Bill the Bastard

by Roland Perry

  One medico ran to the horses. Towers’ Waler was fretting and sweating. The medico turned to Bill, who stood by placidly. The ambulance driver helped the medico remove the ammunition boxes and machine-gun equipment from him. They stretchered the barely conscious Towers onto Bill and tied him on. The medico mounted Towers’ Waler and moved off slowly. Bill made no sign of protest. He seemed to regard the prone trooper on the stretcher as a ‘load’ rather than someone trying to ride him. He trotted along obediently, head down and untroubled, to the field hospital.

  Meanwhile the fighting at the trenches was bloody. The Anzacs were unforgiving, especially after several incidents in which troopers were killed by Turks who had previously surrendered.

  One German engineer reached vital installations with demolition charges laid ready at the wells and main buildings. He was chased by a trooper who caught up to him just before he could throw a switch that would have set off most of the charges. The trooper aimed his revolver and shouted options to his quarry: ‘Stop or I’ll shoot!’

  The German hesitated. The trooper stepped forward until he was four metres from the German. He put his hands up. Only two of the seventeen wells were blown, and the bulk of the Walers would be watered that night in Beersheba.

  Soon almost all the horsemen broke through and overwhelmed the Turkish trenches, making it the most successful large-scale charge in the last 200 years. The attack claimed thirty-one troopers and seventy-one of their horses. Exhausted troopers, adrenalin still pumping, watered their horses at Turkish troughs and then fell on their knees to drink beside their thirsty mounts.

  ‘How did we go?’ Ben Towers managed to ask as a doctor administered morphine and then completed dressing his leg wound. Towers was in excruciating pain. A moonfaced padre with a nervous eye tic entered the tent and sat by the young trooper.

  ‘We took the town’ the padre said, attempting to sound free and easy. ‘You’ve been part of a terrific victory.’

  Towers was doped and delirious. The padre’s breezy words did not seem to register.

  ‘Are they at the trenches? Are they fighting?’

  ‘No, that’s all over. The blokes and horses are enjoying a good drink.’

  Towers screamed in pain. After a moment he asked: ‘What about my Waler?’

  ‘They’re all okay, Ben, don’t worry.’

  ‘Bill?’

  Thinking he was referring to a fellow trooper, the padre assured him: ‘Bill’s fine, really well.’

  ‘Bill the Bastard!’ Towers yelled, and attempted to sit up. The startled padre eased him back down on the pillow.

  ‘Yes, the bastard,’ the padre said airily, again thinking he was speaking of another trooper.

  Towers lapsed in and out of consciousness through the night. He made it to the morning, but only just. The padre returned, his tic now a never-ending blink of nervousness. He would be with the youth at the end.

  ‘My name is not Towers, it’s Burke,’ he said, ‘I’m Ben Burke. Please make sure they get the tombstone right!’

  The padre’s rapid tic could not hold back his tears. He gripped the young trooper until he went limp. The next day, he was buried in a temporary cemetery on the outskirts of Beersheba.

  Soon afterwards Fred Burke of Cootamundra received a telegram from army headquarters informing him of the death of his ‘nephew’ Ben, who had joined the Light Horse in 1914.

  Burke wrote back to the army: ‘I do not have a nephew named Ben. I do have a son by that name but I believe he is somewhere in the Northern Territory droving. We have not heard from him for three years. In any case, he couldn’t be in the army. He is only 17. That means he would have been 14, just, when he joined up. You have made a mistake.’

  21

  RESTART

  Shanahan wrote regularly to Paterson and his mates Mulherin and Legg and received news from them about the progress of the Light Horse through Palestine as they pushed the Turks back. He always asked for news about Bill and was delighted to learn he had survived Beersheba and was again with a group of packhorses picked out for senior officers.

  Shanahan had made his own progress. He completed hospital rehabilitation and gained a job in an office in London’s Victoria sorting out allocations of Australian Soldier Settlement Blocks of property for servicemen when they returned home. It was a job not without importance, although it was largely clerical. His debility limited his options and he decided it was futile trying to re-establish himself as a carpenter or builder.

