SAPPER ROBERT BARBOUR WATSON
1252 – 3rd Tunnelling Company
Born at Wallsend, near Newcastle, New South Wales in 1880, Robert was the son of William and Joanna (nee Holland) Watson. Joanna was born on 27 September 1849, the daughter of John and Lititia (nee Little) Holland.
By a previous marriage of his father, Robert had a half-brother George born at Ballarat in 1867 and a second half-brother William born 1868, died 1870.
Robert was the 5th of five children, all boys, born to William and Joanna. James Thomas was born in 1872, died 1938 in Queensland. William, born 1874 and believed to have died in 1947 in New South Wales. John was born in 1876 and Andrew in 1878.
At a medical examination on 15 January 1916 at the Sydney Town Hall Recruiting Depot Robert was considered ‘fit for active service’, with some dental work required. The examination recorded that he was 5ft 6ins tall, weighed 140 lbs, had a fresh complexion, blue eyes and brown hair.
He was Roman Catholic by faith. Distinctive marks: appendix scar and v[aricose] veins scars left leg. He was appointed to ‘C’ Company, Depot Battalion, Casula on the same day.
Robert completed the ‘Attestation Paper of Persons Enlisted for Service Abroad’ on 15 January, signing the Attestation, and the Oath to ‘well and truly serve’, on 3 February 1916 at Casula, New South Wales.
He was 36 years and 2 months of age, not married and a Signalman by trade. He named as his Next-of-Kin his mother, Mrs Johanna (sic) Watson of Withers Street, West Wallsend.
Robert embarked at Sydney with the Australian Mining Corps on Ulysses.
At a civic parade in the Domain, Sydney on Saturday February 19, 1916, a large crowd of relations and friends of the departing Miners lined the four sides of the parade ground. Sixty police and 100 Garrison Military Police were on hand to keep the crowds within bounds. The scene was an inspiriting one. On the extreme right flank, facing the saluting base, were companies of the Rifle Club School; next came a detachment of the 4th King’s Shropshire Light Infantry, then the bands of the Light Horse, Liverpool Depot, and the Miners’ on the left, rank upon rank, the Miners’ Battalion.
Following the farewell parade in the Domain, Sydney, the Australian Mining Corps embarked from Sydney, New South Wales on 20 February 1916 on board HMAT A38 Ulysses.
The Mining Corps comprised 1303 members at the time they embarked with a Headquarters of 40; No.1 Company – 390; No.2 Company – 380; No.3 Company – 392, and 101 members of the 1st Reinforcements.
Ulysses arrived in Melbourne, Victoria on 22 February and the Miners were camped at Broadmeadows while additional stores and equipment were loaded onto Ulysses. Another parade was held at the Broadmeadows camp on March 1, the Miners’ Corps being inspected by the Governor-General, as Commander-in-Chief of the Commonwealth military forces.
Departing Melbourne on 1 March, Ulysses sailed to Fremantle, Western Australia where a further 53 members of the Corps were embarked. The ship hit a reef when leaving Fremantle harbour, stripping the plates for 40 feet and, although there was a gap in the outside plate, the inner bilge plates were not punctured. The men on board nicknamed her ‘Useless’. The Miners were off-loaded and sent to the Blackboy Hill Camp where further training was conducted. After a delay of about a month for repairs, The Mining Corps sailed for the European Theatre on 1 April 1916.
The ship arrived at Suez, Egypt on 22 April, departing for Port Said the next day; then on to Alexandria. The Captain of the shipwas reluctantto take Ulysses out of the Suez Canal because he felt the weight of the ship made it impossible to manoeuvre in the situation of a submarine attack. The Mining Corps was transhipped to B1 Ansonia for the final legs to Marseilles, France via Valetta, Malta. Arriving at Marseilles on 5 May, most of the men entrained for Hazebrouck where they arrived to set up their first camp on 8 May 1916.
A ‘Mining Corps’ did not fit in the British Expeditionary Force, and the Corps was disbanded and three Australian Tunnelling Companies were formed. The Technical Staff of the Corps Headquarters, plus some technically qualified men from the individual companies, was formed into the entirely new Australian Electrical and Mechanical Mining and Boring Company (AEMMBC), better known as the ‘Alphabetical Company’.
As with most of No.3 Company of the Mining Corps, he was absorbed into the 3rd Australian Tunnelling Company (3ATC). Initially based at Hazebrouck, by 13 May half the Company had started to relieve the 255th Tunnelling Company, Royal Engineers (RE), at Laventie and La Drumez while the other two sections joined the 251st and 254th Tunnelling Companies, RE at Le Hamel and Bethune for instruction.
