John Simpson Kirkpatrick

[michaeldr]

My father has brought to my attention an item from yesterday's (4th March 03) NE England local TV news and the Newcastle Evening Chronicle which I pass on as of possible interest to all Gallipolians/Diggers/Geordies.

A memorial service for John Simpson Kirkpatrick (served as Private John Simpson, Australian Army Medical Corps and also known as 'The man with the donkey') k.i.a 19 May 1915, Gallipoli,

will be held at St. Hilda's Parish Church, Lawe Road, South Shields

at 1200 hrs on Sunday 18th May 2003

Regards,

Michael D. R.

[Paul Reed]

How interesting; I remember there used to be a pub in South Shields called the 'Kirkpatrick' opposite where the bronze statue of him was located - and quite an extensive display in the local history museum. So he is obviously remembered in the place where he was born, as well as in Australia, which is good.

Last time I was at Gallipoli I (being a little bit naughty!) left a poppy cross on his grave which stated 'in memory of a true British hero' - I suspect it didn't last long!

[Raster Scanning]

If I remember correctly (I am sure Andrew P will help out with this), he was a British merchant seaman, who jumped ship in Fremantle to enlist. So he was not Australian at all.

L A Carlyon in his excellent book "Gallipoli" states " He (Kirkpatrick) would become Australia's folk hero from Anzac, even though he was as Australian as North Sea cod and peas "

John

[Rob HAmilton]

Obviously this man has a well known history which is unfortunately not well known to me !

Can anyone enlighten me ?

Rob

[Paul Reed]

A typical description of him from the 'Forging the Nation' website:

Simpson and his donkey

Hero of ANZAC

Twenty-two years old, English-born and a trade union activist, John Simpson Kirkpatrick was an unlikely figure to become a national hero. Having deserted from the merchant navy in 1910, he tramped around Australia and worked in a variety of jobs. He enlisted in the AIF, expecting this would give him the chance to get back to England; instead, Private Simpson found himself at ANZAC Cove on 25 April 1915, and was killed less than four weeks later.

Simpson would not have made a good peacetime soldier, and he was recklessly independent in war. Instructed to recover and help the wounded he undertook this work enthusiastically. Famously, he used a small donkey to carry men down from the front line, often exposing himself to fire. The bravery of this "man with the donkey" soon became the most prominent symbol of Australian courage and tenacity on Gallipoli.

Although Simpson carried no arms and remains an enigmatic figure, the nature of his sacrifice made a vital contribution to the story of ANZAC.

http://www.awm.gov.au/forging/australians/simpson.htm

[Andrew P]

I think Simpson's grave must be the most visited at Anzac Cove. At least that's where the tourist coaches pull up for the whistle stop tours.

As Raster said Simpson did jump ship and enlisted in Fremantle and joined the 3rd Field Ambulance. Various publications(including the AWM site) have him enlisting in Melbourne, but this is wrong as the nominal roll has him in Western Australia at the time of enlistment.

I like the fact that he was newly arrived from England and became an Australian legend. When I first started looking into the 1st AIF, I was surprised to learn how many in the Australian forces were newly arrived Englishmen.

There was a push on a couple of years ago to award Simpson a VC as 'apparently' he was recommended for one but at the time the paper work was not issued properly to the relevant authorities.

I seem to recall that a member of Parliament was trying to push this through, but I don't think it was very successful.

If this move was successful to award him a VC, can you imagine how many other cases that might have opened!

Cheers

Andrew

[michaeldr]

Obviously this man has a well known history which is unfortunately not well known to me !

For anyone like Rob who would like to learn more about John Simpson Kirkpatrick, can I recommend the book "Across the Bar" by Tom Curran, published in 1994 by Ogmios Publications,

Yeronga, Queensland 4104 Australia. ISBN 0 646 16524 0

Tom Curran was perhaps uniquely qualified to write Simpson's story, for his own life in many ways followed a remarkably similar path. Like Simpson he was born and brought up a Geordie, emigrated to Australia and served in the Royal Australian Army Medical Corps (in 1969 Curran commanded a field medical unit in Vietnam.)

The doyen of Gallipolian historians, the late Sir Robert Rhodes James said of "Across the Bar"

'A marvellous book. I read it, almost in one gulp... A very notable contribution to the Gallipoli

bibliography.'

