John Monash – His Life And Times

Who was the most innovative general of World War One? For The Hon Tim Fischer, former National Party leader and Deputy Prime Minister, the answer has to be Australia’s “Maestro” John Monash, a man who, for all the recognition he received in his lifetime and after, has arguably not been given his proper due. Fischer also asks why Monash, Australian Army Corps Commander, was never promoted to Field Marshal, post war, as international precedent suggested was most appropriate. To discuss all this, Tim Fischer addressed The Sydney Institute on Friday 27 November 2014. He was introduced by The Hon Barry O’Farrell, former Premier of NSW. The paper which follows is an edited transcript of the talk given on the day.

JOHN MONASH – HIS LIFE AND TIMES

TIM FISCHER

 Introduction – Barry O’Farrell

This is an important book and it’s an important book because John Monash was a significant figure. Monash was regarded by his British peers at the time of the First World War as perhaps the best general on the Western Front. Others have claimed that the war could have been shorter, and the casualties would have been lighter, if Monash had been promoted far earlier in the war. General John Monash was the Australian general – not the British, not the French, not the Canadian, not the United States but Monash the Australian general.

This book is important because the First World War is also important in the way it shaped this country. That savage conflict united our island continent in a way an act of parliament or referendum never could. Of course the terrible loss of life also had an impact upon people, in towns and cities across this nation, for decades to come. Equally, those who returned from that terrible conflict did as Monash urged them when he spoke at the opening of the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne. They engaged in nation building across this country in a way those who lost their lives would have been proud of. This book is important because it again reminds us of all that is good about our country. The opportunities that abound and are too often taken for granted.

I’ve been a long term Monash admirer. I regard him as the greatest ever Australian. In his life, Monash demonstrated that, regardless of race, creed and colour, working hard with the opportunities on offer, particularly education, can provide you with limitless success and international renown.

Monash succeeded on the Western Front, despite being of Prussian origin, despite being a Jew, despite being militia not regular army, and of course despite being an Australian colonial. He succeeded along with other commanders like Harry Chauvel and Pompey Elliot because they were open minded, because they were practical, because they were approachable and, importantly, because they understood the value of human life.

This book is also important because we are currently commemorating the centenary of the First World War. It would be fitting at the time to give Monash the recognition that he deserves. The Australia in which he lived wasn’t perfect. Discrimination did occur, petty jealousies and political paranoia could, and did, limit advancement. Tim Fischer’s campaign, if successful, to posthumously promote Monash to the rank of Field Marshall, would be fitting reward for his service, but it would also be an appropriate salve to the national conscience.

To those who oppose such a move, I’d simply point out that history is a continuum. As time goes by, the real significance of events and people comes into better perspective. I’d argue that Monash’s contribution was always clear. What hasn’t always been clear was why he never got the recognition or the promotion that he deserved.

For those of you who are uninterested in war can I say there’s another, political reason for this promotion. It comes from the words of former Australian PM Bob Menzies who recounts that, in 1928, he was a member of the Nationalist government in Victoria. After the war, Monash was chair of the State Electricity Commission of Victoria. Menzies recounts how Monash put in a request as chairman of the SEC for an extra million pounds to upgrade electricity across the state of Victoria. An application for funding which cabinet rejected.

Suddenly, in the midst of the cabinet meeting, Monash arrived outside the building. He demanded entry to the cabinet and, as Menzies tells the story, McPherson the premier invited Monash into the room. As he entered the room, every minister out of respect stood in their place. As Menzies recounts it they felt they were in the presence of a man they “knew was the greatest man that ever would be”.

Menzies told how Monash said words to the effect, “I gather the cabinet has rejected my proposal.” The premier concurred. Monash remonstrated that this was because the cabinet had failed to understand it. Menzies recalled that Monash took half an hour going through an exposition of the proposal. “One by one we became convinced, or at any rate felt we were convinced, of the error of our ways,” Menzies recalled. “We were left silent.” No one objected, Monash looked at the premier and remarked “Well Sir I take it that your decision is reversed. Indeed, anticipating your approval of my proposal, and so that there will be no delay, I’ve brought with me the order of council that will be necessary for the purpose”.

