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WW1
GUTTERIDGE, LANCELOT YORK
Poperinghe, France. 1916-10. Group portrait of members of the Australian rules football team of the 9th Battery, 3rd Field Artillery Brigade. They were unbeaten between 1916-02 and 1916-11 and were known as the `Battery 18'. Amongst the team were five members of the Rialannah (Tas) Football Team including the captain, 2059 Bombardier James Hoskins Clennett (with the ball) and vice-captain, 2058 Sergeant (later Air Commodore) Raymond James Brownell. Left to right, back row: Anderson, 2023 Leonard Molloy, Bombardier Crawford; second row: ?Bocnde, 1966 Sergeant George William Clare, 1943 Leslie Ainsworth, 1973 Lancelot York Gutteridge, Sibley, Marchant, Sergeant Brownell; third row: Morgan, Hood, Bombardier Clennett, Webster, Russell; front row: 1942 Roy Cecil Aherne, Turner, Lewis
LANCE GOTTERIDGE A COMRADE'S TRIBUTE. (By N.C.O.) This, gallant lad enlisted on the outbreak of the war, and it is only one example of his splendid keenness that whilst in camp at Brighton he was transferred from the Light. Horse to the Artillery, is order to go straight away. He joined the famous 9th battery just before embarkation and from the very start was a general favorite with the gunners. Nothing was too much trouble for him on the trip over to Egypt. 'When some of the boys were sick, Lance Gutteridge could always find time to do an extra bit of work. Mind you, he was no 'mug.' You could not put a joke up on him good fellow that he was, he would not have his leg pulled - to do the other fellow's work when they were able; but any chap that was ill could always rely on him to help him out. There is a story about the time when the lads were suffering from vaccination; one Tassy with a swollen arm who never took an hour off, although he must have suffered, not only did his own work, but was the mainstay of the horse deck. The deck N.C.O. has still a kindly feeling for the chap that saw him through. The man's name was Lance Gutteridgo. At the disembarkation of the horses, Gutteridge again showed the way; he worked like a Trojan,, and then again. at Mena Camp. Tasmanians do not realise how awfully hard it was to keep fit in that sweltering choking desert. : I can well remember one of the gunners saying ''We eat dust, we drink dust, and we breathe dust, and yet we have to work harder than we ever did at home: how is it done-?' Yet even here, in a totally strange environment Gutteridgre still kept cheerful, and never got sick or tired. Many a Tassy can tell you how 'crook', he felt one night, and he got Lance to do his picquet. The last leave he had before the Battery embarked for the Peninsula campaign he spent in travelling across Cairo with young Colin Glascow to see some other Coast boys at other encampments — a kindly action properly appreciated. Most boys would have had a great spree for the last day in Cairo. On Gallipoli, he was 'just the same. If you had asked a gunner who was this Gutteridge that everybody had a good word for, he would have answered, 'The best bloke on Anzac.' He was always cool when in action, nothing seemed to trouble him, and his work was always done to time. I firmly believe that rapid promotion must have come to him in any other branch of the service but the Battery could not replace him, and like many more in this war, he just kept on, never grumbling and never asking for promotion. In conclusion, if anything will stir up Australia it must be this awful list of casualties; I don't mean the quantity so much, but the quality. For example I will quote four names:— Captain Littler, Captain Tyrrell, Captain McNamara Driver Lance Gutteridge. Tasmania has indeed lost her best. These four men were born soldiers, they understood that the actual fighting is not all a soldier's life they all in their own spheres studied the individual soldier and spent many hours in the interest of their fellows. I knew the four of them, and never were there grander men; they did the things that don't get recorded, and yet are so much to the hoys. I commit, to the respect and honor of all Tasmania the above four men, who not only died for the Empire, but lived for the men under or with them.’ The North Western Advocate 9th March 1917
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