Archives for May 2017
CHARLES EDWIN ROBERTSON – Long lost RSA badge found in button box in Invercargill antique shop.
8/3051 – CHARLES EDWIN ROBERTSON
An email from a fellow NZ military history buff who is also the architect of the websites “Unknown Soldiers & Nurses of Southland” and “Unknown Warriors of the NZEF” Iain Davidson sent me a photograph of a small Returned Soldiers lapel badge (the small size badge was produced in 1927, as a more practical variation from the large Returned Soldiers badge that had been introduced in 1916). The badge contained a date clip of 1949 fixed around the crown. Iain’s friend had found the badge in a box of buttons while poking around in an Invercargill antique shop some years ago and seeing an opportunity to possibly reunite the badge with a descendant, Iain bought the badge from his friend. I was very happy to help Iain identifying possible ancestors to pass the badge of this long deceased soldier to.
The badge was stamped on the rear with a regimental number – 8/3051 – and after a fast bit of research I was able to identify the original owner as a WW1 soldier from Southland, Charles Edwin Robertson. Thanks to en entry by a descendant on Pte. Robertsons’ biographical page on the AWMM Cenotaph website, I located Neil Robertson of Auckland, a grandson of Charles Edwin Robertson, within a matter of minutes was talking with . Neil surprised me when he said that his grandfather Charles’ son, Edward William Robertson – known by Neil’s family as “Uncle Eddie”, was still very much alive and well. At 89 years young Eddie Robertson is currently a resident of the Rowena Jackson Retirement Home in Invercargill. Further, a niece of Charles’, Eileen IRWIN (nee Cameron), is also alive and well and living independently in Winton.
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Charles Edwin Robertson was born at Outram in 1887 on the Western Taieri Plains, south of Dunedin to parents James Robertson and Bridget NOLAN of Outram.
Charles was the youngest of four brothers, the others being Edward James (ka Ted), James (jnr), and John Christopher (ka Chris). Charles had three sisters; Ellen Elizabeth (ka Nellie) ROBERTSON, Marion Churruth Robertson (ka ‘Minnie’) CAMERON, and Amy Hannah Robertson (died at 1 day old, 1888).
James Robertson (father of Charles Edwin) had died in 1890 and one of Charles’ sisters Nellie died in 1897. Eldest brother Ted, born 1881, had decided to seek work and adventure elsewhere so went to Australia in the late 1890s. In 1901 Ted enlisted for Boer War service in South Africa. 340 Trooper Edward James Roberston was enlisted into the New South Wales Citizens Bushmen, a mounted rifles unit that would be joined with other elements to form 5th Victorian Mounted Rifles (VMR) Contingent which embark for South Africa in February 1901.
Tpr. Ted Robertson survived some of the fiercest fighting of the war during his year of service in South Africa. His contingent had suffered the loss of 19 officers and soldiers killed and 41 wounded by the time the 5th VMR Contingent returned to Australia in May 1902. Ted made his way back to NZ and by 1905 had returned to Southland, briefly living at Browns. Ted subsequently struck out on his own farming his own property at Springhills. In 1911 Ted married Jessie McCRAE.
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The death of James Robertson (snr) in 1890 had left his widow Bridget alone with sons James, Chris, young Charles and her daughter Minnie living on the Taieri Plains. In the mid 1900’s Bridget and her family, with the exception of James (jnr) who had gone to Dunedin, moved to the small rural forestry and farming district of Forest Hill near the town of Browns, east of Winton. Here the family settled to start farming a piece of land.
James Robertson (jnr) had also left home about this time to pursue a professional career, being first educated in Dunedin before going on to attend Otago University in 1910 and 1911, graduating as qualified lawyer. By the outbreak of World War I James had taken a position as a Partner of a small legal firm in Huntly. Like his younger brothers before him, at 33 years of age James would also be called up for military service in June 1917.
