Genealogists' Forum - We have branches everywhere!



Go Back   Genealogists' Forum - We have branches everywhere! > Research > What Did Your Relative Do In The Great War?

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #1  
Old 05-04-14, 06:45
marquette's Avatar
marquette marquette is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: Australia
Posts: 1,251
Default Cleveland Edmund Page

Cleve Page was the second son of Captain (Ret) Reuben Edmund Page (my great-grandfather) and his first wife Beatrice Mary nee Dawson. He was born on 13 April 1892 at Hamilton, a suburb of Newcastle NSW. He went to school at Auburn and Granville (probably Auburn Public School and Granville Boys High) in Sydney.

He volunteered for Service Abroad with the Australian Imperial Force on 19th August 1914, aged 22years and 4 months. He was a plumber, having completed his apprenticeship a few years earlier but lived with his parents and siblings at Macquarie-road, Auburn, Sydney NSW.

He was given the service number of 70 and appointed with the rank of Sapper to the 1st Field Company Royal Australian Engineers, where his father had been a Quartermaster (Honorary) Captain until 1908.

He embarked on the HMAT (His Majesty's Australian Transport) "Afric" on 18th October 1914, bound for Egypt with the 1st Australian Division.

He was killed by a sniper on the first day of action at Gallipoli, Turkey.

This brief account comes from the local paper, given by another local man who was also involved in the first day of the Gallipoli campaign.
(Private Jack Sargood, writing to his friend Joe Hyer)

"Now Joe, I will tell you about Cleve Page. Auburn should be proud of its soldiers at the front. While I was coming down to the beach, I met young J. Smith who lived near the Auburn Hospital. He told me that Cleve Page was killed. It appears that Page, with another man from the Engineers charged and captured a machine gun and killed about seven Turks. While they were coming back to the beach, they were both shot dead by snipers"

Cleve is buried in the Shrapnel Valley Cemetery near Anzac Cove, Gallipoli.

The inventory of his effects, in his service file were "2 brown paper parcels" containing "cards, housewife (sewing kit), pendant, cigarette case, h'chief" and "letters, gold-ring, purse, coins, pocket-book, cards"

Cleve Page, left and a mate, name unknown



Original graves, Shrapnel Valley






Diane

Last edited by marquette; 05-04-14 at 07:37.
Reply With Quote
  #2  
Old 08-09-14, 03:19
Catherine Catherine is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2014
Posts: 2
Post Cleve's real Anzac story

Hi Diane,
Fantastic photo. I think that's Cleve's older brother Ray beside him. How prophetic, since they both grew up to be WW1 soldiers. Cleve was in one of the very first boats of the Gallipoli dawn landing and was one of the first handful of Australians to die there as soon as he landed on the beach, without firing a shot and was dead before the sun came up. That version in the newspaper clipping seems to be embellished for the benefit of the family. Cleve's older brother, Ray, also joined the engineers and served through the Western Front with many of Cleve's comrades, so he knew the real story, and told his own children, of whom my mother was one. Research through primary documents, including the diaries of Cleve's mates, backs up Ray's story.
It also, astonishingly, reveals the presence in those first boats of no less than 150 men who history has completely overlooked, from the 1st Field Company Engineers, who landed in the so-called first wave with the advance battalions of the 3rd Brigade.
Five engineers died at the landing. Two of Cleve's Section died beside him on North Beach in those opening moments. Their Section landed with the 11th Battalion. Another from two men from his Company died at the same time, one on Anzac Beach, while landing with the 9th Battalion and the other still on the deck of his ship, as he was climbing into the landing boats with the 12th Battalion, as part of the so-called second wave. Yet no history book or webpage has ever included them in the story of the landing.
Cleve and his fellow engineers were in the very front boats, and among the very first ashore because their first job was to destroy the barbed wire defences it was thought were protecting the beaches and the cliffs so that the infantry, (and engineers) could attack. They carried grappling irons and wire-cutters for this purpose. Their next job, after attacking the Turkish trenches, was to blow up the Turkish guns, and they carried explosives and spiking tools ashore with them to do this. As it turned out, there was no barbed wire on the beaches and the Australians failed to successfully capture any Turkish guns that day, so the engineers fought as infantry, charging the hill, battling for the ridges and fighting the Turkish counterattack.
Diane, I wonder whether the brothers (if that is Ray, and it certainly looks like him), are dressed up in their father's uniforms? They're too big, and the cuffs are rolled up. Cleve was well over six feet tall as an adult. His mate's Anzac diary is full of jokes about his height.
Diane, I'm keen to hear what you have learned about Reuben and Reuben senior. Can I contact you?
Reply With Quote
  #3  
Old 08-09-14, 12:56
marquette's Avatar
marquette marquette is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: Australia
Posts: 1,251
Default

Hi Catherine

You can contact me on my email [email protected]

Thanks for all the extra information.

As well as being Uncle Ray, Ray taught my dad at Technical College when dad was an apprentice ! I can remember visiting his brothers Jimmy, and Tom (at Carlingford) as a small child.

For a long time, I was stalled with finding family for Reuben Page, but now I can take the family back to the William Page (b abt 1640) and to Reuben Pearce born 1622 in Shrophshire.

If you get in touch by email, i can send you lots of information. I have a lovely family afternoon tea photo you will love.

Diane
Reply With Quote
  #4  
Old 09-09-14, 01:41
Catherine Catherine is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2014
Posts: 2
Default

Thanks Diane, I will be in touch.

Meanwhile, here's a glimpse of Cleve Page in camp at Mena at the end of March 1915, celebrating with his mates because they'd just heard they were finally going off to war. They're the first. The Australians training at Mena had begun to fear that the a British command didn't think they were good enough to send into battle.

By his mate, Tom Drane:

Feb 28 1915
Told we are to leave Mena Camp on Sunday March 1st. That is good we are going to celebrate it tonight in the canteen. There goes Cookie with his ballads, he is properly wound up with two pints of beer. ... Allo, there goes Page right over the seat, singing “Who where you with last night” and “Get out and get under”. .. Old Boller Freebairn wants to be kissing everyone; Will Harvey wants to be Robbie Burns. Mansfield wants to be a comic singer, but what a failure he is. Cookie has gone to sleep and his snore seems to anoy me very much, and I have just given him a crack. Hello what’s this Harvey thinks he is Jack Johnson he wants to bash in someone’s head. At last there is a little order in the house, ah I spoke to soon, here is Freebairn walking over everyone to come and tell us he wants to be friends, and will we shake hands. I don’t know about shaking hands, I got his heel in my little Mary, and he is no light weight. Anyhow on Sunday we leave for somewhere."

Go to http://youtu.be/fNZSjSOOVxQ if you want to sing along with Cleve and his mates.

Freebairn died with Page on the beach eight weeks later. A week after the landing Drane had his kneecap blown off in Shrapnel Valley, Will Harvey was also in hospital and Mansfield was soon to join them. Cookie survived to earn a Commission in the Infantry in 1917, but was killed just two weeks after taking up his new post at Passchedale. Drane, Harvey and Mansfield survived the war. Mansfield returned to Anzac Cove sixty years later and told a documentary crew how the engineers landed and died there.

Freebairn and Page are still together. Their gravestones are side by side in Shrapnel Valley.

Not succeeding in posting a photo
Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT. The time now is 15:12.


Hosted by Photon IT

Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.7 PL3
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.