Eliezer Margolin (1875 – 7 Tevet, 1944), soldier and businessman, served in two armies in the First World War, the Australian and British, and was buried twice with full military honours, first in Australia, then Israel. He was born in Belgorod, Russia, son of Mordechai Joseph Margolin, merchant, and his wife Zlata Freida, née Carlin. When Eliezer was 17, his family migrated to an agricultural colony in Palestine. At night Margolin and others from his village, Rehovot, patrolled their orchards on horseback to fight marauders from neighboring Arab villages. In this way, he became an excellent rider and shot. After his parents died within a week of each other, Eliezer, as sole breadwinner, worked the family vineyard and almond orchard and other orchards as well, to supplement a meager income. During 1902, in depressed conditions, he was one of many Palestinian Jews who sold their land to seek capital elsewhere in the hope of eventual return. Margolin found suitable homes for his younger siblings and sailed for Australia. After learning some English, he opened a small medical supplies factory in Sydney before moving to the mining town of Collie, Western Australia, where he ran a cordial factory. He was naturalized in 1904. In 1911 he was commissioned as a second lieutenant and formed the Collie Company of the 1st Battalion, Western Australian Infantry Regiment, Australian Military Forces. On 1 October he joined the 16th Battalion, Australian Imperial Force, as a lieutenant; in December he was promoted to captain. On 25 April 1915 Margolin, leading B Company, was among the first of his battalion to land on Gallipoli. His troops knew him affectionately as Margy—a disciplinarian, taciturn, quick-tempered but fair and courageous, who always showed great concern for their welfare. He was tall and dark and had a deep voice with a Russian accent, also noticeable when he spoke Hebrew and Arabic. On 18 September 1915 Major Margolin took temporary command of the battalion and commanded its rear party during the evacuation. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Order. On the Western front, in France and Flanders, Margolin was wounded several times in 1916-17. While recovering from a knee injury in a London hospital, a leader of the Russian Zionist movement, Zev Jabotinsky, who had heard about Margolis, visited him. Jabotinsky offered him command one of the units of the Jewish Legion then being formed in Great Britain - the 39th Battalion Royal Fusiliers, which consisted of Jewish volunteers from the USA, Canada, England. Margolin accepted the offer and was transferred to the British army with a significant loss in salary. In March, 1918, as a lieutenant-colonel, he took command of his battalion, telling his troops that “our aim is to participate in the fighting on the front of Eretz Israel and the liberation of our homeland.” In the summer of 1918 this battalion participated in a breakthrough of the Turkish front on the Jordan River and capture of As-Salt in Transjordan, where Margolin became a commander of the British garrison. After the Armistice when most Jewish volunteers had left for their homes, Margolin remained in Palestine. During the summer of 1919 he organized and became colonel of a new unit, “The First Jewish Battalion of Judea”, with its own uniform and insignia—with Hebrew the language of command but remaining part of and financed by the British Army. Without British approval, Margolin’s men of the First Judeans put down the 1921 Arab May Day pogrom in Jaffe for which he was expelled from Palestine back to Australia. Margolin felt no remorse, believing that Jews had to fight for Israel with their own army. He became a hero of the Palestinian Jews who knew him as the first commander of Judea. On his return to Western Australia in 1921, he became a businessman and vice-president of Western Australian Zionist association. In 1926, in a civil ceremony, he married Hilda Myrtle England. They had no children. Margolin died of cerebral haemorrhage and was cremated after a non-denominational ceremony at Karrakatta cemetery. In December 1949 his widow, as requested in his will, took his ashes, ceremonial sword, medals and decorations to Israel. A military guard of honour met her at Haifa and led a procession through the village of the Jewish Legion, Avichail, including the Eliezer Margolin Square, to Tel-Aviv and Rehovot, where his ashes were buried next to his parents graves. Among the mourners was Israels prime minister, David Ben Gurion, a former officer in Margolins Jewish battalion. In 1956 a memorial to Lieutenant-Colonel Margolin was unveiled at Rehovot. geni/people/Eliezer-Margolin/6000000020775608798 Sources: Australian Dictionary of Biography - Eliezer Margolis; britishempire.co.uk/forces/armyunits/britishinfantry/fusilierseliezermargolin.htm (Posted by Edna Kalka Grossman)
Posted on: Sun, 28 Dec 2014 23:45:01 +0000
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