Obituaries Australia

Esme Govett, c1915

photo privately sourced

Second-Corporal Hubert Esme Govett, of the Sixty-seventh Field Company, Royal Engineers, killed in action in the Gallipoli Peninsula on the 19th of December, 1915, aged twenty-six years, was the third son of the late Mr. and Mrs. Robert Govett, of St. Albans, Geelong (Victoria) and Culloden (Queensland), says the British Australasian London of the 17th of February. He was educated at the Geelong College. He left for England when he was seventeen years of age to study engineering at the Crystal Palace and was employed at the British Thomson Houston firm of engineers at Rugby for some years where he was very popular. Mr. Govett joined the Royal Engineers as a sapper in August, 1914, and quickly rose to the rank of second-corporal. He was twice offered a commission. He was a keen sportsman and motorist, equally good with gun, rod, or rifle. He was killed by a shell on the 19th of December while waiting to blow up a gun if necessary. He was buried in the Eleventh Division Cemetery. Kavakol Gap, Suvla. Mr. Govett’s mother was lost in the s.s Waratah off the coast of Durban, South Africa, some years ago when on her way to settle in England to make a home for her son.