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     This biography is lengthy.  The reason for that is when I started researching this man I found numerous articles written about him so to pay honour to him, and in an attempt to try and tell his story so you get a glimpse of who he was, I have quoted several of those articles.  If you read on you will not be disappointed but will come to see just what an extraordinary man he was.  

     Herbert Patrick Hare was born in 1878, the eldest child and first born son of Henry and Maria Hare.  Mystery surrounds his birthplace as his service records shows it as “Waterford, Ireland” but his marriage certificate states it as “Hobart”.  His parents were born in Hobart as were his 6 siblings so it’s reasonable to conclude that he was too.  He also had a half-sister from his Mother’s previous marriage.  He was affectionately known as “Pat”.

     After completing his schooling he was an apprentice engineer for 3 years.  He trained in the Southern Tasmania Artillery for 3 years, served in the Southern Tasmania Infantry, D Company, for 2 years and also as a Chaplain for 18 months with the Citizens Military Forces (Reserve Army).  In the late 1890’s Pat had theological training at Queen’s College, Melbourne, before proceeding to Queensland in 1902 to take up an appointment as a Home Missionary for the Methodist Church in the Warwick Circuit.  He did this for 2 years before being received as a minister on trial at the 1904 Methodist Church Conference.  He served the church at Toowong then moved to Howard in the Wide Bay District in April 1906 and during this time he became an ordained Methodist Minister.

     In January 1907, aged 29, he returned to Hobart briefly to marry Eloise Gladys Crisp (went by Gladys) at her parent’s residence in Archer Street, New Town.  Pat & Gladys returned to Queensland where newspaper articles confirm that Pat assisted the Rev R C Hamilton at Apple Tree Creek in 1907 then Mt Perry in 1908.  They returned to Brisbane briefly where Pat ministered at Ithaca in Brisbane where he also preached at Albert Street Church.  In 1911 he took up the invitation to be the second minister at Charters Towers.  He remained there till 1913 when he was appointed the Superintendent of the Methodist Church Mount Morgan Circuit then they moved to their Gordon Street home in Mount Morgan.  Fifteen months after arriving in Mount Morgan Pat offered his services as a Chaplain to the military forces but due to the Methodist quota already being filled, he was rejected.  This didn’t deter him and on the 24th August 1914 he enlisted for WW1 as a Private aged 33 years and 3 months.  One of the last sermons he preached before leaving for the war was titled “Why I Enlisted.”  Chaplain Colonel Dr. G.E. Rowe V.D. said of him:                      “He did not love war; he hated it.  He did not want to leave his wife and friends, his vocation as a minister of the Gospel, to face the horrors of the battlefield. But he was compelled by a sense of duty to enlist and take his place in the ranks to protect the weak against the tyranny of an unscrupulous foe.  Animated by the noblest motives, and impelled, by the loftiest ideals, he went forth to the battle line”.

     After Pat enlisted he proceeded to Brisbane for training at the Enoggera Barracks while his wife and adopted daughter, Mildred Hope Sands, returned to Hobart.  His service records describe him as being a tall man at 6 feet with black, curly hair, brown eyes with a fresh complexion and a half inch scar in the middle of his forehead.  He was posted to the Ammunition Column, 3rd Field Artillery Brigade, with his service number being 2258.  No doubt all the experience he had in Tasmania, prior to becoming an ordained minister, influenced his posting and because of his previous service he was quickly promoted to Sergeant.  He embarked from Brisbane on the 25th September 1914 on the ship “Rangatira”.  The following is an extract from a letter that Pat wrote to a friend in Mount Morgan from the ship, dated 23rd November 1914.  It was published in the Capricornian newspaper on the 2nd January 1915:                                                                                   "Just a line to let you know that all's well, and have arrived this far slowly but surely. We have been delayed on the voyage for various reasons, all of which were unknown to us but doubtless good ones. The only incident worth anything was the capture of the Emden by our convoy Sydney off the Cocos Islands. We were ordered up on deck about 8 p.m., all lights being extinguished, and we stood silent for about three hours, looking into the dark sea and hearing in the distance the boom of guns. In the morning we heard of the capture, and all hands shared in the rejoicings. ….I becoming more and more a troopship soldier. We are getting plenty of stables and gun drill, and I am becoming quite an expert artillery man. ….the whole of the company have been very kind and generous to me, and my life on board the ship, both as a soldier and a parson - as I am conducting both duties on the ship - have been very pleasant. We (the Field Artillery) have lost no men, and only four horses. In the whole transport consisting of 40 ships (including the New Zealanders) six men have died and 46 horses, so we have not done too badly. We don't get much in the way of war news, so I really don't know how things are going, but I am sincerely hoping that things will so happen as to enable us to return early next year. How are things going at the Mount? I trust you are keeping and doing well. Give my regards to any of our mutual friends."

