The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (505) Sergeant Albert Levy, 39th Infantry 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 Richard Cruise, the story for this day was on (505) Sergeant Albert Levy, 39th Infantry Battalion, AIF, First World War.

505 Sergeant Albert Levy, 39th Infantry Battalion, AIF
KIA 29 March 1918
Story delivered 29 March 2018

Today we remember and pay tribute to Sergeant Albert Levy.

Albert Levy was born in 1895 in Ascot Vale, Victoria, one of three children of Jacob and Eve Levy of St Kilda. Affectionately known as “Mick”, he had two sisters, Minnie and Phoebe. Albert attended South Melbourne College and then worked as a warehouseman. He also served for three years in the 50th Battalion of his local St. Kilda cadets. Levy enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force on 10 January 1916, joining the 39th Battalion, which formed in Ballarat. Due to his previous military experience in the cadets, Levy was soon promoted to the rank of sergeant.

Levy and the 39th Battalion sailed from Melbourne in late May 1916 and when they reached Britain, began four months of training. In late November they sailed for France, arriving on the Western Front in December 1916, just in time to face the coldest European winter in living memory.

Levy spent the next six months experiencing the hardships of trench warfare. He did not take part in a major battle, but instead fought a grinding war of attrition, spending time at the front line under intermittent enemy artillery fire, and training and taking leave behind the front. Levy wrote home to his mother, “It is nearly 12 months since we first came out, but it seems like years.” Later in the year, Levy and the 39th Battalion transferred north to near Ypres in Belgium, where the focus of British operations had shifted.

On 7 June, Levy and the 39th Battalion had their first taste of a major battle at Messines. Having bombarded the German position with high explosive artillery for a week, one million pounds of explosives that had been buried under German lines in a daring series of mines and tunnels was detonated.

The explosion was devastating, and the ridge was occupied virtually unopposed by 5.30 in the morning. Levy and the 3rd Australian Division, however, came under heavy German gas and shrapnel attack while approaching their starting position. Five hundred men were gassed and hundreds more fell to shrapnel wounds. Although it was a successful operation, Australian forces suffered nearly 6,800 casualties. Levy was wounded by gunshot wounds to both legs and his right arm. He was transferred to a field hospital and then sent to England to recover. He did not return to the front until late August. A few months later, he sprained his ankle and was hospitalised for almost the entire month.

Returning to the front, on the night of 30 November Levy led a night blocking party into enemy trenches near the French–Belgian border. A report of his conduct noted, “He was one of the first to enter the enemy trenches and his example of courage, determination and complete control of his men while under heavy fire helped largely in the success of this operation. He was also one of the last to leave the enemy’s trenches and assisted the bringing in of the wounded.” He was awarded the Military Medal for his conduct on this night.

On 29 March 1918, while serving in northern France at Merricourt L’Abbe, Levy took part in a reconnaissance mission in no man’s land. Struck in the ankle by machine-gun fire he lay in no-man’s-land until two stretcher bearers were able to come to retrieve him. The stretcher-bearers were able to carry him to the relative cover of a nearby hay stack, where they dressed his wounds and waited for half an hour for the enemy machine-gun fire to die down. When they left their cover to return safely to the trenches, Levy attempted to sit up and was struck in the head by a sniper’s bullet and killed instantly. He was 22 years old.

He was buried at the Mericourt-L’Abbe Communal Cemetery Extension in France, where his remains lie under the epitaph chosen by his family: “A good and dutiful son”.

A few months before his death, Albert had written home to his mother, informing her of his intention to marry his sweetheart, Doris. Less than a month after his death, Albert’s family would also be informed of the death of Albert’s cousin, Alywn, who was killed in an air force training accident.

In their grief, Albert’s sisters Minnie and Phoebe placed the following poem in the local newspaper: “Just when his life was brightest, Just when his hopes were best, His country called: he answered; Now in God’s home he rests. Loved by all who knew him.”

Sergeant Albert Levy is listed on the Roll of Honour on my right, among almost 62,000 Australians who died while serving in 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 Sergeant Albert Levy, who gave his life for us, for our freedoms, and in the hope of a better world.

David Sutton
Historian, Military History Section