Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Son of John DEWAR and Frances DEWAR nee JENKINS

Husband of Doris May DEWAR

Meritorious Service Medal

'This N.C.O. has served in this Unit continuously from 26th January, 1916, to present date during which period he has rendered excellent services formerly as an Artificer and latterly as a Section Sergeant of the Cable Section. His work has been consistently of the highest order, remarkable devotion to duty and gallantry being displayed on many occasions. During the operations in the vicinity of BELLICOURT between 1st and 5th October, 1918, he handled his Section most capably - on one occasion working ceaselessly for 30 hours in maintaining communications that were subject to enemy shell fire and aerial attacks. The Company has materially benefited by his high standard of efficiency, tact, initiative and leadership - qualities that have been prominent at all times.'
Source: 'Commonwealth Gazette' No. 113
Date: 6 October 1919

Harry Claude Dewar was age 25, almost exactly, when he enlisted to join the Australian Army. Harry was born in May 1890, and in May 1915 he enlisted into the Australian Army. Before the war, Harry worked as a clerk, so he wasn’t involved with the army forces prior to World War One. Harry’s religion was a British influenced religion, it’s called Presbyterian. Harry was dark skinned, he was 5 ’11 tall, he weighed 161lbs, his eyes were blue, and his hair was black coloured.

In the war, Harry’s division that he worked in was the 2nd Division Signal Company, which was a group of people who worked on engineering and communications in the army. Harry didn’t “fight” in any specific battles, but his divisions job was to ensure the uplink of communications signals, which meant they had to walk across the battlefield holding a wire during the night, so that way the soldiers could communicate. They also had to go out onto the battlefield and find the broken communications lines, and repair them. However, his division did work in the Gallipoli area, among other conflicts.

Harry won the Meritorious Service Medal, he was recommended for the medal on 9th January 1919.

Harry was quite a good soldier in the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, earning a few promotions during his time in the army. He started ranked as a sapper, moved to a corporal, and then was promoted to a sergeant.

Harry travelled out of Australia towards the fighting on the HMAT Wandilla A62. This boat was a steamboat built in 1912 for the Adelaide Steamship Company, and it was used to transport people from Sydney to Fremantle, then it was converted to a troop transport boat in 1915 and then in 1916 it was reconverted to a hospital boat, coincidentally also being a medical boat in the second world war – but in the end the boat was sunk, accidentally, on the 10th of September 1942 by friendly aircraft.

Australia was fighting in World War one because their primary ally, the British were fighting, and they were very eager to fight because they didn’t have any prior knowledge as to what wars were like; because of this going into the war was honourable and glorious. Because they didn’t know that war is very dangerous, there were high enlistment rates. Though, when the people began to realise that the war was dangerous, and the mortality rate was high, the enlistment numbers began to decline.

ANZAC meant “Australian New Zealand Army Corps”. The ANZACs were the Australians and New Zealanders who fought in World War one on the Triple Entente’s side. The two countries are very close together on the world map, and because of that they decided to work together to fight in wars.

The ANZAC Spirit, was the concept that Australians and Zealanders have similar characteristics, mainly revolving around their attitude during the war, even more specifically, World War One. These characteristics involve; courage, endurance; humour, and loyal to friends.

Harry showed this Spirit, because although the signals company sounds like an easy job, in reality it’s actually very dangerous to run out onto the battlefield to fix communications lines; you’re a sitting duck out there and you’re an easy target, and you will be targeted because it would be strategically smart to take out the enemies’ technicians, because the enemy would be at a significant disadvantage without communication. So the signal company's should be commended for extreme bravery, because although it's not like sitting in a bunker shooting at other people, it's a different kind of brave; risking your life to increase the chance of other people surviving.