According to Brisbane’s Daily Standard newspaper on 21 August 1915, junior club Rag Tags withdrew from the Queensland Brisbane Football Association competitions because almost every player had enlisted for the war. Being a junior club, their line-ups were rarely listed in the newspaper, but a team photo exists from the 1913 season. From that earlier side one player can be shown to have enlisted: Leslie De Voss.
De Voss was a chauffeur who enlisted aged 23 in 1916, having played soccer for Rag Tags and Milton. On enlistment De Voss signed a declaration stating he was not of German, Austrian, Turkish or Bulgarian parentage. He had been born in Queensland to an Irish mother and Canadian father. Curiously, De Voss was charged with being absent without leave while at sea and sentenced to four days cleaning.
His war was short. De Voss marched into France with the 10th Machine Gun Company in May 1917, and left a month later with a gunshot wound. He left hospital in September to a depot in Weymouth only to be sent to a specialist hospital in Bulford a fortnight later with VD, where he stayed for 187 days. The official communication with his mother stated he was “dangerously ill”.
De Voss finally left hospital in March 1918 and was sent back to Australia. In the 1930s, he came involved in the Incapacitated and Wounded Sailors’ and Soldier’ Association of Queensland. De Voss enlisted in the Militia Forces in 1934 for a 3-year term, with a stated occupation of mechanic.
In 1941 he enlisted again at the age of 47 and served within Australia until discharged medically unfit in 1946.