"FIGHTING MAC."

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XXXIX, Issue 9545, 10 March 1919, Page 8

"FIGHTING MAC."

COLONEL AS PRIVATE

Of ail tlie tales of gallantry and grit disclosed by the war, none surpasses that told of Lieutenant-Col. Charles Melville Macnaghten, the details of which have jiust become known. This officer, eon of Sir Melville Maenaghten, for many years head of the Criminal Investigation. Department- at Scotland Yard, wbo won the CM.G. for gallantry in command of a battalion at Gallipoli and acted as a brigadier-general in Egypt, deliberately threw away his rank and position because, as an officer, he was "shelved" through wounds, and enlisted as a private, and was a-gain commissioned for gallantry iti France.

On the outbreak of war Colonel Macnagliten, who, like his father and grand-lather, is an old Etonian;, was in Australia practising law as his profession and soldiering with the local militia as a, hobby. Witlhm 20 minutes of the declaration of war Colonel Macnaghteru booked his passage for England, intending to join the Britush Army. The ship by which he was to travel was. commandeered for military purposes, and before another vessel sailed arrangements were on foot for moblisiug an Australian contingent. He was appointed to the 4th Battalion of the Ist Australian Infantry Brigade, ■ and' as second in command he went into training with his battalion in Australia, and Egypt.

A-x aW the world knows, the Ist Australian Brigade made the landing at Auzac.Cove, GallipoLi, Major Macnaghton beinv the first man to reach' the shore. He was wounded almost immedately, but "carried on." -Next day he received two more wounds, and was sent into hospital at Alexandria and afterwards in England. He succeeded in being returned to hi,s unit at Gallipol'i, where, to the-great joy"of the men of the 4th Battalion, to whom he was known as "Fighting Mac," he wayS appointed, to succeed Lieutenant-Colonel Onslow Thompson, killed in action while in command of the battalion. He led the 4th in their immortal charge at Lone Pine, of which gallant action Generall Sir lan Hamilton Wrote :—

"At an early period of this last coun-ter-attack the 4th Battalion were forced by bombs to relinquish" portion of a trench, but later on, led by their commanding officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Macnaghten, they killed every Turk who had, got in."

JN'ext came the evacuation, and Colonel Maenaghten was one of the officers engaged in that marvellous military" enterprise. Service in JSgypt followed, during which he temporarily did duty as a brigadier. But it wa.s not long before his wounds and fever laid him low, and he was eventually invalided to England. In the meanwhile it had been announced that the King had ■rewarded his distinguished services at Gallipoli with the C.'M.G.

While in England Colonel Maenaghten was always seeking to get back to his regiment, but the doctors refused; he had suffered too much in the war. Eventually he was sent bade to Australia as second in command of the Australian ..Sandhurst. From that period onwards his story is best told in his own words to a relative, diffident and modest though they are. "I tried to get on the active list again out there, but it was of no avail, and eventually I decided to slip away and join one of the reinforcement battalions. I got away to Queensland, where, after four attempts—l am a. bit lame after Gallipoli—l was enlisted as a private under the name of Charles Melville in the 9th Battalion Reinforcements. My one fear' was that I should be recognised before getting to France, but I was not, and eventually 1 found myself'in England training with the rest of them on Salisbury. Plain

"I had been promoted to corporal, and one morning on parade the commanding officer, in whom 1 recognised a fellow-passenger in the hospital ship which brought me to England as a colonel, sang out, 'Corporal, do you think you could drill this company?' Seeing that among other things I had acted as brigadier while, in Egypt, I replied that I thought i could, and did so.

■"All the time I was trying to get into a draft to France, and at "last succeeded, tut there 1 found my identity could not be hidden for long, for I was among officers and men who had known me in Gallipoli, and I. was 'given away.' General Birdwood, who had known me at Lone Pine, sent for me aud gave me a. commission. I was invalided to England, and the next thing was I. received a summons to attend Buckingham Palace in my old rank as lieuten-ant-colonel, vto receive the C.M.G. which the King had bestowed on me years before."

Colonel. IVlaona-ghteii omitted v> inciitioii that he was especially congratulated by his general in France for gallantry at Messines, but did not neglect to extol the valour of Ills men at Gallipoli and across the Channel. "They," he said, "did everything; I did nothing by comparison." But tlie colonel, who is not yet forty years old, wears four wound stripes, and in the words of one of his own battalion, "He is riddled like a colander; it's only hi.s fighting spirit which keeps him alive."

That his identity should not be traced when he enlisted as a- private he deliberately cut himself off from all his relatives, even from his wife, who was nursing in England, for fear that in the censoring of letters his true name and rank might be discovered.