Name: David Simcock
Date: 1915
Unit: 11th Battalion AIF
Location: Gallipoli
Not many privates in the Australian Imperial Force (AIF) would have a Colonel hold up the taking of an official group photograph while he climbed to the top position. But that's exactly what happened to Private David John Simcock in Egypt in 1915.
David, also known as ‘Pink Top’, had so endeared himself to his fellow soldiers that the Colonel insisted he should climb up the pyramid at Cheops to be the highest point in the group of 740 troops from the 11th Battalion.
Group portrait of all the original officers and men of the 11th Battalion, 3rd Brigade, Australian Imperial Force (AIF). The group of over 685 soldiers are spread over the side of the Great Pyramid of Khufu (Cheops) near Mena AIF camp (now Cairo), Egypt, 10 January 1915. AWM P05717.001
David also received a 13-line reference in CEW Bean's Official History of Australia in the War of 1914-18.
Born in Callington, South Australia, David moved to Perth in 1906. The young man sold fruit from a barrow in the city that became incredibly popular. He called himself ‘the bloke with the Pink Top’ due to his ‘ruddy’ auburn hair. Newspapers from the time show that the name stuck.
David’s outgoing nature and natural cheek and wit appealed to the Saturday night crowds that thronged the streets of Perth before World War I. His natural patter had people crowding round to buy his fruit, with many spilling out onto the road as they tried to get closer.
Apart from his entertainment value, David was a shrewd businessman. He supplied top quality at low prices, with his ‘bob a bag’ fruit being snapped up by keen buyers. In 1911, he opened a shop on Barrack Street, between Murray and Wellington streets, that came to be known as Pink Top's corner. He also opened a fruit barrow on Market Street in Fremantle, and offered to deliver fruit and vegetables around the country.
Never one to shirk his duty, David was training at the Blackboy Hill army camp, near Bellevue Station, in late August 1914, just after the war began. He enlisted in the AIF on 11 September 1914, aged 31. He'd left his wife and thriving business behind. On 5 November 1914, David embarked at Fremantle for Egypt with the 11th Infantry Battalion, AIF, on troop transport Ascanius (A11).
Fremantle, Western Australia. November 1914. The troop transport Ascanius (A11) which was the first ship carrying troops to leave the area. It joined the convoy on 3 November 1914 and proceeded in convoy to Colombo. After leaving Colombo the Ascanius rammed the troop transport Shropshire (A9) on 21 November 1914 but both ships were able to continue in convoy to Aden. Photographed by EL Mitchell. Donor AW Bazley. AWM H16157
During training in Egypt in January 1915, the 11th Battalion posed for its historic photograph on the pyramid. Once Pink Top had climbed up to take his place, the scene was recorded for posterity.
When the troops were sent to Gallipoli, David remained a popular member of his unit. He was always full of fun, ready to crack a joke or help out a mate.
Sadly, David didn’t survive long after landing at Gallipoli on 25 April. He was killed in action on 2 May 1915, aged 32.
CEW Bean outlined the events leading to Simcock’s death:
At certain points of Walker's Ridge the Turks attacked fiercely. In parts the gullies in front were too steep to allow of organised assault. But near its foot and near the Top they constantly approached. In the lower third of the spur was a single post, about thirty strong, under Captain Critchley-Salmonson of the Canterbury Battalion. This post was continuously pressed. Salmonson's men consisted partly of New Zealanders and partly of men of the 11th and 12th Battalions from Baby 700 and The Nek. One of these was a red-headed fruit-seller well known in Perth, Western Australia, as Pinktop, under which name he traded. He was a strange, ungainly, splay-footed soldier. His main anxiety - sedulously encouraged by his mates - had been how he should face barbed wire, and he had solved the problem by putting tin guards beneath his putties. His sergeant had ordered him to remain on the Beach as a sentry over the men's packs, but he refused, and came on with the rest. In the fighting on Sunday night - in an endeavour, it is said, to bring a wounded man into cover - Private Pinktop was killed.
David is commemorated in the Baby 700 Cemetery at Anzac. A fruit shop continued to trade on Barrack Street under the name ‘Pink Top’ until 1979, helping Perth’s citizens to remember David long after the war.
Sources
1909 '"THE BLOKE WITH THE PINK TOP."', The Daily News (Perth, WA : 1882 - 1955), 23 January, p. 6. , viewed 02 Feb 2024, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article77110225
1909 'Advertising', Sunday Times (Perth, WA : 1902 - 1954), 14 February, p. 2. (FIRST SECTION), viewed 02 Feb 2024, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article57590511
1914 'A VISIT TO THE VOLUNTEERS', Sunday Times (Perth, WA : 1902 - 1954), 30 August, p. 6. , viewed 02 Feb 2024, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article57784645
Bean CEW (1941), Volume I – The Story of ANZAC from the outbreak of war to the end of the first phase of the Gallipoli Campaign, May 4, 1915, Official History of Australia in the War of 1914-18 (11th edition).
Commonwealth War Graves Commission, Private David John Simcock casualty details, https://www.cwgc.org/find-records/find-war-dead/casualty-details/604691/david-john-simcock/
National Archives of Australia: SIMCOCK David John : Service Number - 951 : Place of Birth - Callington SA : Place of Enlistment - Blackboy Hill WA : Next of Kin - (Wife) SIMCOCK Ellen Jane; B2455, SIMCOCK DAVID JOHN; 1914 – 1920. https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=8083873
The material for the original article was supplied to DVA in 2000 by Mr Allan Ellam of Western Australia. Mr Ellam and his late wife, Raye Innes, ran a museum of war memorabilia from their home.