'Nothing left in this world to mother'
When Emily Mary Elizabeth Delo wrote a letter, giving her permission for her 18-year-old son John 'Jack' Alfred Alston Delo to join the expeditionary forces, we can only guess at the nerves and concern this action must have kick-started.
Emily's letter giving consent for Jack to go to war. Source: National Archives of Australia.
She and husband, Joshua Harris Delo, were raising Jack in the early 1900s in Adelaide, South Australia.
At the outbreak of World War One, Jack was in the Citizen's Forces and keen to enlist in the Expeditionary Forces that would head overseas. The Citizen Army was made up of young 'boy conscripts' under the Compulsory Training Scheme set up in 1911.
Now the young lad was signing up for the real deal and he enlisted with the 1st Auxiliary, previously the 16th Battalion, and by 1916 he was in Greece. His time overseas was marked with a few hospital visits, mainly it seems for issues with veneral disease.
In August 1916, he was transferred to 11th Field Artillery as a gunner, but sadly by January of 1917, young Jack, Emily's only son and family, was killed when a shell struck the gunpit he was in.
Emily was understandably devastated and her heartbreak is recorded in history when she inserted a small article in the South Australian Chronicle on the first anniversary of his death:
DELO, John Alfred Alston, Gunner 11th Field
Artillery Howitzer, killed in action on 14th of
January, 1917, age 19 years 4 weeks 13 days,
at Fleurs, France, by shell striking gunpit. Died
at the post of duty.
No matter how I pray, dear Jack,
No matter how I call,
There is nothing left in this world to mother,
But your photo, on the wall.
Your mother's part is a broken heart to end
her days. —Inserted by his heart-broken mother.
Jack had been a late baby for Emily, as she would have given birth to him around 1897 when she was 37 years old. After his death, she lost her husband Joshua in 1920, then moved from South Australia to Melbourne where she died in 1926.
The outline of Emily Mary Elizabeth's unmarked grave. Source: Findagrave
Emily is buried in an unmarked grave in Fawkner Memorial Park.
References
'Births, Marriages, Deaths', Chronicle, Adelaide, Saturday, 12 Jan 1918, Page 27
'Emily Mary Elizabeth Delo', Findagrave, accessed 2nd August, 2024, Photos of Emily Mary Elizabeth Delo - Find a Grave Memorial
'Citizen Army', National Museum Australia, accessed 2nd August, 2024, Citizen army | National Museum of Australia (nma.gov.au)
'John Alfred Alston Delo', National Archives of Australia, accessed 3rd August, 2024, Home page | naa.gov.au
'John Alfred Alston Delo', Birth index - SA Genealogy, accessed 3rd August, 2024, SA Births - Births, deaths and marriages - LibGuides at State Library of South Australia (slsa.sa.gov.au)
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