A man of right-wing sentiments, he was adopted as an anti-Socialist candidate for Katesgrove Ward in the Reading Town Council elections of 1929, but was defeated by 851 votes.
Throughout his life, Potts retained his links with ex-servicemen’s associations. He was a member of the Royal British Legion, and he attended the VC Garden Party of 1920 as well as the Remembrance Day parade in London nine years later in which 300 VC recipients participated.
During the Second World War, Potts, by then a prominent freemason and a ruri-deaconal representative for St Giles’ Church, joined the Home Guard and was commissioned as a lieutenant.
Much of his work during this period was geared towards the services, particularly the RAF, and most of his spare time was spent on Home Guard duties. The twin pressures took their toll and, in 1943, with his health failing, he entered Greenlands Nursing Home. There, on 3 November 1943, Fred Potts VC died.
Three days later, his coffin, draped with the Union Jack, was borne from his house at 4 College Road to St Bartholomew’s Church, for a funeral service prior to cremation at Reading crematorium. The escort was provided by members of the Home Guard in which Potts had served, and the service was attended by representatives of the Berkshire Yeomanry, the Special Constabulary and the Aldermaston Lodge of Freemasons. Also among the mourners on that autumn day was Arthur Andrews, the man Potts had risked his own life to save. Andrews, whose wounds sustained on Scimitar Hill kept him in hospital until 1917, out-lived his rescuer by a further thirty-seven years, dying aged eighty-nine in 1980.
Twelve years later, a memorial was unveiled at Brock Barracks, Reading, to mark the centenary of Potts’ birth. More recently, a television documentary charting the story of his heroism has reawakened interest in the town’s only Victoria Cross recipient and fund-raising is under way to create a life-size statue, depicting the exploit. The programme also prompted a remarkable meeting, in November 2009, of descendents of both rescuer and rescued at the Imperial War Museum where the yeoman’s VC group is displayed. As the relatives gathered, Arthur Andrews’ words rang out again, spoken by his grandson and quoting from a letter written almost nintey-five years earlier congratulating Potts on his award: ‘My people will be forever grateful, Freddie … a great debt which I can never hope to repay.’
H.V.H. THROSSELL
Hill 60 (Kaiajik Aghala), 29 August 1915
2nd Lt. H. Throssell
Gen. Sir Alexander Godley’s visit to the 10th Australian Light Horse on the afternoon of 28 August was a short one. As the men sheltered in their bivouac at Damakjelik, the commander of the NZ Brigade, charged with the task of capturing Hill 60, briefed the unit’s officers. The 10th, he explained, were to seize a trench on the summit. ‘I know you will get it’, he said. ‘It’s the holding that’s the difficulty.’
But his tone was rather too jaunty for a man whose repeated efforts to capture the 66-yd rise had already cost the lives of thousands and turned a few acres of scrubland into an open cemetery. ‘Is it only one trench you want us to take?’ asked one of the assembled officers with a note of thinly disguised sarcasm. ‘Only one’, came the quiet reply.
The young Light Horseman with the dry sense of humour was 2nd Lt. ‘Jim’ Throssell. In the coming operation he was to lead the second wave into the captured trench and defend it against the inevitable counter-attacks.
Throssell had been on the peninsula for three weeks. In that time he had already survived one ill-starred operation; the infamous assault on the Nek where, four days after joining his unit, he had led a troop over the top after seeing three waves mown down. Almost half of the 300 men of the 10th, engaged in the battle of 7 August, were killed or wounded. Throssell, after sheltering in dead ground in no-man’s-land, was able to crawl back unharmed. His brother Ric was not so fortunate. He was among the seriously wounded. Since then, sickness and casualties had thinned the 10th’s ranks still further. By 28 August, they could only muster 180 men.
Known as Kaiajik Aghala (the Sheepfold of the Little Rock) to the Turks, Hill 60 was little more than a pimple on the broad, flat expanse of the Azmak Dere plain. Its importance lay not only in its commanding view of the parched landscape, but in its location at the junction of the Anzac Corps and the British positions at Suvla. This small rise, bristling with 3-ft-high scrub and an unknown number of Turkish trenches, had been one of the objectives for the ill-fated offensive launched on 21 August. But like the British assault on the neighbouring W Hills, the Anzac efforts at Hill 60 had ended in failure. A second attempt the following day was similarly defeated. But the Anzac commanders refused to give in. Five days later, the New Zealanders succeeded in capturing two trenches, unimaginatively styled Nos 2 and 3 trenches. They were situated on the southern slopes, just below the upper ring of Turkish trenches believed to encircle the crest of the hill. In a confused night action, the 9th Australian Light Horse extended the New Zealanders’ gains, only to be ejected by a fierce counter-attack.
