The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (5867) Private John Moore, 17th 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 Gerard Pratt, the story for this day was on (5867) Private John Moore, 17th Battalion, AIF, First World War.

5867 Private John Moore, 17th Battalion, AIF
KIA 15 April 1917

Story delivered 14 April 2017

Today we remember and pay tribute to Private John Moore.

John Thomas Moore was born in 1892. He was one of 14 children of Horace and Ellenor Moore of Junee in the Riverina region of New South Wales. Known as “Jack” to his family and friends, he attended Junee Provisional School and afterwards farmed sheep and wheat with his older brother, Bill, on a property at nearby Illabo. A devout Methodist with aspirations of becoming a minister, Moore was a lay preacher at the Junee Methodist Church, a member of the Illabo Rifle Club, and was engaged to marry Miss Maggie White. According to those who knew him, “it would be no exaggeration to say that few young men in the district lived such a noble, clean, honest life as Jack”.

Moore enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force at Illabo in March 1916, and after a period of training at Cootamundra military camp, embarked for England with a reinforcement group for the 17th Battalion. After further training on the Salisbury Plains near Wiltshire, he sailed for France in December and joined the battalion in the line near Le Sars on the Somme two months later. By then, winter had set in and the fighting was at a virtual stand-still as both sides dug-in and waited for the warmer months when the fighting would resume.

Not long after Moore joined the battalion, the Germans abandoned their positions on the Somme and withdrew towards the Hindenburg Line further to the east. After two years of deadlock, there was a brief period of movement, with the Australians being among the troops that followed up on the German withdrawal. After capturing Bapaume , they spent the following months advancing towards the town of Bullecourt where the Germans had taken up their new positions. The attempt to break through the Hindenburg Line at Bullecourt on 11 April 1917 was costly and unsuccessful.

The 17th Battalion formed part of a thin defensive screen that protected the flank of the Australian positions as the 4th Division recovered from its shocking losses at Bullecourt. On 15 April, large numbers of German troops overran the positions occupied by the 2nd Division at Lagnicourt, including the outposts manned by the 17th Battalion. After several hours of bitter fighting, the Germans returned to their original positions, by which time they inflicted nearly 200 casualties among the ranks of the 17th.

Among them was Private John Moore, who was killed instantly by a German machine-gun round as the men of his platoon defended their ground. Aged 24 at the time, Moore was given a hasty battlefield burial, but his grave was lost in subsequent fighting in the area. His body was never recovered from the Lagnicourt battlefield, and today his name appears on the Australian National Memorial at Villers-Bretonneux alongside 10,700 Australians killed fighting in France who had no known grave.

Not long after learning of Jack’s death, the Moore family inserted a memorial poem in the local newspaper:

He has borne his cross; he has gained his crown,
Though he lies in a far off grave.
And we think of his life as a duty done,
Many, unselfish and brave.

His name is also listed on the Roll of Honour on my right, among more than 60,000 Australians who died while serving in the First World War. His photograph is displayed today beside the Pool of Reflection.

This is but one of the many stories of service and sacrifice told here at the Australian War Memorial. We now remember Private John Thomas Moore, who gave his life for us, for our freedoms, and in the hope of a better world.

Aaron Pegram
Historian, Military History Section