Private David Glen Guthrie, 10th Battalion, AIF

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Private David Glen Guthrie, 10th Battalion, AIF AWM P10299.003

Australian War Memorial

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David Guthrie was born David Matson Glen Guthrie on 21 March 1898, the youngest son of Senator Robert Storrie Guthrie and his wife Janet. His father had been a seafaring man who became a leading figure in the seamen’s and waterside workers’ unions based in Port Adelaide in South Australia. Robert Storrie Guthrie, known as “Sailor Bob”, went into Parliament before his son David was born, serving nearly 30 years there as a strong advocate for the shipping industry. David Guthrie was born in Port Adelaide and educated at the nearby Le Fevre’s Peninsula School. After a short period working for the Reid brothers, he went into the railways and was stationed at Largs Bay working as a porter.

David Guthrie enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force in August 1915, a few months after his seventeenth birthday. He underwent a period of training in Australia, but his departure for the war in Europe was delayed by sickness and he did not leave for active service overseas until January 1916.  He first went to Egypt, where he again fell ill, spending several weeks in hospital in Abbassia, and in May 1916 he was sent to France with the 10th Battalion. 

In July 1916 the 10th Battalion participated in the attack that captured the French village of Pozieres. The battalion remained in the area for another six weeks, conducting several more small operations. Guthrie came through all of these attacks, but a few months later, as the bitterly cold winter of 1916 and 1917 set in, he started to have trouble with his feet. After a period of hospitalisation he rejoined his battalion in the field after Christmas 1916. 

In February 1917 the 10th Battalion was in the front line not far from the French town of Albert. Although major operations were still suspended because of the cold weather, the battalion conducted a small-scale attack to capture a German position known as the Le Barque Switch Trench. The attack cost the 10th Battalion an estimated 20 per cent of its strength through casualties.

This time Private David Guthrie was one of the casualties. Senator Guthrie had to contact the Minister of Defence to find out what had happened to his son, and was informed that he had been killed by shell-fire on 25 February 1917. David Guthrie was buried in a trench not far from where he fell. After the war his battlefield grave was recovered, and today he lies in the AIF Burial Ground in Flers. He was 18 years old.

Less than five months later Senator Guthrie and his wife were informed that another son, Robert, had also been killed in action.

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