Charles Bean’s war

1

Charles Bean won the ballot to select one Australian journalist to go to war and cover the conflict. By the letter of his instructions, or at least as he interpreted them, he was to report to the Australian public on what their compatriots were doing and not comment on the conduct of the war in the bigger picture.

2

One of Bean's first writing tasks was to produce a brief guide for Australian soldiers about how they should act in Egypt but it was his article about the rowdy conduct of some of them that caught the eye. This piece may never have been written but for the pushing of Major-General Bridges who was trying to get a message to the Australian troops about the misbehaviour of some of them.

3

Many of the Australian soldiers, including Sergeant Frank Westbrook, thought they were being unfairly described as drunk and rowdy even though it was a small minority of men who were responsible for the misbehaviour and tarnishing Australia's reputation.

4

Bean defends himself by saying that he was only referring to a minority of soldiers. There is little doubt he didn't enjoy the criticism directed at him as it's mentioned many times in his diaries. This may have affected his writing, at least in the short term, because he didn't want to get offside with the people he would be interviewing for his stories.

5

Even though Bean had landed at Gallipoli and the English correspondent Ellis Ashmead-Bartlett had not, it was the latter whose article appeared first in Australian newspapers (even though it was more than two weeks after the landing). Ashmead-Bartlett's writing was characterised by emotional language designed to lift the morale of the Australian people.

6

Bean was upset that he had gone ashore, at some risk to his safety, on the morning of 25 April while Ashmead-Bartlett did not reach land before 9.30 that evening. He also disliked the Englishman's emotive, exaggerated style of reporting. Bean would not write about something that had not happened just to make a story sound more dramatic.

7

Ashmead-Bartlett's opinions and writing had changed significantly as the Gallipoli campaign wore on. By August and September he was desperately trying to get an uncensored account of the campaign to the British Prime Minister. He did this by writing a letter, highly critical of the campaign's commanders, and giving it to Australian journalist Keith Murdoch to take to London.

8

On his way to London, Murdoch was stopped in France by police who had been tipped off. Ashmead-Bartlett's letter was confiscated so Murdoch wrote his own, partly based on the Englishman's writing as well as some observations of his own.

9

Bean thought that Ashmead-Bartlett's letter was true by-and-large and he praised its writing. However he stuck to his principles, firstly because of the censorship rules and secondly because he didn't want to rock the boat and risk being sent home.

10

Bean was critical of some aspects of the censorship rules but he still toed the line. The effect on his writing can be seen by two accounts of the same incident; in his newspaper article he is very positive and writes about courage under file while in his diary entry he talks about an officer threatening to shoot another soldier if he did not get out of the trench and fight. This kind of cowardice would never have been reported in the media.

11

Bean used a number of techniques including the interviewing of soldiers, asking the men to make sketches and maps, looking at the condition of the battlefield before and after fighting as well as his own observations. Students should be aware that sometimes soldiers' recollections were affected by fatigue, shock and many other factors.

12

Some newspaper editors found Bean’s writing style dull, far too precise and overly technical. After a while they didn't publish his stories. Students should give examples of his writing that were criticised.

13

Bean would soon discover that fighting on the Western Front was bloodier than that of Gallipoli. However, the food was better and more varied, they weren't hemmed in by steep cliffs and a narrow beach, at times they could escape to the local towns, leave could be taken, meaning a trip to England, and the weapons were superior.

14

Frank Hurley felt that he was unable to capture the dramatic nature of warfare in a single photograph. He therefore combined different elements of a battlefield into one shot. For example, aircraft might be added, the weather might be made more 'artistic', or explosions might be included for a more powerful image.

15

Bean admired Hurley's skills, however he strongly disapprove of the photographer's composite images. This was Ellis Ashmead-Bartlett all over again, only this time it was the photo being made more dramatic rather than the writing. Bean, a stickler for the truth, could never agree with such a concept.

16

Bean disliked John Monash for a number of reasons including his belief that Monash was a self-promoter, that he knew little about the trench life of the soldiers and that he was Jewish — anti-semitism was not uncommon at this time.

17

Monash believed that Bean was little more than a public relations officer for the Anzac forces. He had little time for his writing and quite deliberately excluded him from many press conferences.

18

As with Ashmead-Bartlett and Hurley, Bean still appreciated their work to a certain extent. Bean believed Monash was a meticulous strategist who planned his battles very thoroughly. He wrote in a later history of the war that Monash's approach became the template for all Allied commanders to organise an attack.

19

It didn't take long for the soldiers to realise that the Western Front would be just as bad, if not worse than Gallipoli. The grim tone was reflected in their diaries and Bean's as well. Yet Bean's newspaper stories remained upbeat. Student should quote examples from both diaries and newspaper article.

20

Bean believed in conscription but there is no doubt that he was used to try and convince the troops to vote 'Yes'. Prime Minister Billy Hughes and others desperately wanted the soldiers to vote ‘Yes’ because they feared the reaction from the Australian public if the men actually at the front supported the 'No' cause. Bean received much criticism from Labor supporters and media outlets for his stance.

21

Bean was adamant that the deaths of 60 000 Australians in the First World War should not be in vain. He urged those at home, especially the younger generation, to build the country that the soldiers had wanted and had fought for. The product of his thinking was the very nationalistic In your hands Australians.

22

Bean took 22 years to write the Official History of Australia's participation in the First World War. It was a twelve-volume history of which Bean wrote six volumes and edited the rest. He would work for hours at a time, often in the middle of the night, while referring to an enormous amount of primary source material.

23

After the censorship of his newspaper writing during the war, Bean must have relished the opportunity to write a history of the war without restrictions. He used official records but also made great use of dozens of his own diaries if there were any gaps in those records. He freely admitted that his diaries were often written while he was tired and not in full knowledge of all the facts.

24

Bean was thinking about a war museum, saying it would be an excellent attraction for the new national capital, as early as 1916 and began collecting relics with his usual enthusiasm. With John Treloar, who was injured fighting earlier in the war, they established the Australian War Records Section in London. This became the repository for all collected items until the end of the war.

25

Bean was determined that the Australian War Memorial would have a dual function. As well as being a museum, it was also to be a solemn place for remembering the sacrifices paid by the people who died in the Great War, although it was two years into the Second World War before it opened so it became a memorial for those who fell in all conflicts. As a museum its focus was on the everyday soldier rather than the bigger picture of grand strategies and well-known leaders.