Hugh Gemmell Lamb-Smith (31 March 1889 26 December 1951), known as Gemmell, was an innovative Australian educator who landed at Anzac Cove, Gallipoli, on Sunday, 25 April 1915 as a member of the Second Field Ambulance unit, and went on to serve in Europe for the duration of the war. He also served (immediately post-war) as an AIF Education Scheme Instructor in Belgium. He was a prominent (lay) member of the Melbourne Anglican community, and he taught at Caulfield Grammar School from 1913 to 1951.He gave his family name as "Lamb-Smith"; sometimes others (including Caulfield Grammar) used "Lamb Smith". His university enrolment lists him as "Smith, Hugh Gemmell Lamb" (UOM, 1926, 1932, and 1934). His initial A.I.F. enlistment document (see HGLSd) also registered him as "Smith, Hugh Gemmell Lamb", despite the fact that he signed the enlistment form with "Gemmell LambSmith" (one word, capital "S", no hyphen) on 11 September 1914. In the process of his deployment with the Second Field Ambulance on 15 December 1914, at which time he was given the Service number 279, the family name on his military service record was amended to read "Lamb-Smith" (see HGLSd); and from that time, all of his service record documents identify him as "Lamb-Smith, H.G.". Also, after the war, he signed the separate official receipts (each of which identified him as "Lamb-Smith, H.G.") for his three service medals with "G LambSmith" (see HGLSd). "He was a man of wide and sympathetic culture. In addition to his love for music, he was a discriminating connoisseur of painting, and a devotee of ballet and the theatre. He was a devoted churchman and interested in manly sports. Above all, he was an idealist, but, unlike many idealists, he was ready to give practical expression to his ideals." — Webber (1981), p.248
Family The son of William and Margaret Serpine "Maggie" Lamb-Smith, née Gemmell, Hugh Gemmell Lamb-Smith was born on 31 March 1889, at Cheltenham, Victoria.Weekly Times, 13 April 1889. and died on 26 December 1951, at his home in East St Kilda, Victoria.The Age, 28 December 1951.
Father and mother His father, William Lamb-Smith (1846–1910), born in Renfrewshire, Scotland in 1846, was a Justice of the Peace, and a prominent auctioneer and land developer in the outskirts of Melbourne.Prahran Telegraph, 28 May 1910. He was also, among many things: a Councillor of the Moorabbin Shire Council from 1899 until 1902 (when, due to his move from Beaumaris to Armadale, he was no longer residentially qualified to serve), and served as its President in 1893;Oakleigh Leader, 18 March 1983.Brighton Southern Cross, 28 May 1910. President of the Cheltenham Lawn Tennis Club;Mornington Standard, 21 January 1892. President of the Mentone Erica Literary, Musical and Dramatic Society,Brighton Southern Cross, 18 March 1899. the Captain of the Cheltenham Rifle Club from its inception until his death (in Armadale, Victoria on 23 May 1910);The Argus, 30 May 1910. and the Consul-General for Paraguay.AGG, 1902, 1907; and Johns (1908), p.46.
His mother, Margaret Serpine "Maggie" Lamb-Smith (1853–1938), née Gemmell — who had married William in St Kilda, Victoria on 19 April 1883The Age, 23 April 1883. — was the daughter of Hugh Mitchell Campbell Gemmell (1827–1880), and Simonette Marie Gemmell, née Christiani (1824–1888). Born in the West Indies,Illustrated Australian News, 10 January 1880. she "was much given to good works, and rated serving people more highly than reputation or wealth", and, moreover, "was sensitive to the beauties represented by art, and especially music".Webber (1981), pp.246–247. She was a life governor of the Alfred Hospital, and a member of the foundation committee of the Convalescent Home for Men, at Cheltenham (which operated from 1886 to 1956). She died at St Kilda on 22 June 1938.The Argus, 24 June 1938.
Sister Gemmell's only sibling, Mora Marie Lamb-Smith (1884–1945),See The Argus, 19 May 1884, and 31 December 1945. was a trained nurse.Ballarat Star, 30 June 1910. She enlisted in World War I, and served in India, with the rank of Sister, in the Australian Army Nursing Service.See MMLSa, MMLSb, MMLSc, and MMLSd. Note that, as a member of the Australian Army Nursing Service, she had no service Number. She returned to Australian on 17 May 1919, and her military appointment was terminated on 29 June 1919.MMLSd. She married Hugh Gibson Gemmell Sloane (1875–1960), of Mulwala, New South Wales on 26 October 1921 at Christ Church in South Yarra;The Australasian, 10 December 1921.See Farmer & Settler, 22 July 1955; and Sydney Morning Herald, 4 October 1960. they had two sons, one of whom died at the age of seven. Mora and her brother Gemmell were both confirmed at the same ceremony at Saint George's Anglican Church in Malvern, Victoria on 21 June 1904.C. of E. Messenger, 1 August 1904.
Wife One of the five daughters and four sons of William Marshall Harris, (1842–1905), bank manager, and Alderman of the Borough of Armidale, and Marina Jane Harris (1851–1914), née Ross,Sydney Morning Herald, 10 August 1872, 24 June 1905, and 24 June 1914; Armidale Chronicle, 16 January 1897; and Murrumburrah Signal, 7 July 1905. Dorothy Vernon Harris (1885–1964) was born in Armidale on 3 September 1885. One of her brothers, Second Lieutenant Philip Vernon Harris, A.I.F. (1880–1917), died of wounds on 11 June 1917, in France.PVH; Sydney Morning Herald, 6 November 1880, and 21 July 1917; and Brisbane Courier, 27 July 1917.
