Military Medal and bar: Corporal Robert Bartlett Bates, Australian Army Medical Corps attached to 7 Battalion, AIF

Military Medal and bar (Geo V). Impressed around edge with recipient's details.

Robert Bartlett Bates was born in Kew, England in 1886 or 1887; his family emigrated to Australia, and settled on the Mornington Peninsula at a property called 'Una', near Moorooduc. His parents were both Quakers and Bates was studying for the Anglican priesthood in Melbourne at the time of his enlistment at Melbourne on 19 August 1914. He was assigned to the Army Medical Corps (2nd Field Ambulance) and attached to 7th Battalion under service number 375. Bates was a pacifist but wanted to contibute to the war effort, and the Army Medical Corps seemed to be the best means of achieving this. He served on Gallipoli until the evacuation, coming to prominence at Lone Pine where he was awarded his first Military Medal, recommended by the 7th Battalion’s Medical Officer, Captain J C Campbell.

The citation reads: 'For his gallantry and devotion to duty at Lone Pine Anzac on the 8/9 August 1915. Corporal (then Private) Bates was on the left of the 7th Battn. Position at Lone Pine with B Coy, 7th Bn. The enemy was heavily bombing the position all night. The stretcher bearers were kept busy evacuating the wounded and Pte Bates had in consequence to do practically the whole of the work of bringing the wounded under cover from the firing line and rendering first aid. He carried out this work repeatedly and fearlessly under very heavy bombardment.

During the enemy’s counter attack on the morning of 9th August 1915, Pte Bates continued the same work while the attack lasted. His first aid work was also of a very high order. Pte Bates was previously recommended for the D.C.M. [Distinguished Conduct Medal] for his work at Lone Pine but no award has been made. On many other occasions his conduct in the performance of his duty under fire has been conspicuous.'

Although the Military Medal was only established in March 1916, Bate's Lone Pine DCM recommendation was revisited and he was awarded the Military Medal instead.

After taking a brief rest at Mudros on Lemnos in September and part of October to rest and train, the battalion returned to Gallipoli. Just prior to the evacuation, on 27 November, Bates was promoted to corporal. The battalion recuperated in Egypt, taking in reinforcements before being sent to France. Their first action was at Pozieres in 23 to 27 July 1916 returning on 15 to 21 August where Bates was observe tending to the wounded in No Man’s Land while under fire, and saying a prayer for the dying or the dead. His citation for the bar to the Military Medal reads:

'In trenches NE of Pozieres France on the 21st August Corporal Robert Bartlett Bates of AMC attached to 7th Bn AIF showed conspicuous bravery during the fighting around Pozieres. He continuously by his calmness and coolness under very heavy shell fire stimulated over-excited men to return to their duties in the line. He has shown excellent work with the Battalion from the time of its formation and has never missed a day from it. During the day of the 21st August he under very heavy shellfire went out into No Man’s Land and read the funeral service, bareheaded, over a fallen comrade, and beside those that he was unable to bury he placed a wooden cross bearing their name and particulars concerning them. He remained in No Man’s Land over 1 hour and during the whole time the enemy’s shelling was extremely heavy.'

Bates’s actions were described by Captain Samuel Lyttle, the medical officer of 7 Battalion "Bates had worked with a will; a queer little fellow and a Quaker who would not fight. But he carried in man after man, and tended them, and there were a few chaps who said that he had prayed over them.... In one hand he held a bundle of wooden crosses and in the other a flask. Over each wounded or dying man he bent and put the flask to his lips. On the breasts of the dead he put a cross - not much less than a hundred all told." The Chaplain of the unit commented that he "would give all that I care for in the world to have the courage of that man."

Later, in 4 November, when the battalion was manning the trenches at Gueudecourt on the northern part of the Somme, Bates was struck by a bullet which wounded him in the right knee joint and glanced off his upper right arm, causing a 'severe flesh wound'. These injuries effectively ended his military service. He was evacuated to England. Although the injuries healed within 4 months, he spent the next eighteen months undergoing further operations, electrotherapy and physiotherapy to regain the use of both limbs.

When he returned to 7th Battalion the war was almost over, but he was appointed a lance sergeant. Instead of returning home Bates applied for leave to continue his theological studies at Merton College at Oxford, earning a BA. He returned to Australia in August 1920 and was discharged on 9 December. As he was returning to England he arranged for all his medals to be sent to his sister Florence, who lived in South Yarra. He left for England soon afterwards and spent two years acting as curate of an inner London church.

Bates returned to Australia in 1924 and in 1926 was appointed the rector of All Saints in Brisbane – a position he held until 1947. In that year, he married Clarice Mary Albina Cox who was a well-known female vocalist and a member of the All Saints Church choir. Robert Bates died on 27 June 1955.

• 1914-15 Star: Corporal Robert Bartlett Bates, Australian Army Medical Corps attached to 7 Battalion, AIF