A site for people interested in the social and military history of Ballarat & district in the Great War.
Ballarat Soldiers of Note
Lt-Col Murray William James Bourchier CMG, DSO, VD – Led 4th & 12th Australian Light Horse Regiments in the charge at Beersheba; Deputy Premier of Victoria
Lt-Col Arthur Vivian Deeble – Led the 2nd wave of the attack at The Nek on 7th August 1915
Major General Harold Edward “Pompey” Elliott, CB, CMG, DSO, DCM, VD – Australia’s most famous frontline general, Dux of Ballarat College
Capt Will Longstaff – Official war artist, painter of Menin Gate at Midnight
Lt George Pinnock Merz – First member of the Australian Flying Corp to be killed in action (30 July 1915).
ERA John Messenger – Ballarat’s first casualty of The Great War. Lost At Sea 14 September 1914 onboard submarine AE1.
Sister Rachael Pratt RRC, MM – One of only 7 Australian nurses to win the Military Medal.
Major John Linton Treloar MBE – First director of the Australian War Memorial.
Capt Harold Boyd Wanliss DSO – First lieutenant of the AIF to be decorated with the Distinguished Service Order.
Lt-Col Alexander Henry White – Killed in Action 7 August 1915 leading the first wave of the attack at The Nek.
Major George Devine Treloar DSO, MC – Actor, soldier, statesman and humanitarian.
LtWilliam Dunstan VC – Ballarat’s only Victoria Cross recipient of The Great War
Major Percy Lay MC, DCM, MM, CdeG (French) – Most decorated soldier of the 8th Battalion
Lt-Gen Sir Leslie Morshead KCB, KBE, CMG, DSO ED, Legion d’Honneur, Virtuti Militari 5 (Poland), Medal of Freedom 2 (USA) – Known as the hero of El Alamein; commanded garrison during the siege of Tobruk; second only to General Thomas Blamey in line of command during World War Two.
Sir Albert Ernest Coates OBE, FRCS – Served Gallipoli, Prisoner Of War WWII surgeon on Burma-Thailand Railway,
Will Dyson – born Alfredton, Australia’s first official war artist
Sister Alice Ross-King ARRC, MM – described as Australia’s most decorated military nurse
Sir Daryl Lindsay – Official war artist, responsible for illustrating horrific facial injuries of patients at Queen’s Hospital, Sidcup, helping with groundbreaking maxillofacial reconstructive surgery being performed there
Lt-Gen Sir John Northcott KCMG, KCVO, CB, KStJ – First Australian born Governor of New South Wales.
Lt Wilfred Graham Salmon, Royal Flying Corp – Killed In Action 7 July 1917 during German bombing raid of London. Said to have been the first to die in the defense of London against a foreign invader since the time of William the Conqueror.
Lt-Col Cecil Wanliss – First Australian to lead a regiment into battle in the Great War, commanding the 2nd Battalion of the South Lancashire Regiment during the Battle of Mons.
Major Robert Hunter Weddell – Government Resident of North Australia; Administrator of the Northern Territory.
Lieutenant-General Sir William Bridgeford KBE, CB, MC – soldier, Chief Executive Officer of the organising committee for the 1956 Melbourne Olympic Games