Rupert Downes

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Rupert Downes
Australian Army Medical Corps
Commands held2nd Light Horse Field Ambulance
3rd Light Horse Field Ambulance
Battles/warsFirst World War: Second World War
Awards
Mentioned in Despatches (4)
RelationsMajor Downes (father)

FRACS
(10 February 1885 – 5 March 1945) was an Australian soldier, surgeon and historian.

The son of British Army officer

Anzac Mounted Division in 1916, which he combined with the post of ADMS AIF Egypt. In 1917, he became Deputy Director of Medical Services (DDMS) of the Desert Mounted Corps. After the war, he wrote articles on medical aspects of the Sinai and Palestine campaign, and the section on the campaign for the Official History of Australia in the War of 1914–1918
.

Returning to Australia, Downes became an honorary consulting surgeon at the

St John Ambulance Brigade
, which he led for 25 years, and president of the St John Ambulance Association for eight years.

In 1934 Downes became Director General of Medical Services, the Australian Army's most senior medical officer, with the rank of major general. He oversaw the construction of major military hospitals in the capital cities. In 1944 he accepted a commission to edit the medical series volumes of the

Official History of Australia in the War of 1939–1945
but he was killed in a plane crash in March 1945, before he could begin the work.

Education and early life

Rupert Major Downes was born on 10 February 1885 in

Victoria and retired with the rank of major general in the Australian Army in 1902.[4]

Duke of Cornwall and York's legs.[5]

Rupert was educated at

Ormond College, and he graduated with the double degree of Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) in 1907.[8]

Soon after graduation, Downes re-enlisted in the Army.

captain in the Australian Army Medical Corps on 1 July 1908 and promoted to major on 26 March 1913.[10] He served his residency at Melbourne Hospital and became a general practitioner in Malvern, Victoria, but soon returned to the university to pursue a doctorate. His Doctor of Medicine (MD) thesis, entitled "The anatomical relations of the thymus, especially considered in regard to thymic death with an account of cases of abnormality", was accepted in 1911. He also did the coursework for a Master of Surgery (MS), and this degree was conferred in 1912.[11]

Downes married Doris Mary Robb on 20 November 1913 at St John's Church,

Toorak, Victoria. They had three children, all given the same middle name as Rupert: Rosemary Major, born in 1914;[12] Valerie Major, born in March 1918;[13] and John Rupert Major, born in 1922.[14]

First World War

Downes joined the Australian Imperial Force (AIF) on 2 October 1914, shortly after the outbreak of the First World War, assuming command of the 2nd Light Horse Field Ambulance with the rank of lieutenant colonel;[10] this made him the youngest officer of that rank in the AIF at the time. Soon after his taking command, the unit was renamed the 3rd Light Horse Field Ambulance.[1] After training at the Broadmeadows Army Camp near Melbourne, the unit embarked for Egypt on the transport SS Chilka on 2 February 1915.[15]

After the early fighting in the

Anzac Cove lodgement without their horses.[16] The 3rd Light Horse Field Ambulance departed Alexandria for Anzac on 17 May 1915.[17] It moved to Lemnos in June, where it operated a hospital, but returned to Anzac for the August offensive. Downes missed this operation, as he remained on Lemnos supervising the hospital until he returned to Anzac on 11 August.[18] He remained with his unit until 13 November, when he departed for Lemnos and then Egypt.[19]

About thirty soldiers and two dogs pose on the steps of a building
Lieutenant General Sir Harry Chauvel (front and centre) with his Desert Mounted Corps Headquarters. Downes is immediately behind and to the right of Chauvel

After the evacuation of Gallipoli, Downes was appointed Assistant Director of Medical Services (ADMS) of the newly formed

Anzac Mounted Division on 15 March 1916. He was given the temporary rank of colonel. Downes combined this post with that of ADMS AIF Egypt from 6 September.[10] Downes therefore had to travel back and forth to Cairo. In November 1916, a Deputy ADMS was appointed to assist him.[20]

