Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Son of William and Mary Ann Luckett of Nymboida, NSW

Husband of Levenia G. Luckett of Griffiths Avenue, Ryde, NSW

Medals: 1914-15 Star, British War Medal, Victory Medal

Served with the NSW Police for about 3 years

THE WAR
Died for His Country.
A Ryde Hero.
Lance-corporal Joseph Edward Luckett, a well known Ryde man, has died of wounds sustained at the Dardanelles. He was 32 years of age, and had served in the N.S.W. Police for three years at Parramatta, Helensburgh, and Ryde. After 18 months in the force at Ryde he resigned from the service and engaged in contracting work. When war broke out he was in Queensland, and on the 5th August he enlisted and was appointed to a machine gun section in the 9th Battalion, Third Brigade. On the 25th April last he was wounded in the leg by a shrapnel ball at the Dardanelles; but when this healed he went back to the front again. He was again wounded, and died from those wounds on the 29th. June. Whilst at Ryde he married Miss Renie Deane, of Ryde. His last letter to his wife contained the following:— "My dearest Renie,—
I have arrived at the front again, and am amongst the Turks, but they are very quiet now. My wound is perfectly healed, and I am having a good time, and keeping in the best of health. Renie, write
to mother for me, and tell her I am quite well. I have only one envelope, so be sure and write as soon as you get this. Your ever loving husband." In a previous letter he wrote that he was sending some trinkets, and the shrapnel ball that was taken out of his leg. "I hope to be going to the front again," he wrote;
"I may get through it all right. One never knows one's luck."

 
#56  LUCKETT Joseph Edward  9th Battalion
 
Joseph Luckett was born at Grafton to William and Mary Ann Luckett. He attended Grafton Public School. Joseph was accepted into the NSW Police Force where he served in a number of stations in suburban Sydney. While a serving police officer, he married Lavinia Deane and the couple lived in Griffiths Avenue at Ryde. After three years in the police force, Joseph resigned and went contracting in the country. It seems Lavinia remained in Sydney.
 
In August 1914, when the War broke out, Joseph was probably working as an itinerant worker in the North Burnett district. Like many of the men from the district, he travelled by train down to Maryborough when he enlisted on 22nd August 1914. His low service number indicates that he was one of the first to enlist. Joseph stated his occupation as blacksmith. Curiously, he did not name his wife as next of kin on his enlistment papers; in fact, he answered No to the question, “Are you Married?” Joseph named his mother of Nymboida as his next of kin.
 
Joseph travelled by train to Brisbane and then on to Enoggera where he went into camp and was drafted into the Machine Gun section of the 9th Battalion which was being raised as part of the first Australian contingent to be placed at the disposal of the British government. After a period of hasty preparation and issuing of equipment, the men of the 9th Battalion boarded the “Omrah” at Pinkenba wharf on 24thSeptember. The battalion consisted of 32 Officers, 999 ordinary ranks and 15 horses. The embarkation roll shows Joseph had been promoted to Lance Corporal.  
 
The original plan was for the convoys of ships carrying the first contingent of the AIF to assemble for a hasty departure for Europe but fears surrounding the exact location of Admiral Graf von Spee’s China Squadron of battleships and cruisers held up the departure until verification was received that the German squadron was in the central Pacific heading towards South America.
 
While waiting for the all clear, the men of the 9th Battalion disembarked in Melbourne for further training. In late October, the 38 ships that would make up the first contingent of Australian and New Zealand troops assembled in Albany, Western Australia and set sail on the 1st November 1914. During the voyage, the Australian Cruiser HMAS Sydney encountered the one ship which had detached from von Spee’s squadron and had been terrorising ports in the Indian Ocean. The sinking of the SMS Emden was greeted with great joy amongst the men on board the transports. Four German officers and 40 ratings, survivors of the sinking of the Emden were transferred to the “Omrah” from one of the escorting destroyers at Colombo. Also, during the voyage, news was received that Turkey had entered the war on the side of Germany and Austria Hungary which changed the plans for the Australians and New Zealanders.
 
