ARTHUR G. BYRNES
WWI YEARS
Nurse Janet Gibson Graham from Scotland (Doonfoot, Ayr) whom Arthur Byrnes met probably in London.
Arthur was a young Australian who went to the continental war (WWI), and was shipped over to France
and then served presumably on the western front somewhere in Flanders. He was invalided back to
England, and he married Janet there on 14 November 1918. The Australian government after war's
end repatriated the soldiers back to Australia and Janet followed too as soon as possible. She
was pregnant on the trip with their first child Mostyn (This is a Welsh name, and the name
of a town not far south of Doonfoot). The facts compiled here are far from perfect or
complete. Also interpreting the obtained military record (included here) is in places
beyond the author. So any help with that, or any errors pointed out, would
be appreciated (send to john.mail"at"ozemail"dot"com"dot"au).
Arthur Gervin BYRNES
b. 7.8.1894 Picton
m. 14.11.1918 Edmonton UK
d. 30.1.1964 Newcastle
Occ. Railway Worker
Cremated, Beresfield Cemetery.
*married*
Janet Gibson GRAHAM
b. 21.5.1898 Edinburgh, Scotland
d. 28.7.1997 Toronto NSW
Cremated, Beresfield Cemetery.
Arthur Girvan (Gervin) Byrnes (1894-1964)
Arthur Byrnes was born on 7 August 1894 and died on 30 January 1964. He was one ten children of William and Kate.
Father: William Taylor Byrnes (1869-1964)
Mother: Maria Catherine (Kate) Cummins
William and Kate had ten children, born as follows:
Alice Beatrice Byrnes - 1892, Penrith
Arthur Girvan (Gervin, Gurvin) Byrnes - 1894 Picton
Stella Jane Byrnes - 1896, Penrith
Edith Kate Byrnes - 1899, Penrith
Thelma M. Byrnes - 1901, Penrith
William Edward Byrnes - 1902, Penrith
Doris Eliza Byrnes - 1904, Windsor
Claude Harold Byrnes - 1906, Lithgow
Elsie Pearl Byrnes - 1908, Lithgow
Eva Catherine Augusta Byrnes - 1910, Lithgow
Arthur with sisters Kate (Edith) and Stella, at Mostyn and Doreen's wedding.
Preamble
This information is for purpose of family distribution or discussion with others who may be interested. It is not for publication as some of the images probably have (others') copyright on them. The contents herein focus only on Arthur's life during the War years. Separate broader compilation may follow, on Arthur and his children, provided that sufficient information can be obtained to make that possible.
The children of Arthur's parents William and Kate were all born at Penrith between 1892 and 1902, except for Arthur who was born at Picton in 1894. Before Arthur was born, his father William was in a general store business with his grandfather Samuel, running their shop in Penrith. Prior to that Samuel had worked in the profitable enterprise of being a carrier of goods across the Blue Mountains, beginning in the 1850s goldrush when he would have been aged in his later 20s. This probably gave Samuel his stake to get into store-keeping.
Arthur, unlike the children before and after him, was born at Picton, at a time when his parents were apparently living there - although not for long as they appear to have soon returned to Penrith, where they resided for some years before moving to Lithgow. When Arthur was born William and Kate seem to have been actually living at Picton, and not just visiting there. Arthur was born on 7 August and his father registered the birth at Picton on 4 September 1894. Thus sometime between 1892 and 1894 the parents may have moved to Picton. What could have precipitated the move to Picton is easy to infer, be it right or wrong, from the family history. William had been the joint lessee or stakeholder in the shop in Penrith, with his father. This shop is believed to have stood on the corner of Woodriff and High Street - which is at the western end of the main street of Penrith. The family leased the shop and its conjoined six room cottage, which later was of substantial construction. Samuel and William Byrnes had also considerably added to and improved this house. Then between one and two a.m. on a Tuesday morning In August 1891 these premises caught fire.
The shop, the cottage, outdoors scullery, and two outhouses were all completely destroyed (The Nepean Times, 23 August 1891). Samuel managed with difficulty to save a number of books which he considered of great value. The Nepean Times reported that the Byrnes' loss was a most serious one. The shop's stock was insured with the Phoenix Insurance Company for 150 pounds but at the time of the fire some 450 pounds worth of goods were being stored on the premises. Only the stock is known to have been insured, and the buildings themselves were apparently uninsured. After this unfortunate accident, cause unknown, the Byrnes'es certainly could have been very unpopular with the owner of the destroyed premises, Mr Francis Woodriff. As well they personally suffered the grave loss of probably 300 pounds after the presumed insurance payout. Such a loss in those times was about the value of a small farm or rural house. Thus this could have meant a spell of very hard times and William Taylor if out of work presumably moved to Picton to get employment at his uncle's store. This store has possibly been commenced by Henry in the year 1894. Before Henry got his shop he had worked a long time in Picton as a railways fettler, since at least 1888 when he would have been 25.
