Edmund Cornish

Full-length portrait of Captain Edmund Warhurst Cornish, painted in 1917 when he served in the Australian Imperial Force in the First World War by his cousin, Evelyn Chapman.

Captain Edmund Cornish and the artist's personal histories are interwoven against the backdrop of the First World War. Born in 1888, from 1906 to 1911 Evelyn Chapman took art classes under Antonio Dattilo Rubbo and then at the Julian Ashton Art School in Sydney before leaving for Europe with her parents for further study in Paris and England. During the First World War, the family was based in the vibrant artistic community of St Ives, Cornwall.

Edmund Cornish enlisted 19 May 1915, aged 18; by 20 August he was a Private in the 13th Infantry Battalion on board the HMAS Shropshire departing from Sydney. Thomas White, in ‘The History of the Thirteenth Battalion’ records that in freezing conditions at Gallipoli on 27 November 1915 “Turks were seen massing on Chunuk Bair and dispersed by our artillery. Snow falling to-night. N.C.Os like E. Cornish, J. Cooney and J. Coyle setting splendid examples.”

By August 1916 he had been transferred to the 45th Battalion, was promoted to the rank of 2nd Lieutenant, and had fought and been wounded in France. He suffered a 'contused left knee' in action and was sent to England to recuperate and resumed duty in October. In February 1917, Lieutenant Edmund W. Cornish was recommended to receive the Military Cross "For conspicuous gallantry in leading an attacking party on enemy's Strong Point and trenches at GUEUDECOURT on the morning of the 21/2/1917." In May he was detached for duty to the 12th Australian infantry Brigade as an intelligence officer. Later that same year Cornish received the bar to the military cross: “East of ZONNEBEKE on 12™ October 1917 this Officer successfully organised and personally supervised the laying of the "jumping off" tapes in "No mans land". On 28 November 1917 Cornish was transferred to the Flying Corps and probably returned to London. At this time it seems reasonable that he was permitted some leave over Christmas, and may well have visited his relatives in St Ives, Cornwall.
Evelyn Chapman likely painted the portrait of her cousin within the family home. Cornish wears his Captain’s uniform, standing as though he has just entered the room, with his overcoat discarded beside him and holding his horsewhip under his arm. His three-quarter pose centres the colours of the Military Cross and bar on his chest. Chapman was surely proud to record the achievements of her cousin, at only 20 years of age, but she also shows his youth and vulnerability.

In January 1918, Cornish went to the Royal Flying Corps School of Military Aeronautics in Reading, England, to qualify for an appointment as a flying officer and within a few weeks he was seconded for training to the Australian Flying Corps Depot. He graduated in October and was sent to the 1st Wing Headquarters in Sary, France and joined the 2™ squadron of the Australian Flying Corps. Within a fortnight Cornish was involved in one of the last great air battles of the First World War. Flying a Scout Experimental 5, Cornish was part of a midday patrol over Lille, France. According to ‘The Australian Flying Corps in the Western and Eastern Theatres of War 1914 – 18’ by F. M. Cutlack, the Australians came across a German formation of twelve Fokkers and engaged them in a dogfight:
“Cornish was lost through his lack of experience in air fighting. He was a newly-joined pilot, and had won his captaincy in the infantry. He was a reckless fighter, and his comrades in the squadron were dismayed to see him during this engagement pursue one German, clinging hard upon its tail, through and below a bunch of other Fokkers, regardless of the danger to which he was thus exposing himself. Several of those other enemy machine promptly dived on him and shot him down.” (page 375)

Cornish was taken a prisoner of war, and in a postcard to a Miss Henley on 10 November 1918 wrote: "Wounded in the arm which is broken, and in the back. Arm now progressing very well. My Doctors and Nurses are very good and I am being treated very well." At the close of the war, he was repatriated and was transferred to the 14th General Hospital in Wimmereux, France, before being admitted to the Prince of Wales Hospital, London. He returned to Australia on board Czaritza, arriving 15 May 1919. His appointment was terminated in February 1921. Eight years later, on 11 February 1929, Edmund Warhurst Cornish was killed in an aeroplane accident at Goulburn, NSW.

Cornish seems to have been a brave and somewhat audacious participant in many significant battles that involved Australian forces during the First World War. He was acknowledged as a good soldier and leader, and rapidly achieved the rank of Captain. He was 32 years old when he died. This is the most significant portrait that has been credited to Chapman, made more important by the fact that she stopped working as an artist when she married in 1925.

It is likely that the time she spent at St Ives permitted her to work amongst artists, exchanging ideas and developing her personal style. This work is also a significant record of her stylistic development, as it differs remarkably from the tempera paintings of ruined buildings also in the Memorial collection, painted less than two years later. Painted ‘en plein air’ in France and Belgium in 1919, the tempera works are painted with a much lighter and more varied palette. She was the only known Australian woman artist to have gained access to the Western Front in the immediate aftermath of the war (accompanying her father, who was attached to the New Zealand War Graves Commission.) The Memorial holds seven paintings by Chapman completed in France at this time. Her portrait of Cornish remained in the Chapman family until it was donated to the Memorial by the artist’s daughter, Pamela Thalben-Ball, who is also represented in the collection with her portrait of ‘Captain Reg Saunders’ (ART28159).