Bridget Robertson died suddenly in 1911 thus leaving Chris, Charles and Minnie (now married to Charles Livingston CAMERON of Forest Hill) to manage the farm.
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The Robertson Family’s commitment to war service …
As WW1 conscription started in Southland Charles (who listed himself as a shearer) and his brother Chris (farmer) were enlisted for future active service.
8/3051 Private Charles Edwin Robertson and brother Chris, 8/3053 Private John Christopher Robertson, were among the first to be called up as reinforcements for the Otago Infantry Regiment. Together they went to Trentham Camp in June 1915 to be attested and complete their basic training.
By October 1915 the Gallipoli campaign had been going for almost six months. The Robertson brothers, both members of 21 Platoon, together with the rest of their platoon mates were exited and had high expectations of “joining the lads from home in that show“. On October 9th their Platoon embarked with the 1st Battalion, Otago Infantry Regiment (OIR), an element that made up the NZEF’s 7th Reinforcements. Whilst on-board the men learned that Gallipoli would not be their destination. After a period in training at the NZEF’s Zeitoun Camp near Cairo in Egypt, they would be heading directly to the Western Front to an unspecified area in the north of France.
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The Robertsons and 21 Platoon arrived at Alexandria, Egypt in mid Nov 1915 and their Battalion spent the next four months training for what was ahead. Finally on April 6th 1916 the 1st Battalion OIR embarked for France. Over the ensuing six months the Battalion, being part of the 1st NZ Infantry Brigade, fought in some significant actions in Northern France including the battles of Flers and Morval on the Somme. On 16 September 1916 Pte. Chris Robertson was shot in the right arm (not life threatening) putting him out of action for three weeks before he was able to re-join the unit. Whilst Chris was convalescing, his brother Pte. Charles Robertson had been reported ‘Missing’ on 27 September. Charles was eventually found in a wounded state with severe gunshot wounds to his back, right arm and right leg. He was immediately evacuated to No. 36 Casualty Clearing Station in the field and then on to St John’s Hospital at Etaples in France in preparation for his evacuation to the 1st Southern Hospital at Birmingham, England. After convalescing at Hornchurch, Charles was returned to the NZEF lines at Sling Camp (Wiltshire, Southern England) in Jan 1917 where a medical board declared him ‘no longer fit for war service on account of wounds received in action’. As a result charles was on his way home and returned to New Zealand on the Maunganui in April 1917 thereby separating Charles and Chris for the first time since embarkation in Wellington. Pte. Charles Edwin Robertson (29) was discharged from the NZEF on 11 June 1917 and returned to family home at Browns.
Awards: 1914-15 Star, British War Medal, 1914-20, Victory Medal
Overseas Service: 1 year 218 days
Total NZEF Service: 1 year 364 days
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Prior to his discharge Charles’ thoughts had been very much of his brother Chris since he had learned that the 1st Battalion were approaching the Belgian border and about to be involved in some very heavy fighting as part of the NZ Division’s push into Belgium.
Temporary Lance Corporal Chris Robertson had already recovered from a Gun Shot Wound his right arm he received in Sep 1916 but was about to face a far greater threat. On the 7th of June 1917 the NZ Division went into action as part of the 2nd Brigade’s offensive to secure the heavily defended Messines Ridge, the first stage of what would become known as the Battle of Messines. Unknown to Charles at the time, his older brother 8/3053 Pte. John Christopher Robertson had been Killed in Action on the very first day of the battle – he was 31 years of age and has no known grave. Pte. John Christopher Robertson is commemorated on the Messines Ridge (New Zealand) Memorial in Belgium.
After the war Charles, by default, became his brother John Christopher’s legal ‘next of kin’ for the purposes of post war administration. As a consequence Charles received John Christopher’s posthumously awarded service medal trio together with a commemorative Memorial Plaque & Scroll.