William and family did not stay living at Picton for all that long and the next child, Stella Jane Byrnes, was born back at Penrith. William and family possibly returned back to Penrith after Samuel's situation had recovered following the store fire. By 1895 Samuel was leasing a 60 acre farm at Castlereagh (on land owned by Mrs Goodridge). The farm produced hay, cereals and general farm products which were carted to Paddy's Market in Sydney for sale (that trip taking from 3 a.m. in the morning till dusk of the same day). Possibly William found work associated with the farm, although this is not known. William and family presumably lived at or near Penrith till they moved to Lithgow about 1906.
The current account focusses on interpreting the information on Arthur in the Commonwealth Archives. Some related snippets found so far to fill in the story are a photo of the ship Arthur left Australia in, information on the camp he stayed at in England, and a little information on the radio/wireless training he undertook near the end of the war. Specific information on his movements in France/Belgium is lacking and what is envisaged is based only on the history (still very incompletely known to the writer) of his unit. He left Australian in a reinforcement unit for the 2nd Battalion, 1st Division of the Australian Imperial Force (AIF). A little on the likely movements of 'his unit' in Belgium (Flanders) is compiled, as well as a generalised account of the Flanders campaign of World War I. Of course there is no guarantee that he remained always attached to that same unit, and if he was a signalman he might have been shifted at times to other units when needed. The family information is that Arthur suffered from gassing, not just once but on a number of occasions. No details of that are known and what he was hospitalised for, on 2 November 1917, leading to his return to England, was the widespread affliction of "Trench Fever".
Any correction of inevitable errors, or additional information, would be greatly welcomed by the writer (John Byrnes, grandson). No letters, and few family traditions survive on these matters, as far as I am aware of. Thus where he is speculated to have gone must be based on knowledge of his battalion's movements, and not on any direct knowledge of what he did individually. Please contact the writer at john.mail@ozemail.com.au) if you have any comments or corrections or information, or if you can help better interpret military records.
Arthur's WWI years
The war years were a momentous time for the young Arthur Byrnes. He survived the war on the Western Front, probably by a matter of mixed blessing (being ill and sent back to England). From exposure to gas he possibly had some impairment of his health or chest disease resistance for life, but on the bright of things his stay in England gained him his wife Janet. She was a Scottish nurse working in London. Whether or not she worked at the recovery centre where he was, or was directly involved in his care in any way, is unknown. It is thought that she may have been, and that she worked at Edmonton hospital which Arthur spent time in from November 1917 till January 1918.
After the war Arthur and Janet established themselves at Mayfield, a suburb of the City of Newcastle. The 2nd Battalion AIF had been recruited generally from Newcastle and the Hunter Valley (and in 1927 the 2nd Battalion was renamed the City of Newcastle Regiment). Arthur would inevitably have gotten to know many men from Newcastle and such contacts may have influenced why he moved to Newcastle.
The key dates in Arthur's WWI years are:
- Enlisted for "Service Abroad" at Bathurst on 24 October 1916.
- From 24/10/16 to 1/11/16 at Bathurst (induction/training?)
- From 2/11/16 to 8/11/16 at Liverpool army base for further training, and/on awaiting transfer overseas.
- Left Australia on board the "Benalla" on 9 November 1916.
- Disembarked at Davenport on 9 January 1917 and went to the 1st Training Brigade.
- Left for France via Folkestone on 3 May 1917; arrived France possibly on 10 May 1917.
- Hospitalised on 2 November 1917.
- Returned to England on 25 November 1917.
- Stayed at Sutton Veny from June through November 1918, or longer.
- He never returned to Europe. Instead he was deployed into signals training, wireless specialty. At the time of his marriage to Janet Gibson Graham (from Doonfoot, Ayr) on 14 November 1918, Arthur's address was 1st Training Brigade Signal School, Sutton Veny. Other references are to "Wireless Telephony", and that he was attending the Central Telegraph Office in London. On 1 November 1918 his classification at Sutton Veny was "First Class Signaler".
