Last of B&B’s ‘three musketeers’

Preparations for Anzac Day and the centenary of the Gallipoli landings loom closer. It was not uncommon for men who experienced WWI to try and dissuade their son/s from enlisting for WWII. That was the case for Lawrence Baldwin, 95, who talked to Simon Ed

The terrible things Frank Baldwin experienced fighting in Gallipoli and in Europe prompted him to refuse permission for his teenaged son Lawrence to sign-up when World War II came. Maybe it saved Lawrence’s life. Lawrence Frank Alfred Baldwin is now 95. Recalling the events of decades ago as he relaxes in an armchair in his Upper Hutt home, wearing slippers and fingerless gloves as the cold of Autumn starts to bite, it’s a stark contrast to the vital young man looking staunch in a line-up of Royal NZ Artillery comrades-in-arms taken at Trentham Camp in 1940.

Lawrence remembers his mother, Milly, telling him that Frank was among the first on the beach at Gallipoli in 1915.

He was 30 at the time, and a sapper.

Lawrence says his dad hardly ever talked about The Great War.

The service record of the former Hertfordshire, Englishman who came to New Zealand in 1912 shows he saw active duty for 363 days. There is mention of convalescence from illness, and eventual discharge because he was no longer strong enough to fight.

Back in New Zealand, ‘‘as a gesture from a grateful Government’’, Frank was allocated 100 acres of farmland outside Morrinsville.

But the family had to walk off it some time later.

‘‘My mum would say ‘ you can’t live on trippence for a pound of butterfat’.’’

Lawrence says he stood on that now lush Waikato farmland decades later. ‘‘It’s probably worth a million dollars now.’’

The family moved back to Auckland where, at the age of 19, Lawrence was working at Bond and Bonds, the boss of two others – Max Cronin and George Sole.

When New Zealand declared for the Allies at the outbreak of World War II the trio of young men immediately declared they would sign-up for the air force.

‘‘I went home and dad said, ‘like hell you will. I have to give permission and I’m not giving that until you’re 21’.

‘‘That put the mockers on it for me.’’

His two friends joined the air force. Max was shot down over Holland, and George’s aircraft was lost over Burma in 1943.

‘‘I’m the surviving one of the three musketeers, you might say.’’

Instead Lawrence signed up for the artillery and was to stay in New Zealand until he was 21. He said it was ‘‘hard yards’’ during five months of training at Trentham.

They dubbed the man in charge of his group ‘‘The Screaming Skull’’, and Lawrence’s strongest memories are of endless drills; pissing in a tin at night because noone was allowed to leave the huts; and super-strict discipline.

There was not a lot of contact at all with the artillery they would be using.

Lawrence gained his sergeant’s stripes during stints manning anti-aircraft guns in Auckland and Whangarei guarding against the feared invasion by the Japanese.

‘‘I kept pestering once I turned 21, I wanted to get overseas to the action . . . like a mug.’’

He got his wish. He had two years of heat and ‘‘Yankee rations’’ in the Pacific, hauling huge 25-pounder guns about to point out across channels, waiting for Japanese patrol

boats. He recalls getting the grim news about captured New Zealand soldiers being beheaded on Fanning Island. ‘‘I knew some of those blokes.’’ He saw few Japanese and even fewer native islanders.

‘‘They headed for the hills; they knew what to do.’’

Later, Lawrence saw service in Egypt and Northern Italy.

He thinks he fired one of the last artillery shells in that conflict and remembers both the Italian villager who banged on the door of the tractor hauling his gun carriage yelling ‘‘guerra finito!’’ (the war is over), and the harsh grappa he gave him to drink.

After the war, Lawrence worked at the 500-staff Phillips Electrical factory in Naenae, and for 20 years was in charge of its finances.

Before his dad died, they used to go to Anzac parades in Auckland, walking across Grafton bridge.

Lawrence understands that the young generation today want to remember the sacrifices of their grandparents and greatgrandparents, and so turn up to Anzac parades.

But it also makes him feel sad and uneasy.

‘‘I don’t think they quite realise what war really involves . . .’’

Memories can fade when you are 95, but some of the things Lawrence Baldwin experienced fighting in the Pacific and Europe are not easily forgotten.

For Lawrence Baldwin, third from top left, his memories of Trentham Army Camp were of strict discipline and a Scots officer they called the Screaming Skull.

Fighting in Gallipoli and Europe was grim but when Frank Baldwin, left, and others underwent training at Trentham Army Camp the feeling was that they would be off on an adventure that would soon be over.