THOUGHTS ON WAR
Corporal R. Antill, Windsor, Victoria
14 May 1915
“I am still alive but I can’t tell you hardly how it is, for I have had some of the most marvelous escapes a fellow could have…amongst this slaughter and strife. I must honestly say I will be delighted when this war is over for it is simply terrible, for to see your pals shot down beside you and the roar of the big 15” naval guns the shrieks of our own artillery and the clatter of the rifle fire is enough to drive a fellow mad.”
Image: A cross erected in memory of 55 members of the 2nd Australian Infantry Brigade killed in action at the Battle of Lone Pine. http://cas.awm.gov.au/item/C03193
14 May 1915
“I am still alive but I can’t tell you hardly how it is, for I have had some of the most marvelous escapes a fellow could have…amongst this slaughter and strife. I must honestly say I will be delighted when this war is over for it is simply terrible, for to see your pals shot down beside you and the roar of the big 15” naval guns the shrieks of our own artillery and the clatter of the rifle fire is enough to drive a fellow mad.”
Image: A cross erected in memory of 55 members of the 2nd Australian Infantry Brigade killed in action at the Battle of Lone Pine. http://cas.awm.gov.au/item/C03193
Private E.C. N. Devlin
“They are lucky who get away from here wounded…it is quite common for men to go mad here. The strain on the nerves is so severe.”
Gammage, Bill. The Broken Years; Australian Soldiers in the Great War. Canberra: Australian National UP, 1974, p87.
Image: Wounded being carried down to the beach by stretcher bearers from Pope's and Quinn's Posts. http://cas.awm.gov.au/item/C02708
“They are lucky who get away from here wounded…it is quite common for men to go mad here. The strain on the nerves is so severe.”
Gammage, Bill. The Broken Years; Australian Soldiers in the Great War. Canberra: Australian National UP, 1974, p87.
Image: Wounded being carried down to the beach by stretcher bearers from Pope's and Quinn's Posts. http://cas.awm.gov.au/item/C02708
Sergeant AA Barwick
“Had a terrible fight with myself…one part of me wanted to run away and leave the rest of my mates to face it and the other part said no, we would stop and see it out at any cost.”
Gammage, Bill. The Broken Years; Australian Soldiers in the Great War. Canberra: Australian National UP, 1974, p112.
Image: Group portrait of unidentified men on the Gallipoli Peninsula. http://cas.awm.gov.au/item/C00499
“Had a terrible fight with myself…one part of me wanted to run away and leave the rest of my mates to face it and the other part said no, we would stop and see it out at any cost.”
Gammage, Bill. The Broken Years; Australian Soldiers in the Great War. Canberra: Australian National UP, 1974, p112.
Image: Group portrait of unidentified men on the Gallipoli Peninsula. http://cas.awm.gov.au/item/C00499
Herbert Reynolds
“One thing amounting to a positive certainty helps one to cast aside some of the uneasiness these thoughts bring when he knows and realizes that the average Australian will stand up to his job and see it through or go down in the attempt and it is humanly impossible to do more. It is an inevitable thing to be found wanting by your mates when they require your help and this unwritten law among our troops is responsible for them standing up to the job so well, it certainly inspires them to do things that nothing else could.”
http://www.awm.gov.au/blog/category/diary-of-an-anzac/
Image: Private Herbert Vincent Reynolds. http://cas.awm.gov.au/item/P09114.002
“One thing amounting to a positive certainty helps one to cast aside some of the uneasiness these thoughts bring when he knows and realizes that the average Australian will stand up to his job and see it through or go down in the attempt and it is humanly impossible to do more. It is an inevitable thing to be found wanting by your mates when they require your help and this unwritten law among our troops is responsible for them standing up to the job so well, it certainly inspires them to do things that nothing else could.”
http://www.awm.gov.au/blog/category/diary-of-an-anzac/
Image: Private Herbert Vincent Reynolds. http://cas.awm.gov.au/item/P09114.002
John Harold Falconer
"Thinking over the times I have been through, and of the pals I have fought with and whom I have lost, I feel proud that I was one of them in the big venture, they laid down their lives in. I need hardly say, that this life being as it is, devoid of all that a man holds dear in life, and that makes life worth living has not altered me. I have witnessed joy at its highest, sorrow at its deepest, my views on life, comradeship etc has broadened. I think I am telling the truth when I say that I also know the principals on which a man's life must be based. I am not going to give my readers, the opinion that I have conquered sin entirely, because it would be a lie. But I have learned lessons by painful experiences that I will benefit by all my life. It is easy enough under normal conditions to live rightly, but on active service, a man being months at a time among horrors unspeakable, and away from the soothing influences of home life, it is very hard, and one must learn by experience and I am sure it is the best way of forming the base to the life one wishes to live. And I am sure too that as long as one does benefit by the pitfalls and skies clear in future his mistakes will be overlooked and forgiven."
http://users.tpg.com.au/rnoakes/text/J%20Falconer%20WW%20I%20diary.htm
Image: Informal group portrait of 17 officers of the 23rd Battalion in a trench at Gallipoli. http://cas.awm.gov.au/item/C01472
"Thinking over the times I have been through, and of the pals I have fought with and whom I have lost, I feel proud that I was one of them in the big venture, they laid down their lives in. I need hardly say, that this life being as it is, devoid of all that a man holds dear in life, and that makes life worth living has not altered me. I have witnessed joy at its highest, sorrow at its deepest, my views on life, comradeship etc has broadened. I think I am telling the truth when I say that I also know the principals on which a man's life must be based. I am not going to give my readers, the opinion that I have conquered sin entirely, because it would be a lie. But I have learned lessons by painful experiences that I will benefit by all my life. It is easy enough under normal conditions to live rightly, but on active service, a man being months at a time among horrors unspeakable, and away from the soothing influences of home life, it is very hard, and one must learn by experience and I am sure it is the best way of forming the base to the life one wishes to live. And I am sure too that as long as one does benefit by the pitfalls and skies clear in future his mistakes will be overlooked and forgiven."
http://users.tpg.com.au/rnoakes/text/J%20Falconer%20WW%20I%20diary.htm
Image: Informal group portrait of 17 officers of the 23rd Battalion in a trench at Gallipoli. http://cas.awm.gov.au/item/C01472