Monash pulled it out of his breast pocket. Menzies said he passed it around, it was signed and he went out. At a time when in this country, particularly in this state, we need more infrastructure, any private individual engaged by government to provide advice on the best way to deliver infrastructure to the people of this state should be rewarded.

May I introduce Tim Fischer.

Tim Fischer

I would name Sir John Monash as the best general on the Western Front in Europe. He possessed creative originality. His grip of situations silences all doubters and compelled the admiration of even the most critical professional soldiers, such as Sir Basil Liddel Hart, senior British journalist and World War historian of great fame.

This is about a cause. Maestro John Monash, Australia’s greatest citizen general, arrived on his honeymoon at Platform 1 Sydney Central after foolishly having sent a telegram the week before to his former mistress, Annie Gabriel. Frank Gabriel had shifted his whole family to Sydney to get away from the influence of Monash. Monash had invited the Gabriels to meet his new wife.

The Melbourne to Sydney express arrived at Platform 1 and Fred Gabriel sauntered up to a rather tired Mr and Mrs Monash getting off the train, having changed at midnight at Albury where various other good people like Mark Twain and General Douglas MacArthur have had to change trains. As the crowd swelled along the platform, Fred Gabriel began to muscle up. Was it to be a dagger, was it to be a scene out of a Giuseppe Verdi type opera, or was it to be a challenge to a duel? This was the 1890s. Or was it to be an encounter of a different kind? Well you’ll have to buy the book to find out.

Born in Melbourne, the son of Mr and Mrs Lewis Monash, of Prussian descent, Monash moved to Jerilderie. The young John Monash did once meet Ned Kelly, in Jerilderie. Ned was having a bit of trouble with the ATM of the era and had to take some direct action to get the money out. Others would say, historian Geoffrey Serle for example, would say that he may have met Ned Kelly. Either way, John Monash met William Elliot, a fantastic headmaster of the Jerilderie primary school. William Elliot went on to be the recipient of the famous Ned Kelly letter and went on to become editor of the local paper for decades.

By the time John Monash was aged 11, William Elliot believed he could teach the child no more. He needed to go on to schools in Melbourne. And Monash did. He was equal dux of Scots College in 1881. He would graduate in Law, Arts and Engineering from Melbourne University. In time, he would spend eight years as Vice Chancellor of Melbourne University. His life was action packed, before, during and after the war.

Monash began his working life as an engineer involved with bridge building – he worked on the Princes Bridge over the Yarra near the Flinders Street Railway Station, and other bridges in Footscray, Moonee Ponds and the Coburg areas. Later, he started up a concrete bridge building firm – Monash and Anderson. They were responsible for work on the Anderson Street (Morell) bridge over the Yarra and were contractors for the Fyansford (Barwon River) and other Victorian bridges.

Monash and Anderson also took up pipe manufacture forming, with David Mitchell, the Monier Pipe Co Pty Ltd of Victoria in 1901.

It was John Monash, after the war, who campaigned for a fitting monument for the 60,000 Australians who lost their lives in the First World War conflict. In this he fought Keith Murdoch at the Herald and the Weekly Times in Melbourne, in the 1920s. Then, the Victorian State government agreed with Monash and built that magnificent Shrine in perfect alignment with Swanston St, now known as Melbourne’s Shrine of Remembrance.

But all of that pales into insignificance when Monash sailed, 100 years ago, as the commander of the 4th Brigade and the commander, effectively, of the 2nd AIF convoy. That was on 22 December 1914. And, later this year, on 31 December or New Year’s Eve, if you go to Albany in Western Australia you’ll see a set of ship plaques commemorating those who left with him for the Front. For hundreds on board, their last sight of Australia was the magnificent King George Sound at Albany on New Year’s Eve, 100 years ago.

At sea, the fleet was an impressive sight. Monash recalled a single column over 20 miles long leaving Albany. He could see the whole fleet spread out in regular formation, responsive to every signal. He saw it as something to have lived for. And a privilege to have been entrusted with such a magnificent responsibility.

