John Wilmot Roberts R.A.N.V.R.
8 September 1918 - 5 September 2019
“Count your life by smiles
Not tears;
Count your age by friends
Not years”
- John Lennon
John Roberts (also known as Jack) was born on 8 September 1918 in his parent’s home in Awaba Street Mosman.
His father, Henry William Roberts who had grown up in North Sydney and his mother, Dora Eardley Wilmot were married at Christ Church Lavender Bay, North Sydney in 1910. His brother, Lindsay was four years his elder. John’s father, Henry, was Chief Draughtsman, Surveys, Land Titles in the Registrar Generals Department, Sydney.
In 1924 the family moved to Lavoni Street, near Balmoral Beach to the home his father had drawn the plans for and had designed. John lived there until April, 1948 when he married Margaret Mackenzie at St Augustine’s Church Neutral Bay. They then moved to Oswald St, Mosman, as newly-weds.
Then in 1959 he with his wife and three young daughters moved to Wyong Rd Mosman, where he continued to reside for the rest of his life.
John was always thankful that his father had chosen Mosman as the place for his family to live. In later years John was able to serve as President of the Mosman Historical Society.
John commenced school in 1924 at 5 years of age at Mosman Infants and then in 1926 went to Mosman Public School (Primary). While at Mosman Public School he played the fife in the Drum and Fife Band. On Fridays the Drum and Fife band would lead the school as they marched to Balmoral Baths for swimming.
As a young boy he enjoyed riding his scooter up and down Mandalong Road. On Saturday mornings he would grocery shop for his mother and then ride downhill using the heels of his shoes as brakes. His main activity was swimming at Balmoral Baths and exploring with his friends through the bush to Mosman golf links (where H.M.A.S. Penguin is now) and around to Chowder Bay and George’s Heights, swimming, playing and looking at old fortifications.
He also enjoyed attending musicals that his mother took him to. On Sunday afternoons in John’s youth, many in the community would gather to hear the municipal band at Balmoral Rotunda play selections from Gilbert and Sullivan.
After primary school age he played junior Rugby Union and he loved sailing and joined the Middle Harbour 16 foot sailing club. He joined the Navy League who trained boys to be young sailors. The Navy League had a depot at Mosman Bay and a direct link to the Royal Australian Navy and the boys dressed in full Naval dress with caps and collars. He learnt seamanship and sailing in a whaler and would row out on Sydney Harbour.
In 1930 he went to Neutral Bay Intermediate High and obtained the Intermediate Certificate (3rd Year) in 1932, the same year that the Sydney Harbour Bridge opened. Whilst at Neutral Bay Intermediate High a classmate of John’s was Sumner Locke Elliot, the Australian author and playwright, who at the age of 12 years to 14 years was writing and producing plays. John was amongst those who acted in Sumner’s plays and they won a theatre competition at a school end of year play night
During his youth, nearly all sport was amateur and the clubs carried the word amateur in their names eg Balmoral Amateur Swimming Club, North Sydney Amateur Swimming Club. John remembered Australia’s leading Olympic and ‘Empire’ Games swimmer, Noel Ryan from Manly who worked in the Commonwealth Bank and did his training at Manly Baths before and after a full days work at the Bank. Later sport became a professional business.
In 1933 John commenced at North Sydney Boys’ High School where he obtained his Leaving Certificate and was made a prefect. While at school the subjects he enjoyed studying the most were Latin and Science.
At North Sydney Boys High in 1934 he won the Combined High Schools 220 yards and 440 yards Junior ( under 16 years) Swimming Championships and played in First XV Rugby, Water Polo and Second XI Cricket Teams. He also played Rugby Union with the Mosman Rugby Club and Northern Suburbs Rugby Club. He swam and played water polo for the Balmoral Amateur Swimming Club, his favourite club.
In 1935, still during the Great Depression, John, at the age of 16 years, was offered a position by the Bank of New South Wales (now Westpac) and started work in March that year at Oxford Street, Sydney. Subsequently, before joining the Royal Australian Navy, he worked at branches in the City and Manly including the Bathurst and George Streets branch in 1940 where he met Margaret Mackenzie who later became his wife.