Medically speaking, the health of the Anzac Mounted Division was remarkably good,[21] but the Sinai Peninsula still had its challenges—especially for medical officers unfamiliar with conditions in the Middle East. The Battle of Romani revealed the importance of transportation in an area with few roads.[22] A poorly organised casualty evacuation effort caused preventable hardship and suffering for the wounded, and resulted in several avoidable deaths.[23] An inquiry into the matter was held after the battle, at which Downes was called to testify.[24] The Commander in Chief of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force (EEF), General Sir Archibald Murray, declined to assign blame to any individual, but implemented the inquiry's recommendations for improving the casualty evacuation process.[23]

There was also the heat, and the problem of supplying adequate quantities of

bilharzia. To combat these, Downes obtained the services of Lieutenant Colonel Charles James Martin,[25] and created the Anzac Field Laboratory to investigate these diseases.[26] As a result of aggressively tackling the problem, Downes reduced rates of disease among Australian and New Zealand troops well below those of British troops serving alongside them. Martin advanced the notion that heat exhaustion and heat stroke were not the result of defective evaporation, as had previously been believed, but simply a matter of failing to drink enough water. He in turn converted Downes to the belief that "provided water is available in adequate amount the heat mechanism of the body can defy all ordinary climatic ranges of temperature even under conditions of hard work."[27]

With so many people and horses, sanitation was a challenge, and discipline in this area was initially slack, as it had been with disastrous results at Gallipoli. Downes took measures to improve the situation.[28] Although not normally one to engage in disputes, Downes repeatedly clashed with the British medical officers of the EEF, especially the Director of Medical Services (DMS) EEF, Colonel Alfred Keble, whose attitudes Downes regarded as endangering his troops.[29] Downes's rank of colonel became substantive on 20 February 1917.[10] Doris travelled to Egypt to visit her husband in March 1917. By June, Rupert was becoming increasingly immersed in preparations for the

Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for her volunteer work among soldiers' families as secretary of the Friendly Union of Soldiers' Wives and Mothers.[32][33]

On 10 August 1917, Downes became Deputy Director of Medical Services (DDMS) of the

Es Salt area, Downes experimented with the delivery of drugs and medical supplies by air.[35] In the Jordan valley in 1918, Downes was confronted with an epidemic of malaria and vigorous preventative and prophylactic efforts were required to bring it under control.[36]

In October 1918, with victory near, Downes was confronted by his most serious medical crisis.

Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca over Damascus.[37] At this point the Desert Mounted Corps itself began to experience epidemic diseases, particularly of bronchopneumonia, cholera and malaria, putting the medical services under great strain. Through extraordinary measures, including the diversion of lighthorsemen and motor vehicles to medical units, Downes managed to evacuate the sick to Beirut, and the crisis abated.[38]

For his service in the

Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George on 1 January 1918.[43][44]
His citation read:

In addition to his duties as ADMS Australian and New Zealand Mounted Division, Colonel Downes has carried out those of A.D.M.S., Australian Imperial Force in Egypt for many months. He has shown considerable administrative ability and has placed Australian A.M.C. matters on a much better footing than they were when he took over the appointment.[45]

Interwar years

Returning to Australia, Downes was discharged from the AIF, but remained in the Army as a reservist. He became an honorary consulting surgeon at the

Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne, and Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital, and honorary surgeon at Prince Henry's Hospital.[1] He was a founding fellow of the College of Surgeons of Australasia in 1927, and became president of the Victorian branch of the British Medical Association in 1935.[1] He established a reputation as one of Melbourne's leading paediatric surgeons,[46] but found himself in disagreement with certain medical practices then in vogue. In a 1922 paper published in the Medical Journal of Australia, he examined 100 cases of tonsillectomy in children, and concluded that the majority of them were unnecessary. It would be another four decades before the medical profession in Australia accepted this.[47] He lectured on medical ethics at the University of Melbourne from the late 1930s until his death in 1945,[48] and wrote a course textbook on the subject, entitled Medical Ethics, which was published in 1942.[49]

