The Encyclopaedia of Australia's Battles

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Author: Chris Coulthard-Clark

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The Encyclopaedia of Australia’s Battles

M7.38517_NEWAUSTBATTSPRELIMS_F

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The author and publisher wish to express their thanks to ADI for their assistance in the preparation of this book.

Other books by this author The Citizen General Staff: The Australian Intelligence Corps 1907–1914 A Heritage of Spirit: A Biography of Major-General Sir William Throsby Bridges, KCB, CMG Duntroon: The Royal Military College of Australia 1911–1986 No Australian Need Apply: The Troubled Career of Lieutenant-General Gordon Legge Action Stations Coral Sea: The Australian Commander’s Story The Third Brother: The Royal Australian Air Force 1921–1939 Edge of Centre: The Eventful Life of Group Captain Gerald Packer White Ensign 1939–1945: The Navy Goes to War (with Tina Coulthard-Clark) The Shame of Savo: Anatomy of a Naval Disaster (with Bruce Loxton) The RAAF in Vietnam: Australian Air Involvement in the Vietnam War 1962–1975 Air Marshals of the RAAF 1935–1995 Soldiers in Politics: The Impact of the Military on Australian Political Life and Institutions McNamara, VC: A Hero’s Dilemma Hit my Smoke! Targeting the Enemy in Vietnam From the Ground Up: The Training of RAAF Technical Ground Staff 1948–1993 Breaking Free: Transforming Australia’s Defence Industry Australia’s Military Map-makers: The Royal Australian Survey Corps 1915–1996 Edited Collections R.J. Brownell, From Khaki to Blue: The Autobiography of Air Commodore R.J. Brownell, CBE, MC, MM Gables, Ghosts and Governors-General: The Historic House at Yarralumla, Canberra The Diggers: Makers of the Australian Military Tradition


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The Encyclopaedia of Australia’s Battles Chris Coulthard-Clark


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First published 1998 This edition published in 2001 Copyright © Chris Coulthard-Clark 1998 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or 10% of this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to Copyright Agency Limited (CAL) under the Act. Allen & Unwin 83 Alexander Street Crows Nest NSW 2065 Australia Phone: (61 2) 8425 0100 Fax: (61 2) 9906 2218 Email: [email protected] Web: www.allenandunwin.com National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry: Coulthard-Clark, C. D. (Christopher David), 1951- . The encyclopaedia of Australia’s battles. [New ed.] Includes index. 1. Battles—Encyclopaedias. 2. Battles—Australia—Encyclopaedias. 3. Australia— History, Military—Encyclopaedias. I. Coulthard-Clark, C. D. (Christopher David), 1951—Where australians fought. II. Title. 355.40994 Designed and set in 10 pt Fairfield by Steven Dunbar Printed and bound by South Wind Productions, Singapore 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1


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TO THE AUSTRALIAN MEN AND WOMEN WHO DIED IN WAR

Black Wars

Unknown

Maori Wars (1860–1866)

20 approximately

Sudan (1885)

6

Boer War (1899–1902)

606

Boxer Rebellion (1900–1901)

6

World War I (1914–1918)

61,919

World War II (1939–1945)

39,366

Korean War (1950–1953)

339

Malayan Emergency (1950–1960)

36

Indonesian Confrontation (1963–1966)

15

Vietnam War (1962–73)

520

Somalia (1992–1993)

1

East Timor (1999– )

2

The numbers cited here are taken from the national roll of honour at the Australian War Memorial.


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Introduction

T

his book attempts to provide a record of all the major battles in which Australians have been involved, or which have taken place on Australian soil within recorded history. Listed are 311 actions covering more than 200 years since European settlement of the continent began. Included within its scope are not just formal engagements between armies, navies and air forces, but—using a somewhat more liberal definition of what constitutes a battle—many significant episodes of frontier conflict and and civil strife or unrest which have come to carry also the appellation of ‘battles’ in popular memory.

Thus the reader will find here such notable incidents as the use of troops to crush the 1804 convict revolt outside Sydney (Vinegar Hill) and the 1854 rebellion by miners on the Ballarat goldfield (Eureka Stockade), along with many of the clashes occurring between Aborigines and explorers, settlers, troops or mounted police. For other instances, though, the rationale for inclusion might not be so obvious, especially when the armed force applied came from non-military agencies—as in the case of the siege of Glenrowan in 1880. In these cases, the reader must look for the special circumstances associated with these events, either in terms of the nature of the violence used or the political overtones associated with either the motivating cause or the outcome. Although the object from the outset was to make the work as definitive as possible in its scope, this nonetheless entailed exercising an unexpected degree of choice over which episodes to include. After noting all the largescale and well-known engagements which obviously ought to go in, there remained a range of lesser actions which—when judged on other factors such as duration or intensity of fighting, number of casualties involved, or decisiveness (political as well as military) of the outcome— were also worthy of selection. When focusing on this range of ‘lesser’ actions, however, there was often considerable difficulty in separating out those that might be described as especially noteworthy from others which were essentially the same. For instance, the Pacific island campaign of the Second World War produced


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many more actions than appear here, but it has been possible to recognise only a certain number which—for one reason or another—stand out. There is another sense, it must be acknowledged, in which this work could never hope to achieve the goal of being definitive. In dealing with the the drawn-out conflict which raged for almost the entire nineteenth century along the fringes of settlement in Australia, much transpired which remains unknown or only partially recorded today. Since one party to the conflict, the Aborigines, lacked the written means to document their experience, we are largely reliant on information left to posterity by their white opponents. Often it was not in the interests of the latter group to preserve details of what happened, but apart from this it can be seen that even what we do now know is purely one-sided in the accounts provided of events. Recognising this limitation also gives rise to the obvious further point that warfare did not suddenly come to Australian shores only four centuries ago with the arrival of the white man. Inclusion of the 1829 skirmish between Aborigines (Hyde Park) is a reminder that the continent’s indigenous inhabitants had their own experience of armed conflict which both predated and existed concurrent with European colonisation, but is something about which we know practically nothing. This only emphasises that the concept of a battle as a contest between formal military forces is not universally applicable to all cultures, and provides an impulse for adopting a wider view of what constitutes warfare for the purposes of this book.

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Organisationally, the battles appear chronologically and with each episode shown by a title which refers to the geographic location of its occurrence. Listing by date order is intended to provide the general reader with a sense of the sequence of events and the correlation in time between battles in different theatres of operations. Naming actions according to their location is a widely accepted practice, but in this work results in some episodes being listed under titles other than those by which they are often better known. For example, the naval action referred to here as ‘Cocos Islands’ (1914) is perhaps more commonly called the Sydney–Emden clash, while few will recognise the 1941 action involving the second Sydney and the German raider Kormoran under the designation of ‘Carnarvon’ used here. In such cases, a check of the index for units or commanders known to have been participants will help identify the relevant entry. In more than a few instances, it may seem strange to the reader to include an action when there were very few Australian personnel involved. This is especially true of episodes in several of Britain’s colonial wars (such as Chitral, Hmawang and the early battles of the Boer War), but occurs even later in the World Wars (as in Ctesiphon or Dieppe). It should, of course, be clear that there is no intention of trying to ‘claim’ these as Australian battles; rather, the point is to establish the extent of Australian involvement in these actions and to place them, quite properly, within Australia’s military heritage. The criterion applied in these cases is that the personnel present were members of a formed Australian unit or involved in an official capacity, rather than serving as enlistees in the forces of another country. The only exception to this rule is where personnel formed a distinct or identifiably Australian component—as in the case of the Waikato Militia in New Zealand or the AIF men who late in the First World War were recruited directly into organisations such as Dunsterforce and the British North Russian


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Relief Force. Where Australians serving as peacekeepers became involved in significant actions, as in the Gulf of Oman, these too have been included. Some episodes have been included which might best be characterised as non-events, such as the attack at Peitang in China in 1900 or the Royal Australian Navy’s expedition to Malaita in 1927. Their inclusion derives from the fact that Australians were involved in a theatre of active operations (which fact may itself be little known, as in the case of Malaita) or were intended to be involved in a specific action (as at Peitang). In case it might be argued that this provides examples of where Australians served rather than where they fought, it should be noted that the involvement of Australian personnel in some campaigns was occasionally in non-combatant roles—for example, radio operators in Mesopotamia in the First World War—but in performing their normal battlefield duty they frequently came under fire. Finally, it should be mentioned that the works listed at the foot of most entries serve two purposes. First, the items cited may be recommended as further reading where more information is sought. Second, the author’s role in this book was often to find the fullest and hopefully most reliable version, and to correct inaccuracies or update interpretive aspects of an incident’s significance. The listed works therefore frequently represent the best or most pertinent (but rarely exclusive) references utilised in compiling the relevant entry, and as such may be useful in identifying the source of a particular interpretation adopted. While the aim in all cases has been to provide the most authoritative yet brief factual account possible, the attempt has been made to reflect recent scholarship on the subject. This has meant that the account given may sometimes be at variance with the popularly-received version of events, but represents where the best available information or most cogent study has come up with a divergent view, which the author has accepted. Chris Coulthard-Clark

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Chronology of Battles Date

Australian mainland

1789, Mar. 6 1795, June 1797, Mar. 1804, Mar. 5 1804, May 3 1816, Apr. 17 1819 1824, Sept.–Nov. 1826, Dec. 1829, Feb. 1829, Dec. 26 1830, Sept.–Oct. 1830, Oct.–Nov. 1834, Oct. 28 1836, May 27 1838, Jan. 26 1838, Apr. 11 1838, June 9 1840, Mar. 8 1840, May 1841, Apr. 16, May 13 1841, June 20, Aug. 26–27 1841, Sept. 6 1842, Mar. 28 1842, Aug. 7, 10, 18 1843, Sept. 19 (21?) 1845, June 28 1846, Feb. 1 1848, Dec. 1849, June 1849, July 9 1850, Aug. 1854, Dec. 3 1855, Sept. 23 1857, Oct. 27 1860, June 26 1860, Dec. 29–31 1861, July 14 1861, Oct. 17 1861, Dec. 1 1863, Sept. 14


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External location

Botany Bay Richmond Hill Parramatta Vinegar Hill Risdon Cove Appin River Plenty Bathurst Emergency Pittwater Launceston Hyde Park Bathurst Rebellion Black Line Pinjarra Mount Dispersion Waterloo Creek Winding Swamp Barfold Fighting Hills Heidelberg The Islands Rufus River Sydney Town Port Lincoln Eumeralla One Tree Hill Nassau River Murrabit Geraldton Bingera Carbucky Paddy’s Island Eureka Stockade Rannes Hornet Bank Attack Creek Matarikoriko Lambing Flat Cullinlaringo Floraville Pukekohe East

State/theatre NSW NSW NSW NSW TAS NSW TAS NSW TAS TAS NSW NSW TAS WA NSW NSW VIC VIC VIC VIC NSW NSW NSW SA VIC QLD QLD VIC WA QLD QLD QLD VIC QLD QLD NT New Zealand NSW QLD QLD New Zealand

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The Encyclopaedia of Australia’s Battles Date 1863, Oct. 23 1864, Mar. 31–Apr. 2 1864, June 21 1864, Dec. 18 1865, Apr. 6 1865, May 1871, Mar. 1873, Sept. 6–7 1873, Nov. 5 1873, Dec. 1874, Feb. 23–25 1874, May 27 1874, June 13 1875, Oct. 16 1876, Apr. 19 1876, Sept. 1880, June 28 1884, Aug. 1884, Sept. 1885, Apr. 3 1885, May 6 1887, Mar. 22 1893, Sept. 1894, Nov. 16 1895, Mar.–Apr. 1897, Mar. 1899, Nov. 23 1899, Nov. 25 1899, Nov. 28 1899, Dec. 11 1900, Jan. 1 1900, Jan. 16; Feb. 9 1900, Feb. 12 1900, Feb. 13–15 1900, Feb. 17–27 1900, Mar. 7 1900, Mar. 10 1900, Mar. 29 1900, Mar. 31 1900, Apr. 30–May 1 1900, May 5 1900, May 10 1900, May 17 1900, June 11–12 1900, July 3 1900, July 19


Australian mainland

External location Titi Hill Orakau Te Ranga

Mitchell River La Grange Bay Coomooboolaroo Tam O’Shanter Point The Officer Battle Camp Gilberton Barrow Creek Palmer River Weld Springs Ularring Rottnest Island Creen Creek Glenrowan Anna’s Reservoir Battle Mountain Tamai Takdul Hmawang Behn River Windjana Gorge Chitral Oscar Range Belmont Graspan Modder River Magersfontein Sunnyside Slingersfontein Pink Hill Kimberley Paardeberg Poplar Grove Driefontein Karee Siding Sannah’s Post Houtnek Coetzee Drift Zand River Mafeking Diamond Hill Leeuw Kop Palmietfontein

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State/theatre New Zealand New Zealand New Zealand QLD WA QLD QLD SA QLD QLD NT QLD WA WA WA QLD VIC NT QLD Sudan Sudan Burma WA WA India WA South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa

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Date Australian mainland 1900, July 22 1900, July 24 1900, Aug. 4–16 1900, Aug. 16–17 1900, Sept. 25 1900, Nov. 6 1900, Nov. 29 1901, Feb. 14 1901, Feb. 18, Mar. 21 1901, May 15 1901, June 12 1901, Aug. 1 1901, Oct. 30 1902, Jan. 4 1914, Sept. 11 1914, Nov. 9 1915, Jan. 1 Broken Hill 1915, Apr. 2 1915, Apr. 25 1915, Apr. 25–30 1915, May 2 1915, May 8 1915, May 31–June 1 1915, July 31 1915, Aug. 6–9 1915, Aug. 7 1915, Aug. 8 1915, Aug. 21–22, 27 1915, Nov. 22–25 1915, Dec. 3–1916, Apr. 29 1915, Dec. 13 1915, Dec. 25 1916, Jan. 23 1916, July 19–20 1916, July 23–Aug. 5 1916, Aug. 4–5 1916, Aug. 8–Sept. 3 1916, Nov. 5, 14 1916, Dec. 23 1917, Jan. 9 1917, Mar. 11 1917, Mar. 26–27 1917, Apr. 11 1917, Apr. 15 1917, Apr. 19 1917, May 3–17


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External location Koster River Stinkhoutboom Elands River Buffels Hoek Peitang Bothaville Rhenoster Kop Wolvekuil Kopjes Hartebeestfontein Grobelaar Recht Wilmansrust Grootvallier Bakenlaagte Onverwacht Bitapaka Cocos Islands First Wassa Anzac Cove Sea of Marmara Baby 700 Krithia Kurna Second Wassa Lone Pine The Nek Hill 971 Hill 60 Ctesiphon Kut el Amara Um Rakhum Gebel Medwa Halazin Fromelles Pozières Romani Mouquet Farm Gueudecourt Magdhaba Rafa Baghdad First Gaza First Bullecourt Lagnicourt Second Gaza Second Bullecourt

State/theatre South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa China South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa South Africa New Guinea Indian Ocean NSW Egypt Turkey Turkey Turkey Turkey Mesopotamia Egypt Turkey Turkey Turkey Turkey Mesopotamia Mesopotamia Egypt Egypt Egypt France France Sinai France France Sinai Sinai Mesopotomia Palestine France France Palestine France

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The Encyclopaedia of Australia’s Battles Date 1917, May 4 1917, June 7 1917, Sept.–Nov. 1917, Sept. 20 1917, Sept. 26 1917, Sept. 28 1917, Oct. 4 1917, Oct. 9 1917, Oct. 12 1917, Oct. 31 1917, Nov. 1–8 1917, Nov. 2 1918, Mar. 27–30 1918, Mar. 27–Apr. 5 1918, Mar. 28 1918, Mar. 28–30 1918, Apr. 4 1918, Apr. 5 1918, Apr. 7 1918, Apr. 14, 17 1918, Apr. 22–23 1918, Apr. 24–25 1918, Apr. 30–May 3 1918, May 4–9 1918, May 19 1918, June 1 1918, June 10 1918, July 4 1918, July 14 1918, Aug. 6–7 1918, Aug. 8 1918, Aug. 9–11 1918, Aug. 10–13 1918, Aug. 10–12 1918, Aug. 16–17 1918, Aug. 23 1918, Aug. 26–Sept. 14 1918, Aug. 31–Sept. 2 1918, Sept. 18 1918, Sept. 19–21 1918, Sept. 20 1918, Sept. 21 1918, Sept. 25 1918, Sept. 25 1918, Sept. 29–Oct. 1 1918, Sept. 30


Australian mainland

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External location North Sea Messines Third Ypres Menin Road Polygon Wood Ramadi Broodseinde Poelcappelle Passchendaele Beersheba Khuweilfe Daur First Amman Hébuterne First Dernancourt First Morlancourt First Villers-Bretonneux Second Dernancourt Hangard Wood Hazebrouck Zeebrugge Second Villers-Bretonneux Es Salt Second Morlancourt Ville-sur-Ancre Heligoland Bight Third Morlancourt Hamel Abu Tellul Karawaran Amiens Lihons Etinehem Proyart Lille Chuignes Baku Mont St Quentin Hindenburg Outpost Line Megiddo Nablus Wady Fara Second Amman Semakh St Quentin Canal Kaukab

State/theatre North Sea Belgium Belgium Belgium Belgium Mesopotamia Belgium Belgium Belgium Palestine Palestine Mesopotamia Palestine France France France France France France France Belgium France Palestine France France North Sea France France Palestine Persia France France France France France France Azerbaijan France France Palestine Palestine Palestine Palestine Palestine France Palestine

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Date Australian mainland 1918, Oct. 5 1919, Mar. 24 Merivale Street 1919, Aug. 29 1927, Oct.–Nov. 1929, Dec. 16 Rothbury 1934, Jan. 30 Dingbat Flat 1937, Apr. 3 (4?) Korewa Island 1940, May 10–June 22 1940, June 28 1940, July 9 1940, July 10–Oct. 31 1940, July 19 1940, Aug. 8–18 1940, Sept. 23–25 1940, Nov. 12 1941, Jan. 3–5 1941, Jan. 21–22 1941, Jan. 25–29 1941, Mar. 21 1941, Mar. 28–29 1941, Apr. 4 1941, Apr. 6–8 1941, Apr. 11–Dec. 7 1941, Apr. 11–13 1941, Apr. 18 1941, Apr. 24 1941, May 20–30 1941, June 9 1941, June 11–27 1941, June 20–21 1941, July 6–9 1941, Nov. 19 Carnarvon 1941, Dec. 22–1942, May 9 1941, Dec. 23–1942, Mar. 8 1942, Jan. 14–15 1942, Jan. 18–22 1942, Jan. 23 1942, Jan. 26–27 1942, Jan. 31–Feb. 3 1942, Feb. 8–15 1942, Feb. 19–1943, Nov. 12 Darwin 1942, Feb. 20–23 1942, Feb. 27 1942, Feb. 28–Mar. 1 1942, Mar. 3–1943, Aug. 16 Broome 1942, Mar. 3–23 Wyndham


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External location Montbrehain Emptsa Malaita

France North of Benghazi Calabria Britain Cape Spada Berbera Dakar Strait of Otranto Bardia Tobruk (Capture) Derna Giarabub Matapan Er Regima Mechili Tobruk (Siege) Vevi Pass Tempe Gorge Brallos Pass Retimo Litani River Merdjayoun Damascus Damour Malta Rangoon Gemas Bakri Rabaul Jemaluang Ambon Singapore Timor Java Sea Bantam Bay

State/theatre France QLD North Russia Solomons NSW WA NT NW Europe Mediterranean Mediterranean UK Mediterranean Somaliland West Africa Adriatic North Africa North Africa North Africa North Africa Mediterranean North Africa North Africa North Africa Greece Greece Greece Crete Syria Syria Syria Syria WA Mediterranean Burma Malaya Malaya New Guinea Malaya Netherlands E Indies Malaya NT Netherlands E Indies Netherlands E Indies Netherlands E Indies WA WA

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The Encyclopaedia of Australia’s Battles Date Australian mainland 1942, Mar. 4 1942, Mar. 14–Aug. 1 Horn Island 1942, Mar. 20 Derby 1942, Mar. 21–May 9 1942, Mar. 22 Katherine 1942, Apr. 5 1942, Apr. 9 1942, May 4–8 1942, May 31–June 1, June 8 Sydney Harbour 1942, June 8 Newcastle 1942, June 29 1942, July 26–29 Townsville 1942, July 27 1942, July 28–Nov. 2 1942, July 30–1943, Aug. 17 Port Hedland 1942, July 31 Mossman 1942, Aug. 9 1942, Aug. 19 1942, Aug. 25–Sept. 7 1942, Sept. 1 1942, Oct. 23–Nov. 5 1942, Nov. 22–Dec. 9 1942, Nov. 26–27 Brisbane 1942, Dec. 18–1943, Jan. 2 1943, Jan. 12–18 1943, Jan. 28–Feb. 1 1943, Mar. 2–3 1943 Rockhampton 1943, May 9–11 1943, May 20–22, Sept. 15–16 Exmouth Gulf 1943, June 20–23 1943, July 10 1943, Sept. 4–16 1943, Sept. 9–11 1943, Sept. 19–20 1943, Sept. 22–Oct. 2 1943, Sept. 26–27 1943, Oct. 3–Nov. 25 1943, Oct. 12–13 1944, Jan. 19–31 1944, Aug. 5 Cowra 1944, Oct. 25 1945, Jan. 5–9 1945, Mar. 19–Apr. 5 1945, May 11–15 1945, May 1


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External location South of Java

Port Moresby Colombo Trincomalee Coral Sea

Salamaua Ruin Ridge Kokoda Trail

Savo Island Dieppe Milne Bay Tel el Eisa El Alamein Gona Buna Sanananda Wau Bismarck Sea Mubo Lababia Ridge Sicily Lae Salamaua Kaiapit Finschhafen Keppel Harbour Sattelberg John’s Knoll Shaggy Ridge Surigao Strait Lingayen Gulf Slater’s Knoll Wewak Tarakan

State/theatre Indian Ocean QLD WA New Guinea NT Ceylon Ceylon SW Pacific NSW NSW New Guinea QLD Egypt New Guinea WA QLD Solomons France New Guinea Egypt Egypt New Guinea QLD New Guinea New Guinea New Guinea New Guinea QLD New Guinea WA New Guinea Italy New Guinea New Guinea New Guinea New Guinea Singapore New Guinea New Guinea New Guinea NSW Philippines Philippines Bougainville New Guinea Borneo

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Date 1945, June 10, 16 1945, July 1 1950, Oct. 17 1950, Oct. 22 1950, Oct. 25–26 1950, Oct. 29–30 1950, Nov. 5–6 1951, Jan. 1–4 1951, Apr. 23–24 1951, Sept. 28, 30 1951, Oct. 2–8 1951, Dec. 1 1953, Mar. 16 1953, July 24–26 1953, Nov. 1956, Feb. 21 1956, June 22 1957, May 13–14 1958, Nov. 20 1964, Oct. 29–30 1964, Dec. 13 1965, May 27, June 12 1965, June 15 1965. July 12 1965, Nov. 8 1966, Jan. 8–14 1966, Feb. 23–24 1966, Aug. 18 1967, Feb.17 1967, Aug. 6 1967, Oct. 18 1968, Jan. 24–Mar. 1 1968, May 13–28 1969, June 6–7 1971, June 7 1990, Sept.–Oct. 1993, Feb.16–Mar.26 1999, Oct. 6 1999, Oct. 10 1999, Oct. 16


Australian mainland

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External location Labuan–Brunei Bay Balikpapan Sariwon Yongju Kujin Chongju Pakchon Uijongbu Kapyong Han River Maryang San Sunchon Wonsan Samichon River Bongsu Forest Kluang Sungei Bemban Klawang Sungei Siput Sungei Kesang Singapore Strait Sungei Koemba Kindau Babang Gang Toi Ho Bo Woods Suoi Bong Trang Long Tan Ap My An Suoi Chau Pha Cape Lai Bien Hoa Coral–Balmoral Binh Ba Long Khanh Gulf of Oman Baidoa Suai Motaain Aidabasalala

State/theatre Borneo Borneo Korea Korea Korea Korea Korea Korea Korea Korea Korea Korea Korea Korea Malaya Malaya Malaya Malaya Malaya Malaysia Malaysia Malaysia Malaysia Malaysia Vietnam Vietnam Vietnam Vietnam Vietnam Vietnam Vietnam Vietnam Vietnam Vietnam Vietnam Arabian Gulf Somalia East Timor East Timor East Timor

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Botany Bay, a clash between Gamaraigal Aborigines and convicts from the settlement at Port Jackson (Sydney), fought on 6 March 1789. The incident was triggered by the murder by Aborigines of a convict labourer who strayed from the brick-kilns at Rose Hill, near the head of Darling Harbour, in search of a herb known as ‘sweet tea’. The sixteen members of the brickmaker’s gang to which the man belonged decided to avenge his death and, taking up staves, marched to Botany Bay in search of the killers. When the party arrived at the bay, they were met by a larger number of Aborigines than they expected and these—having guessed the convicts’ purpose—attacked with spears, killing one man and wounding six or seven others. The next day the colony’s governor, Captain Arthur Phillip, RN, sent armed marines into the area to restore order. These found the body of the convict felled and another who had been left wounded at the scene of the fight. For disobeying his orders aimed at maintaining relations with the Aborigines, Phillip ordered those not already injured to receive 150 lashes and for the rest to receive the same punishment as soon as they recovered. George Barrington (1825) The History of New South Wales, including Botany Bay, Port Jackson, Parramatta, Sydney … , 2nd edn, London: M. Jones; Australia’s Heritage (1971), vol.1, Sydney: Hamlyn House

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Richmond Hill, an encounter between Dharuk (Darug) Aborigines and troops of the New South Wales Corps, fought in June 1795 on the Hawkesbury River, New South Wales. When five settlers in the district were killed and others wounded in attacks by Aborigines within the space of a few weeks, the acting governor, Captain William Paterson, decided to send a detachment of 60 soldiers under Lieutenant Edward Abbott ‘to drive the natives to a distance’. The evening after this force arrived at the Hawkesbury, it fired upon and pursued a large body of Dharuks ‘who had concealed themselves in the neighbouring woods during the day, and at night came to a settler’s farm to plunder it’. Abbott reported seven or eight Dharuks supposed killed, while five (one man, four women) were taken prisoner. Historical Records of Australia, Series I, vol.1 (1914), Sydney: Commonwealth Parliament Library Committee

Parramatta, the site of a skirmish in March 1797 in which Bidjigal (Bediagal) Aborigines fought white settlers and troops of the New South Wales Corps. The clash followed depredations upon settlers in the Toongabbie district, led by the Aborigines’ noted guerilla leader Pemulwuy. An armed party was sent after the marauders, and following a pursuit lasting throughout one night came across their quarry—numbering about 100—the next day. The Aborigines fled, leaving the

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The defeat of rebellious convicts at ‘Vinegar Hill’, as pictured by an unidentified artist. Source: Watercolour; 31.2 x 4.3 cm. Rex Nan Kivell collection NK10162, National Library of Australia T2495

spoils of their raids on the ground. The punitive expedition pursued the hostile band into the Parramatta district but—becoming fatigued—eventually retired into the town. The Aborigines followed them there, with Pemulwuy at their head threatening to kill the first white man who approached him. He effectively challenged the town’s military garrison to battle by hurling his spear at one of the soldiers. What was described as a ‘desperate fight’ followed, in which Pemulwuy and his followers pitted their spears against the muskets of the troops and settlers. Five Aborigines were killed and many more wounded, including Pemulwuy who was made prisoner with seven buckshot hits in his head and body. He was taken to the hospital, but subsequently escaped to play a leading role in numerous other incidents until he was finally shot dead by two settlers late in 1802. George Barrington (1825) The History of New South Wales, including Botany Bay, Port Jackson, Parramatta, Sydney … , 2nd edition, London: M. Jones


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Vinegar Hill, the action which ended an insurrection by Irish convicts from the government farm at Castle Hill north of Parramatta, New South Wales, was fought on 5 March 1804. At 8 p.m. the previous day (a Sunday) 200 convict workers at the farm had overpowered officials, set fires and seized arms, then gathered to hear their leader—an ex-soldier named Philip Cunningham—outline plans for full-scale attacks on the main towns of Parramatta and Sydney. An official who had escaped ran to Parramatta and raised the alarm about 9 p.m., enabling the 60-strong garrison there to immediately embark on defensive arrangements with the assistance of civilian volunteers who joined during the night. By the time the rebels reached the outskirts some hours later, they found the town prepared and decided against making an attack. Before daybreak they withdrew westwards towards Toongabbie, with the apparent intention of marching on the settlement along the Hawkesbury River to induce other convicts to rise in support.

