Ralph Stanley Dyer was the second son of Benjamin Hatch Dwyer, a staircase builder and his wife Frances (Fanny) nee Flinn, living at 317 Nicholson St., Brunswick. His elder brother, Gilbert Beresford Dyer, was born in 1889. Ralph followed in 1894, then Cecil Francis, who died in his first year (1896); Arthur Phillip, (1897); John Henry (1900); Charles Hatch (1902), and finally a daughter, Nina Bernice Dyer, born 1904.
Ralph enlisted at Victoria Barracks, St. Kilda Rd., Melbourne on 26 September, 1914, immediately following Britain's declaration of war against Germany. He was a carpenter by trade, 21 years and 11 months old. He had served a three year apprenticeship to E. L. Luckman and had also military training for three years prior to the war, serving in the Citizens' Miltary Forces. He was single, 5' 8" tall, and by faith, Church of England.
Ralph Dyer would have trained at Broadmeadows, before leaving Australia on 22 December aboard HMAT Themistocles A32. On 28 September, 1914,Ralph was placed with the 8th Battalion, one of the four Battalions raised from Victoria, forming the 2nd Brigade and led by Lt. Col. Harold 'Pompey' Elliott. They sailed round the coast to Albany, Western Australia, to join with the rest of the fleet, before heading off for Egypt.Once in Egypt, Ralph Dyer was moved to the 7th Battalion, also part of the 2nd Brigade.
His brother Gilbert had followed him, enlisting on 9 January, 1915, after the initial fleet had gone to Egypt. He was placed in the 14th Battalion, 4th Division. He was to die at the Gallipoli landing on 25 April, 1915, killed charging the enemy on Dead Man's Ridge.
Ralph's Battalion was part of the second wave, and he survived the Anzac landing, but on 22 May, was wounded - a gunshot wound to his right hip at Cape Helles. He was admitted first to the HMHS Guildford Castle, a hospital ship with 427 beds, with nione medical officers, 1r nurses and 59 other medical staff. From the ship, he was transferred to the Egyptian Government Hospital at Port Said. On 10 July, 1915, he was discharged to Base Detail at Zetoun, but was then admitted to Abbasia Hospital, on the outskirts of Cairo, suffering from venereal disease, Syphilis. His medical record says he had 'a bad bubo left groin, widely opened in Egypt, wound now healed, but a bad scar in fold of groin.'
Ralph Dyer was pronounced medically unfit. He returned to Australia on board HMAT Wiltshire on 31 August, 1915, and although he was pronounced medically negative on 19 September, was discharged from the AIF at Langwarrin on 4 October. On 4 December, he was struck off strength. It must have been an embarrassing and painful lesson to a young man.
Ralph Dyer re-enlisted on 13 June, 1918. He was srnt to Langwarrin, on 11 July, but by then the war was nearly over. On 27 November he was discharged from service at Broadmeadows and on 24 December, was discharged from the AIF once more.
The Electoral Rolls tell us that he returned to Brunswick and in 1924, was once again working as a carpenter, In 1931, at the height of the Depression, he was at Blyth and working as a postal employee, as was his father. In 1937, he married Eunice Sybil Holmes. By then he wasforty-three years old; Eunice was forty. They moved to Tasmania and in 1943, were living at Clarence where Ralph was again working as a carpenter. They were at Clarence until 1954, when they moved to Bellerive. Eunice died in 1982, Ralph in 1993 at Warrane in Tasmania. He would have been 99 years old.