First blood

It is both strange and sobering to read more than 100 years after the fact, in words that sound quite fresh, of the first death and the first encounter with the enemy of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force - en route to their destination in Egypt. I can do no better than to quote directly from New Zealand Artillery in the Field 1914-1918 to relay the first unexpected loss:

Early on Monday morning, October 25th, a signal went round the fleet that a private of the New Zealand Medical Corps had died the previous night on board the Ruapehu [one of the troopships]; and the intelligence of this first death came almost as a shock to men who had thought only for that side of war that promised excitement and adventure, that stirs the blood and fires the imagination, and little for that other side on which lay its tragedy and suffering and death. In the afternoon an impressive burial service was held. At 3 p.m. the Ruapehu moved up to the centre of the two divisions, and the troops on every transport were paraded facing inwards. Five minutes later all engines were stopped, and the convoy rode motionless on the water while a brief funeral service was held on every ship, and the body was committed to the deep. The customary volleys were fired on the Ruapehu, and the Last Post sounded; the Ruapehu hauled her ensign close up, and the convoy proceded on its way. The service was very brief, but the circumstances invested it with an impressiveness that was not lost on the thousands who paid their tribute of respect to the dead.

A couple of weeks later, after the New Zealand fleet had been joined by the Australians, one of the Australian cruisers serving as an escort was called away to engage with a 'strange warship' that had entered the harbour in the Cocos Islands in the Indian Ocean. The Australian cruiser Sydney took on and ultimately defeated the German raider Emden, which had been trying to disable the radio station on the Cocos.

However great the pride with which the Australians viewed the honours which had fallen to their young Navy, it was fully shared by every New Zealander, and the official congratulations of the Force were duly offered to the Sydney on the results of the Australian Navy's first engagement. The Sydney had two men killed and thirteen wounded, but the list of killed and wounded on the battered Emden ran into big figures.

According to Wikipedia, under the rather grand title of "Battle of the Cocos", the Emden lost 134 men, and had 69 wounded. More than 150 were taken captive, but the shore party of 50 commandeered a schooner and escaped ultimately to Constantinople (Istanbul).

Close to home

Today at the dinner table, our youngest child asked why in World War One and all the other wars did all those men go out to kill each other? I tried to explain, as simply as possible, that the reasons were complex and even historians can’t agree. World War One stemmed in part from agreements different countries had to protect others if another nation attacked them; and so things kind of spiralled out of control when two smaller countries attacked each other. Then she pressed us as to why the individual men went out to kill each other. I told her some felt they were fighting a great evil, or felt it was their job to fight for their country if it went to war – the “my country, right or wrong” mentality.

What I would give to know what was in my grandfather’s mind as he enlisted then sailed off to war in 1914.

He actually joined the Army long before, in January 1913 as a driver in the Artillery, and received initial training in Wellington for three months before returning south to serve with the Army in Dunedin and Invercargill. From what I can make out from the records, it seemed he was with the Invercargill Field Artillery at the outbreak of war. He probably spent time in further training at Palmerston North, before members of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force trooped down to Wellington.

“An official farewell was tendered to the units which embarked in Wellington, at a big parade held in Newtown Park on September 24th,” says the official history New Zealand Artillery in the Field 1914-1918. “Great crowds assembled in the Park to witness the parade, and afterwards lined the streets and cheered the soldiers as they marched down to the wharves. The transports backed out from the wharves before dark, and anchored in the stream ... ready to sail with the dawn”. However, two of the escort ships were delayed from Auckland, and it was decided not to sail without a sufficiently powerful protective convoy.

So, the following day, they all disembarked, “the Artillery with their horses and vehicles marched out to the Lower Hutt Racecourse, and went into camp.” All those years ago, Grandad was less than a kilometre from where I now live. It was three weeks before the troopships departed – with less of a fanfare. The Expeditionary Force, my grandfather among them, finally set sail from Wellington under convoy in the early morning of October 16th – “the sky was cloudless, and only the soft early morning mists obscured the first rays of the sun.”

How the guns were starved

During a visit to my uncle’s on the weekend, I finally learnt how my grandfather Sydney Williams earned his Military Medal. I won’t share details now – it seems premature, and if I leave it a while, that may induce you to come back some time to find out.

Tonight, instead, I turn to the next installment – ‘How the guns were starved’ – of the official 1922 history of the New Zealand Field Artillery. The author, while saying it was ‘unnecessary and inadvisable’ to deal with the overall events leading up to the Gallipoli campaign, felt it necessary to cover the shortcomings that affected the Artillery. Namely, the out-of-date and inadequate guns, and a severe lack of ammunition– usually limited to two rounds a day.

After several urgent requests by the Commander of the Australian Field Artillery for some more powerful naval guns, on 11 July 2015 (100 years ago) ‘one very old and much-worn gun arrived’, though its usefulness turned out to be very limited. At the same time, an ‘absolutely reliable’ source had informed the British that the Turks were having to economise on ammunition for the next three weeks, however, there seemed to be no let-up in their bombardment.

Later in July, reinforcements arrived, resulting in a reorganisation of the Artillery Batteries into two Brigades. I learned today that my grandfather’s commanding officer was Major F G Hume, in charge of 2^nd Battery in the 2^nd Brigade.