Roland Hermann Riebe

Born: 21/4/1896
Died: 4/10/1917

Roland was 19 years old when he, along with 9 other young men from Tanunda, enlisted in the Australian Infantry Forces. Roland’s records say he was 5 ft 5inches tall and weighed 118 pounds, however despite his small physical stature and his boyish face, he had already served two years in the Senior Cadets and Citizen Forces.

Roland was immediately assigned to the 6th reinforcement of the 27th Battalion and was readied for departure on board the ‘Benalla’ on October 27th. Two weeks after they left a photograph of Roland and his Tanunda cohort was published widely in South Australian newspapers with the heading ‘Patriotic German Australians’, in which Roland is seated in the front row alongside his mate, Louis Hoffmann.

Louis kept a diary in his years on the front lines in France, recorded in little notebooks that he posted home to his family. Rolly is mentioned regularly, first appearing November 24th 1916 while the battalion was being entrained into Egypt. “10.30pm…Nearly all sleeping except Rolly and self – don’t want to miss anything’. Louis, ever the larrikin, closes the paragraph by saying they are ‘now going to have a run alongside the train.’

On Rolly’s 20th Birthday he, and the Battalion, were encamped at Zietoun, near Cairo for training and they received a shipment of mail. On the 22nd of February Roland, and all his Tanunda cohort, were transferred from the 27th Battalion to the 10th and Louis says “They have split up the 6/27th. We are going into the 10th – all our Tanunda boys together”.

The Battalion was moved into the front lines in France in March 1917 and were thrown immediately into offensive action. Louis described the front lines as like “Hell with the lid open”. Over the next six months the men were rotated regularly between the front lines and relief duties, with short spells behind the lines. On September 19th the Battalion was sent in at dawn for a 48hour stunt, during which Louis was injured. While waiting at the dressing station he says ‘the biggest bombardment I have ever heard opened up on our boys’. While in hospital in England Louis received news that Rolly had been hit in the bombardment and seriously wounded, then ten days later was told that Rolly had died. “Ada bought bad news of Rolly. Poor Rolly has gone under – battled hard. Died Oct 4th” Shot through the left buttock the wound had damaged his bladder, and the postmortem revealed extensive infection.

Rolly’s mother had died when he was seven years old and he had listed his father as Next of Kin, however his will stated that all his possessions were to go to Miss Malie Riebe, Tanunda. In November 1917 Miss Florence Mann of the Tanunda Red Cross stepped in to manage correspondence on Malie’s behalf and Roland’s war files contain several handwritten letters from Flo. When Roland’s personal effects were shipped back from the front the small package of simple items contained:

Strap and handle, brush, balaklava, bible, pair of mittens, disc, wallet, photos, letter, notebook, cigarette case (metal) tinder lighter, wristwatch (silver) and strap, 8 coins, 4 badges, pair of scissors, ring (metal).

Roland’s Uncle, Gustav Riebe, owned Riebe’s General Store on the main street of Tanunda from 1911 to 1917, and Gustav’s wife, Aunt Caroline, submitted a recipe for Champagne Crust to the fundraising cookbook. Gustav and Caroline’s son Alan, Roland’s cousin, was killed in action April 1941, the first South Australian soldier to lose his life while serving in WW2.