Footnotes:
- Anecdotal evidence passed to the family by a soldier present at Chris’s death described Chris as initially being only wounded but conscious when he was placed on a stretcher to be evacuated from the battlefield. Chris had apparently said “Thank God I’m out of here” – and was immediately hit a second time, killing him outright.
- After the war Charles, by default, became his brother John Christopher’s legal ‘next of kin’ for the purposes of post war administration. As a consequence Charles received Christopher’s posthumously awarded medal trio and his commemorative Memorial Plaque & Scroll in 1921-22.
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There was more sad news for the Robertson family before the end of the war. 59990 Cpl. James Robertson (the solicitor from Huntly) had been called up for service in 1917 with the 4th Battalion, NZ Rifle Brigade – 36th Reinforcements. After training in New Zealand James was promoted to Corporal prior to embarking for England and Egypt. In September 1918 Cpl. James Robertson, aged 33 years, went into the front line in France however his stay was short lived as he became ill. He subsequently evacuated to Le Havre where he died of Acute Pneumonia on 22 Oct 1918. Cpl. Robertson’s death had occurred just three weeks short of the Armistice being signed on November 11th officially ending hostilities and signalling the end of the ‘Great War’ – the so called ‘war to end all wars’.
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Charles Edwin Robertson married Annie Jessie McGREGOR on his return to New Zealand, making their home on a property they farmed at Drummond, due west of Winton, Southland for the remainder of their lives. They had four children at Drummond, three sons and one daughter. Their eldest son, born in 1919, was named Christopher James in honour of Charles’s two deceased brothers thus ensuring the memory of John Christopher Robertson and James Robertson would never be forgotten.
Charles Robertson lived an uneventful life in Drummond and died at home on 12 January 1950 aged 63 years. Annie his wife, spent the next 30 years on the farm at Drummond, passing away in 1980.
Tributes are paid …
In June 2014 Neil Robertson paid a personal tribute to his great-uncles John Christopher (Messines Memorial) and James (St Marie Cemetery, Le Havre) Robertson’s war service by laying poppies on their graves, the first time in 100 years a member of the Robertson family had visited their graves since their deaths. The visit was a poignant reminder of young men who in the prime of their lives had traveled so far from home and who had laid down their lives for ‘King and Country’.
Neil also noticed that very few New Zealanders had signed the Visitors Book at Le Havre, and as a measure of respect also laid a poppy on the grave of another NZ soldier buried there – 33673 Private Albert Percival Baker of the 3rd Battalion, Canterbury Infantry Regiment – 21st Reinforcements. 20 year old Pte. Baker* was from Templeton in Christchurch and had died as the result of a fall whilst alighting from a train in France on 16 March 1919.
* Neil invites any family or descendants of Pte. Baker to contact him as he would be happy to provide a photograph of the grave.
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On 17 May 2017 Iain made contact with Neil’s brother Harvey and personally handed over Charles Edwin Robertson’s NZRSA badge. Harvey will pass it to Neil’s custody as the family historian and custodian of the Robertson military memorabilia.
The Southland Times account is published here: http://www.stuff.co.nz/southland-times/news/93117546/family-reunited-with-war-badge
The reunited medal tally is now 136.
UPDATE ~ 8/2134 Sgt. WALTER GRAHAM SINCLAIR, M.M.
8/2134 – WALTER GRAHAM SINCLAIR, M.M.
In April we bought you the story of a Memorial Plaque named to Walter Graham Sinclair, a Sergeant in the Otago Infantry Regiment who was a Gallipoli veteran and Military Medal recipient. Four months after the action that had Sgt. Sinclair nominated for the Military Medal for ‘Bravery in the Field’, he was killed and his Military Medal subsequently awarded posthumously to his mother. The Memorial Plaque sent to his family after the war to commemorate his death and bearing Sgt. Sinclair’s name, had been found in a house at Winton, Otago. MRNZ was able to assist with the research of Sinclair descendants which facilitated the return of the plaque to a family in Mosgiel.