     He joined the MEF in April 1915 and was part of the first contingent to land at Gallipoli.  He wrote the following letter to a friend in Mount Morgan from Gallipoli, dated 11/5/15.  It was published in the The Capricornian newspaper on the 7th August 1915:                                                                                   "We are allowed to send a line from the front. You have, of course, heard about our engagement, the subjugation of the unspeakable Turk being our objective.  So far we have done well, though it has been very costly and many of my personal friends have died doing their duty.  My brother was wounded in the first attack on the Peninsula.  My word, our fellows have done very nobly indeed.  I believe that our attack on what was considered to be an impregnable position is one of the best things in the history of warfare.  To have heard and to have seen the bombardment by the warships was the sight of a lifetime, and it sounded as though hell was let loose.  I hope we shall soon reach Constantinople, but lots will have to happen before then.  It was hard luck that the Light Horse was out of it, having to remain in Egypt, but its turn may come later.  I believe I have been turned out of Mount Morgan, for which I am very sorry.  I hope someday to see you and tell you of this great campaign."

     He transferred to the 7th Battery in July then was promoted to 2nd Lieutenant in August.  He was admitted to hospital in late October and transported to Malta on the hospital ship “Rewa” where he was admitted to hospital in early November.  On the 8th December 1915 he was promoted to Lieutenant. 

     In January 1916 he embarked from Malta for Alexandria, Egypt, and rejoined his unit at Tel-el-kebir Camp.  It was here in Egypt that he met up with my Grandfather, Cyril Morsley, (SN 1707) and Arthur Wheatley (SN 1706).  Cyril was in the 3rd Field Ambulance and was a student at King’s College in Brisbane training to be a Methodist minister when he enlisted.  Prior to that he had been a Home Missionary for the Methodist Church at Helidon at the same time that Pat was serving the church in Charters Towers.  Arthur was a resident tutor at King’s College when he enlisted.  Cyril and Arthur were close friends and from Cyril’s 1916 war diary I know that the three of them often spent time together and regularly attended YMCA meetings.  While Cyril’s diary doesn’t confirm this, it’s possible that Pat may have known Cyril and Arthur prior to his enlistment through attending Methodist Church Conferences together in Brisbane in March 1913 and 1914.  The three of them sent greetings to the Methodist Church Conference in March 1916 while they were in Egypt.

     Pat was transferred to the 4th Division Artillery in late February and then to the 22nd Battery, 1st Field Artillery Brigade in early March.  He embarked from Alexandria on the 21st March and arrived in Marseilles, France, six days later.  He was transferred to the DAC (Division Ammunition Column) in May then another transfer in July saw him back in his original unit, the 3rd Field Artillery Brigade with the 103rd Howitzer Battery.

     In a letter to home he expressed his horror of the battlefield and the presentiment he had of his end. "It is,'' he wrote, "such an extraordinary life to live.  Just imagine me spending all my time wondering how best I can kill Germans.  Isn't it a dreadful game?  Many, if not most, of my personal friends have either been killed or wounded.  I have been mercifully spared.  Still I never know when a close call, of which I get many, will come a little closer and end the chapter.  Somehow I hardly think I'll get through our next campaign."

