The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (1175) Corporal Herbert Smythe, 3rd Battalion, AIF, First World War.

The Last Post Ceremony is presented in the Commemorative area of the Australian War Memorial each day. The ceremony commemorates more than 102,000 Australians who have given their lives in war and other operations and whose names are recorded on the Roll of Honour. At each ceremony the story behind one of the names on the Roll of Honour is told. Hosted by Meredith Duncan, the story for this day was on (1175) Corporal Herbert Smythe, 3rd Battalion, AIF, First World War.

1175 Corporal Herbert Smythe, 3rd Battalion, AIF
KIA 3 May 1917
Photograph: P07938.001

Story delivered 11 May 2016

Today we remember and pay tribute to Corporal Herbert Andrew Smythe, who was killed fighting in France in the First World War.

Herbert Smythe was born in 1892, one of a large family born to Edward and Annie Smythe of Toorak in Victoria. Known as “Bert”, he and the rest of the Smythe family spent many years living in Jerilderie, where he attended school and was afterwards involved in the local rifle club. Around 1911 the Smythe family moved to Kogarah in Sydney, where Bert passed the New South Wales government exam and went on to work as telegrapher at the Sydney General Post Office. As well as parading part-time in a local Militia regiment, he was an active member of the New South Wales Post and Telegraph Rifle Club and participated in at least three annual interstate telegraphic chess matches.

War was declared in August 1914, and Smythe enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force at Kensington Racecourse. He embarked for the fighting in Europe as an original member of the 3rd Battalion two months later. After a brief stop in Albany, Western Australia, Smythe sailed to Egypt with the first troopship convoy to protect British interests in the area following Ottoman Turkey’s entry into the war. He spent the following months training at Mena Camp near Cairo, where he was noted for his leadership skills and promoted through the ranks to corporal in early 1915.

The AIF’s first real test in battle came several months later when its troops landed on the Gallipoli peninsula as part of a wider British plan to force a passage through the Dardanelles. Smythe landed at Anzac Cove with the 3rd Battalion on the morning of 25 April 1915, coming ashore as part of the second wave attack around 8.30 that morning. He participated in the confused fighting that followed, and was wounded in
the shoulder by a Turkish bullet. Evacuated to England to recover, Smythe returned to Gallipoli just after the August Offensive, when the 3rd Battalion was in the trenches at Lone Pine. He was soon evacuated
again with a severe case of bronchitis, returning to hospital in England for a lengthy period of rest and recovery.

While in England Smythe was posted to the 1st Training Battalion at Perham Downs in Wiltshire and became an instructor for Australian reinforcements preparing to embark for France. In June 1916, just as the
3rd Battalion was preparing to participate in the bitter fighting on the Somme, Smythe was posted to a Signals School of Instruction at Bulford, teaching telegraphy to those destined to be signallers on the Western
Front. He remained at Bulford for the rest of the year, after which he sailed for France and re-joined the 3rd Battalion while the AIF was following up on the German withdrawal to the Hindenburg Line near
Arras.

On 3 May 1917 the 3rd Battalion was brought forward from the village of Vaulx to relieve Australian troops at the recently captured positions of the Hindenburg Line near Bullecourt. The men were under constant
shell-fire as they carried stores up a nearby railway embankment to the front line, crossing more than a kilometre of exposed ground in full view of German artillery observers. It was while Smythe was moving up the
line towards Bullecourt that he was killed by a German shell.

Aged 24 at the time of his death, Smythe was buried in a disused trench, although his grave was later lost. As such, Herbert Smythe is listed on the Villers-Bretonneux Memorial to the Missing alongside the more than
10,737 Australians who died in France and have no known grave.

Three of Smythe’s brothers also served in the war, and his older brother Vivian made attempts to try and find his brother’s grave.

Herbert Smythe is listed on the Roll of Honour on my right, among more than 60,000 others from the First World War. His photograph is displayed today beside the Pool of Reflection.

This is just one of the many stories of service and sacrifice told here at the Australian War Memorial. We now remember Corporal Herbert Smythe, who gave his life for us, for our freedoms, and in the hope of a better world.

Aaron Pegram
Historian, Military History Section