The Barefoot Kangaroo Point Schoolboy Who Went to War

Long before Ted Smout became Queensland’s last surviving First World War veteran, he was a barefoot Brisbane schoolboy making a determined daily journey to Kangaroo Point.

New research into Smout’s 106-year life has brought renewed attention to his early years at Kangaroo Point State School, where he remained a pupil even after his family moved back to Dutton Park. Smout continued making the journey for about six months because he hoped to win the school’s dux medal.

A long walk to school

Smout was born in Brisbane in 1898 and spent his childhood in several inner-city neighbourhoods. His family lived in Woolloongabba and Dutton Park before moving to Kangaroo Point, where he attended the local state school.

When the family returned to Dutton Park, Smout did not immediately follow them to another school. He later recalled walking about two miles each way to Kangaroo Point State School, barefoot, for another six months.

The reason was competition. Smout wanted the dux medal and believed he had a chance of winning it if he remained at the school. The prize ultimately went to another pupil, but the journey became one of the childhood stories Smout would still remember many decades later.

From classroom to uniform

At 16, Smout began working as a junior clerk in Queensland’s Audit Office. War had broken out in Europe, and within a year he was trying to enlist.

Smout was 17 years and eight months old when he joined the Australian Imperial Force in September 1915. He overstated his age by a year and eventually served with the 3rd Australian Sanitary Section of the Australian Army Medical Corps.

His duties on the Western Front included inspecting sanitation and water supplies, while periods of fighting brought first-aid and stretcher-bearing work.

At Passchendaele, Smout later recalled working for about 72 hours with little rest as casualties were moved along duckboards through deep mud. He also remembered reaching the scene after German fighter ace Manfred von Richthofen, the Red Baron, was fatally shot down in April 1918.

Coming back to Brisbane

Smout returned to Australia in 1919 after more than three years of military service. His transition back to civilian life was difficult, and he later described suffering delayed shell shock and experiencing a breakdown after coming home.

He resumed work, later moved into insurance and married Ella Stevens in 1923. The couple built a War Service Home in Clayfield and raised three children before Smout’s career and family life took him elsewhere.

Smout remained involved in military and community service over the following decades. He received the Medal of the Order of Australia in 1978 and, at 100, was appointed a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour by France for his First World War service.

A life spanning 106 years

Smout died in Brisbane in June 2004 at the age of 106. By then, he was Queensland’s last surviving veteran of the First World War.

His name was later given to the 2.74-kilometre Ted Smout Memorial Bridge across Bramble Bay between Brighton and Clontarf, which opened in 2010.

Kangaroo Point holds a much earlier chapter of that 106-year life. Before the battlefields, medals and memorials came a local state school and a boy willing to walk miles barefoot for another chance at its top academic prize.

Published 28-Sept-2026