     On the 7th August 1916 the battery was preparing to leave the position they’d held for the previous 3 weeks to go to the rear for a rest after a prolonged period of shelling.  Pat was busy with one of the detachments moving a gun out of the pit when a 9” shell landed in the pit and exploded, killing or wounding most of the detachment.  Pat had his right arm blown off.  He was immediately evacuated to the 3rd Casualty Clearing Station but sadly, he died the following day from his wounds aged 39.  He was buried at Puchevillers Military Cemetery, plot 1, row B, grave 60. 

     Tributes by Officers serving with Pat when he met his death, Major Keith Jopp and Brigadier-General Hobbs, sent to Gladys after the news of her husband’s death and published in the Brisbane newspaper “The Week” on the 27th October 1916:      “We attended him as best we could but it was bad.  He never complained and just bore his pain with his wonderful, cheerful, courage that he has borne everything.  I stayed with him as much as I could till we could get him away.  He asked me, in case of things going wrong, to write to you and let you know that he went down in action, and to give you his love, and also to little Mildred.  We saw him off to the ambulance, and I was told two days ago that he had died.  Believe me Mrs Hare, you have all of our sympathy for we all loved Pat.”         Major Keith Jopp

“Dear Mrs. Hare,                                                                         I want to tell you how deeply we all, but especially myself, deplore the loss, on the battlefield of your gallant husband and our respected and beloved comrade. I knew him almost from the time he joined the A.I.F. and fully appreciated what a splendid soldier he was, always keen, ready, and willing to do all that laid in his power to do his duty and to secure efficiency and success. He was an example of what a soldier should be, always cheerful, energetic, self-sacrificing, and brave to a fault. That he died a soldier's death just after a great fight and victory, in which he had gallantly taken his part, beloved, by all who knew him, will, I am sure, be some consolation to you, and his many friends in Australia. Personally, I deplore his loss, which cannot he easily replaced, but he died as I know he would have wished to die, gallantly doing his duty in action.”            Brigadier-General Hobbs

     Pat’s two brothers, Charles (SN 528), who was wounded twice at the Dardanelles and Gallipoli, and Henry (SN 2961), who served in France, were both returned to Australia however, in a strange twist of fate, Henry was wounded on the very same day that Pat died.  Henry was later awarded the DCM Medal and the Italian Bronze Medal for his actions in WW1. 

     Gladys eventually received a parcel of his personal effects as well as a trunk and suitcase held in London that Pat had directed be sent to her in his will.  Later on four more parcels arrived but Gladys has been ordered away on account of ill health so Pat’s sister took receipt of them.  Gladys later received his 1914-1915 Star Medal in June 1920, his British War Medal and a Memorial Scroll in 1921, his Victory Medal and a Memorial Plaque in 1922.  Twelve years after Pat’s death Gladys married John Purssell in 1930 aged 48.  She died in 1975 aged 93.

     The loss of Herbert Patrick Hare was felt all across the world….from his fellow soldiers and officers in France to his friends back in Tasmania and the many people whose lives he’d touched in places throughout Queensland where he had endeared himself to the congregations he served as an ordained Methodist minister, but none felt it more keenly than his wife and family. 

     A Memorial Service was held for Pat at the Mount Morgan Methodist Church on the 3rd September 1916.  The following is an extract of an article published in the Morning Bulletin (Rockhampton) on the 6th September 1916:                               “A service in memory of Lieutenant the Rev. H. P. Hare was held in the Methodist Church on Sunday night last. There was a very large attendance, the church being unable to accommodate all who wished to be present. The altar was draped with the Union Jack, and on either side of an enlarged, framed photograph of Mr. Hare, were arranged some pretty bouquets of white flowers. Chaplain the Rev. J. H. Heaton conducted the service and spoke of the remarkable popularity that Mr. Hare had at all times enjoyed and exhorted all who had known him to endeavour to emulate all they had found so straightforward and upright in him, and their lives would be the better for it. The service terminated with the sounding of the last Post and the singing of the National Anthem.”

