Unscathed
Sydney George Collis (1896-1972) 1914, courtesy of Mark Robinson
In the words of his younger brother George, Syd Collis ‘came through the war unscathed’.[1] As a jockey and racehorse trainer, it was no surprise that when war broke out in 1914, Syd joined the Australian Light Horse.[2] A medical orderly in the 3rd Light Horse Field Ambulance (3LHFA), his war years were spent in Egypt and the Middle East, triaging and treating wounded soldiers and transferring them to dressing stations or field hospitals.[3] Syd seems to have been an unassuming, pragmatic young man with a positive outlook on life, and despite the dangers of war and several bouts of enteritis during his almost four years of service, fate treated him kindly. Such characteristics likely helped Syd get through the war and were perhaps instrumental in helping him settle back into civilian life after returning home.
Sydney George Collis was born in 1896 in the small town of Alberton in Victoria.[4] His mother Agnes (née Hunter) died from complications of childbirth a week after he was born, leaving his father George to care for three young children - newborn son Syd, five-year-old Tom and three-year-old Laura.[5] George remarried two years later to Emmeline Thirkill, and by the time the war broke out in 1914, there were nine children in the Collis family.[6]
Syd was among the 45 young men who presented at the local Shire Hall in Yarram on 16 September 1914, all determined to do their part for the war effort.[7] He was eighteen years old, at 5 foot 8 ½ inches perhaps a little taller than the average jockey, and despite an appendix scar and an atrophied testicle caused by a riding accident, was passed fit and allocated to the Light Horse.[8] The following Monday he set off by train from Alberton to the camp at Broadmeadows with 39 other recruits, the local community turning out to farewell them, in no doubt that their boys would ‘be a credit to South Gippsland’.[9]
After initial training, Syd, a Private, was assigned to the 3LHFA.[10] On 2 February 1915 they departed Victoria Docks at 5:45pm aboard the Chilka, bound for Egypt; on board were three officers, 89 men and 109 horses. Following a two day stop in Colombo, and sailing via Suez and Port Said, the Chilka arrived in Alexandria on 9 March. The 3LHFA disembarked and marched to Mena where they set up camp, and seven weeks later they moved camp to Heliopolis racecourse.[11]
On 6th May Syd wrote to his father George, and the letter was published in the local newspaper the following month.[12] Despite the circumstances, Syd seemed to be enjoying life. As a jockey, he would have had a critical eye for the racecourse, which was located right in the town. According to Syd it was a lovely course. ‘We have our church parade in the straight, and the chaplain gets in the judge’s box. It looks funny’
Palace Hotel, Heliopolis.
Creator: Sister Selina Lily Mackenzie, Museums Victoria, https://collections.museumsvictoria.com.au/items/1562671
Heliopolis was a wealthy city and was built by syndicate. Syd noted that ‘All the houses are let to different tenants who have plenty of money. The buildings are wonderful. All the fronts are mostly marble of splendid architecture’. The city also boasted a boxing stadium, and the troops ran boxing competitions to keep themselves active and amused. Syd seemed very happy to be able to tell his father that ‘a chap from Gippsland has won all his fights up till now’. The weather was extreme – the day started with reveille at 5am and finished at 12:30pm due to the oppressive heat. The soldiers were well fed on Australian mutton and potatoes and were allowed 6d per day for food by the Egyptian government. ‘Everything is right with us’, Syd wrote to his father, ‘But anytime now the fun commences and we are fit and well to rough it’.
