 A few days afterwards , Blamey became seriously ill and was forced to receive his field marshal 's baton from McKell in a bedside ceremony at the Heidelberg Repatriation Hospital . Blamey died there of hypertensive cerebral haemorrhage on 27 May 1951 . His body lay in state at the Shrine of Remembrance , where 20 @,@ 000 people filed past . Crowds estimated at 300 @,@ 000 lined the streets of Melbourne at his state funeral . Ten of his lieutenant generals served as pallbearers : Frank Berryman , William Bridgeford , Edmund Herring , Iven Mackay , Leslie Morshead , John Northcott , Sydney Rowell , Stanley Savige , Vernon Sturdee and Henry Wells . His body was cremated at the Fawkner Crematorium and Memorial Park . 
