Volunteers of Essendon and Flemington, 1914-1918

 

Neilson N R        Gunner    27766    Neil Robert           15 FAB    24    Driver    Single    C of E        

Address:    Flemington, Mt Alexander Rd, 39    

Next of Kin:    Neilson, O, father, 39 Mt Alexander Rd, Flemington    

Enlisted:    4 Jan 1916        

Embarked:     A30 Borda 20 Oct 1916    

 

Date of Death:  08/06/1918  Gunner 5 FAB

CWGC: "Son of Oscar and Caroline Neilson, of 39, Mount Alexander Rd, Flemington,

Victoria, Australia. Native of North Melbourne."

VIGNACOURT BRITISH CEMETERY

 

 

Gunner Neil Robert Neilson

 

Rod Martin

 

Although his attestation form and its duplicate indicate that Neil Neilson was variously assigned to 15 Field Artillery Brigade (FAB) and 4 FAB, his service record states that he began in 5 FAB and remained there until his death - that is, when he was not in the guardhouse for quite a few misdemeanours! 

 

Neil was twenty-four years old when he enlisted on 4 January 1916.  He was a driver by trade and had no previous military experience.  His build was slight: he was only 173 centimetres tall and weighed just under sixty-seven kilos.  It may be that a poverty-stricken upbringing led to him being somewhat undersized.  He came from a family of eleven children, perhaps somewhat unusual for an Anglican family, and lived at 39 Mt Alexander Road in Flemington. Another possible indicator of a poor upbringing may be the fact that he was required to undergo dental treatment before he could begin training.  However, we cannot take this one too far.  People still try to avoid the dentist today!

 

Neil signed up after Gallipoli had been evacuated during the previous month, and he may have been motivated to do so by a government recruitment campaign that was launched at the same time.

 

Proclamation issued by the prime minister 15 December 1915

 State Library South Australia, PRG 980/16/1/1

 https://digital.collections.slsa.sa.gov.au/nodes/view/2434 
 

 

“Billy” Hughes issued this appeal after promising Britain fifty thousand more Australian troops in November 1915. The target was not achieved.  Recruitment numbers peaked at 36 575 for the month of July 1915.  Thereafter, they declined steadily to the point where, in 1918, some battalions had only fifty per cent or less of their proper complements and no new recruits were available.

 

Neil trained at a number of places, including Maribyrnong.  It was there that he committed his first misdemeanour. On 17 July, he left a parade without permission, the punishment for which was seven days confined to barracks.  His record indicates no excuse for his action. His behaviour was not going to improve for a while.  Soon after, he went absent without leave on 16 August and either reappeared or was apprehended on 3 October.  For this misdemeanour he was awarded twenty-five days’ detention - presumably in the guardhouse.  By this time, the military authorities may have been wondering why he enlisted in the first place!

 

Neil’s misdeeds did not end there, however.  Not much later, on 20 October 1916, he and his comrades sailed for England on A 30 HMAT Borda.

 

HMAT Borda sailing from Port Melbourne 20 October 1916  (AWM PB0277)

 

The ship sailed via the Cape of Good Hope in order to avoid German submarines in the Mediterranean. When it reached Cape Town, Neil went absent again.  He failed to re-embark on the ship on 15 November, and it sailed for England without him.  He was declared absent without leave. Three days later, having returned or been brought back to the wharf, he was loaded on to A38 HMAT Ulysses and resumed his journey. For his indiscretion, he received ninety-six hours of detention and forfeited one day’s pay.  He probably spent his time on Ulysses in the brig!

 

When the ship reached Sierra Leone on 30 November, it caught up with the Borda, so Neil was transferred back to his unit on that ship.  However, before he could settle in, he was transferred back to the Ulysses again.  Perhaps the brig on the Borda was full!

 

HMAT Ulysses    (AWM PS0154)

 

Ulysses arrived at Plymouth, on the south coast of  England, on 28 December. It would appear that Neil went straight to a guardhouse because he did not appear at the Australian training camp at Lark Hill, on Salisbury Plain, until 4 February 1917.  One would think that he had surely learned his lesson by the end of that session - but not Neil.  On 10 February, he went absent from Lark Hill for twenty-four hours, for which he received forty-eight hours of detention, plus fourteen days confined to barracks, plus the loss of four days’ pay.  He was incorrigible!  It would appear that, as soon as he was released, he failed to answer a defaulters’ roll call and then broke out of camp in the middle of the day on the twenty-sixth, not returning until 8.30 pm on the twenty-seventh.

 

The military authorities had obviously had enough. Neil was immediately awarded another twenty-one days’ detention and was held in custody, pending a trial.  He was subsequently fined twenty-four days’ pay.

