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Australia

Allan O'Halloran Wright entered the Collegiate School of St Peter in 1898 but two years later and at only 13 years of age left to serve in the Boer War.

No. 17 Trumpeter Wright sailed from Australia with the 2nd South Australian Mounted Rifles Contingent on 26 January 1900 and received special mention by Lord Roberts as being the youngest Australian at the front.

He served in three engagements, and received a medal with clasps from the hands of the Commander-in-Chief in London on December 17, 1901. [i]

Upon his return to England, he attended the Military Training College at Bedford where in April 1903, at just 17 years of age; he was posted to the Sussex Artillery as a second lieutenant. He returned to South Australia in 1906, where he hoped he would gain a commission in the permanent artillery, but as none were available, he returned to England. There he served in the Suffolk Royal Garrison Artillery, Ipswich until he gained a commission in the Royal Irish Rifles in 1907. [ii]

Captain Wright had served five years in India and Aden and was serving in Aden as adjutant of the 1st Battalion, Royal Irish Rifles and at the beginning of the war returned to England with his unit; they disembarked at Liverpool on 22 October 1914. Later that month the battalion relocated to Winchester as part of the 25th Brigade of the newly formed 8th Division and embarked for the Western Front in early November 1914.

The division disembarked at Havre on 6 November and upon taking over the sector south of Armentières, played a leading role in the Battle of Neuve Chapelle in March 1915. British commanders learned a number of lessons at Neuve Chapelle, lessons that would stand them in good stead for future battles, but the lessons of war never come cheap and the 8th Division alone suffered more than 4,800 casualties.

Twenty eight year old Captain Allan Wright, 1st Battalion, Royal Irish Rifles was killed in action on 13 March 1915.

In a letter written from the trenches in Flanders, Captain Wright told a friend he was looking forward to the eventual arrival of the Australian division. He said he had seen several photographs of them.

They are a magnificent looking lot of men, and their stay in Egypt will give the required finishing touches.[iii]

Allan felt the Australians would be better off for being ‘out of this part of the show’ which he described as ‘so appalling’ it would spoil any troops. He said he found nothing glorious about war and it was unlike anything one reads in books.

One has under these conditions to alter all one's previous outlook on life from the human standpoint, and survey it from the point of view of the common or garden worm, which burrows about in the mud as we do now. [iv]

Wright said he believed they would not always be stuck as they were then and felt when the stalemate was broken it would be as ‘if the war bad begun again.’ He told how he saw winter as dividing the war into two distinct parts by, and how he felt the second part would be as furious as the first.

There can only be one result, but there will be some heavy work before the enemy are finally knocked out. It is a pity they cannot be drummed out of Europe. I'm proud of the old Commonwealth; they are British, with a big B, and have played the game magnificently.[v]

In a letter to the School published in 1915, Captain Wright’s brother Cecil (OS) wrote that his brother had ‘well earned and won a place in the records of the dear old School.’ He wrote how he had received letters from some of Allan’s fellow officers speaking warmly of his unusual gallantry and stating that of the 21 original officers who had gone to France with him in October there were by then only four still alive. One of Allan’s peers told Cecil his brother was mentioned in despatches and had practically led the Royal Irish Rifles in the rush to capture the trenches at Neuve Chapelle.

Another wrote that ‘few men were so well prepared to meet death’ as Allan. ‘He was a splendid officer, cool and fearless and universally popular.’

On Saturday, March 13th at the fag end of the battle he had to take a despatch across an open meadow to his Brigade at ‘Port Arthur’ and on returning was dropped, being killed instantaneously when near home and cover. [vi]



[i] The Advertiser Adelaide, South Australia 1889-1931, 19 March 1915, p. 7
[ii] St Peter’s School Magazine , W K Thomas & Co, Adelaide, May 1915, p. 64
[iii] The Advertiser Adelaide, South Australia 1889-1931, 19 March 1915, p. 7
[iv] ibid
[v] ibid
[vi] St Peter’s School Magazine, W K Thomas & Co, Adelaide, August 1915, p. 63-64

A cablegram from London received on March 18 by Messrs. Lyons & Leader, stated that Captain Allan O'Halloran Wright, who was well known in Adelaide, had been killed in action on Sunday, March 14, whilst fighting with his regiment in Northern France. The news was received by his many friends in Adelaide with deep regret. Captain Wright had been at the front since early in the war. He was adjutant of the Royal Irish Rifles, and was promoted to the rank of captain at the front in January. He was an admirable man in every way.

The youngest son of the late Mr. Frederick Wright, one-time manager of the National Bank of Australasia, in Adelaide, Captain Wright was born in this city on April 27, 1886. He received his early education at Queen's School and St. Peter's College, and entered on his military career at the age of 13, when he went to South Africa as trumpeter with the first South Australian contingent. In that campaign he received special mention by the late Lord Roberts as being the youngest Australian at the front. He served in three engagements, and received a medal with clasps from the hands of the Commander-in-Chief in London on December 17, 1901. After the war he began in 1902, a course at the Military Training College Bedford, England, and received his first commission as second lieutenant in the Sussex Artillery, on April 17, 1903, he then being 17 years of age.

He returned to South Australia in 1906, hoping to obtain a position in the permanent artillery, but as no opening offered he went back to the old country, and entered the Royal Irish Rifles, with which regiment he served for five years in India and Aden. He left the last named place on September 27 for the front.

His widowed mother is living in India, but his sister (Mrs. H. P. Gill) is in Adelaide, and his brother Norman is in the Adelaide Steamship's Company's service in Western Australia. He has several relatives in South Australia, including Mr. T. J. S. O'Halloran, S.M.

Mr. P. F. Leader recently received a letter from Captain Wright, written from the trenches, in Flanders, in which the writer said: — "I am looking forward to the eventual arrival here of the Australian division. I have seen several photographs of them. They are a magnificent looking lot of men, and their stay in Egypt will give the required finishing touches. They are just as well out of this part of the show, which is appalling, and would spoil any troops— just mud, slush, and rain, requiring patient and dogged 'sticking!' Nothing dashing or glorious like one reads in the books; but it is very fine the way the men generally are 'sticking it.' One has under these conditions to alter all one's previous outlook on life from the human standpoint, and survey it from the point of view of the common or garden worm, which burrows about in the mud as we do now. We shall not always be sticking here like this, and when we move I think you will find it will be as if the war had begun again. It will be divided into two distinct parts by the winter, and I think the second will be as furious as the first part. There can only be one result, but there will be some heavy work before the enemy are finally knocked out. It is a pity they cannot be drummed out of Europe. I'm proud of the old Commonwealth; they are British, with a big B, and have played the game magnificently."

1915 'THE ROLL OF HONOR.', Chronicle (Adelaide, SA : 1895 - 1954), 27 March, p. 42, viewed 12 August, 2014

Sourced by Peter Lutley