     Other Memorial services were held for Pat at Methodist Churches throughout Queensland…Albert Street Brisbane, Charters Towers and Sherwood just to mention a few.  On all occasions there were large crowds attending which was a testament to how much Pat was loved and admired and missed by so many people.  The Rev A G Smith spoke at the Charters Towers service and the following is an extract of what he said which was published in The Northern Miner newspaper the day after the memorial service: “Herbert Patrick Hare, after 13 years in the ministry of the Queensland Methodist Church, has been called from the service of the church militant to that of the church triumphant.  ….During his thirteen years of service he laboured at Toowong, Howard, Mt. Perry, Ithaca, Charters Towers and Mount Morgan, and in every place he left behind fragrant memories.  He was a very striking personality.  ….. It gave strength and attraction to his preaching.  It marked him out as a leader, so that the young and those that were no longer young gathered about him.  His entrance into any company was an event.  He added something individual and personal, something that was all his own, to the general stock.  It was this distinctive personality, with its strength and charm that marked him off from others in his ministerial and social life.  As a pastor he was exceedingly diligent.  In visitation of his people in their homes was a very marked feature of his ministry.  When sickness or trouble visited any member of his congregation, no trouble was too great, and no distance too far for him.  ……He went through nearly the whole of the Gallipoli campaign, winning the esteem of officers and men.  Many a time he acted as chaplain to his men, and during all those months he gave the regular chaplain all possible assistance.  Before proceeding to France he was granted his commission as Lieutenant.  We have not yet had details of those last weeks, nor of the circumstances under which he received the wounds that resulted in his death.  We must wait patiently for these.  We only know that on August 8th there passed from this earth a gallant Christian gentleman and a faithful soldier of Jesus Christ.”

     At the Albert Street Memorial Service Chaplain Colonel Dr. G.E. Rowe, V.D. conducted the service and said of Pat:                      “He was a brave soldier and a distinguished minister and had the spirit of a truly heroic saint.  He fell in honour's cause, and it was a fall upward. His reward is in heaven.  His memory will be cherished by his brethren in the ministry and by the whole of the Methodist Church.  He was a noble example of "a man in Christ."

     Tributes flowed from near and far for this special man, one all the way from France from his friend Arthur Wheatley serving with the 3rd Field Ambulance.  The following is an extract from a letter of Arthur’s published in the Queenslander newspaper on the 21st October 1916:                                                                          “I must just say a few words about Hare. I met him several times in Egypt, and more frequently in France.  Just before this last scrap I had dinner with him on several occasions, and came to like him very much.  He had been fortunate enough to get leave to England, and he gave me some very interesting descriptions of life in London.  He was getting on well, and had great prospects in the army.  Last time I saw him he said how be often thought of his people at Mount Morgan, and longed to be back with them.  Now he is dead.  Killed by a shell just a few minutes before his battery was to be relieved.  I have felt his loss very much.  He was a fine, manly exponent of Christianity, and fought for his conscience' sake.”

Footnote: Arthur Wheatley was killed in action in Meteren, France, on the 25th April 1918, Anzac Day.  He and Pat are now sharing stories in heaven.

A tribute published in the Queensland Times on the 26th August 1916 reads:                                                                       “About three years ago, it was my privilege to be associated with him in Mount Morgan for several months, and a more sympathetic and helpful colleague it would have been impossible to find. His strong, manly character, and cheerful disposition endeared him to people in various parts of the State indeed, it is no exaggeration to say that no minister of the Church in Queensland was more widely beloved than he.  Wherever he went there was progress and often, wonderful progress, too.  It was a common occurrence in Mount Morgan for a large number of people to be unable to gain admission to the evening service.  The miners flocked in crowds to hear him, and his forceful, fearless preaching always produced a profound impression.  His death will be a loss not only to the Church, but to the State.  He was a man who possessed high ideals of citizenship, and social evils were given a prominent place in his message.  Even the worst characters in the community respected him, and on several occasions, I have seen them call attention to him, and say, as he went by; "There's Pat! He's a good fellow, is Pat!" …… A life of splendid service has been crowned with a supreme sacrifice.  Herbert Patrick Hare has entered into the full joy of his Master.”

