ANZAC Day Dawn Service

It was there that over the next eight months Australian and New Zealand soldiers died, and the ANZAC legend was born.

The 25 April 1915 was a Sunday.

Not far from where we stand, local churches were full or parishioners attending morning services, singing hymns, giving praise to the Lord, and praying for their husbands, sons, brothers, uncles and nephews who were serving overseas in the Australian Imperial Force.

Half a world away, the ANZACs were preparing for what would be a fateful morning; a day that would shape the character of our young nation.

In the months leading up to the landing, there were high hopes that a successful campaign by the Allies in the Dardanelles would knock Turkey out of the war. 

Winston Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty made this observation: “The price to be paid in taking Gallipoli would no doubt be heavy but there would be no more war with Turkey. A good army of 50,000 and sea-power—that is the end of the Turkish menace.”^[1]

As the boats moved slowly towards the shore before dawn, the soldiers listened to the lapping of the water and their own heartbeats.

They had a rendezvous with destiny.

Eyes darted sideways and downwards.

The time would soon come.

But for now, it was time for one last look at a photo of their wife, sweetheart or children.

Time for one last look at the hint of the golden rays of the sun peeping out from the cliffs of the peninsula.

Time for one last prayer to God.

Among the men of the 10th Battalion - comprised solely of South Australians - was Bunel John Nash.

The younger son of Mr. Joseph George Nash and Mrs Emma Mash, Brunel was born in Parkside on 29 May 1887.

He later moved to 15 Charles Street, Norwood but continued to attend Sunday services at the Anglican parish in the suburb he was born.

After attending Pulteney Street School and St Peters College, he earned an engineering degree and then followed in his father’s footsteps by taking a job with the South Australian Government as a fitter and turner.

A talented athlete, in 1909 Nash joined the Norwood Football Club and began his career in the B Team; what we now refer to as the Reserves.   

His popularity with his teammates and natural ability helped him land the role of Captain. 

Nash also played 12 league matches between 1909 and 1914, his last being against South Adelaide at Norwood Oval on Saturday 22 August 2014.

During the third quarter of that match, Nash was one of three Norwood players considered “many times instrumental in getting the ball into a position favourable for scoring.”[2]

The Advertiser reported the Redleg’s “stirring finish” by unexpectedly beating South by four points after being 14 points behind at three-quarter time.[3]

Despite Norwood also winning its last match the following week against North Adelaide by seven points, the club had a poor season and earned consecutive wooden spoons.

On Tuesday 25 August, Nash travelled to Morphettville where he enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force.

He was assigned to F Company.

His Enlistment papers stated he stood at 5 foot, 10 ½ inches tall, had fair hair and blue eyes.

Nash was among the first senior players at Norwood to enlist but by means was he the last.[4]

Word quickly spread throughout the club that several players were answering the call to serve their country to fight in the war in Europe.

Within days, the players’ red and blue football kit was replaced with a khaki kit, football boots were replaced with army boots, and drills on the football field were replaced with drills on a training field.

On 9 September 1914, Kensington and Norwood Mayor Henry James Holden hosted a ‘Smoking Social’ for 200 people in the Norwood Town Hall in honour of the players who were going to war.  

Six weeks later on 20 October 1914, Nash embarked on the HMAT Ascanius with the 10^th Battalion.

The commanding officer was Lieutenant Colonel Stanley Price Weir, who was among the first students to attend Norwood Public School (now Norwood Primary School) shortly after it opened in 1877.

The men continue their training in Egypt before joining the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) at Gallipoli on 2 March 1915.

No less than eighteen Norwood players would serve in the Gallipoli campaign.

Nash - nicknamed ‘Bruno’ and ‘Bruce’ - and his Norwood teammates Philip De Quetteville Robin, George Darling Beames, and Thomas Victor Storey were inseparable.

A photo of the four men in uniform taken in 1914 can be found in the State Library.

At the time the war broke out in early August, the men were part of the Norwood Football Club’s interstate tour of Western Australia, where it played three matches.

Two were against Fremantle teams while the other match was against an Association team.

On 11 August, the men also watched a match between the Christian Brothers Old Boys versus the Present Boys as the Western Australia Cricket Association (WACA) ground.[5]

A letter from the quartet, who enlisted within seven days of each other between 24-31 August, to Mr J. J. Woods, Secretary of the Norwood Football Club, was read at the annual meeting of the club held on 30^th March 1915:  

“…we formed a club in this battalion, with P. Robin as captain and B. Nash as vice-captain, and have successively beaten, by a large margin in each case, the 11th Battalion (Western Australia), the 6th (Victorian), and the 3rd Field Artillery Clubs. All these teams had senior players in them, about half of the Victorians being either league or association.…The first game was played right under the pyramids almost, the ground being only about 400 yards distant from Cheops, and the latter two on the Cairo ovals. Give our kind remembrances to all our club-mates, and we, wherever we are, hope to hear or read that Norwood are going very strong.”

In its appraisal of how Norwood would perform in the 1915 football season, The Adelaide Herald observed that, “From the last team they have lost Nash, Storey, Robin and Beames, who are representing their country in the firing lines.”[6]

Six days later, on the day of the Gallipoli landing, Robin, the dashing wingman who won the 1907 Reserves Magarey Medal and represented Norwood and South Australia with distinction, was killed in action.

