The Wallabies at War

By Greg Growden

Aussie heroes who have proved themselves on the battlefield as well as on the sporting field.
Members of the Wallabies, the national rugby union team, have fought in virtually every major conflict Australia has been involved in, including the Sudan, Boer War, Boxer Rebellion, both World Wars, Korea, Vietnam and East Timor. Among them are some of Australia's most illustrious footballers. In this book, a veteran sports journalist tells their extraordinary stories of bravery, hardship, courage and human endeavour.

The strengths that made these young men sporting heroes are as important on the battlefield as on the sports field: teamwork, athleticism, tenacity, humour and courage.

The Wallabies at War includes untold stories from Aussie military and sporting history - not just on the battlefield but from POW camps and even the Burma Railway - and a wealth of experiences from humour to tragedy, and from the depths of torture, injury and deprivation to achieving stunning post-war sporting comebacks.

For anyone who loves their sport and their military history.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Australia
• Release date: Aug 1, 2018
• ISBN: 9781460709085

Greg Growden

Greg Growden is a leading authority on Australian rugby. A senior sportswriter for The Sydney Morning Herald for more than three decades, he was also the SMH and Sun-Herald's chief rugby union correspondent, covering hundreds of Test matches, more than 25 Wallaby tours and every World Cup tournament - and is one of just two international rugby writers to have covered all eight World Cups. As ESPN's senior sports columnist in Australia for six years, he covered numerous sports. In 2019 he returned to the Sydney Morning Herald as a sports columnist. He is the author of 15 books.

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

War and Australian rugby have a deep connection. Australia’s leading rugby representatives have been involved in numerous major battles, including the Sudan, Boxer Rebellion, Boer War, the First and Second World Wars, Korea and Vietnam.

In 1882, when a Queensland team travelled to Sydney to play NSW in Australia’s first representative intercolonial rugby match, the only recent battle of note was when Ned Kelly unsuccessfully took on the constabulary at Glenrowan. ‘Such is life’ did not then incorporate getting caught up in other countries’ squabbles. This was soon to change. Australia, although physically isolated from Britain and the rest of the British Empire, rigidly supported a supposedly protective Mother Country, and willingly provided troops for the Sudan in 1885, and beyond. Among those who went away to defend Britain and her empire were soldiers who had learnt on the Australian rugby field the qualities required to survive in a battle.

When Australia — comprising players from NSW and Queensland — played its first rugby Test match in 1899, the players wanted to show their opponents Great Britain how they had picked up and run with the English private school game. That year Australia bolstered the British Empire’s stocks by providing troops to help sort out an imperial tiff on the South African veldt. Many of the Australians who fought beside the British credited their rugby roots for their athleticism, drive and dedication to the Boer War cause. Several years after the Australian team made its first Wallaby tour of Great Britain in 1908–09, the rugby fraternity en masse embraced the call to arms when Britain declared war on Germany.

Rugby, through its distinct Australian middle-upper class school links, was regarded as the game which upheld British values and devoted itself to defending the empire. To boost enlistment, it was constantly expressed how rugby was the ideal preparation for a soldier.

As ‘The Winger’ wrote in The Referee sports newspaper in September 1914: ‘The Rugby Union footballers seem specially adapted and inclined for the work. The physical, moral and mental education of the 15-a-side game serves in a better way than any code for the preparation necessary to face a grim and stern struggle.’

The Australian Imperial Force (AIF) ranks soon overflowed with rugby fanatics.

There were major ramifications. Apart from losing countless important footballers to the trenches, the consequences of war almost saw the rugby code disappear. The First World War wiped out the game for well over a decade in Queensland, previously a formidable rugby state. The impact of war both strangled and revived the code in Australia.

Then again, the Australian game has always been one of contrasts and contradictions, gutted and bolstered by division. The bitter amateur/professionalism divide which came with the introduction of rugby league in Australia in 1907 hit rugby union hard. After losing its best players, many of whom moved to league not just because of money but through disenchantment with short-sighted rugby officials who showed only scanty interest in their welfare, rugby crowds and interest slumped.

