Sir John Monash

Sir John Monash

"I always tell my staff, 'I don't care a damn for your loyalty when you think I am right, the time I want it is when you think I am wrong.'"Sir John Monash

Time Line

1865

Born

His father Louis migrated to Melbourne in 1854, prospered as a merchant, was naturalized in 1856 and was secretary of the Deutscher Verein. He returned to Europe in 1863, married Bertha and the next year took her back to Melbourne.

For three years he attened St Stephens Church of England School at Richmond. But his dad had some losses so he attened public school.

He was given a state funeral, reputed to have drawn a crowd of more than 250,000. Monash was buried with Jewish rites in Brighton cemetery. The extensive commemorative tributes to Monash upon his death testified to the fact that he was widely revered by Australians.

He served in Gallipoli from the landing on 25 April to the evacuation on 19 December. In July 1916 Monash was promoted to Major General and given command of the 3rd Australian Division, which fought at Messines and Passchendaele.

After the war ended, Monash was appointed on 1 December 1918 as Director-General, Repatriation and Demobilisation. In less than nine months Monash organised the return of 160,000 Australian servicemen to Australia

Sir John Monash was born 27 June 1856 in West Melbourne. Eldest of three and only son of Louis Monash and his wife Bertha.

1854-1867

Migration

1871-1877

School education

1915-1920

1948

War life

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Several generations of John's paternal ancestors had lived Krotoschin and alomost one third of the town was Jewish.

Prussia (where his parents come from) had great speed in winning the battle in 1886 against Austria.

John had firmly decided to take arts and engineering at the University of Melbourne. His first-year lecturers did not excite him and he began his own course of concentrated reading at the Public Library of Victoria, mainly in English literature and history; he was also stage-struck, attending the theatre twice a week.