On 6th December 1914, the “Omrah” arrived in Alexandria in Egypt. The Emden prisoners were handed over to the Port Provost Marshall and the 1000 odd troops disembarked and travelled by train to a camp site at Mena in the outer suburbs of Cairo, under the shadow of the Great Pyramids. The war diary of the 9thBattalion is fairly sparse in the description of the period from December to February; with most days taken up with training at company, then battalion and finally brigade level. At the same time, the idea of an assault on the Dardanelles began to gain support within the British War Office. A fleet of aging battleships and cruisers was assembled to force passage through the Dardanelle Straits but met with unexpected resistance. To supplement the naval campaign, a series of amphibious landings by infantry was added to the overall plan.
 
The four brigades of AIF infantry plus a brigade of New Zealanders were to land about half way up the Gallipoli Peninsula. The 9th Battalion, as part of the 3rd Brigade of the AIF, boarded transports in Alexandria on 1st March 1915 and set sail for Mudros Harbour on the Greek Island of Lemnos where they were put ashore and camped under canvas. The 3rd Brigade was to be the first group of troops to go ashore and the men spent almost 7 weeks practising boat drills in Mudros harbour.
 
At the landing on the 25th April 1915, the 9th Battalion was positioned at the far right of the line as the men rowed quietly towards the shore. The first wave of Australians suffered relatively few casualties and quickly scrambled up the steep terrain to establish firing positions. Joseph, as a lance corporal in charge of a section of men, would have been in the thick of the action on that first day.
 
Four days after the landing, Joseph was wounded by a piece of shrapnel. He was evacuated to a hospital ship off shore and may then have been transported to the Australian General Hospital on Lemnos. With his wound healed, Joseph returned to Anzac on the 18th May. Two days later he was promoted to full corporal. The latter half of May was a period when the Turkish commanders tried to drive the Australians into the sea by launching a series of headlong bayonet charges from the heights down on to the Australian positions. In spite of crippling casualties incurred by the Turks, they were unable to dislodge the Australians. The bodies of the dead lay out in no man’s land and a cease fire was agreed to allow for the burial of the dead.
 
After a month of fighting during which neither side could gain superiority, the battle began to develop a routine of bomb throwing, occasional shelling and sniping. For reasons that are not made clear, Joseph faced a Field Court Martial on 10th June. Whatever his perceived crime or crimes, he was found not guilty and presumably he returned to the line with his platoon.
 
In late July, Joseph was wounded a second time. One entry in his file notes that he received a shrapnel wound in the buttock but his death certificate states a compound fracture of the thigh. He was evacuated to the Hospital Ship “Sicilia”, where died on 27th July 1915. Joseph was buried at sea with a Chaplain officiating.
 
Joseph’s name appeared in the daily casualty lists that were published in the major newspapers and it may have been this which alerted Lavinia Luckett to write to the authorities regarding his death. Joseph’s file is missing a deal of correspondence between the authorities and it can only be speculated as to the sequence of letters. It does appear that Lavinia sent her marriage certificate to Melbourne where the document was “scrutinised” on 12th September 1915. From that point on, Lavinia became the official next of kin. There is no record of her having been granted a widow’s pension. Lavinia continued to reside at “Lala” in Griffiths Avenue in Ryde and it was to this address that service medals, a memorial plaque and scroll were sent in the 1920s.
 
Remarkably, Joseph Luckett is only commemorated on the one war memorial in Australia; the Degilbo Shire memorial. This inclusion is probably due to a friend adding Joseph’s name to the memorial. It seems that neither his mother nor his wife chose to have his name added to Honour Rolls in NSW. Corporal Joseph Luckett is commemorated on the sandstone tablets of the Lone Pine Memorial, Gallipoli.