Battery Sergeant Major Frederick Handel Bowditch

Frederick Handel Bowditch was born in 1893 in Penzance, Cornwall, to Frederick Joseph Bowditch and Ellen Jane Williams. Bowditch moved to Melbourne just before the First World War, but found himself soon heading back to Europe. He enlisted on 26 April, 1915, just a day after the first landings on Gallipoli.

Before his enlistment, Bowditch had spent five years in the British Territorial Force, allowing him in the Australian Imperial Force to take on the rank of sergeant. His pre-war profession is listed as a hanger and decorator, at which he had spent five years as an apprentice before emigrating to Australia.

Bowditch embarked HMAT Wiltshire on 18 November 1915, aboard which he performed the popular songs "Thora", and "When Father Papered the Parlour", a good choice, given his profession. After a brief stop in Alexandria, Bowditch disembarked in Marseilles. As a member of the 4th Australian Field Artillery Brigade, Bowditch saw action first at Armentieres and then their first major offensive in the Battle of the Somme. It would later support allied attacks on Messines, Menin Road, Polygon Wood, Broodseinde, and then Passchendaele.

In August 1917, Bowditch suffered a gunshot wound to the nose, which led to a month's stay in hospital in France. Later that year, owing to "most consistent gallantry and devotion to duty in the field during the period February 26th to September 20th, 1917", Bowditch received a mention in Field Marshall Sir Douglas Haig's despatches on 7 November. By August 1918, Bowditch was serving as Battery Sergeant Major of the 5th Field Artillery Brigade and in January 1919, received the Meritorious Service Medal.

After four years of service, Battery Sergeant Major Bowditch returned to Australia aboard HMAT Argylshire in August 1919, arriving in Australia the following month and soon returning to his pre-war profession. Bowditch would go on to be an important member of the Painters' Board, a union for painters and decorators, in which he played a significant role in the determination of fairer wages and working conditions in 1937.