Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Angus, known as ‘Gus’ was the second son born in the Adelaide seaside town of Glenelg on the 29th December 1917. His parents were Jessie Florence (Balderstone) and Duncan Eustace Fraser Dodd. Gus’ siblings included Harry, Douglas, Eunice, and Wendy. (Prior to Gus’ arrival, his parents had a stillborn daughter on the 10th May 1915.) Gus’ father, Duncan was the second son of Josiah Eustace, a renowned pipe organ builder in Adelaide, providing locally made organs for a huge number of Adelaide based churches, including the Norwood Clayton Congregational Church, St Francis Xavier’s Cathedral and Elder Hall to name just three. Over his life Joshua supplied hundreds of organs throughout Australia and New Zealand. Duncan also followed in this profession.
Gus was eight when his 46-year-old mother died on the 24 December 1925. She was buried in the West Terrace cemetery with her parents. Duncan soon re-married Marie Olsen and moved to Sydney to live. Like his father, Duncan was an organ builder and the Australasian representatives of the Rudolf Wurlitzer Company of New York. Gus was sixteen when a huge dispute erupted over the £1,475 costs owing for the installation of a Wurlitzer Organ in the Alhambra Theatre Port Pirie, installed in 1926. The trial continued for several months before the final ruling was that the correct organ was installed and that the contract was one of sale and not of hiring.
Post school, Gus became a Commercial Traveller until aged 22, he enlisted at Wayville on the 5th July 1940 and was allocated the number SX7885 in the newly formed 2/48th Battalion. Just months later, eighteen-year-old Ivan Alfred Laughton also enlisted in the RAAF as 407503. Fighting in the Middle East at the same time as Gus, Ivan died on the 20th June ’42. He crashed while attempting to land through a ground mist after returning from an operational flight. He was buried in the El Alamein War cemetery. Just months earlier, his sister, an 18-year-old stenographer, Joyce Ellen Charlotte Laughton, had also enlisted in February ’42, as 91779 in the Women’s Auxiliary Australian Air Force. (A quirky comment was made on her enlistment forms that she had a ‘Charming smile’, a comment not noted on any of the enlisting soldiers!) Joyce eventually becoming a highly respected telegraphist, and in later years was to play a major role in Gus’ life.
Following leave, Gus was soon embarked for the Middle East, on the 7th November. On the voyage over, he was promoted to Acting Corporal, with the rank of Corporal being officially confirmed in January the following year. Just two months later, Gus sustained a broken right clavicle in Dimra in an accident during May 41, but this did not prevent him gaining a further promotion in October to Lance Sergeant and then Sergeant in February ’42. Inevitably training followed with Gus attending Gas School. His meteoric rise in rank continued with his appointment of Lieutenant in November ’42.
With the 2/48th Battalion completing its extensive time in the Middle East, Gus and his fellow soldiers were able to return to Australia via Melbourne and enjoy well-earned leave in February ‘43. With the dust, dirt and extremely challenging conditions in the Middle East behind him, training in the humidity of Queensland took place. Gus and the 9th Division and were then sent to New Guinea, in August of 1943, disembarking at Milne Bay to face a totally different enemy and in a very different setting. The tropical conditions contributed to a range of severe health issues for Gus, who was also facing the massive, frontal fight for Coconut Ridge where the 2/48th faced machine gun fire on the ground and snipers hidden in the trees as they attempted to take control of Fougasse Corner in November ‘43. At least six men were killed and others wounded. At the same time, Gus was facing acute health issues being severely affected by carbuncles (boils) scrub typhus, dysentery and malaria, all products of his extensive service and culminating on him being placed on the seriously ill list.
The December ’43 issue of the Chronicle listed those from Gus’ battalion who were killed, wounded or injured. They included Killed In Action.— SX7651 Pte. Ronald G. Bowen, Burra; SX12975 Pte. Arnold C. Kerber. Mount Torrens; SX13763 Pte. Eric K. Reynolds, Novar Gardens. Wounded In Action.— SX6837 L-Sgt. Dean H. Adams. Forestville; SX7093 Lt/Sgt. Norman L. Badman, Pinnaroo; SX15377 Pte. William V. Davidson. Mitcham; SX7629 Pte. Charles H. Hewitt. Tumby Bay: SX17852 Pte. Douglas C. Maher. Renmark; SX7292 Pte. Angus J. McMahon, Mitcham; SX17621 Pte. Clarence T. Pickett. ArdrossanSX7690 Pte. Fredrick. C. Serle, Inf.. Robe. Seriously Ill: SX7885 Lt. Angus C. Dodd, Inf., Glenelg.
Gus was transferred on a hospital ship and then ambulance train back to South Australia. Having initially named his father, living in Sydney as his next of kin, with Duncan re-married and challenging communication, at best, by December ’43 Angus nominated his paternal grandmother Mrs Josiah Dodd of Glenelg as his family contact.
His health was so severely affected that he then spent time in Kapara Convalescent Home, at Glenelg, a rehabilitation home for servicemen to recuperate. In Gus’ case, it was septicaemia and from what was initially diagnosed as malaria and scrub typhus in April ’44. By September this condition was further updated to being amoebic hepatitis, a liver infection that is usually the result of a severe infection. Finally in December that year, Gus was able to return to his battalion in Queensland for an amphibious training course in November. By March the following year he was on his way to Morotai and thence to Tarakan for the final days of the war. Prior to leaving a group photo was taken on the Atherton tableland in North Queensland of Lieutenant Dodd with his fellow members of the 6th Platoon, 2/48th Battalion.
In September ’45 Gus’ 59-year-old father died suddenly in the Illawarra Cottage Hospital, Coledale, NSW. He was buried in Woronora Memorial Park, NSW. and described as Brother Duncan, ‘organ builder, of the Old Castle, Tom Ugly's Point, and dearly beloved husband of Marie, of 40 Kirton Road, Austinmer, and loving father of Harry, Angus, Douglas, Eunice, and Wendy, and loving step-father of Daisy and Bill, aged 59 years. Deeply mourned.’
Less than two months later, Gus was finally discharged on the 13th November ’45. Joyce Laughton, 91779 of the Women’s Auxiliary Australian Air Force was discharged ‘on compassionate grounds’ three months earlier, in August ’45, with an exemplary record and the rank of Corporal. She had captured Gus’ eye and in October ’46 the two announced their engagement. They married in a March mid-afternoon ceremony in the St Peter’s Church at Glenelg the following year. Their daughter arrived two days after Gus’ birthday on the 31st December ’48.
Gus died just days after his 76th birthday, on the 31st December 1993 and is buried in the SA Garden of Remembrance.
Researched and written by Kaye Lee, daughter of Bryan Holmes SX8133, 2/48th Battalion.