The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (3080) Lance Corporal John Bryson Dunsmuir, 56th 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 Chris Widenbar, the story for this day was on (3080) Lance Corporal John Bryson Dunsmuir, 56th Battalion, AIF, First World War.

3080 Lance Corporal John Bryson Dunsmuir, 56th Battalion, AIF
KIA 26 September 1917

Today we remember and pay tribute to Lance Corporal John Bryson Dunsmuir.

John Bryson Dunsmuir was born in 1886 in Grangemouth, Stirlingshire, in Scotland, the youngest son of Robert and Marion Dunsmuir. He attended Board School in Grangemouth before migrating to Australia with his family at the age of 23. Once in Australia, he lived in Bexley in Sydney, and worked as a bandsaw miller in the timber trade in Sydney and Adelaide. He also received training to carry out clerical work in a timber merchants office.

Dunsmuir enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force on 27 August 1915 and commenced his training at the Liverpool Camp near Sydney. On 20 December 1915 he embarked from Sydney aboard the transport ship Suevic. Once in Egypt, he joined the 56th Infantry Battalion, which formed part of the 14th Brigade of the 5th Australian Division. He joined this unit as part of a process known as the “doubling of the AIF”, in which troops who had served on Gallipoli were mixed with fresh recruits to ensure that newly created and rapidly expanding Australian units retained a mix of new and experienced men.

In June 1916 Dunsmuir was promoted to lance corporal before sailing for France and the war on the Western Front. Soon after his arrival, the 56th Battalion had its first taste of a major battle at Fromelles, the first major battle involving Australian troops on the Western Front. Australian troops of the 5th Division attacked a bulge in the German lines known as the “Sugar Loaf”, but came under heavy German machine-gun fire. In the failed attack, the Australian 5th Divison suffered over 5,500 casualties.

In early 1917, Dunsmuir and his unit took part in a series of attacks on enemy positions as the Germans withdrew to a series of well-defended trenches known as the Hindenburg Line. Later that year, they moved north to the Ypres sector of Belgium.

From 24 July until 5 August Dunsmuir was on leave in the United Kingdom, and it is likely that he met up with friends and family in Scotland during this time.

On 26 September 1917, Dunsmuir and the 56th Battalion took part in the Battle of Polygon Wood, an attack designed to capture 1,500 metres of enemy lines near the ruins of a destroyed planation near Zonnebeke.
Before the attack, as the men lay in the starting positions, Dunsmuir gave one of his friends in the trenches a cigarette case to pass on to a lady he knew in Scotland. Dunsmuir told his friend that he had a bad feeling about the battle, and had had a premonition of his death.

At 5.50 am, Australian and British forces began laying an intense artillery barrage on German positions, and the Australian infantry leaped out of their trenches into no-man’s-land to begin the attack. The attack was untimately successful, but cost Australian over 5,770 casualties in a single day. Dunsmuir was one of those killed. As he advanced towards the German lines, an artillery shell struck him in the stomach and killed him instantly. He was 31 years old.

He was buried in the Aeroplane Cemetery in Belgium, where 471 casualties of the Fisrt World War now lie. His grieving family left the inscription on his grave: “Life for evermore”.

His name is listed on the Roll of Honour on my right, among almost 62,000 Australians who died while serving in the First World War.

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

David Sutton
Historian, Military History Section