TASMANIANS IN THE ANGLO BOER WAR: fourth contingent
The following images are thumbnails only having been reduced to minimal size. If you wish to view the image in its original format, please refer to the Weekly Courier and Tasmanian Mail LINC.
No full size images are given on this website due to uncertain copyright restrictions. These thumbnails are intended simply as a preview indexed to the relevant Weekly Courier issue date and page.
No full size images are given on this website due to uncertain copyright restrictions. These thumbnails are intended simply as a preview indexed to the relevant Weekly Courier issue date and page.
Second Tasmanian Imperial Bushmen
Departed 27 March 1901, returned 15 June 1902
LEONARD PERCY HUTTLEY
Twenty-one year old trooper Leonard Percy Huttley died at East London, South Africa, from enteric fever on 14 February 1902. He was the youngest son of James Huttley of Launceston.
Several months after his son’s death, James Huttley retired from the Launceston Post Office. He had worked there for 31 years and had walked over 225,000 kilometres while delivering letters. Prior to joining the 2nd Tasmanian Imperial Bushmen, Leonard Huttley kept a store at Springfield near Scottsdale. The last letter received from him a week or two before his passing stated that he had completely recovered from an illness and was putting on weight. |
GEORGE E SAUNDERSON
Trooper Saunderson was wounded during a skirmish near Mortimer. Early one morning in May 1901, Corporal Brownell was given orders to take four men and move out on the right flank from the main column. All went well until the sharp crack of rifles rang out.
Saunderson wrote to his friends at Penguin: “Our leader found we were in a trap and gave the order to retire. We made a dash and my word how their rifles cracked the bullets whistled.” In another letter, Saunderson wrote: “All of a sudden I was pitched clean out of the saddle and you may guess I struck the ground very hard as the little mare was going her level best. As soon as I struck the ground my senses returned and I only rested until I found my rifle. As was running the pleasant sound of a horse came to my ears and on look round I saw an old grey retiring on his own. As he could go faster than me I thought it a good plan to get on his back and make a chum of him. When we mustered there was good many of ours and the Tommies missing. I was ordered back to camp. It was about dark before Brownell got back and he was about stripped but he went out with the ambulance wagon to bring in poor Jack E Warburton. Poor Jack had a soldier’s funeral. We are going to have a headstone and a fence to his grave.” Brownell distinguished himself in this campaign and afterwards received a commission in the Imperial Army. |
JOHN E WARBURTON
On 9 May 1901, Trooper Warburton of Westbury sustained serious injury which resulted in his death. Corporal Brownell and Warburton were intercepted by a large group of Boers near Mortimer, however, instead of surrendering to the Boers they decided to make a stand.
Three other troopers who were in the same patrol were some distance behind as pre-arranged to space out some 100 metres. While sheltering behind some trees, Warburton and Brownell tried to repulse the enemy. Then they shot their horses in order that they might use them as cover and together kept the Boers at bay until Warburton was shot in the head. Brownell maintained a steady fire until he came to his last cartridge when he surrendered. He was afterwards shot in the shoulder by a Boer, stripped of his equipment and then released. Warburton, who was barely out of his teens, had six dependents—his mother, grandmother and four siblings under the age of ten. A fundraiser was organised by the local community. A remarkable story to come out of this tragic incident is a notebook which Warburton carried with him. The book was evidently given to him by a young lady as the following was written on the inside cover: To Jack from Janie. When Warburton was killed, his book passed into the possession of Judge Hugo, one of the enemy’s commandants. Hugo was killed in action in April 1902 and the book passed onto a rebel named Kemp who came from Scotland. When Kemp surrendered some time later, Lieutenant Stoker found this book in his possession and procured it to send to Warburton’s family. Both Hugo and Kemp have left their legacies in the notebook with their notes written in pencil. Photo at left by photographer James Fox of troops of 2nd Imperial Bushmen embarking for the Boer War on SS Chicago at Hobart on 27 March 1901. |
JOHN ORR
On 18 November 1901, Lance Corporal Orr was with a scouting party of ten men when he was killed at Rietpoort near Jamestown. The party was riding at the head of a column when they were ambushed by the Boers.
Previously news was received that a commando of Boers of a hundred strong was camped at a farmhouse at Rietpoort. However, when the scouting party arrived, the Boers were nowhere to be found. The scouts then followed the tracks some 200 yards past the farmhouse and then waited for the arrival of the column. Unbeknown to them, the Boers were lying in wait just 300 yards further beyond a kopje. Suddenly a volley of shots rang out. Orr was shot twice in the first volley but he bravely tried to escape. He managed to scramble 100 yards when he was shot through the back. He died instantly aged 21. The money pouch belonging to Orr is on display at the Maryborough Military & Colonial Museum in Queensland. A bullet tore a hole in the pouch and bent two South African coins contained within. At right are three Lilydale men who went to South Africa. From left to right: William Cameron Carlin, John Orr and George Martin Brewer. |
HAROLD ROSS
Trooper Harold Ross, a resident of Queenstown, volunteered for service with the 2nd Imperial Bushmen in 1901. The strength of the contingent was 253. However, fifteen more joined after the unit landed in South Africa.
Although the contingent returned to Tasmania on 15 June 1902, Trooper Ross were among several dozens who remained in South Africa. Photos of the 4th Contingent: At left, Corporal Orr (see above) is seen standing and pointing behind the first row. In the camping photo below the portrait, Harold is standing at far right. Photos courtesy of A Ross.