By 28 August Anzacs and Turks were sharing the same trenches on the southern rim of the hill, separated only by sandbag barriers. However, despite their proximity, the location of all the Turkish positions was still uncertain. Much of the day was spent strengthening the defences and clearing up. The hill was littered with the corpses of Gurkhas, Australians, Connaught Rangers, New Zealanders and Turks. The bodies were removed wherever possible, but many could not be reached. The grotesque sights and the sickly smell of rotting bodies were among the most hideous features of the close-quarter fighting on Hill 60.
In the late afternoon the officers who would lead the next assault made a reconnaissance of the position. It was approaching dusk when Capt. Phil Fry, the commander of the first wave, and Throssell were guided along a path which crossed a ditch exposed to Turkish fire. Throssell later recalled: ‘We just doubled up and ran for our lives, treading on dead and wounded men. It was awful, but we had to find out what was before us’.
The view from Nos 2 and 3 trenches, however, was far from clear, and there were calls for the attack to be postponed. These were turned down for fear of allowing the Turks more time to strengthen their position. Around midnight 180 men of the 10th Light Horse, split into two squadrons, were led across the Azmak Dere and into the forward trenches. On their way up, each second NCO and man was given a sandbag containing ten cast-iron spherical bombs. Every man carried an additional two sandbags in their equipment to ensure there were sufficient to build barriers once the position was captured.
Their objective, a 150-yd stretch of trench, lay about 80 yds across open ground known to be covered by a Turkish machine-gun emplacement. An officer and four men were given the job of silencing this post with bombs ten minutes before the main assault. Then, the first wave would charge across the open, with bomb and bayonet, followed by the second wave, who were bringing with them picks and shovels to consolidate the position.
The plan went like clockwork. The machine-gun was destroyed and Fry’s men surged across a moon-lit no-man’s-land and into the trench before the Turks knew what had befallen them. Shortly afterwards, Throssell arrived with the second wave. The operation had lasted but a few minutes, and work began immediately on erecting a barricade near a bend in the captured trench. While his men set about their task, Throssell stood guard. As the Turks began to feel their way forward, he shot down five in rapid succession. The remainder withdrew a safe distance and then resorted to throwing bombs in the general direction of the working party. It was the beginning of one of the fiercest bomb-fights to take place on the peninsula. Throssell’s advance party fought it out with the Turks, using not merely their own supply of bombs but a number of longer-fused Turkish ones which landed on the floor of their trench. Prominent among them were Corporals S.H. Ferrier and H.M. McNee, and Troopers F. McMahon and W.J. Henderson. In citing their gallantry, Throssell recorded: ‘Whenever a Turkish bomb landed in the trench these men immediately picked it up and threw it out again, frequently succeeding in lobbing it back among the Turks. I saw this
act, not once but dozens of times …’
At about 1.30 a.m., the Turks succeeded in placing a biscuit tin packed with explosive at the foot of the barricade, wrecking it. Throssell and his party, however, retreated to a second, unfinished barrier about 10 yds back and from there repulsed the first Turkish counter-attack with bombs and rifle fire. A second attack, fifteen minutes later, was also beaten off, but only after some Turks had reached the parapet of the captured trench. During this attack Capt. Fry was killed, and command devolved upon Throssell.
The bombing duel continued until 3.00 a.m., when the Turks rushed the barricades again. Throssell, assisted by Lt. ‘Tom’ Kidd, known in the 10th as ‘Bomb-proof Kidd’, led the Australians in defeating the attack. An hour later, the Turks launched their most powerful attack of all. Throssell later recalled:
It was in the very early morning – between 4 o’clock and 4.30 – that our worst trial came. The expected counter-attack came then, and we were hopelessly outnumbered. We had started out with only 160 men [sic] and many had fallen, while the Turks seemed to be in unlimited numbers. We who held the section of the trench on the extreme right next to the Turks had to get our men in the next section to take down half of their sandbag barricade so that our men in the next section could hop over and give up the section when things got too hot. Twice we had to do this, giving up five yards of trench each time and replacing the sandbag barricade. Early in the counter-attack I got a bullet through the left shoulder. Not until long after did I know that a bullet had gone through my neck; it felt just like a blow. We could see the bayonets above the Turks’ trenches just as thick as they could stick.
