In St Mary’s Church, Avenel there is a heritage-listed, stained-glass window with imagery of St Martin of Tours, a patron saint of France.
It seems an unusual choice of saints for a Church named St Mary’s in regional Victoria, where there were no great numbers of French settlers. That is until we read the inscription: “In loving memory of our dear son and brother Private Martin O'Dwyer, died in France August 6th, 1916. R.I.P.”
Private Martin O’Dwyer died of gunshot wounds incurred at the Battle of Pozieres in Somme, near Amiens in France. He was buried at Puchevillers British Cemetery, 20 km north of Amiens and over 16,000 km away from his home in Tahbilk, Victoria.
The Memorial Window must have given some solace to the O’Dwyer family who were unable to bury their loved one and, in time, their fellow parish families who shared the same particular kind of vinegary grief.
We can imagine that the Memorial Window must have been a passion project for Private O’Dwyer’s parents, who commissioned and gifted the window to their local Church, as it was unveiled and blessed by Rev. Fr Kavanagh on 5 August 1917 only twelve months after Private O’Dwyer’s death.
When the O’Dwyer family commissioned the window from Melbourne stained-glass artist, William Montgomery, they might not have known that their sons were in the same battalion and had been fighting in the same battles. We can imagine the artist working on the design of the window as if it were for his own son, praying for him to be returned safely home.
Private Martin O’Dwyer, a grazier from Tahbilk was 37 years old when he enlisted on 1 April 1915. By 9 May he was on board HMAT ‘Ulysses’ A38 heading to Gallipoli (via Port Tewfik) with the 21st Australian Infantry Battalion. After the evacuation of Gallipoli, he was treated for bronchitis at the 27th British General Hospital West Mudros, Lemnos in Greece. He rejoined his battalion in January 1916 in time to be amongst the first Australian troops to land at Marseille and march into the Somme Valley in France for the battle of Pozieres, a bitter and costly battle for the Australian divisions.
On 4 August 1916, during fighting at Mouquet Farm, Private O’Dwyer was shot in the abdomen. Two days later he became one of the 11,000 casualties sustained by German attacks mounted against the Mouquet Farm post (called Moo Cow Farm by the ANZACs).
Image above: Sergeant William (Monty) Montgomery circa 1915. Source, Museums Victoria
Like his father, William Montgomery, Sergeant William Montgomery from Hawthorn, was also an artist. Known as ‘Monty’, he was 25 years old when he enlisted in January 1915. He was on the same ship and fought the same battles as Private O’Dwyer. He survived the attacks on Mouquet Farm but was later killed in action at Montbrehain, the Australian Infantry’s last battle, on 5 October 1918 and was buried at Tincourt New British Cemetery near Picardie France – some fourteen months after the Memorial Window dedicated to Private O’Dwyer had been revealed and blessed by Fr Kavanagh.
It would be interesting to know if William Montgomery senior journeyed to Avenel to see this window in situ. At the end of World War I, he became a member of the Victorian War Memorials Committee and remained a steadfast member until it disbanded in 1922. Perhaps his experience of the Avenel Memorial Window infused a deep sense of the importance of tangible ways to remember the fallen, especially when they are buried so far away.
Image above:Puchevillers Cemetery, Somme, France in 1916 by Sergeant John Lord Source, Museums Victoria
