The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (4/1172) Private Leon John Leger Dawes, 2nd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, Korean 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 Richard Cruise, the story for this day was on (4/1172) Private Leon John Leger Dawes, 2nd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, Korean War.

4/1172 Private Leon John Leger Dawes, 2nd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment
KIA 26 July 1953
Story delivered 27 July 2018

Today we remember and pay tribute to Private Leon John Leger Dawes.

Leon Dawes was born on 15 August 1933, in the town of Cleve in South Australia.

His father’s work as a fisherman took the family to Thevenard, a deep water port town on South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula. He grew up here and attended the local school.

Dawes’s early life was unsettled. His father left the family and moved to Western Australia shortly after arriving in Thevenard. His mother Violet later met Peter Beveridge and remarried. When he was six, his older brother Clarence, who was then 14, ran away to join the Merchant Navy. Clarence sent money from his first pay check home so that Leon, who had just started school, could buy a bicycle to make the daily journey easier, but the brothers would never meet again. Clarence served on a variety of ships throughout the Second World War and when he returned to Australia in 1946 he did not return to Thevenard, instead joining his father in Western Australia.

Leon Dawes left school after completing the sixth grade. At the age of 15 he began working as a junior porter at Thevenard Railway Station. He remained in this job until he and a mate decided to enlist for service in the army.

Despite the early upheaval in his life, Dawes was remembered as a lad who could turn his hand to almost anything. He played musical instruments and was good on the dance floor.

He enlisted into the Australian Regular Army for a six-year term on 13 September 1951. His intent was to serve in Korea and he nominated the infantry as his preferred posting. After completing his training, he was posted to the 2nd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, then based at Puckapunyal in Victoria.

After another posting, Dawes returned to 2RAR and joined D Company.
He embarked with 2RAR aboard the Merchant Vessel New Australia for service in Korea on 5 March 1953, and disembarked at Pusan 12 days later.

The next six weeks were largely taken up with training and absorbing men from 1RAR who had not completed their year in Korea. The battalion went into the front line on the night of 3 May, relieving the Royal Fusiliers. It would be a busy time for the men of 2RAR as patrols were sent out each night.

At the end of May, following a heavy Chinese attack on a British battalion on the Hook, the 28th Brigade, of which 2RAR and 3RAR were a part, was transferred to the Samichon Valley. 2RAR took over the Hook positions at the beginning of July and spent the next two weeks rebuilding them.

On 19 July, Chinese probing attacks on Australian and adjacent US Marines positions began to intensify. The same day at Panmunjom the negotiations for an armistice concluded, with the date for the signing set as 27 July.

In the evening of 24 July, the Chinese began a final offensive in an attempt to capture the strategically important high ground occupied by the Australians and the adjacent US Marines.

The following night, Dawes was part of a standing patrol sent out to occupy an observation post on Green Finger, forward of the Hook. At 9.30pm around 20 Chinese soldiers approached the 2RAR patrol and a sharp firefight ensued. The enemy were forced to withdraw, leaving one of their number dead on the field.

At around 1.30am on 26 July the Green Finger position came under heavy Chinese mortar fire. A piece of shrapnel tore into Dawes’s abdomen, fatally wounding him. He cried out, “I’ve been hit in the back!” A mate cradled him until he died three minutes later.

With Dawes dead and another man wounded, the patrol on Green Finger withdrew to the Australian front line. Two other members of 2RAR were also killed that night, another nine were wounded. The battle of the Samichon had cost 2RAR seven men killed or died of wounds, and over 20 wounded.

The armistice which brought about an end to the fighting was signed at Panmunjom at 10am on 27 July and came into effect 12 hours later.

Dawes’s body was taken to Pusan and he was laid to rest in the United Nations Memorial Cemetery. He was just 19 years old.

His name is listed on the Roll of Honour on my left, among the 340 Australians who died during the Korean War.

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

Michael Kelly
Historian, Military History Section