Five days before his 21st birthday, on 3rd September, 1939 War was declared and he was called-up as part of “ The 1918 Group ” for Army Service - Militia Home Defence. They were called “Universal Trainees” and were required to enrol for Army training and service for Home defence in units as allocated. In January 1940 he was enlisted as a Sapper, Royal Australian Engineers, 52nd Anti-Aircraft Searchlight Company and taken from the enlistment point, Moore Park Barracks, by bus to North Head Artillery Barracks, Manly, for introductory and initial Army training. After about three weeks of drill, marching, rifle and bayonet he and his new fellow sappers were transported by bus to Middle Harbour, Mosman where their
accommodation was canvas tents pitched on the ninth fairway of Mosman Golf Course (taken over by the Military). He became a Corporal and was a Detachment Commander in charge of a detachment comprising 8 men, mobile searchlight (transported by truck), power generator (towed by truck) plus a rifle each. The Detachments were to provide searchlights to illuminate attacking planes for the A.A. Guns in the event of a night time air raid on the ports of Newcastle, Sydney and Port Kembla, principally when troopships were anchored.
From then until March 1942, he was in and out of Service between the Army and the Bank, serving with Searchlights at Clarendon (near Richmond), Wollongong, and Newcastle.
Over this time he had also qualified as Associate of the Australian Society of Accountants (A.A.S.A.)
The Japanese had been broadcasting that they would bomb the Sydney Harbour Bridge and at the beginning of 1942, still with Searchlights, John was with a detachment stationed at the top of the South-West pylon of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. They did not have searchlights but were equipped with Lewis machine guns. There were detachments similarly stationed on each of the other three pylons. On top of each pylon is a central blockhouse and that is where they lived and slept on straw mattresses on the concrete floor. Outside the blockhouse is a narrow walkway and a parapet around the four sides and that is where the guns were mounted. The maintenance painters allowed them to use their showers and toilets. The army cookhouse was at the ground level inside the base of the pylon at Dawes Point and inside each pylon, a metal stairway of 300 steps from ground to top. That meant that for all meals 300 steps were descended and then 300 steps climbed back three times a day. Those stationed on the northern pylons had to walk the length of the bridge span each way as well as handle the 600 steps. John left the Harbour Bridge Pylons when, in March 1942, he received his long awaited call up from the Navy.
The previous September in 1941 John had applied for enlistment in the Royal Australian Navy and was accepted, but as intake was limited to small numbers, his name was put on a waiting list. Finally in March 1942 the Navy called and he went off as an Ordinary Seaman to H.M.A.S. “Cerberus”, Flinders Naval Depot, Crib Point, Victoria for New Entry Training. At the end of the initial seamans’ training he was selected for the Officers’ Training School at Flinders and became a Leading Cadet rating. On 9 November, 1942 he was commissioned Sub. Lieutenant, The Royal Australian Naval Volunteer Reserve (R.A.N.V.R.) with promotion in due course to Lieutenant. Firstly he was required to complete a specialised Anti- Submarine Officers’ course at H.M.A.S. “Rushcutter”, Rushcutters Bay, Sydney.
From February 1943 he served as both Anti Submarine Control Officer and later as First Lieutenant in H.M.A.S. “Yandra”- (a converted merchant ship about 800 tons) and H.M.A.S. “Bunbury” (a corvette/mine-sweeper about 600 tons) at sea on convoy escort duties, patrols and mine-sweeping in Pacific Ocean, Indian Ocean, Tasman Sea, Coral Sea, Gulf of Carpentaria, and north of Papua-New Guinea, Halmaheras, Celebes towards Borneo.
H.M.A.S. “Yandra” operated as an escort to convoys sailing between Brisbane and Melbourne off the east coast, in which area during 1942 and 1943 twenty Allied
ships were sunk by Japanese torpedo and 17 damaged by gunfire and more than 450 lives lost.
