Thomas Charles Adrian

Service number: 7343

Rank: Private/Gunner/Driver

Unit: 14th Battalion 5th field artillery brigade

Service: Australian Army

Date of death:

Cemetery or memorial details:

War Grave Register notes:

Source: National Archives of Australia

Tommy Adrian was born to John and Mabel Adrian at Manly in 1893. He was employed as a clerk. Thomas resided at 22 Park Road Manly with his parents.

Thomas enlisted on 28 July 1915 at the age of 22 and embarked on the 18th November 1915 from Sydney per the Persic. Thomas was discharged on the 12th June 1919 with appendicitis.

He was a well-known swimmer. In the 1920s, Tommy Adrian became the coach of Olympic swimmer Boy Charlton. Peter Fenton writes of Tom Adrian in They Called Him Boy, a biography of Andrew Boy Charlton(p25-6):

“It was at the Manly Baths that Andrew met a young returned serviceman named Tommy Adrian. It was a meeting that would have a profound effect on the youngster’s life. Tommy was from an established Manly family whose grandfather [sic, actually uncle], Robert Edward, had set up the shoe shop in the Corso many years earlier. The old man, invariably referred to as Colonel, was a Boer War veteran and the Adrian family still ran the shop. Tommy was a very good swimmer, good enough to win the NSW mile championship in 1915 and finish second in the half mile. He also defeated Duke Kahanamoku in a thrilling 440 yards swim at the Domain Baths in Woolloomooloo, Sydney. Though Kahanamoku was essentially a sprinter, his fame was such that the victory earned Adrian great popularity in Manly. In July of 1915, Adrian took himself off to Liverpool and enlisted in the army. He was just 22.

When he returned to Australia in August of 1919, he brought with him little more than three standard service medals and a host of horrific memories. As a gunner, and later as a driver, with the Fifth Field Artillery Brigade, he was involved in the prolonged, debilitating and barbaric trench warfare in Europe that followed the Gallipoli campaign. During those three years, his only extended leave was when he had his appendix removed in London, after which he returned to the thick of the action in France. Physically exhausted by his own efforts, his mind tortured by the suffering he had seen and forever dismayed by the death of his Manly club mate Cecil Healy, he was officially discharged from the forces in January 1920.

Tommy Adrian was a slightly built man, 5½ feet tall, with fair complexion, brown brushed-back hair and blue eyes. He never got over the war and now spent his time pottering around the family shop but enjoyed, most of all, helping young swimmers improve their technique at the Manly Baths. Though not a professional coach, Adrian was a student of the sport and had a keen perception of styles that were constantly evolving. He had quite a few young swimmers under his guidance including Ernie Henry, only two years older than Charlton, who was already showing signs of becoming a champion.

When Charlton was selected for the 1924 Olympic Games, there was controversy over whether Adrian should accompany him as coach. Adrian’s passage on the Ormondewas paid for by the Sunday Mail newspaper. However, the extended sea passage exacerbated a fit of depression, and on 23rd May, he threw himself overboard in a panic attack. He was rescued, but was locked below decks for his own safety, and was unable to take further part in coaching Charlton, not seeing him again until well after the Olympics.

However, there can be no doubt that some of Charlton’s success was due to Adrian’s intelligent coaching. Adrian did not return to Australia until February 1926, having taken over a year to recuperate; he had only a hazy recollection of Charlton’s success in 1924. He died in December 1948, aged 55.

He was buried in Manly Cemetery plot S.22