As a result of our research, I had noted that the next of kin of Sgt. Sinclair (or ‘Wattie’ as he was known by family), in addition to receiving his medals and Memorial Plaque had also been eligible to claim an ANZAC Commemorative Medallion on Sgt Sinclair’s behalf. However, there was no evidence on his military file to indicate the medallion had been claimed or even applied for.
The ANZAC Commemorative Medallion (also called the Gallipoli Medallion) is a memento that was struck in 1967 for the Australian and New Zealand Governments to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the Gallipoli Landings on 25 April 1915. The boxed medallion (engraved with the recipients initials and name only) was designed for presentation to all Gallipoli Veterans (alive and deceased) but only ‘upon application’. In the case of deceased veterans, next of kin or another direct descendant could apply for the medallion (and still can if not previously claimed) – contact MRNZ for further details.
Mary Ward of Invercargill is the niece of Sgt. ‘Wattie’ Sinclair, an avid Sinclair family historian and collector of their military memorabilia. In writing the previous story I was able to advise Mary that I believed that ‘Wattie’ Sinclair’s ANZAC Medallion had never been claimed. Mary of course would need to have that fact confirmed first and, if not claimed, as a direct descendant she was eligible to apply for it. After providing her the necessary information Mary duly submitted an application and today emailed me excitedly to advise a courier had just delivered Walter Graham Sinclair’s ANZAC Medallion (suitably engraved) from the NZ Defence Force’s Personnel Archives & Medals Section.
Thanks to NZDF PAMS staff for their expeditious processing of this Mary’s claim.
The reunited medal tally in now 135.
JOSEPH NORMAN BRAUND – NZ Trooper’s Boer War medal found in Australia is reunited with his son in Auckland.
SA5463 ~ JOSEPH NORMAN BRAUND
A Queen’s South Africa medal named to 5463 Trooper Joseph Norman Braund with original ribbon and two of the three entitled Clasps still attached, has been reunited with the son of the original recipient. Joseph Wilfred (ka ‘Wilf’) Braund of Auckland received a surprise phone call from me two months ago advising him that I had become aware of the location of a Boer War medal that had been awarded to his father, Joseph Norman Braund.
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The ‘Braund’ name was/is well known name in Auckland in both early shipping and sporting circles, particularly during last century. Captain James Braund was a native of Colebrook, Devonshire, born in 1829 who embarked on a sea-going career at a very young age. By the time he had turned 18 years of age he was a Master Mariner. James Braund married Mary DENNETT of Lustleigh, Devonshire in the fledgling port of Auckland in 1858 and raised a family of five children.
Capt. Braund had started trading out of Auckland to the South Sea islands from around 1857 with the 100 ton cutter Surprise which he bought out from England. Over his seagoing life he acquired a number of ships that were engaged in the coastal trade and became a widely respected sailor for his seamanship skills.
Mary Dennett Braund died unexpectedly in 1872 and with five young children to be cared for the sea-going Capt. Braund needed help to raise the family. James married for a second time in 1874 to another ‘Mary’ – Mary Ellen HORNE, a Scottish lady from Rushy Hill, Cadder in Larnickshire, Scotland.
Not only did Mary Ellen Horne have James and the late Mary Dennett’s five existing children to care for but the addition of their own three – Mary Ellen (jnr), Albert Edward and Joseph Norman Braund – added to their brood and therefore her work load when James was at sea.
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The Auckland Star dated 9 Feb 1897 carried the report that Capt. James Braund had died at 68 years of age of “.. apoplexy after climbing onto the roof of his house to supervise repairs being carried out by a carpenter….” The number of children at home with Mary Ellen by this time was reduced to approximately five – two of James and Mary Dennett’s children, and the three of Mary Ellen’s and James. The older children of James and Mary Dennett Braund had decided they wanted to return to England and live and so made their way back to Devonshire. At the time of his death Capt. Braund was one of the oldest shipmasters trading out of the port of Auckland.
