I
had come to the conclusion that war has consequences some time ago and it was
more than ever reinforced to me when I started researching the life of Ken
Holland, the youngest Australian to die in the Battle of Britain.
My
first question about Ken was: Why would a 16 year old boy travel to England to
live, permanently, with a 51 year old son of a baronet, and how could his
parents let him? The answers are revealed in his father’s repatriation files.
Harold
George Holland—dubbed ‘Pugs’ by Ken—was born on 22 April 1892 near Cowra, New
South Wales. At some point he moved to Waverley in Sydney and was employed as a
commercial traveller. His route took him to Liverpool, where he enlisted on 30
June 1915 in the Australian Imperial Force and was posted to the 2nd Division
Ammunition Column (2 DAC) as a corporal. He was soon promoted to sergeant and
embarked on 16 November 1915.
After
initial service in Egypt, Harold’s unit was transferred to France. 2 DAC was
part of the 2nd Australian Division Artillery, which transported and delivered
ammunition for their artillery unit. It was not an easy job. Germans constantly shelled artillery units and DAC
drivers often carried ammunition under fire. Harold had
been in France for 11 months when, on 16 December 1916, at Fleurs, he succumbed
to a heavy cold and an infection of the larynx. He was on his way to a field
hospital when he was caught in an artillery attack and was, in his words,
‘blown up’. In a daze, he was sent to Rouen Hospital for a month and then to
Etaples where he began to complain of general weakness, loss of weight, and loss
of voice, and became very shaky. He also displayed dyspnoea (breathlessness) on
exertion and occasionally palpitations. He was assessed as employable, but only
in a base environment, and so, on 17 February 1917, he was transferred to
England.
Harold
was attached to 2nd Command Depot (originally named 2nd Convalescent Depot) at Westham Camp, Weymouth, on the
Dorset coast. The depot was a half-way house for casualties who no
longer required hospitalisation but were not fit enough to rejoin their units.
It is not known whether Harold met Ina Gladys Christopher, an assistant florist
who was born on 21 July 1892 at Upway in Dorset, during his convalescence or
earlier while on leave. Either way, they had not known each other long when
they married on 23 April 1917. (And perhaps they continued to have little time
together as, after their marriage, Ina remained in her parents’ house at 6 St
Edmund Street, Weymouth).
Harold’s
health did not improve and at a medical board on 7 August 1918 he was declared
‘temporarily unfit for General Service for more than six months but fit for
Home Service’. He embarked two days later on the Carpentaria, out of Plymouth, and arrived in Australia on 5 October
1918. He took a house in Bronte, a coastal suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, and
later moved to nearby Bondi. With the end of the war and general demobilisation
there was no place for Harold in the military, even on light duties. He
attended another medical board in January 1919 and was medically discharged the following month.
At
that stage, Ina was on her way to Australia. It must have been a shock to
arrive in a new country and discover that her husband of less than two years continued
to be unwell, had been discharged from the army and was unemployed, although
receiving a small pension. Within a month or so, Harold resumed his old work as
a commercial traveller on commission and Ina had fallen pregnant. By September
1919, Harold had developed a nervous disposition, was experiencing insomnia,
and had lost about half of his normal working time through illness and was
assessed as having lost a third of his earning powers as a consequence of the
battlefield explosion.
To
compound matters, he had been suffering attacks of acute appendicitis since
December 1916 and was admitted to 4 AGH (Australian General Hospital) at
Randwick on 30 October 1919 with appendicitis. The appendix was removed but
Harold remained in hospital until 5 January 1920, convalescing from the
operation. On discharge, his wound was still running so one can assume that, from
the length of time in hospital, the operation was not overly successful.
The
appendicitis and operation were admitted as war service related and Harold
received a full pension for his time in hospital. This, however, was backdated,
so it would have been a very difficult period for the pregnant Ina, not knowing
when her husband would be discharged. The lump sum would have helped when it
arrived but Harold’s health problems were not solved and, when Ken was born on 29
January, it is likely she was nursing her husband and his weeping wound as well
as her son. Harold’s appendicitis-related problems obviously continued through
the first months of his son’s life as, on 6 August, he reported that ‘there is
only a slight improvement in my condition since my discharge from hospital. I
am employed for about three days a week as a [commercial] traveller’.
Over
the years, despite little or no improvement from previous assessments, and, in
October 1923, a prognosis that future improvement was ‘problematical’, Harold’s
invalidity assessments decreased from 25% pension to 15% pension. Harold’s 22 April
1926 statement—written on his 34th birthday—indicates how he suffered from the lingering long term effects
of shell shock, the impact on his career and limits on his lifestyle:
I
respectively wish to lodge an appeal against the reductions made. Naturally you
must act according to recommendation of Medical Officer but in support of my
appeal I have to bring under your notice the nature of my complaint ‘shell
shock’. This, as you know from experience, is the worst type of recurrent
complaints. Many days I feel quite as fit as before I enlisted, but at least a
third of my days are marred by severe reminders that I have still got the
complaint. Unfortunately I get severe attacks when I least expect them, which
greatly inconvenience in the course of my duties. My work is as a travelling
salesman and during the past I have been compelled to forego many opportunities
of increasing my earning, just through inability caused by the Shell Shock. I
might state that prior to my being in France I did not have one minute’s
illness through any cause whatsoever. I am a strict abstainer and do not
gamble. I am unable to participate in athletic sports through shortness of
breath and attacks of giddiness, therefore, you can see I do nothing to
exaggerate my complaint. I retire reasonably early and rise early and take the
greatest care in regards to bodily cleanliness generally. The pension I was
receiving does not nearly compensate me for lost earning power due to my
complaint, but I am not unreasonable for having voluntarily enlisted must take
my share of the knocks and consider myself fortunate in escaping as lightly as
I did.
