A Goldfield’s Soldier of the Great War – Lance Corporal William Thomas Maddern, MM
William Thomas Maddern circa 1915
William Thomas MADDERN was born at Woods Point, Victoria in 1889, the son of William Henry and Isabella (nee Shade) Maddern. At the outbreak of WW1 he was newly married to Evelyn Ann (Crouch) Maddern, they had a young daughter Evelyn and lived near Boulder Block Mine, Fimiston near Kalgoorlie, W.A. where he was a miner.
Known in the goldfield towns of Kalgoorlie/Boulder as a keen footballer, Will Maddern was sometimes known as ‘Yank’ or ‘Billy’ and had played for both North Fremantle and Subiaco clubs as well as in goldfield teams. He was an only child, having lost a half-brother many years earlier in Victoria. His father, William Henry MADDERN, had been a miner in both Ballarat and at Gippsland in Victoria before they moved to the West Australian Goldfields in around 1903 and worked the Boulder 280 Lease in Fimiston near Kalgoorlie.
Following the outbreak of WW1, Will Maddern enlisted on July 17, 1915 at the Kalgoorlie Recruiting Depot. With the rank of Private he commenced basic training at Blackboy Camp on July 22 until August 6 1915 when he was allotted to the 4th Reinforcements in the 28th Battalion with the regimental number 2181. His battalion departed on the transport HMAT A20 Hororata on December 12, 1915 from Fremantle, W.A.
Following arrival on January 16, 1916 at Tel-el-Kebir in Egypt and a period of intensive training, the 28th Battalion joined the B.E.F. on the Western Front in France on March 16, sailing for Marseilles and disembarking on March 21, 1916. He served in numerous operations in the Somme Valley, until August 1916, when as a runner during the Battle of Pozieres he was wounded in action and was awarded the Military Medal for distinguished conduct. His citation reads as follows:-
“When in position at POZIERES RIDGE on the night of 4/5 August, 1916, Private MADDERN was sent back on two occasions through a heavy barrage fire with messages to Battalion Headquarters.
On two later occasions he was sent back again with important messages and although badly wounded on the last occasion did not fail to deliver his message safely. He showed great devotion to duty under most trying conditions”
During this savage and relentless battle, he was also commended for having carried a wounded superior officer, Capt. Isaac, to safety although being badly wounded himself. Promoted to Lance Corporal following the battle of Pozieres, he was evacuated to England on September 6, 1916 for treatment of gunshot wounds to the thigh, where he remained until April 5, 1917. Following rehabilitation and further training in England, he proceeded to France, arriving at Etaples and rejoined his unit on April 9, 1917.
A poignant parallel story emerged from family research which is worthy of mention and which had a rather interesting twist during Will. Maddern’s stay in England. His father, William Henry MADDERN, had also joined up with the First Tunnelling Company in the Mining Corps in February 1916 as Sapper No: 422. Being a miner of many years experience, although in his 40s, his skills with tunnelling and explosives was needed in the trenches. It is also very likely, that he signed up to be near his only son, as many relatives did during that period did. Following training at Blackboy Camp, he too arrived in France and was deployed to the Western Front where he served alongside his son on numerous occasions during the Somme battles. In October of 1916, Maddern senior was transferred to Waymouth in England and it would appear met up with his son during this time. L/C William Maddern’s records show that he was disciplined at Monte Video Camp in Weymouth for overstaying furlough from 3 p.m. October 28 until 5 p.m. November 14, 1916, was confined to barracks and received the forfeiture of seven day’s pay.
Years later, family research would uncover a possible explanation for this lapse in conduct in the otherwise dutiful younger Maddern. A relative would be told that “two men in Australian uniforms” had visited the small mining town of St. Just in Cornwall at about this time in 1916. It is almost certain that those two men were William Henry and his son William Thomas. St Just was the home from which the original Maddern family had migrated to Australia during the great Gold Rush. No doubt a visit to connect back to family roots was too tempting an opportunity to resist for this war-weary father and son since both men were in England at the same time recovering from wounds. Overstaying a furlough and the forfeiture of a week’s pay was probably a small price to pay for two men who had been through hell together and who would only too soon be parted forever.