Then they crawled out of their trenches and came straight at us. In the dim light we could see them against the skyline. I passed the word to our fellows, and when the first of the Turks got within 10 yards we cheered and shouted, and, standing up in the trenches, started firing as fast as we could. There was no thought of cover. We just blazed away until the rifles grew red-hot and the chocks jammed, and then we picked up the rifles the wounded or killed men had left. Twenty yards was about our longest range, and I have no idea how many rounds we fired; I think I must have fired about a couple of hundred, and when we were wondering how long we could stand against such numbers, the Turks turned and fled.
In a few minutes they came at us again, and the same thing was repeated. We had no machine-guns, and had to fire away with our rifles as quickly as we could. After the second repulse they changed their tactics and came at us again from front, rear, and flank as well, getting behind us – between our trench and that occupied by the New Zealanders.
Someone must have said something about retiring, though I did not hear it, and all round there were angry cries of, ‘Who said retire?’ The hubbub was awful. Every man was determined to stick to the trench, and along with the firing they were yelling and shouting like demons. The noise must have deceived the Turks as to our numbers, for they were all round us within ten yards, and if they had come on we should have been overwhelmed. Just at the critical moment, as it was getting daylight, a machine-gun came across from the New Zealand line, and was quickly placed in position. It settled the Turks’ third and final charge – and the trench was ours.
The relentless Turkish pressure had, however, taken a heavy toll of the defenders. Of Throssell’s closest allies, Tpr. Frank McMahon was killed and most of the others wounded. Tpr. Tom Renton suffered a serious leg wound and Cpl. McNee had one hand shattered by a bomb blast. Most seriously injured of all was Cpl. Syd Ferrier, who was said to have thrown 500 bombs during the night-long struggle. According to his unit history: ‘His arm was blown off by an exploding enemy missile, but he continued hurling his bombs, until, faint and exhausted, he collapsed in the trench …’ Together with Throssell, he was evacuated from the peninsula but died on board a hospital ship a week later. Throssell, who had ignored advice to seek medical aid, was eventually ordered out of the captured position at 7.00 a.m. Capt. Horace Robertson later recounted:
I gave him a cigarette, and ordered him to the dressing station. He took the cigarette, but could do nothing with it. The wounds in his shoulders and arms had stiffened, and his hands could not reach his mouth. He wore no jacket, but had badges on the shoulder straps of his shirt. The shirt was full of holes from pieces of bomb, and one of the ‘Australias’ was twisted and broken, and had been driven into his shoulder. I put the cigarette in his mouth and lighted it for him. Then he left, but he returned after his wounds were dressed, and I realised that the concussion of bursting bombs had made him light-headed, so I rather roughly ordered him out again, and said he was not to return.
Throssell heaped praise on his gallant comrades for the successful defence. His own diary entry was a model of brevity: ‘Fine bayonet charge – Major Scott in command of Regt. Capt Fry killed – suffered about 90 casualties – Regt only mustered 160 bayonets for the charge. Wounded. Left by hospital ship Devonnah.’ Of his own role, there was nothing. But the CO of the 10th could not ignore such a display of inspirational leadership. In his report to brigade HQ, he wrote: ‘This officer fought magnificently and I cannot speak too highly of the splendid work he did encouraging the men and by his personal example keeping their spirits up although badly wounded himself at the time.’
As Throssell departed the scene of his triumph, the Allied commanders hailed the success of the operation. That night, Sir Ian Hamilton noted: ‘This evening we were all in good form owing to the news from Anzac. Knoll 60, now ours throughout, commands the Biyuk Anafarta valley with view and fire – a big tactical scoop.’ Such celebrations, however, were premature. In reality, the trenches won at such a heavy cost in Australian, New Zealand, British and Gurkha lives were not on the summit of Hill 60 at all, but just beneath it. Beyond them lay another line of Turkish trenches every bit as formidable. In time, the trench Throssell and his men had fought so hard to hold would be christened Ivy Lane and become part of the Allied frontline. But the crest of Hill 60, upon which so many hopes rested, remained in Turkish hands to the bitter end.
