by Honor Auchinleck
Based on two talks on 27th October 2017 to members of the Light Horse Memorial Park Inc (Seymour) & the second on 30th October 2017 to members of the Seymour Rotary Club.
Background: The Light Horse and General Sir Harry
General Sir Harry Chauvel wrote in the Preface to Australia in Palestine (1919), that the Australian Light Horseman ‘is a type peculiarly his own and has no counterpart that I know of except in his New Zealand brother. His fearless initiative and endurance, and his adaptability to almost any task, are due to the adventurous life he leads in his own country, where he has been accustomed to long hours in the saddle, day and night, and facing danger of all sorts from his earliest youth. Perhaps these qualities are inherited from his pioneer parents. This invariable good humour under the most adverse conditions comes from the good-fellowship and camaraderie which exists in the free and open life of the Australian Bush. His chivalry comes from the same source, and it is one of his strongest points. In other words, the life he has been accustomed to lead has fitted him to become, with training and discipline, second to no cavalry soldier in the world.’ [1]
I wonder how many Light Horsemen trained here where the Light Horse Memorial Park [2] stands today and how many went on to serve with Chauvel? How many of those Light Horsemen came from the Seymour district and rode their horses into town to enlist? Undoubtedly someone knows the answers – the pattern would have been much the same across country Australia. While I’m not a military historian, having been an Army wife for 27 years must have something to do with it. It is easy to understand how military history begins to grip those with military links. From a distance, I have watched with interest Seymour’s Light Horse Memorial Park develop from its inception into becoming a place of evocative, peaceful beauty and reflection.
Just like the Light Horsemen Chauvel described in his preface to Australia in Palestine, he too was accustomed to long hours in the saddle, day and night, and facing danger of all sorts from his earliest youth. He was born on 16th April 1865 at Tabulam on the banks of the Upper Clarence River in Northern New South Wales. Aged six in 1871, he rode with his older brother Arthur 102km to Grafton to catch the ship to Sydney from where they travelled on to Belcher’s school just outside Goulburn in New South Wales. The fact that Harry Chauvel achieved zero for mathematics in 1871 might only be attributed to his youth and that he was a long way from home. His early school results certainly didn’t impede his progress in later life. Later Harry went on to Sydney Grammar and then in 1880 to Toowoomba Grammar School to finish his schooling. His ride with his younger brother Allan to Toowoomba Grammar of some 270km was longer and more arduous than the ride from Tabulam to Grafton. But those boys were made of tough stuff and Chauvel brought up my mother Elyne on stories of mustering cattle, of brumbies in the ranges and of floods on the Clarence River. Chauvel’s early years would have been very similar to stories told by other Light Horsemen. It didn’t matter where they came from – Victoria, Queensland or New South Wales, South Australia, West Australia and Tasmania – those days fitted them well to meet the challenges that they met on the Boer War battlefields and later in the First World War. During the Boer War, for instance, it didn’t take long for them to show that they were not to be written off as ‘ a damned fat, round-shouldered, useless crowd of wasters’ [3] as Major-General Sir Stuart Brownlow Beatson, (K.C.B., K.C.S.I., K.C.V.O. (1854–1914)) suggested. Their Boer War experience set in good stead many a Light Horseman, including Chauvel and Leslie Maygar, for the First World War. I have a locket in which there is a photograph of my grandfather. The energy in the slim figure in the photograph is palpable. On the back of the locket, there is a date – 19th May 1902.
By 1902 Chauvel had served in South Africa, attained the rank of Lieutenant Colonel, had been mentioned in despatches and appointed Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George. It was a great achievement for a young officer in the newly established Commonwealth Mounted Infantry. The Light Horsemen were to go on (and continue) to show the likes of Major General Sir Brownlow Beatson, that they were most certainly not a ‘useless crowd of wasters.’ Yet for all that, they had to keep proving themselves.
Service in one war doesn’t necessarily fit soldiers for service in another. No two wars are ever the same and when the First World War broke out, never before had such widespread conflict been seen. It was to become warfare on an industrial scale. Initially, from the British point of view, the emphasis was on the Western Front due to the immediate threat to the British homeland. Perhaps it was this emphasis that led to the pressure on the training facilities on Wiltshire’s Salisbury Plain ensuring that there were inadequate facilities to accommodate the Light Horse.