Now you must remember that Monash was under suspicion. His father’s name was Monash, he was a first generation descendant of Prussian Jews and he could speak high German. He could also speak Hebrew, as well as French which was useful when he helped negotiate the ceasefire on 24 May 1915 at Gallipoli. But he was also Australian. And he believed in the Allied cause as he volunteered like every other member of the AIF.

There were 414 chaplains sailing with the AIF and I have dedicated this book to those chaplains. A couple of them won MCs as non-combatants. At the battle of Hamel, some of these men crawled forward with stretchers and tea and coffee beans to help establish an RAP before the 3.10 am start time for the battle of Hamel. I salute those chaplains and I salute all those associated with the AIF.

In Monash’s case, he went to Gallipoli and he made mistakes. But he was one of those people who admitted he made mistakes at Gallipoli. It’s a debate whether or not he had a nervous breakdown on the 8 or 9 August on a dreadful night. I don’t think he did. But he picked himself up and said we can do this better. He was one of seven welcoming Kitchener ashore in October. Kitchener took one look around and a couple of hours later walked up Monash Valley with Richard Casey, a young lieutenant and much later a prominent Australian MP and Governor-General.

So many others were seared by Gallipoli. All were over achievers in the years after the First World War – Hudson Fish, Ross Macpherson Smith, Kingsford Smith, and even a young Normal Gilroy, subsequently Cardinal of Sydney. They were all at Gallipoli. When the Allies withdrew from Gallipoli, Monash determined command had to do it better, to protect our men.

There were two strengths to Monash’s template as a commanding officer. He was focused on being bold, but also holistic. Tanks should be embedded, and give confidence to the infantry and the men should train with them, behind the lines, allowing the diggers to drive them so they would know the inadequacies of the Mark 5 tank just coming off the factory lines at the time. Above all, he would use the barrage of the artillery and not move it, predictably, every five minutes. Move it forward every 4 minutes in the Monash battle plan. And build the confidence that the troops can well up behind that barrage in the knowledge that suddenly at the four minute mark it would jump forward another 50 metres and allow them to storm into the trenches.

Of the slaughter in the mess of the battles of the Armentières sector, Monash wrote, “I hate the business of war. … I cannot describe the awful horror of it. The waste, the destruction, the inefficiency. My only consolation has been the sense of faithfully doing my duty to my country.” Twenty thousand Allied soldiers lost their lives on the morning of the 1 July 1916 in the battle of the Somme.

As the Battle of the Somme raged, the hostilities were horrific. One Sergeant Gates recalled:

… we held grimly to a battered trench and watched each other grow older under the day-long storms of shelling. For hours, sweating, praying, swearing, we worked on the heaps of chalk and the mangled bodies. Men did astonishing things. At dawn, the next day, we were drawn back to a wood to recover. There were flowers amongst the ferns. And my last thought before I collapsed into a fitful sleep was a dull wonder that there could still be flowers in the world.

Monash learned from northern France. He was given the Third Division to command, and trained it on Salisbury plains. He met the King somewhere near Stonehenge. Empowered by that, he returned to the front in late 1916, through to 1918. Finally, despite the bitter opposition of C.W Charles Bean and Keith Murdoch, Monash was given command of the AIF Anzac Corps of 5 divisions. He began to plan.

Commanding officer Rawlinson offers something of the prejudice among the officer class in a reference to Monash in 1920. When Rawlinson thought that Sir Edwin Montague might oppose his appointment as Commander-in-Chief India, he compared Montague to Monash in two acrid letters to Archibald Montgomery, who had been Rawlinson’s chief of staff during the war writing:

I read him [Montague] as a clever, slippery, creepy crawly Jew who will always back you if he thinks you are winning and have no scruples about sticking you in the back if he thinks you look like a loser . . . He is clever and intelligent but his knees knock together when trouble is about. Edwin is not unlike Monash!! We know how to manage his sort.

I thank Peter Pedersen for that quote. This is a flavour of what Monash endured at the officer level. But he just simply got on with the job.

