People Australia

Robert Bage, by McGuffie's Studio, 1914

Australian War Memorial, HO6761

CAPTAIN EDWARD FREDERICK ROBERT BAGE

From East St. Kilda. Attended Melbourne Grammar School 1900-1904 - matriculated at 14 in 1902. Attended Trinity College while studying Civil Engineering. First class Honours in Chemistry and Exhibition in Surveying in 1905. Second Lieutenant in Corps. of Australian Engineers, 1909. Joined Mawson's Australasian Antarctic Expedition, 1911-1914, as Astronomer, Assistant Magnetician and Recorder of Tides. One of six volunteers for the relief party left in the Antarctic for a second winter, when Mawson and his companions had failed to return to winter quarters at the appointed time. Led a party on a perilous journey of 600 miles, man-hauling their sledge over rough blizzard-swept ice. Awarded the King's Polar Medal in 1915. Enlisted on August 25, 1914, as a Captain, second in command of the 3rd Field Company of Engineers. Took part in the Landing at Gallipoli. While marking out a trench line on May 7, 1915, he died near Lone Pine when he and his companions came under fire from five Turkish machine guns. He was buried at Beach Cemetery, Anzac. One of the most gifted of all MCC Members lost in the War. A contemporary remarked that he was "a real loss to the country and everyone who knew him". He was 27.