Herbert Hercules Murray — the name just rings of strength and special deeds. His departure for the front could then have been on no more appropriate ship than HMAT Ulysses. But we get ahead of ourselves.
Bert Murray was born in the NSW southern highlands town of Bowral in February of 1889, the first born of several who were born in such disparate places as Fiji, Mt Drysdale and Cobar in Western NSW, and in Woonona, one of Wollongong’s northern suburbs. Herbert and his elder brother Archie and younger brother Claude all played for the famous Balgownie club, the home of the great Judy Masters, ‘Herc’ as a left winger.
Marrying before the war, Murray, a miner, enlisted in March of 1916 and was assigned to the tunnelling companies where his knowledge and skills would be best used. Embarking for Europe in October he left behind a heavily pregnant wife.
The men of the mining companies performed vital roles both offensively and defensively in the trench warfare that so categorised WWI. Sapper Murray was promoted to Second Corporal and negotiated the end of the war, returning safely home to the Illawarra in May of 1919.
No record points to Murray playing again after the war but he continued to work the mines for the rest of his life. He passed away in early 1956 after having been made a life member of the football club some years earlier. The members of the tunnelling companies rarely won decorations and carried their work out often in the dark and regularly in silence. It took a special breed to carry out the work they did and they remain, for the most part, unsung heroes.
His wife Maud outlived ‘Herc’ by some 22 years.