There had been a huge lunge by the Germans after they’d shut down the Russian front operation in March-April 1918. It was turned around by Pompey Elliot, Lieutenant General Leslie Morshead and the Australians, including elements of Monash’s Third Division. They nearly got through to Amiens. Had the Germans in mid-1918 cut the line at Amiens, one half would have gone north and pushed the British into the sea, the other half would have turned south to Paris. They would have captured Paris and continental Europe would have fallen to Teutonic Germany. And the world’s history would have been very different.

This did not happen largely due to the Canadians and, most notably in March-April 1918, the Australians. The British fifth army was in tatters, retreating, and often stopped in their tracks. At Hamel, Monash determined it should take “90 minutes”. It took 93 minutes.

It was a clever battle plan because it was a holistic approach. As others have written, it was Monash at his best. He finally had the command. He took the village of Hamel and Vaire Wood and turned the tide for the Allies. US General Pershing did not want his troops under the command of an Australian, but a thousand remained. Some of them grabbed Australian coats and put them over their American uniforms because they were so keen to mount up at 3.10pm. Monash had chosen the 4 July 1918 for the battle.

Then it was on to Amiens. On 8 August, under Rawlinson’s Fourth Army, the British III Corps attacked north of the Somme, the Australian Corps to the south of the river in the centre of Fourth Army’s front, and the Canadian Corps to the south of the Australians. Monash proceeded only when he was told Canadians would be on his right flank. Canadian General Arthur Currie, another with a holistic approach, had by far the hardest terrain to capture that day. By sunset, they’d punched through 24 kilometres. Finally, they realised if they could take out the baseline of the German artillery on day one of the battle and there was no way the German’s could mount a counter attack. So they went beyond the baseline of the artillery, beyond the trenches and kept going way out to the east of Amiens, a battle that should be called greater Amiens.

On 11 August, Winston Churchill as Minister for Munitions congratulated John Monash. Through the rest of August, September and October, Mont Saint-Quentin, and other battles, the war moved to the armistice on 11 November. There were 2000 Allied soldiers killed on that last day. At 5 am, the armistice was signed in a railway carriage to come into effect at 11 am. One Canadian was killed at 10:58 am. But when the clock struck 11 am, the fighting did in fact stop. The Germans downed their weapons and started walking back to Germany from Belgium and eastern France.

Winston Churchill, as he looked out his window at Whitehall, later wrote how “from all sides men and women came scurrying into the street. Streams of people poured out of the buildings. The bells of London began to clash… [after 52 months] of making burdens grievous to be borne and binding them on men’s backs, at last, all at once, suddenly and everywhere the burdens were cast down” Churchill got that right.

So what of Monash? At the victory banquet on the 27 December 1918, attended by US President Woodrow Wilson, and five prime ministers, John Monash was sitting next to Rudyard Kipling at a sparkling table which took off as he records in his letters. The Queen’s private secretary has now sent to me the seating plan and menu (in French). And the Queen has given permission to use this in my book about “Field Marshall” John Monash. Perhaps the Palace knows something that I don’t know.

Of course, I would argue that John Monash should be promoted, posthumously, to the rank of Field Marshall. He has been discriminated against for not being a graduate of Duntroon but a reservist. He was also a Jew of Prussian descent. He was too old at Gallipoli; his 50th birthday was on the beach and Anzac Cove. Prime Minister Billy Hughes kept him frozen at the rank of Lieutenant General, while in Canada Arthur Currie was promoted in the weeks after World War I from Lieutenant General to General. Field Marshall Haig was promoted to the House of Lords, and even Rawlinson was promoted.

I’ll leave you with another thought. You can have wins and never say die. Five years ago I approached the Imperial War Museum in London and asked why there was no mention of John Monash. They were about to prepare their galleries for the commemoration of the centenary of World War 1. In July, UK PM David Cameron opened the new galleries at the British War Museum. I checked, and there was a mention of the AIF, a mention of the Canadian Expeditionary Force, but no mention of John Monash or Arthur Currie. I hit the roof.

Through Australia’s High Commissioner Alexander Downer, I said they should fix it or I would bombard Prime Minister Cameron when he was in Australia by one method or another at the G20. Two weeks later, the Imperial War Museum of London has announced it is doing a back flip. And John Monash and Arthur Currie are going into the World War 1 gallery where they belong.