 

When he was finally released from the guardhouse, Neil joined his comrades in training.  5 FAB had initially been attached to a new Australian organisation, 3 Division, under the command of Major-General John Monash.  After a number of incidents involving half-trained and green members of 1 Anzac Corps in the Armentières sector of the Western Front in early 1916 and, prior to that, the loss of 8 000 men at Gallipoli, the Australian government decided to create a new division that would be very well-trained and which would set an example for other Australian troops to follow.  The huge losses at Fromelles, Pozières and Mouquet Farm in July 1916 emphasised the need for better training.

 

Thus it was that the well-trained formation sailed for France on 8 August 1917.  On the twelfth, Neil and his comrades were transferred to 5 FAB, then located at Larch Wood, just south-east of Ypres in Belgium.  On 31 July, after a successful attack at Messines, also in the Ypres region, in early June, the Third Battle of Ypres commenced with an allied attack in the area.  The earlier two battles, in 1914 and 1915, had been indecisive.  Now, British commander-in-chief, Sir Douglas Haig, wanted to capture the German submarine pens on the occupied Belgian coast, thus diminishing the danger to allied convoys from North America and, at the same time, demoralising the German Army.  At least, that was the official justification for the battle.  Many historians, however, believe that Haig’s real reason was to prevent British prime minister David Lloyd George from diverting war resources to the battle front in Italy.  Whatever the real reason, Haig wanted a victory after the Battle of the Somme, fought in the previous year, petered out as an extremely cold winter set in without any real strategic gains being made.  He was probably also concerned to gain a victory before American troops arrived at the front in large numbers and stole his thunder (America had joined the war in April that year).

 

Unfortunately, Haig’s overly ambitious battle plan depended upon the weather for its success.  Given the marshy nature of the Ypres area, fine weather was essential.  Heavy rain would quickly turn the ground into an almost impassable bog.  The gods obviously were not with Haig on 31 July.  Right on cue, heavy rain fell and lasted for several days.  The initial attack bogged down very quickly, men, animals and materiel all being prevented from advancing and some assets from all three groups actually disappearing into the morass. Gunners such as Neil had extreme difficulty in finding firm ground on which to base their guns.  Firing them on muddy ground faced the risk of them sinking into the mire.  Lloyd George, not amused, described the whole situation as “the battle of the mud”.

 

Soon after arriving at Larch Wood, Neil was allocated to 15 Battery of 5 FAB.  His troop was responsible for six eighteen-pounder field guns.  

 

 Eighteen-pounder field gun       ( historylearningsite.co.uk)

 

 

Conditions on the Ypres battlefield in 1917.  Continual heavy shelling of the area had destroyed

the delicate drainage system and turned the land into an almost impassable morass.  (AWM E01409)

 

At that time, 5 FAB was exchanging fire with its German counterparts, no real progress being made.  Mention of 15 Battery firing its guns on 21 August is made in the war diary.  On the morning of the twenty-second, the batteries were ordered to stop firing and the brigade went into reserve.  The men were no doubt relieved, as their guns had been targeted by the Germans, making the situation quite dangerous for them.  However, their relief was short-lived.  Some batteries always had to stay in the front line to provide protection for the infantry, who were also subject to bombardment by the enemy.  Thus, on 6 September, we discover from the war diary that 15 Battery had been in the line for an unspecified period of time, and was then relieved by 14 Battery.  That very same day, however, all batteries were ordered to open fire at 7.35 pm because the Germans were bombarding the trenches in the area.  This had the desired effect, the German shelling tapering off, and the batteries were ordered to cease fire at 8.30 pm.

 

This pattern of bombardment and response continued into September. On the twenty-sixth, while 4 and 5 Australian Divisions were mounting a successful attack at Polygon Wood, east of Ypres, in blessedly clear weather conditions, the Germans near Larch Wood massed their forces in preparation for an attack.  This may have been designed to counter the allied efforts at Polygon Wood.  Some of the batteries were ordered to fire their guns at the enemy concentrations.  In the evening, it was reported that the enemy was marching towards the village of Zonnebeke, further away, and the 5 FAB batteries were ordered to stop firing.

 

On 4 October, the weather still remaining fine, 1, 2 and 3 Australian Divisions plus the New Zealand Division attacked the strategically important Broodseinde Ridge, also east of Ypres. After intense hand-to-hand fighting, the Anzacs were successful.  While this was happening, 5 FAB was moving its guns forward as the Germans in the area retreated.

