Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Born in Melbourne on the 24th July 1908, to Annie and Vivian Rule, Charles Bruce and his sister Joy moved to Adelaide with their family. Their father, Vivian Rowland (Rollie), a bricklayer at the time, had served in WWI as Number 2479 in the 48th Battalion. He served in France before returning to England for medical treatment and eventually back to Adelaide.
Charles had married Jessie Kathleen with the young couple living in Fullarton, a suburb of Adelaide. He worked as an upholsterer, forming his own business, called Ideal Upholstery based in Grote Street. However, many conditions, including the Depression, meant that Charles’ business had to go before the Bankruptcy Court in 1940. It appeared that while 31-year-old Charles’ skills were in his trade but Judge Paine, hearing his case commented that Charles showed “a woeful lack of appreciation of the essentials of carrying on business." He added that “his operations, were conducted with reckless optimism.” The Official Receiver (Mr Burns) reported that the bankrupt attributed his position to “losses on trading, due to the failure to include overhead expenses in the selling prices of his suites; that they amounted to 12/6 a suite on an output of up to 20 suites a week. The Official Receiver was of opinion that inefficient management was the cause of bankruptcy.”
This was a dire situation for Charles and Jessie. With the outbreak of WWII, just prior to his 32nd birthday, he therefore followed in his father’s footsteps enlisting to serve on the 1st July ’40. He was given the number SX7313 and coincidentally, allocated to the newly formed 2/48th Battalion. Charles’ initial days were spent in the cold of the Pavilions, now part of the Royal Adelaide Showgrounds before the new enlistees headed to Woodside for their preliminary training.
Following brief per-embarkation leave Charles returned to the 2/48th with his contingent then embarking on the Stratheden for the Middle East, on the 7th November 1940, arriving on the 19th December 1940. There the recruits completing a few months training in Cyrenaica. The battalion was soon on their way to serve in Tobruk, Syria and Egypt. By the start of April 1941, the 2/48th were in Tobruk where the dust, flies, heat, minimal water supplies and constant bombardment were quite a challenge to new enlistees. They were to become the famed Rats of Tobruk.
Conditions were ever-changing and the fighting continuous. John Glenn in Tobruk to Tarakan wrote that “The battalion was continually harassed by enemy artillery, mortars and machine guns, so that movement by day was absolutely impossible. Ration trucks were forced to come up from B Echelon at night, bringing the one ot meal for the day with them.” On the 4th July in the recently published Derrick VC In His Own Words by Mark Johnson, Derrick records that “Fritz went horribly close and that’s something he is doing too often – Fritz has just scored a lucky one on our firing aperture and Jack Brice has been killed Tommy Hill a nasty head wound, Jack Pascoe face injuries and chest wound.”
It was during this encounter that Charles received a shrapnel wound to his left thumb causing him to be evacuated to hospital. The Chronicle reported his injury on the 24th July and the names of others from his 2/48th Battalion. They included: Killed In Action.— Pte. John B. Brice, SX6827, Broken Hill, N.S.W. Died Of Wounds.— A/Cpl. Arville T. Todd, SX9384, Berri, S.A.; Wounded In Action.— Pte. Albert J. Pascoe, SX4804, South Broken Hill (N.S.W.) and Pte. C. B. Rule, SX7313, Fullarton.
By January ’42 Charles had been appointed to Lt/Corporal and graded as a Group III clerk. By July that year he had returned to Australia via Sydney, then soon after was attached to the Movement Control Group. Training in Queensland followed before he was then posted to New Guinea and a further promotion to Warrant Officer II, continuing to serve in that country until the war concluded.
Charles survived the war and was eventually discharged with the rank of Warrant Officer Class 1 in November ’45. In a fitting acknowledgement of Charles’ service, in February ’46 he was Mentioned in Despatches for his distinguished services in the South-West Pacific Area.
Returning home, Charles had some time with his family until his 71-year-old father, Vivian a WWI veteran died on the 14th January ’53 and was buried in the West Terrace Cemetery. There a headstone in recognition of Vivian’s war service stands.
Just three years later, aged 48, Charles died on the 6th April ’57. He is buried in the Derrick Gardens at Centennial Park Cemetery, Path 5 Grave 84. The inscription reads ‘Greater love hath no man than this that he lay down his life’.
Researched and written by Kaye Lee, daughter of Bryan Holmes, SX8133, 2/48th Battalion.