As soon as they arrived, the 3LHFA was busy unloading wounded soldiers from trains, dressing wounds and helping in operating rooms. The Palace Hotel had been converted to the ‘biggest hospital in the world’, and it was full. Syd saw men with arms, legs, toes and hands shot off; he saw soldiers who had been shot in the eyes; he helped with amputations. Wherever they were to be stationed during the war – across Egypt and Palestine –this was the work of the 3LHFA Like so many soldiers who were not fighting at the front, felt his ‘blood boil to see them, and us waiting here’.[13]
A fortnight after arriving in Heliopolis, on 15 May 1915 they set off for Alexandria, then on to Gallipoli and eventually to Mudros on the island of Lemnos. Here they opened a Stationary Hospital where they tended to all imperial soldiers wounded at Cape Helles, and a number of the unit, including Syd, were admitted to the hospital with enteritis.[14]
Over the next three years, Syd and the 3LHFA found themselves in the thick of many battles: the Jifjafa Raid (April 1916); the Battle of Romani (August 1916); the Battle of Magdhaba, (December 1916); the Belah Bombing Raid (May 1917); and the Battle of Beersheba (October 1917).[15]
Members of 3rd Light Horse Field Ambulance Brigade showing improvised methods of carrying wounded soldiers, Egypt, 1915. Sergeant Major Stanley Thomas Parkes, Australian War Memorial, Photograph Collection, Acc. No. P03319.001]
The Belah Bombing Raid was a typically harrowing experience. The camp conditions and rations were ideal, the weather perfect, and patients were pouring in. Then, at 10pm on 4 May 1917, the sky was ‘suddenly full of planes’, and a bombing raid began targeting the Casualty Clearing Station. Two men of the 3LHFA were killed instantly. Patients dragged themselves from tents with horrific wounds, and many were killed outright. As the injured were triaged and operated on, the enemy planes continued to fly overhead. It was 3:30am the following morning before all was calm again.[16]
Like many medical personnel, Syd was transferred to and from various units – he was attached to the hospital in Moascar for three weeks in November 1916, and in February 1917 was transferred to the 10th Light Horse Regiment as a Medical Detail. Syd returned to the 3LHFA in July and was promoted to Lance Corporal and in November 1917 was promoted again to Corporal.[17] Syd succumbed to illness on several occasions and spent time in hospital in May 1915, September 1915, September 1916, October 1916 and August 1918.[18]
As one of the ‘original Anzacs’, Syd was entitled to Anzac leave, and on 30 August 1918 he left Suez aboard the Wiltshire.[19] On 4 October, he arrived in Melbourne, expecting to return to the front for the planned spring 1919 offensive.[20]
D’Arcy and James Brown, also from the Alberton District, had recently returned from the front injured, and on the afternoon of 9 October a large gathering of ladies and schoolchildren were in attendance at the shire hall in Yarram to welcome the soldiers home.[21] The following Tuesday evening, a formal welcome for Syd took place at the Alberton Mechanics Hall. After much praise and gratitude were expressed by local dignitaries, Syd thanked everyone ‘for the kind but rather far fetched remarks’ about himself. He ‘only did his duty’, and ‘knew when he enlisted that they didn’t shoot cream puffs over there’. He considered himself ‘very fortunate to return home intact’.[22]
Syd never returned to the front. The Armistice was declared on 11 November 1918, and he was officially discharged from the Australian Imperial Force on 3 December of the same year. He was awarded the 1914/15 Medal, the General Service Medal, and the Victory Medal.[23]
In 1921, Syd married Minnette Tanaka, the daughter of Japanese laundryman Samuel Tanaka.[24] Around 1922 their daughter Agnes was born, and shortly afterwards Syd re-enlisted. Military life must have held some appeal for Syd, and this time around he joined the RAAF. His service was short-lived however, and he was discharged at his own request less than twelve months later. [25]
Syd’s father-in-law Samuel died in 1926,[26] and Syd and Minnette took over the laundry business in Caulfield.[27] The family lived quietly in suburban Melbourne for many years, and it is easy to imagine Syd simply getting on with life, finding pleasure in small things.[28] Agnes married Stanley Ross in 1943.[29]
Towards the end of 1961, Minette became very ill and was admitted to St Vincent’s Hospital. She died on 10 January 1962 from cardiac and renal failure associated with diabetes and septicaemia, aged 59.[30] Sadly, just six years later, Agnes passed away from lung cancer and pneumonia leaving behind her husband and three daughters. She was just 45 years old. [31]
Syd had seen death and grief in the war, but the sadness of losing his wife and daughter so young must have been hard to bear.