Along with his medical writings, Downes wrote a book-length section on the Sinai and Palestine campaign for Volume I of the Official History of the Australian Army Medical Services in the War of 1914–1918,[50] in the late 1920s under the direction of Medical Series editor Graham Butler. The two men had discussed writing a medical history of the campaign during a visit Butler made to Egypt in 1918 to inspect the medical records of the AIF, and again in France in 1919. Downes published an article in the Journal of the British Army Medical Corps entitled "The Tactical Employment of the Medical Services in a Cavalry Corps" in 1926, which he expanded into one of the chapters of the Official History. His manuscript proved too long for the proposed book, and was extensively edited by Butler before it was published in 1930.[51] Downes was instrumental in supporting Butler's Medical Series and helped obtain the funding necessary to complete the project.[52]

Downes was chairman of the Masseurs' Registration Board, a councillor of the Victorian division of the

Venerable Order of Saint John,[53] and became a Knight of Grace of the order in 1937.[54] At the same time, Doris became an Officer of the Order of Saint John,[55] in recognition of her fundraising efforts for the Victorian branch. She later served as a member of its council from 1942 to 1953. Downes was instrumental in persuading the state branches to come together as a national organisation, arguing that without a national body, the organisation would be eclipsed by the Red Cross.[56]

A group of men in suits pose for a picture.
Army Medical officers participate in a training exercise in the southern highlands of New South Wales in April 1936. Downes is front row, third from the left.

Downes remained in the Army throughout the inter-war period. He became a colonel in the Australian Army Medical Corps on 8 January 1920. He was DDMS of the 3rd Military District (Victoria) from 1 July 1921 to 26 June 1933, and Officer in Charge of

Governor General of Australia from 1 July 1927 to 30 June 1931.[10]
In 1930, Downes's son John, then in his first year as a boarder at
toxaemia and died in 1933, at the age of 10. The failure of modern medicine to save his son affected Downes deeply, and led him to abandon his medical career in favour of a military one.[58] On 20 August 1934 Downes became DGMS, a full-time post and the Army's most senior medical officer.[10] His priority was a recruiting campaign to increase the number of medical professionals in the Army.[59]

The 1938

Commonwealth Serum Laboratories, most of this was delivered by July 1939.[61]
In 1939, Downes began a tour of military and other medical centres in
Australian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom.[63] Downes foresaw a major war, fought in the islands to the north of Australia. Still in London, he took steps to obtain the services as consultants of two eminent Australian doctors: the surgeon Sir Thomas Dunhill and Neil Hamilton Fairley, an expert on tropical diseases.[64] The outbreak of the Second World War caused Downes to curtail the North American leg of his tour and return to Australia in October 1939.[62]

Second World War

Downes, in his role as DGMS, pressed for the construction of major military hospitals in the

Austin Hospital in Melbourne and Greenslopes Private Hospital in Brisbane remain part of his legacy.[65]
In late 1940, medical units in the Middle East were experiencing "precarious and at times acute" shortages of medicals stores. Units were sent to the Middle East as fully equipped as was possible, with the expectation that the British Army would make up the difference, but British policy was that all possible sources had to be exploited before any demands could be made on the United Kingdom's sources.
Samuel Burston to that post. This came as a surprise to them as they had not realised that Blamey had the authority to make such an appointment; but on seeing the situation for himself, Spender confirmed Burston's appointment.[67]

On returning to Australia, Spender appointed Major General Frederick Maguire as DGMS and Downes was appointed to the newly created post of Inspector General of Medical Services (IGMS).[67] As IGMS, Downes toured extensively—he visited all the Australian states and overseas locations where Australian troops had been sent, including Papua and New Guinea, Malaya, the Middle East and North Africa, as well as the Netherlands East Indies (Indonesia), India and East Africa.[1] When Blamey reorganised the Army on his return to Australia in 1942, he appointed Burston as Director General of Medical Services. Downes became the DMS of the Second Army on 6 April 1942. He joined the Second AIF as a major general on 27 June 1942,[10] receiving the AIF serial number VX57673.[68]

Death and legacy

Alan Vasey
and Downes in Cairns.