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1797–1804 Meanwhile, news of the outbreak was received about midnight by the governor 25 kilometres away in Sydney. A detachment of 56 men of the New South Wales Corps was ordered to Parramatta under the regiment’s acting commander, Major George Johnston. Arriving at dawn after a forced march, Johnston immediately set off in pursuit of the rebels—his small force bolstered by some twenty local inhabitants who were armed. He took with him a Catholic priest, James Dixon, who had been transported after the 1798 uprising in Ireland but allowed by the governor to work as a clergyman among his countrymen. When the main rebel band, numbering around 260, was located near present-day Rouse Hill, Johnston sent forward a trooper under a white flag to counsel surrender; this suggestion was rejected. He next sent the priest Dixon up to them, but they refused to listen to him. Johnston himself then rode out in advance of the soldiers, accompanied by only one trooper, and demanded to parley with the rebel leaders. Cunningham and another man named Will Johnson stepped forward, carrying swords, and again refused the major’s call for surrender. Johnston then rode back to his troops to once more bring up Dixon to try reasoning with his countrymen, but in response to renewed demands for submission Cunningham replied in the same terms as the 1798 rebels, declaring ‘Death or Liberty!’. At this Johnston and the trooper quite dishonourably drew pistols which they had hidden on themselves, made prisoners of the two leaders, and forced them back to the military ranks. Orders were given at the same time for the soldiers to open fire and charge. A few shots were returned by the rebels, but the majority quickly broke ranks and scattered at the run with the soldiers in pursuit. Casualties among the convicts were at least fifteen killed and six wounded; another 26 were captured. The site of their defeat was dubbed ‘Vinegar Hill’, recalling the place in


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Wexford, Ireland, where the British crushed the main body of Irish rebels in 1798. In the aftermath of the failed uprising, Cunningham was summarily hanged without trial at Green Hills (Windsor). A court martial promptly conducted at Parramatta convicted ten others and passed death sentences on them. Approved by the governor in all except two cases, these executions were carried out as public spectacles over three days, 8–10 March, in Parramatta, Castle Hill and Sydney as a warning to the rest of the convict population. Nine others received heavy floggings, while some 50 others were sent to labour in coalmines at a new settlement established at what is now Newcastle. K.S. Inglis (1974) The Australian Colonists, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press; Iris Nesdale (1987) The Fettered and the Free, Adelaide: Orchid Publications

Risdon Cove, a tragic encounter on 3 May 1804 between Moomairremener Aborigines and a detachment of troops of the New South Wales Corps protecting the new settlement established on the Derwent River, Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania), eight kilometres north of modern Hobart. When some 300 Aborigines were spotted during the morning descending the foothills in semi-circular formation towards the settlement, it was assumed that this was a war-party. In fact, the group—which included women and children—carried only waddies, not spears, and was almost certainly engaged in a kangaroo hunt, but this practice had not been observed before in the short period of the colony’s existence. As the Aborigines came within range at about 11 a.m., the detachment commander, Lieutenant William Moore, ordered his men to open fire. He later claimed to have done so only after ‘they had thoroughly convinced me of their Intentions by using violence to a Settler’s wife and my own Servant who was returning into Camp with some Kangaroos, One of which they took from him …’ Moore also maintained that the Aborigines would

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The Encyclopaedia of Australia’s Battles not disperse until one of the carronades (cannon) in the camp was fired ‘to intimidate them’. Official reports maintained that only three Aborigines were killed, but other accounts put the death toll as high as 30– 60. An unknown number were injured; Moore himself conceding that there was ‘reason to Suppose more were wounded, as one was seen to be taken away bleeding’. No action was taken against him or any of his men. Historical Records of Australia, Series III, vol.1 (1921), Sydney: Commonwealth Parliament Library Committee; James Fenton (1884) A History of Tasmania from its Discovery in 1642 to the Present Time, Hobart: J. Walch & Sons

Appin, an encounter between Gundungurra (Gandangara) Aborigines and the grenadier company of the 46th Regiment under Captain James Wallis, fought on 17 April 1816 in the district south of present-day Campbelltown, New South Wales. In response to a series of ‘Acts of Atrocity being Committed by the Natives’ on the fringes of the settlement, Major-General Lachlan Macquarie—normally a humane and enlightened governor by the standards of the times—on 9 April ordered separate detachments of the 46th Regiment to undertake circuits of the outposts along the Grose, Hawkesbury and Nepean rivers, with instructions ‘to make as many Prisoners as possible’ of the hostile tribesmen. Any who resisted or fled were to be shot, and their bodies conspicuously hung from trees as a warning to others. The detachments set out on 10 April, two of them guided by Aboriginal trackers who effectively ensured that the troops got nowhere near their ‘wild’ compatriots. It was Wallis alone who—dispensing with Aboriginal guides—achieved any success. While at Appin, near Lachlan Vale farm owned by public servant William Broughton, a local convict led his grenadiers to an Aboriginal camp situated beside ‘the precipitous banks of a deep and rocky creek’


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and he decided to mount a quick attack. The camp’s sleeping occupants were alerted when their dogs began barking at the sound of movement through the bush, so that by the time the troops were on the edge of the camp it was empty. Burning fires provided evidence of hasty vacation, however, and a child’s cry was heard from the surrounding scrub. Forming his men into line, Wallis ordered an advance through the campsite towards the precipice beyond. Dark figures were seen in the moonlight flitting across the steep rock-faces, and the troops began firing— shooting down men, women and children. Many of the Aborigines, however, perished by jumping in terror, falling, or being driven over the cliff. Fourteen bodies were later found, including those of Durelle and Kanabygal (Cannabayagal, or Camanbigal) who were on Macquarie’s wanted list as ‘Two of the most ferocious and Sanguinary of the Natives’. With considerable difficulty Wallis’ men retrieved their corpses from the gorge below the camp, in order to give effect to the governor’s instructions about displaying them, but the remainder were left where they were. Five survivors of the attack (two women and three children) who were taken prisoner were conveyed by cart back to Liverpool, where they were placed in gaol. Carol Liston (1988) Campbelltown, North Sydney: Allen & Unwin; J. Brook & J.L. Kohen (1991) The Parramatta Native Institution and the Black Town: A History, Kensington: NSW University Press

River Plenty, a tributary of the Derwent River lying ten kilometres to the west of New Norfolk, Tasmania, was the scene of a clash between Aborigines and British soldiers in 1819. The incident was allegedly triggered by the behaviour of white stock-keepers in detaining and maltreating an Aboriginal woman, the wife of a tribal elder or ‘chief ’. The Aborigines retaliated by spearing cattle and sheep, and in a collision one man on each side was killed. A party of the 48th

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1804–1824 Regiment then pursued the Aborigines, killing seventeen of them. The Lieut.-Governor, Major William Sorell, reportedly provided for some of the children orphaned by this episode, including one who, christened George van Dieman [sic], was sent to England in 1821 aged about nine. Clive Turnbull (1948) Black War, Melbourne: F.W. Cheshire

Bathurst Emergency, a series of engagements between September and November 1824 which marked the final phase of resistance by Wiradjuri Aborigines to British settlement of New South Wales west of the Blue Mountains. An escalating series of clashes beginning in 1822, led by the Wiradjuri leader Windradyne (or ‘Saturday’ as he was called by whites), caused the governor, Major-General Sir Thomas Brisbane, to proclaim martial law ‘West of Mount York’ on 14 August 1824. A further 43 troops of the 40th (2nd Somersetshire) Regiment were sent to Bathurst, bringing to 75 the strength of the garrison there under Major James Morisset. In addition, a paramilitary force of 50–100 men was raised from among local settlers. Few details of the military campaign which followed are known with certainty. Although the episode is often called the ‘Battle of Bathurst’, it was neither a single action nor focused exclusively in the immediate vicinity of the present-day city of that name. Grassby and Hill maintain that events began on 10 September with a clash about 80 kilometres north-west of Bathurst, between a 30–40strong Wiradjuri war-party and three station hands who were tracking cattle that the Aborigines had driven from the Cudgegong River area. The next morning the whites stumbled upon the war-party’s camp about 32 kilometres north of Bathurst—fortunately emptied of its occupants, who were burying three warriors killed the day before. Finding the camp laden with weapons, the station hands burned the greater part of this cache


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before the tribesmen returned. Opposed now by largely defenceless Aborigines, the whites shot down sixteen of their opponents— including one of the Wiradjuri leaders nicknamed Blucher, after the Prussian commander at Waterloo—and forced the remainder to retreat with many wounded. In one stroke a major war-party had been eliminated. Following on this success, a week later the garrison at Bathurst itself took to the field in four ‘flying’ columns. The largest of these led by Morisset advanced north, while another moved west and two others headed east. Over the next fortnight a giant sweep was carried out across a radius up to 160 kilometres from Bathurst, covering as far east as Mount York and as far north as the Capertee district and Cudgegong River. The success of this operation was unarguable. By mid-October, the first Wiradjuri had begun to surrender; by 3 November Governor Brisbane was able to report that ‘hostile Natives were hourly coming in to tender their submission and sue for peace and protection’. Brisbane, evidently concerned to justify to London such an extreme measure as the resort to martial law, later admitted that the number of Aborigines who were killed in achieving his desired outcome ‘can only be gathered from conjecture’, but claimed that in all probability the figure was not much more than double the seven Europeans who lost their lives. Aboriginal tradition, however, presents a different picture, suggesting that tactics of the utmost severity bordering on extermination were employed. Two incidents alone—at Bell’s Falls Gorge, a few kilometres west of Sofala, and in another gorge near the headwaters of Clear Creek (east of Brucedale)—allegedly resulted in the systematic shooting of hundreds of Wiradjuri men, women and children. Another incident amounting to a massacre reportedly occurred at a camp established mainly as a refuge for women and children.

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The Encyclopaedia of Australia’s Battles Brisbane’s own description of the campaign’s aims and methods—although superficially innocuous—lends support to the worst interpretations of what happened. The governor reported that: . . . the Detachment at Bathurst . . . [was] divided into various small parties, each headed by a Magistrate, and proceeded in different directions in towards the interior of the Country, and by previous arrangements were to form junctions at certain given points. This system of keeping these unfortunate People in a constant state of alarm soon brought them to a sense of their Duty . . .

The tactics are recognisably those of marshalling terrorised Aborigines into areas where they could be attacked. It need scarcely be added that the presence of magistrates did no more than preserve the quasi-legal nature of proceedings, since at least one of these functionaries was a retired army officer anyway and another was Morisset himself, the very man authorised to employ ‘the Use of Arms . . . beyond the ordinary Rule of Law in Time of Peace . . . [including] Resort to summary Justice’. While a ruthless policy of extermination undoubtedly brought results, curiously Windradyne himself remained at large for several months after the terror began. Not even the offering on 25 August of a reward of a land grant of 500 acres (202 hectares) for his apprehension did anything towards inducing his hapless fellow tribesmen to betray him. Windradyne decided himself when resistance was useless and submitted personally to Brisbane at Parramatta on 28 November, described by some as a broken and defeated leader. On 11 December Brisbane formally repealed his martial law measures. Historical Records of Australia, Series I, vol.11 (1917), Sydney: Commonwealth Parliament Library Committee; Al Grassby & Marji Hill (1988) Six Australian Battlefields, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Pittwater, near Sorell, Tasmania, was the scene


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of a clash in December 1826 between a party of troops and field police and about 40 Oyster Bay Aborigines, in which fourteen of the latter were killed and ten captured. Lyndall Ryan (1981) The Aboriginal Tasmanians, St Lucia, Qld: University of Queensland Press

Launceston, scene of a clash in February 1829 between British troops and Aborigines, in which nineteen Aborigines were killed and five captured, and one European speared. Among the casualties was an Aborigine named Boomer, who was guiding the soldiers in pursuit of the Aborigines; he allegedly struck the sergeant of the detachment, attempted to escape, and was shot as he did so. Lloyd Robson (1983) A History of Tasmania, Melbourne: Oxford University Press

Hyde Park, formerly the site of Sydney’s first racecourse, was the scene of a ‘desperate fight . . . between two hostile tribes’ of Aborigines on 26 December 1829. A number of the combatants were severely wounded and one killed on the spot. Although little is known about this incident’s causes, it remains a reminder that, both before and after the white settlement of Australia, the Aboriginal people practised forms of warfare among themselves. J. Henniker Heaton (1879) Australian Dictionary of Dates and Men of the Time, Sydney: George Robertson

Bathurst Rebellion, or ‘Bathurst Insurgency’ as it is sometimes called, was the name given to the shortlived bushranging episode involving a group of escaped convicts known as the ‘Ribbon Gang’ during September– October 1830. The outbreak is usually described as having its origins in a cruel act of injustice inflicted on a 25-year-old English convict-servant named Ralf (Ralph) Entwistle, who a year earlier had almost caused an embarrassing scene while the governor, Lieut.-General Ralph Darling, was visiting the Bathurst district. On a hot day

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1824–1830 in November 1829 Entwistle and another convict had been swimming naked at a ford on the Macquarie River when the governor’s entourage happened to pass by. Although none of the visitors noticed the innocent incident, the pair were spotted by the local police magistrate who ordered that they be flogged. By most accounts, Entwistle harboured bitter resentment at his treatment and plotted an uprising in revenge. Given the interval before he took any action, however, and the apparent lack of planning involved, this seems a less plausible explanation than suggestions that the real cause was a grievance at being deprived of adequate food and clothing by a landowner keen to maximise the profitability of his farm—a practice common in the period. The trouble began on 23 September, when Entwistle and at least four others absconded from the farm where they were assigned in Fitzgerald’s Valley, some twenty kilometres south-west of Bathurst, after seizing firearms. Over the next two days they appeared at several other farms in the district, adding to their weaponry and forcing other convicts to join them. When the overseer at one of these places refused to join their ranks, he was shot dead. The insurgents’ numbers eventually swelled to around 80, but few of these men had any enthusiasm for the cause suddenly thrust on them and many deserted at the first opportunity. Entwistle was keen to dispel any appearance that his was a band of mere marauders, and even took to wearing white streamers on his hat as an emblem of leadership. This later led to comparisons being drawn with earlier nationalist rebels in Ireland known as the Ribbonmen, but significantly none of Entwistle’s followers— Irish or other—followed his example. Realising that little reliance could be placed on the majority of the men in the rebels’ ranks, Entwistle decided to divest himself of all except the most committed among the


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group, and at about 1 a.m. on 25 September rode off at the head of no more than a dozen others. In response to the activities of the gang, the local landowners held a meeting on 27 September at which a volunteer cavalry corps of twelve men was raised under William Suttor. With the help of two Aborigines, the settlers tracked the rebels the next day to the steep ranges alongside the Abercrombie River, 64 kilometres south of Bathurst. About a hour before sundown they located the band in a rocky glen near a point now called Captain Cook’s Lookout and immediately prepared to attack. While three men were sent to approach from the rear, the main body made a frontal assault. The rebels were alert, however, and strongly engaged the attackers in a gunbattle lasting about an hour, during which an estimated 300 shots were exchanged. With night coming on and his volunteers running short of ammunition, Suttor ordered a withdrawal. Some accounts suggest his leadership of the attack lacked both energy and courage, and was easily seen off. Entwistle’s group suffered two men slightly wounded. News of the volunteers’ defeat prompted the commandant at Bathurst, Major Donald McPherson, to send out the next day a detachment comprising mounted soldiers of the 39th Regiment and mounted police. Commanded by Lieutenant James Brown, this party—reinforced by a second group of volunteers—sighted the rebel gang on 30 September disappearing over the ridgeline at a place even then called Bushrangers’ Hill. Confident that they had their quarry on the run, Brown sent his force in headlong pursuit, but as they neared the summit they were met by a volley of gunfire which killed two men and five horses. The pursuers fell back and allowed the Ribbon Gang to continue their westward progress unhindered. During the next few days the gang was active along the Lachlan River, but then

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The Encyclopaedia of Australia’s Battles dropped entirely out of sight. Entwistle and his followers were finally located on 13 October by a ten-man detachment of mounted police from Goulburn, led by Lieutenant Lachlan Macalister formerly of the 48th Regiment. In a sharp clash fought near ‘Borona Plains’ (possibly a reference to Borowa Plains) and lasting only twenty minutes, four of the police party were wounded—including Macalister, who was hit in the thigh—and three of the rebels were shot and captured. Again, the ‘banditti’ (as they were called) were allowed to depart when the police found themselves running low on ammunition, although it was evident now that the rebels’ situation was no better; an official report noted that the ‘worst shots [among the gang members were] loading for the good ones’, which was almost certainly a tactic to make every shot count. The next day the rebels found themselves up against a fresh detachment of troops of the 39th Regiment, recently arrived after being force-marched from Sydney under Captain Horatio Walpole. With the latter were the various parties of volunteers, along with the police and troops under Brown and Macalister, and a number of assigned servants and at least a dozen pensioner veterans. Faced with overwhelmingly superior force, Entwistle and the six men remaining with him—weary and suffering the effects of illness and minor wounds, and now desperately short of food and ammunition—surrendered without a struggle. Taken to Bathurst, all ten rebel prisoners were tried before a Special Commission consisting of the Chief Justice, Sir Francis Forbes, and a jury of military officers. The outcome of these proceedings was a foregone conclusion (the government executioner was despatched even before the trial began), and on 3 November the condemned men were publicly hanged at Bathurst. Eric Fry (ed.) (1983) Rebels and Radicals, Sydney: Allen & Unwin; Stephan Williams (1994), Ralph


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Entwistle & the Bathurst Insurgency, Canberra: Popinjay Publications

Black Line, a famous episode in the history of Tasmania, in which an attempt was made during October–November 1830 to clear the eastern half of the island of its Aboriginal population by herding them into the confined space of the Tasman Peninsula, on the south-east coast. The lieut.-governor of the colony, Lieut.-Colonel George Arthur, conceived of the plan in an attempt to stem a growing list of depredations committed by the Aborigines. It followed the failure of earlier measures, such as ordering the arrest of the leaders of the hostiles in 1826, banning all Aborigines from settled districts in 1828, and the imposition of martial law later in the same year. Commencing on 4 October 1830 a string of military posts was established extending from St Patrick’s Head (near St Marys) on the east coast, through Campbell Town to the junction of the Macquarie and Lake rivers near Cressy, south of Launceston. The personnel in these posts began marching south three days later, and, in theory, they began forming a more solid line as the narrowing terrain compressed the distance between them. Their numbers were also augmented by thousands of volunteers drawn from the settler and town populations, and even 300 convicts. Meanwhile, a party moved down the east coast from the Swan River to Spring Bay; in the lakes district, in the centre of the island, other military parties aimed to push the Aborigines before them as they advanced due east towards the Jordan River; others swept the country from Norfolk Plains to the Ouse River, and from Lake Sorell to Lake Echo, where they remained as a blocking force to close off avenues of escape to the west. By 31 October the bodies coming south and east had closed into a tight cordon running from Prosser Bay to Sorell, and the operation moved into its final phase. Five parties were sent within this line to scour

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September–November 1830

LAUNCESTON 7 Oc

St Patrick’s Head

t.

Great Lake

Campbell Town Lake Sorell

7 Oct.

Lake Echo

12 Oct.

Freycinet Peninsula

Oatlands 16 Oct.

Bothwell

ct.

O 20

v.

Richmond

o 2N

Sorell 2

New Norfolk HOBART

Tasman Peninsula

0


9

25

50

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75 kms

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the terrain for the Aborigines enclosed, and to capture or else drive them towards the Tasman Peninsula. The failure of Arthur’s elaborate scheme was apparent well before he eventually called an end to proceedings on 26 November. Writing a despatch to London a week earlier, he himself intimated an expectation that the vast expenditure of effort would prove to have been in vain. By that time it was widely reported that the Aborigines had got through the line of 5,000 troops, constables and volunteers and were continuing their attacks in the rear on homes and property left undefended. Numerous claims were made that escaped convicts had helped the tribesmen to evade the cordon, though the evidence of this was not especially convincing. The more plausible explanation for failure lay in the vastly superior bush skills of the Aborigines, especially in comparison with many town employees who treated the affair as a holiday; and growing disenchantment among the participants, especially as fatigue and bad weather sapped their spirit. In the event, two Aborigines only—a man and a boy of about fifteen years of age— were captured in the whole of the six-week campaign. Both were seized during a brush along the Prosser River on 22 October, when two other Aborigines were shot. Emphasising the lack of contact between the two sides was the fact that the whites also sustained few casualties, with one soldier wounded by a spear during an attempt by some Aborigines to breach the cordon on 27 October. More injuries, four or five reportedly fatal, were caused by accidents. The whole enterprise reportedly cost some £35,000 in direct expenditure by the government (equivalent to about $2 million today), and probably not much less in time and outlay by civilian volunteers. Though a spectacular waste of money and effort, the Black Line lived on in the popular memory of Tasmanians for a long time.


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John West (1852) The History of Tasmania, Launceston, Tas. Henry Dowling; Clive Turnbull (1948) Black War, Melbourne: F.W. Cheshire

Pinjarra, a clash between Nyungar Aborigines and a party of 25 police, soldiers of the 50th (West Kent) Regiment and settlers personally led by Captain Sir James Stirling, RN, governor of the Swan River Colony (Western Australia), was fought 80 kilometres south of Perth on 28 October 1834. The expedition was undertaken in retaliation for several murders committed by members of the tribe—most recently in July when a private of the 21st Regiment (Royal North British Fusiliers) was killed near Peel Town (Mandurah)—and, Stirling claimed, because of Nyungar threats ‘to burn the Barracks and Houses on the Murray [River] and destroy all the whites in their District’. After assembling his force at Mandurah on Monday, 27 October, Stirling moved rapidly south-east towards the Serpentine River where fresh tracks of a large band of Aborigines were picked up and followed. The next morning the party located a camp of some 70–80 Nyungar under their leader Calyute, occupying flat ground on the east bank of the Murray about 2.5 kilometres south of the present-day town of Pinjarra. The river at this point was only 30 metres wide, and under the cover of rain the main body of the attacking force was able to adopt an ambush position on the six-metre high banks opposite the Nyungar camp. A five-man group, sent by Stirling to cross the river and approach from the eastern side, was also able to complete its circling movement undetected until within 200 metres of the camp. As the Nyungar warriors rushed to take up their weapons, the mounted party charged among the huts, firing as they came. Their initial resistance quickly overwhelmed, the Nyungar made for the river only to find themselves caught in a crossfire. Shooting reportedly went on for over an hour, during which not only men but some

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1830–1836 women and children, too, were killed. In his report of the incident Stirling stated Aboriginal deaths as fourteen (three of them women and one child), but accounts of other participants indicated a more accurate figure may have been double this. Claims that the number killed was as high as 50 are probably exaggeration but, whatever the truth, it is clear that the majority of Nyungar men had been wiped out in the action. The attackers’ casualties were two policemen wounded by spears, one fatally. Commented The Australian Encyclopaedia (1958): Effects arising from the encounter were immediate—the natives of the district dispersed and ceased to cause trouble. Consequently, white settlers regarded ‘The Battle of Pinjarra’ as conclusive, which fact probably gave the incident greater stature than was really warranted. Al Grassby & Marji Hill (1988) Six Australian Battlefields, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; Henry Reynolds (1989) Dispossession, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Mount Dispersion, a clash between Aborigines and a 23-man party of exploration led by Major Thomas Mitchell, SurveyorGeneral of New South Wales, fought on the northern bank of the Murray River southeast of Mildura on 27 May 1836. Mitchell’s actions on this occasion were probably prompted by difficulties he had experienced with Aborigines on previous expeditions in 1831–32 and 1835. On the second of these, he had been forced to turn back after a fight at Menindee on the Darling River in which several Aborigines were killed; a member of this expedition (Richard Cunningham, the superintendent of the Botanic Gardens in Sydney) who strayed from the main group and became lost was later found to have been killed by Aborigines. The next year Mitchell set off on a further attempt to establish that the Darling River emptied into the Murray, taking with him what he pointedly described as ‘the army with which I was to traverse unexplored


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regions, peopled, as far as we knew, by hostile tribes’. While travelling west along the Murray to its junction with the Darling, Mitchell’s party encountered a band of some 180–200 Aborigines on 24 May at Lake Benanee near Euston, New South Wales, who for the most part kept their distance. When contact was finally made with this group, Mitchell claimed to straight away recognise many who had led the adversaries he encountered in 1835. During the next two days, while the expedition moved overland ignoring the southerly loop followed by the river, he was increasingly concerned by the continuing interest shown in his party. He became convinced that a corroboree performed by the Aborigines on the night of 26 May prefigured an attack, and he resolved to strike first. The next day, as the expedition rejoined the Murray at Tarpaulin Bend, Mitchell divided his men into two groups and set an ambush. This was almost immediately discovered, however, when one of his men open fire prematurely. The Aborigines quickly fled, though not before at least seven of their number had been killed. Mitchell recorded that: The Aborigines betook themselves to the river, my men pursuing them and shooting as many as they could. Numbers were shot swimming across the Murray, and some even after they had reached the opposite shore.

He commemorated the action by naming a nearby hill ‘Mount Dispersion’, before continuing on with his mission. An official inquiry into the affair held in December 1836 regretted that he had not been more conciliatory towards the Aborigines (whose true intentions had not, after all, ever been established), but declined to censure him severely. J.H.L. Cumpston (1954) Thomas Mitchell, London: Oxford University Press; Bruce Elder (1988) Blood on the Wattle, Frenchs Forest, NSW: Child & Associates

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An engraving from Colonel G. C. Mundy’s 1852 book, Our Antipodes, based on reports he heard of the ‘Slaughterhouse Creek’ massacre. Source: Mundy, G.C. Our Antipodes London, vol. 1, 1852, facing title page, National Library of Australia

Waterloo Creek, a clash between Kamilaroi Aborigines and mounted police, fought 50 kilometres south-west of Moree, New South Wales, on 26 January 1838—the fiftieth anniversary of European settlement of Australia. The precise location of the affair is still debated, but is most likely to have been the extremity of Waterloo Creek known as Lower Water, and more specifically along the banks of what was subsequently called Snodgrass Lagoon on present-day Millie Creek. In response to alarming reports received in late 1837 regarding Aboriginal ‘outrages’ on the Liverpool Plains north of the Hunter River, on 19 December the acting governor, Colonel Kenneth Snodgrass, ordered the commandant of mounted police, Major James Nunn, to assemble and lead a party to the area. The details of what has subsequently become famous in bush lore as ‘Major Nunn’s campaign’ are shrouded in uncertainty and subterfuge, but there is no doubting that late the following month Nunn


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was on the trail of a large band of Kamilaroi— who may or may not have been involved in depredations against the settlers—with 30 police and between ten and twenty heavily armed civilian auxiliaries. About midday on 26 January the column was moving along the bank of the creek when the leading elements, under the command of Ensign George Cobban, spotted smoke ahead and proceeded in the expectation that a camp had been found. The smoke turned out to be from a burning log and it was assumed that their quarry was still some distance away. On passing around a bend in the creekline a few hundred metres further on, however, the five or six troopers with Cobban suddenly spotted ‘a great number of blacks’ camped on the other side of a lagoon. As soon as the horsemen were seen by the Kamilaroi, the women and children in the camp fled downstream while the warriors scrambled for weapons to cover their retreat. Cobban and his men quickly forded the

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January–April 1838 stream and galloped into the scrub, aiming to get around the flank of the camp and pin its occupants to the creek-bank between themselves and the rest of the mounted party following on the opposite bank. They were immediately engaged by the armed men, one of whom speared Corporal Patrick Hannan in the calf; the police later claimed that only after this did they open fire to defend themselves. What is clear, however, is that firing upon the Aborigines became general and continued for at least an hour as they were pursued west to where the lagoon drained into a swamp. Only here were the surviving Kamilaroi able to break contact and escape. By the time firing stopped, a great many Aborigines had been killed; subsequent accounts put the number at not less than 40–50 and more likely between 60 and 70. Later stories which circulated in Sydney claimed that ‘upwards of 120 were destroyed’, and Nunn himself reportedly boasted that the death toll was ‘two or three hundred’. While the latter may have been an exaggeration in response to public acclaim of his deed, there is no reason to doubt other references to ‘the greater part of the tribe’ having perished. Hannan was the only European casualty in the fight. Nunn’s party returned directly to Sydney, after 53 days in the field, and submitted brief and vague reports of what had transpired. An official inquiry conducted some fifteen months later got no closer to the truth of what has also become known to history as the ‘Slaughterhouse Creek massacre’. Peter Stanley (1986) The Remote Garrison, Kenthurst, NSW: Kangaroo Press; Roger Milliss (1992) Waterloo Creek, Ringwood, Vic.: Penguin

Winding Swamp, an encounter between Taungurong and Waveroo Aborigines and a party of shepherds and stockmen in the employ of brothers William and George Faithful (often spelt as Faithfull), fought on 11 April 1838 on the Broken River at the


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site of the present-day town of Benalla, Victoria. When George Faithful led off the party from drought-ravaged Goulburn, New South Wales (where William held Springfield Flat station), the object was to drive 395 cattle and 3,472 sheep belonging to both brothers overland to the newly opened Port Phillip Bay district in search of land which was suitable for squatting runs. When the Ovens River was reached about 4 April, George Faithful decided—in his words—‘to turn out of the beaten road and visit Oxley Plains’, sending the stock further on ‘to the finer lands spoken of by Sir Thomas Mitchell’ in the charge of James Crossley, his brother’s overseer. A more recent account suggests, however, that the real reason for adopting this course was an incident at the Ovens in which several Aborigines had been shot by members of the party for spearing some of the cattle, prompting Faithful to move on the men involved in the hope of avoiding further trouble. His instructions were for the party to wait at the Broken River, where he would join them. Moving in two groups or ‘divisions’, each with a dray, the eighteen-strong party under Crossley reached the river crossing known as the Winding Swamp on 6–7 April. When the first ‘division’ driving the cattle arrived on 6 April, a camp was established near the present Benalla railway bridge on the grassy eastern (right) bank of the river. Members of the party were to claim later that during the time spent resting here a small number of Aborigines were seen and spoken to, but without any hint of hostility. In reality, there are grounds for suspecting that the site chosen by the whites may have been a meeting place which the Aborigines were preparing to use for ceremonial purposes, and that there had also been instances of interference with some of the Aboriginal women. Apparently in an effort to put distance between themselves and the Aborigines, on 8 April Crossley ordered the stock to be

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herded across the river and for camp to be re-established on the high western bank. While the need for fresh pasture may have been a factor behind this move, it was more likely in response to growing tensions between the two groups—including the taking of some sheep by the Aborigines. After spears were found hidden in reeds beside the river the next day the whites were well aware that an attack was a possibility. They also became suspicious when a group of about twenty Aboriginal men attached themselves to the party and refused to leave when instructed, until compelled to go at gunpoint on 10 April. They left only after first searching about in the reeds for their spears, which had been removed. Crossley was now eager to leave the area before a clash became inevitable, and ordered the camp to be struck at first light the next day. Later his decision would be attributed to him having heard about good grazing land further on along the Goulburn River, but it does not explain why he ignored the instructions he had been given to wait for George Faithful. On the morning of 11 April the camp beside the Winding Swamp was packed up by the cattlemen of the party, while the sheep ‘division’ set off to the south away from the river. The shepherds had travelled only some 800 metres before they were set upon by about twenty Aborigines and sent fleeing back towards where the drays were being loaded, with their attackers following in pursuit. Despite the fact that the numbers of Aborigines barely exceeded the size of the party they were attacking, and the latter had at least three muskets, only a fleeting defence was offered by the whites. Accounts mention just three shots being fired, only one of which hit its mark, before the whole party broke and ran in headlong flight. This allowed the Europeans to be picked off individually with ease, so that eight men were knocked down and killed. Some versions of the incident claim that the death toll was as high as ten


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or fourteen, but such estimates are clearly exaggerated. Only seven bodies were later recovered and buried at the scene of the fight, and another found a month or so later and separately interred. The appearance of survivors at an outpost of a station on the Ovens some twenty kilometres away brought George Faithful and others to the scene of the raid the next day. They found the plundered drays and several wounded men, but apart from gathering together the widely scattered sheep there was little else that could be done. The affair subsequently entered white folklore, but in a form which included many erroneous details. Key among these concerned the number of Aborigines involved in the attack, sometimes put as high as 300. Such a figure, if true, would have made it unlikely for any whites to have escaped, but was probably offered to justify the action of members of the party in running for their lives. Bassett plausibly argues that no more than twenty Aborigines took part, and contends that this group had been sent to exact retribution for the shootings at the Ovens River rather than act to repel an unwelcome European intrusion into tribal territory. The whites had, after all, been tolerated for several days and were actually on the point of departing when attacked. The Faithful brothers decided not to venture further but to pull back to the Ovens and King rivers. Here they suffered attacks by Aborigines on 1–2 May, and fears of further attacks caused them and two other squatters nearby to abandon their runs in June, although they later resumed their occupancy. While the clash at Benalla was invariably referred to in subsequent years as the ‘Faithful massacre’, there is no reason to view this incident as anything other than a battle which the Aborigines won. Michael Cannon (ed.) Historical Records of Victoria, vol.2A (1982): The Aborigines of Port Phillip 1835–1839, Melbourne: Victorian Government Printing Office; Judith Bassett, ‘The Faithfull Massacre at the Broken River, 1838’, Journal of Australian Studies, no.24, May 1989

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April–June 1838 Barfold, a clash fought on 9 June 1838 between Wurrunjerri (or Yarra) Aborigines and a party of white station hands along the Campaspe River, Victoria. The incident followed trouble in the area earlier in the year, in which Aborigines had pillaged the Pyalong station belonging to Alexander Mollison and the adjoining run at Sutton Grange held by Dr William Bowman. During May one of Bowman’s shepherds was found speared and disembowelled, as a result of which the police magistrate of the Port Phillip district, Captain William Lonsdale, ordered a detachment of mounted police to ‘show themselves thereabouts for a short time in order to inspire confidence [among the settlers] and to alarm the blacks’. The next month a group of about 50 Aborigines allegedly seized two flocks belonging to Bowman and his neighbour at Barfold, Henry Yaldwyn, after chasing off the shepherds. Yaldwyn’s overseer, John Coppock, immediately got together another three men and proceeded to the out-station some eleven kilometres away in search of the missing sheep, being joined by four or five of Bowman’s employees who were also armed. After following the trail of the sheep for more than six kilometres, it was nearly sundown when the party came across the Aborigines’ camp at a distance of about 400 metres. While some of the camp’s occupants were sitting around fires, others were engaged in building a bough yard to contain the sheep. As the whites approached at the run, the dogs accompanying them began to bark. Thus alerted, the Aborigines took up weapons and gave a great shout. One of the whites fired a shot, whereupon the Aborigines began throwing their spears. Taking shelter behind trees, Coppock’s men opened fire and in his words ‘a regular engagement’ followed which lasted for about three-quarters of an hour. By the time the attackers had fought their way into the camp, it was empty except for the bodies of seven


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or eight Aborigines killed in the exchange. The rest of the occupants had retreated several hundred metres into the gathering darkness, driving the sheep before them. Afraid to remain more than a few moments where the campfires made them visible targets, and at the same time afraid to continue the pursuit in the dark, the whites quickly retreated and in Coppock’s words ‘went home’. Not until the next morning did he return to the scene of the fight with six men to continue searching for the sheep. These were found a short distance away, while of the Aborigines there was no sign. According to the later statement of one of those present, the bodies of the Aborigines killed the night before were found to have been placed upon the campfires and ‘partly consumed’ by the flames. When word of the incident reached Melbourne, Lonsdale promptly sent mounted police with a summons to Coppock to provide him with a full account. Official inquiries continued into the following year, with Assistant Protector of Aborigines Edward Parker being instructed to investigate reports that the pitched battle fought by the men under Coppock was actually a massacre. Suspicions were apparently raised by reports that, according to the ‘common fame’ of the district, Bowman was ‘in the habit of shooting every black man, woman and child whom he met on his run’, and had instructed his employees to carry out similar shootings. By one account, it was as a consequence of these investigations that the eight whites involved in the incident at Barfold were later sent to Sydney for trial but perished when the ship conveying them sank off the New South Wales coast; only Coppock survived, by virtue of having missed the vessel’s sailing. G.A. Bremner (1976) A Tour Brochure of Kyneton and District with Historical Background, 3rd edn, Kyneton, Vic.: Kyneton Guardian; Michael Cannon (ed.) Historical Records of Victoria: The Aborigines of Port Phillip 1835–1839, vols 2A (1982) and 2B (1983), Melbourne: Victorian Government Printing Office

