PRECEDE
In the middle of last year two local historians discovered an unmarked Berwick grave belonged to highly decorated Gallipoli veteran Brigadier-General Cecil Henry Foott, CB, CMG. He had lain there anomymously for more than 70 years. The Narre Warren and District Family History Group joined forces with the Berwick RSL and the Berwick and Harkaway Cemeteries Trust set about righting that wrong and on Saturday 11 April a new headstone was unveiled. At that ceremony, the history group’s vice-president Steven Smith read the following account of Brig-Gen Foott’s life.
BRIGADIER-General Cecil Henry Foott, CB, CMG, was a soldier all his life. While the man buried here saw much death and suffering during the Great War, he has had the misfortune of almost being forgotten in death, lying for many years in an unmarked grave.
Cecil was born on 16 January 1876, in Burke, New South Wales. He was the elder of two sons born to Irish-born stock inspector Thomas Wade Foott and his Scottish-born wife, Mary Hannay Black.
Mary Foott was a renowned teacher, journalist and poet. Upon her husband’s death, she moved to Queensland with her two sons, and became editor of the women’s page for the “Queenslander”. It was during this period she also wrote the majority of her poems, and in 1885 a collection of them, “Where the Pelican Builds and Other Poems” was published.
Cecil went to school in Toowoomba, then Brisbane Grammar School and later qualified as a mechanical engineer.
He began his military career in March 1895, commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Queensland Militia Garrison Artillery. After Federation, in July 1901, he was promoted to captain in the newly-formed Royal Australian Artillery.
That same year, 1901, Cecil married Isobel Agnes McDonald in Moorooka, Queensland. Isobel studied art under Frederick McCubbin at the National Gallery School in Melbourne.
She was also known to Tom Roberts, who painted her portrait in 1895. She exhibited some of her work with the Queensland Art Society. Cecil and Isobel had three children between 1902 and 1908, Celia, Thomas and Sydney.
In 1902, Cecil transferred to the newly formed Corps of Royal Australian Engineers, but remained in Queensland as staff officer, engineer services. He went to England for technical training in 1908 and on returning to Australia, was staff officer and commander, Royal Australian Engineers in Victoria between 1909-’10 and was promoted to the rank of major.
His next posting was to Army Headquarters, Melbourne, where in 1910-’11, he was director of works and in 1911-’12, director of engineers. He attended the Staff College in Camberley, England, in 1912-’13 and in 1914 was attached to the British Army in England for further training.
When war broke out, General Bridges requested him as deputy adjutant and quartermaster-general for the 1st AIF. The staff division handled administration and logistics.
After General Bridges was mortally wounded at Gallipoli, Cecil was reposted with the division as assistant adjutant and quartermaster-general, he held this appointment for the next two years. Determined to supply his men with proper provisions, he is known to have made his feelings felt when obstacles were placed in his way.
The event that was to become the annual Waterloo Dinner, came about because Lt-Col C.H. Foott wanted to have a dinner to celebrate the completion of the first pier at Anzac Cove, constructed by a party of the 2nd Australian Field Company under Lt S.H. (Stan) Watson RAE.
When the English brass vetoed the idea, Cecil asked could he have a dinner to celebrate the battle of Waterloo. This was granted, so on 18 June 1915, a dinner was held in his dugout that evening to celebrate both the completion of the pier and the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo. At the celebration that evening it was decided the pier would be named Watson’s Pier.
The dinner was attended by six Royal Australian Engineer officers, six Royal Engineer officers and one non-sapper officer (one of the regular occupants of the dugout).
The first known Waterloo Dinner to be held after 1915, was held in Melbourne in 1924. It seems probable that the Annual Corps Dinner that year was programmed on Waterloo Day on Cecil’s suggestion, as a result of his attendance at the original Gallipoli Dinner and of his recognition of the significance of that first gathering of Royal Australian Engineers officers on active service.
In 1917 Cecil was transferred to AIF depots in Britain and in 1918 was posted to France as the Australian Corps Chief Engineer working under Sir John Monash. After the war Cecil was appointed deputy director general of the AIF Department of Repatriation and Demobilisation in London, also under Monash.
During his war service, Cecil was mentioned in dispatches six times, and was decorated twice by England and was also awarded the Order of the Eagle Second Class with Swords, by the King of Serbia.
War historian, Charles Bean, described him as ‘a man of educated tastes, fine intellect and an officer of great ability who became one of the notable figures in the Australian Imperial Force’.
Returning to Australia in 1919, he subsequently held a number of important military posts, and was Aide De Camp to the Governor-General from 1921 to 1924. In 1927 he was made an additional Aide De Camp to His Majesty the King.
The post-war era which Cecil faced as a regular officer in the Australian Military Forces was one of economy in Defence, with few prospects of promotion. In October 1920, as a colonel and honorary brigadier-general, he joined the newly formed Australian Staff Corps, then in 1922-25 served as a colonel in various posts at Army Headquarters in the quartermaster general’s branch.
In 1926 he was posted to Queensland, where he was given, concurrently and temporarily, for the next four years, three command appointments, including that of base commandant, 1st Military District.
By late 1929, the Depression had forced further cuts in military spending. In August 1930, Cecil was transferred from Queensland to Victoria to be temporary commander of the 4th Australian Division, as well as temporary commandant and base commandant of the 3rd Military District.
A year later, in July 1931, at the age of 55, he was transferred to the reserve of officers, his army career ended; although it was not until February 1936 that he was officially placed on the retired list as an honorary brigadier-general.
In Cecil’s personal life, his wife Isobel died in 1926.
On returning to Victoria, he moved to Upper Beaconsfield, and resided in “Lytton”, a 30-acre property purchased from Basil Morris on Foott Road, and in 1934 married Agnita Regnier Cogan, the sister of Basil Morris’s wife Audrey.
Cecil was an active member of the local community and in March 1934 was appointed a trustee of the Upper Beaconsfield Public Hall and Children’s Playground. He was also a member of the local lodge, No 339.
In 1939 we find Cecil is president of the Berwick RSL and the Pakenham Gazette reports on 28 April that he placed a wreath during the Anzac Day service. Cecil died of a coronary occlusion on 27 June 1942 and was buried here in Berwick Cemetery.