While rugby league, which had lured across the other code’s big stars including Dally Messenger and Chris McKivat, consolidated its position as the leading winter football code in several states during the Great War, rugby union, through its officials calling off all serious competition, had become almost forgotten.

In NSW, rugby’s strongest territory, it required frontline soldiers who had endured so much at Gallipoli and the Western Front to resuscitate the code after the war, with a successful AIF team rugby tour reminding all that the 15-man game was still breathing and warranted a revival.

When Britain and Germany declared war in September 1939, rugby was once more in a shaky state. A Wallabies tour, aimed at rewarding those who hadn’t been lured to league by offering them the most alluring overseas sporting trip of all, had to be abandoned. Then they lost too many men to the war. But once again rugby survived post-war through the dynamic efforts of those 15-man devotees who had served.

Since then, Australian rugby has actively encouraged its military links, with representative player and official ranks including those who have served in Korea, Vietnam, East Timor, Iran and Afghanistan.

On numerous occasions, war has forced rugby to get its act together. War emphasised the character and will of many who played at the highest level. But war led to enormous dilemmas within the rugby ranks.

Ten Wallabies were killed during the First World War. Nine died in the Second World War. Numerous state representatives were victims. Some suffered excruciating deaths. The Australian rugby ranks produced soldiers of varying standards. Some were decorated. Others were shirkers. There were inspirational battlefront leaders and deserters. Decorated fighter pilots and prisoners of war (POWs) with extraordinary escape stories are mixed up with eccentrics, suspected spies and those caught up in messy court martials. There was a fair share of philosophers, pisspots, leaders and lecherous individuals, as well as those who completely lost the plot.

Wallabies at War focuses on those rugby footballers with compelling tales to tell. And there are many. Some are sad, some stirring, some involve unexpected mirth or strange twists and turns where ingenuity and courage are rewarded. It is not just confined to players who attained Wallaby Test status. For many decades, a player would be tagged a Wallaby if he represented Australia overseas. But from the 1980s onwards, a Wallaby became someone who had been selected for Australia at home or away. For the purposes of this book, a Wallaby is someone who played at the highest level of their time. It also includes those who played rugby at state level who on the battlefront boasted moments of valour.

A few have already been glorified in print. But the bulk of those worthy of accolades or close attention have either been ignored or forgotten. Sometimes the footballer wanted it that way, desperate to forget those horrid, maniacal times.

Countless footballers, as courageous on the battlefield as they were on a rugby pitch, were badly affected by war. Families collapsed under the strain of bureaucratic bungling while endlessly waiting for any news of lost loved ones.

Yet several overcame dreadful experiences to somehow resurrect their footballing careers. The rapid recovery of those who returned to the Test ranks following years of torture and hardship is a testament to the human spirit. Most didn’t talk about what they had gone through, believing it nothing more than their patriotic duty to represent their country on the frontline as vehemently as they did when wearing the national rugby colours.

But many had important stories to tell, ranging from heroic to hilarious. These deserve greater recognition. That is the aim of Wallabies at War.

PART ONE

FIRST WORLD WAR

CHAPTER 1

TWO HISTORIC FIRSTS

James McManamey and Brian Pockley

Family, admirers, historians and the curious assembled in the Blue Mountains near Sydney in September 2015 to attend a commemorative service for one of Australia’s most admired sportsmen.

James Whiteside Fraser McManamey is not one of Australian rugby’s most famous names, but one cherished by those with a rich, broad knowledge of the game.

The small, reputedly haunted church at the Woodford Academy — a 180-year-old establishment that has been a highway inn, police station, private residence, guesthouse, sanatorium and school — a place with which the McManamey family have been deeply involved, was at capacity as we heard of his feats, and sad death, 100 years to the day at Gallipoli.

The audience was told of how McManamey played in the first New South Wales versus Queensland rugby match in 1882. How he then became the best-known referee in NSW, and was so renowned for his impartiality that once he was invited to Brisbane to referee the interstate match even though he had selected the NSW team. And how when the First World War broke out, as NSW Rugby Union (NSWRU) president, he was the country’s most prominent rugby administrator. Also how, as a teacher, he was instrumental in growing the game at schoolboy level.