  A perky, auburn-haired cockney woman, Charlotte Lampkin, joined the office as a typist/clerk. More vivacious than beautiful, the 26-year-old was of medium height and full-bosomed. Charlotte had the odd experience of being introduced to five men without the full complement of limbs, three who were missing legs and two with amputated arms. They had also been set up in administrative work after being injured in battle and forced out of the Australian army.

  The fifth man she met was Shanahan. He was the only male to stand for her when they shook hands.

  ‘No need to get to your feet,’ Charlotte said.

  ‘I didn’t,’ Shanahan said, ‘I’ve only got one.’

  Charlotte giggled. ‘Cheeky!’ she said, creating an immediate rapport. ‘And weird,’ she said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Never met an amputee before,’ she whispered.

  ‘Bit disarming?’

  She began to agree and then saw the joke. ‘You are so naughty, Major!’ she said. ‘I think I’m going to like you.’

  Later on her first morning she walked past Shanahan, smiled, and then looked back to find him ogling her shapely calves.

  ‘I saw that,’ she said, ‘you’re only jealous.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’ve got two,’ she said.

  Shanahan gave a hint of a smile. Humorous exchanges had been few and far between for him in the last year. He had become despondent waiting for the war to end so he could take a boat home. He was grateful for every letter but each one put him in a maudlin mood. He hated not being involved with his cobbers and the men in his former command in the desert. Each report indicated the Light Horse was headed for glory sooner or later. They were beating the Turks at every encounter. It was a slow, painstaking business held up by lack of supplies, bad weather and the superior numbers of the enemy. There were grumbles from Mulherin and Legg, but they also conveyed a certain satisfaction in the Light Horse’s achievements. They were gaining their revenge after Gallipoli. There had been several charges after Beersheba, which had already (only six months after the event) lodged itself into Australian folklore.

  ‘But our charges are always against fixed positions and trenches,’ Mulherin wrote to him, ‘and you may be amused to learn that the Turkish cavalry has hardly been seen in fighting against us. We reckon they are scared. We have learned from captured German cables that they believe we are truly madmen, and I quote, “who will go where no man or horse should go”. Reckon they might be right too. But we think the Turkish cavalry has taken the German appraisal to heart. They won’t come out and play.’

  A friendship began between Shanahan and Charlotte. They both had flats at Marble Arch, north London. Shanahan lived alone and Charlotte stayed with her two older sisters.

  In conversations during the morning tea break, she peppered her comments with references to a ‘Stanley’. Shanahan asked about him and was told that they were ‘nearly engaged’. ‘He just hasn’t popped the question yet,’ she told Shanahan, ‘but he will.’

  ‘What’s his name?’ he asked.

  ‘Stanley Butler.’

  ‘I should have guessed.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘All butlers in England are called “Stanley”, aren’t they?’

  ‘Oh, you!’

  ‘Don’t tell me he’s a manservant?’

  ‘No, he’s a stockbroker’s . . . er . . . clerk.’

  ‘Hmm. Didn’t serve?’

  ‘Failed the medical. Lung problems.’


  ‘Does he smoke?’

  ‘Too much.’

  Shanahan bought a motorbike with a sidecar and rigged up a pulley system connected to the steering to allow him to drive it with one foot. He asked Charlotte to ride with him to Hove on the south coast one weekend. She said she would like to but that she had to be true to ‘Stanley’ even though he was ‘in Scotland grouse-hunting with friends’.

  After knowing each other for two weeks, one mild winter’s afternoon they walked from Victoria to Marble Arch, and then decided on a further stroll to Bayswater Road, nearly as far as the farm at Notting Hill Gate. A pretty young girl was walking with a milk pail, selling milk. Charlotte bought a bottle. When they returned to Marble Arch, she asked Shanahan if he would like to come in for tea and meet her ‘spinster’ sisters, Ruth and Rebecca. Both the corpulent, dour women seemed taken aback at meeting Shanahan. He stayed at the flat for an awkward half-hour during which the sisters grilled him about his intentions. Would he return to Australia after the war? What trade would he take up? Wouldn’t he be restricted because of his disability?