Father and Son, Sapper William Henry Maddern (seated) and Lance Corporal WilliamThomas Maddern, MM. Photo taken in France 1916
Discharged on June 26, 1917 to the No. 2 Command Depot at Weymouth he remained for a month to recuperate, then reported to the No. 3 Command Depot at Hurdcott. It was a slow three month rehabilitation, largely because his debility was reclassified three times as he recovered following further training in England, Lance Corporal Maddern rejoined his unit in France on April 9, 1917 and was quickly back in action. Only 8 days later he was wounded in action for the second occasion receiving gunshot wounds to his back and legs. Sent back to England once more, on Anzac Day 1917 he was admitted to the Ontario Hospital, Orsington and thence to the 1st Aust Auxiliary Hospital at Harefield later that day.
On September 15, 1917 he reported to the Overseas Training Brigade at Perham Downs and left for Southampton on October 14, 1917 crossing to Le Havre and eventually rejoined his unit in the 28th Battalion on October 20th 1917 which was now about to serve in Belgium.
On Wednesday, 24th October 1917 he celebrated his 28th birthday in time to enjoy the spoils from fifty cases that had arrived from the 28th Battalion Comforts Fund. Unit Diaries state that the cases contained much-needed socks, soap, tobacco, sweets and other delights which were distributed to the men.
Celebrations were short lived, as four days later on October 27 as he moved towards the front, he was gravely wounded in action for the 3rd occasion and admitted to the 15th Aust Field Ambulance with shrapnel wounds but died from these wounds at day later on October 28, 1917. He was buried at the back of a field ambulance station which is now the Menin Road South Military Cemetery, Ypres in Belgium.
Official military records however conflict with a Red Cross eye-witness account of Lance Corporal Maddern’s death. The eye-witness, Private John Reidy, a 21 year old fellow soldier from the 28th Battalion, reported seeing Lance Corporal Maddern “killed instantly” together with two other men on 27th October 1917 as in the following account.
Red Cross Reference No. 2435:- “We were moving up to the front line and at Hellfire Corner four or five shells landed amongst the company, killing Hughes and Maddern and another man instantly. We rushed along the road to get to the cover of an old trench and I saw Hughes as I passed. We moved on soon after that.”
Other military records by contrast indicate that Lance Corporal Maddern appeared to survive his initial injuries only to die of them the following day. In the fog and chaos of war it was not uncommon for such inaccuracies to occur. A more accurate reconstruction, based on family research of Unit Diaries and other documents, seem to account for his final three days in Belgium as follows:-
On Friday 26th October, the battalion fell in at 8.00am, marched to Steenvoorde and boarded buses for the front. The battalion dismounted the transports at Café Belge on the Ypres-Kemmel Road south west of the town of Ypres in the forward area and were billeted in huts overnight. Their objective over the following two days was to relieve the 5th Division which had been holding a sector of the 1 Anzac Corps front north west of Polygon Wood near the Albert Redoubt. The following morning, 27th October 1917 dawned wet and grey and the troops were ordered to dump surplus packs and gear at the transport lines, taking only battle-order equipment plus a single blanket, an oil-sheet, a greatcoat, spare socks and sandbag puttees in readiness for their deployment into action.
Australian Soldiers at the bathhouse Ypres, France
At around 3.00pm the battalion set out on their long march through the ruined town of Ypres to the Menin Road where a further five hour march lay ahead of them in order to reach their appointed destination for that day. Their proposed route would take them east along the Menin Road, past the infamous Hellfire Corner and then inland across country along a series of duckboard tracks up to the front line. Just outside the town of Ypres about a half mile on the right- hand side of the Menin Road was a partly-ruined schoolhouse. At the time, this housed the 15th Field Ambulance and was a major casualty clearing station for that area. Without realizing it, Lance Corporal Maddern and his battalion marched right past it on that drizzly Saturday afternoon, little knowing that he would soon be transported back there with injuries that would claim his life.
A half mile further up the road lay Hellfire Corner with a reputation which well matched its name. Its coordinates were accurately lined up by the enemy who shelled this major troop and transport route out of Ypres on a daily basis. It was always a matter of luck to get safely past this hot spot. The 28th Battalion took their turn to traverse this deadly cross-roads on that bleak afternoon as thousands of men and horses had done before them since the start of this costly war with varying success. The Unit Diaries record briefly what happened next. In simple, concise language the unit officer wrote in his daily report:-
“ While ‘A’ Company moved along the duckboards an enemy bombardment bracketed the track, causing three casualties”.
