Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

BARWICK MM, Leslie Vere. 

Service No 2034 34^th Battalion|9^th Brigade|3^rd Division, AIF.

Born 3 November 1892, Leslie Vere Barwick was the youngest of the ten children of Alfred Robert Barwick and his wife Elizabeth Ann (nee Ashford) who had married at St Luke’s Anglican Church, Scone on the 30^th June 1873.

His siblings were Edwin Alfred b 1873-d 1955; Florence Eleanor b 1875- d 1960; John William b 1876-d 1935; Charles Edward b 1878- d 1965; Samuel Frederick b 1880-d 1880; Matilda Jessie b 1881-d 1961; Melba Mercy b 1883- d 1945; Elsie b 1886-d 1886; Alma Estell b 1888- d 1975;

Leslie enlisted at the AIF recruiting depot in Newcastle on 13 March 1916.  He had been farming at Gunnedah while his parents were living at Willow Tree.

He is recorded as being, twenty three years and four months of age, a single man 5’9” tall and weighing 11 stone he had a fair complexion, blue eyes and fair hair.  His religious denomination was Church of England.  His only previous military experience had been six months in the cadets.  Leslie was assigned to the 3^rd reinforcements for the 34^th Battalion. 

Following four weeks training at West Maitland, Leslie was sent to No 11 NCOs School where he qualified as a Corporal.  He was appointed Corporal on 21 August 1916 three days before he embarked from Sydney on His Majesties Australian Transport, A 68.  Anchisses.  Arriving at Southampton 11 October he was assigned to 3^rd Division Training Battalion.  On the 11 November he was taken into the 34^th Battalion which moved across the channel to France and entered the trenches 27 November as the terrible 1916-17 winter closed in.

For four weeks during February/March Leslie was in hospital suffering from German measles.  While in hospital as was the practice he lost his stripes and reverted to Private. 

Leslie was at Messines on the night of 7 June 1917 when the British Commander General Herbert Plummer simultaneously detonated 19 mines totalling 600 ton of explosive that had been laid under the enemy trenches on the ridge.  With the 34^th he advanced, with a New Zealand Battalion, through a barrage of enemy artillery and gas shells as they drove the surviving enemy troops from their position.

During the next seven days the 34^th were successful in repelling the constant German counter attacks until they were given a well earned rest behind the lines.

For the next four months the 34^th returned to the trenches on several occasions to relieve other Battalions.  They underwent further training before re-entering the front to prepare for the coming battle at Passchendaele.

On the morning of the 12 October, following a 10 hour march though rain, bitter cold and heavy German artillery, the Australian and New Zealander troops attacked Passchendaele.  The attack devised by Field Marshal Douglas Haig was a disaster.  Haig, despite the advances in the weapons available to him, still believed that if he could capture the heights at Passchendaele the British cavalry would be unstoppable.

The battlefield in front of the heights was reclaimed marshland, kept dry only by a well planned drainage system.  The German artillery barrage soon destroyed the drainage system and turned the area that the Allied troops had to cross into an impregnably barrier.

Men who slipped from the duck-boards found themselves in mud up to their armpits.  Many were drowned when they fell into the water filled shell holes.  Ignoring the advice of General Gough, who had urged him to call a halt to the battle, Haig insisted that the attack go ahead.

When he learnt that all of his company’s stretcher bearers had either been killed or wounded, Leslie had selflessly gone alone and unaided into No-man’s-land and spent the next thirty six hours under constant fire from enemy artillery and machine guns, treating and bringing in the wounded.  He was recommended for a Military Medal for his conspicuous Gallantry and devotion to duty; The recommendation submitted by the Commanding Officer of the 34^th Battalion Lieutenant Colonel Ernest Edward Martin, DSO, VD revealed that many of the men he brought back to safety were 1.5 kl forward of the Australian line, while several he rescued had been hopelessly buried in the mud and would certainly have perished without his untiring effort.  Haig allowed the battle to continue until he was forced to withdraw the survivors eight days later.

On 26 October, Leslie was appointed Driver, to replace Driver John Woods, 28 year old former miner from Islington, Newcastle who had been killed at Passchendaele.  Leslie’s Military Medal was confirmed in the London Gazette of 4 February 1918.

Following two weeks leave in England he returned to his unit in March before they moved from the Somme and entered the front line at Lancer Wood at 2pm on 31 March in support of the 33^rd.  The 33^rd did not receive any artillery support as it took up a position on the Western side of the road that ran from Villers-Bretonneux to Demuin due to the uncertainty of the position of the British Battalion.

The 33^rd commenced their attack with a bayonet charge, capturing a section of the German line without firing a shot but in doing so they suffered heavy casualties.  The 34^th followed and were so incensed at the sight of so many of their comrades from the 33^rd who had been killed; they spared nobody who opposed them.  The following day the 9^th Australian Infantry Brigade and the 3^rd British Cavalry were credited as being the saviours of Villers-Bretonneux.

Australian Commander General John Monash was to report that the 9^th Brigade had defended Villers-Bretonneux for three weeks before they were withdrawn for a rest on the 23 April.  The following day the young, under trained and inexperienced British troops were attacked and driven from Villers-Bretonneux by the German infantry who were supported by tanks.

Recalled on 25^th April the Australians halted the German advance and retook Villers-Bretonneux earning the praise of many including those who had previously considered them undisciplined civilians in uniform.

Tempory Brigadier-General George Grogan who received a VC for his actions a month later at Bouleuse Ridge, referred to the Australians victory at Villers-Bretonneux “As perhaps the greatest individual feat of the war”.  While Major Neville Lytton, the military head of the British press at Amiens believed the Australians had made one of the most outstanding manoeuvres of the war, adding that irrespective of their lack of discipline, their battlefield discipline was absolutely perfect.  Lytton then said “That even if Villers-Bretonneux had been the Australian’s only battle of the war, they had won the right to be known as one of the greatest fighting nations of the world”.  The French still believe this battle halted the German advance on Paris.

At Villers-Bretonneux, on the afternoon of the 6 May, the 34^th were ordered to seize a 1,100 yard section of the enemy trench south of the Bray-Corbie Road.  Captain (acting Major) Herbert Henry Percy from the Newcastle suburb of Waratah had received these orders less than two hours before the designated time of the attack, giving him little time to assemble his men, who were scattered in outposts along the line. 

The 34^th again saw action at Amiens, 8 August where the Australians started to push the Germans back toward the Hindenburg Line.  It was again at the front during the battle of St Quentin Canal and they were there when the Germans were driven beyond the Hindenburg Line at the end of September, the beginning of the end for Germany.

Two days before the Armistice, Leslie went down with the influenza which was spreading among men on both sides of the trenches, he was fortunate enough to recover and be released from Hospital three weeks later.  Given leave in England in February he returned to France where he stayed until 11 April, when his unit returned to England and boarded HMAT A54 Runic for the voyage home to Australia.  He was discharged from the Army 6 October 1919.

At his request his sister Melba Mercy Barwick received his Military Medal on 12 June 1919.  On 27 November 1929, Leslie married Dorothy May Lang the daughter of Herbert and Mary Louise Lang in Waverley, Sydney in 1929.  Leslie died Quirindi in 1962. Dorothy died Quirindi 1970 they are buried in Willow Tree Cemetery.

BARWICK. L. V. is recorded on the Honour Roll of Willow Tree and District. 

© Harry Willey. October  2010