[Page 403]
[2nd Lieutenant, later Major, Clement Robert (Clem) Walsh MC, a pharmaceutical chemist of Newcastle, NSW, joined the Army on 9 September 1914 aged 25, and embarked from Sydney on HMAT A39 Port Macquarie on 21 December 1914 with the 7th Company, A.A.S.C., 4th Infantry Brigade. He served throughout the War, first at Gallipoli and later in France and Egypt. He rose to the rank of Major and was awarded the Military Cross on 5 June 1917 "for distinctive service in the field". He married Mary Kathleen Hayes Harrington on 12 May 1919 at Croydon, England, and returned to Australia on HT Friedrichsruh later that year.
This series of 13 letters and postcards, photographs and printed materials spans almost the entire period of the War, from 1915 to 1918, written to Dr and Mrs N J Dunlop of Newcastle, NSW. Some letters are out of chronological order.
Includes a letter written from Egypt prior to leaving for the Dardanelles (pages 465-468) and letters written from Gallipoli, including one describing the evacuation (pages 420-433). An edited version of this letter was printed in the Newcastle Morning Herald newspaper.
It also includes a photo of Clem Walsh (page 438) and mentions several prominent Newcastle medical practitioners who served (page 400), as well as Major George Robert Short whose letters (pages 306-320) are in this collection. It also includes a leaflet warning soldiers about venereal disease (page 469) and briefly mentions the influenza epidemic (page 475).]
[Envelope]
Clem Walsh
From Lieut. Clem Walsh
From Gallipoli [indecipherable] & others