Syd lived the remainder of his life in the family home in Elsternwick that he had shared with Minnette since 1942[32]. A modest and unassuming man who ‘just did his duty’, he emerged unscathed from the Great War, raised a family during the Depression, and lived through the Second World War. A life well lived.
Syd died aged 76 of ischaemic heart disease and bronchitis in the Repatriation Hospital in Heidelberg in 1972, four years after the death of his daughter Agnes.[33] He is buried beside Minnette in Brighton Cemetery.[34]
References
[1] Diary of George Gravin Collis, original held by the author.
[2] Gippsland Times, 21 June 1915, p3.
[3] Service record of Sydney George Collis, National Archives of Australia, B2455.
[4] Birth certificate of Sidney George Collis, BDM Vic 1034/1896.
[5] Death certificate of Agnes Arnot Collis, BDM Vic, 4/1896.
[6] Marriage certificate of George Collis and Emmeline Georgina Thirkill, BDM Vic, 6792/1898.
[7] Gippsland Standard and Alberton Shire Representative, 18 September 1914, p2
[8] AIF Service record of Sydney George Collis.
[9] Gippsland Standard and Alberton Shire Representative, 23 September 1914, p2.
[10] AIF Service record of Sydney George Collis.
[11] Unit War Diaries of 3rd Australian Light Horse Field Ambulance, Australian Imperial Force unit war diaries, 1914-18 War, Australian War Memorial, AWM4 26/41/1.
[12] Gippsland Standard and Alberton Shire Representative, 16 June 1915, p2
[13] Gippsland Standard and Alberton Shire Representative, 16 June 1915, p2
[14] Unit War Diaries of 3rd Australian Light Horse Field Ambulance, AWM4 26/41/1; AIF Service record of Sydney George Collis.
[15] Australian Military History of the Early 20th Century, ‘3rd Light Horse Field Ambulance’, http://alh-research.tripod.com/Light_Horse/index.blog?topic_id=1105788, accessed 13 August 2020.
[16] Australian Military History of the Early 20th Century, ‘3rd LHFA, AIF, 3rd Light Horse Field Ambulance, The Belah Bombing Raid, 4 May 1917’, http://alh-research.tripod.com/Light_Horse/index.blog/1826746/the-belah-bombing-raid-4-may-1917/, accessed 13 August 2020.
[17] AIF Service Record of Sydney George Collis.
[18] AIF Service Record of Sydney George Collis.
[19] AIF Service Record of Sydney George Collis.
[20] Gippsland Standard and Alberton Shire Representative, 4 October 1918, p2
[21] Gippsland Standard and Alberton Shire Representative, 11 October 1918, p3
[22] Gippsland Standard and Alberton Shire Representative, 16 October 1918, p3
[23] AIF Service Record of Sydney George Collis.
[24] Marriage certificate of Sydney George Collis & Minnette Irene May Tanaka BDM Vic 4324/1921.
[25] RAAF Service record of Sydney George Collis, National Archives of Australia, A9301.
[26] Death certificate of Samuel Tanaka, BDM Vic 9583/1926.
[27] Australia City Directories 1845-1948, Victoria Sands Directory, Ancestry.com, accessed 25 July 2020.
[28] Australia, Electoral Rolls, 1903–1980, Ancestry.com, accessed 25 July 2020.
[29] Marriage certificate of Agnes Thelma Sarah Collis and Stanley William Ross, BDM Vic 9691/1943.
[30] Death certificate of Minnette Irene May Collis, BDM Vic 950/1962.
[31] Death certificate of Agnes Thelma Sarah Ross, , BDM Vic 18001/1968.
[32] Australia, Electoral Rolls, 1903–1980
[33] Death certificate of Sydney George Collis, BDM Vic, 10068/1972.
[34] Grave plaque for Sidney George Collis, Brighton General Cemetery.