My grandmother Sibyl Chauvel wrote about her husband Harry (who in 1914 had been posted to London as the Australian Representative on the Imperial General Staff) in her preface to the Chauvel War Books, ‘He was at this time very anxious about the housing of the Australian troops, which were expected to arrive in England early in November (1914), & were to be trained during the winter on Salisbury Plain, about the coldest & bleakest spot in England.
It was intended to build huts for the men & stables for the horses, & a contract had been let by the War Office for the erection of these. However, Harry soon ascertained that there was no likelihood of them being completed by the time they were required, & he suggested to the General Staff that the Australian troops should be trained in Egypt instead, as the majority of these men, & their horses, had never experienced real cold before, & would suffer accordingly if put under canvas during an English winter. No decision was arrived at by the War Office on this matter, & eventually [Chauvel] went to Sir George Reid, High Commissioner for Australia [in London], & put the whole thing before him. Sir George thereupon secured an appointment with Lord Kitchener[4], who, when he heard the facts, determined to stop the Australian and New Zealand troops in Egypt, instead of bringing them to England. Consequent on this decision, my husband left England for Port Said on Nov 28th in the P & O Ship Mooltan, to meet his Brigade and take up his command.’ [5] I wonder what the young men who did their training here in Seymour thought about training in the Egypt with its sand, heat and flies. Of course, there were the sin bins and flesh pots in Cairo, but that is another story.
Nothing is ever stable during warfare; politics, politicians and society change and so it was during the First World War, firstly with the plan to open a front on the Gallipoli Peninsula. The evacuation of the Gallipoli Peninsula in December 1915 freed up Ottoman troops to attack the Suez Canal, the shipping lifeline between the Empire and the mother country. So early 1916 saw Chauvel and his Desert Mounted Division defending the Canal Zone and then moving north to clear the Ottomans out of the Sinai Peninsula. In August 1916 the Australian Light Horse had distinguished itself with success at Romani and later in December at Magdhaba. But there was a long hard battle ahead with setbacks in the two battles for Gaza in March and April 1917.
Sir Archibald Murray the Commander in Chief of the Egypt Expeditionary Force was found to be flawed, not just in his battle plans but he portrayed the Gaza setbacks as successes. He was recalled and replaced by General Sir Edmund Allenby at the end of June 1917. Meanwhile, in the UK, the December 1916 election saw the fall of British Prime Minister Asquith and the appointment of David Lloyd George. Lloyd George had inherited a nation that was thoroughly fed up with hearing of casualties and of war. Because of the German attacks on British shipping, food was running short and prices were rising. Similarly, here at home in Australia people were war-weary as shown by the results of the October 1916 and December 1917 referenda when the nation twice voted against conscription. To gain ascendancy to bring the war to a more satisfactory conclusion, success was needed. Lloyd George wanted Jerusalem as a Christmas present for the British people and success at Beersheba was one of the vital keys. General Sir Archibald Wavell (1883–1950), General Allenby’s biographer explained:
‘Mr Lloyd George had always believed that the shortest road to victory lay not in the main western theatre, but by eliminating Germany’s lesser allies in the subsidiary theatres—the policy of ‘knocking out the props’.
After the two failures at Gaza a new plan was needed and it was decided to outflank Gaza by attacking Beersheba. Any delay would have run the risk of operations becoming bogged down in autumnal rains and mud. The pressure was on and Allenby wanted Beersheba captured on the first day of operations. The Palestine Campaign was now no longer a sideshow.
So what was Chauvel doing one hundred years ago on 27th October 1917? On 26th October he wrote to his wife Sibyl, ‘I sent you two days ago, some aeroplane photographs of my headquarters near Abasan-el-Kebir.’ ‘The camp is on a fig-tree orchard, & the hedges are of prickly pear. When we came here first, all the countryside was green, but now it is all sand. This has been a very comfortable camp, except for the dust. My new ADCs, Cox and Lyons are doing very well. Frank Newton is a great boon to me.’ [6]
For security and censorship reasons, there is no hint of the forthcoming battle.