 

Gun of 14 Battery, 5 FAB firing near Bellewaarde Lake, Ypres sector,

28 September 1917.      (AWM E00920)

 

The action against the Germans over the next few days was almost continuous, with the enemy fighting back ferociously. The Australian guns were aimed particularly at the ridge near the village of Passchendaele, a strategic target and a name by which the battle is often labelled.  However, progress was slowed up to a great extent by the resumption of rain on 6 October, creating what Richard Travers refers to as “appallingly boggy conditions.”  On the twelfth, amid the wet and the mud, 3 and 4 Divisions, the New Zealand Division and five British divisions attacked the Passchendaele ridge.  However, to use Travers’ words again, the attack proved a bridge too far, failing once again in the mud of Belgian Flanders.

 

Having done some preliminary work for this assault, 5 FAB was, by the twelfth, in reserve, having been relieved by 4 FAB the day before.  On 24 October, with winter starting to set in, mist often reducing visibility, the guns were again in action, firing towards Passchendaele. The unit commander recorded on the twenty-sixth that the village had been badly damaged by the shelling.

 

Passchendaele village June 1917

 

December 1917    (Imperial War Museum)

 

Despite the fact that the Anzac/British assault of 12 October failed, 5 FAB remained in the area, shelling around the village on a continual basis.  The conditions and the German retaliation were horrendous.  The commander wrote on 28 October that three guns of 11 Battery had been completely destroyed and two guns were buried in the mud.  Eleven men had been evacuated with shell shock.  Nowhere was safe on the Western Front.

 

Haig refused to be daunted by the failure of the assault on 12 October.  He continued to concentrate on the now totally ruined village.  In three subsequent attacks on 30 October and 6 and 10 November, Canadian troops finally captured Passchendaele and some territory beyond it.  However, the strategic situation in Belgium changed little as a result.  Something less than eight kilometres of territory had been gained, mainly, as Bryan Cooper comments, “a few miles of cratered mud-flat and the ruins of a village that was called Passchendaele.”  The German Hindenburg Line remained unbroken and unflanked.  The estimated cost of this “success” was 70 000 allied dead and 205 000 casualties.

 

5 Fab remained in the same area, supporting the Canadian assaults with barrages.  The Germans fought back, using a variety of weapons.  On 1 November, for example, Neil’s 15 Battery reported heavy shelling, using gas shells.  At 11.00 am the next day, 15 and several other batteries reported that German aircraft were strafing their positions with machine guns, so much so that four of the batteries had to evacuate their sites. The shelling slackened considerably around noon but resumed with extra intensity later.  After this time, the Germans seemed to know that it was the Canadians who were leading the assault on the village, and concentrated their artillery on them.  As a result, things quietened down, to a relative extent, in the Anzac sector.  However, bombardment and counter-attacks continued in the area.  And it was not always the enemy that was the danger.  On 8 November, as an example, the commander reported that an apparently Australian  R.E. 8 aircraft was reported to be firing on 5 FAB’s howitzer battery.  The aircraft was then said to have flown over the Australian-occupied ridge at Westhoek and fired tracer bullets at the trenches and pillboxes there.  Even the number of the aircraft was provided : C 47.  One wonders if  any subsequent action was taken about this.

 

R.E. 8           (adf-gallery.com.au)

 

At 7.40 am on 10 November it was reported that three white Very lights were seen in the sky just north of Passchendaele, signifying the fact that the Canadians had finally obtained their objective.  This did not mean that hostilities then ended, however.  Artillery duels continued throughout the day and over the next week.  Finally, 5 FAB was relieved on 21 November, moving to comfortable  billets (farm houses and huts) near Steenwerk.  Refitting the men with clothing and equipment then occurred.

 

On 20 December, orders to relieve 4 FAB at a new location were received and the brigade moved out.  By the next day, the brigade was located over the French border at Oosthove Farm, north-west of Armentières.  It discovered good billets, gunpits and roads everywhere.  “Such a difference to the places the b’de has been in during the past seventeen months”, the commander wrote.  However, the war was still going on and no time was given to settle in.  14 Battery was shelled the very next day and, in reply, the battery’s howitzer section destroyed three German minenwerfer mortars.  Despite the hostilities, the men were determined to have a good Christmas dinner and celebration.  They covered an old barn with tarpaulins and set up a fireplace and tables.  A sum of money had been given to them from their own regimental funds for the occasion.  A concert was arranged as a follow-up.  The Christmas scene was finally set by two heavy falls of snow on the day. According to the commander, writing at 11.50 pm, “Great merriment and great success.” However, hostilities continued, even on Christmas Day.  Around 9 pm, the infantry reported a German working party in the vicinity.  The brigade’s batteries fired on it and it was dispersed.  The next day, in the early hours of the morning, 14 Battery was shelled and the Australian guns responded.