The most meticulous of rugby historians, John Mulford, told of the emotional moment in 1997 when he went in search of McManamey’s grave at Gallipoli. He found it, and placed on it a waratah, that he had brought with him from his Sydney garden. As another who had served high office — a past Sydney Rugby Union president — Mulford said it was his duty to find McManamey’s grave at the Hill 60 Cemetery, two kilometres north-east of Anzac Cove.

The futility of battle was a constant theme that afternoon in a church where on display was a cap from the first Australian Test match, football trophies from another era and family memorabilia.

The tall, slender McManamey was a many-faceted individual, but most importantly the first Australian rugby player to serve his country in an overseas imperial battle.

The eldest son of a police constable, McManamey studied at All Saints’ College, Bathurst. When sixteen, James entered Sydney University, completing an Arts degree and sharing the highest award, First Class Honours in Mathematics. A notable University forward, he was a natural to be picked in the NSW team for the first match against Queensland at the Sydney Cricket Ground in August 1882.

On the morning of the match, the Brisbane Courier said McManamey was one of NSW’s most dangerous players, as he was ‘always well on the ball’ and a ‘splendid long placekick’.

There was confusion about the final score, most commonly recorded as 28–4, but NSW dominated. They won either by four converted tries to one goal, or five tries and four goals to one goal. No matter — the game was a success, with the local press delighted it was ‘fast and exciting’. The code, which had been played in Sydney on a serious level for almost two decades, consolidated itself further in 1882 when NSW went on its inaugural trip to New Zealand, where they succeeded in winning four of the seven tour games. Rugby was on its way.

However, McManamey’s fascination with the game was soon swamped by international affairs, particularly in the Sudan, with concerns of an uprising against the British backed Egyptian regime. General Charles Gordon was sent out to clear up the mess, but when the decorated British soldier was killed in Khartoum, the NSW Government cabled London with an offer to send a contingent of soldiers to avenge his death.

Among the 770-man Australian force farewelled by more than 200,000 at Circular Quay in March 1885 were several Sydney footballers, including McManamey. He had taken leave from his part-time work as a Fort Street Model School teacher to become a soldier.

It was a short trip for McManamey as the NSW contingent, the first group of Australian soldiers to fight in an imperial war, were back in Sydney by mid-June, because the British Government had abandoned its campaign. While the official records of those who served in the Sudan are sketchy, McManamey’s school — All Saints’, Bathurst — states in its official history and on its honour board that McManamey was a member of the NSW Infantry during that brief skirmish. The McManamey family are similarly convinced of his Sudan service.

McManamey continued his involvement with the artillery through being a volunteer infantry officer for well over 20 years and the commander of the Kogarah regiment. He returned to teaching, appointed as one of the first masters at Sydney High School. Then he went to the Bar, involving himself in industrial jurisdiction.

Not surprisingly, considering his many sporting administrational roles, McManamey wasn’t among the first to enlist at the outbreak of the First World War in late 1914. But when he did, in June 1915, the AIF did not hesitate in making him a major in the 19th Battalion even though he was 53 years and three months old.

By mid-August, McManamey was in Gallipoli as second-in-command of the 19th Battalion, 5th Infantry Brigade. On 1 September 1915, he wrote from Gallipoli to his wife: ‘My Dear Rose, we are in the trenches but not in the firing line. Our casualties have not been severe but numerous for the work being done. So far I have escaped altogether, and my health was never better. Our diet, principally bully beef and hard biscuits and tea with milk and sugar and occasionally an egg, nil bacon, is quite liberal in quantity, but there is such an amount of dust and such innumerable plague of flies that we live in anything but comfort.

‘We are not far from the sea and a walk of about a mile gives us a good swim in the Mediterranean. The beach is very fine though not quite equal to the Collaroy one. The sand is too pebbly and lacks the whiteness of the ones about Sydney, but all is forgotten in the enjoyment of a quiet, shallow water and the great sea.

‘To some extent we are interfered with by shrapnel but very little damage indeed has been caused by it partly through the Turks bad shotting [sic] and partly through the shrapnel itself being of such poor quality that not more than half of it bursts . . .’