In
addition to the above, Harold’s medical assessment notes that by that stage he
was almost bald, which he put down to the shell shock.
A
June 1931 Repat review, when he was 39, states that Harold was still suffering
from nervousness, and it continued to affect his ability to work. All in all,
he was so physically debilitated that, although he was alright in the morning,
he ‘was not much use’ in the afternoon. His health declined further and, at his
January 1934 assessment, he was unemployed and suffered from frequent headaches
and shortness of breath on exertion. His dream-filled nights were broken by
restless sleeping, where he would wake up with a start in a cold sweat. He also
suffered from recurrent indigestion with heartburn and flatulence. His
diagnosis was now neurosis and dyspnoea due to war service.
Somewhat
contradicting his assertions regarding employment, Harold’s July 1934 assessment
indicated that he had in fact been a casual salesman for four years, with him working
more on a part time basis, but had not actually been laid off. The discrepancy does
not reflect any intention to deceive, but indicates the uncertainly of employment,
which was certainly not regular, during the worse years of the Depression.
The
Holland family would have been frequently beset by financial difficulties. The
small pension received by Harold, Ina as his wife and the component for Kenneth
as a child under 16 would have been heavily relied upon to keep the family
afloat. As would the government endowment Ina received for Ken as a child under
16. Despite their difficulties, Harold presented at interview as well
nourished, indicating that Ina was a good household manager. Perhaps Ken played
his own small part as a friend recalled him fishing from the rocks around Bondi.
The
Depression years were marked by high unemployment. Official surveys were based
on union members who were out of work but, as social historian Michael Cannon
has pointed out, true figures, which included non-unionists, women and those
who had left school but who needed work, would have been double, possibly
treble the official figures. In 1932, the official rate of unemployment was 29
per cent. It began to improve over the next years and was down to about 10 per cent
by war’s outbreak. Harold then was lucky to have maintained any sort of job in
light of his illness.
Harold’s
luck, however, did not extend to everyday life. Always breathless, he would
have had few opportunities to play with his growing son or take him
out-and-about as any father would. Indeed, by his own admission, ‘I am unable
to participate in athletic sports through shortness of breath and attacks of
giddiness’. His irregular working hours and varying wages meant he could not
afford to buy his own home and so his family moved from one house to another. (‘Bingara’,
Sir Thomas Mitchell Road, Bondi, Forest Knoll Avenue, Bondi; 3 Wonderland
Avenue in 1934; and finally, 11 King Street Bondi in 1936, which Harold and Ina
rented until Harold’s death in 1962 and Ina for sometime after before moving to
a flat in Croydon Park.) Close living in small, rented houses with a husband
and father suffering from sleepless nights and nightmares would have been
difficult, and Ina and young Ken would have experienced the uncertainty of good
and bad days. With Harold’s chronic illness having such an impact on their
family life, it is not hard to see how he would have been drawn to another
father figure in the form of Major Hugh Ivor Emmott Ripley.
Ripley,
born in Yorkshire in 1884, was the third son of a Baronet, Sir Edward Ripley.
Known to all as Toby, he was educated at Marlborough College and was admitted
to the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, in January 1903. He was awarded the
Sword of Honour when passing out and was granted a commission in the
Worcestershire Regiment on 13 August 1904. On 26 February 1913 he was seconded
for service with the Gold Coast Regiment of the West Africa Frontier Force. He
continued to serve in West Africa until September 1917 when he commanded C
Company, 2nd Worcester Regiment in France. In 1919 he was with 1st Worcester
Regiment and the following year joined the regiment in India where he served
until he retired in 1923.
Toby’s war experiences also left their
mark: he had been gassed in France and wanted to live in a mild climate that
was conducive to his health so, before he left India, he took what appears to
have been a reconnaissance voyage to Australia. He then returned to Australia,
arriving in February 1923, and settled in Hobart.
By 1930 he was living in Bondi
and had joined the Tamarama SLSC as an associate member. He was well-liked and
generous, often staking refreshments at club functions. It is not known when
Toby and Ken Holland first met but, despite both living in Bondi, their
different social circumstances were unlikely to have thrown them together until
Ken joined the Tamarama SLSC.
Regardless
of their backgrounds and despite the age difference, Ken grew close to Toby,
who appeared to him all that a father should be. More than that, Toby gave Ken
a glimpse of a different life and a means to escape his own. He begged the
older man to take him to England. In May 1936, they boarded the Comoron and arrived in London on 12
June. Rather than return to Yorkshire where the harsh climate would play havoc
with his gassed lungs, Toby decided the milder climate of Cornwall would be
more healthful and—perhaps during this visit—he purchased ‘Melorne’, a house
near Camelford in Cornwall.
