Towards Peace a Worker’S Journey
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Towards Peace A worker’s journey Writing about oneself requires some egotism, but I have never sought personal power nor had high ambitions in any sphere of life and have always found great strength in just being among workers at job level. Though I have never sought high positions as an individual, I have lived my life with a grand objective always in mind: it has been my hope that the peoples of the world will one day be free from poverty and armed conflict. Perhaps I will not live to see it, but I believe that eventually all in the world will be free from poverty, unchecked disease, oppression and war. My life to the present has been made up of three ‘wents’: I went to school, I went to the war and I went into the Waterside Workers Federation. All three ‘wents’ were educational in one way or another, with Federation membership and involvement in industrial, political and social events of the post–war years as the most meaningful part of my life. Unable to get a regular, permanent job during the 1930s, I joined the army in October, 1939. I was fed, clothed and taken in semi–luxury conditions in the old Strathaird to the Middle East early in 1940 where I was supplied with a rifle and the other paraphernalia of military life. The war experience caused me some deep thinking, as patriotism was not one of the reasons I had joined the army. The depression, war and post–war experiences were responsible for my involvement in the anti–war movement. My wife and I take pride in the fact that none of our three sons has ever had to wear a uniform. Due to the efforts of millions throughout the world, a third world war has been averted despite former prime minister Menzies’ prediction in 1950 of ‘war in three years’ and his commitment of our troops to the Vietnam war during the 1960s. Being a Federation member always made my activities in the anti–war movement just a little easier. The Federation’s role and reputation were acclaimed, not only throughout Australia, but internationally also. As a delegate to the World Peace Congress in Moscow in 1962, and again as Australia’s representative to the Warsaw Presidential Meeting of World Peace Councillors in 1973, I learned of the international reputation of the Waterside Workers Federation. Today, as much as during the Vietnam years, ordinary workers need to participate in shaping our future. The serious and disturbing move to the right reflected at the ballot box after the 11 November 1975 dismissal of the Whitlam government by sir John Kerr shows the need for all progressive people and organisations to work harder to achieve a better Australia. Phil O'Brien, April 1976. Reasons This autobiography records the period from my father’s birth in 1895 until the present time, the early 1990s. I have written it for several reasons but will mention only two. Most important is my desire for a world free from war, although while so many small conflicts still bedevil many parts of the world, this always seems an impossible dream. However, since the end of world war II, we have witnessed a tremendous movement for world peace embracing every country of the world with millions of ordinary people playing their parts in various ways. My main objective is to persuade the present and future generations to become involved in the general world peace movement. There are numerous organisations that have that grand objective as their ultimate goal. The fact that there has been no major world conflict since 1945 is due, I believe, in no small measure to the general world wide peace movement. Many times the superpowers have been very close to actual conflict but each time reason, perhaps encouraged by the knowledge that unbelievable suffering would follow any nuclear conflict, prevailed. A second reason I have written this story is a personal one. I would like all of my immediate family – my sons and their wives, my grandchildren and great grandchildren – to pass this story down to future generations who I hope will all be living in a world of permanent peace. They can then say that some of their ancestors tried in their lifetime to help them enjoy the most prized possession of all: life itself. Phil O'Brien 1992. Chapter 1. My Father and the War to End All Wars. Will they never fade or pass! The mud, and the misty figures endlessly coming In file through the foul morass, And the grey flood–water lipping the reeds and grass, And the steel wings drumming. Vance Palmer Nineteen fourteen saw Michael James O'Brien working for New South Wales railways around Coffs Harbour, Casino and Lismore. Life, particularly for ordinary people, was difficult. When the Australian government called for volunteers shortly after the outbreak of war in Europe in August 1914, Mick joined the army, the 1st AIF (Australian Imperial Forces) at Lismore. He enlisted on 12 October and was posted to the 15th Battalion stationed at Enoggera, Brisbane. His army number was 473. My father, Mick O'Brien, had been born in Armidale, a small country town in the New England district of New South Wales, to working class parents on 4 April 1895. Michael’s father, also Michael James, was a bricklayer who, along with his wife, Susan, died in the early 1900s. The children – three girls, Clarence, Muriel, and Mabel, as well as Michael – were sent to live with various relatives. The girls went to Queensland and Michael to Sydney. War on behalf of England beckoned enticing if hazy opportunities for fit young battlers throughout all states of the Federation of Australia, itself still youthful. Army enlistment records show that Mick gave his age as 21 years 5 months, although he was only 19. Similarly, when I enlisted in 1939, many young fellows overstated their age by a couple of years – this solved the problem of getting parents’ or guardians’ written consent. At the time of the first world war my father’s battalion was simply known as the 15th. In both wars, a battalion consisted of around a thousand men. Historians during and after the second world war began to distinguish between the first and second generation battalions (between, say, the 1/15th and 2/15th), recruited from the same areas of Australia and trained in the most appropriate training camp, usually the nearest to where they lived. During both wars, men such as Mick O'Brien from northern New South Wales trained at Enoggera in Brisbane. Such men were part of the 1st/15th or 2nd/15th respectively. After training at Enoggera, the 1/15th Battalion moved in November to Broadmeadows camp north of Melbourne. With the 1/16th Battalion, they left Railway pier, Port Melbourne on 22 December aboard the SS Ceramic bound for the Middle East. Two other battalions, the 1/13th and the 1/14th, also departed Melbourne at this time on another vessel. Intense training in the desert after their arrival in Egypt left the men superbly fit. The soldiers spent their leave in Cairo and Alexandria. Many young AIF men had their first sexual experiences in the brothels in Wazzir and Burka streets in Cairo and Sister Street in Alexandria. For less physical entertainment they visited the Sphinx and the Pyramids. The 15th Battalion was an infantry battalion. The word infantry means exactly what a novice to war might expect: a band of youths. Originally designed to distinguish infant foot soldiers from mature cavalry men, the infantry came to mean the group of front line soldiers. On 10 April, 1915, the 1/15th Battalion boarded two ships, the Australind and the Se Eang Bee at Alexandria to travel to the Gallipoli Peninsula calling briefly at Mudros Island enroute. During the journey the men were issued with cloth caps to wear at the landing. The army believed that slouch hats would be too conspicuous to the enemy. The soldiers thought that what they would be wearing on their heads would be the least of their worries. They were right. The Australian troops alongside English soldiers landed on 25 April. The Australind and the Se Eang Bee went as close to the beach as possible, where the men got into smaller row boats to make the landing on Cape Helles. Mick took part in several stunts (as actions were called) which commenced at Cape Helles and included Quinn’s Post, Popes Hill and Shrapnel Gully. Conditions throughout these stunts were terrifying with only the occasional rest back on the beach area. Ordinary soldiers, like Mick and me, from both world wars referred to actions as stunts. During one of the rest periods Mick was a member of a work party that was unloading supplies. The cases were marked as food, but one was accidentally broken open and found to contain rum. Most of the work party, including Mick, got very drunk. His army record of 11 July, 1915 read: “Found guilty of being drunk at Gallipoli whilst on duty and in the presence of the enemy, awarded 96 hours FP.” ‘Field punishment’ was a possible death sentence of four days back at the front line. A major action by the 1/15th Battalion on 8 August was an attack on Abdul Rahman Bair, known to Allied troops as Hill 971. The stunt was a disaster and the many casualties included Mick who, early in the attack, received gun shot wounds in the leg and hip. He was left to lie in the field.