Percy from the Pews
The most poignant is found in the story of Private Ernest Charles Mawley Woolley. His death was the first notified of the Holy Trinity 101, and he was the brother of the church’s assistant curate. He was just a month short of his 26th birthday when he enlisted at the end of November 1914. An orchardist, he was born at the family’s Woolleycroft, Flowerpot, down the Channel. From the peaceful rural delights of fruit harvesting in Tasmania he went to face the horrors of Gallipoli.
Let us now pay renewed homage to those Tasmanians who gave their lives for their country on the battlefield. Let us fittingly respect, and retain, the memorials that stand in their name.
I was sharply reminded on the need for the above by the comments of the Old Bear on the Diggers’ Memorial Window in Holy Trinity Church and the uncertainty of the memorial’s protection after tomorrow’s closure of the church. Heroism … and the closure of Trinity)
He mentioned the 101 from Holy Trinity Parish who died in World War One, and who are so beautifully commemorated by that window, and who have their names on the Roll of Honour board at the other end of the church.
This told me to look at their records with the Australian War Memorial in Canberra. There you will find so many facts pointing to the bravery of Holy Trinity’s servicemen in that most terrible of wars.
The most poignant is found in the story of Private Ernest Charles Mawley Woolley. His death was the first notified of the Holy Trinity 101, and he was the brother of the church’s assistant curate.
He was just a month short of his 26th birthday when he enlisted at the end of November 1914. An orchardist, he was born at the family’s Woolleycroft, Flowerpot, down the Channel.
From the peaceful rural delights of fruit harvesting in Tasmania he went to face the horrors of Gallipoli.
He would never return to the lovely apple groves of his native land, for in May, 1915, while emptying bags of earth from a parapet he was hit by a sniper’s bullet. It penetrated his upper left thigh.
Private Woolley was admitted to the Greek Hospital in Alexandra, Egypt, on May 19. He underwent two operations and the leg had to be amputated. The records say that many wounded had been saved by such amputations, but in his case the bullet took material deep into the leg, turning the wound gangerous.
The hospital’s secretary wrote that they were very sorry they could not save him and he died on May 28.
But Private Woolley remembered his fellow servicemen, the people back home, and his religion, before he died. Consider this from his last moments:
“After being operated on he asked the nurse to read the first three chapters of the Acts of the Apostles. And he then lifted up a weak voice in prayer for the wards and those at home. He sank into unconsciousness and passed away. A Christian hero.”
Remembrance Day is just a few days away. The closure of Holy Trinity comes before that. Yes, as the Old Bear says: Lest we forget.