For the twice wounded and decorated young soldier, “Yank” Maddern’s luck would run out just as his company was mid-way through their long trek to take over the trenches at the front line. He was one of those three casualties and one of those shells unfortunately had ‘ his number ‘ on it.
Within his small but close surviving family, that particular number has always been considered a great irony. It is the number 28. Lance Corporal William Thomas Maddern was in the 28th Battalion. His regimental number was 2181. He died on 28th. October 1917 at the age of 28 years and his AWOL visit to his family’s ancestral village in the mining town of St Just in Cornwall had occurred on 28th October 1916…..exactly one year to the day of his death in Belgium. This eerily recurring ’28’ appears to have indeed been ‘his number’ in the end!
Following the shelling, Lance Corporal Maddern would have been taken back up the Menin Road to the schoolhouse which housed the 15th Field Ambulance station. There he died of his wounds on Sunday 28th October 1917 and it was there he was buried, ironically in the same row as members of his father’s 1st Tunnelling Company who had been killed in separate incidents. Today the schoolhouse is gone and in its place is the Menin Road South Military Cemetery, a small but dignified and beautifully tended resting place for the fallen. It is lovingly tended by Belgian volunteers from the War Graves Commission.
North Fremantle Amateur Football Club colts conducting a tribute ceremony at L/C Maddern’s grave at Menin Road South Military Cemetery Ypres in 2008. He had played for them prior to WW1
Prior to his son’s departure for Belgium, his father, Sapper Maddern departed England on the H.T. Nestor on July 22, 1917 for the voyage to Australia for discharge due to age and chronic rheumatism. He arrived back in Fremantle, W.A. on September 18, 1917 and on 1st October he was discharged as medically unfit for further active service. He returned to work as a miner at the Great Boulder Lease, remaining there until 1931.
The news, a little more than a month after his return to Australia of his only son’s death, was to shatter this small but close family and leave a young widow and small child to grow up never knowing her father. The grieving families placed these notices in the Western Argus on Tuesday October 29th, 1918, a year after the tragedy.
MADDERN—
In sad and loving memory of our dear son, Corporal W.T. Maddern, M.M.,
28th Battalion, who died of wounds at Ypres on the 28th October, 1917, aged 28 years.
Could I, his mother, have clasped his hand
The son I loved so dear ;
To kiss his brow when death was near,
And whisper, “Dear Will, farewell,”
My son.
Sadly a father is thinking
Of his soldier son so brave ;
Who fought for the cause of freedom,
Who lies in a hero’s grave.
My dear boy.
Inserted by his sorrowing father and mother, W.H. and Isabella Maddern, Great Boulder Lease, Fimiston
Daughter Evelyn and wife Evelyn Annie(‘Annie’)
William Henry Maddern remained in the goldfields until the death of his wife, Isabella in 1931 after which he moved to Fremantle to be near his only grandchild, Evelyn and Will’s widow,’Annie’ who had remarried. He died on September 3, 1937 aged 71 years and is buried with his wife in Fremantle Cemetery.
Like so many other families who had been left grief stricken after the Great War and impoverished following the subsequent Great Depression of the 1930s, the Madderns did not have the luxury of being able to visit the grave of their lost son, husband and father. It was not until 2008 that the wife and only daughter of Will. Maddern’s grandson, Ian van Hemert, visited Ypres and found his grandfather’s grave. It was a moving and healing moment for a family who finally had the opportunity to bear witness to the loss of those who had to endure it in silence and get on with their lives as that whole generation had to do.
With the centenary of the outbreak of WW1 now present in the minds of this current generation, it is with great respect and gratitude that our family pays tribute to the sacrifice of our gallant lost soldier who lies so far from home in the fields of Flanders. May his memory be forever cherished and his story serve to inspire those of us who hold his memory dear. May it also honour the resilience, hardiness and commitment to duty of a unique breed of Australian men and women from the W.A. Goldfields whose example of courage and endurance should never be allowed to be forgotten. That in itself is a small price to pay for what they gave and what they lost.
Will Maddern’s surviving family in 1940 (Left to right) : His widow, ‘Annie’, his grandson Ian, his only child Evelyn and his grand-daughter Gaye (front). Fremantle, W.A.
Story submitted by Colleen van Hemert 2015 in memory of Ian – Many thanks for her permission to reproduce her story.
Moya Sharp
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