  ‘Have you ever been married?’ Ruth asked as Shanahan took out his fob watch, looked at it absent-mindedly and seemed not to hear. Ruth was about to repeat the question when he stood up.

  ‘Sorry, ladies, must be going,’ he said, and shook hands. Charlotte accompanied him outside.

  ‘I apologise for them, Michael,’ she said.

  ‘The tea was okay,’ he said brightly, ‘and that milk was so lovely and fresh.’ He touched her on the shoulder. ‘I understand their concerns. They wouldn’t want their beautiful little sister disappearing halfway round the world with a one-legged stranger! Their home would be much less attractive.’ He kissed her warmly on the cheek, held her close and added, ‘Even quite plain, really.’

  She looked up. ‘Bit previous, aren’t we?’ she said with a coy look. ‘Who said anything about me going halfway round the world?’

  ‘Why not? Australia is a fine country.’

  ‘I’ve known you just a few weeks!’

  ‘So? It’s time to know what you want.’

  ‘What you want, perhaps.’ Her hand went to her mouth as she tried to repress a smile. ‘You are quite wicked, really!’

  Charlotte returned to her flat. The three women sat in their living room discussing him. Ruth asked her why she was friends with him.

  ‘The major is a lovely man,’ she said, realising that they had not approved of him.

  ‘You’re not dumping Stanley?’ Rebecca asked.

  ‘No, Michael is just a work friend.’

  ‘That’s where he should stay, then,’ Ruth remarked tartly.

  ‘What’s wrong with him?’

  ‘C’mon, Charlotte! You’re not blind!’

  ‘Spill it out then,’ Charlotte challenged them, ‘why do you object to the major?’

  ‘For one thing,’ Ruth said, ‘he has to be twenty years older than you.’

  ‘Didn’t know there was an age barrier to friendship!’ Charlotte snapped back.

  ‘He is also an Australian,’ Rebecca said.

  ‘He has manners, he is charming . . .’

  ‘He hardly opened his mouth. Talk about a man of few words!’

  ‘He’s shy.’

  ‘Weak, if you ask me,’ Ruth said.

  ‘Michael is a war hero! He has the DSO.’

  ‘They give them out to staff officers,’ Ruth sneered. ‘Harry Baker was—’

  ‘Not anymore. Michael got his for bravery in the field.’

  ‘So he may have told you,’ Rebecca mumbled.

  ‘I’ve seen the citation!’ Charlotte took out a handkerchief. ‘You two are really horrible!’ she sobbed.

  ‘We just don’t want you to give up Stanley Butler,’ Rebecca said.

  ‘I think you are both jealous!’

  ‘Let’s be frank, Charlotte,’ Ruth interjected, ‘he is an old Australian cripple with few prospects.’

  ‘We are just friends!’

  The sisters glanced at each other.

  ‘Come, Charlotte, we saw the way you were together,’ Ruth said. ‘Very cosy. Mark my words, that man has designs on you.’

  22

  BANJO’S REBUKE

  ‘Bloody Bull!’ Paterson said, screwing up a letter and throwing it at a bin. ‘The bastard!’

  Sutherland was in the office going through files.

  ‘What’s wrong, Major?’

  ‘Allenby has made it official. No horses will be allowed back to Australia at the end of service.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Aw, bullshit about the mares not being able to breed on returning home in case they had disease. What disease? Arrant nonsense! There’s other mumbo-jumbo from the “Horse Demobilisation Committee” in the damned London War Office. How would those bloody grey pommie bureaucrats understand anything about the bonds between the troopers and their mounts?’

  Sutherland retrieved the screwed-up paper near the bin and read it. ‘Jesus!’ he exclaimed. ‘They want to sell them to the British or Indian army.’ He shook his head. ‘I wouldn’t be letting the lads know this. They’ll go on strike.’

  ‘Read the last paragraph. It’s fucking “Top Secret!”’

  ‘You know what it means?’ Sutherland remarked after scanning the one-page letter. ‘The troopers won’t give them up. They will shoot them rather than hand them in. Besides, we know that the older neddies will be sold for meat in Cairo.’

  Paterson sat at his desk. He frowned, thought for a minute and then asked: ‘Do we know where Allenby is now?’