It was not until February 1922 when my grandmother was transcribing his letters, that he described for her the build-up to the Battle of Beersheba:
‘The biggest problem of all for the Cavalry was to find sufficient water, east or south-east of Beersheba’ … ‘A study of the Journal of the Palestine Exploration Fund which was procured for me from Cairo by General Russell showed that considerable cities had existed in days gone by where Kasla and Asluj are now, so that there must at that time have been water in both these places. We took advantage of the raid on the Asluj – Auja railway to make a thorough reconnaissance of the water possibilities at Asluj & Kalasa. The old wells were found, & it was estimated by Russell that a fortnight’s work by his engineers would put them into working order, & provide all the water we required. This made the attack on Beersheba a feasible operation. In the meantime in order to deceive the enemy as to our intentions, our infantry strength was kept until the last minute opposite Gaza, & a sort of weekly routine of reconnaissance in force of mounted troops was instituted towards Beersheba, so as to accustom the enemy to seeing them there, & also to give infantry commanders & staff, who used to accompany them, a chance of reconnoitring the country they were to operate over. Various simple devices were adopted to further delude the Turk. For instance, on one occasion a haversack was allowed to be dropped by a Light Horseman during reconnaissance. It contained amongst the usual paraphernalia what purported to be an unfinished letter to his girlfriend in Australia, describing what a bad time they were having, doing these long reconnaissances on the hot summer days, without any other object than to deceive the enemy into thinking we were going to attack Beersheba, whereas the real attack was to be on Gaza, where the Light Horse would not have a show! It was afterwards discovered from enemy documents, that the letter was found by them, & served its purpose in helping to deceive the Turkish High Command.
‘Towards the end of October, all the arrangements were completed, & the engineers, assisted by mounted troops, in less than a fortnight had, under cover of ordinary reconnaissance, developed sufficient water at both Kasala and Asluj for two cavalry divisions. The plans of the operations were roughly as follows. While the 21st Corps & the Navy created a diversion by heavily bombarding Gaza, the Desert Mounted Corps, less the Yeomanry Division & plus the 7th Mounted Brigade, was to attack Beersheba from the east & northeast, & the 20th Corps under General Chetwode, striking from Bir El Esani, was to attack Beersheba from the south-west. The Yeomanry Division & the Imperial Camel Corps were to hold the ground between the 20th & 21st Corps. The object was to turn the enemy’s left flank at Beersheba, roll up his line from the East with the 20th Corps & press the attack on Gaza with the 21st Corps, the Desert Mounted Corps being by then available to cut off the enemy’s retreat from Gaza.’ [7]
1st Nov 1917:
‘I am writing in the Turkish Commander’s room in a fine comfortable stone house, in a Biblical town which, in accordance with censorship regulations, must be nameless. We had a great battle yesterday, & an entirely successful one, but it was a long business & a hard fight. Mine was the usual wide turning movement, with a long night march, & more than all day battle, as we really did not take this place until about seven o’clock last night, when Grant’s Brigade (formerly Meredith’s), which I put in as a final effort, carried the last defences & the town, at the gallop in the dusk. It was a very brilliant performance, & the C-in-C who motored out this morning to see us, personally decorated Grant with a bar to his DSO. I don’t know whether you will remember General Grant. You did meet him in Brisbane once, when he was (I think) in the Toowoomba or Dalby squadron of Light Horse. He was one of those who always attended my staff rides.’
Describing the town of Beersheba Chauvel commented,
‘I was rather disappointed with this place. It is merely an Arab town with about four decent, almost European houses, in it, obviously new, a rather fine hospital (quite new) and a better mosque than one would expect. The house I am in is the best in the place & has a nice little garden in front, with a fountain in it, not in working order. All around, the country is to all intents and purposes, desert, though there are signs of it having been cultivated in places. It is blowing a gale today & the dust is appalling.’ [8]
Later in the letter Chauvel goes on to write:
‘I am sorry to say young Markwell of Beaudesert, one of my very best officers, was killed. Colonel Maygar VC Commanding one of the Victorian regiments has lost an arm, poor chap, & will have a hard job to pull through.’
