I’m kicking this off with my favourite Victoria Cross recipient, Albert Jacka. In a land where even the plant life has confirmed kills, Albert Jacka stands the biggest and baddest mother fucker of them all.
Before he became the head crushing, scrotum-eviscerating, Australian war hero we know today, Albert Jacka was born on a dairy farm near Winchelsea, Victoria in 1893. He attended school as all kids do, before turning 13 where he decided that he had had enough of that nonsense and became a labourer with his father. Then, when that seemed too safe of a job for a young teenager, Jacka took up a job in the Victorian State Forests, lopping down eucalyptus trees with saw and axe.
In 1914, when word came his way that the entire world had descended into chaos and declared war on each other, 21-year-old Albert Jacka decided he wasn’t going to miss his opportunity to skewer the Kings enemies on the end of his bayonet. On 08 September 1914, Albert Jacka marched straight down to the recruitment centre and signed his life away. 10 days later, Albert Jacka had his first run in with army incompetence, where he discovered that the recruitment centre had lost his paperwork. Albert Jacka sprinted straight down and signed his life away AGAIN presumably threatening grievous bodily harm to whatever unlucky sod stood in the way of his chance to bash some enemy skulls in.
After completing boot camp and most likely terrifying some Recruit Instructors, Jacka was assigned to the 14th Battalion and shipped off to Egypt to defend the Suez Canal. When the enemy failed to go to Jacka, Jacka decided to go to them. In April 1915, they shipped Jacka and the rest of the Australian Imperial Force to a fun little Turkish peninsula called Gallipoli.
On 25 April 1915, the Aussies, Kiwis, and presumably some other people hit the beaches of the Dardanelles hard, carving out enough space for boats to come ashore before slogging it further up the hillsides against heavily armed, battle-hardened Turks. The Turks weren’t fucking around either, this land was theirs and they intended to keep it.
On 19 May of the same year, the Turkish launched a general attack to push the Australians back into the sea from whence they came. They seized about ten metres of trench line. Albert Jacka and the rest of the ANZACs agreed that ten metres was ten too many so the Lieutenant in charge decided to lead a counter attack. The man was dead before he could climb over the trench line. The poor bugger was shot straight between the eyes before he could even get out a “follow me men!” or “attack!”. The charge was over before it began. Jacka the young digger decided to take charge, and lead another assault. This too failed, with two men taking bullets to their guts and Albert Jacka dragging them back to safety (both ended up surviving the war thanks to his actions). With these two attacks failing, Jacka knew they would need to act quickly or risk his platoon going up in a blaze of fire.
The plan Jacka came up with should have been suicidal… If it were conducted by anyone else. Someone with more sanity or self-preservation. Jacka’s plan involved positioning his mates on one side of the trench hurling grenades, firing weapons and generally making as much chaos and destruction to the Turkish lines as they possibly could whilst he dragged himself through the mud, blood and guts of no man’s land before leaping feet first into hell and clearing the entire Turkish trench by himself. Jacka shot five men and bayoneted two more, before chasing off the rest presumably because they feared being squashed by the massive testicles between the man’s legs.
Reinforcements didn’t arrive until the next morning. This wasn’t because they were lazy or slow or unorganized, but because they rightfully assumed Jacka was dead. No man could have surived that right? Well thanks to the foresight of history we know that Albert Jacka wasn’t any old bloke down the street. This man was the Aussie reincarnation of the Achilles, his hands made for war. This left Jacka to hold off an entire Turkish counter attack himself in what must have been an unbelievable display of onslaught and fury. When his Commanding Officer finally reached the captured trench, he found Jacka sitting there by himself amid a pile of corpses with a cigarette in his mouth. All he said was, “Well, I got the beggars, Sir.”
Albert Jacka was promoted to Lance Corporal, Corporal and then Sergeant faster than they could sew the bloody rank onto his uniform. Jacka was then awarded the Victoria Cross personally by King George V. He was the first Australian Victoria Cross recipient of WWI. Before the year was out he was promoted to Company Sergeant Major and then Second Lieutenant in early 1916.
Medals and promotions weren’t enough to make Albert Jacka decide to settle down and have an easy life by the countryside. The King still had enemies that needed killing, and there was no man better at it than him. In 1916, Jacka requested to be transferred to the western front, going from one bloody campaign to another. Jacka’s 14th Battalion suffered 5,285 casualties after just three days of fighting and capturing Pozieres. The fight was so bloody and the ground was so churned up that by the end, the only way the Australians could identity their own trenches or the bodies of their comrades was their red-and-white shoulder patches. The ANZAC’s would then lose 23,000 men in the span of 45 days assaulting the German Hindenburg Line, and once again, Jacka found himself right in the middle of a fucked up situation that could only be improved with insane amounts of luck, excessive use of violence and non-existent care for one’s own safety.
