FOR LACK OF MEN

Evening Post, Volume XCV, Issue 140, 13 June 1918, Page 7

FOR LACK OF MEN

DWINDLING AUSTRALIAN FORCES

BREAKING UP OF FAMOUS

BATTALIONS.

(Official Commonwealth Correspondent.) LONDON, Ist June. The cutting down of the Australian force in France, in order to compensate for the absence of normal reinforcements, is being carried out up to the present by disbanding one battalion after another as the shortage makes it necessarj'.

So far, the battalions which are being thus dealt with are the 36th, 47th, and 52nd. The 52nd was a battalion which was formed from the 12th battalion, after Gallipoli, consisting of Queensland and Tasmanian troops. Lately it has become entirely a Queensland - unit. Its first great fight was at Mouquet Farm, where, for three days, it was involved in a tremendous struggle with the second Prussian Guard reserve division till relieved by the Canadians. In its next great fight at Messines, it reached the furthest point gained on the first day. It seized 81a. yards of front line on the flank where a neighbouring division was held up, and by so dpig probably saved the situation in the centre of this advance. Later, it went through the Ypres battle, though not heavily engaged, but it never gained more glory than in the recent fighting, where it was the one battalion which bore the brunt of the German attack at Dernancourt. Within a fortnight afterwards it made a magnificent ni^ht attack, which all the world knows—Villers-Bret-onneux.

Tho 47th, also a Queensland battalion, was formed out of theold 15th. Its first great fight was at Pozieres, where it had to withstand a most terrible German bombardment in the old German lines. The 47th had portion of its strength in the memorable attack, in which the 4th Australian Division broke through tho Hindenburg wire at Bullecourt. It was one of the attacking battalions at Messines which reached the furthest object on the first afternoon, and fought a give-and-take struggle till the position was assured with reinforcing troops next day. The 47th made one of the most difficult attacks ever made by the Australians in the great battle of Ypres, and lately it was the 47th who took the main brunt of the Dernancourt attack full in. the chest after driving back the Germans day after day from the railway embankment. Sergeant MacDougall won the Victoria CroEs in this battle by repelling, almost single-handed, from an isolated post on one flank, a German attempt to cross the railway line on the very morning after the 47th here stemmed the German advance.

_ The 36th (New South Wales) Battalion, beyond question, saved Villers Bretonneux when the Germans flung themselves against the town on 4th April. The 36th was in reserve. Late in the afternoon, by a tremendous attack, the British line was driven in together with the flank of the Australians. The 36th had a well-known fighting commander, "Jock" Milne, an old Gallipoli soldier. No sooner were the retiring troops seen coming over the rise about him than he ordered the battalion to fix bayonets and up over, the ridge at once. The Germans advancing there, suddenly found a line of grim men with bayonets coming straight towards them where they expected to find men retiring. The German line at once wavered and fell back. "Jock" Milne, a few days afterwards, was killed by a shell, but his fighting tradition lives through the force. That is exactly the way in which Australians are facing present emergencies. The 36th fought very heavy, battles on the right of the British line at Messines, and during the most difficult and ambitious attack ever undertaken before Ypres. The name badges of the three battalions will be . preserved at the depots, but the battalions themselves will be gone. *.

Some other famous battalions -will go. They will be kept up to the last possible moment, but the dissolution is certain if the fighting is as heavy as a.t Ypres. Further reduction is certain—possibly by the aboliiton of one division in one act.