- Granted leave with pay from 14/3/1919 till 11/6/1919 to undergo radio (Maconi) training, possibly all in London. In connection with this training (in "wireless telephony") he attended the Marconi School, London, for studies. The Marconi School had been started by the Marconi Company, and it was located at the original Marconi House in the Strand.
- Returned to Australia aboard the "Katoomba", disembarking on 25 September 1919.
Other young men of the Penrith district followed a similar course as Arthur but never returned. One such was David Andrew Gregor of the same Castlreagh-Cranebrook area as the Byrnes family came from. David enlisted in June 1916, went to 2nd Battalion based at Liverpool the same as Arthur, took ship from Australia in November 1916 the same as Arthur, and was killed on 7 November 1917 at the Second Battle of Passchendaele (which may have been the same battle during which Arthur was affected by gas?).
The war began in 1914 and documentation shows that Arthur tried to enlist earlier, and was at first rejected (depressed chest). By 1916, the 2nd Battalion had been to Gallipoli and the Somme and had suffered many casualties. There was obvious need for reinforcements, and when Arthur volunteered again he was accepted. He became part of the 23rd wave of reinforcements sent from Australia to maintain the fighting strength of 2nd Battalion, 1st Division, Australian Imperial Force.
At the time of his enlistment, Arthur was recorded as being 22 years 2 month in age, and of height five feet seven and one half inches. He gave his occupation as "Viewer", and his next of kin as Mrs Alice Beatrice (? - uncertain surname spelling). Alice Beatrice was his eldest married sister, then living in Penrith. He did not enter his father as next of kin. Family tradition has it that when leaving for the war, he left any money and posessions with family in Penrith (although the father and children were last known living at Lithgow). There is known possible explanation for this. Arthur's mother Kate had died four years previously, on 5 October 1912, from ovarian cancer. A few weeks before her death, Arthur's father William was dismissed from his Government Railways job in Lithgow, on 2 September 1912. Despite an appeal to have him re-instated, and the petitions of Rev. F.T. Walker and others, the dismissal stood. Since 1908 William had been working as Night Officer on the Zig Zag railway, and from 1910 as Signalman. The Zig Zag was formerly the way that trains made passage, via zig-zagging, down the steep cliff face of Triassic sandstone forming the edge of the Blue Mountains Plateau, into the Ligthgow Valley. This was a risky operation and there has been at least one runaway train accident on that section of track. Signalman was a responsible position and if William had been absent from this post, or under the influence of alcohol, this may have been why he was dismissed. The Railways Department appear to have either lost or destroyed the pertinent records. The death of Arthur's mother left his father with ten children, no wife, and no job. William's response or way of coping is not known. On top of this, the family were living in a railway house at Corney Town, Lithgow, and being no longer an employee of the Railways, William was no longer entitled to this house. Fortunately, Arthur was by then also working for the Railways, and it was possible to have the house made over to Arthur's name, and thereby retain it. That Arthur cited his eldest sister as next of kin possibly suggests that his father's situation at Lithgow was unstable at the time. That Arthur went to Bathurst to enlist suggests that in 1916 he and his family were still living in Lithgow then. However, William possibly did not stay long in Lithgow after Arthur left since by the time of his marriage, in England in November 1918, Arthur gave his father's address as "c/- Post Office, Blacktown, N.S.Wales".
Click on the below links for the various sections of this compilation:
Sutton Veny army base, England
AND THEN AFTER THE WAR
Arthur and Janet settled at Mayfield and spent most of their lives there.
They had seven children, including twins:
1. Mostyn Arthur Byrnes. Born 23 January 1920 at Iluka Hospital, died 7 Jan 2007.
2.Yvonne Peggy Byrnes. Born 14 May 1921, died 1 June 1950.
3. Malcolm Graham Byrnes. Born 3 May 1922, died 20 January 1998.
4. Gwendoline Ellen Byrnes. Born 22 February 1925, died 6 Jun 2005.
5. Robert Gibson Byrnes. Born 3 June 1927 d 18 September 2002.
6. James Edward Byrnes. Born 25 August 1936.
7. Kenneth Warren Byrnes. Born 25 August 1936.
Mostyn (right) and Malcolm Byrnes, in their backyard at Mayfield.
Years later - Mostyn and Malcom with their wives and their mother Janet
(Also Jack Bebb, husband of Gwen who is likely taking the photo).
Mos and his mother in the Mayfield backyard.