DOWLING, Charles Ware (1893-1967)Charles Ware Dowling was born on the 25 August 1893, the son of John Ware Dowling and Jessie nee Dodd, and educated at Southport High School, Queensland, and then enrolled as a boarder at Geelong College in February 1910. His entry address was recorded as Bywong, Gundaroo, NSW. He was in the 1st Cricket XI and the 1st Football XVIII in 1911. The Register records him leaving in December 1911.
He enlisted (No 364) in the 8th Light Horse as a Trooper on 30 September 1914, embarked with the Second Contingent on
HMAT A16 Star of Victoria on 25 February 1915, and served in Egypt and on Gallipoli, being wounded on Walker’s Ridge on 28 June 1915, and invalided to Australia on 3 September 1915 on
HMT Ulysses. Shortly before his wounding, he was at the graveside when a fellow Old Collegian,
Major Ernest Albert Edward (1882-1915) was buried at Ari Burnu Cemetery, Anzac, on 27 June. On his return to Australia, and after recovering from his leg wound, he was appointed District Recruiting Sergeant on 14 February 1916. He was discharged from the AIF on 1 May 1916. In April 1919 he married Margaret Enid Wynne Douglass, second daughter of Henry Percival and Enid Mary Douglass, of Geelong.
Charles Dowling died on 24 January 1967.
Charles’s son, Tom Douglass Dowling (Old Geelong College, 1930-37) served in WWII and survived 3½ years as a POW 1942-5 in Singapore and along the Burma Railway.
Wynne Douglass’s younger brother, George Percival Douglass (Old Geelong Grammarian), enlisted in the AIF in 1914, and was invalided home in March 1915 from Egypt to Australia, suffering rheumatic fever. He travelled to England at his own expense, and entered the Officers’ Training Corps at St John’s Wood, obtaining his commission in July 1916. He served with 157th Brigade, Royal Field Artillery, and died on 25 August 1918 at No 62 Casualty Clearing Station, of wounds suffered the previous day. He was buried at Arneke British Cemetery, near Hazebrouck – Grave III E 23.
His father, John Ware Dowling (1857-1934) and brother,
John Ware Dowling (1891-1968), were also educated at Geelong College.
Sources: Based on an edited extract from Geelong Collegians at the Great War compiled by James Affleck. p181 (citing Alexander Henderson, Early Pioneer Families of Victoria and Riverina (1936); Australian War Memorial; James Affleck, Geelong Grammarians at the Great War; Pegasus; National Archives). Also based on an edited extract from Geelong Collegians at the Second World War and subsequent conflicts pp.197-8, (citing Pegasus; Australian War Memorial, Dowling Family Recollections).