Downes was the DMS of the Second Army until 22 August 1944. Due to the run-down of the Army in the latter stages of the war, the Second Army, always mainly a paper organisation, increasingly had less to do. Now nearly sixty, Downes accepted an invitation to write the medical history series of the

Aitape-Wewak campaign.[69]

On 5 March 1945, the RAAF

Canberra air disaster in 1940,[70] and Lieutenant General Henry Wynter, who died from natural causes on 7 February 1945.[71] The bodies were recovered and buried in the Cairns War Cemetery with full military honours. A memorial service was held at St Paul's Cathedral, Melbourne, on 9 March 1945.[69]

Gavin Long, the editor in chief of the Official History of Australia in the War of 1939–1945, prevailed on Allan S. Walker to write the medical series volumes. Walker discarded Downes's plans to have specialists write different sections, and ultimately wrote three volumes himself, starting with Clinical Problems of War (1952). He was working on the fourth and final volume, on the Medical Services of the RAN and RAAF, when he was compelled to quit in November 1956 due to ill-health, and he died in January 1958. The final volume was finished by others and appeared in 1961.[72][73] Downes's papers are in the Australian War Memorial.[74] The Royal Australasian College of Surgeons established the triennial Rupert Downes Memorial Lecture in his honour. The subject of the lecture is "related to some aspect or aspects of military surgery, medical equipment (military and civil), the surgery of children, neurosurgery, general surgery, medical ethics or medical history; these being subjects in which Downes was particularly interested".[75]

Rupert Downes Memorial Lectures

  • 1950 Major General
    Samuel Burston
    Some Medical Aspects of Atomic Warfare
  • 1954 A.S. Walker The Following Wind of History
  • 1957 Major General Frank Kingsley Norris Be Strong and of Good Courage
  • 1961 Sir Albert Coates The Doctor in the Services
  • 1965 D. Waterson Œsophageal Replacement in Pædiatric Surgery
  • 1970 J.H. Louw The Scientific Method in Surgery
  • 1972 H.E. Beardmore Pædiatric Surgery – Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow
  • 1976 P.P. Rickham Nephroblastoma – a New Look at an Old Problem
  • 1978 C.M. Gurner Military Medical Preparedness
  • 1980 D.G. Hamilton One Hundred Years of Pædiatric Surgery in Sydney
  • 1983 G.B. Ong The Trifacetted Nature of Surgery in Hong Kong
  • 1988 B.A. Smithurst Distinguished Australian Military Surgeons
  • 1990 Patricia K. Donahoe The Development of Tumour Inhibitors
  • 1994 General Sir Phillip Bennett Medical Aspects of Australia's Defence
  • 1996 Professor Averil Mansfield Arterio-Venous Malformations and their Treatment
  • 1998 Donald Trunkey I am Giddy, Expectation Whirls me Round
  • 2000 A. Wyn Beasley Of Scurvy and Shipwreck – the Dutch Discovery of Australasia
  • 2002 Colonel D. Beard The Music of Warfare
  • 2005 Robert Pearce Trust me, Claudius
  • 2008 Professor Arthur Li Ethics and standards
  • 2011 Major General John Pearn Pro patria et spe gentis
  • 2014 Air Vice Marshal Hugh Bartholomeusz Tissue reconstruction in war and peace
  • 2017 Professor Michael Besser The anatomical enlightenment
  • 2021 Andrew Connolly Striving for excellence- Enhancing recovery in the Great War

Source:[75]

