Gympie Connections

At the recent Q ANZAC 100 First World War White Gloves experience, held in Gympie, it was heartening to see connections made between people and places through the items through local knowledge.

One of the items taken to Gympie for the experience is the Nominal Roll of B squadron of the 2nd Light Horse Regiment from the collection of the 2nd Light Horse Association Records 1914-1920 - OM77-14/11.

This nominal roll includes regimental number, rank, age, occupation, address, date of enlistment, pay details, as well as transfers and casualties for the men. It also includes a horse roll and a punishments register which includes name of the offender, date of offence, place, offence, witnesses, the punishment received and by whom awarded for the period 2 October 1914 to 1 May 1915.
While this roll was open for the workshop participants to view, interested Gympie locals turned a couple of pages to reveal names of local significance such as Captain AW Nash, Major TW Glasgow and Major GH Bourne.

These three Gympie boys - Nash, Bourne and Glasgow signed up together and all served in the 2nd Lighthorse Regiment. As officers they were responsible for discipline and therefore their names appear in the punishments register as awarding disciplinary action.
One of the punishments given by Major Bourne is 14 days confined to barracks for disobedience of an order distinctly given.
One name instantly recognised was AW Nash (son of James Nash, the discoverer of Gympie) who was at one time Bourne’s second in command and at the time of his death held the rank of Major. Nash was killed in action on 29 June 1915 at Gallipoli; his diary is available online at University of Queensland and his portrait appears in The Queenslander Pictorial, supplement to The Queenslander, 24 July 1915.

Nominal roll showing entry for Nash. Photo by State Library of Queensland, October 2015.

The Gympie Times and Mary River Mining Gazette reported the Death of Major AW Nash on 8 July 1915.

In the papers of G H Bourne held in the State Library of Queensland, an entry in his diary for 1/7/15 reads: “Just a line to say all O.K. We have made good progress this week. The Turks had the cheek to attack us twice, which is what we long for, as we give them Hell every time. Two troops of my Squadron counter attacked with the bayonet on night of 29th & did well with slight loss – but early in the night, poor Nash who was just receiving his orders, in rear, was shot dead by a chance shot. He is a great loss to us. Had just been promoted Major to succeed Graham – who was killed on 14th May."

Captain Nash’s name appears on the memorial gates in Mary Street Gympie along with the names of his comrades. Another Gympie name listed first on the gates is that of Arthur Auchterlonie... but that is another story.

Niles Elvery, Regional Coordinator Q ANZAC 100

State Library of Queensland