H.M.A.S. Bunbury carried out anti-submarine patrols in the Indian Ocean, across the top of Gulf of Carpentaria to New Guinea waters and assisted with bombardment of Japanese entrenchments near Madang and Wewak.
After cessation of War John returned to Sydney to join the 20th Minesweeping Flotilla working off the East Coast down to Bass Strait. In February,1946 he was appointed Executive Officer in charge of H.M.A.S. “Magnetic”, the Navy’s Shore base at Townsville, North Queensland.
Finally in September 1946 he requested and was granted demobilisation and returned to Sydney and home.
In 1946, on his return, John resumed his career with the Bank of NSW and subsequently qualified as Associate Chartered Institute of Secretaries (A.C.I.S.) Just a year after returning home from the Navy, John was faced with the deep sadness of the death in 1947 of Lindsay, his dear brother.
John would march on Anzac Days. He last marched in 2018 just a few months short of his 100th birthday and he was able to march unassisted.
In April 1948 John married Margaret Mackenzie at St Augustine’s Church Neutral Bay where he later served on the Parish Council for 25 years from the 1960’s to 1980’s and Treasurer for 20 years. John was St Augustine’s Synod Representative for 10 years. He and Margaret’s three daughters were Christened and Confirmed at St Augustine’s.
John met many friends whilst serving in the Navy. One good friend became Best Man at John’s wedding and he in turn played the same role at his friend’s wedding. Both couples together enjoyed going to the Opera, Ballet and attending Balls which were held at The Trocadero in George Street, Sydney with the Big Band Jazz orchestras of the 1940’s. In later years John and Margaret regularly enjoyed attending Sydney performances of the Australian Ballet.
John also had enjoyed bushwalking, camping and climbing Mt Bogong and traversing the Bogong High Plains. Later, John would take his family on bush walks in the Blue Mountains particularly around Blackheath.
John had become involved as a volunteer in the early days of the Mosman District Hospital (later known as the Mosman Private Hospital). His family doctor, who had also served in the Navy as a Naval surgeon, wanted to set up a hospital for post-war young brides to have their babies. John and some other patients volunteered to clean up the grounds and a building that had been left derelict. Over a period of 18 months he, along with a variety of people from other areas of Sydney, enjoyed meeting on Saturday afternoons to help with roof repairs, installing new guttering, dismantling chimneys, painting outside and inside.
John served in the Bank of NSW Branches and the Investment Division. His main appointments with the Bank were Assistant Manager, King and Castlereagh Streets Branch 1962- 1968 and Manager, (Affiliations) and Manager Administration of the Investment Division at the time of his retirement.
In 1975 John received an Award from the Bank’s Managing Director for 40 years of distinguished service. John was responsible for managing and reporting on the bank’s direct equity investments in other companies and one of those investments was in Old Sydney Town - a recreation of Sydney as it was in the early 1800’s.
John was well liked and highly regarded by his colleagues, staff and the Bank’s clients. He made many friends within the organisation.
On 20 January 1982 John’s beloved wife, Margaret passed away. She was the love of his life and it was agonising and heartbreaking that she was taken from him, the family and friends so early. John was on leave looking after Margaret when she passed away.
On February 26 1982 John retired as Senior Manager after 47 years of distinguished service to the Bank of NSW.
John and Margaret’s three daughters all had attended S.C.E.G.G.S. Redlands. John was a founding member of the Parents and Friends Association in 1960. He and Margaret were both members and John became Treasurer, Secretary and then President in 1973/1974.
During this time the Church Council, running all the S.C.E.G.G.S. Schools, were in serious financial trouble and had secretly decided to close and sell S.C.E.G.G.S. Redlands and use the proceeds to bale themselves out of their situation. John, together with John Lang and Bruce Adams set about to save the School. Their determination, courage and perseverance saved the School from being sold.
After the death of his wife and his retirement from the Bank in 1982 John continued with his involvement and kept very busy as Trustee, Company Secretary, Treasurer and Director on the Board of SCECGS Redlands Ltd. He attended every Foundation Day (up to and including 2019) and all the Annual General Meetings of the Redlands Company (up to and including 2018).
