John LEE #730

Indigenous Australian, John Lee, 41st Infantry Battalion, Machine Gun Company

John Lee, a horsebreaker and stockman was born in Camooweal, Queensland in 1893. He volunteered to serve in the AIF in October 1915, but was discharged in April the following year as he was "not likely to become an efficient soldier". While is training camps in Brisbane he had been found to be AWOL on four occasions, leading the commanding officer to write that he was "lacking in the soldierly spirit".

However in February 1917, John Lee again volunteered, this time his service was welcomed. He was assigned to the 41st Infantry Battalion, Machine Gun Company reinforcements and sent to the Machine Gun Depot at Seymour in Victoria for training.

By June 1917 they had embarked from Melbourne on board HMAT Suevic bound for England and France. Not long after landing in England, Lee was admitted to the Group Hospital, Codford with mumps. Soon fit for service Lee embarked for France in December 1917 to join his Battalion in Flanders where they were being rotated between the front lines and rear areas.

On 28 March 1918 while deployed near the Corbie-Bray Road, north of the River Somme, Lee was seriously injured, receiving a gun shot wound to his right arm. He was first taken to a Casualty Clearance Station, before being transported to hospital at Camiers. Lee was later evacuated to the Norfolk War Hospital, Norwich, in England, where he remained for several months.

Lee was granted two weeks leave before being transferred to the Convalescent Depot in Hurdcott. No longer fit for active service he remained at the camp until being invalided home to Australia in January 1919.

Read more ...

• Service record: LEE, John
• Embarkation roll: 13th Machine Gun Company Reinf.
• AWM Unit War Diaries: 41st Infantry Battalion
• One of the soldiers featured in SLQ’s HistoryPin Collection

Watch ...

• Queensland’s Indigenous Servicemen [digital story & oral history, 12 mins, mp4]

The information in this blog post has been researched by State Library staff and volunteers, it is based on available information at this time. If you have more information that you would like to share or further research uncovers new findings, this post will be updated.