     An extract from another tribute published in the Brisbane Courier on the 26th August 1916 reads:                                  “The Rev. W. Dinning…..says there will be keen sorrow in the Central district over the loss of this popular young minister. He was greatly esteemed, both in Rockhampton and Mount Morgan. "Frequently," writes Mr. Dinning, "we exchanged pulpits, and I supervised his circuit work for some time after he left for the camp.  It was during this period that I learned how deeply the people of Mount Morgan loved and respected him.  He had laid hold of the miners as few other men could do.  He seemed to know the name of every man and child he met in the street.  Every Sunday evening he preached to a crowded congregation, and on special occasions there was scarcely standing room. The church will seat 500 or 600 persons.  His spirit of self-sacrifice appealed to the people.  An incident which transpired a few months before he left illustrates this.  A woman lost her life while crossing the dam in a boat.  Mr. Hare was among the first to dive to recover the body, and he remained doing this for many hours.  The large number of young men who early enlisted from the Mount were inspired by the heroic example of the young Methodist minister.  'If the Rev. Pat Hare is willing to enlist as a soldier,' they said, 'it is up to us to go.'  I saw him off at the station, with a large number of young men from his congregation accompanying him.  I shall never forget the animated face, and the gleam in his eye as he said farewell. …..His memory will remain green for many a year with those who knew him best."

     In Hobart, Tasmania, there are several Memorials bearing Pat’s name paying honour to him.  The Hobart community decided to honour all of their fallen heroes by planting trees that bear their names.  The first planting took place on the 3rd August 1918, almost 2 years to the day after Pat’s death, with his family there to witness the ceremony.  Pat’s tree is number 23.  This memorial is called “The Soldiers Memorial Avenue” and is found at Queens Domain, Hobart.  An Honour Board in the Hobart Town Hall bears his name and a Memorial Plaque found at the Woodbridge Uniting Church bears the names of three men who made the supreme sacrifice with their lives…Pat’s is one them.  His name also appears on the Kingborough Roll of Honour.  He was also remembered in Melbourne on the Queen’s College Roll of Honour.

     An Honour Board was unveiled in the Mount Morgan Methodist Church on the 30th July 1917, bearing the names of all the members who enlisted in the AIF.  Pat’s name appears with a photo of him in the centre of the board.  The Mount Morgan Historical Museum also has a portrait of Pat. 

     No doubt there are more Memorials to Pat and certainly there are so many more tributes published in newspapers that could be shared but there are simply too many.  It is abundantly clear that not only have his family, friends, congregations and colleagues suffered a great loss in this man, so has Australia and mankind.  For those who knew him personally, he touched their lives in such a way that he’s left an indelible impression.  For those of us who never knew him personally but can only read about how he affected the lives of all he came into contact with over the 39 years he was here in this world, he has still left an impression and we look forward to meeting him and shaking the hand of a true saint and a wonderful example of humanity.  

Herbert Patrick Hare was awarded:             

1914/1915 Star 3393

British War Medal 764

Victory Medal 721

The Anzac Commemorative Medallion was instituted in 1967 by Australian Prime Minister Harold Holt.  It was awarded to surviving members of the Australian forces who served on the Gallipoli Peninsula, or in direct support of the operations from close off shore, at any time during the period from the first Anzac Day in April 1915 to the date of final evacuation in January 1916.  Next of kin, or other entitled persons, are entitled to receive the medallion on behalf of their relatives if the medallion has not been issued.

The medallion is cast in bronze and is approximately 75 millimetres high and 50 millimetres wide.  The obverse of the medallion depicts Simpson and his donkey carrying a wounded soldier to safety.  It is bordered on the lower half by a laurel wreath above the word ANZAC.  The reverse shows a map in relief of Australia and New Zealand superimposed by the Southern Cross.  The lower half is bordered by New Zealand fern leaves.  The name and initials of the recipient is engraved on the reverse.  The medallion is issued in a presentation box. 

(Australian Government - Department of Defence)

Sue Smith August 2016

NOTE: The first Given Name was incorrectly transcribed on the Embarkation Roll. The Attestation Papers signed by the individual indicates the first Given Name as HERBERT. The record on this site has been amended to accord with that recorded within the Service Record. Virtual War Memorial Chief Moderator, August 2016.