Great Scot - The Scotch Family Magazine - Issue 151 September 2017 GreatScot_Internal_Sept_2017_FA | Page 10

Scotch Commemorates World War I
‘Death before Dishonour’
This article commemorates the first 31 of the 61
Scotch Collegians who died as a result of war
service in 1917.
The first Old Boy to die that year was
WILLIAM ALLISON BLAIR (1906). Just five feet
four inches tall on enlistment, by 1917 he was a
sergeant with the 38th Battalion, and was praised
as energetic and solicitous for the welfare of his
men. Shellfire killed the 28-year-old stock and
station agent at Armentieres on 16 February.
Lieutenant EBENEZER RALPH (known as
Ralph) PEARSON (1904) was also 28 when
he died, at Lagnicourt in France. A pre-war
commercial traveller, Ralph served at Gallipoli
before being commissioned an officer with the
58th Battalion. Ralph was telling his men to
remain under cover when a shell fragment struck
him on 26 March. He has no known grave.
CHARLES MELBOURNE NEILD (1889)
was an architect before enlisting at 44. After
serving in the infantry at Pozieres, Charles
joined the 4th Field Ambulance. With them
he distributed food to troops at a well-known
Australian Comforts Fund tea stall. The 46-year-
old was one of seven Australians who died when
the explosion of a German delayed action mine
destroyed the Bapaume town hall on 25/26
March.
Commissioned as a lieutenant with the
50th Battalion in February, WILFRED VIVIAN
HUBERT LUTHER (known as Luther)
BIDSTRUP (1904) was made the ‘bomber
officer’, in charge of the unit’s grenades. Before
his death, in front of a German strongpoint at
Noreuil, he wrote to his mother that his motto
would be ‘Death before Dishonour’. He emptied
his revolver at the Germans before their machine
gun fire killed him on 3 April.
The AIF initially rejected JAMES
MCARTHUR STEWART (1907) because of
bad teeth. He was accepted in 1916. On 3 April
1917 at Morchies he was speaking excitedly
about being accepted to go to officer training in
England, when a shell exploded on the dugout
where he was sheltering. He was buried some
10 metres away but the 26-year-old’s grave was
later lost.
GEORGE COLIN (known as Colin)
BUCHANAN (1910) was from Ballarat, and
boarded at Scotch before enlisting at 19.
He served on Gallipoli, but suffered ill-health
8
afterwards and did not join his new battalion, the
46th, until December 1916. Listed as ‘wounded
and missing’ at Bullecourt on 11 April, Colin was
last seen walking to the rear with blood coming
from his mouth. His body was never found.
PELHAM STEANE JACKSON (1904)
served in the Light Horse on Gallipoli and was
twice wounded fighting the Turks in Palestine. On
19 April the second wound, to the thigh, proved
mortal, despite the best efforts of his mates, who
carried him to help at Gaza. His grave was lost.
EDLEY WILLIAM (known as ‘Snowy’)
NATHAN (1911) was initially rejected on trying
to enlist but, after an appendectomy, passed the
medical examination. When killed at Armentieres
on 20 April 1917 he was a highly efficient and
popular corporal. He repor tedly dodged one of
two shells heard heading his way, but not the
second.
A class captain at Scotch in 1911, ROBERT
WILLIAM HUNTER (1911) enlisted in 1915,
just 19 years old but over six feet tall. Soon after
arriving at the Western Front he was hospitalised
for months with pneumonia. After officer training,
he joined the 37th Battalion as a lieutenant in
March. Enemy shellfire killed him on 23 April.
GEORGE FREDERICK (known as Fred)
CHAFFEY (1911) boarded at Scotch. Groomed
to take over the family’s winery in Mildura, the
20-year-old was furthering his education in
London on the outbreak of war and joined the
British Army. He was with the ‘Artists Rifles’ when
artillery fire killed him at Ypres on Anzac Day 1917.
EVELYN DENISON BOURCHIER (1915)
was a grazier before enlisting on Anzac Day 1916.
A gunshot wound to the chest killed the 20-year-
old on his first day in action, at Bullecourt on 3
May 1917. Killed on the same day was EDWARD
HENRY HALFORD BAIN (1910), who was also
a grazier when he enlisted on his 23rd birthday.
His arrival at the front was delayed by wrist and
ankle injuries, but when he got there he was killed
on his first day of action. Like Evelyn he was in the
bomb throwing squad of his battalion.
Sergeant DAVID HUNTER (1909) survived
Gallipoli and Pozieres, though in the latter he
received a severe neck wound. At Bullecourt on
3 May, the 24-year-old was one of many 22nd
Battalion members killed. His brother, Robert,
had fallen the previous month.
A fourth Old Boy killed at Bullecourt was
44-year-old WALTER ULYSSES KER (1885). A
civil servant in Perth before enlisting, he arrived
at the front on 1 May 1917, and survived for just
four days. Little is known of his fate. Like Bain and
Hunter, Ker has no known grave.
CHARLES FREDERICK (known as Fred)
REEVE (1911) sprained his back while carrying
ammunition on Gallipoli. While recovering in
England, he followed a boyhood dream by joining
the Royal Flying Corps. By May 1917 he was a
2nd Lieutenant flying in France. On 11 May his
plane crashed soon after take-off and he died of
his injuries two days later.
English-born RUSSELL FRANK CLARKE
(1912) attended Scotch for two years before
enlisting in England in 1914. As a Second
Lieutenant with the ‘Civil Service Rifles’, Russell
died at Arras on 21 May, aged just 20.
ARTHUR DEANS (1908) was a school
Prefect at Scotch in 1908. He was a final year
honours student at Melbourne University when
he joined the AIF in 1916. Though initially rejected
for the AIF because of poor eyesight, he enlisted
after memorising the eyechart. On 1 June 1917,
he and two fellow artillerymen were killed when
an enemy shell burst in a barn where they were
sleeping.
JOHN CECIL DRURY REID (1893) was
nearly 40 and married with three children on
enlisting in 1916. An engineer in civilian life, he
became a Lieutenant in the 4th Pioneer Battalion.
He earned a Military Cross for his reconnaissance
work after the great explosions at Messines. On
one of his reconnaissance patrols he received a
mortal bullet wound to the head, and died on 10
June.
RUPERT HOTTON HERD (1907) was
a grazier when he enlisted in the Light Horse.
After serving as an officer in the Anzac Cycling
Battalion in France, Rupert joined the Australian
Flying Corps in England. He had just finished
his training in June 1917 when, while acting as
observer on a training flight, he was killed in a
crash at Eastbourne on 16 June.
JOHN WILSON MCWHAE (1900)
matriculated from Scotch at just 15. He became
a well-qualified mining engineer in Australia
and California, and in 1914 enlisted in England.
As a Lieutenant in the Royal Artillery, John
commanded his battery with distinction at the
Great Scot Number 151 – September 2017