Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

# 466 MACKAY Colin Reay                  9th Battalion / AIF Headquarters Cairo
 
Colin Mackay was born at Warra near Dalby to parents Grant and Agnes Mackay. The family moved to Bell in time for Colin to attend school at Bell and it is possible he had further education in administration and stock accounting.
 
Colin enlisted in Dalby on 24th August 1914. He stated his age as 23 and occupation as stockman, although his mother in later documents indicated that Colin had worked as an auctioneer. Colin advised the recruiters that he served three months with the 14th Troop of the Australian Light Horse at Bell. Colin was given a travel warrant to travel by train to Enoggera where the first of the Queensland recruits were being organised into the 9th Battalion.
 
Uniforms and equipment were issued and rudimentary training begun. The battalion paraded through the streets of Brisbane prior to boarding the transport “Omrah” at the Pinkenba Wharf on 24th September 1914. The “Omrah” departed Brisbane the next day. A scare surrounding the whereabouts of the German Far East Asia Cruiser Squadron forced the troop transports operating in the Tasman Sea to seek safety in Melbourne.
 
The “Omrah” arrived in Port Phillip Bay and the battalion disembarked from their transport in Melbourne and spent from the 1st to the 16th of October in training, with the other battalions of the 3rd Brigade. On the 17thOctober, the battalion was inspected on the Melbourne Town Pier by Prime Minister Andrew Fisher. The Battalion then re-embarked on the “Omrah” and sailed for King George Sound, Albany to rendezvous with the rest of the first division transports before sailing for Egypt on 1st November.
 
The convoy arrived at Suez on 29th November and sailed through the Suez Canal to Port Said and then on to Alexandria where the battalion disembarked and marched into the Mena Camp on the outskirts of Cairo. The three brigades of the AIF, some 15000 men, set about engaging in a training regime first on company and battalion levels and then brigade manoeuvres.  The work was hot and dusty but one saving grace was that Mena was so close to Cairo that men could easily take a tram into the city, whether they had a pass or not, to sample the delights on offer. To the country boys of the 9th Battalion, most of whom had little experience of the world beyond their farms, Cairo and its exotic environment must have presented a memorable spectacle.
 
As the months at Mena passed, it became obvious that the Australians were being trained to become part of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force. On the 1st March 1915, the 9th Battalion and the other three battalions of the 3rd Brigade boarded transport ships for a journey across the Adriatic to the Island of Lemnos where the invasion force for the Dardanelles was being assembled. When the 9th arrived in Mudros Harbour on 7th March, the battalion disembarked and set up camp on the harbour shore from which position, the troops began to practice boat and landing drills.
 
The plan for the landing on the Gallipoli shore just north of Gaba Tepe on 25th April 1915 was for the 3rdBrigade to be the covering force (first ashore) with the 9th Battalion taking up position on the far right of the line, closest to Gaba Tepe and the Turkish artillery emplaced there. The 9th Battalion men boarded the battleship HMS London late on the 24th April. The ships carrying the covering force slipped silently out of Mudros Harbour and headed for their designated station off the Gallipoli coastline. The men in the first wave climbed down the scaling ladders to a destroyer which took them closer in shore before boarding lifeboats which in turn were towed by steam launches to within a few hundred yards of the beach. All of this was achieved in complete silence and when the first of the 9th Battalion men waded ashore around 4:30am, there was very little opposition from the Turkish defenders. A number of men from the 9th took it upon themselves to charge up the steep slopes in front of them without waiting for orders from company commanders. By the time the troops had been reined in to form a defensive line, a number of their ranks had gone well ahead and were probably surrounded by the defenders. They were never seen again.
 
The positions occupied at the end of the first day were as far as the front line would ever go with men clinging precariously to positions that were overlooked by the Turks on the heights above. The 9th Battalion was occupying Pope’s Hill above Anzac Cove. On 5th May 1915, Colin Mackay received a serious gunshot wound to his shoulder. He was taken down to the beach and then was taken off to a hospital ship. Australian casualties in the first few weeks of the Gallipoli campaign were so heavy that the Australian hospitals back in Cairo became overwhelmed. Colin was taken to one of the many hospitals in Malta to have his wound treated and to convalesce. Colin was discharged and returned to the Australian HQ in Cairo on 20th August 1915.
 
Colin was transferred to the staff of AIF Headquarters in Cairo and performed clerical duties, perhaps on account of his having worked in this trade before the war. On 30th August 1915, Colin was promoted to the rank of corporal. The early months of 1916 were a busy time for the HQ staff as the AIF was expanded from two divisions to four with the creation of entirely new battalions which were staffed with a core of experienced Gallipoli veterans. Individual files for thousands of AIF personnel had to be laboriously updated by hand. The AIF moved from Egypt to France once the reorganisation was completed but the Light Horse remained in Egypt and AIF Headquarters continued to maintain records. On 4th May 1917, Colin was promoted to acting sergeant where he was in charge of a team of clerical staff. In November of 1917 he was designated as sergeant and then in May of 1918 was promoted to the rank of Staff Sergeant.
 
In all Colin, served for over three years in the records office of AIF headquarters in Cairo. On 9th December 1918, Colin reported sick to the 31st General Hospital in Cairo. He was diagnosed as suffering from lobar pneumonia, a particularly virulent form of the disease. Colin died of pneumonia the following day and was buried in the New Cemetery at Cairo, which became the Cairo War Memorial Cemetery. His headstone carries the following inscription: HIS DUTY DONE.
 
Agnes Mackay, who was a widow living in Chinchilla when Colin died, received his service medals, memorial plaque and scroll and the balance of his deferred pay.