CAPTAIN A. O'H. WRIGHT KILLED.
27 March 1915
A cablegram from London received on March 18 by Messrs. Lyons & Leader, stated that Captain Allan O'Halloran Wright, who was well known in Adelaide, had been killed in action on Sunday, March 14, whilst fighting with his regiment in Northern France. The news was received by his many friends in Adelaide with deep regret. Captain Wright had been at the front since early in the war. He was adjutant of the Royal Irish Rifles, and was promoted to the rank of captain at the front in January. He was an admirable man in every way.
The youngest son of the late Mr. Frederick Wright, one-time manager of the National Bank of Australasia, in Adelaide, Captain Wright was born in this city on April 27, 1886. He received his early education at Queen's School and St. Peter's College, and entered on his military career at the age of 13, when he went to South Africa as trumpeter with the first South Australian contingent. In that campaign he received special mention by the late Lord Roberts as being the youngest Australian at the front. He served in three engagements, and received a medal with clasps from the hands of the Commander-in-Chief in London on December 17, 1901. After the war he began in 1902, a course at the Military Training College Bedford, England, and received his first commission as second lieutenant in the Sussex Artillery, on April 17, 1903, he then being 17 years of age.
He returned to South Australia in 1906, hoping to obtain a position in the permanent artillery, but as no opening offered he went back to the old country, and entered the Royal Irish Rifles, with which regiment he served for five years in India and Aden. He left the last named place on September 27 for the front.
His widowed mother is living in India, but his sister (Mrs. H. P. Gill) is in Adelaide, and his brother Norman is in the Adelaide Steamship's Company's service in Western Australia. He has several relatives in South Australia, including Mr. T. J. S. O'Halloran, S.M.
Mr. P. F. Leader recently received a letter from Captain Wright, written from the trenches, in Flanders, in which the writer said: — "I am looking forward to the eventual arrival here of the Australian division. I have seen several photographs of them. They are a magnificent looking lot of men, and their stay in Egypt will give the required finishing touches. They are just as well out of this part of the show, which is appalling, and would spoil any troops— just mud, slush, and rain, requiring patient and dogged 'sticking!' Nothing dashing or glorious like one reads in the books; but it is very fine the way the men generally are 'sticking it.' One has under these conditions to alter all one's previous outlook on life from the human standpoint, and survey it from the point of view of the common or garden worm, which burrows about in the mud as we do now. We shall not always be sticking here like this, and when we move I think you will find it will be as if the war had begun again. It will be divided into two distinct parts by the winter, and I think the second will be as furious as the first part. There can only be one result, but there will be some heavy work before the enemy are finally knocked out. It is a pity they cannot be drummed out of Europe. I'm proud of the old Commonwealth; they are British, with a big B, and have played the game magnificently."
1915 'THE ROLL OF HONOR.', Chronicle (Adelaide, SA : 1895 - 1954), 27 March, p. 42, viewed 12 August, 2014, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article95768899
27 March 1915
A cablegram from London received on March 18 by Messrs. Lyons & Leader, stated that Captain Allan O'Halloran Wright, who was well known in Adelaide, had been killed in action on Sunday, March 14, whilst fighting with his regiment in Northern France. The news was received by his many friends in Adelaide with deep regret. Captain Wright had been at the front since early in the war. He was adjutant of the Royal Irish Rifles, and was promoted to the rank of captain at the front in January. He was an admirable man in every way.
The youngest son of the late Mr. Frederick Wright, one-time manager of the National Bank of Australasia, in Adelaide, Captain Wright was born in this city on April 27, 1886. He received his early education at Queen's School and St. Peter's College, and entered on his military career at the age of 13, when he went to South Africa as trumpeter with the first South Australian contingent. In that campaign he received special mention by the late Lord Roberts as being the youngest Australian at the front. He served in three engagements, and received a medal with clasps from the hands of the Commander-in-Chief in London on December 17, 1901. After the war he began in 1902, a course at the Military Training College Bedford, England, and received his first commission as second lieutenant in the Sussex Artillery, on April 17, 1903, he then being 17 years of age.
He returned to South Australia in 1906, hoping to obtain a position in the permanent artillery, but as no opening offered he went back to the old country, and entered the Royal Irish Rifles, with which regiment he served for five years in India and Aden. He left the last named place on September 27 for the front.
His widowed mother is living in India, but his sister (Mrs. H. P. Gill) is in Adelaide, and his brother Norman is in the Adelaide Steamship's Company's service in Western Australia. He has several relatives in South Australia, including Mr. T. J. S. O'Halloran, S.M.
Mr. P. F. Leader recently received a letter from Captain Wright, written from the trenches, in Flanders, in which the writer said: — "I am looking forward to the eventual arrival here of the Australian division. I have seen several photographs of them. They are a magnificent looking lot of men, and their stay in Egypt will give the required finishing touches. They are just as well out of this part of the show, which is appalling, and would spoil any troops— just mud, slush, and rain, requiring patient and dogged 'sticking!' Nothing dashing or glorious like one reads in the books; but it is very fine the way the men generally are 'sticking it.' One has under these conditions to alter all one's previous outlook on life from the human standpoint, and survey it from the point of view of the common or garden worm, which burrows about in the mud as we do now. We shall not always be sticking here like this, and when we move I think you will find it will be as if the war had begun again. It will be divided into two distinct parts by the winter, and I think the second will be as furious as the first part. There can only be one result, but there will be some heavy work before the enemy are finally knocked out. It is a pity they cannot be drummed out of Europe. I'm proud of the old Commonwealth; they are British, with a big B, and have played the game magnificently."
1915 'THE ROLL OF HONOR.', Chronicle (Adelaide, SA : 1895 - 1954), 27 March, p. 42, viewed 12 August, 2014, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article95768899