Notes

  1. ^
    ISSN 1833-7538
    . Retrieved 5 November 2010.
  2. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 13.
  3. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 10.
  4. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 15–20.
  5. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 29.
  6. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 26–29.
  7. ^ "Downes Rupert Major : Service Number - VX57673 : Date of birth - 10 Feb 1885". National Archives of Australia. Retrieved 18 July 2022.
  8. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 32–34.
  9. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 36.
  10. ^ a b c d e f g h i Australian Army 1945
  11. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 37–38.
  12. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 32.
  13. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 44.
  14. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 226.
  15. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 59.
  16. ^ Bean 1921, pp. 599–600.
  17. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 85.
  18. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 90.
  19. ^ a b Howie-Willis 2008, p. 101.
  20. ^ Downes 1930, pp. 646–647.
  21. ^ Downes 1930, pp. 598–599.
  22. ^ Downes 1930, pp. 582–585.
  23. ^ a b Downes 1930, p. 580.
  24. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 133–135.
  25. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 138.
  26. ^ Downes 1930, p. 651.
  27. ^ Downes 1930, pp. 600–602.
  28. ^ Downes 1930, pp. 600–611.
  29. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 143, 164.
  30. Newcastle Morning Herald and Miners' Advocate
    . No. 13, 310. New South Wales, Australia. 30 June 1917. p. 5. Retrieved 2 August 2022 – via National Library of Australia.
  31. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 156–157.
  32. ^ "No. 30935". The London Gazette (Supplement). 4 October 1918. p. 11772.
  33. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 155.
  34. ^ Downes 1930, pp. 647–650.
  35. ^ Downes 1930, pp. 693–694.
  36. ^ Howie-Willis 2016, pp. 58–64.
  37. ^ Downes 1930, pp. 729–735.
  38. ^ Downes 1930, pp. 736–741.
  39. ^ "No. 29845". The London Gazette (Supplement). 1 December 1916. p. 11807.
  40. ^ "No. 30474". The London Gazette (Supplement). 12 January 1918. p. 804.
  41. ^ "No. 31138". The London Gazette. 22 January 1919. p. 1164.
  42. ^ "No. 31383". The London Gazette (Supplement). 5 June 1919. p. 7189.
  43. ^ "No. 30450". The London Gazette (Supplement). 1 January 1918. p. 6.
  44. ^ "No. 30514". The London Gazette (Supplement). 5 February 1918. p. 1802.
  45. ^ "Honours and Awards – R M Downes" (PDF). Australian War Memorial. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  46. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 236.
  47. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 228.
  48. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 233.
  49. ^ Downes & Anderson 1942, p. i.
  50. ^ Downes 1930, pp. 547–713.
  51. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 227–229.
  52. ^ O'Keefe 1988, pp. 29–30.
  53. ^ "No. 33618". The London Gazette. 24 June 1930. p. 3956.
  54. ^ "No. 34356". The London Gazette. 1 January 1937. p. 2.
  55. ^ "No. 34356". The London Gazette. 1 January 1937. p. 4.
  56. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 242–245.
  57. ^ Walker 1961, pp. 173–181.
  58. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 251–253.
  59. ^ a b Howie-Willis 2008, p. 263.
  60. ^ Long 1952, p. 26.
  61. ^ Walker 1953, pp. 14–20.
  62. ^ a b Walker 1953, p. 20.
  63. ^ Howie-Willis 2008, p. 279.
  64. ^ Walker 1953, p. 32.
  65. ^ Walker 1953, pp. 78–81.
  66. ^ Walker 1953, pp. 333–339.
  67. ^ a b Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 305–309.
  68. ^ "WW2 Nominal Roll". Australian War Memorial. Retrieved 23 May 2009.
  69. ^ a b Howie-Willis 2008, pp. 349–356.
  70. ^ Long 1952, pp. 89–90.
  71. ^ Long 1952, p. 8.
  72. ISSN 1833-7538
    . Retrieved 26 July 2022.
  73. ^ Walker 1961, pp. xiii–xv.
  74. ^ "Downes, Rupert Major (Major General, CMG, VD AAMC)". Australian War Memorial. 3DRL/0518. Retrieved 18 July 2022.
  75. ^ a b "Rupert Downes Memorial Lecture and Medal". Royal Australasian College of Surgeons. Retrieved 10 July 2022.

References

Military offices
Preceded by
Major General George Walter Barber
 Director General of Medical Services
1934–1941 		Succeeded by
Major General Frederick Maguire
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