Four days later, McManamey was surveying a water well when a shell landed next to him. Syd Middleton, a 1908–09 Wallaby, who the following year became the first Australian to captain a winning team against the All Blacks, witnessed the moment. Middleton and fellow Test footballer Clarence ‘Dos’ Wallach were members of McManamey’s battalion.

Middleton wrote: ‘Major McManamey left here at about 7.30am to view the position preparatory to setting our men to work digging a safe communication trench. It was while this inspection was in progress that a shrapnel shell burst and Major McManamey was struck down being practically killed outright — part of the contents of the shell entered the body one side and came out the other, piercing the abdomen — and although the Major lived some ten minutes, he was unconscious and never spoke.’

The news of McManamey’s death deeply upset his fellow troops, many of whom called him ‘Father’.

Middleton said: ‘Men and Officers alike . . . simply worshipped Jim and all were down in the dumps today. Just as I write these few lines I hear officially that he was to have been given command of his battalion tomorrow (the irony of fate), so that you will understand that his knowledge, fine manly parts, and ability to get the best out of men were recognised by his commanding officers.’

McManamey was the ‘best liked man in the battalion’.

The Referee’s ‘Cynic’ (J.C. Davis) said of McManamey: ‘No other man in the history of Rugby Union football in this country has been held in such universal favor by those in the game and by those who line the pickets and fill the stands.’

The Sydney Morning Herald remembered him as a selfless patriot: ‘Major McManamey stated that if it was right for sons to go to the front it was also right for those fathers who had had military training to go also to be of what service they could in protecting those sons.’

He left behind a wife and two sons.

Rugby had direct links to a man purported to be Australia’s first victim in the Great War. Five weeks after the British Empire declared war on Germany, and many months before the Gallipoli campaign, Captain Brian Pockley was killed on 11 September 1914 during the Battle of Bita Paka, when serving with the Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force in German New Guinea.

While studying medicine at Sydney University, Pockley played on the wing in the NSW second XV that defeated Queensland at University Oval in August 1913. He had a busy afternoon, scoring one try and having another disallowed by referee Blair Swannell for being offside in their 24–12 win.

Pockley was an exceptional teenage sportsman. As captain of the Shore School XV and Combined Greater Public Schools (GPS) XV, he excelled in the 100, 220, 440 and 880-yard running events, broad jump, long jump, hurdles and rowing. He was adept at boxing, rifle and ju-jitsu, sports he continued at Sydney University. The Sunday Times described him on the rugby field during his three seasons in the students’ first XV as being ‘very tricky on his feet, speedy and frequently bored his way through the defence’.

Pockley was a medical practitioner appointed to the resident staff at Sydney Hospital, but that did not stop him from enlisting. He hailed from a military family, which included his great grandfather Major John Antill, who had fought in the American War of Independence.

He was part of the first landing force of the naval brigade at Kabakaul on 11 September 1914, in the north-east of what is now known as Papua New Guinea. The force was advancing towards a strategic German wireless station when Able Seaman William ‘Billy’ Williams was shot in the stomach.

A fellow officer, Lieutenant Bowen, said Pockley, aware Williams was injured, rushed along a track to assist his wounded colleague.

Bowen called out to Pockley: ‘Don’t, Doc. You will be sure to be shot. These natives don’t respect the Red Cross.’

‘I must go,’ Pockley replied.

‘Very well. I’ll give you three of my men to act as guards.’

‘No, you need your men yourself. I’ll go alone.’

Bowen insisted and Pockley, with three guards, went to find Williams. Pockley attended to him, and stressed they had to get Williams back to the ship for medical attention.

A stretcher-bearer called out: ‘We’ll never get through, sir.’

To which Pockley pulled off his jacket with a Red Cross armband or brassard on the sleeve, and laid it over Williams, with the words: ‘That will get you through.’

Shortly after, Pockley was shot from point blank range by a German officer. Both he and Williams died on HMAS Berrima that afternoon. It is not clear whether Pockley or Williams was the first to die in the Battle of Bita Paka. No matter what, there appear to have been only minutes in it.

Pockley’s action made him an immediate war hero. As S.S. Mackenzie wrote in The Australians at Rabaul: ‘Pockley’s action in giving up his Red Cross badge, and thus protecting another man’s life at the price of his own, was consonant with the best traditions of the Australian army, and afforded a noble foundation for those of Australian Army Medical Corps in the war.’