I cannot top such a judgement, however if asked to sum up this 400 page biography I could do no better than to repeat the penultimate paragraph of Curran's 'End Note:'

"It says a great deal for the Australian character, that the people of Australia should have chosen for their national military hero, not a successful general or admiral - not a Wellington, or a Nelson; nor a Napoleon or a Frederick the Great - but a simple private soldier, and one who wasn't awarded a single military medal."

Regards

Michael D.R.

[Rob HAmilton]

Many thanks to everybody who replied and enlightened me. I'm now off to my local library to see if they have a copy of "Acroos the Bar".

Rob

[Andrew P]

On the weekend while working at the Army Museum of Western Australia in the prisoner of war gallery, I was thinking about what michaeldr mentioned about Simpson being Australia's chosen national military hero from ww1.

In WW2, a man of similar ideals is probably Australia's greatest known and best loved person from that War.

Weary Dunlop was a doctor who had served in Tobruk & Syria and was captured by the Japanese when his unit landed in Java.

It was his selflessness as a doctor for the POW's that brought him into fame.

If anyone gets the chance I highly recoommmend reading 'The War Diaries of Weary Dunlop'

(For those rugby fanatics, Dunlop also played for the wallabies)

Cheers

Andrew

[Hedley Malloch]

How interesting; I remember there used to be a pub in South Shields called the 'Kirkpatrick' opposite where the bronze statue of him was located

Paul,

The pub is still there, as indeed, is the statue.

Is Duffy the Donkey the only named WW1 animal to have had a statue erected in his honour?

[Andrew P]

In Albany Western Australia there is a lighthorse memorial which features a horse.

While it's not dedicated to any one single horse I think it's a memorial to all.

I believe there is also an animal war memorial in adelaide.

Cheers

Andrew

[michaeldr]

Duffy is the donkey's name which is generally remembered, however Simpson in fact had to use more than one to make up for those kia. At the beginning of the campaign the trench-way which he used was very shallow and not yet the 8 foot depth of later months. A man could crouch at danger points, however the donkey stood up as did Simpson to balance the wounded man on the donkey's back. If Simpson got through 4 donkeys, the wonder is that he himself managed to last as long as he did. The other names which he used for his donkeys were: Murphy, Abdul and Queen Elizabeth (it is not recorded if this was after the battleship or the Consort.) Curran thinks that Duffy may have been used for more than one animal.

Regarding memorials for other animals I understand that there has been good progress towards putting up a substantial memorial to animals in war in London. A site at Brook Gate on Park Lane has been chosen and also the design; two heavily laden bronze mules struggle through an arena enclosed by a dominant wall with a bas-relief, beyond the wall a bronze horse and a dog face into the garden bearing witness to the loss and representing hope for the future. Further info from; The Animals in War Memorial Fund, 72 Wilton Road, London, SW1V 1DE

This from 'The Gallipolian' No.99 Autumn 2002.

Perhaps one of our UK/London contributors can keep us up to date on this one.

Regards,

Michael D.R.

[michaeldr]

This is an up-date for anyone thinking of attending the memorial service at St. Hilda's Parish Church, South Shields at 1200 hrs on Sunday 18th May: contact details are now available

Arthur Lockyear, Parade Co-ordinator

12 Stockley Park

Broompark

Durham City

DH7 7NS

tel: 0191 373 2035

or

Fay Cunningham

South Tyneside Civic Centre

tel: 0191 427 1717

Regards

Michael D.R.

[stevenbecker]

It is said that the Simpson legend is larger the the man.

In that most of the work he is surpose to have done was by others.

That many soldier were using donkeys to shift wounded on Gallipoli. That the many photo's of him are in fact not him.

Weather this is true or not I don't know either but we have blown his work way out of all poritions.

There was a number of people including some Politician trying to get Simpson the VC that he was surpose to have been given all those years ago.

S.B

[michaeldr]

Steve is right about there being more than one 'donkey-man.'

In 1937 a New Zealand stretcher bearer Private James Gardener Jackson wrote to Major Treloar, the then Director of the Australian War Memorial, confirming that he and three of his mates had also worked with donkeys in Shrapnel Gully at the beginning of May 1915. They did not do so for very long however as they were moved to the bottom of Walker's Ridge and found that there they could not get feed for their animals. In total they worked for about 5 days at most. Jackson also confirmed that they had seen Simpson working with a donkey and that they had got the idea from him.