Ken Holland, courtesy of Jonathan Falconer
Soon
after arriving in England, Ken took a significant step in establishing new ties
in a new land when he was baptized in Parish Church of St Materiana, Tintagel,
Cornwall, on 13 September 1936. Within a fortnight, he and Toby had boarded the
Orontes to travel first class back to
Sydney for a final farewell to Australia. It was apparent that they intended
returning to ‘Melorne’, as both had listed it as their address on their travel
documents.
Melorne House, Courtesy Helen Wood <indianking@btconnect.com 19 September 2012
Meanwhile,
shortly soon after Ken embarked to the UK with Ripley, Harold reported at his
medical review that he had been working as a salesman but, since the previous
review, had lost eight weeks work due to his disabilities and symptoms which
still included frequent bad headaches and sleepless nights.
Ken
and Toby returned to Sydney on 27 October 1936 and Toby put his plans to Harold
and Ina Holland regarding Ken’s future in Cornwall. Ken didn’t have a job and
only limited employment prospects during the Depression. (How did I come to
this conclusion? Well, Ken had only passed four subjects in his Intermediate.
There is no evidence to indicate that he had taken up employment when he left
school and his Intermediate results were not good enough for desirable, secure
jobs such as the bank. The Commonwealth Bank, for one, did not employ just
anyone. It was selective. It certainly took into account references but
interviewing staff were also interested in a prospective employee’s neat
appearance, good handwriting and good school results, especially in English and
mathematics. Even in 1936, competition for jobs, including good junior
positions, was fierce.) Once their only son turned 16, the Hollands lost the
pension component relating to an underage child as well as the child endowment;
finances were already tight and would not improve if their son couldn’t
contribute to the family income. Ken’s home life would always be at the mercy
of Harold’s illness.
So,
in framing a response to the first question I asked when looking at Ken’s
background: given the apparent lack of a job and secure prospects, a difficult
family life dominated by illness, tight economies and uncertain family
finances, why wouldn’t Ken’s head be turned by the opportunities presented to
him by a kindly English gentlemen, the third son of a baronet, who appeared as
a benevolent father figure willing to sponsor his further education in England.
Knowing the limited possibilities that life in Australia offered Ken, how could
his parents refuse permission for their son to go to England with Ripley, to
enjoy a level of society to which they could never aspire, to enjoy life in a
large, established home never plagued by landlords demanding rent, to enjoy the
benefits of gentry life which included hunting, shooting, tennis, golf,
swimming, a large circle of friends and a decent allowance from someone who
could afford not only that allowance but the gift of not one but at least two
motorbikes, a decent watch, and the 250 guinea fee for an aeronautical
engineering course.
The
obvious answer was: they couldn’t. So Ken prepared to sail to England. He
passed his examination for the surf bronze medallion on 20 December and in
early 1937 farewelled his family and left Australia with Toby, trading the beaches
of Bondi and Tamarama for the Cornish coastline.
(Some
years after framing and responding to my question, I discovered another reason
why Ken’s parents were prepared to let him travel half way round the world with
a new father figure. It does not detract from my original conclusions and, in a
way, probably springs from Harold’s circumstances. But that is another story
and you will have to read the book.)
By
June 1938, Harold’s pension stabilised at the 15 per cent rate and his health
never improved. In 1943, while working in the Department of Aircraft
Production, he suffered a coronary thrombosis. He had another attack in 1948
and a letter to the Deputy Commissioner, Repatriation Department, noted that he
had not claimed for an increase in pension in 1943 because ‘I did not need
financial assistance. I did not then or since smoke or drink due to my nervous
and allergy state, did not/do not attend any places of amusement my living
expenses were not heavy. I have fought my disabilities as much as possible.’ In
about 1948 he commenced work at The Producers’ Co-Operative Distributing
Society, which was a large-scale wholesale distributor of farm and dairy
produce and, by 1953 had had five years employment during which he had had some
time off through illness which, in aggregated, only exceeded his entitlement by
one week. When he required time off for medical appointments, he worked in lieu
of sick leave. Harold’s allergic state was recognised as war service related in
November 1951 and coronary disease and arteriosclerosis accepted in October
1952, but the pension was reduced to 10 per cent incapacity. He died in 1962 of
congestive cardiac failure. Ina died in 1968 of a cerebral thrombosis suffered
after an operation. She had had nephritic syndrome for a number of years.
Harold
Holland suffered much from his war service related injuries but, despite all, his
1943 letter indicates that he took pride in his ability to support himself and his
wife. He did not even appear to regret the health problems and considered
himself fortunate in escaping as ‘lightly’ as he did. But Harold didn’t really
get off lightly, did he? Nor did Ina, nor Ken. The entire family continued to
suffer the effects of Harold Holland’s Great War.
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I am so excited. Australia's Few and the Battle of Britain has arrived. What wonderful cover art!