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Fighting Hills, a clash between Aborigines of the Konongwootong (Jardwadjali) tribe and a party of white settlers, fought on 8 March 1840 on the Wando River about ten kilometres north of Casterton, Victoria. On 7 March, a month after five brothers named Whyte arrived from Melbourne to establish a pastoral station on the Wando, Aborigines stole over 120 of the settlers’ sheep. The brothers rode out to pursue the thieves, with four employees on foot, and the next day came across them camped in a clump of tea-tree by the river at The Hummocks, near Wando Vale. In the two-hour fight which followed every adult Aboriginal male except one was killed, this number being variously reported as between 25 and 51. Since the Aborigines had already killed 50 of the sheep, the bodies of the men and the animals lay all around in almost equal numbers—their bones ‘mingled together bleaching in the sun’. Only one European was injured in the clash, receiving a spear wound in the leg. Although many of the women and children escaped up the river while their menfolk fought the attackers, there is no reason to believe that some of these were not among the fatalities since Aboriginal tradition suggests a death toll perhaps as high as 80 people. Michael Cannon (1990) Who Killed the Koories?, Port Melbourne: William Heinemann Australia; Jan Critchett (1990) A ‘Distant Field of Murder’, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Heidelberg, now an outer suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, was in May 1840 the scene of an extraordinary confrontation between white settlers and Aborigines using European firearms seized in raids on shepherds’ huts. Early in 1840 a large band of Aborigines led by Jackie Jackie made their presence felt on the upper reaches of the Yarra River during several incidents in which firearms were used. Attempts were made by white authorities to retrieve the weapons, but were too late. In May, Armyne Bolden, a settler based several kilometres up the Yarra


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from Melbourne, reported to the superintendent of the Port Phillip district, Charles La Trobe, that more than 200 Aborigines armed with about 30 guns were ‘shooting in every direction’ and threatening to burn down huts on his run. A detachment of mounted police was sent out from Melbourne, but by the time this arrived the Aborigines had disappeared. Several troopers led by Lieutenant F.B. Russell tracked the band, but when they were about 65 kilometres upstream they were ambushed by the Aborigines who had concealed themselves in dense scrub by a ford. The police were fired on as they attempted to cross the stream, three were wounded and all were forced to retreat. The incident is chiefly notable for showing the Aborigines acting virtually as guerillas in opposing white occupation of their lands. The solution adopted by La Trobe was to issue orders to police patrols to prevent any Aborigines from entering Melbourne, and in particular to impose severe penalties on shopkeepers supplying powder and shot to any Aborigines, especially women, who sneaked into the town. Michael Cannon (1990) Who Killed the Koories?, Port Melbourne: William Heinemann Australia

The Islands, a locality named by Captain Charles Sturt in 1830 in the extreme south-west corner of New South Wales, west of Lake Victoria, which became the scene of two sharp fights in 1841 between Milmenrura (Maraura) Aborigines and Europeans on the overland stock route to South Australia. The first clash occurred on 16 April, when an eleven-man party under Henry Field and Henry Inman (a former superintendent of police in Adelaide) was approaching the great northern ‘elbow’ of the Murray with 5,000 sheep. The party had been periodically harassed by the Aborigines from the time of leaving the Darling River, having had several ewes speared, but at this point they encountered 300–400 warriors

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1840–1841 who showed their determination to bar the whites’ passage. The shepherds carried firearms, but these weapons proved to be of inferior quality and many did not discharge. Only a slow and ineffectual fire was consequently opened up on the attackers, who quickly surrounded and overwhelmed the whole party. Two men defending the party’s dray were speared before the rest fled through the scrub, abandoning the wagon and bullocks—and all their stores, as well as the sheep—to the Aborigines. Field managed to reach the station at Mount Dispersion (q.v.) to raise the alarm, and when news of the rout reached Adelaide from there on the evening of 21 April it caused a sensation. Eventually all members of the party were able to make their way to stations in the vicinity, and it was established that in fact no lives had been lost, but by then a force of police had already been despatched by the governor, Colonel George Gawler. The relief expedition which departed Adelaide on 22 April was led by the Commissioner for Police, Major Thomas O’Halloran, and comprised an inspector and thirteen police officers and privates, with a doctor to treat the injured. Two days later the party had grown in size to 23 (nineteen of them police), plus two Aboriginal guides; among the additions was retired naval Lieut. W.G. Field—a brother of the attacked party’s co-leader, and a part-owner of the flock which had been lost. By 30 April, O’Halloran was within 80 kilometres of the scene of the battle when a trooper arrived with a despatch from the governor ordering the immediate return of the force. Gawler—himself recalled to England and his successor already having arrived—no longer felt justified in allowing matters to proceed to the inevitable point of a collision, knowing that all members of the Field–Inman party had survived the attack and the only object to be gained was the rescue of the sheep. Angered by this development, on 1 May


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Lieut. Field left the returning force of police and proceeded to raise a party of his own to go in search of the lost sheep. This expedition, which left Adelaide on 5 May, comprised twenty men—seven of them police constables who were ordered to accompany and assist Field only so far as the colony’s border with New South Wales. This separation occurred on 9 May, and Field additionally left some of his paid employees behind to protect the party’s dray, proceeding the next day with only ten mounted volunteers. The attack site was finally reached on the evening of 12 May, the main examination of the scene being held over until the following day. The next morning (13 May 1841) the dray seized the previous month was found, and while following sheep tracks a short time later the party came upon a large body of Aborigines lying in concealment, waiting for them. Field and his men rode towards the Aborigines, who promptly rose up—showing their number to be in excess of 200—and boldly advanced in a crescent formation to within 40 metres before throwing spears. The whites opened fire, expecting that the sight of warriors falling to their bullets would send the rest fleeing. The Milmenruras were not at all intimidated, however, even though at least eight of their number were killed, and pressed forward aiming to surround the horsemen. Field ordered the party to retire out of the closing ring of warriors, and began a fighting withdrawal. During this, the Aborigines determinedly continued to pursue the horsemen on foot. After an action lasting half an hour contact was finally broken, though not before both Field and his mount had been hit by spears and another member’s horse killed. While convinced that the surviving sheep were not far distant, Field recognised that the task of recovering the animals in the face of Milmenrura resistance was beyond his small party. Their numbers and courage made these tribesmen, he concluded, ‘a

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much more formidable enemy than the colonists have generally any idea of ’. After Field’s return to Adelaide on 21 May, public agitation for measures to be taken to protect future overland stock parties led to the raising of another police expedition, which became involved in another incident the following month (see Rufus River). Alexander Tolmer (1882) Reminiscences of an Adventurous and Chequered Career at Home and at the Antipodes (2 vols), vol.1, London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington; John Wrathall Bull (1884) Early Experiences of Life in South Australia, Adelaide: E.S. Wigg & Son

Rufus River, located between Lake Victoria and the Murray River 60 kilometres west of Wentworth, New South Wales, was the scene of two sharp fights in 1841 between Milmenrura (Maraura) Aborigines and Europeans using the overland stock route to South Australia. These clashes followed several similar incidents earlier the same year, which took place about twenty kilometres further west, just inside the border with South Australia (see The Islands). On 20 June a party of sixteen men under C. Langhorne, driving 700 cattle along the north bank of the Murray, suffered a similar fate to previous expeditions. The party had reached the Rufus River (at the point later given the name of Langhorne’s Ferry) when the overseer, Miller, sent several men back to gather in a part of the herd which had strayed. While the advance party was thus temporarily weakened it was heavily attacked by Aborigines, several of its members killed and two (including Miller) wounded. The survivors, who had taken to the safety of the river, emerged after the attackers had left and found three of their colleagues dead. These bodies they concealed, then—after recovering the drays, which had been looted of everything except part of the stock of flour—they hurried forward along the track, hoping to reach the safety of the nearest stations before the Milmenruras set upon them again. The drovers sent back for the


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strayed cattle subsequently overtook the advance group, but too late to be of assistance during the attack. Two days later, on 22 June, the survivors met up with a large expedition which had been sent out from Adelaide on 31 May purposely to provide protection for their passage through Milmenrura territory. The force—operating under the command of the Commissioner of Police, Major Thomas O’Halloran, and accompanied by Dr Matthew Moorhouse, the Protector of Aborigines, as an observer—numbered 68 police and settler volunteers who had been sworn in as ‘special constables’. It carried, however, specific orders preventing belligerent action from being taken against the Aborigines unless directly attacked, and, although the numerous Milmenruras encountered taunted and mocked the relief force, they were not so foolish as to take on such a large and well-armed group. All O’Halloran could do, therefore, was provide the Langhorne party with what assistance was possible. This amounted to collecting the scattered cattle, of which only seventeen ultimately could not be recovered. In the course of this effort vast heaps of carcasses and bones were found, which were the remains of some 2,000 sheep taken from the Inman–Field party two months earlier. The scene of the fight was also visited on 24 June to check for signs of the four men known or now believed killed. In the event, the body of only one man could be found and buried. Mounted parties scouring the country on both sides of the river attempted to take Milmenrura prisoners, but without success, and on 28 June the whole party began the return trip to Adelaide via Lake Bonney. Two months later, another party passing through the same area similarly came under attack—but this time with a somewhat different outcome. The party of 26 men driving 6,000 sheep and 500 cattle, led by William Robinson, had left Gundagai, New

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June–September 1841 South Wales, on 1 July. When news of its embarking along the inland stock route was received in Adelaide, another armed expedition was raised and despatched on 31 July in an attempt to avoid a repetition of previous troubles. This mounted force of twelve police and sixteen volunteers was placed under Moorhouse’s command, with Sub-Inspector John Shaw of the Metropolitan Police as his deputy. On 25 August, as the expedition passed around the Murray’s northernmost bend, Moorhouse sent three Aboriginal guides ahead to tell the tribesmen of the whites’ superior firepower and advise against any interference with their progress. Disregarding this warning, an estimated 300 Milmenruras set upon Robinson’s overlanders about noon the next day (26 August 1841) as they approached the Rufus. The stock party was about three kilometres east of the river when they sighted the first warriors. Suspecting that their intentions were hostile, Robinson accordingly ordered the party’s three drays and other property drawn into as tight an area as possible, and set seven men to guard the stock. The remaining nineteen men—all well armed— he posted at the front in a single line. As the Aborigines advanced in a wide semi-circular formation, the riflemen opened fire and continued until each man had fired eight rounds. The Milmenruras—kept outside spear range, but having lost at least five killed and ten wounded—withdrew, and the stock party was able to continue their progress to the river where camp was made 1.5 kilometres below Langhorne’s Ferry. The next day, 27 August, Moorhouse’s party met up with Robinson’s party on the river at 10.30 a.m. The Protector of Aborigines had been hoping to avoid conflict with the local inhabitants, but when confronted soon after by an advancing group of 150 hostile Milmenrura warriors he concluded that a ‘contest’ was inevitable and handed over command to his deputy. Shaw


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determined not to wait until the Milmenrura made their move at a time of their choosing, but to attack first while they were still beyond spear-throwing range. Supported from the eastern bank of the river by some ten riflemen of Robinson’s party (all that could be spared from the sheep, cattle and drays), Shaw ordered his own men on the opposite bank to advance and open fire. Faced with this combined onslaught, the Aborigines scattered—about 100 fleeing into the bush while the remainder sought concealment in the reed-beds beside the river. The latter group was pursued to the water’s edge by the gunmen who continued firing into them for 15–20 minutes. Thirty of the Milmenrura were killed, and approximately another ten wounded; four (one adult male who was injured, a boy and two women) were taken captive. The only casualty among the Europeans was Robinson, who was speared in the left arm. Moorhouse released three of his prisoners with a warning for their tribesmen, but took the wounded male back to Adelaide as a hostage; this man briefly escaped into the river but was retaken after receiving further gunshot wounds to the jaw and left arm. This clash on the Rufus, the largest to occur during the settlement of South Australia, ended serious Milmenrura attacks on parties using the overland trail along the Murray. Alexander Tolmer (1882) Reminiscences of an Adventurous and Chequered Career at Home and at the Antipodes (2 vols), vol.1, London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington; John Wrathall Bull (1884) Early Experiences of Life in South Australia, Adelaide: E.S. Wigg & Son; Pastoral Pioneers of South Australia, vol.2 (1927), Adelaide: Publishers Ltd.

Sydney Town, was the scene of a public disturbance on 6 September 1841 which resulted in troops being called out to restore order. The trouble began on the 5th when about 50 sailors from HMS Favourite who were on leave while in port became involved in a fight with civilians in a theatre. After a ‘severe struggle’, a large number of people—

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including ten of the seamen—were taken to the police lock-up. All those arrested were released the next morning, except two of the man-of-war’s crew who were remanded to their ship. Instead of being conveyed as ordered, however, they were taken by police to the watch-house in Cumberland Street and detained. When news of this proceeding reached the Favourite, the men’s shipmates came ashore and—joined by about 300 townsfolk—marched on the watch-house. The police there quickly fled, leaving the mob to wreck the building and release all the prisoners being held. The crowd then proceeded to St James’ watch-house and did the same, before turning their attention to the main police lock-up at the corner of George and Druitt streets. In the meantime troops had been called out to confront the demonstrators and the Riot Act was read. When the mob refused to disperse, blank cartridges were fired and, this having no effect while some in the crowd began showing ‘an inclination to violence’, the soldiers next fired some rounds of ball ammunition. At least one man was shot (who died the next day), and the rest of the throng duly broke up. J. Henniker Heaton (1879) Australian Dictionary of Dates and Men of the Time, Sydney: George Robertson

Port Lincoln, on the western side of the Spencer Gulf in South Australia, was the scene of a brutal attack by Parnkalla Aborigines on a sheep station on 28 March 1842. About 1 p.m. the owner, Rolles Biddle, an employee Charles Stubbs and his wife Elizabeth, with another man named Fastings, were about to have lunch when the station (situated some 30 kilometres from Port Lincoln) was approached by 36 Aborigines, including one who had previously worked for Biddle. The whites stepped outside the Stubbs’ hut where the meal was being eaten, and saw the Aborigines enter and begin looting Biddle’s hut nearby. When the


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Europeans attempted to keep them back, spears were thrown—the only casualty fortunately being a dog. The Aborigines left, but about an hour later returned. More spears were thrown, this time striking Fastings and also Stubbs, who opened fire and shot two of his attackers before retreating into the unpillaged hut with the others. They attempted to barricade themselves inside, but several Aborigines broke the windows and hurled in spears while others began dismantling a corner of the hut near the chimney. A spear thrown in from here fatally wounded Biddle, while Stubbs, standing with his weight against the door, received four more hits—three of them in the head which blinded him in one eye. When he fell the Aborigines surged inside, spearing Fastings to death and dragging Stubbs’ wife from under the bed where she had taken refuge. Shears which were hanging in the hut were then used to stab Mrs Stubbs, her cries being heard by her husband who was lying helpless on the floor blinded by his own blood. After robbing the hut, the Aborigines left, having set fire to the brush-fence beside the hut. Stubbs managed to take himself outside and prevent the fire spreading to the hut. He then dragged the bodies of Biddle and Fastings outside, and his wife—who was still alive—before laying down beside her while she died. The victims of this grisly attack were found about two hours later by shepherds bringing in their flocks for the night. According to local tradition, following this attack the settlement at Port Lincoln was almost abandoned as outlying settlers fled into the town, neglecting their farms in the face of the Aboriginal threat. The governor, Sir George Grey, sent a detachment of soldiers from the 96th Regiment, but this deployment proved to be something of a fiasco. While some Aborigines were captured, killed or wounded, in general the troops were no match for the tribesmen and

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1841–1842

An 1864 newspaper illustration of a clash at Port Lincoln which was possibly meant to depict the clash at the Biddle Station more than twenty years before. Source: Samuel Calvert, 1828–1913. Wood engraving; 16 x 22 cm. National Library of Australia S4272

were withdrawn. They were replaced by police on 10 November, who within two days had captured two Aborigines on suspicion of taking part in the March attack. One of these, named Ngarbi (or Nulta) alias Little Jemmy, was tried at Adelaide, found guilty, and hanged in April 1843 on the site of the three murders. Neville & Margaret Wanklyn (1971) The Early History of the City of Port Lincoln 1802–1971, Port Lincoln, SA: self-published; Henry Reynolds (ed.) (1972) Aborigines and Settlers, North Melbourne: Cassell Australia

Eumeralla, the district around the Eumeralla River between Port Fairy and Portland, Victoria, was in August 1842 the scene of several violent clashes between Aborigines and whites over the ‘theft’ of sheep. On 7 August Aborigines attacked a shepherd employed by James Hunter, who held Eumeralla station with his brother John, and drove off his flock. The station manager,


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Samuel MacGregor, and several hands pursued them and took back the sheep after ‘a severe skirmish’. On 10 August a group of Aborigines estimated to number more than 150 again appeared on the station, part of the group driving off the sheep while the rest attacked the shepherds. This time the latter were well armed and kept them at bay until help arrived, whereupon the Aborigines made off and the flock was recovered. Eight days later there was a third large-scale attack, with this time the tribesmen taking away over 1,000 sheep. A party from the station which went out in pursuit found the flock’s trail littered with dead carcasses. About thirteen kilometres from the station the party came up against the Aborigines, and only after overcoming ‘a vigorous resistance’ (during which three warriors were shot dead and several others wounded) were they able to retake the 500 or so sheep which remained alive.

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These clashes were repeated on neighbouring stations of the district to the north-west of Port Fairy over the next five years, reaching a peak of ferocity from early in 1845. Tom Browne—a local squatter who wrote novels under the pseudonym of Rolf Boldrewood—characterised this period as ‘The Eumeralla War’ in his 1884 book of recollections Old Melbourne Memories. Michael Cannon (1990) Who Killed the Koories?, Port Melbourne: William Heinemann Australia; Jan Critchett (1990) A ‘Distant Field of Murder’, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

One Tree Hill, a clash between Jagara Aborigines and white settlers, fought on 19 or 21 September 1843 only nine kilometres north-west of present-day Toowoomba, Queensland. The incident was triggered when about 100 tribesmen, under their leader Multuggerah (called ‘Chief Moppy’ by the Europeans), blockaded a road in a scrubby gorge on the upper reaches of the Lockyer Creek valley. Logs were dragged across the road, while saplings were tied to trees to fence off the roadsides. Three drays carrying supplies west to Francis Forbes’ station at Clifton on the Darling Downs were duly ambushed here, the eighteen teamsters travelling with the wagons abandoning them without firing a shot and leaving the loads to be looted. On learning of the raid, about twenty local settlers organised themselves into ‘a kind of drive’ and went in pursuit of the Aborigines. The tribesmen were tracked as they moved west towards several tall hills, one of which they occupied. This was a narrow conetopped hill liberally strewn with basalt boulders named ‘Hay’s Peak’ by explorer Allan Cunningham in June 1829, but known locally as ‘One Tree Hill’. The position was nearly impregnable but, instead of following the Aborigines up the spur they had used, the whites attempted to charge up the steep slopes. The Aborigines responded by rolling large boulders down onto the attackers and hurling stones. With horses knocked off their


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feet, and riders thrown from their saddles or injured by the fusillade of rock missiles, the whites hurriedly retreated—though reportedly not before many of the Aborigines had been shot. Defeated for the time being, the whites returned to the plundered drays and camped there. During the next three weeks a group of the settlers headed by the Crown land commissioners for Moreton Bay and Darling Downs, Stephen Simpson and Christopher Rolleston respectively, backed up by an officer and ten soldiers of the 99th Regiment, continued to hunt the Aborigines who participated in the incident. They were pursued through the Rosewood Scrubs until they sued for peace and returned the property they had stolen. As a further measure to ensure the incident was not repeated, in October a six-man military detachment was stationed at Helidon, at the foot of the Great Dividing Range, to escort drays through the gorge. ‘Hay’s Peak’ has since become better known as Mount Davidson or Sugarloaf. Matt. J. Fox (1921) The History of Queensland: Its People & Industries, vol.2, Brisbane: States Publishing; Maurice French (1989) Conflict on the Considine, Toowoomba, Qld: Darling Downs Institute Press

Nassau River (or Dunbar Creek as it is actually), was the scene of a surprise attack on 28 June 1845 by Aborigines on the exploring party led by Dr Ludwig Leichhardt, which comprised six white men and two Aborigines (who were from New South Wales tribes). The party was camped about 60 kilometres inland from the Gulf of Carpentaria, on the western side of Cape York Peninsula, Queensland, when it was attacked at about 7 p.m. Leichhardt recorded that members of the expedition had mostly retired to their tents, and he himself was dozing on the ground near a fire, when the camp was suddenly showered with spears. The attackers then swarmed into the camp and assaulted several of the men with waddies.

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1842–1849 After the two Aborigines in the party succeeded in discharging muskets into the attackers, the latter then fled; one of the whites who had been able to take shelter behind a tree before suffering any injury had also managed to fire his weapon, severely wounding one attacker. Among the exploring party there were three casualties, including naturalist John Gilbert who was killed by a spear which struck him in the neck. Coming out of his tent, he only had time to hand a gun and ammunition to one of the party’s Aborigines before he dropped down dead. The other two men injured suffered multiple spear and waddy blows, but quickly recovered from these so that the expedition was able to resume its journey on 1 July. The attack was seemingly unprovoked, but in September 1849 naturalist John MacGillivray recorded having been later told by a member of Leichhardt’s party (while intoxicated) that it had actually been prompted by ‘a gross outrage . . . committed upon an aboriginal woman a day or two previously by the two blacks belonging to the expedition’. Robert Logan Jack (1921) Northmost Australia (2 vols), vol.1, London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co.

Murrabit, a clash between Aborigines and Native Police, fought on 1 February 1846 between the present town of Koondrook, Victoria, and the junction of the Loddon River with the Murray. Escalating violence between local tribesmen and shepherds during the previous year had prompted the despatch of a detachment of fourteen police under William Dana (the younger brother of Henry, commander of the Native Police Corps) to ‘pacify’ the area. On the afternoon of 1 February the troopers were riding through a swampy bed of reeds when they encountered a group of Aborigines estimated to number 200 warriors. Dana claimed that he tried to avoid the hostilities, but was pursued onto dry ground where one of his men and two horses were speared. He


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accordingly ordered a charge, resulting in a mêlée in which the troopers fired at least 100 rounds. Dana later reported seeing ‘several dead bodies’ and stated that ‘there must have been a great many wounded’. Michael Cannon (1990) Who Killed the Koories?, Melbourne: William Heinemann

Geraldton, in the Champion Bay district of Western Australia, was the scene of a notable clash in December 1848 between Amangu Aborigines and an official party which included the governor of the colony, Commander Charles FitzGerald, RN. Having arrived only in August, FitzGerald had become caught up in the mineral fever which followed the discovery of lead at Northampton, 50 kilometres north of Geraldton, and insisted on being taken to the site of the find by its discoverer, Augustus Gregory. The expedition had tragic consequences because, although the local Aborigines had previously appeared friendly, an incident took place in which FitzGerald received a spear wound in the knee and was reportedly fortunate to escape with his life. At least three Aborigines were shot dead. Paul Hasluck (1970) Black Australians, 2nd edn, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press; C.T. Stannage (ed.) (1981) A New History of Western Australia, Nedlands, WA; University of Western Australia Press

Bingera, a clash fought between Taribelang Aborigines and white settlers in mid-June 1849 nineteen kilometres west of Bundaberg, Queensland, at a spot near Bingera later known as The Cedars. The action came about after an incident on 4 June at Tirroan (subsequently renamed Gin Gin) station, about 50 kilometres west of Bundaberg, in which Aborigines speared two white shepherds, brothers in their teenage years, and drove off half the flock they had been minding. A punitive expedition numbering some 50 well-armed and well-mounted men assembled at Tirroan under the leadership of Gregory Blaxland

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(seventh and youngest son of the famed Blue Mountains explorer) and his nephew, William Forster. Tracking the offending tribesmen in the direction of the coast, the force of whites located a camp of about a hundred Aborigines supposedly feasting on roast mutton in thick scrub a short distance from the Burnett River. Blaxland decided to attack the following morning, and led his horsemen into a night bivouac. At dawn the next day the party crept through the tangle of vines and undergrowth on foot, approaching the sleeping camp from three sides before opening fire. Despite descriptions of the camp’s occupants putting up a strong resistance before those that remained fled to safety across the river, the struggle which followed was clearly a very one-sided affair. No whites were killed, and injuries among the attackers were evidently confined to flesh wounds. On the Aborigines’ side, however, there was reportedly a heavy slaughter—to the extent that more than 60 years later ploughmen on the sugar plantation operated at Bingera by the firm of Gibson & Howes were said to have unearthed skulls, bones and weapons where the fight occurred. Clem Lack & Harry Stafford (1964) The Rifle and the Spear, Brisbane: Fortitude Press; Janette Nolan (1978) Bundaberg: History and People, St Lucia, Qld: University of Queensland Press

Carbucky, a clash which took place between Aborigines and Native Mounted Police on the western edge of the Darling Downs, Queensland, on 9 July 1849. The police detachment of ten troopers under their commandant, Frederick Walker, reached the lower Condamine River from Callandoon (near present-day Goondiwindi) on 24 June, and found the district in a ‘most disturbed state’ due to frequent Aboriginal attacks on the settlers. According to Walker, the greatest danger existed at John Dangar’s Wallann Creek station, where the store had been robbed before being burnt and a hutkeeper


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killed. It was believed that some 150 Aborigines from the Fitzroy, Dawson and Condamine areas were gathering on Dogwood Creek in preparation for a repeat attack on Dangar’s station—a situation which brought on two collisions with the police. Walker reported that on the first occasion (date unknown) the ‘Fitz Roy Down blacks . . . suffered so severely that they returned to their own country, a distance of 80 miles’. Subsequently, when informed that some Aborigines were gathered on the Tannin, near Dangar’s, Walker gave pursuit and tracked them for eight or nine days before finally coming upon them near Carbucky at sundown. The police party found that they were within two kilometres of the camp, which lay on the opposite side of the flood-swollen Condamine. On swimming the river at midnight, the pursuers found the water so cold that two of three squatters accompanying the detachment were nearly drowned and had to be rescued by the troopers. They approached the camp on foot at dawn, and Walker later claimed that as soon as the Aborigines sighted the police ‘they seized their spears, and an engagement ensued’. A press account of the action gave the following description: Mr. Walker and party fired at twelve paces, and we are informed that spears and boomerangs were flying in every direction, the flashing of the fire-arms showing the blacks the position of their assailants; the yells of the savages, answered by the war-cry of the police, and the ring of the carbines, must have had a most exciting effect.

At one stage Walker, with the three squatters (Augustus Morris, Charles Marshall and a man named Rens) and a few troopers, were separated from the rest of the detachment and engaged the Aborigines at close quarters: Mr. Rens was wounded by a boomerang, and Edgar, Mr. Walker’s orderly, wounded in the leg by a spear, while in the act of rushing on a black he

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1849–1854 had wounded; the gallant fellow, however, drew out the spear, and drove it into the breast of the black who had thrown it . . . .The blacks must have suffered severely, as the trails of blood were very conspicuous, and one body left dead on the field.

After gaining possession of the Aborigines’ camp, the attackers recovered a great deal of damaged property which was identified as belonging to Dangar. While the punitive measures taken by Walker’s troop won the general approval of settlers on the Downs, the government was initially critical of his methods as demonstrated at ‘the Battle of Carbucky’. On 8 August 1849 the Colonial Secretary in Sydney cautioned him against committing ‘acts of aggressive warfare against the Aborigines’, and pointed out that the command of the Native Police Force had been entrusted to him ‘for the maintenance of peace and not for the purpose of carrying war into the Aborigine’s country’. Regardless of any misgivings voiced on this occasion, the Native Police remained a significant factor in the violent and bloody struggle waged on the frontier for many years. Sydney Morning Herald, 2 August 1849; L.E. Skinner (1975) Police of the Pastoral Frontier, St Lucia, Qld: University of Queensland Press

Paddy’s Island, a clash between Taribelang Aborigines and white settlers, fought on the Burnett River in August 1850 near the later site of Youngs’ Fairymead sugar plantation outside Bundaberg, Queensland. The incident followed the murder of Gregory Blaxland, part-owner of Tirroan (later known as Gin Gin) station, who was clubbed to death about the end of July within 200 metres of his homestead—presumably in reprisal for his role in leading an expedition against the Aborigines the previous year (see Bingera). In response to this killing a call for volunteers went out to surrounding stations, and about a week later a force of more than 100 men were sworn in as ‘special constables’ apparently by Maurice


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O’Connell, the Commissioner for Crown Lands in the Burnett district. Proceeding to Paddy’s Island—the known crossing point on the Burnett used by local tribesmen—the punitive party came across a camp estimated to contain close on 1000 Aborigines. Without attempting to identify any individuals directly implicated in Blaxland’s death, the party attacked the whole camp in a mounted charge which reportedly resulted in death for hundreds of its occupants. Aborigines who sought shelter in the dense scrub were hunted down on foot, and many others were killed while attempting to swim the river to the safety of the Woongarra (the brigalow thicket on the southern side). No record exists of any casualties suffered among the attacking force. According to O’Connell, who appears (from evidence he gave to a parliamentary committee ten years later) to have been present, the punitive party afterwards burned the camp and all the Aborigines’ possessions in it. In view of his official position and background as a former regular army officer (he subsequently became a colonel and commandant of Queensland’s volunteer military forces), it seems probable that O’Connell was the leader of this expedition. Clem Lack & Harry Stafford (1964) The Rifle and the Spear, Brisbane: Fortitude Press; Janette Nolan (1978) Bundaberg: History and People, St Lucia, Qld: University of Queensland Press

Eureka Stockade, a clash between gold-miners and a force of soldiers and police fought at Ballarat, Victoria, on 3 December 1854. It was the culmination of widespread unrest on all the main Victorian goldfields over the denial of full civic rights, unfair taxation through licence fees on mining activity, and police repression when enforcing the licence system. In the face of several public meetings at Ballarat during November attended by as many as 10,000 diggers, the government responded by despatching detachments of troops as well as police

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J. B. Henderson’s painting of the storming of the miners’ stockade at Ballarat. The artist has correctly portrayed details of the soldiers’ uniforms and the dress of the miners, but reportedly did not reach the scene until several hours after the fight. Source: Mitchell Library, State Library of NSW, SSV 2B/BALL/7

reinforcements. On 30 November about 1,000 of the more militant miners had taken up position on a hill at the Eureka lead under an Irish engineer, Peter Lalor, whom they named as ‘commander-in-chief ’. A crude fort of upended log slabs and earth had been thrown up, from within which it was intended to resist any further arrests for non-possession of a licence. By the evening of Saturday, 2 December, a large government force had already been assembled at Ballarat and more troops were known to be on their way from Melbourne accompanied by the commander-in-chief of Imperial troops in Australia, Major-General Sir Robert Nickle. Learning that the numbers of miners manning the stockade had been steadily dwindling in subsequent days as tempers cooled and men returned to their diggings, the local gold commissioner, R.W. Rede, gave instructions for an attack the following morning on those who remained. Plans were drawn up for an assault under Captain John Thomas at the head of 276


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men—30 cavalrymen and 87 soldiers of the 40th Regiment and 65 of the 12th Regiment, along with 70 mounted and 24 dismounted policemen. At 3.30 a.m. the attack force set off to silently march the 2.4 kilometres from the government camp, along the Yarrowee Creek and into the cover of dead ground on the northern side of the stockade. Here the troops and police took up assault formations before beginning a slow, silent advance in the pre-dawn gloom, approaching simultaneously from the north and north-west as well as the west and south-west. Most of the 150 or so miners who remained inside the stockade were still asleep when their sentries spotted the advancing troops less than 300 metres away at 4.45 a.m. and fired several warning shots. The attackers immediately came on at a slow run, receiving a ragged volley from behind the stockade’s frail ramparts which felled several soldiers. Two strong volleys were fired in return before bayonets were fixed and the position stormed.