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Joseph Norman Braund had been born at home in Grafton Road in 1878, the youngest child of James and Mary Ellen’s family. Joseph was working as a plumber from the late 1890s at the time the NZ Government committed to provide troops for the 2nd Boer War in South Africa (also known as the Anglo-Boer War or South African War).
This was a war between Britain and her Empire against the Boers of South Africa. The Boers were made up of combined forces of the South African Republic and the Republic of the Orange Free State. The Boer Republics wanted Britain gone from South Africa and so declared war upon the English residency on 11 October 1899.
New Zealand’s contribution initially was a 215 man contingent of Mounted Riflemen drawn from the ranks of the serving and Volunteer Forces (Militia). Later contingents (there would be 10 in all) would be supplemented with civilian volunteers.
Seven contingents had been sent to South Africa by December 1901, six having returned to new Zealand after their tour of duty. In January 1902 whilst the 7th Contingent was in South Africa, England requested an additional contingent for the war. Unlike the previous contingents however, the men were not required to be members of the Volunteer Force. 4000 young and older New Zealand males applied but only 1000 were accepted. 23 year old Joseph Braund who had formerly been a member of the 1st NZ Native Rifles (a voluntary militia unit based in Auckland), had volunteered and accordingly was one of the 1000 selected.
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5463 Trooper Joseph Braund joined the 1120 man 8th Contingent of the NZ Mounted Rifles (NZMR). He was allocated to ‘D’ Squadron of the North Island Regiment and attested / kitted at Trentham. The 8th Contingent departed NZ in two regiments – the North Island Regiment sailed from Auckland on the SS Surrey on 01 February 1902 and the South Island Regiment, on the SS Cornwall from Lyttelton on 08 February – both ships arriving at Durban on March 15th.
Footnotes:
- Captain Richard John Spotswood SEDDON, the son of the then Premier of New Zealand, Sir Richard John ‘King Dick’ SEDDON, was the officer in command of ‘A’ Squadron of the North Island Regiment.
- On 12 April 1902 the 8th Contingent suffered the tragic loss of 16 soldiers killed when their armoured train derailed at Machavie, near Pretoria in the Transvaal.
- The following quotation from Lord Kitchener’s dispatch of 1st June 1902 shows how hard service of the last days of the war was, especially for mounted men who had been for some weeks on the sea. It bears ample testimony to the good work of the newly arrived Australians and New Zealanders (the 8th): “…. the enthusiasm and energy with which the troops met the exceptional hardships and work involved by lining out and entrenching themselves on four successive nights after long marches in a practically waterless country. On each of these nights every officer and man, after marching some 20 miles, had to spend the hours usually devoted to rest in entrenching, watching, and occasionally fighting. In this connection he draws special attention to the spade work done by the Commonwealth regiments—3rd New South Wales Bushmen, and the 8th New Zealand Regiment. Every night while the sweep was in progress these troops dug one redoubt to hold 20 men every 100 yards of their front of six miles. The redoubts were so solidly constructed that they would have afforded perfect cover from artillery fire, and the intervals between them were closed by wagons linked together with barbed wire.” Source: AngloBoerWar.com
The 8th Contingent was to have a relatively short period of war service. The ‘Peace at Vereening’ Agreement was signed on 31st of May thereby officially ending hostilities after 2 years and 8 months of a protracted guerrilla-style war. Trooper Joseph Braund and the 8th Contingent sailed for home on 05 July 1902.
Awards: Queen’s South Africa medal with Clasps: Cape Colony, Transvaal, South Africa 1902
Overseas Service: 01 Feb 1902 – 05 Jul 1902 = 155 days overseas
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Joseph Braund returned to Auckland and his plumbing work, initially returning to the family home in Grafton Street with his brother Albert and sister Mary Ellen. By 1914 Joseph had a new job, that of Tally Clerk and in September married Elizabeth Ella SNOOK of Dovedale, near Nelson. Joseph and Elizabeth made their home in Parliament St and had two sons, Joseph Wilfred and Laurance Alan Braund who also followed their father into the Clerk trade.
