LIEUTENANT HERBERT WILLIAM GARTRELL

9545 - 1st Tunnelling Company

Herbert Gartrell was born on 14 August 1882 at Maitland, South Australia. He signed the ‘Attestation Paper of Persons Enlisted for Service Abroad’ on 11 December 1916. A medical examination in November had found him to be ‘fit for active service’ and recorded that he was 5ft 9in tall, weighed 138lbs, was of medium complexion with light blue eyes and dark brown hair.

He named his wife Evangeline Gartrell of Henry Street, Payneham, South Australia as his Next of Kin, allotted three-fifths of his pay for the support of his wife and child and stated that he was Mining Engineer by trade.

Herbert William Gartrell was allocated the Service number 9545 and with the rank of Private he served with B Company at Mitcham, South Australia from 11 December to 31 December 1916

On 1 January 1917 he was transferred to Base Tunnellers until 31 March when he was placed in “A” Company. He attended the Engineer Officers Training School from 16 April 1917, being promoted to Acting Corporal on 19 April, Acting Sergeant from 1 June through to 2 September when he graduated.

Herbert was posted to the Technical Battalion at Bendigo, Victoria on 23 September as Acting Sergeant; his duties are unknown but may have included the training of Tunnellers to reinforce the units in France.

He was transferred to the 1st (Depot) Battalion A.I.F. at Broadmeadows on 22 February 1918 and appointed to the ‘January Reinforcements Tunnelling Coys’.

Embarking at Melbourne, Victoria on board HMAT A71 Nestor on 28 February 1918 with 62 Tunnelling Company reinforcements, Herbert was made Acting Sergeant (without pay - Voyage only) from 28 February until they disembarked at Liverpool, England on 20 April when he reverted to EDP Corporal and marched in to the 3rd Details Camp at Parkhouse

On 14 May he reverted to the rank of Sapper and proceeded overseas to France via Southampton, marching in to Australian General Base Depot on 15 May 1918

Herbert was taken on strength of the 2nd Australian Tunnelling Company on 20 May and transferred to the 1st Australian Tunnelling Company on 13 June, where he was taken on strength – ‘ex 2nd Aust Tunn Coy’

On 2 July Herbert was admitted to hospital with PUO (pyrexia unknown origin) until 7 July when he was discharged back to his unit.

He was promoted to 2nd Lieutenant on 13 August and seconded from 1st Aust Tunnelling Company for duty with the British 257th Tunnelling Company, Royal Engineers. On 7 October he marched out of that unit to Admin. HQ London to attend the Officers Educational School for a course of Instruction at Cambridge, returning to Admin HQ London on 30 October.

On 30 October 1918 he was transferred from the British Tunnelling Company he was serving with and posted for duty with No.2 Command Depot Education Service, Weymouth

Herbert was promoted to Lieutenant on the General List, Education Service, on 23 January 1919 and on 14 May he marched out to No.5 Group Tidworth. On 20 May he marched in to No.2 Group, Sutton Veny for repatriation to Australia.

He embarked on HT Mahia on4 June 1919 for his return to Australia, departing London 10 June 1919. He was ‘on Duty’ during the voyage as the Educational Officer, disembarking in 3 MD on 17 July, then travelling by rail to 4 MD.

On 10 August 1919 the appointment of Herbert William Gartrell as an Officer in the A.I.F. was terminated. He was entitled to wear the British War Medal (22575) and the Victory Medal (15129) in respect of his service to the Nation.

Herbert William Gartrell died on 8 June 1945 at Adelaide, South Australia

© Donna Baldey 2008

ADDENDUM 1:

H. W. Gartrell (Lieut.) returned to Australia on 17th July 1919. He was on Active Service, first with the 2nd Australian Tunnelling Co., then with 257th Co. Royal Engineers. During service he had charge of a battalion of Portuguese, when his knowledge of Spanish, obtained some years ago, proved most useful.

Source: Proceedings Institute of Mining & Metallurgy 30 Sep 1919 p lxix

ADDENDUM 2:

GARTRELL, HERBERT WILLIAM (1882-1945), professor of mining and metallurgy, was born on 14 August 1882 at Maitland, South Australia, son of English-born parents William Pascoe Gartrell, blacksmith, and his wife Martha, née Finch. Educated at the Collegiate School of St Peter, Adelaide, on a scholarship, and at the University of Adelaide (B.A., B.Sc., 1902), in 1903 Herbert won the Tate memorial medal for his field-work in geology. Two years later he was awarded an Angas engineering scholarship which enabled him to travel to North America. He worked for mining companies in Idaho, United States of America, and British Columbia, Canada, and studied mining at Columbia University, New York (M.A., 1905). In 1910 he was the first lecturer to be appointed in mining engineering at the University of Adelaide, where he was to teach for the rest of his life. At St David's Anglican Church, Burnside, on 8 December 1910 he married Evangeline Murphy.

On 11 December 1916 Gartrell enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force. He served in France in 1918 in the 1st Tunnelling Company, Royal Australian Engineers, and the 257th Tunnelling Company, Royal Engineers; he was commissioned in August that year and promoted lieutenant in January 1919; his A.I.F. appointment terminated in Adelaide on 10 August. Gartrell published AnIntroduction to Mining Finance (1923), as well as several papers in the Proceedings of the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy during the 1920s and 1930s. In 1934 he took on the additional posts of director of the Bonython laboratories, South Australian School of Mines and Industries, and of consultant to the Commonwealth Council for Scientific and Industrial Research. He achieved considerable support from the Australian mining industry as his courses won growing national and international recognition. In 1939 he was appointed professor and in 1943 the Broken Hill Proprietary Co. Ltd made a gift of £15,000 to endow his chair.

Gartrell was an active member of the A.I.M.M. and its president in 1941. Believing that 'It is good for a lecture to provide a student with food (for thought), better if it provide him with an appetite . . . all education is self education', he defined the degree in mining engineering as 'a licence to go out and learn'. He was an outstanding teacher who followed with fatherly care the careers of his students. They knew him affectionately as 'Spog'. He and his wife belonged to the Luhrs Road Congregational Church, South Payneham, and gave generously to deserving causes, among them the Adelaide Legacy Club. Gartrell had a clear vision of the nature of the world and of the role he could best play in it. He also had a wry and sometimes caustic manner of expression, especially when he was debunking hypocrisy or humbug: 'Mining prospectuses are frequently obviously fraudulent, since experience has shown no bait is too crude for large sections of the public'.

Survived by his wife and adopted son, Gartrell died of a dissecting aneurism of the aorta on 8 June 1945 at Parkwynd Private Hospital, Adelaide, and was buried in Centennial Park cemetery. In 1985 a number of his former students established the Gartrell School of Mining, Metallurgy and Applied Geology at the South Australian Institute of Technology.

Select Bibliography:

V. A. Edgeloe, Engineering Education in the University of Adelaide (Adel, 1989); D. A. Cumming and G. C. Moxham, They Built South Australia (Adel, 1986); A. Aeuckens, The People's University (Adel, 1989); University of Adelaide, Calendar, 1910-15; Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy, Proceedings, no 124, 1941, July 1945; information from a number of Gartrell's former students.

Author: E. D. J. Stewart

Print Publication Details: E. D. J. Stewart, 'Gartrell, Herbert William (1882 - 1945)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 14, Melbourne University Press, 1996, pp 254-255.