Brunel Nash was last seen seven hours after the landing but was un-noticed until the first roll call of his unit five days later.  

It was reported in one of the daily newspapers in May 1915 that “The Norwoods (sic) have lost several good men who heard their King and country …, and the flower of their team are now playing with ball cartridge instead of the inflated sphere.”[7]

In his first dispatch from Gallipoli made available to the public on 17 May 1915, Charles Bean noted, “The Australians died like tigers, some who fully knew they would die.”[8] 

The same month, three newspapers in Adelaide printed articles stating Nash was officially ‘missing.’ All three articles ended with the same sentence: “Mrs Nash is naturally anxious for further information.”[9]

According to Corporal Douglas Griffin Tenison Woods, a resident of Shipsters Road, Kensington and the grand-nephew of Father Julian Tension Woods, who, along with Saint Mary of the Cross Mackillop founded the Sisters of Saint Joseph of the Sacred Heart, Nash’s final movements were as follows:

“We had advanced about 3 ½ miles by mid-day April 25^th and got out of touch and came back. When we turned Nash was missing and never seen again. Quarter Master Sergeant H. F. Colby and Sergeant Beames both of A Company were with us at the time and might be able to give further information, but we all turned back together.” [10]

Another witness, the Scottish-born Private Edward Henderson Boag, said this of Nash:

“He was a good footballer and I think he came from North Adelaide. He was about 5’10, fair and slim built. One of his mates from the same section said he was killed in the first charge. He was never seen after the charge on 25^th April.”[11]

On 13 July 1916, Nash’s team-mate Sergeant George Beames, while serving on the Western Front in France, wrote a letter to military authorities in London giving his account of events:

“Very sorry indeed, but unable to give any information regarding poor Bruce Nash, No. 702. I only wish I could, as he was my best pal, but we were only together a few hours after landing, when we were parted, and from that time until this day I could get no information whatever of his. Trusting something for the best turns up shortly.”[12]

Eager to find answers about the fate of his son, Nash’s father wrote to some of his Brunel’s mates but to no avail.

He even received a letter from Lieutenant Colonel Weir, who responded that it appeared Nash “went ahead of the main body of the day of the landing.”

Having been reported missing since 13 June 1915, in November 1916, military authorities confirmed Private Brunel John Nash died on 2 May 1915 in the vicinity of Pope’s Hill.[13]

He was 27 years of age.

On 11 November 1916 ‘The Adelaide Observer’ reported Mrs Nash was advised of her son’s death.[14]

On 24th June 1921 the Base Record Office in Melbourne wrote to Mrs Nash advising it could not confirm where her son was buried.

In reply, Mrs Nash wrote: “I cannot tell anything about my son’s death or burial. I was notified in June 1916 that he was reported missing on Gallipoli.”

She went on to say she had made several lines of enquiry but did not hear anything, although her son’s diary and disc were returned to her.

Nash’ last diary entry was on 28 April 1915, where his mother said, “my son was known to get well inland on the peninsula, but no one saw him killed.”

Brunel John Nash is buried at Lone Pine.

We do not know what sort of life he would have lived had he survived the Great War.

What we do know is that he and his brothers in arms who fought and fell in Australia’s name during the Great War will never be forgotten.

Today, we pay our respects to the men who served at different times in different units and in different theatres, but whose names have been brought together – and will stay together - on this Memorial.

May it continue to serve as a reminder to all who pass it of this group of ordinary Australians who served in extraordinary times and who gave up their tomorrows so we can live today.   

Lest we forget

Mayor 

Robert Bria

[1]  https://www.history.com/news/winston-churchills-world-war-disaster

[2] The Advertiser, 24/8/1914, p. 13.

[3] The Advertiser, 24/8/1914, p. 13.

[4] The Register, 1 November 1916, p.8

[5] The West Australian,’ 11 August 1914, p.5.

[6] The Adelaide Herald, 19 April 1915, p. 7.

[7] Quote taken from The Norwood men who served, 2015

[8] Extracted from the Commonwealth of Australia Gazette No. 39, 17 May 1915, https://anzacportal.dva.gov.au/wars-and-missions/ww1/where-australians-served/gallipoli/landing-anzac-cove/beans-first-report

[9] Express and Telegraph Adelaide, 22/6/1915. 4; The Advertiser, 26/6/1915, p. 40; The Register, 22/6/1915, p. 8.

[10] Letter from Corporal D.G.T. Woods, 1 July 1916. Australian Red Cross Society Wounded and Missing Enquiry Bureau Files, 1914-1918 War, 1DRL/0428

[11] Letter from E.H. Boag, 26 July 1916. Australian Red Cross Society Wounded and Missing Enquiry Bureau Files, 1914-1918 War, 1DRL/0428

[12] Letter from G.D. Beames, 13 July 1916, Australian Red Cross Memorial Wounded and Missing Enquiry Bureau Files, 1914-1918 War, 1DRL/0428

[13] Adelaide Observer, 11 November 1916

[14] Adelaide Observer, 11 November 1916