Gallipoli gravestone inscription a touchstone to warrior ancestor for Brigid Mackenzie

AS Brigid Mackenzie runs her fingers over that etched name, and reads aloud the poignant phrase below, she is likely the first.

Brigid Mackenzie beside her great grand uncle’s gravestone at Quinn's Post cemetery / Picture: Sam Ruttyn

AS Brigid Mackenzie runs her fingers over that etched name, and reads aloud the poignant phrase below, she is likely the first.

The lonely gravestone, in Gallipoli’s stark, windswept cemetery at Quinn’s Post, has never felt the warmth of a family member’s hand, nor the loving gaze of a relative, a friend.

Just the near tread of strangers who stop down the line, pay their homage to a fellow soldier, and silently move on.

LEST WE FORGET: RESTLESS GHOSTS HAUNT THE NEK

ANZAC FAMILIES WELCOMED LIKE ROCK STARS IN TURKEY

SECURITY AT GALLIPOLI GOES INTO TIGHT LOCKDOWN

Click here to download the ebook! (PDF, 7.2MB)

Harold Joseph Barry finally has a visitor. And it’s his 17-year-old great grand niece, a Sydney schoolgirl that carries his name. Brigid Barry Mackenzie. There, just for him, 100 years after he was cut down in that callous waste of good men on August 7, 1915, when Australia’s budding youth jumped the parapet at a whistle, charged those enemy lines and barely made a few feet.

That hapless charge of the Light Horse brigade at the Nek, the 24-year-old sergeant’s final act of valour. The Stella Maris history student is well versed, passionate and articulate on the recklessness of that fateful day, and the men who were prone and lifeless at its bitter end. Of her great great uncle, robbed of a chance at a life long and fruitful.

Brigid Mackenzie beside her great grand uncle’s gravestone at Quinn's Post cemetery / Picture: Sam Ruttyn

“He died in the charge of the Nek which was a really bad battle because they sent them over in waves, but they were off time, so they got slaughtered by the Turks who had time to recover from it,’’ she says.

“I am just so humbled to be here. The epitaph on his grave says “Sweet Jesus have mercy”. That’s hard core stuff. I read that and cried.’’

Grave stone of H J Barry in Gallipoli.

Harold Joseph Barry / Picture: Supplied

In Brigid Mackenzie, Australia has a smart and sweet reason why Anzac Day grows in prominence and potency every year; why the brave men buried in the barren soil of Gallipoli are still having their stories told, a century after their heroic deaths. She has studied every word of Sergeant Barry’s letters home, examining his craft and his shifting attitudes, pining to know more of the man whose death brought immense grief to the family; a wound so deep it likely caused his mother’s fatal heart attack a year later.

Brigid Mackenzie at Beach Cemetery in Gallipoli / Picture: Sam Ruttyn

Standing over his grave this week was indeed a treasured moment for this North Curl Curl teen. A chance to represent a family that grieved deeply, but could never travel to such distant shores. An opportunity to break 100 years of silence with a sweet thank you to the man whose mustachioed faced never aged.

Delivered in person.

“Just to be in this place that I’ve learnt lots about, and with my ancestor being here is really exciting,’’ she says. “Being here I’m able form a deeper understanding of it and what he went through. “He was super excited to go to war. But it is interesting having a look through his letters, some of his attitudes changed wildly; that someone who idealised war so much, can turn against it quickly, that says a lot about the war itself.’’ And a man’s bravery.

Picture: Sam Ruttyn

Harold Joseph Barry best get used to visitors.

While he may have waited a century for his first guest, the next won’t be too far away. For a youthful generation from his own patriotic blood know intimately his story cruelly shortened. They talk of his deeds, they read his words, and they commit to pass his brave tales to the generations to come.

They too will want to come and say thanks.

Picture: Sam Ruttyn

Originally published as Gallipoli gravestone inscription a touchstone to warrior ancestor for Brigid Mackenzie