Dorothy graduated from the Sydney Kindergarten Training College as a fully qualified kindergarten teacher in December 1908.Sydney Morning Herald, 19 December 1908. She married Gemmell Lamb-Smith at Turramurra (a suburb of Sydney), on 17 May 1924.Sydney Morning Herald, 19 July 1924. They had no children. Dorothy died in Sydney on 15 August 1964.The Age, 17 August 1964.
From his own, direct, personal experience of Dorothy, Horace Webber (1981, p. 248), observed that she was a "gracious lady", and remarked that she was well aware of the sufferings Gemmell experienced as an ever-present consequence of the horrors of his wartime experiences, and that, once they were married, "her benign influence did much to restore his peace of mind" — and there's no doubt that Dorothy's innate, natural propensities in these directions had been considerably enhanced by her own extensive wartime experiences of working for the Red Cross, as a quartermaster, in Australian military hospitals in England from 1916 to 1919.Sydney Morning Herald, 31 January 1917; (Sydney) Evening News, 31 August 1918; and West Australian, 18 October 1919.From the newspaper accounts (especially Sydney Morning Herald, 31 January 1917, and 10 November 1919), and from her rank of quartermaster, and from the fact that she was a guest of the wife of the Governor-General, in Melbourne, whilst in transit to Sydney, it is clear that she was not in England as one of the voluntary Australian Red Cross medical orderlies, known as V.A.D.s (see Voluntary Aid Detachment).Also, note that the "Sister Harris" who travelled to France in early July 1916 with the Australian Jockey Club sponsored Red Cross team of "Bluebirds", was an entirely different individual: she was Fanny May Harris (1893–1964), a Warrnambool trained nurse.
She was one of the 2,300 Victorians that were awarded a Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Medal in June 1953.The Argus, 2 June 1953.
Education He was educated at Scotch College, Melbourne from 1901 to 1904,Scotch College Archive records.Whilst at Scotch he performed well as an athlete (Under 14: The Age, 9 November 1901; Tennis, The Age, 16 December 1904) and won various prizes for his academic performance (IVB (Lower): The Age, 12 December 1902; Class IVB: The Argus, 16 December 1903) at various other schools, and, then, at Wangaratta Grammar School (in 1907),The Argus, 21 January 1908. where he not only completed his Junior Public Examination studies,At the 1908 Wangaratta Grammar School Speech Day, the headmaster commented that, in late 1907, Lamb-Smith had "completed the examination in which he has formerly passed some subjects at another school, and obtained distinction in history" (The Ovens and Murray Advertiser, 26 December 1908). but was also (concurrently) employed as a teacher.Ovens and Murray Advertiser, 27 April 1907. In 1910, he enrolled as an "evening student" in a Bachelor of Arts degree at the University of Melbourne).UOM (1920), p.20; and UOM (1926), p.254.
In addition to the extra-curricular studies he had pursued in England under the auspices of the AIF Education Scheme prior to his return to Australia in November 1919, he resumed his "evening student" university studies in 1921,The Age, 12 January 1922. having settled into his teaching role at Caulfield Grammar School once again. He eventually graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in 1931,By coincidence, Lamb-Smith received his Bachelor of Arts in the same graduation ceremony as his CGS teaching colleague, Harold Pennefather (who had also attended CGS as a student 1912–1914, and went on to teach there from 1930 to 1969), received his Master of Arts: The Age, 20 April 1931; UOM, 1932, pp.1074 (Lamb-Smith), 1079 (Pennefather). and a Diploma in Commerce in 1933.The Age, 10 April 1933; UOM, 1934.At the 1933 speech night, the headmaster noted that, "the rapid development of our commercial side under Mr Lamb Smith, B.A, Dip. Com. has enabled us to teach intermediate accountancy" (The Argus, 13 December 1933).
Teaching (1907–1914) Having taught at Wangaratta Grammar School in 1907, he went on to teach at another two schools in New South Wales — Tudor House School, Mona Vale and Chatswood Preparatory School — before returning to Melbourne in 1910, and entering the Victorian State Government Education Department's Teaching Service. He commenced teaching at Caulfield Grammar School in 1913, having been recruited by its owner and principal, Walter Murray Buntine (1866–1953), "from a small school in Gippsland",Webber (1981), p.247.Buntine was born in Gippsland, had also attended Scotch College, and had many professional and personal connexions within the Gippsland area. to serve as a "Resident Master".
First A.I.F.
On 11 September 1914, soon after the declaration of war (4 August 1914), Lamb-Smith — "[whose] sympathy lay with healing people rather than wounding them" (Webber, 1981, p. 248) — enlisted in the A.I.F.,HGLSa; HGLSb; and HGLSc. and joined the Expeditionary Camp at Broadmeadows.
On 15 December 1914, having completed his basic training, he was appointed to the Second Field Ambulance, a unit that had been raised at Broadmeadows, in mid-August 1914. During the five years that he served in the A.I.F., Private Lamb-Smith was temporarily promoted on a number of occasions to fill vacancies caused by the vacations, leave, or deployment of others — including temporary lance corporal, temporary corporal, and temporary sergeant – then, once the individual he had replaced had returned, he reverted to his earlier rank.See HGLSd.
Landing at Anzac Cove on 25 April 1915 As a member of the Second Field Ambulance, he landed at Anzac Cove on 25 April 1915. The historians at the Australian War Memorial write of a "casualties debacle": During the day the medical services were overwhelmed. The suffering of the wounded was pitiful; many men died on the beach, and it is estimated that hundreds more lay in the hills out of the reach of help. Most notably, there were inadequate arrangements for the critically wounded, who could not be taken back to the ships until after all the troops and stores had been landed. It was early evening before boats became available; many of the maimed and bleeding were sent off in filthy barges. No one knows for sure how many Australians died on the first day, perhaps 650. Total casualties, including wounded, must have been about 2,000.AWM-DOTL.
Illness and injury