Early Life
Robert Mactier was born at Tatura on 17 May 1890, the seventh of ten children of Robert and Christina Mactier of "Reitcam" ("Mactier" spelt backwards), a nearby property. He went to school locally, and later worked on his father's properties until he enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force at Seymour on 1 March 1917. He sailed from Melbourne with the other 151 Victorians of 23rd Battalion, 19th Reinforcement aboard HMAT A11 Ascanius on 11 May. He arrived in France on 14 November, and joined the Battalion on 23 November. He fought in all of the Battalion's subsequent battles until his death, including at Albert, where he was gassed, Hamel and the August Offensive.
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“Many a woman shudders ... at the terrible eclipse of those intellectual powers which in early life seemed prophetic of usefulness and happiness, hence the army of martyrs among our married and unmarried women who, not having cultivated a taste for science, art or literature, form a corps of nervous patients who make fortunes for agreeable physicians ...”
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