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1854–1857 Apart from possessing the advantage of surprise and superior numbers, the soldiers and police also completely outgunned the miners. Only about 100 of the latter had firearms; another twenty or so carried steel-tipped pikes, but the remainder were unarmed. All resistance was overcome within fifteen minutes and predictably casualties were heaviest among the miners. Lalor later calculated that 22 of his men had been killed or died subsequently while another twelve (including himself) were wounded; 125 were taken prisoner. Some of the miners who died in the following days were still being concealed by friends and sympathisers, so that only twenty of their number were buried at Ballarat. One officer and four soldiers had also been killed, while twelve soldiers and a policeman were wounded. The disproportionate number of casualties from the one-sided affair led to allegations of a cowardly massacre, a description given some validity by disgraceful conduct on the part of members of the police towards wounded miners and even uninvolved bystanders. The incident attracted attention around the world, but especially in London where Karl Marx hailed it as ‘a symptom, a concrete manifestation [of] the general revolutionary movement in Victoria’. This was a total misreading of the climate and causes of the miners’ stand, or what was needed to effect change in the colony. Although the miners were defeated at Eureka, public sympathy was huge and enabled them to subsequently gain full satisfaction on all their grievances following a commission of inquiry into conditions on the goldfields. This fact has caused what was a relatively minor affair to assume a central, and perhaps exaggerated, significance in Australian historical tradition. John Molony (1984) Eureka, Ringwood, Vic.: Viking

Rannes, a clash fought on 23 September 1855 about 120 kilometres west of Gladstone, Queensland, between Darambal Aborigines


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and a detachment of Native Mounted Police made up of Aborigines who were ‘foreign’ to the district. The attack came as the seven police troopers were asleep in their camp. A small group of the local tribesmen crept into the camp and removed the troopers’ carbines and pistols. Once this had been accomplished, a larger number of Aborigines rushed from the nearby scrub and speared the troopers as they slept. Two troopers were killed on the spot; a third who suffered a spear thrust in his lungs died some days later. Another three received wounds from which they recovered within a few days. Only one escaped with slight wounds and was able to remain on duty. The Aborigines who carried out the attack immediately fled to the bush, taking with them four carbines, five ramrods, and blankets and shirts from the camp. Over the next few weeks further Native Police sent to the scene pursued the large number of tribesmen who had congregated in the Rannes area, while a patrol under Sub-Lieutenant Frederick Walker carried out an unsuccessful search for those directly responsible for the attack. L.E. Skinner (1975) Police of the Pastoral Frontier, St Lucia, Qld: University of Queensland Press

Hornet Bank, an attack mounted on 27 October 1857 by Yiman (Yeeman) Aborigines against a pastoral station on the Dawson River, 40 kilometres south-west of Taroom, Queensland. In an unprecedented act of revenge for past mistreatment by the Fraser family, who had leased the station since 1854, a war-party of over 100 warriors surrounded the station buildings during the night of 26 October. They attacked at dawn, killing nine of the ten people inside—including Mrs Martha Fraser (widow of a Toowoomba carpenter) and seven of her nine children, and the children’s male tutor. Two shepherds camped in the woolshed about a kilometre from the homestead were speared and clubbed to death later in the morning while

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Image rights unavailable

The Fraser family’s ‘Hornet Bank’ station on the Dawson River. Source: John Oxley Library, Brisbane, 16985

washing. The only survivor of the attack was a 14-year-old boy, Sylvester Fraser, who— though clubbed and left for dead—managed to reach a neighbouring station sixteen kilometres away and raise the alarm. On the night of 27–28 October, some of the Aborigines involved in the Fraser murders also attacked a four-man party searching for new pastoral land, which had camped at Conciliation Creek. Ironically this included Frederick Walker, a former officer in the Native Police noted for his enlightened views on racial harmony until dismissed for drunkenness in 1854. Walker and his colleague Arthur Wiggins were saved by the Aboriginal ex-troopers with them, though both suffered spear wounds. When he recovered, Walker raised a new force of ex-troopers which helped patrol the Dawson River district until ordered to disband on instructions from Sydney. The unusual ferocity of the attack at Hornet Bank—involving rape of three of the women and castration of the tutor— especially shocked the white community of the colony. The eldest of the Fraser children, William, had been away in Ipswich at the


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time of the attack. He subsequently took a leading role in the savage reprisals exacted by at least four posses against all members of the tribe encountered in succeeding weeks, and within a year claimed to have personally killed 100 Aborigines. Attack Creek, a clash between Aborigines of the Warumungu tribe and a party of explorers led by John McDouall Stuart, was fought 70 kilometres north of Tennant Creek in the Northern Territory, on 26 June 1860. Stuart was making his fourth expedition into central Australia, having left Chambers Creek, South Australia, in March with the aim of finding a route with sufficient water that would lead north-west to the far side of the continent; with him were two other men and thirteen horses. On 25 June Stuart’s party came across a creek which they decided to follow up after spending the night by a pool. Setting off the next day, the Europeans passed an Aboriginal camp beside the water and—perhaps unusually among explorers—Stuart was careful to avoid giving any offence to the local inhabitants. When the creekline being

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1857–1861 followed was found to peter out into the scrub, he decided to return forthwith to the previous night’s campsite. In passing the Aborigines’ encampment he found it to be abandoned. Crossing the creek at this point, Stuart’s party was suddenly confronted by some 30 warriors ‘all dressed for war’. The Europeans sought to avoid a confrontation, but found themselves under a barrage of boomerangs— one of which struck Stuart’s horse. The Aborigines also set fire to the grass, in an apparent attempt to stampede the packhorses. At this Stuart gave the order to open fire, sending one man to rein in the frightened animals while he and the other covered their retreat across the creek. The Aborigines followed, keeping up their fearful yelling while continually lighting new fires. Eventually Stuart and his men left their pursuers behind, but dared not halt at the previous night’s stop. Instead they rode on until 11 p.m., before camping in more open country on the banks of a different creek. This clash, which seemed to Stuart to be prompted by nothing more than Warumungu resentment at the intrusion of strangers into their territory, caused him to abandon his attempt to reach the Gulf of Carpentaria on this occasion. As he recorded in his journal, he feared that there might be ‘far worse in advance of us’. William Hardman (ed.) (1865) Explorations in Australia: the Journals of John McDouall Stuart, 2nd edn, London: Saunders, Otley & Co.

Matarikoriko, one of the pas (forts) comprising the main Maori stronghold on the Waitara River in New Zealand’s Taranaki district, was besieged by troops under Major-General Thomas Pratt (commander-in-chief of British forces in Australia) on 29–31 December 1860. Located eight kilometres from the sea, on the river’s southern shore, it was the first-encountered of three formidable fortifications sited on the Kairau plateau and was accordingly the first tackled by Pratt when he took to the field on 28 December. Moving


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up with 900 men and four guns, the next day the British began constructing a redoubt able to accommodate 500 men about 730 metres from the Maori positions. This was intended to serve as a depot and start-point for a sap to facilitate an attack against the pa, and also for an attack on the next Maori work at Huirangi. Under a brisk fire from well-concealed rifle pits less than 150 metres away, the British troops laboured all day and received little rest during the night from incessant Maori harassing fire. The exchange of fire on this day was remarkably heavy, with the British alone using an estimated 70,000 bullets along with 120 artillery rounds. The next day, Sunday, a white flag was flown over the stockade and its defenders insisted that they did not wish to desecrate the Sabbath by shedding blood. An armistice was accordingly arranged for the rest of the day, although this did not stop the British from working to finish and improve their redoubt’s parapets, and in preparing barbettes and platforms for mounting two 8-inch guns. Next morning it was found that the Maoris had abandoned the pa, leaving twelve of their dead buried within it. The cost to Pratt’s troops had been three killed and twenty wounded. The action is principally of note because of the involvement in the British force of a naval brigade of 138 officers and men. Included in this corps were two officers and 30 sailors from the Victorian government’s auxiliary-screw warship Victoria (variously described as a barque, sloop or corvette), this being the first military operation carried out by any Australian armed unit overseas. James Cowan (1922–23) The New Zealand Wars, 2 vols, Wellington, NZ: W.A.G. Skinner; Tom Gibson (1974) The Maori Wars, Wellington, NZ: A.H. & A.W. Reed; Colin Jones (1986) Australian Colonial Navies, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Lambing Flat, an armed clash on 14 July 1861 between police and miners near Young,

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New South Wales, which was the culmination of several anti-Chinese riots on the newly proclaimed Burrangong goldfield. After serious disturbances in December 1860 and January 1861 to protest against the large Chinese population on these diggings, the police presence had been bolstered in an effort to keep the peace. On 25 February a contingent of 130 officers and men of the 12th Regiment, supported by a 42-man detachment of artillery manning three 12-pounder guns, was also despatched from Sydney, arriving on 11 March. After two months of peaceful inactivity the military were withdrawn on 24 May, however, and on 30 June there followed an even worse demonstration of the hostility felt by the 15,000 European miners towards their 2,000–3,000 Chinese counterparts. The party of twenty police remaining were powerless to intervene as a mob estimated to number 3,000 sacked the two main Chinese camps, and viciously assaulted and robbed their inhabitants. Reinforcements of mounted and foot police were sent to the scene from surrounding districts to bring the police presence up to 60. On Sunday 14 July three men held to be ringleaders of the violence a fortnight before were arrested and confined in the police camp. In an attempt to force the release of their colleagues, about 1,000 miners marched on the lock-up that evening in heavy rain and seemed ready to storm the camp. As the crowd became more unruly, the Riot Act was read. When this failed to disperse the gathering, foot police fired a volley over the heads of the crowd. After shots came out of the mob aimed at police horses, the police lowered their aim to fire directly into the miners. Several men were wounded and one was shot dead. When this still failed to disperse the crowd, troopers were twice ordered to charge with drawn cutlasses. Eventually the miners’ ranks broke and fled, but only after about twenty of their number had been injured, along with several constables.


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By morning peace had been restored, but the police—fearing a repeat attack—decided to retire to Yass 90 kilometres away. They vacated their camp, taking the prisoners with them and accompanied by the local goldfield administrators who judged it prudent to depart as well. The miners were left to bury their fallen comrade on 16 July with what were described as ‘informal military honours’, and to begin drilling in preparation for a further encounter. In response to this crisis the colonial government returned the military detachment sent before, this time with another 75 volunteers and a naval gun from HMS Fawn, a British warship then in harbour. On the arrival of this force—ready for action—on 31 July, the miners’ resistance evaporated and their leaders fled. The naval contingent was withdrawn on 6 August, followed on 18 September by all except 50 soldiers with one gun who remained until July 1862. When anti-Chinese elements tried to stage a rally in Sydney in support of the miners, the government called out the volunteer militia; in the event the public meeting was washed out by rain and no further trouble arose. Thirteen of the participants in the events at Lambing Flat were subsequently arrested and charged, but acquitted by sympathetic juries; only one man was gaoled for taking part in the disturbances. The anti-Asian hostility expressed in the riots was later given legal status in discriminatory legislation passed to restrict Chinese immigration. K.S. Inglis (1974) The Australian Colonists, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press; P.A. Selth, ‘The Burrangong (Lambing Flat) Riots, 1860–61: A Closer Look’, Journal of the Royal Australian Historical Society, vol.60, pt1, March 1974, pp.48–69; J.B. Hirst (1988) The Strange Birth of Colonial Democracy, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Cullinlaringo, an attack mounted on 17 October 1861 by Gayiri (Kairi) Aborigines against the residents of a newly established pastoral station on a tributary of the Nogoa

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1861–1863 River about 40 kilometres south-west of Emerald, Queensland. The tribesmen struck in the afternoon, while station personnel were resting after a morning spent constructing slab huts and stockyards. The owner, Horatio Wills, the only man in the camp who was armed, succeeded in firing one shot from a revolver as he stepped from a tent before he was struck down. A total of nineteen people were killed—eleven men, three women and five children—the largest loss to Aboriginal attack ever experienced in a single incident. The only survivors were a station hand who hid and two shepherds who were some distance from the scene, one of whom later rode to an adjoining station and raised the alarm. The attack was apparently in revenge for past killings of Gayiri by Native Police, an activity in which the recently arrived Wills party could not have been involved. To that extent, the targeting of Cullinlaringo was unfortunate and undeserved. The outcome of this episode, however, was further killings of Aborigines, as posses of settlers and workers from other stations assembled to make indiscriminate reprisals. The arrival of squads of Native Police in subsequent days ensured that this retaliation continued for the next two months. D.J. Mulvaney (1989) Encounters in Place, St Lucia: University of Queensland Press

Floraville, a clash on 1 December 1861 between Aborigines and a party of four whites and five Aboriginal troopers searching for the lost explorers Burke and Wills, which took place ten kilometres north of the present-day town of Floraville, Queensland. The search party was under Frederick Walker, a former commandant of the New South Wales Native Police Corps, and the few details known of the incident are drawn from his diary. This records that while the party was camped beside a small creek on the east bank of the Leichhardt River, Aborigines attacked but were repulsed; ‘their


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[the Aborigines’] right wing, which was the strongest, got over the river and were off, but the centre and left wing suffered a heavy loss’. What that meant in terms of the number of casualties is unknown. Robert Logan Jack (1921) Northmost Australia (2 vols), vol.1, London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co.

Pukekohe East, an action fought on 14 September 1863 about eleven kilometres south-west of Drury, New Zealand, between British troops and Maori insurgents. A seventeen-man garrison, comprising a militia detachment from Auckland and volunteers drawn from among farmers of the surrounding district who had been forced to abandon their properties, manned a small and still incomplete log stockade built around the local Presbyterian church. This occupied a ridge in an open area surrounded by forest which on all sides was never more than 100 metres distant, and in places as near as 40 metres; while most of the trees close by had been felled, the ground around the building was pitted with stumps and low bushes. Although alerted to the presence in the district of a Maori war-band on 13 September, when four of the volunteers had a narrow scrape while seeing to stock on the farm belonging to one of them, the hillside outpost was nonetheless surprised at breakfast the next day when attacked at about 9.20 a.m. The stockade’s defenders estimated that they faced 300–400 warriors, although a later Maori account put the number at no more than 170–200. These now surged up to the stockade, at times grabbing the muzzles of the defenders’ muskets and attempting to drag them through the loopholes cut in the log walls. After the initial rush failed to take the position, the action settled into a six-hour siege. The Maoris were well supplied with ammunition and kept up an extraordinarily heavy fire from behind trees, logs and stumps, whereas the stockade’s defenders were obliged to exercise extreme care to

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The battle around the Presbyterian Church at Pukekohe, as drawn in 1921 by A. H. Messenger. Source: James Cowan (1922–23), The New Zealand Wars, vol.1, facing p. 27

conserve their limited supply. About 1 p.m. the garrison’s situation received a boost when a group of 33 regulars—men of the 70th Regiment who had hurried from Springfield (Ramarama) in response to the sound of firing—reached the scene of the battle and fought their way through the cordon of Maoris. This reinforcement arrived none too soon, as some members of the original garrison were then down to one round apiece. About 4 p.m. a further relief column of regulars, comprising 150 soldiers of the 18th and 65th regiments under captains Inman and Saltmarshe (or Saltmarch), also arrived and joined in the defence. The newcomers reported having overtaken nearby a party of 25 militiamen of the 1st Waikato Regiment, under Captain Moir, who were escorting three ammunition carts to Pukekohe. These had been despatched earlier in the day but delayed by the state of the road. When this party came into view a short time later, the Maoris were surging to within 40 metres of the stockade and it was necessary to clear a path for them to get inside. To this end the


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troops at the church charged down the road while the Waikato men simultaneously pushed on up the hill, a combined movement which effectively cut through the Maori ranks. After a further hour of hard fighting the tribesmen broke off the fight and retreated, taking with them the majority of their dead believed to have numbered about 40. The troops had lost three men killed and eight wounded, including one man of the Waikatos who was shot in the knee and received a tomahawk cut to the head. The defence of Pukekohe East was later described as one of the ‘pluckiest’ actions of the campaign fought in the South Auckland area. James Cowan (1922–23) The New Zealand Wars (2 vols), vol.1, Wellington: W.A.G. Skinner; John Featon (1923) The Waikato War, Auckland: Brett Printing & Publishing; Leonard L. Barton (1979) Australians in the Waikato War 1863–1864, Sydney: Library of Australian History

Titi Hill, a skirmish fought on 23 October 1863 at Mauku, New Zealand, between Maoris and members of the colonial militia.

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1863–1864 During the morning, troops manning a stockade at St Bride’s Church (one of two defensive works guarding this point inland from the shores of Manukau Harbour) heard firing to the south of them. Scouts sent out to investigate sighted Maoris shooting cattle in the valley beyond Titi Hill, about two kilometres away. The commander of the garrison, Lieut. D.H. Lusk of the Forest Rangers, called for reinforcements from the neighbouring strongpoint 1.5 kilometres away, which contained a detachment of the 1st Waikato Regiment (a unit largely recruited in Australia). The officer in charge of the Waikatos, Lieut. John Perceval, led forward a section of twelve men. Instead of joining the church defenders, however, he rashly took his men up Titi Hill and into bush at the crest in an apparent attempt to catch the Maoris by surprise. The detachment was immediately confronted by a war-party of about 150 warriors and, finding itself hotly pressed and outflanked on both sides, began a hasty but orderly retreat. Observing the sudden turn of events from the church, Lusk led a group from the stockade to the rescue and arrived in time to prevent Perceval’s small group from being overrun. Thinking that the 50 men now under his command might be sufficient to drive back the Maoris, Lusk initially ordered an attack with fixed bayonets which succeeded in pushing beyond a patch of felled timber amid a clearing. When the Maoris again began rapidly skirmishing forward, threatening to outflank him on the left with their superior numbers, he realised that there was no option but to withdraw. As the militiamen began falling back, using the cover provided by the tree stumps and logs which littered the ground, the emboldened Maoris threw their full weight against the Europeans. The gap between the two forces was closed to only twenty metres, with both sides firing at each other as fast as they could reload. Some of the Maoris then threw down their


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rifles and charged forward to engage in hand-to-hand combat, pitting their long-handled tomahawks against the militia bayonets. As numbers of his men started to fall Lusk ordered cover to be taken in bush to the right, and from here a volume of accurate fire was maintained which forced the Maoris out of the smoke-filled clearing. Using this hard-won breathing space, the militia made their way safely back to the stockade using fire and movement by sections. The Maori war-party then broke off the action and withdrew, regaining the far bank of the Waikato River before other contingents of troops could intercept them next day. They carried with them their casualties, estimated to include 20–30 killed and many more wounded. The Mauku garrison had suffered eight dead, including Perceval and another officer—all except one being from the 1st Waikatos. As four of these men were believed to be from Victoria, they are probably the first Australians killed in a foreign war. James Cowan (1922–23) The New Zealand Wars (2 vols), vol.1, Wellington: W.A.G. Skinner; Leonard L. Barton (1979) Australians in the Waikato War 1863–1864, Sydney: Library of Australian History

Orakau, a famous action fought in the Upper Waipa district of New Zealand on 31 March– 2 April 1864, when British troops under Brigadier-General George Carey—including a portion of the Waikato militia which had been recruited in Australia—besieged 300 Ngati-Maniapoto Maoris in their pa (fort). On 30 March Lieut.-Colonel T.M. Haultain, commanding officer of the 2nd Waikato Militia and then in charge of a redoubt at Kihikihi, sent a report of rebel activity on a ridge amid peach-groves at Orakau to the headquarters camp at Te Awamutu. At dawn the next day Carey moved with several columns which quickly and effectively surrounded the Maori outpost. An attempt to rush the pa was repulsed with loss, as was a second assault supported by two 6-pounder

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Armstrong guns. Realising that the Maori defences were stronger than first thought, Carey gave orders for a sap to be driven against the north-west corner of the position and at the same time called for reinforcements which—when they arrived that same evening—brought his strength to nearly 1,500 men. Meanwhile, the work of digging towards the Maoris’ entrenchments was continued throughout the night under a heavy fire. About noon the next day, 1 April, a rebel relief force of 150–200 Ngati-Haua and Ngati-Raukawa warriors appeared on the ranges to the east, and it was anticipated that these intended to try to reinforce the pa’s defenders. A party of troops (which included a company of Waikato militiamen) made sure this did not happen, and a sortie mounted from within the pa to make contact was also beaten back. Despite intermittent volleys fired by the Maoris, the digging of the sap continued unchecked. To forestall the British advance, an attack by 20–30 young warriors was launched against the mining party during the night, but this attempt was repelled by a volley from men of the 3rd Waikato Militia, under Captain Walter Herford, who were posted to guard the trench. Herford, a South Australian barrister before his enlistment, was picked off later in the day by a Maori sniper who wounded him with a shot to the head which took out an eye. At 9 a.m. on the morning of the third day, Lieut.-General Duncan Cameron arrived with a cavalry escort from Pukerimu (near present-day Cambridge) to find the troops still digging their way forward and now within eight metres of the palisade in front of the outer Maori trenches. He sent an interpreter forward with a message calling on the pa’s garrison to submit but, although surrounded now by some 1,800 troops and having spent two days without water and only limited food, the tribesmen would neither surrender nor accept an offer of safe passage for about 50


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women or children who had been helping in the pa’s construction when the battle began, declaring that all would remain to the death. About noon, one of the Armstrong guns was brought into the sap and used to breach the parapet of the outer wall. From the safety of the trench short-fused hand grenades were also lobbed over the parapets among the Maori defenders, causing scores of injuries. Two attempts by men of the Waikato Militia and others to storm the north-west outwork were nonetheless repulsed with loss, but soon afterwards the miners succeeded in connecting the sap with the trench of the outwork and the troops now had entry into the position. The garrison withdrew into the main bastion and continued the fight, but it was clear that the end was near. At 3.30 p.m. the Maoris, recognising the gravity of their situation but still uncowed, chose to abandon the pa in a final show of defiance. Suddenly breaking down the south-east corner of their redoubt, they emerged in a silent compact body—the warriors forming a protective shield around their women and children— and proceeded to hack an escape path out of entrapment. After the remnant of the Maoris had burst through the British cordon, troops converged on the point of their breakthrough and poured a heavy fire into them as they disappeared into the thick tea-tree at the rear of the pa. Other troops, some mounted and others on foot, continued the pursuit over several kilometres. Only about 100 defenders, including their leader, Rewi Maniapoto, escaped by this desperate means but it ensured that the Orakau siege—one of the most important episodes of the Waikato war—could be judged as only partly successful from the British point of view. Between 130–160 Maoris had been killed and another 33 taken prisoner (all but seven after being wounded). The attackers lost sixteen killed and 52 wounded; five of the casualties were members of the 2nd and 3rd Waikato regiments, two of them being

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among the dead—in addition to Herford who subsequently died of his wound. Apart from Herford, Carey also singled out Lieut. H.B.R. Harrison (2nd Waikato Regiment) for gallantry during the siege. James Cowan (1922–23) The New Zealand Wars (2 vols), vol.1, Wellington: W.A.G. Skinner; John Featon (1923) The Waikato War, Auckland: Brett Printing & Publishing; Leonard L. Barton (1979) Australians in the Waikato War 1863–1864, Sydney: Library of Australian History

Te Ranga, an action fought on 21 June 1864 between rebel Maoris and British forces in the Tauranga district of New Zealand. In late April British troops had suffered a serious reverse in this area, when a formidable force assembled by Lieut.-General Sir Duncan Cameron took heavy casualties unsuccessfully assaulting a fieldwork at Pukehinahina (known as the Gate pa) which the Maori leaders then surrendered only after the bulk of their warriors had got away. In the wake of this debacle the officer left in charge at Tauranga, Colonel H.H. Greer, was instructed to be vigilant for any further attempts by the local Ngaiterangi tribe to erect similar fortified positions. On 21 June a reconnaissance patrol returned to Greer’s camp at Te Papa, beside the Bay of Plenty, to report having sighted a large band of hostile Maoris engaged in digging a new fort across a ridgeline at Te Ranga. This was five or six kilometres inland from the Gate pa, at a point where the road from Tauranga to Oropi and Rotorua headed into forests to the south. Greer hurriedly moved out with 600 men in an attempt to disperse the enemy before they were able to develop their defences into a position of strength. Arriving on the scene at Te Ranga, Greer discovered that the earthworks had not so far progressed beyond a single line of rifle pits, but the number of Maoris manning these—members of the Ngaiterangi and allied tribes—was estimated to equal the size of his own force. After sending back to the camp on the


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coast for a 6-pounder Armstrong gun and every soldier who could be spared (another 220 men), Greer immediately sent forward a party of skirmishers to drive the Maoris’ sentries back into the shelters of their trenches. At 10.30 a.m. he moved up his troops and placed them across the front and on the flanks of the position, while opening up a sharp fire intended to prevent the Maoris from retreating without suffering heavy losses. The rebels returned the troops’ fire and the fight continued for the next two hours, until Greer was joined at about 12.30 p.m. by the reinforcements he had summoned from Te Papa. Upon the signal to advance being sounded on a bugle, troops of the 43rd and 68th Light Infantry regiments, and a detachment of the 1st Waikato Militia under Captain William Moore, all charged forward. They were met by a tremendous fire from the Maori positions, most of which fortunately went high, and moments later the attackers were into the trenches and locked in furious hand-to-hand combat. After a short but determined struggle, the Maoris broke and fled. The Colonial Defence Force Cavalry attempted to pursue the survivors with their sabres, but the deep ravines leading off from the ridgeline and swamp areas beyond aided the escape of the majority of the warriors. Remaining in the captured rifle pits were the bodies of 68 defenders, including the Ngaiterangi leader Rawiri Puhirake and several other important figures who had distinguished themselves at Pukehinahina. The recovery of another 40 bodies from the surrounding area, and fifteen subsequent deaths from wounds among the 43 prisoners taken, brought the Maori losses to 123 killed. Greer’s troops suffered 52 casualties, including thirteen killed—all from among the light infantry units. Apart from partially redeeming the earlier disaster at the Gate pa, the outcome at Te Ranga forced the surrender of the Ngaiterangi and was effectively the last

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June–December 1864

Painting by H.M.L. Atcherly (a colour sergeant in the 1st Waikato Regiment from 1863 to 1867) of the action at Te Ranga. Source: Australian War Memorial 19817

engagement of the Waikato campaign. Paradoxically, the action at Te Ranga was also the first pitched battle in which Australians enlisted into any of the four Waikato militia regiments took part. James Cowan (1922–23) The New Zealand Wars (2 vols), vol.1, Wellington: W.A.G. Skinner; Leonard L. Barton (1979) Australians in the Waikato War 1863–1864, Sydney: Library of Australian History

Mitchell River, a clash between Aborigines and a droving party, fought on 18 December 1864 on the western side of Cape York Peninsula about 95 kilometres east of the mouth of the Nassau River. Following a visit of northern ports by Sir George Bowen, governor of Queensland, in August 1862, plans were made for the establishment of a settlement at Somerset, on the northern tip of Cape York Peninsula, under the police magistrate at Rockhampton, John Jardine. To help meet the new settlement’s anticipated needs for fresh food, especially meat, Jardine proposed that his two eldest sons, Frank and Alexander, take a herd of cattle overland to set up a cattle station. This expedition got underway in October 1864,


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when a ten-man party (six Europeans and four Aboriginal troopers) set out from Carpentaria Downs (190 kilometres west of Ingham) with 250 cattle. The party reached Somerset five months later, on 13 March 1865, after a journey across nearly 1,500 kilometres of what was previously barely explored country. Reporting its arrival to Brisbane, John Jardine declared that a successful outcome had been achieved despite the ‘determined hostility of the natives’, who were almost continually on the overlanders’ track and annoyed them ‘on every favourable opportunity’. This opposition had reached the peak of its ferocity as the Mitchell River was neared about 240 kilometres north-north-east of Normanton. On 16 December the Jardine brothers were riding ahead of the main party when they were confronted by a group of Aborigines who jeered and brandished spears. A fight ensued in which eight or nine Aborigines were shot down before the remainder fled. The next day was spent negotiating the many channels of the Mitchell, and the next in moving down what

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appeared to be the main stream. This waterway was 30 metres wide, deep and running strongly, and a halt had to be called for several hours while a suitable crossing point was located amid the dense foliage on both sides. The Jardine brothers, accompanied by one of the Native Police, had scouted downstream about two kilometres when they disturbed a number of Aborigines fishing. These quickly swam to the opposite bank and were initially assumed to be fleeing; instead they returned in strength and swam back towards the intruders, having collected their spears and clubs. Realising the situation which was developing, the horsemen headed back towards their camp, the heavy timber limiting their speed to a canter. This retirement was interpreted by the Aborigines as flight, and they pushed their pursuit harder. Once within throwing range, the Aborigines’ spears began passing in close proximity to the backs of the retreating overlanders, prompting Frank Jardine as leader to decide on making a stand. Suddenly turning on their pursuers and galloping up to them, they poured a volley among the leaders before dismounting and maintaining a destructive fire. The sounds of this skirmish quickly brought the rest of the droving party downstream to join the fight. The Aborigines had largely expended their spears in the initial pursuit and were effectively defenceless against the combined fire of ten carbines, with the result that some 30 Aborigines were killed and many more wounded before the survivors managed to escape. None of the expedition’s members suffered any injury in the affray, although one man had a narrow escape during the return to camp when a spear was thrown by a lone warrior waiting in concealment, who was also shot down. Subsequently recounted as one of the few instances in which Queensland Aborigines stood up to whites in a pitched engagement, showing ‘no sign of surprise or fear at the


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report and effect of fire-arms’, it was apparently this aspect which caused the one-sided affair to be dubbed the ‘Battle of the Mitchell’. The precise location of the action is not known, but is believed to be about five kilometres west of Koolatah station homestead. R. Logan Jack (1922) Northmost Australia (2 vols), vol.1, Melbourne: George Robertson & Co.

La Grange Bay, a clash between Karadjari Aborigines and whites, fought on the north-west coast of Western Australia on 6 April 1865. The incident was triggered by the despatch from Fremantle in March of a party to search for three white men, who had disappeared in November the previous year while examining new pastoral country south of Roebuck Bay and were believed to have been murdered by tribesmen. The expedition initially comprised four Europeans (a 22-year-old expert bushman named Maitland Brown, two police constables and a white ‘navigator’) and three Aboriginal boys; later it was joined by two private citizens named David Francisco and Lockier Burges. Despite his youth, Brown was placed in charge and instructed to act entirely on his own judgement while ‘avoiding by all possible means any hostile collisions’ with the local Aborigines. On arriving at Roebuck Bay, Brown promptly raided Aboriginal camps and seized hostages who were taken on board the ship attending the expedition. With eleven Aborigines in chains he then sailed to La Grange Bay, where the bodies of the three missing men were located a short distance inland. While the remains were being prepared for return to Perth for a state funeral, two of the hostages attempted to escape and were shot dead by one of the Aboriginal boys. Having loaded the bones of the three murdered whites into the expedition’s support vessel on 6 April, the main party started out the same day to make the journey back to Roebuck Bay overland.