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WALTER HEWITT
Trooper Hewitt of Hobart returned to Melbourne from South Africa on the Wilcannia with 29 returning Australian soldiers on 5 December 1901. He then sailed to Launceston with three members of his contingent, all of whom were being repatriated from South Africa. Hewitt was wounded in the left arm. Of the four returnees, only Joshua James Joyce bore the scars of conflict.
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JOSHUA JAMES JOYCE
Trooper Joyce, a native of Geelong, Victoria, volunteered for service with the 2nd Tasmanian Imperial Bushmen and was subsequently repatriated to Tasmania in December 1901. He had sustained a bullet wound in the arm, shattering the bone.
Joyce returned to South Africa in February 1902 as Lance Corporal with the 1st Australian Commonwealth Horse. On his return to Tasmania in September 1902, Joyce moved to Kalgoorlie where he resided for eight years and then Perth for one year before enlisting at the outbreak of the Great War. He was killed in action in Gallipoli on 5 July 1915. He was 41. A month after being notified of his son’s death, his father, Robert James Joyce, passed away four weeks later. |
DOUGLAS MORTON LYNE
Quartermaster-Sergeant Lyne, eldest son of Harry Lyne and Sarah Hume, died of enteric fever at Norvalspont in South Africa on 9 May 1902.
Lyne joined the Second Tasmanian Imperial Bushmen under Colonel Watchorn and was mentioned in despatches to Lord Kitchener for gallant conduct while in action. Some months earlier Lyne was one of seven volunteers called to storm a kopje on which the enemy was known to be. The volunteers instantly charged the kopje and found a large number of Boers. Without hesitating they galloped right into their midst and succeeded in capturing three Commandants as well as other Boers. The remainder of the Boers became disorganised and fled. Sergeant Major Young, who led the charge stated that if he had 20 Tasmanians he would go anywhere. Prior to leaving for South Africa, Lyne was engaged for several years at the Bank of Australasia in Devonport. He had been promoted to Devonport from the same bank in Launceston. |
ARCHIBALD COOMBE
Previously a trooper with the Tasmanian Mounted Infantry, Coombe became Transport Sergeant with the Second Tasmanian Imperial Bushmen. He served in the Anglo Boer campaign for a total of three years and was twice mentioned in Lord Kitchener's despatches.
Coombe and Douglas Morton Lyne were the only two Tasmanians who took part in the storming of an enemy's position and capture of Commandants mentioned in the entry above. None of the five volunteers from other States received a mention in Lord Kitchener's despatches. Coombe was the first to enlist from Campbell Town for the South African campaign in 1899 and he also volunteered for active service in 1914. After his passing in 1941, all members of the military who attended the funeral placed a poppy in his grave and the Last Post was sounded. |
FREDERICK WILLIAM FOREMAN
Trooper Foreman, an orchardist from Huonville, was invalided from South Africa in March 1902. The nature of his illness or injury is unknown. He and five others from the same regiment were met on arrival by a Sergeant Major who supplied them with railway passes for the trip to Hobart from Launceston.
Foreman enlisted again during the First World War and a year later was invalided to England after receiving a severe shrapnel wound to the back. He was out of action for nearly 12 months whereafter he rejoined the 12th Battalion and served with the unit until his repatriation to Australia in April 1919. On his return, Foreman became the beneficiary of the Returned Soldiers Settlement Act when he applied for 25 acres of crown land at Huonville. He died in Hobart in July 1945. |
HERBERT GEORGE NATION
Trooper Nation, a native of Huonville, volunteered for service in South Africa together with 12 officers and 240 other ranks of the 2nd Tasmanian Imperial Bushmen. By this stage, the war had entered a new phase with the Boers adopting a policy of guerrilla warfare.
Nation saw action in the Cape Colony under General French, which was for the most part entailed counter-insurgency operations. On returning to Tasmania in June 1902, Nation resumed work in the sawmilling industry and later went to Hobart to work at the Electrolytic Zinc Company where he remained for 27 years. He died in 1944. |
Group portrait of officers of the 2nd Tasmanian Imperial Bushmen. Back row from left: Lieutenants Blythe, Hallam, Swan, Chalmers, Bisdee and Brent. Seated from left: Dr Mattei, Captain Spencer, Lieutenant-Colonel Watchorn, Captain Henderson, Lieutenant Richardson and Lieutenant McCormick. The men are wearing black armbands in memory of the recently deceased Queen Victoria.
Camp in South Africa with Trooper Harry Whiley of Wynyard, the first of the figures standing on the right. The caption published in the Weekly Courier incorrectly states that that person was W C Whiley. Harry's father received this photo in September 1901 and commented that Harry was easily distinguished.
Group of non-commissioned officers with Sergeant-Major Bruce at centre.
Camp in South Africa with Trooper Harry Whiley of Wynyard, the first of the figures standing on the right. The caption published in the Weekly Courier incorrectly states that that person was W C Whiley. Harry's father received this photo in September 1901 and commented that Harry was easily distinguished.
Group of non-commissioned officers with Sergeant-Major Bruce at centre.
Nominal Roll
The following link is an excerpt from the Official Records of the Australian Military Contingents to the War in South Africa compiled by Lieutenant Corporal Pembroke Lathrop Murray in 1911. It includes full names, rank, promotions, honours and deaths specific to the State of Tasmania for the 2nd Tasmanian Imperial Bushmen regiment.
Please note that not all names are listed in the Australian Military Contingents to the War in South Africa. If you fail to find the person you're looking for, you can search the complete register by surname at the following website: Australians in the Boer War.