The Referee described Pockley as ‘a handsome young fellow, of charming personality and a splendid sportsman of the truest type, it was only natural he was exceedingly popular’. His father Dr Antill Pockley, a Macquarie Street ophthalmic surgeon, said how his son died ‘was just like him. He never counted the cost to himself or anything if it meant a service to anybody else.’

A monument for Pockley was erected within weeks at Sydney Hospital, and the Metropolitan Rugby Union made ‘a resolution of sympathy’ for Pockley’s relatives. This would be the first of many such emotional wartime rugby resolutions.

Back in New Guinea, the 24-year-old was buried in his uniform under the palm trees at the Herbertshohe Cemetery. As Pockley was lowered into the grave, a bugler played the ‘Last Post’. His head was deliberately pointed in the direction of his home town — Sydney.

CHAPTER 2

CERTAINLY NO ADONIS

Blair Swannell

Of the 747 Australian soldiers killed at Gallipoli on 25 April 1915 few could match Blair Inskip Swannell for outlandish, reckless and divisive behaviour. None would have their reputation smeared as much as Swannell, who was despised by many, to the extent that some believed he may have been killed by his own men.

This detested rugby player and soldier alienated many. Making him stand out even further were his odd mannerisms and strange appearance. His face resembled a battered prune. Even Swannell admitted he was ‘ugly’.

‘Certainly no Adonis,’ Swannell would mutter.

Some rated him the most repulsive forward to appear in the Australian rugby colours, not just in looks but for his nefarious on-field tactics. Most regarded him a thug. Then there was the issue of personal hygiene. He had to be convinced to change his clothes, or even to wash.

Making matters worse, Swannell was a notorious braggart, dominating conversations with endless accounts of his many exploits. The super-human feats he recounted sounded so Boy’s Own Annual, it was often difficult to work out what was fact, what was fiction. He claimed he had fought among the insurrectionists in Uruguay, toyed with death as a seal hunter along the South American coast, Cape Horn and Labrador, and played rugby in France, Germany, South Africa, India, North and South America. He even claimed to have bobbed up in Canada, Chile and Patagonia, either fighting with the rebels or trying his luck as a gold prospector.

Swannell was an original football troubadour who, like renowned Wallaby backrower Tom Richards, used the amateur game to see the world. A farmer’s son, Swannell was born in Buckinghamshire, England, in 1875, attending Repton School. Rugby was soon central to his life, and he played for Olney, Weston Turks and Northampton Saints, starting in the centres but moving to the forward pack.

After qualifying as a second mate at the Thames Nautical Training College, the lure of faraway lands was a constant. This was the impetus for his first trip to Australia, travelling to Sydney as a mate on a schooner in 1897. The stay was short, but he saw enough to be convinced Australia was his land of opportunity. Two years later he was back, with Reverend Matthew Mullineux’s Great Britain squad, which played four Tests against the newly formed Australian national rugby team.

He wasn’t picked for Australia’s first Test, but was still part of this historic occasion at the Sydney Cricket Ground as one of the touch judges for New Zealand referee William ‘Gun’ Garrard.

Mullineux realised the mistake in not selecting this notoriously ferocious rucker of the ball as Australian dominated up front to win 13–3. From then on Swannell was an integral part of the British forward pack, giving it an antagonistic edge. What Swannell got up to at scrum-time, including kicking away at his opponents’ shins, wasn’t legal, but it worked. He was soon irreplaceable, playing 16 of the next 17 matches on their Australian tour, including the next three Tests, all won by Great Britain. He was only twice in losing sides.

Swannell’s aggression was encouraged by the ever-whingeing Mullineux,¹ who abhorred Australia’s ‘dishonest practices’ and ‘win at all costs’ attitude. Forever restless, Swannell spent the next three years with the 37th (Buckinghamshire) Company, 10th Battalion, Imperial Yeomanry fighting the Boers in South Africa. An exemplary soldier, rising to the rank of lieutenant in 1902, he was recommended for a commission.