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1864–1865 They had not gone very far when two Aborigines were seen and pursued. One threw a stone axe at Brown and was promptly killed by Burges. What happened subsequently is the subject of some debate. According to the diary of one expedition member, four white members of the party rode over the crest of the next hill and found themselves in the midst of a camp of about 50 Aborigines— men, women and children. As a result of a brief skirmish, ‘Five or six were left dead upon the field and about twelve or thirteen wounded’, the latter taking refuge with the rest in a mangrove thicket where pursuit was impossible. Brown himself later described the incident as an ‘ambush’, a term which overstated what was almost certainly an accidental collision given the presence of so many women and children. Moreover, as Hasluck observed, ‘Eighteen casualties among only twenty-five men of this group, inflicted by four white men in ten minutes, certainly makes the “ambush” a dismal failure for the native plotters’. The party was, of course, justified in acting in self-defence, and in this case was particularly well equipped to do so. Burges later wrote that each of the four whites engaged in the fight carried ‘a six-chambered revolver, with six spare sets of chambers loaded ready for insertion, in addition to our double-barrelled guns or carbines, giving us each 44 shots without reloading’. In the circumstances, it seems more probable that the consideration foremost in Brown’s mind was actually—in his own words—‘the best mode of teaching . . . a severe lesson . . . [in] the superiority of civilised weapons over savage’. It was certainly striking that the two members of the expedition who did not participate in the fight were ‘disappointed at not having arrived in time to share it’. Although officials in Perth and London recognised that the expedition had probably used force against the Aborigines ‘without sufficient necessity’, among the settler


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population in the colony Brown was regarded as a hero and received enthusiastic praise. His report to the government on the incident, first published in the Perth Gazette in May, was reprinted as a very popular pamphlet. Press reports also took to describing the slaughter as though it was a battle of heroic dimensions, depicting the whites as opposed by over 100 ‘fully armed’ warriors. Later accounts—most notably Burges’, first published in 1913—added to this process of exaggerating the scale of the clash by inflating the number of Aborigines present to ‘between 200 and 300 men’. Despite these attempts to elevate the incident in importance, in reality it was nothing more than a savage punitive affair involving the exacting of cruel vengeance against Aborigines who may nor may not have been responsible for the three white deaths earlier. Paul Hasluck (1970) Black Australians, 2nd edn, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press; C.T. Stannage (ed.) (1981) A New History of Western Australia, Nedlands, WA: University of Western Australia Press

Coomooboolaroo, an episode in late May 1865 in the Springsure district near Emerald, Queensland, which affords a rare instance where Aborigines bested elements of the Queensland Native Police Corps with which they clashed. A spate of Aboriginal ‘outrages’ along the McKenzie River, culminating in the murder of a shepherd on the Thomson family’s Coomooboolaroo run (referred to in official reports as Coomooboolano), led to the settlers apprehending ‘a renewal of wholesale massacres’ by the large number of Aborigines who had gathered in the area— Coomooboolaroo being in the immediate neighbourhood of Cullinlaringo (q.v.), site of an infamous mass killing of whites in 1861. While on its way to the scene of the shepherd’s murder, a detachment of four Aboriginal troopers under Acting Sub-Inspector Cecil Hill (brother of W.R.O. Hill, who was also an officer in the corps at this time) was surprised in their camp at

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night. Hill was killed, apparently as was one of his men, while another trooper was severely wounded. In response to this reverse, on 26 May a further four detachments of Native Police (under sub-inspectors Paschen, Blakeney, Beevor and Bailey) were sent into the area with orders ‘to restore order and protect the lives of the settlers’. These reportedly had ‘sundry collisions’ with groups of Aborigines, with Paschen recording four clashes between 4 and 10 June (the last involving all four detachments) before the tribesmen ‘dispersed’ into scrub country in the Lower Dawson district on 22 June. A year later the Commissioner of Police, David Seymour, voiced his suspicion that Paschen had ‘very much exaggerated the number of his collisions with the aborigines’, since the behaviour attributed to the latter did not accord with their known tactics. Consequently he believed that the encounters described in Paschen’s report ‘refer in a majority of cases to a few spears thrown, and a few shots fired at a distance with little or no loss of [sic] either side’. If this was so, the whole episode had definitely been a win to the Aborigines, since contact with the Native Police nearly always resulted in a heavy death toll. J.C.H. Gill, ‘Governor Bowen and the Aborigines: A Documentary Review’, Queensland Heritage, vol.2, no.7, November 1972

Tam O’Shanter Point, opposite Dunk Island at the northern end of Rockingham Bay on the east coast of north Queensland, was the scene of two clashes between whites and Aborigines in March 1871. In the early hours of 26 February the old brig Maria (167 tonnes), after barely surviving shipwreck while taking 67 members of a prospecting expedition to New Guinea, struck on Bramble Reef on the south side of Rockingham Bay. The captain of the vessel, taking in secret five other men and the best boat (which would have held twenty) and leaving before daybreak, effectively deserted


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the ship on the pretext of going to Cardwell— about 50 kilometres to the west—to obtain assistance. Those left on board (all except nine men) got off the vessel in the remaining two boats and two hastily constructed rafts shortly before the vessel sank later that same day; several men were seen clinging to the single arm of one mast which was left protruding above the water. While the rafts made for the nearest land, the boats made for Cardwell—which they duly reached on 3 March, after spending five wretched days stranded on Hinchinbrook Island due to bad weather. This was the first the town knew of the disaster, and early the next morning a vessel was chartered to proceed to the scene of the wreck and begin the search for other survivors, especially those on the rafts. While this effort was still underway, two members of the party which had gone with the captain walked into Cardwell on the morning of 6 March, naked, completely exhausted, and with one carrying a fearful wound from an Aboriginal ‘sword’. These men told how their boat had come ashore at Tam O’Shanter Point on 29 February, only to be immediately attacked by Aborigines. Having seen one man killed and the captain mortally wounded, and knowing nothing of the fate of the others, the two survivors had taken to travelling only at night and hiding up during the day. Later that same day Navigating Lieutenant Sabben of HMS Basilisk, who had been left at Cardwell in charge of the schooner Peri, hurried to Tam O’Shanter Point in a gig with two of his own men and six volunteers from the town, arriving at about 4 p.m. The Maria’s boat was found drawn up into the scrub, where preparations had been made to burn it, and it was hauled back down to the water. Before setting off, Sabben’s party paused to cook a meal on the beach—having been without food for twelve hours. While engaged in this activity they were suddenly rushed by about 120 Aborigines, who emerged from

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1865–1873 the mangroves armed with spears. The attack was beaten off after eight Aborigines had been killed and another eight wounded. The party then returned to Cardwell in the gig and the captain’s boat. Upon the arrival of Basilisk at Cardwell on 9 March the local Police Magistrate, Brinsley Sheridan, appealed to its commander, Captain John Moresby, RN, for assistance in mounting a punitive expedition against the Aborigines at Tam O’Shanter Point who had already claimed four white lives, having reportedly come to the conclusion that the hostility of these tribesmen threatened the existence of the settlement itself. Lieutenant Francis Hayter was despatched in Peri with two other officers and a dozen men from the warship, accompanied by a detachment of Aboriginal troopers led by Sub-Inspector Robert Johnstone. A surprise attack was made before daylight on an Aboriginal camp in the area, and a bloody vengeance reportedly meted out before the punitive party returned to Cardwell, bringing with them a six-year-old Aboriginal boy. Moresby was apparently under the impression that only a few Aborigines had fallen in this action, notwithstanding his knowledge that the Aboriginal troopers had shown an ‘unrestrained ferocity’ which disgusted Hayter and his officers. Other contemporary accounts suggest that the retribution inflicted by Johnstone and his men amounted to a wholesale massacre which accounted for all but five members of the tribe. Nasty rumours circulated for some time, with Johnstone finally forced to deny the allegations to parliament. While events were taking place at Tam O’Shanter Point, Moresby took the Basilisk to locate those survivors of Maria who had come ashore on the rafts. Of thirteen on the larger of these craft, eight were found on 12 March in the care of friendly Aborigines at Cooper’s Point (just north of modern Innisfail); the other five had drowned or gone


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insane and died. That same day a party in Basilisk’s cutter, under Lieutenant Sydney Smith, found the remains of the smaller raft on the beach some ten kilometres away (south of Gladys Inlet, the mouth of the Johnstone River on which Innisfail now stands). The bodies of nine of the twelve men on board this craft were subsequently located—seven of which bore evidence of having been killed by Aborigines. Why this party had been set upon while the other not far away was given succour remains a mystery. Robert Logan Jack (1921) Northmost Australia (2 vols), vol.1, London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co.; Dorothy Jones (1961) Cardwell Shire Story, Brisbane: Jacaranda Press

The Officer, a skirmish between Pitjantjatjara Aborigines and members of a four-man exploring party led by Ernest Giles, fought on 6–7 September 1873 in the Musgrave Ranges at the far north of South Australia near the non-perennial stream which Giles named The Officer. Giles and a colleague were riding ahead of the others on 6 September, reconnoitring a stretch of running water, when they disturbed a large band of Aborigines who ‘raised a most frightful outcry at our sudden and unexpected advent amongst them’. Sending their women and children away into the hills, the warriors—numbering more than 200— became increasingly menacing. Yelling and gesturing violently, they waved their spears threateningly while the intruding pair sat motionless on their horses; one Aborigine who plainly had previous contact with Europeans was heard to call out, ‘Walk, whitefellow, walk’. When the Aborigines made a rush towards the horsemen, Giles fired a round from his rifle which broke some boughs between several of the leading Aborigines. This action momentarily silenced the group, enabling the two whites to retreat and join the other members of the party travelling with the horses. The Aborigines remained near at

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The exploring party led by Ernest Giles clashes with Aborigines in the Musgrave Range. Source: Giles, E. Australia Twice Traversed, 1889, London, vol.1, facing p. 176. National Library of Australia

hand but did not make any further attacks until the explorers had finished setting up camp in a small clearing at the base of a hill. After the horses were fitted with nighthobbles and set free to graze, however, the Aborigines launched what Giles termed ‘a grand sortie’ by rushing down from the hill behind the camp with spears readied for throwing. Judging that their lives were in imminent danger, Giles ordered two rifles and a shotgun to be fired in the attackers’ direction—but without, at this stage, aiming to hit any adversaries. After dodging a volley of spears which landed among them, the whites then ran forward themselves while firing pistols. This tactic had the desired effect in forcing the Aborigines to flee and leave the party in peace for an hour. An attempt was made in the camp to eat a meal, but this had not been completed before another, more stealthy, advance was observed. This attack


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too was broken up by a volley fired so as to throw up dirt and stones from about the attackers’ feet, but did not deter yet one more onslaught. This time, convinced that the party’s firearms were noisy but harmless, the Aborigines made taunting and defiant gestures which Giles felt compelled to answer by placing further rounds in even closer proximity as evidence of real capability. This was enough to cause a retreat which left the camp undisturbed—though not unvigilant—throughout the night. The following morning Giles remained for a short time alone in the camp while one man went to collect the horses and the other two scaled a hill to take some bearings necessary for the day’s travels. He recorded that no sooner had the Aborigines observed this situation than they ‘recommenced their malpractices’, forcing him to open fire—first in the air, ‘then on the ground, at one side of them and then at the other’. By these means

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September–November 1873 they were kept at bay until the others returned, and although they stayed nearby as the party moved off—watching and yelling constantly—there was no further hostile action. Perhaps unusually among explorers, Giles was able to boast that the collision between European and Aboriginal cultures on this occasion had ended with no blood shed and ‘only the loss of a little ammunition’. The incident was later referred to as the ‘Battle of The Officer’. Ernest Giles (1889) Australia Twice Traversed (2 vols), vol.1, London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington

Battle Camp, a clash between GuuguYimidhirr (Kokowara) Aborigines and miners bound for the Palmer River goldfield, fought 60 kilometres west-north-west of Cooktown, Queensland, on 5 November 1873. Reports received early in September that year of the discovery of payable quantities of gold on the Palmer had triggered a rush to the area, and by 20 October some 600 miners were already on the new goldfield. Anticipating that many more would follow, the Queensland government immediately sent an expedition north in two small chartered cutters to establish a seaport to handle the influx. The mouth of the Endeavour River was chosen as the site for this port (now Cooktown) on 24 October, and the next morning the steamer Leichhardt arrived carrying a police contingent, gold commissioner Howard St George and a road engineer, Archibald Macmillian, who had instructions to find and make a road to the diggings. Also on board were 96 miners, including twenty Chinese. Five days later, the first party of diggers bound for the Palmer set off from the Endeavour River. They were loosely under the control of St George and Macmillan, and enjoyed the protection of a troop of Native Police under Sub-Inspector George Dyas which was accompanying them to take up station on the goldfield. Unlike the government men, who rode on horseback,


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the miners (joined now by some seamen who had jumped ship) were on foot, either carrying their food supplies and other needs on their own backs or else in wheelbarrows or on packhorses. All up, the party numbered about 130 men. After crossing the Normanby River on 4 November, the party travelled along the southern bank before establishing camp for the night. The site was close to the place where an exploring party led by William Hann had been attacked by Aborigines on 17 September the previous year, and this was probably sufficient to prompt additional precautions to be taken against the possibility of an attack. Other accounts state that while the camp was settling in for the night, a digger who went to the nearby creek for water came across footprints in the soft sand which could only be fresh and brought this warning back to his fellows. As a result, as well as stacking saddles and items unloaded from the horses and carts into a circle, boughs and saplings had been cut and piled up to form a rough barricade. At 5 a.m. the next morning, it was still dark when the camp began to stir prior to moving off. A barking dog drew attention to movement in bushes not far from the barricade, and the camp’s occupants had just come to the alert when the Aborigines attacked. William Webb, a miner in the party, recounted that: . . . a crowd of natives came up yelling out a terrible war cry, and they reached to about 70 yards from where we lay all over the ground. There were about 40 in the first rank and as many more in reserve some distance behind.

Some twenty warriors fell to the first volley from the defenders, many of whom carried breech-loading Snider carbines. A second volley, fired as the attackers were almost up to the barricade, dropped many more. A third volley—more ragged as the diggers and police hurried to reload—was needed to end the hand-to-hand fighting that was then

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underway and cause the Aborigines to retreat and drop down into surrounding grass. Even this did not end the action, as spears continued to shower the camp. Under the weight of bullets poured out by the defenders, however, the attack began to fade away. When the Aborigines eventually rose and fled, Macmillan and St George led the troopers in pursuit as far as a large lagoon, and in Webb’s words ‘all that went there stayed there’. Meanwhile, a group of Aborigines had managed to panic the party’s horses, and driven fourteen of the animals—still with their hobbles and night-bells on—about a kilometre away from the camp. Four men mounted a few of the terrified horses that came into the camp and rode out to stop this. Further shots were fired on this front, before the Aborigines disappeared into the bush and the horses were caught and returned—fortunately without injury. The fight, which gave the scene of the action the name ‘Battle Camp’, was quickly over. About 8 a.m. the party moved out, and ten days later the Palmer was reached without further incident. Many subsequent accounts of the incident have tended to magnify both its nature and intensity. The Aboriginal war-party (said to have been 500 strong initially) suffered an unknown number of casualties, and the casualties of the camp’s defenders are also unknown—although it seems there were some. The chief effect of this action was to cause the tribesmen to abandon mounting large-scale open attacks, and resort in future to guerilla-style tactics against intruders attempting to reach the Palmer goldfields. Robert Logan Jack (1922) Northmost Australia (2 vols), vol.1, Melbourne: George Robertson & Co.; Hector Holthouse (1967) River of Gold, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Gilberton, a boom town of the goldrush era situated on the Gilbert River 185 kilometres north-north-west of Hughenden, Queensland, which became a rare example of a town


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actually abandoned as a result of attacks by Aborigines. Founded in 1869, the town’s population had grown to several thousand by 1872 when the first serious incident occurred. Late in that year, the local clans raided the Chinese mining camp by the river and killed five of its occupants while putting the rest to flight. The probable cause of this onslaught was the drying up of surface water supplies at the end of the long northern dry season, which forced the Aborigines in towards the main river. In September 1873 news of fresh discoveries of gold along the Palmer River caused an exodus from the town, reducing the population to 110 Europeans and a larger number of Chinese. The withdrawal of the local police presence in November that year left the town without protection, and immediately the Aborigines moved in again. Within ten days two white residents had been killed and several attacks had once more driven the Chinese from their riverside camp into the town, leaving behind their stores and large quantities of washdirt which was being stockpiled for the commencement of the rains. With that the Chinese left the town. For the remaining population the position had become perilous. The wet season was imminent and it was certain that swollen streams would soon cut movement along the roads in and out, and teamsters were refusing to come to the town because of the fear of Aboriginal attack (and the better profits to be made from supplying the Palmer goldfield). Accordingly, in December 1873, the last residents of Gilberton loaded what they could of their belongings for removal, before burning the rest in the town’s main street and departing. Henry Reynolds (1987) Frontier, Sydney: Allen & Unwin; W. Ross Johnston (1992) The Long Blue Line, Brisbane: Boolarong Publications

Barrow Creek, an action fought on 23–25 February 1874 when some twenty Kaytej (Kaititja) Aborigines made a planned assault

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1873–1874

The Aboriginal assault on Gilberton which led to the town’s abandonment began with attacks on the nearby camp of Chinese miners. Source: Sydney Illustrated News, 15/2/1873, p.16. Mitchell Library, State Library of NSW FM4/4302

on the Overland Telegraph repeater station located 240 kilometres north of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory. The attack began after the evening meal, while the few staff were sitting—unarmed—outside the north-west corner of the building. The station was a strongly built square structure, with an internal courtyard and a single entrance on its rear (eastern) side facing a hill. It was down this slope that the Aborigines descended while the Europeans were still enjoying the cool of the evening air. When several were spotted approaching the station’s northern side, the staff ran around the southern side making for the gateway— only to find it already blocked by another party of armed warriors. Faced with no option but to run the gauntlet of spear-thrusts, the whites rushed the gateway. A linesman was stabbed in the heart and died instantly and both the station master and his assistant received serious wounds, but the rest got safely inside with only a few scratches and reached their firearms. The Kaytej then withdrew, leaving the station master (who died from his injuries a few hours later) to transmit news of the incident over the telegraph. The attackers returned the next day, but this time the station’s occupants were ready for them and


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opened fire; they withdrew again, after one of their number had been killed. Another attempt was made to surround the station on the following day, but three shots were sufficient to again force a retreat after one more warrior was killed. The station remained under siege until a line party working to the north arrived on 27 February, after itself having encountered hostile Aborigines about 32 kilometres away. Further reinforcements were received on 1 March, enabling a party of volunteers to go out in search of the attackers the next day. A fight took place at dusk near where the relieving linesmen had their ‘brush’, after the volunteers were lured into an ambush along Taylor Creek in which ‘several’ Kaytej were killed. Further punitive operations were mounted after additional volunteers arrived on 31 March, resulting in an action along the Hanson River some twenty kilometres south of Central Mount Stuart on 10 April in which at least three Aborigines (but almost certainly many more) were shot. Gordon Reid (1990) A Picnic with the Natives, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Palmer River, a clash which took place on 27 May 1874 along the stretch of river between Palmerville and Maytown, Queensland, between Aborigines and a party of white prospectors led by James Mulligan. The Europeans were attacked while panning for gold, and had repulsed three charges by the Aborigines when subjected to another ‘furious rush’ as they were leaving their camp. Mulligan later wrote that: I never saw blacks so determined. The long grass, scrub and high ridges were greatly in their favour. Three of us got marked by them. They will, however, for the future, know the effect of the rifle in that locality.

From this last observation it can only be assumed that casualties among the Aborigines were heavy. Only one of the prospectors was seriously injured, and he

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was reported to be nearly well again eight days later. Robert Logan Jack (1921) Northmost Australia (2 vols), vol.2, London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co.

Weld Springs, a skirmish between Aborigines and an exploring party under John Forrest (a later premier of Western Australia), was fought on 13 June 1874 at a point on the Canning Stock Route about 65 kilometres north-east of Mount Salvado. With his younger brother Alexander as deputy, and accompanied by four other men and twenty horses, Forrest led his expedition out from Geraldton in April to follow a route across the central desert. Finding an abundant water supply at the Weld Springs on 2 June, the party rested for more than two weeks while making several unsuccessful sorties to the east in search of water. Alexander Forrest and another man were out on a reconnaissance on 13 June when those remaining in camp were attacked by some 50 Aborigines armed with spears. The tribesmen appeared at about 1 p.m. on a rise overlooking the camp, reportedly painted and dressed in war costume. The expedition’s members were alert, however, and a volley drove the attackers off. Retiring to their initial vantage point, the Aborigines regrouped before making a second assault which was similarly repelled by a rifle-shot from John Forrest. The Aborigines withdrew, carrying at least two of their number wounded. The explorers hurriedly built a small stone hut for added protection against further attacks at night, and used this rough shelter as their base until shifting to a fresh campsite on 19 June. The cause of the Aborigines’ attack is nowhere explained, although one Forrest biographer speculates that the party may have camped inadvertently on a sacred site. Equally likely is the possibility that the tribesmen resented being deprived of a watering point which was important to their own existence. Ernest Favenc (1908) The Explorers of Australia


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and their Life-Work, Christchurch, NZ: Whitcombe & Tombs; F.K. Crowley (1971) Forrest 1847–1918, vol.1 (1847–91: Apprenticeship to Premiership), St Lucia: University of Queensland Press

Ularring, a clash between Aborigines and a small exploring party led by Ernest Giles, fought about 145 kilometres north of Coolgardie, Western Australia, on 16 October 1875. Giles had left Beltana, South Australia, in May at the head of a well-equipped camel train, in an attempt to find an overland route from central Australia to the western coast. Resting up after having successfully crossed the Great Victoria Desert, on 6 October the party set off for Mount Churchman 560 kilometres to the west. After covering 320 kilometres in seven days, the expedition reached a waterhole which Giles learnt from Aborigines was called Ularring. At first the local inhabitants were friendly, and the explorers’ camp was joined by two men who brought with them a girl about nine years of age. Pleased to be getting on so well with the Aborigines, Giles allowed the trio to stay. On their third day at Ularring, however, the members of the expedition were concluding their evening meal when one of the whites spotted the two visiting Aborigines making signs to two others in adjoining rocks. Moments later this man’s attention was caught by movement on a nearby ridge, and he realised that those in the rocks were scouts for ‘a grand and imposing army’ who were approaching ‘painted, feathered and armed to the teeth’. The alarm was given, and the rest of the exploring party leapt to their feet and grabbed for their weapons. According to Giles’ journal, the Aborigines numbered over 100 warriors and formed what he described as a ‘drilled and perfectly organised force’—although this is more likely to have been a European’s projection rather than a reflection of true military discipline. He was nonetheless struck by the fact that they advanced in serried close-packed ranks, forming ‘a solid

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1874–1876

An artist’s rather fanciful depiction of the attack on Ernest Giles’ party at Ularring while finding an overland route from central to western Australia. Source: Giles, E., Australia Twice Traversed, 1889, London, vol.2, facing p.223; National Library of Australia

phalanx of five or six rows, each row consisting of eighteen or twenty warriors’. Deciding to have ‘the first discharge at them’ before the Aborigines got within spear-throwing range, Giles told his men to open fire. He had no sooner done so than one of the hitherto friendly Aborigines in the camp rushed at him and grabbed him around the neck to prevent him firing his own rifle. Unable to shoot the assailant who was pinning his left arm, Giles used his free right arm to swing his weapon as a club and managed to strike the man’s head with the rifle’s stock. At this he suddenly let go, disappearing behind thick acacia bushes before Giles could do him any further harm. By this time—no more than a few seconds— the attack by the war-party had begun to falter. The shot which the expedition’s leader now fired was followed by their retreat, as Giles vaguely recorded, ‘carrying their wounded’.


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An odd aspect of the brief episode had been the behaviour of the little girl, who throughout the affray ran about excitedly patting the white men on the back as each was about to fire, and generally treating the whole business like some new game. Her adult companion, meanwhile, had taken no part in the fracas, and both shortly afterwards quietly left the camp unobserved. They returned the following day but Giles sent them away. Left alone by the Aborigines for the next two days, on 18 October the expedition set off again and a month later reached Perth in triumph. Ernest Giles (1889) Australia Twice Traversed (2 vols), London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington

Rottnest Island, a minor naval incident involving an American whaling vessel Catalpa and a government ship Georgette which took place in waters off Fremantle, Western

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Australia, on 19 April 1876. Although the shots fired were only in warning, the clash almost caused an international incident between the British and United States governments. Following the abortive 1865 uprising in Ireland organised by the Fenian brotherhood, several members of the revolutionary movement were transported to Western Australia as convicts. One of those who reached the colony in 1868 was John O’Reilly, a former soldier convicted of sedition and ordered to be shot but whose sentence was commuted to twenty years imprisonment. The next year he managed to escape aboard an American whaler called Gazelle and reached Philadelphia, eventually settling in Boston where he became famous as an author and editor while maintaining his devotion to the Irish nationalist cause. Early in 1875 O’Reilly and others organised an attempt to free six other Fenian prisoners still held in Fremantle’s gaol. For this purpose the 200-tonne barque Catalpa was purchased, the master of which, Captain George Anthony, was willing to perform the rescue. An American named John Breslin, using the name John Collins, also arrived in Fremantle late that same year and obtained employment at a carriage factory while finalising the plan of escape. This called for the prisoners being sprung at a suitable moment—they not being strictly supervised because of their good behaviour—and making their way to Rockingham Bay, 25 kilometres to the south. Here they would be taken off the beach in a whaleboat, which would then meet up with Catalpa in international waters the following day. Anthony arrived at the port of Bunbury (150 kilometres south of Fremantle) on 28 March 1876, only to find an unexpected impediment in the form of an armed colonial schooner, Conflict, which was in port at Fremantle. Postponed until after this vessel sailed on 11 April, the rescue attempt was put in motion four days later when the


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Catalpa also left port, on Easter Saturday. The following Monday, 17 April, the six prisoners—who were out on a working party from Fremantle—dashed into the scrub where horses were waiting for them, and galloped away. Their break was witnessed by many people and the police alerted, the latter eventually learning that the fugitives had been picked up by a waiting whaleboat. Such was the confusion of the numerous conflicting reports which reached the authorities that initially there were fears the colony faced a seaborne Fenian invasion. Since Catalpa was the only whaler known to be on the coast at the time, the police returned to Fremantle and a police cutter was sent out to search for her. The governor, William Robinson, also ordered the requisition of the screw steamer Georgette to join in the hunt and it was the latter vessel which encountered Catalpa the next morning. When questioned about the escapees, Captain Anthony denied having them on board—which was true, since at this stage the barque’s rendezvous with its whaleboat had not been made. The police cutter kept the American ship under observation as it moved north, however, and eventually a whaleboat was seen making towards her. A chase ensued, but the police vessel was unable to prevent the boat being picked up and had to return to Fremantle. Georgette being a faster vessel, the steamer was now hastily prepared for a showdown in the event that she could still catch Catalpa in territorial waters. Preparations were conducted with all speed, and a company of infantry and a 12-pounder field-gun were also taken aboard before the vessel put to sea again that night. Delayed by light overnight breezes, Catalpa was overhauled off Rottnest Island about 7 a.m. the next day and two shots fired across her bows. When the superintendent of police demanded the return of the convicts and warned that he would shoot down the American ship’s mast if they were not handed

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1876–1880 over, Captain Anthony defiantly responded: ‘If you fire on this ship, you fire on the American flag’. Recognising the grave diplomatic ramifications of carrying through with his threat, the Georgette’s captain made no further effort to prevent Anthony continuing on his way. Catalpa reached New York with her cargo of Fenians still safely on board in August 1876. J.S. Battye (1924) Western Australia, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Colin Jones (1986) Australian Colonial Navies, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Creen Creek, a skirmish between Aborigines and Native Police, fought in September 1876 on the road from Georgetown to Normanton, Queensland, about 30 kilometres north-west of Croydon. Several hundred Kumulmar (or Walangama) Aborigines, who had gathered on the creek for a bora initiation rite, proceeded to attack the telegraph station. Two detachments of Native Police under sub-inspectors William Armit and L.J. Poingdestre were immediately despatched to the area from Georgetown and engaged in a fight which ‘lasted a considerable time . . . [before] the blacks eventually were dispersed’. Armit had his horse killed under him, and a white traveller on the road who inadvertently stumbled onto the scene narrowly escaped being speared, but otherwise the government forces escaped without loss. No estimates of casualties among the Aborigines are known, but contemporary reports cited the police officers as saying that they had ‘never met with such a determined resistance’ so losses were unlikely to have been light. Henry Reynolds (1989) Dispossession, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Glenrowan, the famous siege which brought to an end the bushranging career of Edward (‘Ned’) Kelly and three others, was fought in the Victorian town of this name located 190


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Drawing of the clash at Creen Creek from the Illustrated Sydney News of 12 October 1876. Source: Mitchell Library, State Library of NSW FM4/4303 Spectators to the last stand of the Kelly gang line the platform of the Glenrowan railway station. Their proximity to the scene of the fight can be gauged from the fact that the Glenrowan Inn where the gang was besieged is the building in the left background. Source: Used with the permission of the Victorian Police Historical Unit

kilometres north-east of Melbourne on 28 June 1880. At one level the incident was purely a law enforcement matter, since the four were criminals who had been outlawed under a revived medieval English measure. The destruction of the Kelly gang was, moreover, accomplished solely as a result of police action. Nonetheless, their ‘last stand’ was also the culmination of an audacious guerilla-style campaign against authority lasting twenty months which—in its final stages, at least—was reportedly waged in support of a wider insurrection.

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The action was purposely brought on by the gang itself, two of whom murdered a police informer named Aaron Sherritt at his home in the Woolshed district near Beechworth, east of Wangaratta, at 7 p.m. on 26 June. This was expected to trigger a vigorous response, entailing despatch of a flying column by rail from the regional police headquarters at Benalla to engage in a pursuit. Accordingly, the gang gathered at Glenrowan—midway between Benalla and Wangaratta—with the intention of wrecking any train as it sped through the township the next day (a Sunday, when a special police express would be the only user of the line), and killing or capturing any survivors of the disaster. A combination of factors delayed the police response, however, with the result that the gang was left cooling their heels throughout 27 June. Faced with the problem of preventing word of their presence leaking out, they took captive more than 60 town residents and held them at the Glenrowan Inn, only several hundred metres from the railway station in the centre of town. By late on Sunday night, as it was becoming increasingly apparent that the gang’s plan had miscarried, about a third of these people were allowed to return to their homes. When the train carrying 24 police officers under Superintendent Francis Hare finally arrived on the town’s southern outskirts soon after 2.30 a.m. on 28 June, they were warned by one of the residents just released of the trap that lay in store. The train did not therefore speed on through to its destruction, but halted at the Glenrowan station and immediately disgorged its passengers. A gunbattle broke out straight away—the police not troubling about the safety of the more than 40 civilians still held in the hotel building—and continued intermittently for the next twelve hours. Some fifteen captives managed to scramble to safety in a lull at about 5 a.m., and the remainder got away during a ceasefire at 10 a.m., but not before


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five of them had been wounded by police bullets—three fatally. At 5.30 a.m. Ned Kelly—who had spent most of the previous two hours in the bush surrounding the hotel unconscious from wounds received in the opening moments of the fight—attempted to disperse the cordon of attackers on the hotel’s northern side. His appearance here in body armour fashioned from plough mouldboards, including a cylindrical headpiece, created momentary panic among police ranks as he emerged from felled timber, a huge grotesque figure in the early morning mist. He was finally felled by shotgun blasts directed at his unprotected legs, disarmed and captured. One other gang member by this time lay dead inside the besieged building, a victim to the police fusillade which perforated its thin timber walls. With nothing known of the two gang members remaining, however, the siege dragged on into the afternoon. Fresh arrivals throughout the day brought police numbers to more than 50. The whole affair was watched by several hundred spectators who gathered on the railway platform and other vantage points, many within gunshot range of the hotel. In the expectation that more firepower might be needed, an artillery detachment with a field-gun left Melbourne by train at 2.30 p.m. but had only reached Seymour when word was received that the siege was over. The end came shortly after 3 p.m. when a constable crept up to the hotel’s southern wall and set fire to it, the building becoming an inferno within minutes. A Catholic priest on the scene dashed into the flames to offer the last rites to the gang members inside. He emerged moments later to announce that the two men were already dead, having apparently suicided using poison. More than just the siege of Glenrowan reportedly thus came to an end. According to tradition, bands of Kelly supporters had gathered in a valley near Greta, awaiting a pre-arranged signal before proceeding to

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1880–1884 proclaim a ‘Republic of North-eastern Victoria’. Hard evidence for such claims is not compelling, but cannot be discounted completely. Little about the self-entrapping conduct of the Kelly gang at Glenrowan makes sense in the absence of some underlying plan of this nature. Some accounts maintain that, moments before Ned made his final effort to break the police cordon, he met with sympathisers and instructed them to stay out of the fight which he already knew to be lost. Only this—it is claimed—ensured that the assembled ‘army’ numbering anywhere between 30 and 150, and the planned republic, remained carefully obscured elements of the whole affair. Ned was initially committed to trial at Beechworth in August, but proceedings were transferred to Melbourne after authorities realised that a local jury might not be willing to convict him. Duly found guilty, he was hanged on 11 November 1880. John Molony (1980) I am Ned Kelly, Ringwood, Vic.: Allen Lane; Ian Jones (1995) Ned Kelly, Port Melbourne: Lothian

Anna’s Reservoir, a pastoral station situated 190 kilometres north-west of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory, was the scene of extensive bloodshed in 1884. In August Unmatjera warriors attacked and burned the homestead, possibly in retaliation for shootings by mounted police based at Barrow Creek, although another account suggests it was because drovers had sexually molested a female Aboriginal child. The two white men at the station at the time—Harry Figg and a cook named Thomas Coombes—were trapped inside the building, suffering burns from the blazing roof falling in on them and spear wounds when they ventured outside. Eventually the Aborigines were driven off when Figg put his arm out a partly opened door and fired indiscriminately with a revolver, hitting one or two of the attackers. Although they survived, both men were left with permanent injuries. In response to this incident, Constable


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William Willshire set out at once with a troop of police and captured four Aboriginal women from whom he extracted ‘useful information’. This led his party to the location of a camp containing over 60 warriors, which was surrounded before dawn on 29 August. According to Willshire, two of the camp’s occupants were killed resisting arrest and another three wounded. Before the party returned to Alice Springs on 17 September another two Unmatjera had also been shot, resisting arrest. This was just the start of a ten-month campaign of terror by Willshire which resulted in the Unmatjera being virtually wiped out. At Italinga, on the northern edge of Hart’s Range, at least 50 Aborigines— men, women and children—were, according to local tradition, shot down probably during Willshire’s drive; the place is accordingly known as Blackfellow’s Bones. Willshire’s own writings make clear that his Native Police on occasions operated without his supervision, attacking and shooting other Aborigines while taking no prisoners. D.J. Mulvaney (1989) Encounters in Place, St Lucia, Qld: University of Queensland Press; Gordon Reid (1990) A Picnic with the Natives, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Battle Mountain, arguably the most famous engagement of Australia’s frontier wars, was fought between Kalkadoon (Kalkatunga) Aborigines and a mixed force of white civilians and Native Mounted Police in the Argylla Ranges 95 kilometres north-west of Cloncurry, Queensland, in September 1884; the precise date is not recorded. The culmination of ten years of vicious conflict with settlers, the action marked the end of active Kalkadoon resistance to European expansion. When the body of a murdered Chinese shepherd employed on Granada station was discovered in September, a reprisal expedition was assembled by the commander of the Cloncurry Native Police detachment, Sub-Inspector Frederick Urquhart. Many of

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the district’s pastoralists and their station hands joined for what was widely regarded as a final showdown, so that the party eventually numbered possibly in excess of 100 men. After much tracking, a large assembly of Kalkadoons was found on a boulder-studded hill at the head of Prospector’s Creek. According to some accounts the group contained 1,000 people, including 600 warriors, but considering the tribe’s losses in numerous previous encounters this estimate seems improbably high. The hill the Kalkadoons occupied was 244 metres high and overlooked the plain below, its


Battle Mountain: scene of the dramatic set-piece engagement between the Kalkadoon tribe and a large force of police and pastoralists. Source: Mulvaney, D.J. Encounters in Place, 1989 UQP

excellent defensive qualities seeming to indicate a determination to fight. Urquhart’s call to them to ‘Stand in the Queen’s name’ was met with a shower of rocks and verbal abuse. He thereupon ordered his men to advance at the gallop up the lower slopes of the hill, evidently hoping such an awesome spectacle would stampede the tribesmen. The Kalkadoons stood their ground, however, and responded with volleys of spears. The horsemen were soon forced by the terrain to dismount and proceed slowly on foot, firing as they went. At this juncture Urquhart was knocked unconscious by a hurled piece of rock-hard


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antbed which hit him in the face. The attack halted while he and several other wounded men were carried down the hillside. Once he had recovered, Urquhart decided to try supporting the main assault party with a flanking movement by some of his Native Police. This tactic proved effective in throwing the Kalkadoons into confusion, prompting what was interpreted by the whites as a valorous gesture on their opposition’s part but which may actually have been simply an attempt to escape. Without warning the tribesmen formed ranks and—carrying their spears ‘before them like lances’—advanced down the slope into the rifle-fire of the whites. As this apparent ‘battle formation’ was lashed by a hail of bullets, the Aborigines wavered and retreated, only to reform and repeat the movement. The Kalkadoons had been a formidable guerilla foe, but in a set-piece battle of this sort their courage was clearly no match for European technology. Battle Mountain—as the episode subsequently became known—represented the tribe’s ‘last stand’. The slaughter was so immense that the hill reportedly remained littered with bleached bones for decades afterwards. Although the attackers’ accounts of the action referred only to the bodies of warriors, there is no doubting that countless women and children were killed too. Many more deaths occurred in the following several days as Urquhart’s party continued a ‘clearing-up’ operation. R.E.M. Armstrong (1980) The Kalkadoons, Brisbane: William Brooks & Co.

