Walter Peeler won a VC at Broodseinde in 1917 and went on to serve in WWII

The Anzac forces at Broodseinde, near Ypres in Flanders, had a secret weapon in the unstoppable Walter Peeler.

Men from the 1st Australian Division in Ypres, Flanders, on their way to the front line to relieve their comrades the day after the successful Broodseinde Ridge attack on October 4, 1917. Picture: Frank Hurley, Australian War Memorial E00833

THE Anzac troops waited patiently near the Broodseinde Ridge in Flanders in the early hours of a drizzly morning on October 4, in 1917. The scheduled start time for their attack was 6am, but, to their surprise, as dawn broke, at about 5.20am, a mortar barrage exploded from the German lines.

Despite the casualties the Anzacs held their ground, waiting for the signal to attack. As it turned out, the Germans had chosen the same morning to launch their own offensive. So when the Anzacs stood to advance at 6am, the Germans did the same.

The advancing Anzacs opened fire scattering the enemy, and found stiff resistance from snipers and machineguns. But they had a secret weapon in Victorian-born Lance Corporal Wally Peeler who, shooting his Lewis gun from the hip, charged forward and overpowered four machinegun nests. That action, a century ago today, would earn him a Victoria Cross.

Peeler became a national hero and survived the war to become the first custodian of the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne as well as a veteran of World War II.

Sgt (later Lance Corporal) Walter Peeler of 3rd Pioneer Batt, 3rd Div, was awarded the Victoria Cross for action on October 4, 1917.

Born Walter Peeler at Barker’s Creek near Castlemaine in Victoria on August 9, 1887, he went to the local state school. He left school early to work on his father’s orchard, but later took a job at Thompson’s Foundry in Castlemaine.

Peeler was also a keen sportsman, captain of the Wesley Hill Football Club and played in the Castlemaine Cricket Club team. In 1907 he married Emma Hewitt and had settled down to a life working and raising children when he enlisted in the AIF in February 1916.

After training in Victoria, he was posted to the 3rd Pioneers as a machinegunner. His battalion was sent to England in June 1916, where they endured several more months of training in Salisbury. Peeler must have gotten a bit bored, he was docked pay for being absent without leave in July. However, he was later promoted to Lance Corporal in November.

This stretcher was in constant use by the 10th Australian Field Ambulance through battles in Messines, Broodseinde and Paschendale in 1917. Picture: Ned Kelly nk212081

But Peeler had a problem with discipline. In January 1917, when he finally made it to the Western Front, he was reprimanded for writing a letter giving away their position and, in May, had his pay docked and was demoted for the “careless and negligent” handling of a Lewis gun causing injury to another soldier.

In June 1917 he was wounded by shrapnel at Messines, earning back his rank of Lance Corporal. On October 4, he once again stood on the front lines and performed his amazing feat of bravery destroying four German machine gun nests at Broodseinde. He personally dispatched 30 Germans, later saying “I never saw the faces of those I killed. They were just men in an enemy uniform. It was simply them or me”. Despite suffering 6500 casualties, including Peeler who was severely wounded in his right arm, the Anzacs achieved their objectives along Broodseinde Ridge.

Peeler was sent to England to recuperate. But while recovering he received a VC from King George V in January 1918.

The Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne in 1938.

In May he returned to the front but, despite being promoted to sergeant, he was sent home in October to help with a recruitment drive. The war ended in November and he was discharged in December 1918.

He worked for the Victorian Lands Department for several years, before trying his hand as an orchardist. When that didn’t work out he joined the staff at the Sunshine Harvester Company.

However, in 1934 Peeler was appointed the first custodian of the Victorian Shrine of Remembrance, which opened that year in November. He stayed until 1940 when he once again signed up to fight, dropping his age by 12 years saying he was born in 1901. The army must have known his real age but were glad to have experienced soldiers. Peeler told a newspaper at the time “Young ’uns are not too keen so we have to do our bit”.

Although he served as a quartermaster he saw some real action in the Middle East, taking part in a patrol to recover wounded soldiers in 1941. In 1942 he was part of a small force sent to Java, in the Dutch East Indies, to deal with the advancing Japanese, but was captured.

As a POW he worked as a cook feeding prisoners working on the Thai-Burma Railway and was released in August 1945. He returned home to find that one of his sons had died in the fighting at Bougainville.

He returned to work at the Melbourne Shrine of Remembrance where he stayed until his retirement in 1964. He died in 1968.

Originally published as Walter Peeler won a VC at Broodseinde in 1917 and went on to serve in WWII