While working between the bottom of Walker's Ridge and Anzac Cove, Jackson took a photograph of one of the other donkey-men, Private Dick Henderson, and it is this photograph which has led to some confusion. It was used by Horace Moore-Jones as the model for his painting of Simpson "The Man With the Donkey" and was accepted as a likeness of Simpson until the error was identified in 1938

Simpson was the only donkey-man working in that area in April and May. Later on in June, after the trench-way was widened and deepened, other bearers eg. Les Johnson of 4th Field Ambulance, once again adopted Simpson's idea of using donkeys. And once again there was a mix-up because of a photograph; a picture of Johnson taken by Lt.Col. Beeston appeared in the Melbourne Sun in Nov 1933 as 'Simpson.' Johnson was 'mortified' and wrote to the Sun pointing out the error.

The above info is taken from a book which I have mentioned before - 'Across the Bar' by Tom Curran and again I recommend it to anyone wishing to sort out the legend of Simpson. For my money, Brig.-Gen. Monash's letter to HQ., NZ & A Div., written only hours after Simpson had died, says it all.

Regards

Michael D.R.

[Andrew P]

For those in Australia, SBS are showing a documentary about Simpson at 830pm 25th of April.

Cheers

Andrew

[AlanCrax]

I realise this is a very old topic so hopefully it may jog some interest.

With the expansion of available records on the web, it is easy to see who John Kirkpatrick's father and sisters were (1891 and 1901 censuses for South Shields) But, does anyone know who his mother was? Some family trees on Ancestry and at least one biography names her as Sarah - possibly from Lanarkshire, Scotland. However she doesn't appear on census records and there is no obvious marriage in a reasonable time frame.

Many thanks - Alan

[michaeldr]

Alan,

This information from Tom Curran's book 'Across The Bar'

Sarah Simpson Kirkpatrick was born in Glasgow

early married life (with husband Robert) was spent in Leith

where Jack's elder sister Peggy was born at 5 Largo St. on 2^nd Feb 1882

Robert worked for the London and Edinburgh Shipping Line

he was Mate in 1870 and Master in 1881

In 1886 he was employed by Fenwick as Master of one of their colliers and at about his time moved his family to Tyneside

Hope the above is of help

Michael

[Hywyn]

This is a really old thread I know. The one I wanted to make the below comment on is locked though.

I will not pretend that I know the ins and out of the 'debate' regarding Simpson and his donkeys but I came across this letter in a local Welsh newspaper dated Dec 1915 from Capt Carey Evans of the field hospital which Simpson served as a stretcher bearer (his words). I thought it might be of interest to those with an interest in the matter.

http://cymru1914.org/en/view/newspaper/3413052/6/ART88

(3rd column, header 'A Hero and his Donkey')

Hywyn

edit

Also

http://cymru1914.org/en/view/newspaper/3413124/6/ART90

(1st article column 5)

[Stoppage Drill]

I realise this is a very old topic so hopefully it may jog some interest.

With the expansion of available records on the web, it is easy to see who John Kirkpatrick's father and sisters were (1891 and 1901 censuses for South Shields) But, does anyone know who his mother was? Some family trees on Ancestry and at least one biography names her as Sarah - possibly from Lanarkshire, Scotland. However she doesn't appear on census records and there is no obvious marriage in a reasonable time frame.

Many thanks - Alan

Almost fifty years ago I bought a copy of "The Man With the Donkey" by Sir Irving Benson. I still have it on my shelves.

Benson met Simpson's younger sister, Annie, in South Shields whilst he was researching, and she clearly provided a substantial amount of family detail. His mother was indeed called Sarah, and there is a photo of her in the book. It seems that she and John were particularly close, as she had lost three sons to scarlet fever. The book contains reprints of a large number of letters (provided by Annie) from John to Sarah, covering the period 1910-1914.

There is a contemporary photograph of the family home in South Shields, and Google Earth indicates that it still stands, 14 Bertram Street. There is also a photo of a previous equine friend, Andrew, a grey who pulled the milk cart for Naworth Dairy which Simpson drove for four years.