and are in fact buried beside each other. By the time the error was discovered, the cemetery register had already been printed and so to this day, the name of George Muller is recorded in the register as having been awarded the DCM.
 
George’s parents chose as the inscription for his headstone:
THE LORD GAVE
THE LORD HATH TAKEN AWAY
HIS WILL BE DONE
Villers Bretonneux has become an important part of the commemoration of Australia’s war dead. In 1938 the Memorial to the Missing, which holds the names of 10,000 Australians who died in France and have no known grave, was dedicated by King George VI. For the last twenty five years, Villers Bretonneux has been the site of an Anzac Day Dawn Service attended by Australian and French dignitaries. The John Monash Centre which was constructed and opened during the centenary of the Great War is also located on the wind-swept hill at Villers Bretonneux.