Suffering from deafness caused by the exploding bombs, Throssell was evacuated to England where surgeons succeeded in restoring his hearing. In his weakened state, however, he contracted meningitis which very nearly killed him. He was still recovering in Wandsworth Hospital when his brother Ric told him he had been awarded the Victoria Cross. The citation in the London Gazette of 15 October 1915 stated:
For most conspicuous bravery and devotion to duty during operations on the Kaiakij Aghda (Hill 60), in the Gallipoli Peninsula, on 29th and 30th August, 1915 [sic]. Although severely wounded in several places during a counter-attack, he refused to leave his post or to obtain medical assistance till all danger was passed, when he had his wounds dressed and returned to the firing line until ordered out of action by the medical officer. By his personal courage and example he kept up the spirits of his party, and was largely instrumental in saving the situation at a critical period.
Two months later, Throssell, his head swathed in a woollen scarf, was well enough to attend a Buckingham Palace investiture where he received his Cross from King George V. For their part in the action at Hill 60, Cpl. McNee, Tprs. Henderson and Renton were awarded DCMs.
Hugo Vivian Hope Throssell was born on 27 October 1884 at Northam, Western Australia, the youngest son of thirteen brothers and sisters to George and Annie Throssell. His father was a self-made man. One of three brothers who arrived at the Swan River Settlement from Ireland in 1850, he rose to become the Hon. George Throssell, commissioner for Crown Lands in the Western Australian Government and, briefly, its second premier. A successful landowner and shop owner, he was mayor of Northam for nine years.
Like his brothers, Hugo Throssell, known as ‘Jim’ in the family, was educated at Prince Alfred College, in Adelaide. There he displayed much greater prowess on the sports field than in the classroom. Later, his headmaster remembered him as a boy with a ‘buoyant nature, generous to a fault, always ready to see fair play
, especially when the rights of smaller boys were involved’.
Returning to Northam, he took a job in the office of his elder brother Lionel’s store and flour mill business. He did not last long there. In late 1909, ‘Jim’ moved to Ashburton Downs, in the north-western corner of Australia, where he worked as a stockman. A year later, in partnership with his brother Ric, he took over a 1000-acre property at Cowcowing, a gift from their father. They were farming there when war broke out. Selling off their team, the Throssell brothers hid their farm equipment and rode 60 miles to Northam to enlist. It was 29 September 1914, and they were both posted to the 10th Australian Light Horse. On his enlistment papers, ‘Jim’ stated he had been a sergeant in the Prince Alfred College Cadets and listed six years’ service with 18th Light Horse. Promotion followed rapidly. He was made sergeant a week later and commissioned second lieutenant on 3 February 1915.
When his unit embarked for Egypt, ‘Jim’ Throssell was left behind in command of C Squadron. Two weeks later, he sailed aboard HMAT Itonus together with his squadron and fifty men of the 2nd Reinforcements.
The 10th Light Horse took no part in the original landings at Gallipoli, but the unit volunteered to serve as infantry to fill gaps caused by the heavy casualties. To his chagrin, Throssell was left in charge of 150 men and 560 horses. The unit had been on the peninsula for almost three months before Throssell arrived at the head of eighty-one reinforcements on 4 August. They were just in time to take part in the diversionary attack on the Turkish positions at the Nek, ‘that fool charge’ as he later called it.
After the August fighting, Throssell was evacuated to begin his long struggle against ill health brought on by his wounds. Though his wounds to his neck and shoulder appeared to heal quickly and his hearing improved, he showed disturbing signs of restlessness while soaring temperatures left him delirious. A medical report dated 13 October 1915 stated: ‘Still very easily excited … The mental condition is not normal. Old friends say he is “500% more excitable than usual”. Eventually, Throssell was diagnosed as suffering from meningitis and in March 1916 doctors found him ‘still somewhat nervous’ and suffering from ‘continuous headaches’ and recommended he be given extended leave. The following month he was invalided home to Australia where further treatment was proposed with the additional comment that Throssell was not ‘at present fit to earn his living’. Months of treatment, examination and convalescence followed during which Throssell slowly regained his strength and managed to take part in a number of recruiting rallies. Finally, on 1 November 1916 a medical board in Fremantle declared him fit for light duties and less than three months later he re-embarked for service aboard. By then, the 10th Light Horse was serving in the Middle East as part of the imperial army seeking to break through the heavily fortified Turkish defences in front of Gaza.
VCs of the First World War Gallipoli Page 29