Tamai, an action involving members of the New South Wales military contingent sent to Sudan, fought on 3 April 1885 about 38 kilometres south-west of the Red Sea port of Suakin. This clash was the largest and most significant engagement in which the 770-man Australian force (comprising an infantry battalion, an artillery battery and a

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1884–1885


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HANDUB Sua kin -Be rbe rr oa Hashin (wells)

ea Red S

K.S. Inglis (1985) The Rehearsal, Adelaide: Rigby

OTAO

l reef Cora

field ambulance unit) took part during the six weeks they spent with British units of the Suakin Field Force commanded by Lieut.-General Sir Gerald Graham. Following the arrival of the contingent from Sydney on 29 March, the battalion was allotted to the Guards Brigade under Major-General Arthur Fremantle and prepared for action. On 2 April a force of over 8,000 men (which included the New South Wales infantry, but not the artillery) moved out from Suakin to attack the headquarters of the local Arab guerilla leader, Osman Digna, at Tamai. After bivouacking several kilometres short of the objective, they resumed the advance early the next morning. Tamai was reached about 9 a.m. and found to have been abandoned, although parties of Arabs could be seen in the hills beyond. These were filling in the permanent deep wells to deny water to the attackers, while maintaining a desultory harassing fire at long range. The advance was carried on through the village to the edge of a deep ravine beyond, and Fremantle’s command took up position along the northern ridgeline to cover the movement of its companion brigade across this gully. While engaged in this manoeuvre, the Australians actually came under enemy fire—although the bullets were mostly spent rounds by the time they landed. Three men (two infantry privates and a corporal of the ambulance unit) nonetheless received minor wounds. At this stage the Arabs broke contact and retreated deeper into rugged mountain country to the south-west, leaving the British with little course but to return to Suakin the way they had come. Before departing soon after 10.30 a.m., the wretched grass huts of the village were set on fire and ammunition concealed in them duly destroyed. Suakin was reached at about midday the following day. By 18 May the contingent’s members were on their way back to Sydney.

d

Takdul

SUAKIN Tofrik

0 2 4 6 8 10 kms

Tamai

Takdul, a minor action involving members of the New South Wales military contingent sent to Sudan, fought on 6 May 1885, 28 kilometres west of the Red Sea port of Suakin. A fortnight after an earlier skirmish at Tamai (q.v.) on 3 April, the commander of the British field force at Suakin, Lieut.-General Sir Gerald Graham, decided to raise a 500-strong camel corps using mounts recently arrived from India. One of the five companies (No.3) comprised 50 volunteers from the New South Wales infantry battalion under Lieut. H.G.B. Sparrow, and an equal number from a British regiment. After receiving reports that a sheikh of the Amarar tribe was assembling a Dervish force at Takdul (T’Hakul) in the Abent Valley to harass his force, on 5 May Graham decided to launch a two-pronged attack. At the same time as a 1,300-man column of mounted infantry, cavalry and cameliers made an overnight march from Suakin via Hashin, aiming to reach the south-eastern entrance to the valley by daylight, another column comprising the 15th Sikh Regiment was ordered south from Otao (sixteen kilometres north of Takdul) to block the enemy’s northern escape routes from the valley. Graham led the main column out of Suakin about midnight and was in position at 5 a.m. the next day, as planned. The mounted infantry leading the advance up

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the valley were soon in contact with hostile Arabs, who exchanged fire as they fell back before the troops. Although surprise had been achieved, the success of the attack was largely negated by the late arrival of the Sikhs in their cut-off position. This enabled the bulk of the enemy force to get away into the hills, although pursued for about five kilometres by some of the camel corps. The main part of the action was over by 7 a.m. The only tasks remaining were to destroy the enemy’s abandoned camp and everything in it, gather up the large flock of sheep and goats left behind, and to deal with small groups of marksmen who remained in hiding in the numerous rocky hills and ravines. The Australians in the camel corps were notable at this stage, at one point engaging Arabs moving about on a high hill on the right flank. According to W.J. Lambie, a Sydney journalist with the expedition: The Australians opened fire on these fellows at a range of eight hundred yards, and did some splendid shooting. Their bullets struck alongside the Johnnies, and brought some of them down, while others got away badly wounded. The hill was so steep that some of the bodies dropped several yards down the surface until they were caught on the rocks.

The two attacking columns then returned to their respective bases, those going to Suakin taking with them the three men wounded (none Australians) who were the only casualties on the British side and ten Arabs taken prisoner. About 100 Arabs were reportedly killed in this skirmish. Ralph Sutton (1985) Soldiers of the Queen: War in the Soudan, Sydney: New South Wales Military Historical Society & the Royal New South Wales Regiment

Hmawang, a minor action of the Third Anglo-Burmese War, fought on 22 March 1887 south of Mandalay. A fortnight after the war’s commencement in November 1885 the object of the conflict (the deposition of King Thibaw) had been accomplished, and


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the royal capital of Mandalay captured. The decision to annex the region of Upper Burma followed on 1 January 1886, but—despite this being quickly achieved—the British government in India found itself committed to a protracted period of military operations. The local soldiery raised to defend Thibaw were demobilised and dispersed to their villages, but once there joined in either guerilla operations or dacoitry (group banditry) to contest the British occupation for more than three years. Overcoming this resistance saw the number of British troops deployed rise from 24,000 in December 1886 to 32,000 by February the next year, along with 8,500 military police. After reading reports in the Sydney press of a plea for more officers by General Sir Frederick Roberts, commander-in-chief in Burma, Captain Henry Airey of the New South Wales Artillery offered to go as a special service officer, and was accepted in late 1886. He was the only member of the Australian colonial forces to so serve. Attached to a column of 523 men led by Colonel Lacy Bance, he was placed in command of two Gardner guns— multi-barrelled mechanical machine-guns which were wheel-mounted and crankfired—supporting an attack on a rebel stockade eleven kilometres from Thabiutdown (Thabyedaung). While directing the fire of his guncrews shortly before the position was successfully stormed, Airey received a serious bullet wound in the left arm which necessitated his evacuation. For his part in this action he was awarded the Distinguished Service Order—a decoration for gallantry instituted only in 1886—and was thus the first Australian ever to receive it. H.P. Airey, ‘On Active Service in Burma, 1887’, Sabretache, vol.18, no.4, October 1977.

Behn River, a tributary of the Ord River in the East Kimberley district of Western Australia now submerged under Lake Argyle,

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1885–1895 the scene of a clash between police and Aborigines which took place in September 1893. The police were endeavouring to make arrests for horse and cattle stealing, but the Aborigines resisted and one constable was fatally wounded by a spear. According to the police report, ‘Twenty-three natives were shot before they could be driven off ’. Paul Hasluck (1970) Black Australians, 2nd edn, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Windjana Gorge, a skirmish between Panuba (Banuba) Aborigines and police troopers, fought in the Napier Range about 140 kilometres east of Derby, Western Australia, on 16 November 1894. The Panuba were led by Jandamarra (Jundamurra or Sandawara), who was known to whites by the nickname of ‘Pigeon’. He was a former police tracker who had rebelled a fortnight earlier after being required to take part in the arrest of sixteen of his own people. He killed the constable with whom he had been working, released the prisoners, and began planning a campaign against white settlers. Firearms were captured by his party a few days later, during an attack on a cattle party passing through Windjana Gorge in which two white stockmen were killed. Fearing a general uprising by the district’s Aborigines, the commander of the police detachment in Derby, Sub-Inspector Edwin Drewry, gathered together fifteen police and fifteen settlers sworn in as special constables to pursue Jandamarra and his band of about 30 men and women. Dividing into groups of ten, Drewry’s force entered the gorge from three directions at daybreak on 16 November and began a fight which lasted until 2 p.m. In this action Jandamarra suffered three serious wounds before collapsing through loss of blood. Other leading figures in the Aboriginal band were also wounded, but escaped into the innumerable caves which line both sides of the gorge. Drewry’s force withdrew in the belief that Jandamarra was among the dead. He was thereby enabled to


55

resurface and continue his armed resistance until finally shot dead in a running gun battle with an Aboriginal trooper in April 1897. Howard Pedersen ‘ “Pigeon”: An Australian Aboriginal Rebel’, Studies in Western Australian History (no.8, 1984), Nedlands: University of Western Australia Press

Chitral, a famous incident in the Dardistan region on India’s north-west frontier, fought during March–April 1895. When the British garrison of the fort at Chitral was besieged on 4 March by a mixed force of Chitrali and Pathan tribesmen, a relief effort was organised which succeeded in rescuing it 46 days later. The main component of the relieving force was a division of nearly 15,000 men under Major-General Sir Robert Low, which marched northwards from Nowshera (near the Punjab capital, Peshawar) on 1 April. Meanwhile a smaller, lightly equipped column (comprising 400 men of the 32nd Pioneer Regiment and 100 native levies under Colonel James Kelly) pushed west from the Kashmiri base at Gilgit and approached Chitral from the north-east, aiming to reinforce the garrison until Low arrived. As Kelly’s force neared the fort, the investing tribesmen fled during the night of 18 April and his column entered unopposed two days later. While the glory of lifting the siege went to Kelly, Low’s troops nonetheless saw some heavy fighting. At Malakand—one of the three passes at an altitude of 3,500 feet (1,067 metres) allowing passage into the Swat River valley—he was opposed by up to 12,000 Pathans, although probably less than half these possessed firearms. The pass was stormed in a five-hour action on 3 April, and a further clash with 2,000 hostile tribesmen ensued the next day around the walled village of Khar, just beyond the pass on the northern side of the range. The Australian association with the Chitral episode, which became a classic of the imperial frontier because of the publicity it received at the time, was in the person of

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Gi

lgi

tR

.

Col. Kelly’s relief force Gilgit

Chitral

.

lR

a itr

at R

.

h

s du

Sw

C

R.

In

ko

ra

PUNJAB

nj

Khar

Pa

R.

Malakand Pass

Gen. Low’s relief force

Kab

ul R

. Nowshera

PESHAWAR Captain James Macarthur-Onslow of the New South Wales Mounted Rifles. One of four officers of the New South Wales military forces selected to gain experience with Indian Army units from November 1894, he had just finished his period of special training with the 1st Battalion, King’s Royal Rifle Corps, when the crisis in Dardistan arose. Instead of embarking for Sydney, Macarthur-Onslow volunteered to accompany (at his own expense) the KRRC battalion when this was attached to Low’s relief expedition. He thus became the only member of the colonial forces to receive the Chitral medal with the Malakand clasp. H.C. Thomson (1895) The Chitral Campaign, London: William Heinemann; Sir George


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0

20

40

60

80 kms

Robertson (1977) Chitral, Karachi: Oxford University Press; Australian Dictionary of Biography, vol.10 (1986), pp.196–7

Oscar Range, a pastoral station north of Fitzroy Crossing in the West Kimberley district of Western Australia, was the scene of an attack in March 1897 by Aborigines led by the Panuba (Banuba) rebel called Jandamarra (nicknamed Pigeon by whites). Although his support was weakened in numbers by a clash in 1894 at Windjana Gorge (q.v.), Jandamarra continued to elude police pursuit using the cave complex at Tunnel Creek, 50 kilometres to the south, as a hide-out. After several daring and provocative escapades, including raiding Lillimooloora police station on three

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1895–1899 occasions, he led his band of twenty men and women against the homestead of Oscar Range station. The night before mounting an attack, a small group killed a visiting stockman who was camped some distance away and took his firearms. The next morning the rebel band began firing on the homestead. After the station manager succeeded in getting out word of the siege to Fitzroy Crossing, a six-man police detachment arrived and surprised the attackers from the rear. Two of Jandamarra’s supporters were killed and others were wounded, but the rest made their escape and headed north-west towards the greater safety of the Napier Range. Within days, four different police parties were scouring the country for them. When four members of the rebel band were captured at Mount Hardman Creek by a party under a Corporal Cadden, these men were put in chains and forced to assist in tracking their leader. The next day Jandamarra was sighted by Cadden’s party while making his way towards Tunnel Creek with eight women. An Aboriginal tracker from the Pilbara region named Micki was sent in pursuit, and succeeded in wounding Jandamarra although he again escaped—but not before suffering a second, more serious gunshot wound in the chest. When it appeared that their quarry had again disappeared into the mountains, Cadden decided to return to Derby the following day. Before the party set off the next morning Jandamarra attacked the police camp, apparently in an effort to effect the release of the members of his band who were chained up as prisoners. Although he managed to keep Cadden’s men pinned down, the sound of gunfire attracted another patrol led by a Constable Buckland. With his situation now hopeless, Jandamarra made a dash for the sanctuary of his Tunnel Creek hide-out, but he was pursued by Micki and killed in a running duel with the police


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tracker. On his death the Panuba rebellion promptly collapsed, allowing for the process of the tribe’s dispossession to be completed. Howard Pedersen, ‘ “Pigeon”: An Australian Aboriginal Rebel’, Studies in Western Australian History (no.8, 1984), Nedlands: University of Western Australia Press

Belmont, a railway station in Cape Colony close to the western border of the Orange Free State, was the scene of an action fought on 23 November 1899 (in the opening stages of the Second South African or Boer War) between British troops under Lieut.-General Lord Methuen and a Boer force attempting to frustrate efforts to relieve the besieged diamond-producing town of Kimberley, 90 kilometres to the north. When Methuen marched out from the Orange River on 21 November, he had about 8,500 men and sixteen guns. Mounted patrols informed him that some 2,000 Boers were entrenched 30 kilometres ahead, atop a range of kopjes (small hills) dominating Belmont station from the east. In response to this information, the next day Methuen marched his infantry to a farm situated about three kilometres to the south of the station and west of the railway line. From here, he began reconnoitring the enemy position in preparation for an attack to sweep aside this blocking force. Among the mounted troops engaged in this effort was a small group of 29 members of the New South Wales Lancer Regiment under Lieut. S.F. Osborne, part of an advance element of 72 men on this unit which had arrived at Cape Town on 2 November. The remainder of the New South Wales contingent had been sent to serve with forces in the Colesberg area under Major-General John French, but Osborne’s troop had been attached to the 9th Lancers—which comprised the main element of Methuen’s limited force of cavalry—and while carrying out patrols became the first Australian troops to come under fire during the Boer War. Based on the information available to him,

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Methuen decided to attack on 23 November and began moving his troops across the Great Karoo plain towards the enemy positions at 2 a.m., in preparation for an assault at first light. The ground held by the Boers was inherently strong for defence, comprising a succession of rocky ridges rising from 30 to 75 metres above the level of the surrounding plain. About 2,000 Boers were waiting in well-placed stone breastworks on each crest, supported by five guns. At about 4 a.m. the advancing British troops came under heavy fire and the fighting soon extended across an area of thirteen square kilometres. The engagement ended with the Boers breaking off at about 7.30 a.m. and making an orderly retreat across the open veldt. About 70 were left behind as prisoners, 24 of whom were wounded; other Boer casualties were unknown, but reckoned at about 100 killed. Methuen was unable to disrupt the enemy withdrawal, both because the 900 cavalry and mounted infantry which he had was insufficient to mount a pursuit and also because the horses of his mounted units were too exhausted from their work prior to the battle. For this victory, his force had suffered 295 casualties (75 of whom were killed)—the worst loss occurring among the Grenadier Guards, which lost 22 killed and 114 wounded; among the dead was Private Henry Schultze, a native of St Arnaud, Victoria, who had enlisted in this regular British regiment. W. Baring Pemberton (1964) Battles of the Boer War, London: B.T. Batsford; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Graspan, an action also referred to as the Battle of Enslin, was fought on 25 November 1899 (during the Second South African War) by a British force of 8,500 men under Lieut.-General Lord Methuen while attempting to break the Boer siege of Kimberley. After an earlier engagement at Belmont (q.v.), eighteen kilometres to the


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south along the single-track railway line which formed the axis of the British advance, Methuen found the Boers occupying a line of kopjes (small hills) about 60 metres high to the east of the railway station at Graspan. Information from British reconnaissance parties indicated that only about 400 enemy were present, supported by two guns. To prevent the enemy escaping as had happened at Belmont, Methuen decided to engage the Boer position first with artillery fire while working the 900 mounted troops available to him around both flanks. Once these were in position, a frontal assault was to be mounted by the small Naval Brigade operating with his force. Unfortunately for this plan of attack, unknown to Methuen— whose scouts were unable to observe into the enemy position from closer than about two kilometres—the original Boer defenders were reinforced late on the afternoon of 24 November by 2,000 Free State burghers under Commandant Jacobus Prinsloo. When the British field batteries opened up soon after 6 a.m. the next morning, the answering fire from the Boers came from five guns instead of two—not including a Hotchkiss quick-fire weapon and a Maxim machine-gun. Realising that his original scheme was unworkable, Methuen promptly opted for an all-out attack on conventional lines. This effort would pit the Naval Brigade with some infantry detachments against the Boers’ eastern (left) flank, while the rest of the British force sought to immobilise the enemy elsewhere and prevent reinforcement of the sector under attack. This plan worked, but not before the 245-strong assault force had lost 15 killed and 79 wounded. By the time the crest of the hill was reached, the enemy had all gone except for a small group which resisted until only one man remained alive. The British could observe the Boers retiring in good order across the plain back into Free State territory, but a shortage of mounted troops meant that a vigorous pursuit

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November 1899

to Boer cu s a t o tte ff p mp urs t ue rs

To Kimberley

Boer line of retreat

(in

clu Mo din unt g N ed SW forc La e nc

ers

)

Enslin Siding

Graspan Siding 0

British 1 2

Boers 3 kms

was not possible. The British weakness in this regard was graphically demonstrated at one point during the Boer retreat, when a large body of burghers suddenly turned and attempted to ride down the lesser number of British horsemen from the 9th Lancers trying to follow them. The threat was averted by the response of some mounted infantry who, along with a detachment of 29 members of the New South Wales Lancers under Lieut. S.F. Osborne, occupied a fold in the ground and poured a heavy fire into the advancing Boers. The incident reportedly won for Osborne and his men the nickname of ‘The Fighting Twenty-Nine’. The engagement had demonstrated once again that the Boers were more than a match for Methuen despite his numerical superiority. While he responded by complaining about the deficiency in the number of mounted troops available to him, and confirmed his disappointment in the part played by his cavalry by removing the


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commander of the 9th Lancers, nothing could disguise his own tactical incompetence which saw his force suffer total casualties at Graspan of seventeen dead and 168 wounded. Among the dead of the Naval Brigade was 19-year-old Midshipman C. Huddart of Ballarat, Victoria. W. Baring Pemberton (1964) Battles of the Boer War, London: B.T. Batsford; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service; L.M. Field (1979) The Forgotten War, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Modder River, an action fought on 28 November 1899 (during the Second South African War) between Boer and British forces, took place in the vicinity of the railway station situated near the junction of the Riet and Modder rivers. A week earlier the British force had set out from the Orange River under Lieut.-General Lord Methuen, driving north along the axis of the railway line to Kimberley which was then under siege from the Boers. In two sharp actions, at Belmont (q.v.) and Graspan (q.v.), Methuen’s men had been forced to turn enemy detachments out of prepared delaying positions at disproportionate cost to themselves. Although increased in strength to over 10,000 men, Methuen’s force still suffered a shortage of mounted troops which meant that the Boers could not be prevented from making orderly retreats free from interference. This enabled between 4,000 and 6,000 burghers under generals Piet Cronje and J.H. (‘Koos’) De la Rey to occupy a fresh defensive position dug in sandy soil along the east–west line of the Riet, about a kilometre south of Modder River station. Although warned of the Boer presence in strength, Methuen continued to place his trust in scouts’ reports that the crossing was only weakly held by probably no more than 400 men. In the early morning hours of 28 November he advanced directly over open flats towards the river, his object being to secure the ground on either side of the bridge

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over which the railway passed (which in any event had been destroyed). The fallacy of the information upon which he was acting was demonstrated at 5.15 a.m., when patrols of the 9th Lancers approaching to within 1,600 metres of the river drew heavy fire from positions extending for 2.5 kilometres east of the bridge—establishing that the area was anything but lightly held. Despite these serious warning signs, Methuen remained convinced that he faced only a rearguard attempting to make a gesture of defiance and pressed blindly on. The whole British movement was stopped cold 45 minutes later when the Boers opened fire at a range of 1,100 metres and forced the troops to go to ground. By crawling and then making short rushes, the British succeeded in reaching to within about 730 metres of the enemy lines on the right, but could then get no further. Methuen brought up artillery and commenced shelling the Boer trenches. Although this fire helped cut down the volume of Boer bullets sweeping the ground covered by the troops, only a few casualties were caused among the defending burghers. Unable to either advance or retire, the bulk of Methuen’s force were kept pinned down all day in torturous heat of more than 42˚C. Only on the left flank was any progress made, when troops succeeded in reaching the Riet and forcing the Boers defending posts on the south bank back across the river. By 2 p.m. British troops were occupying the hamlet of Rosmead on the far bank, on the Boer’s right flank, but this threat posed to the enemy centre could not be exploited after reinforcements failed to reach here and the troops’ own artillery accidentally fired on them. When the fighting halted for the night at about 7 p.m., the enemy remained in full possession of all their other positions. Darkness at least enabled medical attention to reach the wounded, and food and water to be delivered to men who had been without either for more than ten hours.


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The cessation of firing also allowed the Boers to again abandon their positions during the night without hindrance. Although Methuen was thus left in possession of the battlefield and able to take his entire force across to the northern bank the next morning, this hollow victory had been won at a cost of 70 British dead and 313 wounded. Australian participation in the action once more took the form of the 29 men of the New South Wales Lancers under Lieut. S.F. Osborne, who acted as escort to the artillery on the field throughout the day. At least one of the Australians had his horse shot from under him, but otherwise the little band passed through the engagement without loss while sharing the deprivations of the whole force. W. Baring Pemberton (1964) Battles of the Boer War, London: B.T. Batsford; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Magersfontein, scene of a heavy British defeat by Boer forces on 11 December 1899, during the Second South African War. For nearly three weeks the British under Lieut.-General Lord Methuen had been pressing north towards Kimberley (then languishing under a Boer siege) though forced to fight three sharp and costly engagements against enemy detachments seeking to impose delay (see Belmont, Graspan and Modder River). Following the last of these actions, Methuen had rested his troops for more than a week, while building up supplies and taking reinforcements—including several Canadian detachments, and a contingent of Victorian Mounted Rifles which joined a small party of 29 men of the New South Wales Lancers already serving with the force. By 10 December, his division now comprising some 15,000 men, Methuen prepared to brush aside yet another Boer blocking force about 24 kilometres short of his objective. The enemy occupied the Magersfontein Range which ran from north-west to south-east across the British

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November–December 1899

Railway & road to Kimberley (16 km)

CAPE COLONY Magersfontein Hill

Boer trenches

G Bty RHA

Methuen’s HQ 11 Dec.

Modder River Stn

r R.

Modde

Rosmead

ORANGE FREE S TAT E Methuen’s HQ 28 Nov.

Riet

Rive

r British

0


61

1

Boers

2

3

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4

5 kms

62


axis of advance along the railway line to Kimberley. The strongpoint to this position was a dominating hill at the southernmost end of the range, to the right (east) of the railway, which rose to a height of 60 metres above the surrounding veldt. Separated by a gap of a kilometre was a lower extension of the range, in the form of a series of scrub-covered ridges which never rose more than 18 metres as they made a more southerly sweep towards the banks of the Modder River. To defend his position, the Boer commander (General Piet Cronje) had about 8,000 men. These were deployed in sangars across the forward slopes of the high ground, though the bulk occupied rifle pits constructed at the level of the veldt, carefully concealed so as to be barely visible at a distance of 100 metres while commanding sweeping arcs of fire across the open plain in front of them. These trenches formed a broken but formidable defensive line covering the base of Magersfontein Hill and the ridgeline, as well as the flat ground (or pan) in between. Pom-pom quick-fire weapons and Maxim machine-guns were placed below the crestline, while the Boer field-guns were positioned out of sight on reverse slopes from where their fire could be directed by observers. Although once more denied detailed knowledge of the enemy’s dispositions, Methuen prepared to launch a dawn assault against the bluff which he correctly identified as the key to the Boer position. He effectively announced his intention on the wet afternoon of 10 December by ordering an advance by the Black Watch to within about a kilometre of the hill; these retired, without drawing a shot from the Boers, after removing several wire fences which blocked their path. This demonstration was then followed at 4.30 p.m. by a two-hour bombardment from the 31 guns and howitzers available in the British train. Although the barrage looked spectacular, the enemy defenders were


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actually sheltering out of harm’s way in rear positions and reportedly suffered no more than three men wounded. Any element of doubt in Cronje’s mind regarding the actual direction of attack had, however, now been eliminated. Methuen’s approach on the night of 10 December took place in pitch-dark and amid driving rain which, while it helped conceal movement, added immeasurably to the discomfort of the troops and the problem of control. The principal attack formation, a brigade of 4,000 men from four highland regiments under Major-General A.J. Wauchope, was forced to move into position in mass of quarter-column, a formation which effectively had the troops advance on a very narrow front, packed together shoulder-to-shoulder. The intention was to take the units to their start-point by this means, before shaking out into extended deployment about an hour before daybreak when they would fix bayonets and charge. This plan miscarried horribly when the formation for the movement was retained too long, and the dense mass of men blundered on until only 400 metres from the Boer trenches in the gloom of approaching dawn at about 4 a.m. The storm of bullets which the Boers suddenly poured into the packed ranks of the Highlanders rivalled a First World War battle in its intensity. Though much of the fire was high, many British fell—including Wauchope—and the rest either sought refuge on the ground or broke and ran to the rear. By the time daylight finally arrived, the makings of a disaster were already evident. As at Modder River, retreat was impossible, so that survivors of the failed British assault remained largely pinned down where they were for the next fourteen hours. Whereas they were formerly sodden from the night’s storm, now they were forced to endure the burning sun without shade, food or water, and were subjected to searching enemy fire in response to any visible movement.