At the time of writing, Chauvel could not have heard news of Maygar who died on 1st November 1917.
Who but Sir Harry Chauvel could write in such an understated way about a battle that helped turn the course of the First World War in the Middle East? Success at Beersheba helped open the way to the Allies taking of Jerusalem – a welcome and much needed Christmas present for the Allied governments. Who but Sir Harry could talk about the town and the domestic details such as the garden and the fountain that unsurprisingly wasn’t in working order?
Chauvel was cool, decisive, determined and had an uncanny ability to keep things in perspective. I don’t think he ever forgot the world beyond his immediate battlefield and nor did he ever forget his men or the horses. Those killed in action brought him grief that was understood by those who were closest to him and of course by his wife Sibyl.
So where was Chauvel on the eve of the battle a hundred years ago? In February 1922 when my grandmother Sibyl Chauvel began transcribing his letters into large scrapbooks, Chauvel wrote an explanatory note:
‘The Desert Mounted Corps Headquarters & the Anzac Mounted Division which was to lead, were concentrated in Asluj by the evening of October 30, & the Australian Mounted Division at Khalasa, with the 7th Mounted Brigade at Bir Esani. We rested only a few hours, & then marched through the night to Khanshm Zanna, about five miles east of Beersheba. At eight o’clock on the morning of 31st October, [Major General Edward] Chaytor [9] attacked from the east, swinging the 2nd Brigade well round to the north, to get astride the Beersheba-Hebron Road. The Australian Mounted Division was kept in reserve, while the 7th Mounted Brigade masked the Turkish works at Ras Ghannam, & made a link between us & the 20th Corps. Although absolutely taken by surprise, the Turks put up a very stiff fight, having unexpectedly strong works on Tel el Saba (the site of ancient Beersheba), & also on Tel el Sakrati, which later was taken by at one p.m. by Ryrie’s Brigade in its enveloping movement.
‘At three o’clock I got word from Chetwode [10] that he had taken the works to the south-west, & that the enemy in front of him had retired on the town. Tel el Saba was proving a hard nut to crack. Chaytor had put in all his reserves, & I had to reinforce him with the 3rd Brigade from the Australian Mounted Division. I still had two brigades in reserve, & the 7th Mounted Brigade should also soon be available but it was unsound to advance against the trenches immediately east of the town until Tel el Saba, which commanded all the approaches to them was in our hands. Chaytor reported Tel el Saba captured at 3.15, & I then decided to put Grant’s 4th Brigade straight at the remaining trenches, supported by the 5th Mounted Brigade under Fitzgerald [11]. These brigades being very much scattered owing to the constant attacks from aeroplanes, which had also devoted a good deal of attention to my own Headquarters, it took some little time to assemble them & push them off. The 4th Brigade got off about half past four, trotted onto the plain, & then rode at the trenches, charging them mounted, & galloping straight on into the town which was in our possession by dark. By this mounted action, Grant had done in a few minutes, with two regiments & fewer casualties, what it would probably have taken two Brigades, dismounted, a couple of hours to do. So far as I know, such a charge by mounted men against entrenched infantry is unique in the annals of cavalry.’ [12]
Chauvel’s factual yet reflective account of the battle gives credit where credit is due. Those Light Horsemen did what the enemy believed to have been impossible. Surprise was the essence of their successful entry to the town of Beersheba and its wells with the water they needed for horses that had gone without water for over 30 hours.
Success at Beersheba certainly didn’t bring any reprieve. The Allies entered Jerusalem just over a month after the Battle at Beersheba, on 11th December 1917. It was a plan that worked due to subterfuge, surprise and speed. The 4th and 12th Light Horse were part of an international force that achieved victory at Beersheba. Due to the lack of water, victory was uncertain; nothing could be taken for granted and there were hard battles ahead. Beersheba was but one battle in a campaign – the difference was its success and boost to morale. Securing the Gaza – Beersheba line was a tough fight and the hardship continued as the Allies battled on through rugged terrain and in appalling weather to Jerusalem. Chauvel and his Desert Mounted Corps knew from experience that winning a battle, or even a number of battles doesn’t guarantee against setbacks and hardship. After the Allied entry into Jerusalem, it was another ten months before the end of the war. During that time there were the two battles of Es Salt from 27th March – 2nd April and 30th April – 3rd May 1918, and the ghastly hot summer in the Jordan valley before the battle of Megiddo on 18th September 1918 and the eventual entry to Damascus on 1st October 1918. Those months were not only marked by tough fighting but also the increase of disease. Malaria and even more seriously the onset of Spanish influenza hit the Allies as much as it did the enemy and those whom the Allies had taken prisoner. The Treaty of Mudros on 30th October 1918 brought the war in the Middle East to a close.
