Vets at War

VETS AT WAR

Ian M. Parsonson, AM

Australian Military History Publications, 2005.  224pp.

This is a book likely to appeal only to specialists, either dedicated military historians, or veterinary surgeons interested in a now obscure aspect of their profession.  Both groups, unfortunately, are likely to find that it offers thin gruel indeed.

For the military historians, disappointment is likely to come from both the narrowness of focus – the descriptions of the AIF on the Western Front, for example, are largely based on the activities of the 5th Division – and the shallowness of the descriptions of events in Sinai and Palestine.  For the veterinarians, apart for some graphic descriptions of various diseases of horses, there seems to be little to expand their knowledge of their profession.

There are, perhaps, reasons for these deficiencies.  The concentration on the activities of the 5th Division, for example, might be the result of the DADVS of that Division, Max Henry, having left extensive written records.  Henry was also the principal source for the period of World War I up to the 1916 reorganisation of the AIF in Egypt, after Gallipoli, suggesting a dedication to keeping good records.  Perhaps his counterparts in the other divisions were not so enthusiastic?  Or maybe their records have gone astray?

In relation to the events in Sinai and Palestine, the romance of the Light Horse, and the stirring tales of Beersheba and other battles, mixed with the legends around T.E. Lawrence, may have drawn the author towards those events, rather than to the more mundane support provided by the Veterinary Corps.  For whatever reason, we are left with descriptions of battles that are too sketchy for the dedicated historian, and details of the veterinary activities that probably won’t satisfy the curious vet.

Perhaps, then, Mr Parsonson had to ‘make do’ with what he could find, and stretch that as far as he could.  In a slightly different context, he has headed part of an Appendix ‘Other Veterinarians from Australia Who Served in the Armed Services 1914-18’.  Only one of the persons mentioned was a vet before the war, the others received their qualifications later.  This is stretching the definition a bit, for the sake of a page of text, suggesting that the available sources are not particularly extensive!

While there is a bit more in the descriptions of the Boer War, those of the Second World War and the periods before and between the major wars are also unsatisfying.

The use of terminology is a source of annoyance.  Acronyms are expanded inconsistently (DADVS is variously Deputy Assistant Director, or Divisional Assistant Director, of Veterinary Services).  MVS comes out as Mobile Veterinary Section or Mobile Veterinary Service.  The reference to a ‘28th AVSE’ on page 92 is rather enigmatic, but from context seems to be a garbled version of the 28th Company AASC, mentioned with the 60th Battalion on pages 71 and 72.

Overall, while a history of the Australian Army Veterinary Corps is a necessary addition to the body of historiography of the Australian Army, this is not a high-grade book.

JOHN DONOVAN