The Catholic Leader - 22 April

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The Catholic Leader, April 22, 2018
Anzac Day
By Emilie Ng
CHARLES Mitchell and Gordon
Mitchell would have been brothers-
in-law were it not for a war that took
the lives of thousands of Australian
men.
Gordon Mitchell was engaged to marry
Isabella Mitchell, the sister of Charles Mitchell,
and the men would have been brothers-in-law
if they had not taken up the call to serve in the
First World War.
They were from St Lucia, which in the early
1900s was farming land, and they made time to
pose for a photo on a horse-drawn buggy just
before heading off to war.
Private Gordon enlisted in the war in 1914,
and was placed in the 9th Australian Infantry
Battalion, eventually making the landing on
Anzac Cove, on April 25, 1915.
A month later he was shot in the back of the
head and survived.
He was given a medical discharge but, being
born in Scotland, was nabbed by the British
Army to serve in the Irish Guards as Lieutenant
Mitchell.
On February 12, 1916, Private Charles signed
up for battle despite resistance from his mother
who worried about a previous head injury the
22-year-old had sustained when he fell from a
horse-drawn cart.
But the army took him in, seeing only a strong
soldier, one who had crossed the Brisbane River
from St Lucia to West End several times.
Private Charles was also shot in battle
at Lagnicourt but, unlike his future
brother-in-law, died on the Hin-
denburg Line, Germany.
His body was never identi-
fied and while there is no
known grave for him, he is
listed in the Villers-Breton-
neux Memorial in France,
and on the Australian War
Memorial in Canberra.
In 1919, John Moir
Mitchell, owner of fencing
company K wire, wrote a letter
to the Australian military base in
Melbourne, requesting his son’s kit-
bag be returned to the family “as we will be
pleased to have as many of my son’s belong-
ings as possible”.
One of those items, his British War Medal
and a Victory Medal, did come back home to
Soldier’s body never found, but his memory has not been forgotten
Lost family remembered
Friendly outing:
Charles Scott
Mitchell (left)
and Gordon
Murray Mitchell
pose for a
photograph in
a horse-drawn
buggy at St
Lucia. The
photograph,
possibly taken
by Charles
Mitchell’s fa-
ther, was taken
just before the
pair went to
war.
Brisbane, and remain in the home of his niece,
Sandgate parishioner Janet Simon, the
daughter of Lieutenant Gordon
Mitchell.
Her niece Helen Price will
remember her great-uncle
Private Charles Mitchell at
a memorial Mass at Our
Lady of Victories Church,
Bowen Hills, built in hon-
our of the Queensland Catholic soldiers, sailors
and nurses who died in the First World War.
One of the Stations of the Cross paintings has
a plaque honouring Private Charles Mitchell.
“I said to Auntie Janet, Uncle Charlie wasn’t
married and he had no family, but we remember
him,” Mrs Price said.
“It’s nice that they’re thought of still.”
“It’s a very good idea,” Mrs Simon said.
His body was never identified and
while there is no known grave for him,
he is listed in the Villers-Bretonneux
Memorial in France, and on the Austral-
ian War Memorial in Canberra.
Longest-serving army chaplain in Great War
cared lovingly for fallen soldiers and their kin
WHEN soldiers on the Western Front made the
ultimate sacrifice during the First World War,
Catholic priest Fr Edward Sarsfield Barry was
often the first to know.
The young priest from Rockhampton put his
hand up to serve the spiritual needs of Austral-
ian soldiers on the frontline in France between
1916 and 1918.
According to Tom Johnstone, author of The
Cross of Anzac: Australian Catholic Service
Chaplains, Fr Barry experienced more frontline
service on the Western Front than any other
Australian chaplain.
When the First World War broke out, and
Australian men were answering the call to serve
their country, Fr Barry also volunteered, enlist-
ing on May 16, 1916.
He was 27 and had been ordained just three
years earlier in Dublin, serving at St Stephen’s
Cathedral and St Patrick’s Church, Fortitude
Valley, before leaving for France from Sydney.
He served in the 9th Battalion of the 5th Bri-
gade and the 28th Battalion of the 7th Brigade,
serving continuously with Australian infantry
until his service termination.
In a news story for Fr Barry’s silver jubilee,
The Telegraph described how the faithful
army chaplain “saw the flower of Australia’s
manhood die gallantly in action, (which) made
him a staunch champion of the ‘digger’ and an
ardent advocate for peace”.
His spiritual attention to the soldiers,
especially those whose lives would
never be known after 1918, was no
more evident than in a letter one
grieving mother forwarded to The
Catholic Press Sydney.
“Dear Mrs Hoban, I had
intended writing to you before to
sympathise with you on the recent
death of your son. You, doubtless, have
heard how it occurred.
“A shell burst in or near where he was and
wounded him so severely that he died very soon
afterwards, and was buried nearby.
“His grave is known and marked and as well
looked after as possible.
“My particular desire is to let you know that
once at least during the week before we went
into the line that time he was at Confession and
Communion.
“I am inclined to think that he went twice.
“At any rate he was certainly at the sacra-
ments a few days before he died.
“This I know is the greatest consolation a
Catholic mother could have.
“I knew your boy when he was an
instructor at Rollestone, and also here
in France.
“Everybody liked him, and he
had the admiration and respect
of everybody. He seemed certain
to get a commission before very
long.
“I felt his death very much.
“Everybody unites with me in send-
ing you sincere sympathy.
“I have not forgotten him at Mass and assure
you of my prayers that God may be good to
you in your trouble. Edward Barry.”
On June 26, 1918, a cablegram from Rock-
hampton arrived at the Australian Imperial
Forces office from Archbishop James Duhig,
requesting in eight words that Fr Barry return
home.
“REQUEST RETURN BARRY APPOINT-
ED ANOTHER CONTINUOUS ARCH-
BISHP DUHIG,” the Archbishop wrote in the
cablegram, held in the National Archives in
Canberra.
The request for his termination of service
was approved a month later, and he returned to
Australia on September 15, 1918.
He honoured his fallen Anzacs serving as
chairman of the Anzac Day Committee of the
Church for several years.
He was eventually installed as the first parish
priest of a new church in Bowen Hills, built in
1924 “to the Glory of God and in memory of
the Catholic Sailors and Soldiers of Queensland
who fought and died in the Great European War
1914-1919”.
Fr Barry remained the pastor at Our Lady of
Victories Church and his last appointment was
as parish priest of Wilston in 1947.
He was made domestic prelate in 1944,
becoming a member of every organisation in
the archdiocese.
He died in 1956, aged 66 and a priest for 43
years.
– Emilie Ng
Devoted: Fr Edward Sarsfield Barry.