In 1904, Swannell was again in Sydney with the Great Britain team, this time led by a dour Scot, David ‘Darkie’ Bedell-Sivright. Scotland’s amateur heavyweight boxing champion — known as Darkie due to the black circles around his eyes — loved a brawl, telling teammates they must not be intimidated by any underhand trickery from the ‘Colonials’. Described by authoritative sportswriter E.D.H. Sewell as ‘the hardest forward who ever played International football’, Darkie once crash-tackled a carthorse on Edinburgh’s main street after a victory dinner, and then stopped traffic as he lay across the tram tracks for over an hour. No Edinburgh policeman had the courage to go anywhere near this crazed footballer.

Swannell loved his skipper’s bullish attitude and gladly took on the role of chief aggressor, angering the Australian players, press and crowds with his unsavoury acts. Being cast as a villain surprised Swannell, who even took to writing to newspapers professing his innocence. That only inflamed the situation.

In the first Test in Sydney, Australia’s halfback and renowned pugilist Reg ‘Snowy’ Baker was blatantly kicked in the face by Swannell. Then, against Queensland, their forward Alex McKinnon left the field with a badly lacerated head after Swannell stomped on him.

In the midweek game against Brisbane, Swannell’s vicious tongue upset the locals, prompting the Brisbane Truth newspaper to write that ‘several of the players’ had ‘complained bitterly of the filthy language’ used by a British forward. ‘This player is well known in Australia as a rough member, and, to use an Australian term, is a ratty player.’

His roughhouse tactics in the return match against Queensland prompted widespread indignation in the Brisbane press, especially when McKinnon was again the victim. Swannell nearly took McKinnon’s head off with a head-high tackle.

The Referee’s Brisbane correspondent wrote that Swannell was ‘unnecessarily severe’ towards ‘several Queensland forwards who had not always possession of the ball . . . It is a pity that the pure and grand football shown by the team should be marred by one player.’

The Brisbane Truth was more pointed. ‘Swannell’s tackling of McKinnon was very cruel, and the referee should certainly have dealt with him. The British team would do a lot better and be more popular if they dropped Swannell.’

When Swannell ran out for the second Test at Brisbane’s Exhibition Ground, the crowd jeered him loudly. That only motivated him. In the final minutes of their 17–3 win, Swannell flattened Australian backrower Pat Walsh and fullback Jack Verge.

The Courier-Mail took a swipe, saying Swannell was the worst offender for ‘rough play’.

Incensed he had been singled out as a hooligan, Swannell wrote a lengthy letter to the doggedly patriotic Australian sporting weekly, The Referee, proclaiming his innocence. He called on the editor to print it in full. The Referee — like many other newspapers not accustomed to agitated sportsmen sending them a ‘stating my case’ essay — happily obliged.

Swannell argued Australian footballers were no angels, referring to the 1899 British tour, and Reverend Mullineux’s constant complaints that Australian players resorted to ‘dirty tricks’. This included illegal tackling, fouling and obstructing at the lineout, using hands to get the ball out of the scrum, and frequent use of fists and elbows.

‘I return in 1904 and this is what I find. The football in New South Wales is clean and above reproach . . . I regret to say that I find football in Queensland in a very different state. I would advise the Queensland Rugby Union to try and eliminate such play from their games, for if they do not they will certainly kill the game of Rugby football in Queensland — in Brisbane, at any rate. My football days are nearly over. I shall never visit Queensland again as a player.’

The Brisbane Truth was underwhelmed by Swannell’s prolonged bleat, replying the British team had made no friends while in Queensland.

‘Rugby Union officials are pleased to have seen the last of them,’ the Truth wrote. ‘They were extremely difficult to cater for, and treated the Rugby Union discourteously in failing to attend the various items set down on their programme.’

The Truth reporter described the tackle on McKinnon as ‘one of the foulest . . . I have ever witnessed’.

From that day, Swannell was wary of those north of the Tweed. That was only amplified when he returned to Sydney, and enjoyed the hospitality of New South Wales rugby officials. Before the third Test, several took him out on the harbour.

Scoring his first and only international points in the Sydney Test, when he finished under the posts during Britain’s 16–0 win, reinforced to him that