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December 1899–January 1900 Only the supporting fire of the British artillery could do anything to mitigate the troops’ plight, by forcing the Boers to periodically seek shelter from shells. The Royal Horse Artillery’s G Battery had come forward to within 1,300 metres of the low ridgeline on the right and 1,800 metres of the bluff, and maintained a heavy and effective fire for the rest of the day and throughout the night until the next morning. The mounted escort for this battery (which included the New South Wales Lancers) stayed with the guns for the whole of that time, deploying forward to help suppress Boer sniper fire and themselves being hotly engaged. When withdrawn the next day they were almost the last British troops to retire from the battlefield. All hopes which Methuen might have entertained of retrieving the situation evaporated shortly after 1 p.m., when an order to retire, given to a small group of men being troubled by enfilading fire, was taken by adjoining troops as a general instruction to fall back. The mass retirement which resulted was accompanied by a withering fire from the Boers which caused the most severe losses of the entire day. Only with the arrival of dusk were survivors of the most advanced attacking units able to withdraw safely, and ambulance parties to begin clearing the field of casualties. The failed attack had produced British losses totalling over 900, with 220 of these killed; Boer losses were only one-third this number, and included 87 killed. Unlike at the Modder River battle, the Boers did not vacate their position under the cover of darkness on this occasion, and the morning of 12 December found them still holding their ground in strength; the trenches before Magersfontein were not, in fact, abandoned by the burghers until twelve weeks later. In the meantime Methuen pulled his mauled division back to its previous camp at Modder River on the night of the 11th. Here he was ordered to stay by


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the British commander-in-chief in South Africa, General Sir Redvers Buller, while rebuilding the strength for his force in preparation for a renewed drive towards Kimberley. W. Baring Pemberton (1964) Battles of the Boer War, London: B.T. Batsford; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Sunnyside, an action fought on 1 January 1900 during the Second South African War, in which a ‘flying column’ of less than 500 British, Canadian and Australian troops under Lieut.-Colonel T.D. Pilcher of the Northumberland Fusiliers attacked a laager (camp) of some 180 Boers near the township of Douglas on the western border of the Orange Free State. Elaborate security precautions masked Pilcher’s departure from Belmont on 31 December 1899 and ensured that when he began his attack on the enemy camp the next day at 11.25 a.m. with a barrage from two guns, the Boers were taken completely by surprise. While many of the enemy were seen to immediately take flight, the remainder adopted a defensive position on a kopje (small hill) in front of their laager and opened fire on a company of advancing Canadians and some 40 British mounted regulars. Meanwhile, two companies of the Queensland Mounted Infantry Regiment (who had joined Pilcher’s garrison at Belmont less than two weeks earlier) were sent around the right flank. The Queenslanders came into action about an hour later, suffering their first casualties—also the first of any contingent sent from the Australian colonies to the war—when a five-man scouting patrol rode into Boer fire. The enveloping movement was continued and progressively pushed to within 50 metres of the Boer position. Although some more of the enemy had managed to escape while this movement was being carried out, the rest were now trapped and, after another 45 minutes of

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firing, were forced to hoist the white flag of surrender shortly after 3 p.m. Boer losses in this action were 14 dead and 38 prisoners taken (seven of whom were wounded), along with all their stores and wagons. Pilcher’s force had only two men killed and two wounded—these all being from the Queensland Mounted Infantry. The commander of the company to which the dead men belonged, Captain Harry Chauvel, recorded after the action that: ‘We had great difficulty in preventing the men from bayoneting the Boers as they fired a few shots after they put up the white flag’. Although the action was only a minor success, wide publicity given to the steadiness of the Queenslanders under fire helped to modify the unfavourable opinion of colonials which was then current among British regulars. The engagement also enabled Douglas to be entered the next day and its British population freed from the Boers, who hastily fled. Although the inhabitants implored Pilcher to leave a detachment of troops to defend them, he refused this request as being beyond the scope of the expedition. When the column marched out on 3 January, it was accordingly accompanied by some 90 loyalist refugees. L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.3 (1905), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; F. Maurice (ed.) History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.1 (1906), London: Hurst & Blackett; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Slingersfontein, in central Cape Colony about eighteen kilometres east of Rensburg station on the railway line between Naauwpoort and Colesberg, was the scene of two actions between Australian troops and Boers in early 1900 during the Second South African War. The first engagement occurred on 16 January, when part of a patrol comprising men of the New South Wales Lancers and the 1st Australian Horse (another New South Wales unit) were ambushed by Boers. Before dawn


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that day the party had set out from Slingersfontein camp with orders to reconnoitre north towards Norval’s Pont on the Orange River. After proceeding a few kilometres the patrol split into two groups—the first under Lieut. R.M. Heron of the Lancers, the second under Lieut. W.V. Dowling of the Australian Horse. The former took his men on a route which carried them past Norval’s Farm, where they halted to make inquiries of the Boer owners. Heron had taken the precaution of posting a sentry to watch the rear of the farm, however, and when this man rejoined the party he reported that as soon as the Australians departed the place an enemy force had openly ridden in. When making his way back to camp at 1 p.m., Heron accordingly made a wide detour around the farm. Meanwhile, the 21 men with Dowling (fourteen Lancers and seven Horse) had an uneventful patrol before turning for their base that afternoon. Dowling, too, decided to check out a Boer farm located eight kilometres short of his destination— accounts are unclear if it was the same farm—and, after being well received by the family there, rode on at about 2 p.m. Being so close to the main camp it seems probable that the members of the patrol were less vigilant than they should have been, although it is also clear that the Boers (who had been lying in wait all day for Heron’s return, not noticing when this group passed it by in the distance) had made cunning use of a concealed fold in the apparently open plain. The Australians suddenly came under fire from about 50 Boers who rode towards them at full gallop from 500 metres away. Caught by surprise and clearly outnumbered, the men made towards a kopje (small hill) some 250 metres off with the idea of mounting a stand until help arrived. The troopers had actually dismounted and begun opening fire on their pursuers, when they were themselves heavily engaged on all sides by more

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January 1900 Boers who were lying in concealment— including on the hill they had occupied. With Dowling already out of action, a warrant officer gave the order to mount up again. The harried band then raced in the direction of the camp, until they found their escape route impeded by a tightly stretched six-strand farm fence topped with barbed wire. The horses of several of the men were shot from under them during this flight, with those dismounted being immediately taken up behind other riders. Although six men managed to find gaps in the wire through which they were able to ride clear of the trap, the remainder were left with nowhere to go. Fourteen of the Australians were taken prisoner—including Dowling who, like several others, was wounded. One man had been shot dead and another who was mortally wounded were left on the scene; the latter, found the next day crudely bandaged by the Boers, died while being conveyed back to camp in an ambulance. An inquiry into the incident found that no blame attached to anyone, but the Australian cavalry—both the Lancers and the Horse—were retired down the railway line to a rest camp at Arundel. Moreover, they took no further part in operations in the Colesberg sector before being transferred west early in February to join the forces being prepared on the Modder River for a renewed push to relieve Kimberley. The second action, on 9 February, saw men of the West Australian Mounted Infantry (WAMI) involved in a gallant stand which did much to erase the stain of Dowling’s defeat the previous month. That afternoon a troop of twenty men of the WAMI under a British officer, Captain Hatherley Moor, accompanied a squadron of Inniskilling Dragoons on a reconnaissance to the east. After proceeding only some five kilometres, the patrol made contact with a 400-strong Boer commando which was in the process of preparing gun positions from which to shell the British camp at


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The orderly lines of the camp established by the British forces at Slingersfontein, within a few miles of which Australians were twice engaged in January– February 1900. Source: Australian War Memorial A4416

Slingersfontein. Subjected to a hot fire by the enemy force, the Dragoons turned and got away to take up a defensive position some distance off. Moor’s West Australians retired to an isolated kopje on one flank and decided to make a fight of it. The WAMI men maintained their position until nightfall, even though effectively surrounded by Boers occupying hills on three sides and subjected to artillery fire. During this time, they defied all efforts to overrun them. When called upon to surrender, Moor ordered his men to display their fixed bayonets and challenged the enemy to come and get them. Under cover of gathering darkness, the Australians then braved the Boer riflemen covering the rear slopes of their kopje by retiring two or three at a time, carrying their wounded. By this means they got clear, and the frustrated commando made off. Moor’s party suffered three men killed in the action (one of whom was initially reported as missing), and six wounded. One of the latter was so badly hit that he had to be left behind during the retirement; later that night an ambulance went to the scene and retrieved him, but he died a month later in

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hospital near Cape Town. The West Australians’ performance was highly praised in a brigade order issued the day after the fight, and the scene of their stand subsequently became known as ‘West Australia Hill’ or often ‘Australian Hill’. P.L. Murray (1911) Official Records of the Australian Military Contingents to the War in South Africa, Melbourne: Government Printer; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service; L.M. Field (1979) The Forgotten War, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Pink Hill, a famous action during the Second South African War, fought between Australian (and British) troops and a Boer force on 12 February 1900 some thirteen kilometres north-west of Colesberg in central Cape Colony. The engagement occurred after the Boers, realising the weakness of the column of 6,600 men under MajorGeneral R.A.P. Clements which opposed them about Colesberg, moved to drive in the British flanks and force a retreat back down the railway line towards Naauwpoort. Clements’ left flank rested on a low rocky ridge known as Pink Hill, which was held by 75 men of the Victorian Mounted Rifles, 20 South Australians and 100 British regulars (50 Inniskilling Dragoons and an equal number of infantry of the Wiltshire Regiment). When the enemy assault began shortly before noon, carried out by the bulk of General E.R. Grobler’s force of 1,500–2,000 men, the post was commanded by Major G.A. Eddy of the Victorians who had just taken over from an Imperial officer that morning. Soon the defenders were being lashed by close-range fire from three pom-pom quick-fire weapons and a field-gun, as well as innumerable Mauser rifles. Throughout the battle Eddy moved among his men, giving encouragement and directing their fire. After two hours, however, it was obvious that the position must eventually fall. Eddy accordingly instructed


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the Wiltshires to retire while the mounted troops continued to provide covering fire. Once the infantry were safely away, he then gave the order for the rest to follow, but no sooner had he done so than he was killed by an enemy bullet through the head. The action ultimately cost six Australians killed (one of whom died of wounds the following day) and 22 wounded; two of the wounded and one other man were taken prisoner, although one of these (a wounded officer) was released the following day. The gallant defence maintained on the hill ultimately proved to be a futile gesture. By 3 p.m. Pink Hill was in Boer hands. Since the right flank was also successfully pushed back by the Boers, Clements had no alternative but to withdraw south and adopt a new defensive line around Arundel. The action in this quarter has been likened by Field to ‘a little Anzac’ (q.v.): It was a defeat which led to a major withdrawal from the area; it involved proportionately high casualties; and it was praised as a great display of Australian courage and honour in war.

Apart from the laudatory comments made at the time about the Australians’ performance, however, there was also some criticism of Eddy for not having given the order to evacuate sooner and reduce needless losses. F. Maurice (ed.) History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.2 (1907), London: Hurst & Blackett; P.L. Murray (1911) Official Records of the Australian Military Contingents to the War in South Africa, Melbourne: Government Printer; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service; L.M. Field (1979) The Forgotten War, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Kimberley, a major operation undertaken by British forces on 13–15 February 1900 (during the Second South African War) to break the Boer siege of the diamondproducing town of that name on the western border of the Orange Free State. After the campaign to relieve the town mounted by

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February 1900 Lieut.-General Lord Methuen during November–December 1899 ended at Magersfontein (q.v.), a second attempt was prepared by Field Marshal Lord Roberts who arrived to supersede General Sir Redvers Buller as British Commander-in-Chief in South Africa in January. This effort entailed massing 45,000 combat troops (30,000 infantry, 7,500 cavalry and 3,600 mounted infantry), along with 120 guns, in the area between the Orange River and Modder River stations (q.v.). Included in this formidable army were about 500 Australians—men of the Queensland Mounted Infantry, New South Wales Mounted Rifles, and New South Wales Lancers—who were incorporated into the cavalry division commanded by Lieut.-General John French. By 11 February Roberts was ready to move. While ordering Methuen to again take his 1st Division forward in a feint towards Magersfontein—thus tying the Boer general, Piet Cronje, to the defences the enemy had carefully developed there—at 2 a.m. the next day he began moving his main force north towards Modder River, as though confirming Boer expectations that the next major thrust would be along the axis of the railway. The cavalry division was used to guard the British right flank, moving out into Orange Free State territory to secure crossings on the Riet River for use by the 7th Infantry Division. On the morning of 13 February, Roberts inspected the cavalry division before instructing French to proceed with the next step in his bold plan. Instead of continuing a slow ponderous advance via Magersfontein, Roberts had decided to cut the cavalry loose from the main body and send it on a rapid sweep forward to achieve the relief of Kimberley within two days. French’s route from deep inside the Free State would carry him across Cronje’s line of communications and threaten to cut off all Boer forces assembled on the western border unless these quickly fell back. Roberts himself was


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preparing to make an easterly thrust with his main force aimed at capturing the Free State capital at Bloemfontein. Proceeding in scorching summer heat across the waterless veldt, both horses and riders in French’s force suffered terribly; hundreds of mounts dropped in their tracks and had to be destroyed. Added to the hardships imposed by the country was the spirited resistance of the Boers, who realised they had been thoroughly wrong-footed and sought desperately to impose delay on the British cavalry’s progress from the line of the Riet towards the Modder. Throughout the next two days, the Australian horsemen in French’s division were in the vanguard and often under fire. The Lancers in particular were hotly engaged on 14 February at Klip Drift, where a large Boer camp beside the Modder was taken by surprise and captured. When Cronje realised the significance of French’s appearance off his left flank, he despatched 900 men with guns to block any British attempt to push further north away from the drift. The obstruction presented by this force was swept aside on the morning of 15 February with a mounted charge which sent the enemy scattering in all directions— mostly back towards Magersfontein. British casualties during this day’s fighting were five dead and ten wounded, but nearly 70 horses were lost through exhaustion. The way to Kimberley was now wide open, and by early that same evening General French with his staff and nearly 5,000 men finally rode in through the hastily abandoned Boer lines, to the immense relief of the town’s 48,000 residents. Despite the Australians’ prominence during the advance, the only element to actually accompany the relieving troops into the town was a bearer company of the New South Wales Army Medical Corps; this was, in fact, the only medical unit able to keep up with the horse-killing pace of the dash. If the Queensland and New South Wales

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horsemen were denied a share in the glory of breaking the siege, they still found some hard fighting in securing areas out from Kimberley. On 16 February, for example, both the QMI and NSW Lancers were involved in an action at Dronfield (eleven kilometres north of the town) against an entrenched Boer party who eventually left of their own accord. R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service; L.M. Field (1979) The Forgotten War, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Paardeberg, a major action of the Second South African War, which was fought in western Orange Free State and ended with the surrender of 4,000 Boers under General Piet Cronje to British forces under Field Marshal Lord Roberts after a siege lasting 17–27 February 1900. The battle arose after Roberts bypassed Magersfontein (q.v.), which Cronje had been occupying to block British attempts to break the siege of Kimberley along the direct northern route of the railway line, by pushing Lieut.-General John French’s cavalry division around the Boer’s left flank. With Kimberley relieved on 15 February and the British now astride his lines of communication, Cronje had no choice but to hurriedly withdraw east towards Bloemfontein to avoid being cut off entirely. The Boer retirement initially evaded attempts at capture, despite the fact that Cronje was encumbered with a huge train of ox-wagons and large numbers of families who had joined the men in the field. On the bright moonlit night of 15 February, the commandos succeeded in passing unobserved just five kilometres to the north of Roberts’ army. A force of 2,000 mounted infantry (including the New South Wales Mounted Rifles) was sent out the next morning under Colonel Ormelie Hannay, to pursue Cronje and hold him until the slower infantry could arrive and prevent his further escape. This attempt failed when Hannay’s


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men encountered a determined Boer rearguard and were forced to fall back in the face of accurate light artillery fire. Amid the confusion of the retirement, the inexperienced British horsemen (regular infantrymen who had been recently mounted) raced over a steep embankment and into the river. Hannay reformed his troops and resumed the attack, but again they ‘fell back in some confusion’. Cronje was finally brought to bay at Paardeberg on 17 February, when three batteries of British horse artillery operating with French’s advanced elements succeeded in getting into a position from which they could shell the head of the Boer column as it attempted to cross to the south bank of the Modder River at Vendutie Drift (ford). Forced into a defensive laager (camp) extending for three kilometres along the north bank, Cronje was quickly encircled and besieged. Over the next two days Major-General Lord Kitchener, Roberts’ chief of staff who held local command while the field marshal recovered from a cold, attempted to take the Boer position before it could receive reinforcement. He ordered a series of hasty piecemeal frontal assaults which resulted in over 1,260 British casualties (including 320 dead). During these preliminary skirmishes on the periphery of the Boer position, Hannay’s mounted infantry was again involved on 18 February. In response to vague orders from Kitchener which appeared to direct him to rush the laager ‘at all costs’, Hannay prepared his force to carry out an assault—evidently determined to eliminate the stain of the fiasco a few days earlier. This attempt was cut short at 3 p.m. when Hannay was killed while riding bravely at the head of a small token band of his men. For the next ten days the British vice around the laager was contracted mainly by the digging of trenches rather than direct assault, and the main form of pressure on the Boers came from the heavy bombard-

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February 1900 To Kimberley (38 kms) Gen. Fren ch’s Cavalry Division

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British advance by 27 Feb.

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ment maintained by the 91 guns with Roberts’ force. By 26 February the trenches on the eastern side had reached to within 230 metres of the Boer position, and a decision was taken to advance the line with a pre-dawn attack by the Canadian battalion which was present. This succeeded in bringing the British to little more than 80 metres away, in a position which enfiladed all the Boer trenches parallel to the river. At 7 a.m. that morning Cronje finally accepted the inevitable and rode to Roberts’ headquarters to offer his capitulation. By chance, Major Thomas Fiaschi of the New South Wales Army Medical Corps was


0

1

2

3

4

5 kms

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Kitcheners Kopje

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reputed to have received the enemy’s formal surrender. While Fiaschi and members of his corps were collecting Canadian wounded close to the Boer lines, a group of 209 enemy displayed a white flag, filed out of their positions and offered their surrender to him as the senior officer present. In fact, at the same time as this incident was taking place, elsewhere Roberts was personally receiving Cronje’s surrender. Nonetheless the story later grew that the honour of receiving the surrender of the whole Boer position at Paardeberg had gone to Fiaschi. Other Australians played various parts in the action while attached to British units as

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‘special service officers’. Two members of the New South Wales permanent military forces present were Major (later Major-General Sir) William Bridges, attached to the artillery accompanying the cavalry brigade commanded by Colonel R.G. Broadwood, and Lieut. G. Grieve, who was killed on 18 February leading a company of the 2nd Battalion of the Black Watch. Lieut.-Commander W. Colquhoun of the Victorian Naval Forces was also present, in command of one of two 12-pounder naval guns used to shell the laager. When both guns became immobilised through wheel problems on 26 February, Colquhoun took them to Kimberley for repair and succeeded in getting them back in time to take part in Roberts’ subsequent operations. Victory at Paardeberg—coincidentally achieved on the nineteenth anniversary of the defeat suffered by British forces at Majuba Hill in the First South African War— had cost the British 1,540 casualties, compared to probably less than 100 Boers, but it was the last large-scale action of that second conflict. The capture of Cronje, then the most famous Boer general, had ramifications well beyond the loss of the men and equipment with him at the surrender. Some 14,000 Boers had rushed to his assistance but had been held off by the encircling British; these demoralised forces now rapidly dispersed in disorder towards the east. Faced with growing British strength in conventional military forces, the Boers resorted to guerilla tactics to prolong the Second South African War for a further fifteen months. F. Maurice (ed.) History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.2 (1907), London: Hurst & Blackett; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service; L.M. Field (1979) The Forgotten War, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Poplar Grove, a minor action of the Second South African War, fought on 7 March 1900 during the British advance on Bloemfontein


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following the capture of Cronje’s force of Boers at Paardeberg (q.v.) a week earlier. In an effort to delay the progress of Field Marshal Lord Roberts’ large army, 7,000 burghers under General Christiaan De Wet prepared to make a stand on ridges near a drift (ford) over the Modder River some 90 kilometres west-north-west of the Orange Free State capital. Although occupying strong ground on both sides of the river, the enemy were dispirited by their recent defeat. By 7.30 a.m., and before the British artillery could be brought into action, the Boers began abandoning their positions. They had seen Lieut.-General Sir John French’s cavalry division embarking on a wide flanking movement to their left and panicked at the idea of being cut off. During the battle the New South Wales Mounted Rifles and Queensland Mounted Infantry were attached to the 14th Infantry Brigade, which was assigned the role of harassing the enemy on the south bank of the river and diverting attention from the main attack being delivered by French. Although the British infantry was soon in possession of the enemy’s prepared trenches, some of which would have proved almost impregnable if defended, the cavalry’s flanking move had been too slow to catch the better-mounted Boers. Losses on the British side amounted to no more than 50 casualties, including five men killed. De Wet’s forces remained intact to mount a renewed defensive effort. R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Driefontein, an action of the Second South African War, fought on 10 March 1900 during the advance on Bloemfontein by a large British force under Field Marshal Lord Roberts. Following the fiasco at Poplar Grove (q.v.) on 7 March, Boer General Christiaan De Wet succeeded in persuading 5,000– 6,000 burghers to mount a further delaying effort about 30 kilometres east, along a line

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February–March 1900 of ridges south of the Modder River. Although aware that the enemy was holding the hills near Abraham’s Kraal beside the river, and those a little further to the south-east at Damvallei, the British did not initially realise that other parties were occupying the Driefontein–Boschrand ridges as well. This fact only became apparent during the morning of the 10th, as elements of the British force progressively scouted and probed the enemy lines. From 3.30 p.m. the British began steadily pressing in against the 1,500 burghers holding the Driefontein kopjes (hills), judged to be the key to the position, until from about 5 p.m. it was observed that there was a growing trickle of Boers leaving the battlefield in twos and threes. This led to the mounting of a final charge at 6 p.m. which carried the position and sent the Boers streaming away to the north-east. Although British mounted troops (including some Australians) attempted a pursuit from the southern flank, these were unable to intercept a withdrawal in such a direction— because of the poor condition of their mounts—and returned empty-handed as dusk fell. Although the Boers were still in possession of the northern hills, the retention of these was now pointless and they were evacuated, too, during the night. The day’s fighting cost the British 424 casualties, 82 of whom were killed or died of wounds; the Boers lost about 300 men, including about 100 killed. In the morning’s fighting, Captain John Antill’s squadron of New South Wales Mounted Rifles was engaged in reconnoitring the limits of the enemy’s right (north) flank near the river. While performing this work, the Australians had one man killed by a shot fired from a farmhouse flying a white flag of neutrality. Also during the morning, the squadrons of the New South Wales Lancers and 1st Australian Horse (another New South Wales unit) were active on the same flank—both units being attached to the


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cavalry brigade commanded by Colonel T.C. Porter. Shortly before midday, however, these were switched to Colonel R.G. Broadwood’s brigade opposite the enemy’s left flank. Here, they took part in the later cavalry movement to follow up the Boer retirement, until forced to retire by enemy artillery and pom-pom fire. Also among the British casualties for the day was a Victorian, Lieut.-Colonel C.E. Umphelby, serving as a special service officer with the artillery, who was mortally wounded by a sniper late in the afternoon and died three days later. R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Karee Siding, an action during the Second South African War, fought on 29 March 1900, some 30 kilometres north of the Orange Free State capital, Bloemfontein. After the British army under Field Marshal Lord Roberts entered the town on 13 March, Boer forces under General J.H. De la Rey continued to occupy the hills through which the railway line passed to Brandfort. Deciding to eliminate the menace which the enemy presence here presented, and having selected Karee Siding as a suitable place for an advanced supply base, Roberts began concentrating troops at the Glen Siding—the point eleven kilometres south of Karee where the railway crossed the Modder River. By 28 March 9,000 British troops were at the Glen, comprising the 7th Infantry Division of 6,000 men, two cavalry brigades totalling 2,000 horsemen and a 1,000-strong mounted infantry brigade. Supporting this force were 30 field-guns and two pom-pom quick-fire weapons. Lieut.-General John French had been sent to take command of the cavalry, but Lieut.-General C. Tucker held command of the infantry and the brigade of mounted infantry led by Colonel P.W.J. Le Gallais. Among the regiments of Le Gallais’s brigade was the New South

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Wales Mounted Rifles under Lieut.-Colonel G.C. Knight, while the 1st Cavalry Brigade led by Colonel T.C. Porter contained a squadron of the New South Wales Lancers commanded by Captain Charles Cox and another of the 1st Australian Horse (also a New South Wales unit) commanded by Captain Elworthy. Generals French and Tucker both arrived at the Glen on the evening of the 28th, the day before that set for the advance to begin. Although lacking reconnaissance information regarding enemy positions—or even whether any enemy actually remained—they determined on making an infantry advance directly along the rail-line accompanied by turning movements on both flanks, by the cavalry on the west (left flank) and mounted infantry on the east respectively. Though unknown to them, available to oppose this plan were 3,500 Boers led by General Tobias Smuts in the absence of De la Rey. The bulk of the enemy forces were deployed east of the railway, in three parallel ranges of hills running across the proposed line of advance, but a portion also held a plateau called Houtenbeck on the other side of the tracks. When launched the next morning, the British advance initially met no resistance. The flanking movements encountered no opposition, and consequently Tucker’s infantry set off to take the first of the ridgelines, finding it already abandoned by the enemy. The second parallel was also seized by 1.30 p.m., after the leading battalion had only a few shots fired at it. It was only on the last ridge that the Boers disclosed their presence in strength, opening a heavy fire from positions concealed in the brushwood covering the hillside. For about an hour a firefight took place on this front, and also on the left where the British line had now encountered the Boers on the Houtenbeck feature. Artillery was brought up to deal with the enemy on both sides of the railway, and shortly after 4 p.m. a bayonet


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charge against the Houtenbeck trenches found the Boers already in flight across the bare open plain towards Brandfort. Meanwhile, the cavalry and mounted troops—whose movement had been intended to smooth the infantry’s progress and ensure that any enemy encountered were not merely dislodged but severely dealt with—remained effectively out of the battle. In the judgement of The Times history of the war, French’s movements had been ‘unaccountably slow’ while on the eastern flank: Le Gallais had chased some parties of Boers from the outlying ridges . . . , but only with the result of sending them to reinforce the main body opposed to Tucker; and in the afternoon he had allowed his whole brigade to be delayed by a small party of Boers on an outlying spur. The consequence was that he never got round.

In this whole poorly managed operation the British sustained 189 casualties (including members of the New South Wales Mounted Rifles and Australian Horse), compared to Boer losses of only 34. The victory was important, nonetheless, in opening the way for Roberts to resume his advance across the northern half of the Free State and on to the Transvaal. L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.4 (1906), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; John Stirling (1907) The Colonials in South Africa, 1899–1902, Edinburgh: W. Blackwood & Sons

Sannah’s Post, an action fought on 31 March 1900 during the Second South African War, after the British army commanded by Field Marshal Lord Roberts occupied the Orange Free State capital, Bloemfontein, on 13 March. Two days after the town’s capture 300 mounted infantry were sent to Sannah’s Post, situated on the Modder River 34 kilometres to the east, to secure the pumping station which supplied Bloemfontein’s water supply. As it was known that a strong Boer commando under General J.H. Olivier was

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March 1900 in this area, on the 18th another force—a 1,500-strong column of cavalry and mounted infantry under Lieut.-General John French—was sent to take up a defensive position at Thaba ’Nchu, a further 34 kilometres east. On the 26th French had departed to resume command of his cavalry division, leaving the garrison at Thaba ’Nchu under command of Colonel R.G. Broadwood. When Broadwood found himself seriously menaced by Olivier’s force of 5,000 men, he decided on 30 March to withdraw in towards Bloemfontein—taking with him any of the town’s pro-British residents who wished to be evacuated. Unknown to him, his movement coincided with a bold plan by another Boer leader, General Christiaan de Wet, who had moved south from Brandfort with a column of 1,600 men and seven guns, with the intention of seizing control of the Sannah’s Post waterworks and placing himself astride the escape route which Broadwood would use once Olivier launched his planned attack. By 4 a.m. on the 31st he had his men in position: 400 under his own command west of the waterworks, the rest east of the Modder. De Wet’s plan called for the larger force to mount the initial attack on the Sannah’s Post garrison, in the expectation that the defenders (reduced now to only 200) would abandon the place and head to the capital—and straight into the ambush laid for them. Intelligence reports delivered during the night told De Wet that a convoy had been despatched down the road from Thaba ’Nchu the previous afternoon, but he did not know that Broadwood’s whole force was on the move. When he learned of this fact shortly before dawn, he decided to continue laying in wait even though Broadwood’s much larger force (about 1,800)—which he could actually see bivouacking nearby on the west bank of the Modder—could potentially overwhelm his own meagre numbers. While various minor skirmishes before sunrise at


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6 a.m. should have given warning that Boers were in the vicinity, the nature and scale of the threat which was actually present was not evidenced to Broadwood until shells from the north-east started falling around the waterworks bivouac site at 6.20 a.m. Assuming that Olivier’s commando had caught up with them, the British column and its convoy rapidly took to the saddle and moved out along the road to the west. When it was reported to Broadwood that 300 Boers had been sighted along hills to the north, he deduced that an enemy force was trying to interpose itself along his escape route from that direction. He accordingly ordered one of his two batteries of Royal Horse Artillery with a mounted escort to occupy rising ground on this flank, retaining the bulk of his mounted infantry to provide a rearguard at the Modder. The battery proceeded towards the head of the supply convoy, which had become bottlenecked in a gully fifteen feet below the level of the plain—not realising that this was due to the action of De Wet’s men, who were silently disarming and making prisoners of the teamsters as they entered the trap. The lead battery of guns was already in the enemy’s hands when the true position was discovered by the following (‘Q’) Battery. This immediately turned about, with its escort, and galloped back to where a railway station was under construction—under heavy fire from the Boers after De Wet decided the time was right to reveal his hand. With the ambush sprung, Broadwood proceeded to try and fight his way out of the predicament. Despite severe losses suffered during its flight out of the Boer trap, Q Battery brought four of its guns into action beside the unfinished railway buildings. Among the officers and men working these weapons was Lieut. J.C. Walch, a member of the Tasmanian Defence Forces on special service duty; he was severely wounded. Aided by the fire of the guns, Broadwood sent cavalry elements around by the south with

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orders to move into the gully and take the Boers from the right flank and rear. When these moves failed to ease the pressure which the Boers continued to apply, at 10 a.m. Broadwood felt obliged to order a general retreat towards the south-west. In preparation for this movement, volunteers braved a storm of rifle-fire to pull back four of the guns and limbers from their exposed positions and thus prevent them being left for the enemy. While two-thirds of Broadwood’s force made good their escape, the various Boer forces now moved in to press the mounted infantry covering the rear—while also collecting up the spoils left behind. The leading elements of the British 9th Infantry Division began reaching the battlefield in the hour before midday, after marching from Bloemfontein, but these were too late to prevent the Boers making an orderly withdrawal by 1 p.m., taking with them 421 prisoners, seven guns and 83 wagons of stores. Broadwood had also suffered 159 officers and men either killed or wounded. The considerable disaster which befell the British in this action might have been avoided, or at least attenuated, by the skilful intervention of a brigade of mounted infantry which had also arrived three kilometres in De Wet’s rear at about 8 a.m. but then wasted the opportunity which its appearance presented. This brigade, ordered by Lord Roberts from Springfield when he first heard of Broadwood’s planned retirement, was commanded by Colonel C.G. Martyr and comprised two British battalions and the Queensland contingent (commanded by Lieut.-Colonel St G.C. Henry)—a total of 600 men. A force of this size might have materially altered the course of events, but Martyr chose to split it up and disperse it. While one battalion was sent to join in the belated cavalry movement Broadwood had initiated against De Wet’s right flank and rear, the other British unit and the QMI had been sent north-east to aid an isolated outpost at


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Waterval Drift, an important crossing on the Modder north of the waterworks. Here Henry’s Queenslanders came into action after crossing the river for a distance, until recalled to take part in a short-lived defence of the ford. When the QMI was forced to join in the abandonment of Waterval to the enemy, they left behind two killed, two wounded and five men who became prisoners. The position at Sannah’s Post was not restored to British control until 23 April. L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.4 (1906), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Houtnek, an action fought on 30 April–1 May 1900 during the Second South African War, which effectively marked the start of the march by the British army under Field Marshal Lord Roberts from the Orange Free State capital to Pretoria, the capital of the Transvaal republic. The engagement followed Roberts’ decision to straighten the alignment of his forces around Bloemfontein (captured on 13 March) by moving north the column commanded by Lieut.-General Ian Hamilton from Thaba ’Nchu, east of Bloemfontein, to Winburg via Jacobsrust. He was, however, unaware that a large enemy force under General Philip Botha was holding positions in ridges astride this route—principally near Houtnek where the road passed through a defile. Hamilton commenced his march early on 30 April, but his progress was checked soon after 9 a.m. as the mounted infantry leading his advance were approaching Houtnek. Seeing the high ground in front and on both flanks to be held by enemy parties, Hamilton decided to make an attack on Thoba Mountain—a large feature at the western end of the ranges which dominated a pass through which a second road ran to Jacobsrust. Using his mounted infantry to keep the Boers on his right flank and front

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March–May 1900 engaged, he sent infantry towards the mountain on his left. The troops cleared the lower slopes without difficulty but were unable to carry the position before nightfall, forcing them to bivouac where they were, while Hamilton telegraphed for cavalry reinforcements from Thaba ’Nchu. According to their custom, during the night most of the burghers returned to laagers (camps) behind the hills. By the next morning Botha had already determined to abandon his position and sent away his supply train. Only a portion of his force resumed the defence, but despite this the British assault on Thoba Mountain was strongly opposed so that it was 1 p.m. before the feature was in Hamilton’s hands. Just as this issue was decided, squadrons of British cavalry were sighted approaching around Thoba Mountain from the west. With the Boer positions in the east now outflanked as well, the remaining defenders promptly mounted and rode off. By 3.30 p.m. Hamilton’s transport was able to use the road over the mountains to Jacobsrust. The two-day delaying action had cost the British 103 casualties, including four members of E Squadron of the New South Wales Mounted Rifles under Captain William Holmes. The latter squadron— minus 25 men detached for scouting duty—had been sent to occupy an advanced post on a hill located less than 1,500 metres from several enemy guns. Holmes’ men were subjected to intense shrapnel and rifle-fire throughout the first day’s fighting and until ordered to withdraw about noon the next day. It was while galloping away from the position in groups of four that one of the Australians was fatally wounded. P.L. Murray (1911) Official Records of the Australian Military Contingents to the War in South Africa, Melbourne: Government Printer; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Coetzee Drift, an action during the Second