Joseph Norman Braund died at Remuera Auckland on 18 Feb 1952, aged 73, and is buried in the Purewa Cemetery, Auckland, and Elizabeth passed away in 1970.
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Ancestry Family Trees was my primary source of answers for this search and from this I was able to contact the Auckland based descendant Braund family. Few Braund family members had moved away from the Auckland area since the mid 1880s and as a result my first telephone call put me in touch directly with one of Joseph and Elizabeth’s two sons. Wilfred Joseph Braund (ka ‘Wilf’ – widower, retired) still lives in Remuera which is essentially the seat of the Braund family that his grandfather and mother, Capt. James and Mary Ellen Braund established in 1850. Wilf is now 87 years young.
Wilf’s brother Laurance Braund is deceased and as the remaining son of that generation Wilf (and his son James) was able to confirm details of his ancestry and descent from his father Joseph Norman Braund as well as the details of the Braund family’s early shipping and residential history in Auckland.
Wilf told me his father’s Queen’s South Africa medal had been missing for many years; no-one in the family could actually pin down when or where it might have been misplaced. My news of the medals re-appearance after passing through the hands of numerous temporary owners was a great surprise to Wilf. Happily, Wilf has now been reunited with his father’s Queen’s South Africa medal.
The reunited medal tally is now 134.
BERTIE ERNEST EUSTACE LEYDON – Auckland Sister of Mercy is reunited with father’s Victory Medal.
18820 – BERTIE ERNEST EUSTACE LEYDON
Barry Low, a former NZ Army soldier living in Perth, Western Australia recently sent MRNZ a Victory Medal named to 18820 Private Bertie Ernest Eustace LEYDON. Barry had been given the medal by a friend in NZ many years ago and had kept it with the intention of eventually “doing something” with it. Barry called me and asked if we could help him to find a home for the medal. We received the medal just after Anzac Day and now have found a home for it.
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Judith Leydon was the only child of Bertie and Olive (Reid) Leydon of Parnell Auckland. As as a child and teenager for as long as she could remember, Judith’s father took her to every Anzac Day service at the Auckland Domain for as long as he was able to attend. Sister Judith M. Leydon RSM, now 87, has been a life-long member of the religious order, Sisters of Mercy in Auckland. Next Anzac Day for Sr. Judith will be rather special – she will be able to honour her father’s memory in a very personal way by wearing at least one half of the pair of medals her father was awarded for his service in WW1 – ‘half’ seems somewhat ironic but appropriate given Bertie Leydon returned home after the war minus one arm due to injuries sustained on the Somme.
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Bertie Leydon from the time he was a schoolboy wanted to be a railway engineer (train driver). Born in June 1884 to Edward LEYDON and Catherine HANAFIN of Sussex St, Grey Lynn, Bertie soon showed he was very capable with his hands, always making things. Once he left school Bertie tio the first step to being a railway engineer by taking a job as a Pattern Maker in the NZR’s Workshops in Wellington.
When the First World War started in 1914, Bertie was part of that group of men engaged in essential industries which initially exempted them from call up however, as the war ground on it became necessary for even these men to join the ever increasing need of reinforcements. 32 year old Bertie Leydon’s call to fight for ‘King & Empire’ came in January 1916 when he was required to quit the Railway Workshops in Wellington and report to Featherston Camp in the Wairarapa for some basic training and kit issues prior to proceeding overseas. On the 26 of July Pte. Leydon was on his way to England with the 2nd Battalion of the Auckland Infantry Regiment, one of many elements that made up the NZEF’s 15th Reinforcements. After arrival, pre-deployment preparations of the Battalion were made at the NZEF’s Sling Camp on Salisbury Plain before embarking for Etaples, France on 22 October.