The Mine systems of the Red Lamp, Winchester, Colvin, Ducksbill & Sign Post Lane were composed of workings in blue clay at depths from 20 – 35 feet. 3 large mines were fired by the 3rd Aust. Tunnelling Coy, one each at Red Lamp of 9 June, at Colvin on 1 July and at Winchester on 9 July 1916. On 19 July 1916 3ATC supported the 61st Infantry Division in the attack opposite Laventie.
Robert reported sick on 1 October 1916 and after a couple of days in hospital with rheumatism, rejoined his unit on 4 October.
Robert was detached from 3ATC on 18 December 1916 for P.B. (Permanent Base) duty at the Australian General Base Depot (AGBD) at Etaples with a notation on his records ‘unfit for duty at the front’.
He was employed at the Reinforcements Camp, Etaples, until 18 May 1917 when he was transferred to England, marching in to No.2 Command Depot, Weymouth on 19 May. On 9 July he marched in to No.4 Command Depot, Codford, and on 19 July he was transferred to the Overseas Training Depot, Perham Downs.
He proceeded overseas to France on 18 October 1917 and marched in to the AGBD at Rouelles on 19 October. Robert rejoined 3ATC in the field on 25 October.
On 20 February 1918 blue chevrons were awarded to wear on his uniform to denote the number of years he had served since enlisting.
Robert enjoyed some leave from 1 to 18 March 1918, and then rejoined his unit in the field. He reported sick on 26 June and was admitted to 34th Field Ambulance with P.U.O. (pyrexia of unknown origin). He was transferred to the 1st C.R.S. on 2 July and did not rejoin his unit until 7 August.
He was granted leave from France from 23 January to 6 February 1919, rejoining his unit in France on 18 February. On 10 March, Robert left 3ATC for repatriation and demobilisation, marching in to the 2nd Training Brigade at Codford, England on 18 March.
Robert was a member of 3ATC from May 1916 until his return to Australia in May 1919. The Company was allocated to the First Army and were engaged variously at Laventie-Fauquissart, Givenchy, Loos, Lens, Double Crassiers and Vermelles and many other places on the Western Front.
3ATC first saw action at the Boers Head in the lead up the Fromelles diversion ‘stunt’ of July 1916 in which they supported British units.
On 27 November 1916 at the ‘Black Watch Sap’, Hill 70, and enemy camouflet (or a premature explosion, depending on different accounts) killed 20 members of the company. The next day 2 more members were killed in the same area by an enemy camouflet. The 22 members of 3ATC were buried in 14 adjacent graves at the Hersin Communal Cemetery Extension.
The Companies major effort was at Hill 70 where they constructed the extensive Hythe Tunnel system. The company was also heavily involved in road and bridge construction and the locating and clearing of enemy mines and booby traps. This work continued for the company for some months after the Armistice.
Leaving London on 11 May 1919 on board Zealandia for return to Australia, he disembarked in Sydney on 1 July 1919.
1252 Sapper Robert Barbour Watson was discharged from the A.I.F. in Sydney on 23 August 1919, entitled to wear the British War Medal and the Victory Medal.
On 15 March 1926 in Sydney, Robert, age 46, married Eunice Chand, a 42-year-old widow, (nee Bowditch), daughter of James and Elizabeth (nee Lacey) Bowditch.
In 1930 the couple were living at 47 Union Street, Tighe’s Hill, New South Wales where Robert was a Railway Employee.
In August 1937 his military medical records were forwarded to the Repatriation Commission, Sydney.
By 1943 the couple had moved to 14 Thomas Street, Belmont where his occupation was registered as “peace officer”. In 1949 Robert was retired and the couple were living at ‘Arakoxi’, Kurrawan Road, Katoomba.
Robert and Eunice had no children.
Robert Barbour Watson, Railway Engineer, died at the Brighton Nursing Home, Katoomba, New South Wales on 23 January 1973 aged 93 and is buried in the Roman Catholic Cemetery, (Wentworth Falls Cemetery), Wentworth, New South Wales in the same plot as his wife Eunice, who died at Katoomba in 1971.
Addendum
Information provided by Robert Beveridge who has an extensive family history of the Watson family and can be contacted through this website:
It was ‘family tradition’ that Robert and his ‘life partner’, Eunice, were not married; but NSW Marriage Certificate 1926/004593 dispels that tradition.
In 1914, Roberts’ brother Andrew became the manager of the Collie Co-operative Colleries at Collie, WA, where he died in an accident on 29.11.1919. His death certificate (#153/1920) records the finding of the Coroners Jury Inquest that he met his death as a result of “the locomotive leaving the rails and turning over, crushing his head under the cab, and that no blame is attached to anyone.” Lengthy reports appeared in the Collie Mail regarding the accident (Friday, December 5, 1919) and the inquest (Friday, December 19, 1919).
© Donna Baldey 2013
www.tunnellers.net
with the assistance of Robert Beveridge, great nephew of Robert Barbour Watson.