Sir Harry’s Home Front
Sir Harry returned to Melbourne on 14th September 1919. On 10th December he became Inspector General of the Australian Military Forces. As a member of the Council of Defence, Sir Harry devoted his energies to trying to preserve the Australian Defence forces in the face of Scullin’s Labour government’s cuts. The perceptive man he was saw only too well Australia’s vulnerabilities, knowing that the nation couldn’t rely on the British Navy for its defence.
On 16th April 1930, Sir Harry Chauvel relinquished his appointments of Inspector-General of the Forces and Chief of the Australian General Staff and was placed on the retired list. For nearly the last fifteen years of his life, Chauvel was to remain busy. As well as the involvements I mentioned earlier, he had three directorships. He was Chairman of Shrine of Remembrance Trustees and until his death Chairman of the War Memorial. He was involved in various welfare organisations set up for returned servicemen as well as the Red Cross and Toc H [13]. He was a Church Warden at Christ Church South Yarra for twenty-five years and in 1930 he was made a Lay Canon of St Paul’s Cathedral. Perhaps his appointment to lead the Australian contingent at the Coronation of George VI in 1937 was the highlight of his retirement years. It was his first overseas trip since he returned from the First World War. During World War Two he was Inspector in Chief, Volunteer Defence Corps and in this capacity he served until he died on 4th March 1945.
Reflections
In her book Chauvel Country (1983) my mother Elyne remarked ‘Though he was self-effacing, he would stand out for the recognition of his Anzac’s great effort.’ [14] Before she died my aunt Eve in Harare mentioned his quiet sense of humour. Every family member who remembers him speaks of his love of horses and of the bush. Ex-serviceman and journalist Crayton Burns writing in the Argus described Chauvel as ‘a shrewd and safe leader with a sound touch and an uncanny coolness in all times of crisis and danger’ [15]. He was a perfectionist who at all times expected the highest standards of himself. He was a resourceful, independent thinker with a strong sense of moral conviction and determination to carry out his duty to his men and to his country to the best of his ability. I believe it was the development of these personal qualities throughout his military career that inspired confidence in others who served with him and made him into a quietly charismatic leader, the sort of leader who might serve us all well today.
On the eve of the battle of Beersheba, it is fitting that we pay tribute to our local Colonel Leslie Maygar who lost his life, and to the thirty other Australians who lie in the Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery at Beersheba. The Sinai and Palestine campaigns claimed the lives of almost 1,000 Australians – they did their bit too. We pay tribute also to those who returned to Australia and their efforts to continue service in various ways in their communities. For many survivors, the end of the war only meant the beginning of a battle of another kind – that of making a life in the post-war world. While the Kohima Prayer ‘When you go home, tell them of us and say, For their tomorrow, we gave our today, ’ written by John Maxwell Edmunds in 1918 became better known after the Second World War, it was part of a collection of 12 epitaphs for the First World War.
Unfortunately, Sir Harry died before I was born so the only way I have come to know him is through hearsay and archives. One of the problems with my parents’ generation, many of whom lived through two world wars, is that they didn’t say, ‘For their tomorrow, we gave our today’. I suppose that in our younger years, many of us mightn’t have listened and by the time we had learned to listen our parents had passed on.
For me as one of Sir Harry’s granddaughters commemorating the Battle of Beersheba means not only the marking and thanksgiving for a success that helped turn the fortunes of war, but it is a time of deep reflection. Perhaps due to my years as a British Army wife beginning a decade before the end of the Cold War, I have seen at closer hand than many, some of the emotional challenges and the discipline required of those about to embark on operational tours of duty.
