No Ordinary Determination: Percy Black and Harry Murray of the First AIF

By Jeff Hatwell, Fremantle: Curtin University Books, 2005, 304 pages, paperback, $29.95. Reviewed by Janda Gooding in the May 2006 issue.

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Standing at the centre of any military historian's interpretation of Australia's involvement in the first world war probably will be Charles Bean's massive six volume series The Official History of Australia in the War of 1914-18. Authoritative and elegantly written, Bean's work remains as a remarkable blend of the grand narrative while still, in some part, acknowledging the important contribution of individuals. Understandably, The Official History lays out much of the tactical and operational detail of Australia's first world war involvement, and while personal stories are presented as examples of Australians in action, there is little room for a fuller account of the relationship between the fighting serviceman and the broader canvas of war.

Bean's stated aim in the histories was to provide a written 'memorial' that would be worthy of the participant's actions and the only way he could conceive of doing this was to present 'the bare and uncoloured story of their part in the war'. Of course, we know that Bean's history is indeed coloured by his personal experiences, his propensity to praise rather than blame, and his overwhelming desire to explain how the horrendous experience of war shaped the lives of Australians and the nation. Emerging from The Official History is an account that centres heroism, and the 'peculiar independence of character' that Bean saw as characterising the Australian forces. If individual actions are occasionally lost in the immensity of the official history, Jeff Hatwell's No Ordinary Determination begins to tease out the complex human component of the war through the experiences of two men -- each highly decorated and publicly lauded for their actions.

Percy Black and Harry Murray were 'comrades in arms' during the first world war. Fighting alongside each other at Gallipoli and the Western Front in Europe, their individual stories help to make personal the meta narratives provided by official historians such as Bean. Although lacking many of the traditional primary sources that biographers rely on, Hatwell has drawn together first hand accounts, unit histories, press reports and reminiscences to develop the stories of Black and Murray. Hatwell has done an admirable job weaving the stories of these men with the grander narrative of Australia's involvement in the war. Their actions provide the core around which other events spin in and out of focus.

Both Black and Murray enlisted in the 16th Battalion in Perth in 1914 and trained as machine gunners at Blackboy Hill camp where they established a solid friendship. They were sent to the Middle East and in the evening of 25 April 1915 landed on the shores of Gallipoli. Hatwell's prose does well to capture something of the terror, noise and impossibility of the next few days as the machine gun section established a foothold on Pope's Hill. Another Western Australian, signaller Ellis Silas in the 16th Battalion described the horror: 'groans and screams everywhere, calls for ammunition and stretcher bearers ... this is horrible; I wonder how long I can stand it'.

Black and Murray were in some of the fiercest fighting on Gallipoli (Quinn's Post, Courtney's Post. Hill 971, Hill 60), they were each wounded and suffered from the remorseless rotations into and out of the front line. They were both decorated and their work in establishing the machine gun sections as crucial and strategic fighting units in trench warfare was invaluable to Australia's efforts not just on Gallipoli, but also the Western Front where they were transferred in 1916. Commanding different companies, they fought at Mouquet Farm and then Gueudecourt, after which Murray was awarded a Victoria Cross. In April 1917, leading units to assault the Hindenburg Line, Black was killed. Although Murray survived the battle, he was deeply affected by his friend's death who he described as 'the very best of us, the bravest and coolest of all the brave men I know'.

Celebrated as a hero when he returned to Australia in late 1919, for a short time Harry Murray's life was taken over by an exhausting round of receptions and press interviews. After discharge from the military he became a sheep farmer in a remote part of southern Queensland and retired from public life. How much his wartime experiences affected his life and relationships is not known but he was eager enough to join up again for the second world war. Murray's desire to not attract attention to himself and a lack of available information means that Hatwell's last chapter can only provide a cursory account of Murray as a civilian.

Defined by their acts of courage and overwhelming concern for their men, Murray and Black came to epitomise Bean's concept of the fighting Australian soldier: bush hardened men, quick to learn and rising from the ranks to leadership positions. No Ordinary Determination positions its two protagonists within this tradition. Accessible descriptions of the technical nature of war and operational details are carefully blended with an assessment of Black and Murray's personalities and opinions where the sources allow this. For the growing body of literature on Australia's first world war efforts and the increasing readership -- both professional and non-professional -- Jeff Hatwell's book is a fine addition.

Citation

• Janda Gooding. 'Review: No Ordinary Determination: Percy Black and Harry Murray of the First AIF by Jeff Hatwell' [online]. Network Review of Books (Perth, Australian Public Intellectual Network), May 2006. Availability: <please cite the web address here> ISSN 1833-0932. [accessed 06 September 2010].

Back Cover Blurb

• Jeff Hatwell's epic tale is shaped by the lives of two ordinary individuals thrown into the extraordinary and surreal world of the Gallipoli campaign as soldiers of the First AIF in WWI. Percy Black and Harry Murray were plain hard-working Australians of their era whose paths crossed in Western Australia when they enlisted in support of country and empire.
  
  This is a story of those brave individuals certainly, but the powerful narrative is moulded around them and paints a complex and thorough picture of the heroism, loyalty, inventiveness, mateship, stoicism and strength of the many individuals, on all sides, caught up in the horror of the 'war to end all wars'.
  
  A well-wrought chronicle of two unassuming, iconic Anzacs, Black and Murray, who acted with resolve and fortitude under great pressure and in the most difficult of circumstances. In their laconic way these two would have said they simply did what they had to do, they did their job.
  
  'A superb read that continues in the tradition of C E W Bean'. Kim Beazley, MP

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