John was always grateful for the recognition of his wife in the naming of The Margaret Roberts Preparatory School which was officially opened in July 1983. Then in August 2011 he was deeply honoured to open the new Margaret Roberts Preparatory School which had re-located to the School’s Junior Campus, Murdoch Street. He attended, with his daughter Penelope, the Preparatory School ‘Presentation Days’ held in the Robert Dunnet Hall and greatly enjoyed listening to the music and singing and watching the presentations.
In August 2018, just a few days before his 100th birthday, John opened The John Roberts Centre incorporating the Music Centre. John was again grateful and honoured for his name to be associated with this ‘superb’ educational facility. His opening address referred to the Music Centre as following a succession of developments by Parents since acquisition of the School. He felt this had it’s ‘genesis’ since the formation of the Parents and Friends Association in 1960 and from that time Redlands has had successive groups of parents actively involved in the progress and development of the School. In his address John also mentioned ‘regretfully not being a musician’ but having fond memories that 90 years ago he had played the fife in the Drum and Fife band of Mosman Primary School.
John regarded the value and importance of a ‘Partnership of Trust’ between Parents and the School, Teachers and Children as a principle of the School’s success. John’s association with Redlands and the wonderful people who made up it's community gave him a sense of belonging to something worthwhile and enriched the years. His special friendship with John Lang, Bruce and Marcia Adams that formed in the 1970’s continued throughout all the years to 2019.
John kept an active social life and enjoyed meeting friends for lunch and dinner, sailing, attending the theatre, concerts and cinema. He attended reunions with H.M.A.S. Yandra and H.M.A.S. Bunbury. John travelled to the USA and spent time visiting a good friend who had served in the Australian Airforce in WWII and then settled in North Carolina with his wife.
John was also a Director of the Vasey Housing Association of N.S.W. The Association was set up to provide independent living accommodation for War Widows. Mrs Isobel Humphrey, who had been the former Headmistress of S.C.E.G.G.S. Redlands, was a founding member of the Association. She had lost her father in the 1st World War and her husband in the 2nd World War. When John became a widower she suggested he could help so he joined as a member and was elected to the Board in 1985. He served as a Director for 15 years and was a Member of the Finance Committee for 27 years.
Following the death of Margaret, his wife, John became a founding member of the St Lukes, (Elizabeth Bay) Hospital Foundation which formed in 1982 to raise funds toward the cost of establishing a residential aged care facility, now Lulworth House and hospital operating theatres.
In 2001, John had to suffer the passing of his eldest daughter, Margaret. John, even with great personal loss, continued to live a wholehearted life and gave happiness, support and companionship to many people. He never flinched at helping others ‘along the way’.
Close family relatives from Margaret, his wife’s side of the family, shared many enjoyable occasions and celebrations with “Uncle Jack” as they fondly called him..
John, at the age of 100 years also enjoyed a daily walk within the neighbourhood which, apart from exercise, was an opportunity for him to speak with neighbours. He attended St Peters Church, Cremorne each month where he enjoyed the music and caring friendship.
John’s second daughter, Jennifer and husband, Donald, have two sons, Kenneth and Lachlan, John’s grandsons. They regularly kept in touch and visited from Queensland.
His youngest daughter, Penelope, still living in Sydney, frequently spent time with John.
In 2017 she moved back home to provide caring support and help John continue living in his own home.
In many ways John lived by the mottos of the Schools he attended and was associated with and also by the values of the Royal Australian Navy.
Neutral Bay Intermediate:
“Play the Game”
North Sydney Boys High:
“Vincit qui se vincit”
(He conquers who conquers himself)
S.C.E.C.G.S. Redlands:
“Luceat Lux Vestra”
(Let Your Light Shine)
Values of The Royal Australian Navy:
Honour, Honesty, Courage, Integrity, Loyalty.
John’s Light Shines On
- Penelope Roberts
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