For all that I can’t imagine the level of self-discipline, bravery, courageous determination and excellence of horsemanship with which the 800 who charged at Beersheba required to achieve the taking of the town with its wells intact. I can’t imagine how my grandfather must have felt about the men of the 4th Brigade who he decided to put ‘straight at the remaining trenches’ [16]. Concern for the well-being of his soldiers and their horses must have vied for first place together with ensuring the success of the operation. Peacetime seldom requires us to plumb the depths of these attributes and feelings, but in commemoration, we have the opportunity to do so. It is these opportunities that challenge our mental boundaries and perhaps ensure through the examples set by our forefathers that we prepare ourselves for the unexpected in our own lives and strengthen us in possible adversity.
Thankfully my grandmother transcribed my grandfather’s letters home and this has given me some insight into Chauvel as a person. During my journey to find my own history, my husband Mark and I visited Beersheba for the 90th anniversary so we could see for ourselves and the town and surrounding countryside with its major landmarks. It provided us with the opportunity to meet and experience commemoration with other like-minded people from different walks of life. For the centenary commemorations of the Battle at Beersheba having lived overseas for many years, it was time to experience commemoration with all its rich variety on the home front. After the First World War, few had the money or opportunity to travel overseas to visit the battlefields and graves of their loved ones. Their mourning found their expression in their memorials and commemorations at home.
———-
[1] Chauvel, Lieutenant General Sir H. G., ‘Preface’, in Gullet, H.S., Barrett, Chas., (Eds.), Barker, David, (Art Ed.) Australians in Palestine (Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1919) xiii.
[2] The Light Horse Memorial Park has been created on the site of the old Seymour training area.
[3] En.wikipedia.org (5th Victorian Mounted Rifles)
[4] Lord Kitchener was Secretary of State for War
[5] Chauvel War Books (Volume I) p.2
[6] Chauvel War Books (Volume II, p.33)
[7] Chauvel War Books (Volume II, p.33-36)
[8] Chauvel War Books, (Volume II) p. 36
[9] (1868 – 1939) In 1917, he commanded the Australian and New Zealand Mounted Division. He commanded New Zealand Military Forces 1919 -1924 when he retired.
[10] After General Allenby took command of the Allied forces in Palestine, Chetwode took over command of XX Corps
[11] (1873 – 1933) Brigadier Percy Fitzgerald, commanded 5th Mounted Brigade in the Sinai and Palestine Campaign.
[12] Chauvel War Books (Volume II), p.36 – 38
[13] Toc H is an international Christian movement that found its origins in Talbot House, an all ranks rest and recreation centre opened in 1915 at Poperinghe in Belgium
[14] Mitchell, Elyne, Chauvel Country (Melbourne: Macmillan, 1983) p. 48
[15] Burns, Crayton, ‘Chauvel, his place among the Greats’ Argus (Monday, March 5th, 1945) p.2
[16] Chauvel War Books, (Volume II) p.
References
Chauvel, Lieutenant General Sir H. G., ‘Preface’, in Gullet, H.S., Barrett, Chas., (Eds.), Barker, David, (Art Ed.) Australians in Palestine (Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1919)
Gullet, H.S. The Official History of Australia in the War of 1914-1918 (Volume VII): The A.I.F in Sinai and Palestine (The Australian War Memorial in Association with the Queensland University Press, 1984)
Hill, A. J., Chauvel of the Light Horse (Melbourne University Press, 1978)
Mitchell, Elyne, Chauvel Country (Melbourne: Macmillan, 1983)
Wavell, Sir Archibald, G.C.B. C.M.G., M.C., Allenby A Study in Greatness: The Biography of Field-Marshall Viscount Allenby of Megiddo and Felixstowe G.C.B.,
C.M.G. (London: George G. Harrap & Co. Ltd., 1940)
Unpublished Monographs:
Chauvel War Books (Volumes I and II)
Newspaper Articles
Burns, Crayton, ‘Chauvel, his place among the Greats’ Argus (Monday, March 5th, 1945) p.2
En.wikipedia.org (5th Victorian Mounted Rifles)