The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (128) Private Albert Frank Crowle MM, 21st Battalion, AIF, First World War.

The Last Post Ceremony is presented in the Commemorative area of the Australian War Memorial each day. The ceremony commemorates more than 102,000 Australians who have given their lives in war and other operations and whose names are recorded on the Roll of Honour. At each ceremony the story behind one of the names on the Roll of Honour is told. Hosted by Charis May, the story for this day was on (128) Private Albert Frank Crowle MM, 21st Battalion, AIF, First World War.

128 Private Albert Frank Crowle MM, 21st Battalion, AIF
KIA 3 May 1917
No photograph in collection

Story delivered 14 December 2015

Today we remember and pay tribute to Private Albert Frank Crowle.

Albert Crowle – known as “Bunny” – was born in 1892 to Thomas and Mary Crowle of Bendigo. He attended the local school at California Gully and went on to become a miner, working at the Golden Pyke Mine. He was a popular footballer and a well-known trainer for the California Gully Football Club.

Crowle enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force in January 1915 and was posted to the 21st Battalion. He was sent to Egypt and then to the Gallipoli peninsula. On the way there the troopship he was on, HMT Southland, was torpedoed in the Aegean. He eventually made it safely to Gallipoli, but in December 1915 he was near the cookhouse when a shell landed on top of it. He was badly scalded in the foot as a result. While waiting for evacuation his other foot got frostbite, and he found himself in the unique position of being treated for burns on both feet – one from heat and the other from cold.

In 1916 the 21st Battalion was sent to fight on the Western Front. Private Crowle became cook for his company during the fighting at Pozières and Mouquet Farm. In late August the quartermaster sergeant called for volunteers from the cooking staff to carry rations to the front line, where the men were coming under heavy shell-fire. Crowle volunteered and got the rations forward. He would rush over to the ambulance wagons as they brought the wounded out of the line, and witnesses saw him “cry like a big baby” as he made sure men of his battalion had enough hot tea or soup to keep them going. On one occasion a German shell exploded Crowle’s cooker just behind the front line. He was shaken, but stayed to keep the men in rations. The quartermaster sergeant later wrote: “to describe what he had to go through I could not if I wrote for a week. Suffice it to say that it was ‘hell’.”

During the harsh winter of 1916–17 Crowle worked hard in all weathers. A friend later remarked: “He must have been made of cast iron.”

In early 1917 Crowle volunteered to become a stretcher-bearer. That March he was carrying wounded near the French village of Longatte under heavy machine-gun and artillery fire, in complete disregard of his own safety. He and four other stretcher-bearers working that day were awarded Military Medals for their courage, conspicuous gallantry, and endurance.

On 3 May 1917 Crowle was working as a stretcher-bearer amid the fighting around Bullecourt. As an artillery barrage came down he took shelter in a dug-out with some of his comrades. A shell fell on the dug-out, burying three of the men sheltering there. Two were dug out alive, but the other – Private Albert Crowle – did not survive.

Back in Australia Crowle’s sister received a letter accusing her brother of cowardice. She wrote to his battalion to find out the truth. Sergeant Major Trevascus was incensed:

[Crowle] was a wild fellow in his ways, but as a soldier he was sublime. If we could only lay our hands on the being (I will not call him a man) who had the audacity to malign your brother’s name, his very life would not be worth twopence.
… you can give the lie direct to any person who even breathes a word against your brother … for a braver and stronger man never left Australia than the same “Bunny” Crowle, of the 21st Battalion.

Albert Crowle was 24 years old.

His name is listed on the Roll of Honour on my right, among more than 60,000 Australians who died during the First World War.

This is but one of the many stories of service and sacrifice told here at the Australian War Memorial. We now remember Private Albert Frank Crowle, and all those Australians who have given their lives in the service of our nation.

Dr Meleah Hampton
Historian, Military History Section