On a beautiful summers morning while resting on the French countryside Albert Jacka was rudely awoken by the explosion of a live grenade being thrown into his dugout. Shrapnel pasted overhead killing two men but sparing Jacka. He responded by pulling his revolver from its holster and turning the German’s face into red mulch. Jacka emerged from his dug-out to find that the Germans had snuck up and overrun the Australian position during the night, and Jacka and his men were now 250 yards behind enemy lines. Ahead, a Company of German soldiers were escorting 40 unarmed Australian infantrymen off as prisoners of war.
A rational man would have looked at his situation and may have realised the fight was done and the only way he and his seven remaining men were walking out of this alive was by surrendering. Albert Jacka wasn’t a rational man. When Albert Jacka walked through the valley of the shadow of death, death turned tail and ran, as he would soon demonstrate. Jacka rallied his seven remaining men and lead a charge on the German Company. Heavy hand-to-hand fighting ensued and every member of his platoon was shot and wounded. Jacka himself was wounded seven times; including from a bullet that passed through his body under his right shoulder and another to the fucking throat and two more grazing the side of his head. Jacka’s skull must have been made from fucking iron though because he kept fighting, killing 12 Germans in the process. Soon the Aussie POW’s had joined in on the fun and overwhelmed the enemy. 50 Germans were taken prisoner and the tides had changed. Now once again, a rational man might have said “wow, I’ve just been shot in the head twice, I have a bit of a headache, I might have a sit down and a breather now” but the job wasn’t done and Jacka and his Aussie infantrymen went on to take back their position before the day was done. For this, Jacka received the Military Cross and was promoted to Captain. Many present at the time, as well as many historians believe that Jacka would have received a second Victorian Cross if he had not been so insubordinate to his superior officers. Yep, Jacka’s not giving a fuck attitude likely cost him, his second VC. I never knew the man but I doubt he gave a fuck about those snobby Generals thought anyway.
After once again defying the odds and surviving, Jacka was evacuated to England to be treated for his wounds before quickly getting bored out of his mind and requesting to be sent back to the Hindenburg Line with the 14th Battalion.
Jacka was now the 14th Battalions intelligence officer. Jacka found looking at maps and filing paperwork incredibly arduous and tedious work which lead him to be very hands on with the job role, often conducting reconnaissance himself. In April 1917, Jacka led a night reconnaissance party into no man’s land near Bullecourt to inspect enemy defences, and set a path for advancing soldiers who would be assaulting the German lines the following day. Jacka penetrated the wiring at two places, and began to lay tapes to guide infantry. The work was almost complete when a two man German patrol stumbled across them. Jacka knew that they must be killed or captured to prevent them reporting what they had seen. Jacka pulled his pistol from his holster but it misfired. Before the Germans could get a shot off, Jacka had already rushed them, beat their faces to a bloody pulp and dragged them both by their ankles kicking and screaming through the mud back to Aussie lines. Jacka hadn’t called it a night yet. To ensure the assault was a success, Jacka then guided tanks to rendezvous and placed them into position for battle, all whilst under the constant bombardment of enemy 5.9 battery fire. He then guided the 14th Battalion into position which resulted in several trips through enemy machine gun and shell fire. For his actions throughout the night, Jacka was awarded a second Military Cross.
During the Battle of Messines, Jacka commanded D Company of the 14th Battalion. During their advance they overran machine gun posts and captured a German field gun. A month later, Jacka sustained a bullet wound to his right thigh and was once again evacuated to England. Getting sick of the place, he requested to return to the front lines early and made it back in time to take part in the attack on Zonnebeke. Jacka personally took charge of the attack and was recommended for a Distinguished Service Order which was not granted. At Villers-Bretonneux on the Somme, Jacka was bombarded with mustard gas once again evacuating him back to England.
Jacka soon found himself in one of his toughest battles yet. One not against Germans, or Turks but again the Australian Military itself. By this point of the war, Jacka had been through the ringer. There wasn’t many places left on his body where the man hadn’t been shot, and his lungs hadn’t recovered well after the gassing, but Jacka still wanted to go back to the front lines to be with his men. Australian high command would not allow it. They wanted to send Jacka home to Australia for some “well needed rest”. Jacka wasn’t interested in no rest. The king still had enemies out there that needed killing. Jacka attempted to compromise and work at the depot in England but once again the army refused. Jacka held himself back from giving the Australian Generals a good flogging but hung around in England anyway ignoring commands to go home. However, the Great War soon ended and in October 1919 Jacka returned to Australia to a hero’s welcome.
Jacka went on to get married and eventually became mayor of St Kilda. Sadly, in 1932 and the age of 39, Albert Jacka passed away of chronic nephritis. Yep. The man that had survived being stabbed, shot, hit and gassed was taken out by his own kidneys. He was buried in St Kilda Cemetery with eight other Victoria Cross recipients acting as pallbearers and an estimated 6,000 witnesses to the burial.
01. ALBERT JACKA