On the 5th of November Pte. Leydon’s battalion went into the field on the Somme. The Battle of Le Transloy, the fourth and last major battle of the Somme campaign, had officially concluded on 18 October however random barrages continued as did enemy sniping as the Hun was being beaten back and effecting a withdrawal. It was Feb 1917 during this mopping up phase of the battle that Pte. Leydon was in the process of extricating one of his fellow battalion members from a barbed wire entanglement that he had fallen into, when he received a severe gunshot wound which shattered his lower right arm. The two men lay tangled in the wire, stuck, before eventually being disentangled by a third. Field first aid was applied which in Pte. Leydon’s case because of the seriousness of the wound was the application of a tourniquet to his upper arm to stem the blood flow. He was then moved to the nearest field casualty facility for stabilizing treatment, NZ’s 1st Field Ambulance. As Judith told me once her Dad had been taken to the aid station he was not looked at again for some considerable time, seemingly forgotten about possibly due to the number of casualties they were dealing with. Judith said “Dad always said that if they hadn’t forgotten about the tourniquet he probably could have kept his arm.” Pte. Leydon’s arm was amputated above the elbow at a military hospital in Boulogne before he was evacuated to No 2 NZ General Hospital at Walton-on-Thames, England for convalescence and to have an artificial limb fitted. Pte. Leydon’s health was then re-assessed and formally classified as “unfit for further service due to wounds received in action”. After a short leave break in Torquay, Bertie Leydon was embarked at Liverpool for return to NZ in May 1918.
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Returning to his former occupation as a Pattern Maker for the NZR was out of the question for Bertie Leydon however the Onehunga Railway Workshops being close to his post war home in Parnell, kept him on various other roles for the remainder of his working life. Bertie married Olive Myrtle REID in 1929 and together they had just the one daughter, the delightful and now 87 year old Sister of Mercy, Sr. Judith May Leydon RSM. Sr. Judith well remembers her father practicing his handwriting with his left hand for hours at a time at night after work until he was able to write as well with his left hand as had previously done with the right.
One remarkable coincidence that Judith related to me concerning her father was this: Some years after the war Bertie Leydon happened to be visiting one of his wife Olive’s sisters, Judith’s aunt. On the wall in their lounge room was a picture of the aunt’s son, Norman Maxwell – Bertie couldn’t believe his eyes when he saw the picture and said something like – “I’ve seen him before – that’s the bloke who pulled me out of the wire after I got shot in the arm! “ – what a small world we live in.
Bertie and Olive Leydon remained in Parnell, Auckland area for most of their married lives. Bertie Ernest Eustace Leydon died on 04 June 1962, the day after his 78th birthday and was buried in Waikaraka Cemetery, Onehunga Auckland. Olive was reunited with Bertie in 1980.
Footnote: Sr. Judith is renown in Catholic circles for her years of devoted service to religious instruction at St. Mary’s College, a Catholic School for Girls established by the Sisters of Mercy from Ireland in 1850. Sr. Judith as both teacher and mentor was honoured along with four other significant women in the history of the college with a sporting & cultural activities house bearing her name – LEYDON House, the others being Dickson, Leo, Loreto and Maher; Sr. Judith was also the founding Principal of Paul VI College in Samoa. The tireless Sr. Judith has been a selfless contributor and board member of Auckland’s Mercy Hospital (and latterly the Hospice) since its formation in 1952 through to the present day.
Awards: British War Medal, 1914-20; Victory Medal
Overseas: 1 year 324 days
Total NZEF Service: 2 years 104 days
Note: The whereabouts of Pte. B. E. Leydon’s British War Medal remains unknown – if you can help us to locate it, please contact MRNZ.
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Bertie’s Leydon’s medal is now on its way to his daughter, Sr. Judith. Thanks to Barry in Perth for sending the medal to MRNZ.