Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Private Harry Edgar Watts   SN 5788

Harry and his wife were living in a boarding house in McCrae street, Bendigo when he decided to enlist on March 20, 1916. Two other residents of the same boarding house had enlisted two months earlier in Edwin Hall and P.J (James) Stokes. Living in a boarding house was more common at the turn of the twentieth century than today, and Bendigo seemed to have a plentiful supply of large houses and a fair share of transient men involved in the mining sector.

Harry was 28 years of age and listed Olivea his wife as his Nearest of Kin (NOK). He stated he was a Labourer like many of the other White Hills volunteers.

Enlistment took place at the Bendigo Town Hall, and on Tuesday March 20,1916 twelve applicants presented, with ten passing including Harry.  We read a few days earlier in the Bendigo Independent newspaper, a rosy picture of the recruitment process, no doubt in order to bolster the numbers of those wavering.

BENDIGO OFFICIALS STILL BUSY.                                                   'Lieut. Dyett and his small staff are doing good work at the Town Hall recruiting depot. The number of applicants continues most satisfactory, and the facility with which the various processes up to the acceptance or rejection stage are carried out, speaks volumes for the pleasant understanding between the officer and his assistants, who are most courteous and obliging as well as full of energy.' (Source-  Trove Bendigo Independent Newspaper March 16, 1916.)

Upon enlisting, Harry is assigned to the 18th Reinforcements for the 6th Infantry Battalion. At this stage of the war, you were given little choice of which unit you ended up in, unless you had specific skills or were well connected. Tuesday's March 20 recruits would go into the 6th Battalion, the next day another Victorian Battalion was prioritised. 

The initial men recruited into 6th battalion were either dead or if lucky, had survived 7 months of harrowing conditions clinging to the cliffs and beaches on the Dardanelles Peninsula, in Turkey. The 6th Infantry Battalion had suffered greatly in the landing at Anzac Cove, and subsequent battles at Cape Hellas and Lone Pine before the evacuation in late December 1915.   

The week after Harry enlisted he would go into the 16th Depot camp at the Bendigo racecourse in Epsom, however only for a few days. In early April (2) he would along with other reinforcements for the 6th battalion make their way by train to Melbourne and then to the Broadmeadows camp, the home of the 6th.  

Harry and many thousands of reinforcements would be in training at the Broadmeadows camp for three months until they embark for war on July 3, 1916. They would leave from Station Pier at Port Melbourne on board the HMAT A33 Ayrshire. (See photos)

The Ayrshire was owned by the Scottish Shire Line Ltd of London, and was leased to the Commonwealth until 9 Jan 1918. She made five completed trips from Australia. Post war she returned to her cargo carrying role until 28 Nov 1926 when she caught fire while en-route to the UK from Brisbane, and sank.  (source - https://birtwistlewiki.com.au/wiki/HMAT_A33_Ayrshire )

The two-month journey would have been long, hot and arduous. Arriving  at the port of Plymouth on the south coast of England on September 2, 1916 would have presented quite a contrast in scenery and climate for the Australian soldiers.  

On September 15th, Harry and the reinforcements off the ‘Ayrshire’ would be ‘Marched In’ to one of the many AIF training camps in and around Weymouth on the south coast.

The 6th battalion, like the 5th, 7th and 8th Battalions, were all recruited from Victoria and together, formed the 2nd Brigade of the 1st Division.  Reinforcements for the 1st Division, like Harry most likely were sent to Perham Down which was the No.1 Command Depot accommodating 4,000 men in 1916. They would not be there long as they are to ‘Proceed for Overseas’ (POS) to France on October 8, 1916 arriving at the British and Dominion forces main depot town of Estaples.

Two weeks later on October 22, Harry is transferred (Taken on Strength) into the 14th Battalion from the 6th Battalion. No reason is provided on his Service Record, however, at this time, reorganisation of troops within battalions and maintaining battalion strengths was a constant in the field in France and Belgium. The word 'Strength' is written in the margin of Harry's Service Record.  

Whether connected to this move or not, Harry runs into trouble with authorities in the 14th Battalion very early. He is charged with being ‘Absent Without Leave’ (AWL) from his billet, obviously in the evening of October 28, just six days after joining his new battalion. His punishment is forfeiture of seven days pay administrated on October 30. In November (7) we read Harry is with his unit in the field, that is manning trenches on the Somme.   

Harry was probably most fortunate to miss the 14th Battalion's first major engagement in France which came in August 1916 when they were committed to the fighting at Pozières. The Australian official historian Charles Bean wrote that Pozières ridge "is more densely sown with Australian sacrifice than any other place on earth”. The Australians had suffered as many losses in the Battle for Pozières in six weeks as they had in the Gallipoli Campaign.

