Russian Anzacs

Rainer Granit was born in Kotka in Finland as Einar Matias Lautala. According to family legend he had to flee his country because of his uncompromising honesty in a court case. As a result in 1911 he landed in South Australia and made his living as a farm labourer and a seaman.
Enlisting in the 25^th Battalion in Townsville he served at Gallipoli and on the Western Front. He was wounded at the battle for Broodseinde at Ypres in October 1917 and his left hand was amputated.
Returning to Australia, he became a coach painter. In 1920 he went to England, married an English girl, Amy May Green, brought her back to Australia and settled at Cummins in South Australia. Both their children served in the AIF during WWII.

Hugo Sipan, a Latvian seaman, came to Australia around 1912 and continued his seafaring life, working on coastal and ocean ships.
He enlisted in the AIF in Brisbane but any records after that about him wane; obviously he left the Army soon after enlistment.

Jackow Petroff grew up in the village of Tokmak in the Tien Shan foothills, central Asia (now Kirghizia); although ethnically Russian, he knew Turkish as well. He served for three years in the Russian Cavalry as a Cossack and in 1912 came to Western Australia with another Russian. He worked in Holyoake district, Karridale and Collie on the railway construction as a sleeper cutter and hewer.
Enlisting in the AIF, he served at Gallipoli and the Western Front in the 11^th and 51^st battalions.
In 1919 he was returned to Australia and seems to disappear from Australian records. It is quite likely that he returned to Russia where his widowed mother lived.