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AVONDALE HEIGHTS FOOTBALL CLUB |
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JOHNSON PARKER ANZAC DAY MEDAL Awarded to the player in the match who best exemplifies the Anzac Spirit. Skill Courage Self-Sacrifice Teamwork Fair Play
Harold Parker Full Name: Harold Carlyle Parker
Date of birth 26 September 1892
Place of birth Elsternwick, Victoria Rank: Second Lieutenant Unit: 37th Battalion (Infantry) Service: Australian Army Conflict: 1914-1918
Date of death 30 January 1917 (aged 24)
Place of death France Cemetery details: Rue-Petillon Military Cemetery, Fleurbaix, France
Original team Essendon District
VFL Club St Kilda
Family The son of Robert Grainger Parker and Eva Parker, he was born in Elsternwick, Victoria on 26 September 1892. He attended Essendon State School. He married Jessie Parker (she remarried after the war and became Mrs. Cumming). At the time of his enlistment, he gave his occupation as warehouseman.
Footballer Harold Parker’s original team was known as Essendon District. There is not much detail on this but it does show that he was a local person playing local football in our own community. During the latter part of the 1911 season, the St. Kilda Football Club and its off-field operations, and its on-field performances were very seriously affected by a players' strike due to protracted disputes with the committee relating to its mismanagement of club affairs. Due to the sudden decisions of various players not to play in a particular match, the club used a total of 62 players that season, the most ever used in a single season by a VFL club. This indicates that, given Parker only played towards the end of the season (rounds 9. 13, and 14), he may not have been selected at all if all of the regular players were available. When measured on his enlistment in the army in 1915, he was 5 ft 9in tall, and weighed 13 stone. Recruited from the Essendon District Football League, aged 18, Parker played his first senior VFL match for St Kilda, against Collingwood, at Victoria Park on 17 June 1911. He played his second, against Fitzroy, at the Junction Oval, on 15 July1911. He played the last of his three VFL senior matches against Melbourne on 22 July, at the Junction Oval.
Oarsman Harold Parker was a member of the Civil Service Rowing Club.
Soldier Prior to his enlistment on 11 October 1915, Parker had three and a half years of experience in the Citizen's Military Force. After enlisting, Parker was promoted to Second Lieutenant on 21 Feb 1916.
Death He was badly wounded in action with the 37th Infantry Battalion of the 3rd Division of the AIF, during a trench raid in France on the night of 29 January 1917, when he was struck in the groin by German machine gun fire. He was lying in a shell hole, and was too badly wounded to be carried back to the Australian lines. The entire stretcher party that had gone to retrieve him were shot down before they could reach the shell-hole and by the time a patrolling party could reach the site, Parker was no longer there. He was taken prisoner by the Germans and was admitted to the Bavarian Field Hospital, Lambersart, Lille, France. He died of his wounds in the German hospital the next day.
Remembered Buried at the Rue-Petillon Military Cemetery, Fleurbaix, France, Parker is commemorated in a two-panel memorial window installed at St. Johns Uniting Church, at the corner of Mount Alexander Road and Buckley Street, Essendon ("In Loving Memory of Lieut Harold Carlyle Parker, 27th Battln, Died of wounds within the German Lines at Armentieres, 30th January 1917, aged 25 years. Thy Will be done".)
A group of officers of the 37th Battalion before the Battalion left for France in November 1916. Lt H C Parker is standing in the back row second from the left. Officers were encouraged wear gloves and to carry canes and whips as a signal of their status.
Len Johnson Full Name: Leslie Albert Johnson
Date of birth 6 July 1908
Place of birth Addison Street St Kilda
Rank: Private
Unit: 4th Reserve Motor Transport Company
Service: Australian Army Serve Corps
Conflict: 1939-1945
Date of death 24 January 1942 (aged 33)
Place of death Malaya
Original team Ascot Vale CYMS
VFL Club Essendon & North Melbourne
Family Johnson had to be resolute and tough to survive as one of eight children. Born to Albert and Margaret Johnson in 1908, his mother died when Len was ten years of age. He and brothers Eric and Patrick were sent to St Vincent de Paul Orphanage.
Footballer Len Johnson was a fine left-footed full-forward and centre man from Ascot Vale CYMS. He was very fast and a good mark. He was recruited by Essendon in 1929 and was Essendon's equal top goal scorer that year with 40 goals, including nine goals in an eight point win over Footscray in Round 2. This was a fine effort as Johnson broke his arm late in that year, missing the last five games. He was a deadly accurate kick. Johnson eventually gravitated to the half forward flank and shared roving duties with Keith Forbes. It appears that Johnson could not get enough football as he also represented the Fire Brigade in a mid-week competition and occasionally played some Saturday morning industrial matches. Johnson, a marvellously accurate left footer, left Essendon during the 1933 season to play five games for North Melbourne. Johnson then went on to be captain coach of Nhill Football Club in the Mid Wimmera Football League then at New South Wales club Griffith before acquiring an identical position with Tasmanian club Longford in 1938 where he stayed until 1940. Athlete Len Johnson was a fine athlete at the orphanage and look up professional running in 1930 and won a half mile handicap at the Showgrounds from a field which included world champion Jack Fitt. From there, Johnson became a regular competitor at Stawell Gift meetings, finishing third in the 440 yards final in 1931 and being placed in other events up to 1936. His biggest athletics purse was 13 pounds for finishing second in a 440 yards event – the Pleasant Creek Handicap in 1932.
Soldier Johnson and his brother Eric, inseparable from the time that they were at the orphanage, enlisted together and were sent to Malaya because of the threat of a Japanese invasion north of Australia.
They were near Singapore on 24 January 1942, when sergeant told men from his platoon that they had to demolish a warehouse and, to show them what had to be done, jumped into a truck and demolished a wall.
Tragically, Len Johnson was on the other side of the wall and was killed. Eric, who was devastated by the accidental death of his brother, was later captured by the Japanese and spent three years in the notorious Changi Prison. Because of the Japanese invasion of Malaya and occupation of Singapore soon after his death, Private Leslie Albert Johnson has no known grave although his name is engraved at the Singapore Memorial at the Kranji War Cemetery, 22 kilometres north of the city of Singapore. His name is also listed on the Honour Board at the Essendon Football Club, as well as the St Vincent de Paul Orphanage Honour Board.
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