  ‘Camped at Jericho. We had a cable last night. His staff wants a suitable horse—one that is “placid yet big and stately”—they said.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘He’s going to give out medals to the Anzac Mounted Division. Doesn’t want to drive up in his Rolls. Wrong image to present to our troopers. He wants to ride up to them.’

  ‘It’s a wonder he didn’t ask for my Khartoum or one of the other thoroughbreds.’

  ‘I think the “big and stately” suggests that.’

  ‘Who’s running the remount at Jericho?’ Paterson said, reaching for the phone.

  The heat was oven-like at the Jordan River in May 1918. There was a lull in the fighting before Chauvel’s mighty force would again pick up the pursuit of the Turks after pushing one enemy army north beyond Jaffa in Palestine and another east to the Jordan. Allenby was surprised at the position the Light Horse had put him in after taking Jerusalem. When he was dumped from the Western Front, British Prime Minister Lloyd George had put great store in him ‘taking back Palestine, and in particular the Holy City of Jerusalem’ from the Turks. George was then a new prime minister looking to do things differently in an attempt to take the British public’s mind off the tremendous carnage on the Western Front. He foresaw a psychological boost for the British in securing Jerusalem, never mind that it was a trifling military acquisition when compared to the struggle for even yards on the Somme in France. Christians and Jews were thrilled at the snatching of the Holy City from the Muslim Turks. It was not billed as a holy war but that was the underlying theme in George’s emphasis on the sideshow in the Middle East.

  After those early months of anger from Allenby, the success against the Turks since Beersheba had the big man less hostile and more amenable. He let Chauvel run the campaign in the field and only issued broad directives to him. He indulged the enigmatic T E Lawrence in his messianic support for the Arab cause. He gave him guns and gold, as requested, to bribe the various tribes into supporting a roughly unified Arab force that ran terror tactics against the Turkish army garrisoned in forts right along the Hejaz railway. The effect, as Lawrence had promised, was to keep that army in the forts and to disavow them the chance to move into Palestine to help the other two armies.

  Chauvel and Lawrence kept the faith yet Allenby remained impatient, constantly asking Chauvel to get up to strength with men and horses in readiness for a two-pronged thrust to smash
those three Turkish armies. But the commander-in-chief was aware that a previously unlikely success was now more than likely. He took time to hand out decorations for actions in the field. He knew that the Anzacs thrived on victory. They needed incentives and inspiration. With this in mind he had 5000 Australian troopers lined up on their mounts at a parade area near a road five kilometres from Jericho. The same number of infantry in lines together was something to behold, but 5000 horsemen, all wearing their slouch hats with the striking insignia of emu feathers, approaching from three metres above the ground was awe-inspiring.

  Chauvel, Allenby and English Brigadier-General Trew were chauffeured to the division’s HQ just out of view of the waiting mounted troopers. Allenby was strangely nervous. His staff sensed this, as did Chauvel. He knew he was the figurehead of the British armed forces in the Middle East. He would never be loved or adored by the troopers, yet his size, demeanour and aggressive nature were a contrast to his indecisive predecessors, who were rarely seen at the front. And when they did turn up, they were treated with barely restrained disrespect. Allenby projected a warrior-leader image and it was appreciated by all who wanted to fight and win. For these reasons, he was especially self-conscious on this occasion, the first time he had been in front of such a big number of the troopers, and the first where he would give out medals to them.

  ‘What horse have you got for me, Harry?’ he said as he alighted from his Rolls. Chauvel motioned to three troopers who clip-clopped across the road with three riderless, saddled mounts. The one designated for Allenby was the biggest. Allenby examined it.

  ‘Deep, tight girth,’ he said, pushing his finger under the leather belt round the horse’s body which secured the saddle. ‘Long rein. In fact, unusually long rein. Hmm. Haven’t seen such an expensive bridle . . . Rolled leather and brass buckles no less! Reminds me of those used at my polo club.’ He looked around at the trooper who had brought him the horse. ‘Did you saddle him, trooper?’

  ‘No, sa! Remount people did it, sa!’

  Allenby ran his hands over the horse’s left hind leg.