Click for a full list of soldiers’ names on the gates.

We sometimes think of war memorials as edifices erected after a conflict, to honour the fallen. The Lambton Park Memorial Gates indicate a wider purpose, as evidenced in the name of the group who erected the gates – the Send-off and Welcome Home Committee.

The Great War had been fought for little over a year, when Henry Burg and Thomas Pease called a public meeting in September 1915, to form a committee to provide a “send-off to our boys for the front” and to welcome home wounded and invalided soldiers. The group resolved to present each enlisting soldier with an inscribed wallet on his departure, and a gold medal on his return.

At a farewell function in January 1917, Mayor Edward Charlton announced plans to “erect gates, as a Roll of Honour at the park.” With an estimated cost of £250, fundraising efforts ramped up. Dances, concerts, euchre parties, and sports days were held, mostly organised by the ladies on the committee, led by Mary Ott and Vera Darling. Plans for the gates progressed when Newcastle architect Eric G Yeomans agreed to be the honorary architect.

Extracting the time capsule, October 2018

On 19 October 1918, a large crowd gathered in Lambton Park for the ceremonial laying of the foundation stone. Mr J Estell MP addressed the crowd, then placed into a bottle a parchment with the names of 39 members of the committee, “together with a copy of the Newcastle Morning Herald from August 1914, containing the proclamation of the war, and a number of old coins.” The bottle was sealed and placed into the cement foundation, over which the stone was laid. The Mayor then presented Mr Estell with an engraved gilt trowel.

The war ended just three weeks later. The gate pillars could now be engraved with a closing year, alongside the names of 140 soldiers from the district. Thanks to the efforts of the Lambton citizens, one hundred years on, we will remember them.

Lambton Park Memorial Gates, Morehead St.

The ceremonial gilt trowel presented to J Estell at the laying of the foundation stone of the park gates. Photo courtesy of Estell family.

Names on the gates

There are 140 names inscribed on the four gate pillars. Soldiers who died in service are marked with an asterisk.  By using the resources of the Australian War Memorial and the National Archives of Australia I have been able to identify almost all the men and create a spreadsheet with relevant information on each soldier, including links to Honour Rolls, embarkation rolls, and service records.

In the process of compiling the spreadsheet I discovered a surprising number of errors in the gate inscriptions. There are over 30 errors such as

• Mis-spelled surnames
• Initials incorrect, or in the wrong order
• Incorrect enlistment year
• Incorrect rank
• There are five men who were killed in action, who do not have their names marked with an asterisk
  • Daniel Edward Docwra
  • David Douglas
  • Charles Henry Nichols
  • Albert Richard Warring
  • Thomas William Wilson

The table below lists the 140 names on the gates. The first column shows the name exactly as it is inscribed on the gate pillars, and the second column shows the full correct name where it is known from their service records.

Additional Information

• “Lambton Memorial Gates” list of articles on Trove.
• National Archive of Australia service records
• Article on Thomas and Harry Pease.

Newspaper articles

It was reported as “the largest demonstration that had ever been held at Lambton” with the crowd numbered “upwards of 2000.” The occasion was the return to Lambton of Lieutenant Albert Henry McEwan from the South African Boer War.

Albert was born in Lambton around 1877 where his father John worked as a miner. In the 1890s a downturn in the coal trade induced many to leave the area and seek work elsewhere. In October 1895, John along with his eldest son Albert, still a teenager, headed to the booming gold fields of South Africa. Both father and son quickly found employment in the “Simmer and Jack” mine at Johannesburg.

Within a year John was tragically killed in a mining accident. Albert stayed on and rose to a responsible position in the mine. When war broke out in 1899 between the British and the Boers, he joined the Imperial Light Horse and was soon engaged in a number of battles. Describing these in letters home to Lambton, he wrote with patriotic bravado but also noted “the appalling sights of a battlefield are simply terrible”. In 1901 Albert was shot in the leg. He was treated in South Africa, before being taken to Netley hospital in England where his leg was amputated.

Albert returned to Australia and arrived back in Lambton in the afternoon of 14 April 1902. At 7pm a torchlight procession marched down a gaily-decorated Elder St to Bell’s Hall at the corner Morehead St. “At every corner the returned soldier was greeted with loud cheers.” He made an appearance on the balcony and addressed the crowd in the street below, before being entertained at a banquet in his honour.

Ralph Snowball’s photograph from this day is not only a snapshot of the streetscape of Lambton in 1902, but also an indication of the colonial fervour for the British Empire that would propel many more Lambton boys to the fields of the Great War in Europe 12 years later.

14 April 1902 – A decorated Elder St in readiness for the torchlight parade to honour Lieutenant McEwan later that evening. University of Newcastle, Cultural Collections.

The article above was first published in the August 2018 edition of The Local.

Additional Information

Mine work in South Africa

In the newspaper article on 14 February 1902 reporting his wounding, it is noted that Albert McEwan was …

“a native of Lambton, and the eldest son of the late John McEwan, and went to South Africa about six years ago. When war was declared he held a responsible position as first amalgamator for one of the largest mines in the Rand.”

A 1918 US Government publication describes the the job of an amalgamator …

The amalgamator at gold mines prepares amalgamation plates to receive the gold-bearing pulp from stamps. He regulates the flow of water and ore, and at regular intervals collects the mercury-gold amalgam from the mortar, sluices, and plates.

Military service

The National Archives( London, England), has scanned the nominal rolls for the Imperial Light Horse Brigade, which contains an entry for Albert Henry McEwan.

The entry shows …

• Regimental No: 319
• Name: McEwan, Albert Henry
• Regiment: 1st
• Rank: Cpl (Corporal)
• Place attested, date: PMB (Pietermaritzbug), 25/09/1899
• Discharged: Supernumerary awarded pension

His enlistment date of 25 September 1899 was some two weeks before the Boer Republics declared war on 11 October 1899.

A search for “A McEwan” on the Anglo Boer War website shows that the South African Field Force Casualty Roll recorded Corporal McEwan as “Severely wounded. Naauwpoort, 5 January 1901″

Newspaper articles