World War I Commemorative Website

War Memorial Hall  c1929

Memorial Hall circa 1929
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Alan MCKAY

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Alan McKay was born on 19 October 1895 in Mildura, Victoria. His parents were Nathaniel Breakley and Emma (née Thompson) McKay. He attended Scotch from 1910 to 1914. Alan won a Mining & Agricultural Government Scholarship to attend Scotch from a state school in 1909. He was a Government Exhibitioner in 1912, and entered Melbourne University in 1914. He was in Cadets.

Alan was a university student when he enlisted on 4 August 1915 in Melbourne. He served in the 46th Battalion with the final rank of Corporal. His Regimental Number was 4883. His brother and fellow Old Scotch Collegian Oscar also served in the AIF.

Alan died on 14 November 1916 at Gueudecourt, France. He was 21 years of age.

Service record

Before enlisting, Alan McKay was a Sergeant in the Melbourne University Rifles. His mother gave him permission to enlist at age 19, while his father sent a telegram from Queensland saying he gave Alan permission provided the latter’s brother, Ralph, thought he could better serve the nation in the army than in munitions production (see below). Ralph said Alan could enlist. He was allotted initially to reinforcements for the 14th Battalion and was soon made a Sergeant.

He arrived in Egypt on 15 April 1916 (after departing Melbourne on 14 March) and joined the 4th Training Battalion. After arriving in France in June 1916 he joined the 46th Australian Battalion on 21 July 1916. As was standard practice with reinforcements he then lost his NCO status and reverted to Private. On 6 August he was admitted to hospital sick with a fever, but returned to his unit eight days later.

The Scotch Collegian quotes a Captain ‘R.B –‘ as saying of Alan: ‘He come to my company as a private, and I gave him a trial by placing him in command of the company machine gun section. Shortly afterwards he went to the trenches, at Pozieres, where, with his guns, I had to place him in an advanced and very dangerous position. The first night there, with the rain, cold and the German bombardment, is most simply described by one word – Hell. He was constantly under my eye then, and for the rest of our stay in the trenches, and his coolness and work under fire were particularly notable. For this he was promoted to Corporal, the highest rank obtainable in a company machine-gun section.’ This promotion came on 26 August.

His record contains just one disciplinary blemish: on 28 September 1916 he was reprimanded by a Sergeant for being ‘unshaven on parade’. This was far from typical, for Captain B- said that Alan’s character and work in and out of the line had resolved him to recommend Alan for a commission as an officer next time they came out of the line. That was not to be, for on 14 November, as Captain B- put it, ‘an unlucky shell which landed in a support trench some distance behind the firing line, killed him instantly.’ It was reported that the Chaplain attached to the 12th Australian Infantry Brigade buried Alan in Pioneer Trench Cemetery. However, the location was not officially registered, and when bodies from that cemetery were moved to the Bancourt British Cemetery, Alan’s grave was not identified. There was, however, a grave reportedly belonging to ‘Sig. D. McKay’, whose remains were reburied at Bancourt. No Signaller D. McKay had been killed in that area, so it was deduced that this man was probably Alan and that his grave had been incorrectly marked.

Thus his service record includes an October 1924 letter to Alan’s father telling him that the cross above his grave in Bancourt British Cemetery should include the words ‘Believed to be’, as his son’s remains could not certainly be identified as lying in that grave (see below). His father wrote back accepting the difficulty of the task for war graves authorities and accepted this solution. Captain B – had mourned ‘the loss of one who was doing his duty so thoroughly’ and whom he regarded as ‘probably the most promising man of my company.’

Alan McKay is buried in the Bancourt British Cemetery (Plot VIII, Row E, Grave No. 20), France.

Photographs and Documents:

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Alan McKay is pictured here among Scotch students who received 1912 Government Exhibitions

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Telegram from Alan’s father giving Ralph, Alan’s brother, the power to decide whether he could join. From Alan’s service record.

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Letter to Alan’s father, informing him that his headstone is only ‘provisional’.

Sources:

  1. Australian War Memorial – Roll of Honour
  2. Mishura Scotch Database
  3. National Archives of Australia – B2455, MCKAY A
  4. Scotch Collegian1917, where his obituary contains several errors
  5. The AIF Project - https://www.aif.adfa.edu.au/showPerson?pid=199915

Page last updated: 11 November 2015