 

The brigade’s conflicts with the Germans continued until the end of the month, and then it was relieved and moved into reserve, eventually settling at Alquines, east of Boulogne.  It stayed there until the end of the month, the men involved in retraining, relaxation and many sports activities, while 200 of them went on leave.  There is no record of Neil being among that number.  Perhaps his earlier misdemeanours had blackened his name sufficiently so that he was at the bottom of the list for such luxuries!

 

The relaxation could not last indefinitely, of course.  By 12 March, 5 FAB was back at Oosthove Farm and in the thick of battle again.  Eleven days later, on 21 March, the Germans launched their long expected offensive against the Allies.  Ever since the new Bolshevik government in Russia sued for peace on the Eastern Front, the Germans had been moving men and equipment across central Europe,  all destined for the Western Front.  They hoped to use these extra forces to break out and head for the coast, thus splitting the French and British armies and then defeating each in turn.  They wanted to do this before American troops could arrive in Europe in overwhelming numbers.  It is interesting to note that, while the initial German onslaught, centred on the Somme, was driving all before it elsewhere, the situation near Armentières seemed to be a case of  carry on as normal.  The Germans shelled the allied positions and vice versa.  5 FAB remained at the farm for the rest of the month.  On 2 April, however, it was ordered to move, heading for the strategic rail junction at Amiens - one of Germany’s most important targets.  By the eleventh, it was located on the Somme, in the thick of the action. All the batteries were firing and under pressure.  On 21 April, 15 Battery was subjected to about fifty rounds of German 4.2 inch ammunition.  Fortunately, no casualties were reported.

 

On 25 April, the fourth Anzac Day, in a brilliant pincer movement orchestrated by Brigadier “Pompey” Elliott and his 13 Infantry Brigade counterpart, the Australians recaptured the town of Villers-Bretonneux, lost only the day before.  This action marked the end of the German advance towards Amiens.  From this time on, it was a period of consolidation and then counter-attack by the Allies.

 

On 9 May, 5 FAB moved to a training area at Querrieu.  It then began shadowing the infantry as they moved slowly eastwards.  On the nineteenth, it participated in a “mass shoot”,  designed to prevent the enemy forces from gathering together, especially near the town of Morlancourt.  The German response was only small, so allied casualties were light.

 

By 1 June, the brigade was located at Heilly, on the River Ancre, a tributary of the Somme.  The guns were still in action and the war diary reported the following details:

 

Between 12.50 and 4.30am the enemy opened with concentrated fire with gas shells into the valley between Buire.       Ribemont and Heilly . . . . during the day a number of gas casualties were evacuated and passed through the C.C.S.  [casualty clearing station] principally from the 15^th. Battery and up to midday 2^nd. June 1918 total of 26 including 3 officers were evacuated and 7 from the 14^th. Bty.  These casualties were mainly caused by the Officers and men remaining at the guns for an hour on counter preparation, firing all the time with gas shells falling around them, on returning to their dugouts (cellars in RIBEMONT) it was discovered that almost every one had been blown in and that gas was very thick.  The Battery position was then cleared of all peronnel [sic] to a rise at a safe distance from the guns and everything possible was done to prevent casualties.

 

Neil was one of the twenty-six evacuated to the clearing station.  From there, we must presume that he was conveyed to a field hospital for further treatment.  The gas, probably mustard by this stage of the war and capable of causing severe burns to the body and eyes and destroying lungs if breathed in, had obviously injured him severely because he died on 8 June.

 

It is heartening to know that, beginning his army career as a serial defaulter, Neil Nielson ended it as a hero, staying at his post under fire along with his comrades when he and they could have retreated to a safer place.

 

Neil was buried at Vignacourt British Cemetery on the Somme.

 

(ww1cemeteries.com)

                                   

 

Sources

 

Australian War Memorial

Carlyon, Les: The Great War, Sydney, Macmillan, 2006.

Cooper, Bryan: The ironclads of Cambrai, London, Pan, 1967.

Gibbs, Philip: From Bapaume to Passchendaele 1917, London, William Heinemann, 1918.

http://www.adf-gallery.com.au

http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk

http://www.ww1cemeteries.com

Imperial War Museum

Martin, Rod: Percy Charles Richards MM, Melbourne, unpublished, 2004.

Monash, John: The Australian victories in France in 1918, London, Hutchinson, 1920.

National Archives of Australia.

Travers, Richard: Diggers in France: Australian soldiers on the Western Front, Sydney, ABC Books, 2008.

Wolff, Leon: In Flanders fields, New York, Ballantyne, 1960.

 

War Service Commemorated

 

In Memoriam

 

 

— Inserted by his loving brothers and sisters.

 

Family Notices (1918, June 15). The Age

(Melbourne, Vic. : 1854 - 1954), p. 5.

http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article155097491