The Defending Victoria website was first created in 1997. It is frequently updated.
This webpage is just one of 74 on the Defending Victoria website - partial index

© RESEARCHERS PLEASE ACKNOWLEDGE OR CITE REFERENCES FROM THIS WEBSITE

THE AUSTRALIAN LIGHT HORSE

VICTORIAN REGIMENTS

By the start of the 20th century, mounted infantry was believed to provide a mobile, effective force in modern warfare. Australian mounted infantry served superbly during the Anglo-Boer War of 1899-1902. Australian bushmen, used to the rigours of drought, endless dry plains and heat, and confidently self-reliant, won the respect of the Boers. Victoria sent eight contingents of mounted infantry to the Boer War. Such units later were transformed into the Australian Light Horse regiments of WW1.

OTHER (POST-FEDERATION) BOER WAR UNITS

Victoria also provided 250 recruits for the Marquis of Tullibardine's Scottish Horse,

the Second Battalion Australian Commonwealth Horse, the Fourth Battalion Australian

Commonwealth Horse and the Sixth Battalion Australian Commonwealth Horse. Thirty-one

Victorians served with the Commonwealth Army Medical Corps.

Victoria's proud cavalry, dragoon and light horse traditions reached far into the State's European history. The Prince of Wales Light Horse, with troops at Bacchus Marsh, Kyneton and Geelong to begin with, began in 1860, but there were smaller, earlier mounted units. The Victorian Mounted Rifle Regiment commenced in 1885. The regiment's soft felt hat turned up on one side started the tradition of the rakish slouch hat which is worn with such pride by Australian soldiers today.

It was from these traditions--and the blooding gained in the Anglo-Boer War--that Victoria's strong contribution to formation of the the Australian Light Horse Regiments, when they were formed after Federation, began.

Light Horse at Flemington, Victoria, during the 1908 Military Review.

Charles Edward Williamson

enlisted in the 8th Australian Light Horse Regiment

on 8 September 1914, aged 30. A British subject,

he had already served in the Lancashire Hussars

and Royal Welsh Fusiliers. He was promoted to

Corporal in 'A' Troop within a month of joining-up.

On his enlistment papers, Charles Williamson accepted that as a married man he was not entitled to any special

allowance. Required to allot not less than two-fifths of his pay to his wife (Ada), he altered the figure to read

three-fifths of his pay. Williamson may have been a medical casualty of Gallipoli. The 8th Australian Light Horse

were landed there on 20 May 1915, and he was admitted to hospital on the 24th June with influenza. The

next day he had contracted myalgia and was admitted to No 15 MS hospital at Mudros on the nearby island of

Lemnos. In early July, he had developed enteric (typhoid), and was transferred to No 17 General Hospital at

Alexandria, Egypt, ending up at an English hospital near Birmingham in September. He was finally returned to

duty in August 1916.

After further hospitalisation, he joined the 3rd Light Horse Training Regiment in Egypt in 1917, receiving a

gunshot wound to the left knee barely a month later. Photo and enlistment/service records provided by his proud

grand-daughter Loraine Padgham.

Alfred James 'Snowy' Sutton of the 13th Australian

Light Horse Regiment in 1914. He served in Egypt

and France where he later joined the Field Ambul-

ance. He was wounded by a bomb and repatriated.

He died in the 1950s. (Right) a closeup of his boot

and spur. Photo provided by his proud grand-nephew,

Lee Power.

1935 Xmas card of the 13th Australian Light Horse

Regiment Association to its members. War comrades shared special bonds that often

lasted a lifetime.Photo provided by Lee Power.

A 13th Light Horse team displays its prowess in the

saddle over jumps at the Royal Melbourne Showgrounds in the 1930s. Photo provided by Lee Power.

This photo is supposed to show the famous charge of the 4th Light Horse Brigade at Beersheeba on 31

October 1917. But some historians consider it to be a re-enactment staged for a movie cameraman after

the event. In any event, the title of the photograph -- `Thunder of a Light Horse Charge' -- captures the

power and shock of a mounted charge. Photo courtesy of the Australian War Memorial (AWM AO2684).

Albert George Owen was so upset at seeing injured soldiers disembarking after returning from Europe that he enlisted as a reinforcement in the 2nd Australian Light Horse Field Ambulance. Bert left for the Middle East on board the troopship Commonwealth in November 1917. On arrival in Egypt three weeks were spent in the isolation camp before travelling in open train wagons to Gaza. Until the end of the war Bert and his pal Bridget (his horse), above right, traveled throughout Palestine and Syria and at some point was promoted to corporal. After returning to Australia in 1919 Bert discovered that a local bank was displaying a photograph of his unit posing for the camera in Richon, Syria. He could not remember the photograph being taken but obviously obtained a copy of it. Although the 2nd Light Horse (and its Field Ambulance) had been raised in Queensland, Bert Owen, born and raised in Victoria, enrolled as a member of the June 1917 reinforcements...

Cpl. Albert George Owen.
All photos provided by his proud grandson, John Rogers.

During World War One, the Australian Light Horse, many members of which had served during the searing battles of the Boer War, performed prodigious feats in WW1 at Gallipoli and in the Holy Land at Beersheba, and during the struggle for Damascus. The 4th, 8th, (part of the 9th) and 13th Regiments of Light Horse were raised in Victoria. Machine Gun Squadrons formed part of each Light Horse Regiment. Part of the 3rd MG Squadron (attached to the 3rd Light Horse Brigade, ANZAC Mounted Division) and part of 4th MG Squadron (attached to 4th Australian Light Horse Brigade, Australian Mounted Division) comprised Victorians.