HONYBUN, Anthony Garvis

Anthony Honybun was the fourth child of the twelve children of William and Kate Honybun, and was their third son. He was born in Shepherd's Bush, London on 4 March 1894. The family emigrated to Melbourne in 1910, settling in Balwyn.

Anthony enlisted on 17 August 1914, only a few days after the declaration of war. He gave his occupation as motor mechanic. He embarked on 19 October 1914 as a private with the 8th Infantry Battalion. He took part in the ANZAC landing on 25 April 1915. In August he was at the battle of Lone Pine and wrote to his recent employer, the archbishop of Melbourne, describing the scene,

‘I can see Captain Hillyer on top of the trench waving his stick amid a hail of bullets and shell fire, a veritable hell on earth, and we all made up our minds to get forward and we did’.

His battalion served at ANZAC until the evacuation in December when it returned to Egypt. He was at Serapeum, half way between Suez and Port Said, until March the following year. While there he was promoted to 2nd lieutenant and seconded for duty with the newly formed 2nd Machine Gun Company. Two weeks later he sailed for France, disembarking at Marseilles. He was promoted to lieutenant in September. He served in Camiers near Etaples, south of Boulogne. And then to Belgium where he took part in action at Polygon Wood, near Ypres, that resulted in his receiving the Military Cross. He was wounded, suffering a gun shot wound to his right thigh and evacuated to hospital in England. It seems he married during this time.

He returned to Camiers two months later. He was transferred to the 1st Machine Gun Company in April 1918. He spent much of June sick and was found to be suffering from 'debility' and was given three weeks leave in England. He returned to Camiers in July where he appears to have remained until the end of the war. He embarked for Australia in December 1919, 'with wife'.

None of the official documentation gives any clue as to Anthony's connection with East Melbourne but research by author, Elizabeth Rushen, has established that prior to the war he was working at Bishopscourt as a gardener. Also working at Bishopscourt was upstairs maid, Emma Wells. Emma fell deeply in love with the tall, good looking Englishman and hoped to be his wife. In spite of her hopes being so thoroughly dashed and her own eventual marriage she kept and treasured his letters throughout her life.

On their return to Australia Anthony and his wife settled on the north coast of New South Wales. In 1961, writing from the Gallipoli Legion Club in Sydney, Anthony sent a statutory declaration in support of his application for replacement discharge papers which he had lost on account of all his personal effects being destroyed in a bush fire at Giberegee near Coraki on 27 January 1949.