By Jim Allen
Not many people would be aware of two brothers who were possibly one of the greatest influences on the development of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). The connection to the Eltham Shire is that one brother Ellis Charles Wackett, (1901 – 1984) is buried in Kangaroo Ground Cemetery. His nickname to distinguish him from his brother was “Wack”. Ellis and his older brother Lawrence James Wackett (1896 – 1982) were born in Townsville, Queensland the sons of English born James Wackett and his Victorian born wife Alice (nee Lawrence). The two brothers were educated in Townsville along with their sister Iris Alice.
In 1913 Lawrence entered the Royal Military College, Duntroon where he showed he had technical aptitude. With a need for officers at the outbreak of World War 1 Lawrence’s class was graduated early in June 1915 and he transferred to the Australian Flying Corp at Point Cook, where he qualified as a pilot in October 1915.
In the interim his younger brother Ellis had not been idle as in 1914 he entered the Royal Australian Naval College as a Cadet Midshipman. After graduating in 1919 he spent two years at sea before sailing to Britain where he attended the Royal Naval College and the Royal Navy Engineering College.
In the meantime Lawrence was posted to No 1 Squadron arriving in Egypt in April 1916. His duties there included bombing enemy lines, reconnaissance, air-to-air combat and photography. In January 1917 he was put in charge of repairing and overhauling the Royal Flying Corp’s damaged aircraft. Also in 1917 as a result of his success in this field he was mentioned in Dispatches (MID) and posted to the Orford Experimental Station in Britain. He returned to the front in France in June 1918 with the 3rd Squadron of the Australian Flying Corps (AFC). Whilst with this unit he perfected a method of dropping ammunition to ground forces by parachute and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for one particularly hazardous photographic mission, which resulted in eighty bullet holes to his aircraft. He was also awarded the Air Force Cross in 1919 for his service.
Lawrence married Letitia Emily Florence Wood in England in 1919. Upon returning to Australia he was one of 21 Officers appointed to the RAAF when formed in 1921, where his expertise in aircraft design came to the front. During 1924 the RAAF Experimental Section was established at Randwick , New South Wales, under his command. Some of the aircraft he designed were the Warbler, the Widgeon I and II and the Warrigal I and II.
In 1923 Ellis, who had been at sea with the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), saw the light and transferred to the RAAF with the rank of Flying Officer. He completed his pilot training in England, graduated with a distinction from the Imperial College of Science and Technology, London and became an associate fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society.
During World War 1 pilots who were shot down or whose aircraft experienced problems had few choices. They could either jump to a sure death or try to nurse their craft to the ground and try to land. On completion of his post graduate studies in Aeronautical studies Ellis’s passage home was cancelled and he was sent to the Parachute Training School Royal Air Force (RAF) Station, Andover to learn to pack and use the new life preserving equipment.
After returning to Australia Ellis conducted a parachute course for nine volunteers at Richmond, New South Wales and on the 26 May 1926 he made the first free fall parachute jump from a military aircraft in Australia. Over the following week all members of the course also completed jumps. Ellis then went on to run further parachuting courses.
Ellis married Doreen Ivy Dove (known as Judy) in 1919. In 1933 Ellis returned to England to attend the RAF Staff College at Andover and toured the United States the following year to study the aircraft industry.
When the RAAF Experimental Station at Randwick was closed (1930) Lawrence resigned from the RAAF with the rank of Wing Commander. He then went on to head the Aircraft Section of the Cockatoo Island naval dockyard followed by a period with Tugan Aircraft Ltd at Mascot. In these positions his task was aircraft servicing and repair, however he still found time to design two aircraft, the Codock and the Gannet. The RAAF bought five Gannets. In 1936 Lawrence was nominated to set up and manage the Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation Pty Ltd (CAC) that was established to create an aircraft industry in Australia. During World War 2 CAC produced and maintained many aircraft including the Wirraway, the Wackett Trainer, Boomerang Fighters and the Mustang Fighter. Lawrence was also influential in the decision to replace the RAAF’s Meteor fighter with the American Sabre in the early 1950s.
In May 1935 as a Squadron Leader Ellis became the RAAF’s senior engineer as the Director of Technical Services, a position his brother Lawrence had created in 1922. In this position Ellis was able to call on the assistance of his brother, Australia’s best-known aircraft designer. He remained the RAAF’s senior engineer for 24 years whilst progressing through five ranks, including seventeen years as a member of the Air Board. In 1940 he was promoted to the temporary rank of Group Captain. As a result of his successful management of technical aspects of the expansion required during World War Two he was appointed OBE in 1941 and promoted to acting Air Commodore in 1942.
In December 1960 Lawrence retired as CAC’s General Manager, having been on the Board from 1950, though he continued as a Director until 1965.
When Ellis retired from the RAAF in 1959 he was the longest serving officer. Never one to be inactive he joined the Board of the Australian National Airlines Commission (1960 – 68) and was prominent in the Regular Defence Force Welfare Association, where he became foundation Vice President (1959) and life governor (1979). Retirement gave Ellis more time for his hobbies of orchid growing, farming and trout fishing on his 20-acre farm at Panton Hill.
Lawrence In his retirement was awarded many technical medals and wrote a number of books, but in 1970 he had a fall which left him an incomplete quadriplegic. This unfortunate incident gave him the opportunity to use his many skills to design improved equipment for himself and others in his situation.
Sir Lawrence James Wackett KBE DFC AFC Retd passed away on the 18 March 1982 at St Leonards in Sydney and was cremated. He was survived by his wife Letitia and daughter Arlette; their son Wilbur Lawrence having been lost in 1944 during World War Two whilst serving as a fighter pilot.
Air Vice Marshall Ellis Charles Wackett CB CBE Retd passed away at Warracknabeal, Victoria on the 3 August 1984, his wife having predeceased him at Greensborough in 1975. Ellis was cremated with Military Honours and is buried at Kangaroo Ground Cemetery (row 10, Lot 15) with his wife Judy, who was awarded The Order of the British Empire Member (Civil) in 1959 for her work as President of the
Air Force Women’s Association. As a footnote on their grave the following is inscribed regarding Judy, “She loved and lavishly fed all animals and birds: May you too.”
Reference Material:
Ancestry.com
Australian Dictionary of Biography
Coulthard-Clark, C.D. The Third Brother, The Royal Australian Air Force 1921-39, 1991
Molkentin, Michael Fire in the Sky, The Australian Flying Corps in the First World War, 2010
Woiwod, Mick Tread Softly, You tread on Dreams: Kangaroo Ground’s cemetery’s first 150 years, 2001
This story was first published in “Fine Spirit and Pluck: World War One Stories from Banyule, Nillumbik and Whittlesea” published by Yarra Plenty Regional Library, August 2016