Harry arrival in November would mean he spends the winter of 1916/17 and all of 1917 in the trenches on the Somme Valley. On January 31, 1918 he admitted to the 13th Field Ambulance station in Northern France having been ‘Gassed in Action’, with the initials NYD meaning ‘Not yet Diagnosed’. Later we read on his service record, that it was ‘mustered gas’.

Poison gases had become widespread, particularly on the Western Front. Three forms of gas remained the most widely used: chlorine, phosgene and mustard. The most widely used, mustard gas, could kill by blistering the lungs and throat if inhaled in large quantities. Its effect on masked soldiers, however, was to produce terrible blisters all over the body as it soaked into their woollen uniforms. Contaminated uniforms had to be stripped off as fast as possible and washed - not exactly easy for men under attack on the front line. (Source -http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-31042472 ) 

The death toll from gas warfare was never accurately reflected as many more men died prematurely after the war due to weakened lungs that left them susceptible to respiratory problems.  (Source -https://infogram.com/effects-of-gas-during-wwi-1gdk8pdw5xee2q0 )

Harry’s condition does not improve at the 13th Field Ambulance station and on February 2, he is transferred to a French port of Boulogne and admitted to the 7th Stationary Hospital. On February 17, his condition warrants a return to England for treatment and he is taken on board the Hospital Transport (H.T) Cambria.

In England, he is admitted to the Military Hospital at Bethnal Green, in the east end of London and treated there until the end of February. From there he is transferred to the 3rd Australian Auxiliary Hospital at Dartford on the east coast, discharged 5 days later to the AIF on March 4 to an AIF camp at Hurdcott near Salisbury. A month later he is moved to another camp known at Longbridge Deverill in Wiltshire in early April. Here he would spend another month recuperating until deemed well enough to return to the front in France.

On May 1, 1918, Harry would again sail to France leaving via the port of Folkestone once again. It is impossible to comprehend Harry’s emotional state on this voyage. No doubt a mixture of emotions in returning to the horror of where he was gassed, however, an opportunity to see old mates and join the final push to end to war may have also spurred him on.

Harry is ‘Marched In’ to the Australian Infantry Base depot (AIBD) in Le Havre the next day, May 2 and within two weeks is back with his unit in the field. In mid May, the AIF and Canadian troops had repelled a major German Offensive on the Somme in the March and April of 1918. The nature of the conflict in this theartre of the war had moved from trench warfare to a more open ground battle to move quickly and take a large number of yards from the enemy. This suited the Australian soldiers and they had commenced a process of gaining ground using ‘Peaceful Penetration’.     

'Peaceful Penetration' was a term applied to Australian infantry tactics used in the period May to August 1918 (although it was also used by the New Zealanders), which was a cross between trench raiding and patrolling. The aim was similar to trench raiding (namely, to gather prisoners, conduct reconnaissance and gather intelligence), but increasingly the aim was to dominate no man's land and where the situation presented itself, the additional purpose of capturing and occupying the enemy's outpost line (and so capture and gain ground). (Source - https://rslvirtualwarmemorial.org.au/explore/campaigns/31 )

Harry would serve with the 14th continously through to it's end. He would no doubt have been involved in the strategic battle on August 8 at Le Hamel which saw the Australian forces route the Germans in strategically planned event by the new leader of all Australian forces in Major General Sir John Monash.   See details of this battle on this website - https://rslvirtualwarmemorial.org.au/explore/campaigns/33 )

This advance by Australian troops was the greatest success in a single day on the Western Front, one that German General Erich Ludendorff described as "the black day of the German Army in this war...". 

The 14th battalion continued operations until late September 1918. At 11 am on 11 November 1918, the guns fell silent. In November 1918, members of the AIF began to return Australia for demobilisation and discharge.  (Source - https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/U51454 )

Harry would serve through the winter of 1918 / 1919 following the Armistice. In late March (22)1919, he would be stamped as eligible for a passage home. He would head back to the AIBD depot in Estaples and on March 31, gain a passage to England. A few days later, he would be back in Engalnd for a third time, again in the AIF camp at Hurdcott. It was a waiting game until your number came up for a Passage home and critical shortage of Troop transports compounded the wait.

On May 12, he would board the 'H T Port Napier' for the long sea voyage home. It would be 7 weeks at sea before Harry was back in Australia to his wife Olivea in Bendigo on July 2, 1917. Harry had been gone from Australian shores three years almost to the day.He had suffered a sever mustard gas attack, survived the trenches and took the fight up to the Germans in the crucial battles of 1918 that led to an Allied victory.

Private Harry Edgar Watts of the 14th Infantry Battalion is remembered by the people of White Hills. The names of the local lads who sacrificed their lives and those that were fortunate to return from the Great War are shown on the embossed copper plaques on the White Hills Arch of Triumph, at the entrance to the Botanic Gardens.