Walter Edmond (Edmund) Smith, (30 March 1895 – 1976) was an Australian Army officer and industrialist who fought in both World Wars. In the First World War, he served in the Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force north-east of Australia in the New Guinea area then in the Australian Imperial Force on the Western Front from 1916 to 1918. In the Second World War, as a brigadier, he commanded the first force deployed in the New Guinea Campaign, Australia's most important military campaign. During this campaign, he opposed elements of Australian military policy, and his name was omitted from the official Australian history of the New Guinea Campaign. In civilian life he founded Australian engineering firm WE Smith Marine and General Engineer in 1922 (later WE Smith Engineering Pty Ltd) which he managed continuously – except for the period during the Second World War that he undertook full-time military service – until his retirement in the 1970s.
Early life and career
Walter Smith was born in Sydney on 30 March 1895. On finishing secondary school, he was apprenticed to marine and general engineering firm, Nicol Brothers, Darling Harbour, Sydney.
First World War
Shortly after the outbreak of First World War, Smith enlisted in the Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force (AN&MEF). In September 1914, the AN&MEF was dispatched to occupy the German Protectorate of New Guinea, which was administered from Rabaul on the island of New Britain north-east of New Guinea. The operation was Australia's first military engagement of the war and in October, after a brief period of fighting, the Australians secured their objectives. The AN&MEF's six-month tour of duty ended in February 1915 and Smith subsequently enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force (AIF). He was too late to serve at Gallipoli, but went on to serve on the Western Front from 1916 to 1918 as part of the 14th Infantry Brigade, seeing action in a number of battles including Fromelles in 1916, Polygon Wood in 1917, and Mont St Quentin and Péronne in 1918. He was awarded the Military Cross twice, and was recommended for the Distinguished Service Order. He was also mentioned in General Sir John Monash's, The Australian Victories in France in 1918, and in the official Australian history of the First World War in Europe. During his time on the Western Front, Smith was hospitalised several times, being wounded by machine-gun fire, shrapnel, and poison gas, and also suffering from trench foot, a form of frostbite.
Inter-war years
After the war, Smith returned to Sydney where he married Gladys Emily Bullot. In 1922, he founded a company called WE Smith Marine and General Engineer, based in Argyle Street, in The Rocks. Walter and Gladys had three children: Winifred (Win), Elizabeth (Beth) and John.
Smith was a lifelong friend of John Ridley, who had served as a Lewis gunner with Smith during the war. Ridley, who had been shot through the neck during the Battle of Fromelles, became a street preacher and was instrumental in converting Sydney identity, Arthur Stace, to Christianity.
Between the wars, Smith maintained his links with the military, serving in the part-time forces, the Australian Citizen Military Forces (CMF), based at Victoria Barracks, Sydney.
Second World War
On 23 October 1939, just after the outbreak of the Second World War, Smith was promoted to the rank of brigadier and appointed commander of the Australian 14th Infantry Brigade, a militia unit with members drawn mainly from rural New South Wales and Canberra. Until April 1942, the brigade was tasked with coastal defence of Australia's main war production centres stretching from Port Kembla (steel production) about 110 kilometres south of Sydney to Newcastle (coal extraction) about 160 kilometres north. It was also responsible for providing conscripts with training in the Picton, Casula, Greta, Holsworthy, and Tomago areas near Sydney.
The brigade's War Diary records that a week before the Battle of the Coral Sea of 4–7 May 1942, it was ordered on 29 April to move from Tomago near Newcastle to Greta in preparation for embarkation to Port Moresby, New Guinea. The Battle of the Coral Sea saw the Japanese suffer a heavy naval defeat, which forced them to refocus their efforts on securing Port Moresby by an overland attack across the Owen Stanley Range along the Kokoda Track from beachheads in the Buna–Gona–Sanananda area of north-east Papua New Guinea.