The Coronation Boy

The Story of Walter Joseph Host

The Coronation Boy: a short life in World War 1

About Walter

Born in Jaspers Brush, via Berry NSW, Australia in 1896, the grandson of German immigrants, Walter Joseph Host was the “golden boy” of his family. The youngest son of well-to-do farmers, Walter was selected to represent his country as a junior army cadet at the coronation of King George V in England in 1911. At age fourteen, he stood guard outside Buckingham Palace to witness all the pomp and ceremony of the British Empire at its zenith.

Three years later, in 1914, as an under age youngster he queued to be among the first one thousand men to enlist to serve his King and Country in WW1. He was wounded at the landing at Gallipoli then returned to the Dardanelles with a bullet still lodged near his heart, to storm the heights at Lone Pine and, as a Company Sergeant Major, to lead his men to safety in the evacuation of Anzac Cove.

Standing six feet tall, a fine athlete, a crack shot and a great “mate” to his many comrades, he was the popular leader of a platoon of “don’t care dare-devils”. Wise beyond his years, he was no angel; he had seen and known things he should not and started smoking, even though he “did not like it”, in order to be “agreeable” in the officers’ mess.

By 1916, as a newly created nineteen year old Lieutenant, he had been mentioned in despatches and recommended for the award of the Military Medal for outstanding valour in the field. Then it all ended when he was shot in the stomach by a German captive at Pozieres; so far from his homeland, so close to the land of his ancestors.

Walter Host may have remained unknown, just one of the many WW1 soldiers who died too young. However, he had left behind a youthful legacy: a boyish diary kept during the tour to the UK in 1911 and a bundle of war letters addressed to his family in Berry, NSW. These documents form the basis of this account of a brief life of the Coronation Boy, Walter Joseph Host.

The summary above is the book’s own, from its opening page.

What is in the book

The book follows Walter in two parts, in the order of its own contents pages. Page numbers are the ones printed in the book.

Part One, 1896–1913

  1. Section 1 The Host Family Story p. 8 Free sample chapter
  2. Section 2 Background to the Coronation Tour p. 20
  3. Section 3 The Trip to the UK p. 40
  4. Section 4 The Coronation Days p. 60
  5. Section 5 Post Coronation Events p. 77
  6. Section 6 Touring the UK p. 92
  7. Section 7 The Coronation Medal Controversy p. 118
  8. Section 8 Return to Australia p. 130
  9. Section 9 The Years Between p. 143

Part Two, 1914–1916

  1. Section 1 Enlistment and Training p. 161
  2. Section 2 Gallipoli p. 185
  3. Section 3 Lone Pine p. 197 Free sample chapter
  4. Section 4 The Western Front p. 230
  5. Section 5 Pozieres p. 265
  6. Section 6 He Was Only Nineteen p. 293

The complete book also has acknowledgements, a bibliography, sources and an index.

Read a free sample

Two chapters are free to read here: the first, on Walter’s family and boyhood, and the account of Lone Pine, with a letter Walter wrote from the trenches.

Sample: The Host Family Story Sample: Lone Pine (3a–3c)

Read the whole story

The complete book, with every chapter and all its pictures, is available as a soft copy or a hard copy.

Buy the book