Recently, while attempting to find examples of songs and music from the Word War 1 period that were not military, I stumbled across this delightful photo (definitely a search fail but a wonderful find).

Taken in September 1914 at Blackboy Hill camp, Western Australia, it shows Privates Leonard Darcy and John Pratley of the 3rd Australian Field Ambulance creating makeshift music. I also think it shows something of the enthusiasm and the innocence of those early months of World War 1 in Australia before the First Expeditionary Force had left and before we truly understood the human cost of this war.

Darcy and Pratley were in the same unit as Private John Simpson Kirkpatrick, who became known at Gallipoli as ‘The man with the donkey’.

Both men returned to Australia.

John Pratley (Francis John Pratley) of Kalgoorlie was aged 27 when he enlisted on 17 August 1914. He was married and worked as a labourer. Initial training was at Blackboy Hill camp, near Greenmount at the foot of the Darling Ranges. He embarked on HMAT Medic on 2 November 1914 from Fremantle as part of the First Expeditionary Force. The convoy was rerouted to Egypt due to the conditions in the overcrowded military camps in England during the northern winter. The AIF disembarked at Alexandria on 3 December 1914. Pratley served with the 3rd Field Ambulance at Gallipoli but in August 1915 contracted influenza and colitis. He was sent to 2nd Australian General Hospital at Ghizereh, Egypt where he was also treated for dysentery. He was later transferred to the convalescent hospital at Halouan. Whilst in hospital he developed a thrombosis in his left leg. He was returned to Australia for for a ‘change of three months’ on the Kanowna on 28 January 1916. He was discharged from the army on 7 December 1916 as medically unfit. He later worked as a labourer and a horse trainer and died at Perth in 1957.

Leonard Darcy (Edward Leonard Darcy) was 24 when he enlisted at Kalgoorlie on the same day as John Pratley. He was originally from Walhalla in Victoria. He was single and gave his occupation on enlistment as a miner but was actually a clerk with the Great Boulder Perserverance Gold Mining company. As part of the 3rd Australian Field Ambulance, he also embarked on HMAT Medic on 2 November 1914. While carrying a stretcher with patient back to beach at Gallipoli, he was hit by shrapnel on 13 May 1915. The fragment went through his arm causing a compound fracture of the ulna. He was initially treated on board HMT Osmanieh. He was returned to Australia on HMAT Ballarat on 7 August 1915 and discharged as permanently unfit on 11 April 1916.
Darcy worked as a clerk on his return and moved to Victoria where he married in March 1917. He re-enlisted on 8 November 1917 and worked in the Base Records Corps as part of the recruiting staff, again as a clerk. He was promoted to sergeant on 1 August 1918 and finally discharged from service on 31 December 1919. He was employed as a clerk in Melbourne but returned to Western Australia in the late 1930s or early 1940s. He died in Perth in 1946.

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All photographs are courtesy of the Australian War Memorial and are in the public domain.