The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (937) Trooper Percival James Cameron, 10th Light Horse Regiment, 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 Tristan Rallings, the story for this day was on (937) Trooper Percival James Cameron, 10th Light Horse Regiment, First World War.

937 Trooper Percival James Cameron, 10th Light Horse Regiment
KIA 7 August 1915

Today we remember and pay tribute to Trooper Percival James Cameron.

Percy Cameron was born on 23 February 1883 to Robert and Sarah Cameron of Quorn in South Australia’s mid-north. Percy spent his early years in Quorn before the family moved south to take up a property at Mount Compass, just south of Adelaide. As an adult, Cameron moved to Western Australia, where he worked as a labourer until he had secured enough capital to begin farming. He took over a small farm, doing well enough to be able to take over a larger one near Wickepin.

Percy Cameron leased his farm and enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force in early 1915. He began training with the light horse, and left Australia for active service overseas with reinforcements to the 10th Light Horse Regiment on 26 April 1915. After some time in Egypt, he arrived on the Gallipoli peninsula in July.

On 5 August 1915, Cameron wrote home to his parents: “[I] have been in the trenches a fortnight … have seen the place where the Australians landed and consider it a wonderful feat, and every man that stopped at home should raise his hat whenever meeting them.” He described the heights above Anzac Cove as “a huge rabbit warren”, and assured his family he was “in good health and spirits, and must say the authorities look after the men well.”

This was Trooper Cameron’s last letter home before he took part in the ill-fated attack on Turkish positions at the Nek. In the early hours of 7 August the men of the 10th Light Horse Regiment got into position and waited for the artillery bombardment meant to neutralise the Turkish machine-guns opposite. At 4 am a naval destroyer opened fire on the Nek, but although it fired for half an hour, it had little effect on the Turks.

The attack was launched by two lines of infantry from the 8th Light Horse Regiment. Its war diary records, “almost immediately… the first line of ours had left our trenches, enemy rifle and machine gun fire opened on our parapets.” The first and second lines of charging lighthorsemen were mown down by the heavy fire. Although a request was made to brigade headquarters to stop the attack, the 10th Light Horse Regiment was ordered to continue. A third, and then a fourth, line of lighthorsemen was sent over with similar results. It was not until a major crawled out to see the situation that it was decided “it was impossible for men to move forward a yard and live with such a hail of well-aimed and distributed rifle and machine gun fire”, and the attack was called off.

On the small narrow bridge of land known as the Nek, more than 200 men were killed and many more wounded in a shockingly short period of time. The regiments were in a state of confusion and it took some time to determine who had been killed, and who had been taken for medical treatment.

The Cameron family were initially told that their son had been wounded in action. Later they were told because no news had been received that the wounds were serious and they should assume their son was progressing satisfactorily. In fact, he was missing after the attack on the Nek, and his father was shocked to read in the newspaper that he had been killed in action. His father wrote to the officer in charge of base records to say “please ascertain where the mistake is, and you will confer an obligation on his sorrowing parents.”

Despite their hopes that their son might still be alive, a court of enquiry determined Percival James Cameron had been killed in action at the Nek on 7 August 1915. His body was never recovered, and today he is commemorated on the Lone Pine Memorial. He was 32 years old.

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 Trooper Percival James Cameron, who gave his life for us, for our freedoms, and in the hope of a better world.

Meleah Hampton
Historian, Military History Section