War Memorial Hall c1929
Samuel ROSENTHAL
Samuel Rosenthal was born on 27 November 1880 in Melbourne, Victoria. His parents were Joseph and Martha (née Avinsky) Rosenthal. He attended Scotch from 1894 to 1895.
Samuel was a merchant when he enlisted on 20 July 1915 in Melbourne, Victoria. He served in the 58th Battalion with the rank of Lieutenant.
Samuel died on 25 September 1917 at Polygon Wood, Belgium. He was 36 years of age.
Service record
Samuel was just 5 feet 5¼ inches (166 cm) tall on enlistment. He was 33 years old, and his hair was described as ‘black turning grey.’ By the end of December 1915 he was a Corporal. He was sent to an officers’ training school and in January 1916 jumped several ranks to become a 2nd Lieutenant. He reportedly went to the Royal Military College at Duntroon and on return to Broadmeadows was in charge of up to 700 Depot troops. He seems to have been in a Headquarters unit and to have spent time in the 5th Australian General Hospital while still in Melbourne.
By the time he embarked for overseas on 2 October 1916, he was a member of the 6th Reinforcements to the 58th Battalion. He arrived at Plymouth, England on 16 November 1916. In late January he went to hospital at Tidworth sick.
His mother was sent a telegram saying he was ‘seriously ill’ on 12 March. The illness is mysterious but his obituary says he had several painful operations on his face while in England. He stayed in hospital for nearly two months, before being discharged on 22 March. On 18 April he sailed for France, where on 27 April he finally joined the 58th Battalion. Exactly three months later, on 27 July, he was promoted to Lieutenant. This was probably in the light of an excellent performance in the Bullecourt fighting in May, for in the last letter he wrote home he mentioned being recommended for promotion at Bullecourt.
He had less than two months to live, for on 25 September he was killed in action at Polygon Wood, near Ypres. Sister Leah Rosenthal, working at 33rd Casualty Clearing Station in France, told her family of her brother’s sad death. In a letter, former school captain Stan Neale, now an Army Captain, wrote: ‘Another loss is Sammy Rosenthal…He was the heart of his battalion. At Bapaume [France] he had a stadium erected, and arranged fights. His platoon absolutely loved him.’ He said of Samuel’s death: ‘The sad part of it is that he could have remained behind, but he was so keen to be with his platoon all the time that he went forward, and met his death.’
The official historian conveys Samuel’s enthusiasm in his account of the day’s fighting. He explains that Rosenthal was in charge of one of two platoons ordered forward to help a fellow officer, Lieutenant Boyd, whose forces were blocking a German counterattack. ‘The German barrage was then at its heaviest,’ says the official historian, ‘but Lieutenants Rosenthal and Kennedy Smith at once set out with them (as Boyd afterwards reported) “in grand style,” heading, two or three men at a time, straight through the shell-fire.’ He continues: ‘Smith was killed by a shell at once, and Rosenthal by a machine-gun just as, in great spirits, he reached Boyd.’
Samuel Rosenthal is buried in the Hooge Crater Cemetery (Plot XI, Row C, Grave No. 9), Zillebeke, Belgium.
Photographs and Documents:
2nd Lieutenant Samuel Rosenthal is in the centre of the middle row of Old Scotch Collegians on the voyage to England in 1916. Bourchier, Wood, Harper and Rouse would also be killed. Lieutenant George Wood wrote a letter to the school during this voyage ‘home’, as he called the voyage to England. They were on the ship on Foundation Day 1916. It was he said, ‘a terrific upheaval, waves were running 80 feet high, and the whole ship was almost literally upside down.’ He said that ‘we collected a number of Scotchies, together with Melburnians, Xavierians [sic] and Geelong Collegians, and in a quiet corner celebrated the day in hearty fashion.’
Sources:
- Australian War Memorial – Roll of Honour
- Bean, CEW, Official History of Australia in the War of 1914–1918, vol. IV, University of Queensland Press and Australian War Memorial, St Lucia, 1982, p. 806
- Mishura Scotch Database
- National Archives of Australia – B2455, ROSENTHAL SAMUEL
- Scotch Collegian 1917 and 1918
- The AIF Project - https://www.aif.adfa.edu.au/showPerson?pid=261162