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South African War, fought on 5 May 1900 along the Vet River in Orange Free State. After seizing the town of Brandfort two days earlier, the British commander, Field Marshal Lord Roberts, sent forward mounted forces to meet Boer forces under General J.H. De la Rey who were preparing a new line of resistance at the Vet River. The advance was conducted with Major-General Edward Hutton’s brigade (which included several Australian units) on the left of the northern railway, and the mounted infantry division commanded by Lieut.-General Ian Hamilton on the right. The latter had secured Welkom Drift (ford) on 4 May and camped there overnight in readiness for Roberts’ general push across the river the next day. When the advance began on 5 May Hamilton had an easy march to Winburg, which he occupied that afternoon. Hutton, meanwhile, faced a more difficult task on the western flank, where the bulk of De la Rey’s 1,500 burghers were posted in widely dispersed positions at the main crossing points. Arriving at noon at Coetzee (or Misgunstfontein) Drift, ten kilometres west of the railway, Hutton found this so strongly defended that he was deterred from making a frontal attack. Learning from a local farmer of the existence of another disused ford four kilometres further west, he sent a British battalion supported by two companies of Canadians across in a flanking movement at this point. Once he saw that these troops were in a position to bear in against the right flank of the Boers occupying the high ground overlooking the main drift, he ordered the New South Wales Mounted Rifles, supported by the Queensland Mounted Infantry and New Zealand Mounted Rifles, to cross the river and attack. The task given to the men of the NSWMR was a difficult one, for once on the other side they found themselves within a sort of basin formed by steep mimosa-covered banks which the Boers occupied in increasing strength. The pressure on the attacking

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Australians was relieved by the action of a flanking British battalion, which—having discovered another ford further east—took the initiative of crossing without waiting for orders and began driving in against the enemy’s left. At this, the Boer defenders yielded the high ground and began withdrawing. An impetuous assault by the New South Wales men surprised the enemy party covering the retirement of several guns, and inflicted 23 casualties on this rearguard. By 4.45 p.m. Hutton himself crossed over the river to take possession of the Boer positions. The action had cost his force only four men wounded, due to the effective way in which it was managed rather than being indicative of the severity of the fighting involved. Although Roberts now had both his flanks across the Vet, he was still held up in the centre where De la Rey had posted commandos on two kopjes (low hills) south of the river. When a body of the 2nd West Australian Mounted Infantry operating in advance of the 11th Division came within range of the Boer guns mounted on these hills, they were unable to make much headway until these weapons were subjected to counter-fire from three field batteries and other heavy guns. The kopjes were not occupied until just on dusk, after the WAMI made a spirited bayonet charge which prompted the Boers to withdraw before the attack’s full weight could be delivered. The hour was now too late for the British to take effective follow-up action, so that the Boers were able to maintain their pattern of avoiding significant defeat and simply falling back in front of the British advance while imposing delay. L.S. Amery (ed.) (1906) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.3 (1908), London: Hurst & Blackett; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service


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Zand River, an action during the Second South African War, fought on 10 May 1900 in northern Orange Free State as Boer forces attempted to check the advance of the British army led by Field Marshal Lord Roberts. Following the action on 5 May, when the British forced their way over the Vet River (see Coetzee Drift), the Boers had retreated hurriedly to the Zand. It was here that a reconnaissance by the mounted infantry brigade commanded by Major-General Edward Hutton (which included several Australian units) found them strongly entrenched around Virginia Siding on 7 May, confirming that this was to be the focus of the burghers’ next major show of resistance. A squadron of the New South Wales Mounted Rifles reached within 500 metres of the river, but were driven off by enemy shellfire. Since the defence on the Vet, the commandant-general of the Boer forces (General Louis Botha) had arrived at Virginia Siding on 7 May to take personal charge of operations, bringing with him some 3,000 reinforcements from the Transvaal. All the Free State burghers still under arms— probably not numbering more than 5,000—were also now concentrated at the Zand. Their object was to attempt to prevent the capture of Kroonstad, 64 kilometres to the north, which was the Free State capital since the fall of Bloemfontein in March and an important supply centre in its own right. The terrain held a major advantage for this purpose, chiefly in the form of a ridgeline running along the river’s north bank which formed a useful basis for the defence of the Boer centre covering the railway line and the left flank in the east. The weak point was the western flank, which was susceptible to a British turning movement, and Botha was obliged to adopt dispositions which took this possibility into account. Although Roberts recognised the potential for a wide sweep past the Boer flank to carry his cavalry to Kroonstad and beyond, such

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May 1900 as he had used to relieve Kimberley (q.v.), he was not prepared to risk the attrition which that tactic had previously caused. The cavalry division, under Lieut.-General John French, had only just been returned to strength in time to rejoin the army for the Zand operation. He nonetheless decided to attempt to envelop Botha’s forces by sending two of French’s brigades and Hutton’s mounted infantry—4,000 men in all— around the enemy’s right flank, meeting up around Ventersburg Siding with another cavalry brigade which was to come in from the east after turning the enemy’s left. Implementation of this plan began on 9 May, when Colonel T.C. Porter’s 1st Cavalry Brigade (which included the 1st Australian Horse, the New South Wales Lancers and New South Wales Army Medical Corps) seized control of a ford just west of the furthermost Boer outpost at Diamant Drift, some ten kilometres from the railway. French and his staff, along with Hutton’s mounted infantry brigade, joined him here later in the day. The rest of Roberts’ army—totalling 38,000 men with 100 fieldguns and twelve pom-poms—had closed up on the river, but apart from a crossing made at Koolspruit Drift (in the centre) by some mounted infantry the forcing of the Zand was left until the following day. When French set off on 10 May with Porter’s brigade, pushing rapidly north-east, Botha was initially unaware that there was any British activity on his flank. Only with the approach of the cavalry towards Vredes Verdrag, a ridge sixteen kilometres directly north and behind him, did he discover the peril confronting the entire Boer defence. After sending off a 200-man reserve to oppose any further progress by French, Botha ordered a general retirement; only a small rearguard was left at Virginia Siding to delay Roberts’ main advance. The measures taken by the Boer commander were just in time. French’s efforts to capture Vredes Verdrag and cover the last


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eight kilometres east to Ventersburg Siding were vigorously opposed, in the first instance by fire from two Boer guns covering the approaches to the ridge. In an attempt to outflank these weapons, the Australian Horse and three other squadrons were sent to seize an apparently unoccupied kopje (low hill) on the left. The troops gained the hill and dismounted, but were then ambushed by a party of Boers who had been lying in wait. Caught in a crossfire and lacking a unified command, the troopers were quickly driven off the hill in confusion. Left behind were fourteen killed and 63 prisoners, 36 of whom were wounded; at least one Australian Horse officer was among those captured. Attempts by the Boers to capitalise on their success were beaten off, but French— anxious to maintain the momentum of his advance—decided to bypass the enemy position by moving west around Vredes Verdrag and on to the next hill to the north. This movement was constantly harried by the Boers, who were in sufficient strength to keep French’s horsemen away from the railway line. Hutton’s mounted infantry, following along behind, also encountered some hard fighting. Among the casualties suffered by his brigade were eight men of the New South Wales Mounted Rifles, which regiment had been temporarily assigned to his command. Meanwhile, Roberts’ main column made an easy crossing of the river while his mounted elements in the lead pursued the Boers up the railway to Ventersburg Siding. Although more strongly opposed on the right, the British were again able to drive the Boers back and get across the Zand with light casualties. The flanking movement from this side, planned to have been executed by Colonel R.G. Broadwood’s cavalry brigade, was late in starting out and played little part in the course of the day’s operations, which in effect decided the fate of Kroonstad itself—occupied with minimal opposition two days later.

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L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.4 (1906), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; John Stirling (1907) The Colonials in South Africa, 1899–1902, Edinburgh: W. Blackwood & Sons; History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.3 (1908), London: Hurst & Blackett

Mafeking, an action during the Second South African War, resulting in the lifting of the Boer siege of this town in north-western Cape Colony, opposite the western border of the Transvaal, on 17 May 1900. The town, defended by about 1,000 men under Lieut.-Colonel Robert Baden-Powell, had been invested by 5,000 Boers since 14 October 1899. The enemy’s grip was finally broken when a flying column of cavalry and mounted infantry under Colonel Bryan Mahon covered the 380 kilometres north from the Vaal River in twelve days, riding past Boer forces to link up with another small force which had pushed south from Rhodesia to operate beyond the encircling Boer lines for the previous two months. On 14 May the latter column, commanded by Colonel Henry Plumer, was reinforced at Sefetili by a battery of Canadian artillery which arrived after a forced march from Beira, escorted by 100 members of the 3rd Queensland Mounted Infantry (Bushmen) under Captain Charles Kellie. The next day Plumer’s column was joined by Mahon at Jan Massibi’s kraal (fenced enclosure), 32 kilometres west of Mafeking, and on 16 May this combined relief force met and defeated an opposing force of 2,000 Boers in a five-hour action near the Molopo River, north-west of the town. For most of this day’s fighting the QMI men remained in the rear, having been assigned the unglamorous job of guarding the supply wagons. Late in the day, however, when the infantry was sent to clear the enemy from trenches near a farmhouse with the bayonet, they refused to be so constrained and—in defiance of their orders—joined in the assault. As the British troops rose in extended


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order to make their final dash to the enemy lines 400 metres off, they heard fiendish yells like the sounds of a band of Red Indians from behind and found the Queenslanders running alongside them as they completed the remaining distance. Although a stirring exhibition of brave spirit, the Australian Bushmen’s wild rush had also been an act of folly. Whereas the British troops had been carefully advancing in bounds, making maximum use of cover, the Queenslanders had thrown caution to the winds and would have suffered accordingly if they had been attacking a more disciplined foe. Losses in this action were minor on both sides (the British suffering seven killed and 24 wounded, the Boers reportedly one-third that total), but the victors were too exhausted to attempt a pursuit and bivouacked where they were. Later that night, after word arrived from the town that negligible enemy opposition remained to bar their progress, a party of volunteers was assembled and made a dash for Mafeking—only eight kilometres away—in advance of the main column. By 3.30 a.m. on 17 May the seven-month siege was broken, the task of relieving the town being completed at daybreak when the Boers were shelled out of their main camp with the loss of some wagons and a 9-pounder gun. News that Mafeking had been liberated prompted scenes of jubilation across the British empire. James Green (1903) The Story of the Australian Bushmen, Sydney: William Brooks & Co.; L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.4 (1906), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Diamond Hill, an action fought on 11–12 June 1900, during the Second South African War, between British forces under the direct command of Field Marshal Lord Roberts and the main Boer army of the Transvaal republic under General Louis Botha. The latter, comprising 6,000 men and 23 guns,

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May–June 1900 was menacing the Transvaal capital, Pretoria, which the British had entered with 25,000 men on 5 June, by occupying a 50-kilometre front east of the town. To deal with this threat Roberts moved out on 11 June with 14,000 men and 70 guns—all he could spare from the protection of his lines of communication. His plan called for attacks by Lieut.-General John French’s cavalry and mounted infantry in the north and Lieut.-General Sir Ian Hamilton’s infantry and mounted infantry in the south, which were intended to tie up both enemy flanks before a main attack was attempted against the centre. Botha had accurately anticipated Roberts’ tactics, and was ready to deal with both

flanking movements. French’s force comprised only 1,400 horsemen (including ten members of the 1st Australian Horse and 35 of the New South Wales Lancers) and, although supported by a dozen fieldguns, was easily stopped by General J.H. De la Rey and forced to remain in defensive positions for the night. In the opening moments on this flank, a troop of the New South Wales Lancers which was sent forward on scouting duty was mistaken for Boers and shelled by the British guns, fortunately without any of the Australians being hit. Not so lucky was the New South Wales Ambulance, which was later struck by an enemy shell and damaged while moving about in the frontline.

To Pretoria

Pienaarspoort Station

Diamond Hill

British

De Lisle’s mounted brigade

Elands River Station

Boers

0 1 2 3 4 5 kms


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On the right flank, meanwhile, Hamilton found himself strongly opposed by Boers under General Piet Fourie who occupied a long rocky ridgeline dominated by Diamond Hill. In attempting to press ahead in the face of fierce resistance, part of the British force was almost surrounded when night ended the first day’s operations. In the face of the situation which now confronted him, Roberts was reluctantly forced to contemplate a costly frontal attack in the centre against enemy positions which had been barely touched. Reports during the night, however, persuaded him to lend his support for a main thrust to be mounted by Hamilton against the Boer strongpoint at Diamond Hill. The assault which was finally launched shortly after noon the next day entailed five battalions moving against the western slopes leading onto the Diamond Hill plateau. Although successful, the effort soon became bogged down when the Boers retreated to covering positions and the attackers were exposed to murderous fire from high ground on both flanks. This pressure was only relieved when the brigade under Colonel H. De Lisle, which contained a battalion of British mounted infantry along with both the New South Wales Mounted Rifles and West Australian Mounted Infantry, made an assault onto the Rhenosterfontein kopje on the British right. This position was effectively the eastern extension of the Diamond Hill ridgeline, and the source of much of the fire which pinned down the main assault force. De Lisle, sent to concentrate his efforts against the Rhenosterfontein position during the morning, had used the two pom-pom guns with his force to cover the men of the 6th Mounted Infantry Battalion as they began steadily working their way forward on foot until they were close under the hill. By 2 p.m. De Lisle ordered the Mounted Infantry to advance. As soon as he saw that the leading troops had gained a foothold, he moved his pom-poms up to within 1,300 metres and—in the words of The Times


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history of the war—‘let go the New South Wales Mounted Rifles’. The four squadrons of the New South Wales regiment, commanded by Lieut.-Colonel G. Knight, came under fire as they galloped in long well-spaced lines across the broad grass-covered valley to where the local farmhouse stood among a grove of gum trees. Leaving their horses in dead ground here, they rushed forward still widely spaced—27 metres between men and 45 metres separating the ranks formed by squadrons. According to The Times account: Extended in this way the 350 men of the corps created the appearance of a much larger force, and as they swarmed over the crest of the hill with fixed bayonets, the Boers without waiting for the attack retired to a second position some 1,200 yards away.

With darkness now beginning to fall across the hill, the Boers opened up a ‘furious fusillade’ along the whole line of the position. Botha, however, upon hearing of De Lisle’s success, realised that that part of the ridgeline which his men still held would be untenable as soon as Hamilton brought up heavy artillery onto the plateau. He accordingly gave orders for his commandos to disperse during the night, the retirement commencing at 11 p.m. and being carried out so quietly that it went undetected until the next morning. Roberts was therefore initially unaware of the victory which his force had obtained, at a cost amounting to less than 200 casualties (including two officers killed and six men wounded among the New South Wales men engaged). Boer losses were probably heavier than the 24 killed and wounded that were admitted, but were still minor nonetheless. The only pursuit of the retreating enemy was carried out on 13 June by a detachment of 150 Australians, mainly men of the West Australian Mounted Rifles under Major Hatherly Moor with some members of C

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June–July 1900 Squadron of the New South Wales Mounted Rifles. This force followed the Boers for nearly seventeen kilometres, to near Bronkhurst Spruit station, and fought a brief action with an enemy rearguard in a laager (camp). The role of the Australians during the action at Diamond Hill—the last great defensive battle fought by the Boers—was much praised, and during a review at Elands River on 14 June Knight’s men were cheered by British troops for the gallantry they had displayed there. L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.4 (1906), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Leeuw Kop (also known as ‘Bakenkop’), was an action fought during the Second South African War on 3 July 1900 in the northern Orange Free State, during a British advance from the north-west against the town of Bethlehem. During fighting the previous day a British column under Major-General A.H. Paget had succeeded in pushing back the right wing of an opposing Boer force under General Piet de Wet, and occupied the ridgeline known as Plesierfontein thirteen kilometres east of the town of Lindley. Among the 1,000 mounted troops included in Paget’s column was a battalion of 400 Imperial Bushmen from South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania commanded by Major Rose (a West Australian). Following Paget’s success de Wet retired to Leeuw Kop, about ten kilometres to the south-east, and established a new defensive line along a ridgeline running north-east which had Bakenkop as its most prominent feature. On 3 July Paget moved his infantry and two guns into the intervening valley towards Leeuw Kop, while sending 800 of his mounted troops with six guns against Bakenkop on the left. The commander of the latter detachment, Colonel A.M. Brookfield, took his men onto a ridge 4,000


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metres from his objective and returned the fire of five Boer guns which had begun to engage him. The British guns were distributed in pairs along the ridgeline, and although not spaced widely the undulations of the ground meant that no section could actually see any of the others. The mounted troops covering the artillery were also positioned at intervals along the ridge, mostly in rear of the guns. After an inconclusive duel, it was found that the guns of Brookfield’s detachment were beginning to run short of ammunition. The artillery commander accordingly gave the order to cease fire and the crews were ordered to lie down beside their guns. At this point the Boer guns suddenly renewed their fire with increased intensity, causing the British mounted troops not already sheltering behind the ridge to fall back for cover. The heightened barrage was, however, also the prelude to an assault by two Boer parties—each 100–200 strong—who had crept up through fields of Indian maize flanking the British position on both sides. When delivered, this attack caught the guns effectively without any protection. The left flank guns saw the danger of the approaching Boers and opened fire on them, but on the right the enemy approach was not observed until too late and the position was quickly taken. The centre section immediately limbered up and made to join the left section; one crew mistakenly went towards the right section, however, and both men and horses were promptly shot down so that a third gun was added to the Boer booty. Amidst this confusion, an artillery officer managed to mount a horse and gallop to the rear. Here he came upon a detachment of South Australians under Captain A.E.M. Norton who had been ordered to retire, and these he led back to the ridgeline in time to prevent the Boers from carrying away the captured guns. When confronted with the Australians’ fire, the burghers promptly retreated, taking some of the captured

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gunners with them as prisoners. The enemy party attacking the left gun section also now broke contact and withdrew. Meanwhile Paget had seized Leeuw Kop and from here was able to direct flanking fire from his guns against the Boers’ artillery, whereupon de Wet abandoned Bakenkop and made off towards Bethlehem. During the short but sharp battle, Major Rose and about a dozen South Australians were wounded. The Tasmanian squadron, having been kept on other duty near Lindley, did not join in the fighting until the action was in its final stages with the Boers already being driven off. L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.4 (1906), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.3 (1908), London: Hurst & Blackett; John Stirling (1907) The Colonials in South Africa, 1899–1902, Edinburgh: W. Blackwood & Sons

Palmietfontein, an action fought on 19 July 1900 (during the Second South African War) some 75 kilometres east of Kroonstad in the Orange Free State, during the first British attempt to hunt down and capture the Boer general, Christiaan de Wet, while he was making north towards the Transvaal with 1,500 men. The engagement took the form of a running fight over about thirteen kilometres, after two British brigades came upon de Wet’s supply convoy at 2 p.m. and tried to halt it. While horse artillery in the British centre shelled the last wagons in the enemy column, which extended over five kilometres, the mounted infantry commanded by Brigadier-General C.P. Ridley (which included the New South Wales Mounted Rifles and Army Medical Corps, along with the West Australian Mounted Infantry) continually pressed in against the Boer flanks. De Wet had assigned a small division of his commando under the noted scout leader, Danie Theron, to protect the convoy, while he travelled about twenty kilometres behind with the bulk of his men to guard its


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movement. Theron mounted a vigorous defence against the harrying tactics of the British, suffering little damage himself but successfully mauling the West Australians under Major Hatherley Moor. At dusk Theron broke contact and disappeared after the convoy, which by now had made good its escape, and the pursuit was broken off. In the day’s fighting the WAMI had five men killed—including Major Moor—and the NSWMR also had three men killed and a number wounded. John Stirling (1907) The Colonials in South Africa, 1899–1902, Edinburgh: W. Blackwood & Sons; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Koster River, a controversial action fought on 22 July 1900 (during the Second South African War), on the road between Rustenburg and Elands River in western Transvaal. After a Boer commando led by General H.L. Lemmer had cut the westward route towards Zeerust and Mafeking, thereby preventing supplies from reaching British forces stationed at Rustenburg under Colonel Robert Baden-Powell, late on the afternoon of 21 July a detachment of 270 Australian Bushmen (from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria and Western Australia) was sent from Magato Nek (or Pass) under Lieut.-Colonel Henry Airey with orders to ‘brush aside’ the enemy and return with a convoy from Elands River. At about 8 a.m. the next day Airey’s column was ambushed by Lemmer at Koster River, a tributary of the Selons. The Boers allowed the Australians’ advance guard and flanking scouts to pass before opening a heavy fire on the main body from a horseshoe of kopjes (low hills) 730 metres away. Forced to seek concealment in the long grass beside the road, in an area offering little cover such as stones or boulders and only a few thin trees, the Bushmen were pinned down and over 200 of their horses stampeded or shot. Airey, finding that his force was unable to

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July 1900 move, determined to hold out until help arrived. The action accordingly lasted throughout the day, with the Boers’ numbers—initially put at 400—increasing to about 1,000. At one stage in the heated engagement, an isolated party of an officer and ten men raised a white flag to give themselves up. Airey considered that this act compromised the integrity of the defence, and felt honour-bound to surrender his entire command. His decision was flatly opposed by the officer commanding the Western Australians, Major Harry Vialls, who reportedly ‘stamped and swore’ at what he regarded as a shameful order. Attempts to surrender were ignored by the Boers anyway, and in the face of the enemy’s unrelenting fire the column was obliged to keep fighting. After word of the Australians’ predicament was carried to Magato Pass by a young Englishwoman who lived on a farm at nearby Woodstock, a relieving force (comprising 200 Australians from Magato Nek and a portion of the Bechuanaland Protectorate Regiment sent out from Rustenburg) proceeded to the scene. When these reinforcements arrived at about 2.30 p.m. and began to threaten the flanks of the Boer position, the enemy broke off the action and rode away. There were 39 casualties incurred by Airey’s men in the six-and-a-half hour fight: six killed, three later died of wounds, 23 wounded, and seven men missing. James Green (1903) The Story of the Australian Bushmen, Sydney: William Brooks & Co.; John Stirling (1907) The Colonials in South Africa, 1899–1902, Edinburgh: W. Blackwood & Sons; P.L. Murray (1911) Official Records of the Australian Military Contingents to the War in South Africa, Melbourne: Government Printer; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Stinkhoutboom, located some 70 kilometres north of Kroonstad in the Orange Free State and just ten kilometres south of the Vaal River, was the scene of an action during the


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Second South African War fought on 24 July 1900. British forces had pursued the Boer commando led by General Christiaan de Wet north to this point, seeking to prevent his passage into the adjoining Transvaal republic and forcing him to take refuge in the Reitzburg Hills beyond the town of Vredefort. On 24 July elements of Brigadier-General C.P. Ridley’s mounted infantry brigade (which included both the New South Wales Mounted Rifles and Army Medical Corps) learnt that de Wet had passed through the town the previous night, commandeering men, food and horses. Ridley’s men sped on in pursuit. At a farm called Stinkhoutboom some of the NSWMR, working with men from other units in the brigade, came upon part of de Wet’s rearguard with six grain wagons. In the farmhouse they also captured several exhausted Boers who were asleep in bed still fully clothed. De Wet responded to the sound of firing by sending back Danie Theron’s Scouts to make a counter-attack, supported by two guns which opened fire from concealed positions on high ground to the right. The hour-long action which followed saw the small open plain near the farm filled with several hundred men from both sides, who engaged each other at a distance often no more than 200 metres. Initially the mounted infantry were unable to hold their ground, and were forced to make an orderly retreat with the captured wagons. The end came when two guns from Ridley’s brigade arrived on the scene and began shelling the Boers, forcing them to withdraw with seventeen casualties, including two men killed. The British suffered 39 casualties, reportedly including three South Australians killed and several wounded. The engagement was principally notable for the act of a medical officer with the New South Wales Army Medical Corps, Captain Neville Howse, who—at the height of the fighting—rescued a young trumpeter who

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lay wounded without shelter in the field of fire. This act of gallantry earned Howse the Victoria Cross, the first awarded to a member of any Australian unit. L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.4 (1906), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Elands River, fought on 4–16 August 1900 during the Second South African War, entailed the heroic defence of a staging post in Western Transvaal by a mixed force of British colonial troops. The defenders comprised some 300 Bushmen from various Australian colonies (105 from New South Wales, 141 from Queensland, 42 Victorians, nine West Australians and two Tasmanians), along with 201 Rhodesians, two Canadians and three from British units—the whole commanded by Lieut.-Colonel Charles Hore, a British officer. The garrison was supported by only one Maxim and an old 7-pounder screw gun. Opposing this force were 2,000–3,000 Boers armed with six 12-pounder field-guns and three quick-firing automatic guns known as pom-poms, commanded by General J.H. De la Rey and General H.L. Lemmer. The garrison was there to guard a large accumulation of supplies intended for other British columns operating in the region, and the latter represented the Boers’ primary reason for attacking. The main camp occupied a small rocky ridge situated in the centre of a natural amphitheatre about two hectares in extent, about a kilometre east of the river, but detachments of troops also held two small hills on the riverbank. An attack on the exposed outpost had been anticipated before the siege began on 4 August, although it was hoped that a column of 1,000 New South Wales Imperial Bushmen and South African irregulars under General Sir Frederick Carrington would arrive before this eventuated. As a pre-


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caution, though, a defensive perimeter was hastily improvised using ox-wagons and boxes and bags taken from the stores depot. These preparations enabled the defenders to withstand the enemy’s initial onslaught, during which the compound was subjected to a heavy bombardment. In the first two days over 2,500 shells hit the camp, killing most of the 1,500 horses, oxen and mules, blasting stores in all directions and causing numerous human casualties. On the second day of the investment, the leading elements of Carrington’s force were spotted on the rising ground three kilometres to the west. Hopes of relief were cruelly dashed, however, when the column—advancing without the use of scouts—rode into an ambush and was put into headlong retreat, albeit after sustaining only seventeen minor casualties. Left to their own resources, the garrison completed the digging of rifle pits and building of stone sangars to provide shelter from enemy fire. Some relief was also afforded by the fact that the Boers badly wanted the stores being defended, and hence eased up on the weight of their artillery barrage. The battle was nonetheless maintained using smaller calibre weapons, and the colonial troops were kept under fire from all directions, around the clock. This fire had to be braved during the night, when small parties were sent of necessity to carry drinking water into the lines from the river. Occasional night-time forays were also made to deal with particularly troublesome Boer positions. During daylight hours, however, the defenders remained pinned down in their pits, enduring the heat, thirst and overpowering stench from the carcasses of dead animals. After a week of fighting the Boers called on the camp to surrender. As a mark of respect for the gallant defence which had been made, De la Rey was prepared to allow officers to retain their sidearms and the garrison was guaranteed a safe passage to the nearest British position. This offer was

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refused and the battle continued. Meanwhile, a second attempt at lifting the siege was being undertaken from the east by Colonel Robert Baden-Powell at the head of a column 2,000 strong. This reached within 30 kilometres of the post but received orders to turn away in the belief that the defenders had already capitulated. Not until 13 August was the true position learnt, after a native runner was picked up on the Mafeking railway with the news that the camp was still holding out. A new effort to break the siege was immediately ordered, and columns totalling 10,000 men under General Lord Kitchener started out on the 15th. In the face of the overwhelming strength of the advancing British force, De le Rey withdrew his burghers before Kitchener rode into the Elands River camp the next day. By this stage twelve of the garrison had been killed, along with seven native porters, and another 58 wounded. The siege was perhaps the most notable action involving Australians in South Africa, earning high praise from even the Boers’ senior commander, Jan Smuts, who said:


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Never in the course of this war did a besieged force endure worse sufferings, but they stood their ground with magnificent courage. All honour to these heroes who in the hour of trial rose nobly to the occasion . . . James Green (1903) The Story of the Australian Bushmen, Sydney: William Brooks & Co.; History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.3 (1908), London: Hurst & Blackett; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Buffels Hoek, an action fought on 16–17 August 1900 during the Second South African War, near Ottoshoop in the western Transvaal some 40 kilometres north-east of Mafeking. A 1,500-strong British column commanded by Lieut.-General Sir Frederick Carrington (which included over four squadrons of Imperial Bushmen from all six Australian colonies) was ordered to advance from Mafeking to Zeerust, which he had abandoned just a week or so earlier, but was halted by a Boer force under General H.L. Lemmer holding a line of kopjes (hills) about four kilometres long.

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On the morning of the 16th Carrington sent the bulk of his force forward under Brig.-General the Earl of Erroll to attempt to turn the Boer left. Several hills were taken at bayonet-point, but although weakened the Boer resistance held and the British troops were forced to spend the night in the positions they had won. The next morning Lemmer’s men counter-attacked but were repulsed by mid-afternoon and withdrew from the field. The action reportedly cost the Boers nearly 70 casualties and Carrington’s force lost about 50 killed, wounded and missing. Among the latter were five Australians killed and eleven wounded. John Bufton (1905) Tasmanians in the Transvaal War, Hobart: S.G. Loone; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Peitang, the only combat operation involving Australian troops sent to northern China at the time of the Boxer Rebellion, was fought on the shores of the Gulf of Chihli (now called the Bohai Wan) 40 kilometres east of Tientsin on 25 September 1900. The Australians were members of a naval brigade offered to Britain in June, at the time that a multi-national force was being assembled to lift the siege of foreign embassies in Peking (now Beijing) by a Chinese cult of extreme nationalists nicknamed ‘Boxers’. The brigade, comprising 200 men from the naval forces of Victoria and another 260 from those of New South Wales, arrived on 8 September and was absorbed within the British contingent of the international field force, with their quarters at Tientsin. By this stage, however, most of the fighting was already over. Troops of the eight participating powers had landed on the China coast in mid-June, captured Tientsin a month later, and relieved the besieged diplomatic missions in the capital a month after that—whereupon military resistance from the Boxers quickly dissipated. Not until a fortnight after their arrival did the


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New South Wales Imperial Bushmen in action in the vicinity of Ottoshoop, western Transvaal, in September 1900. Source: Australian War Memorial 4281 All that remained in 1984 of the Peitang fort which Australians were sent to attack in September 1900; the main building was blown up by Chinese Nationalist troops in 1949. Source: Bob Nicholls


Australians have any prospect of seeing action. On 24 September, 300 men of the brigade (150 from each colony) formed part of a four-nation force of 8,000 men—1,500 provided by Britain—which was ordered to move against the Chinese fort at Peitang. Moving initially by lighter down the waterways towards the coast, the next day the Australians were obliged to travel the last 30 kilometres by foot. Urged on by the sounds of battle ahead and the sight of rising pillars of smoke, they covered the remaining distance in a gruelling forced march. All this effort proved wasted when, coming across a Russian field hospital at 6 p.m., they learnt that the Russians had gone ahead and

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September–November 1900 stormed the fort on their own an hour earlier. The only consolation to be had was that the Chinese had chosen not to hold the position in strength, but left a single four-man guncrew to delay the attackers; this they had achieved, at the cost of their lives, while the Russians suffered seven men killed and 30 wounded. During the following month the Victorians took part in a similar expedition to capture Pao-ting fu (now Baoding), the capital of Chihli Province situated about 115 kilometres south-west of Beijing. This also did not see any Australians come under fire, as on the force’s approach Chinese officials surrendered the city without offering any resistance. Thereafter the Australians filled only garrison duties at Beijing and Tientsin until their return home. Bob Nicholls (1986) Bluejackets and Boxers, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Bothaville, an action during the Second South African War, fought on 6 November 1900 around Doornkraal farm eight kilometres south of this town in the Orange Free State, between a Boer commando under General Christiaan de Wet and British forces commanded by Major-General C.E. Knox. During the previous afternoon, patrols from a mounted column led by Lieut.-Colonel P.W.J. Le Gallais had picked up the Boers’ trail some sixteen kilometres east of the town and began following it. On nearing the village (which had been destroyed during an earlier British visitation), the troops came under fire from Boer guns positioned south of the Valsch River. Approaching darkness, however, prevented any action to follow up the enemy more closely until the next day. Resuming their saddles at 4 a.m., Le Gallais’ troops crossed the river and were steadily advancing south when at 5.30 a.m. the leading element stumbled across a Boer picket of five men fast asleep; these were captured, without a shot being fired. Realising that the enemy laager (camp) was


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close by, the officer in command despatched a message for the column’s guns to be sent forward before leading the 70 men with him forward at the gallop to a low hill to their right front. On gaining this ground, the main Boer camp was found to lie no more than 300 metres beyond. Immediately taking up position along the crest, the troops opened a rapid fire with their magazine rifles into the sleeping laager, taking its occupants completely by surprise. The majority of the Boers made no resistance but simply leapt upon the nearest available horses and fled, among them de Wet and President M.J. Steyn. Some 130 of the enemy were unable to find mounts, however, and took shelter behind the low stone wall of the farm’s garden in an attempt to defend their own guns and camp equipment. The arrival of additional troops soon brought the number on the British side up to about 170, but this was none too many when de Wet began rallying his men who had escaped the commencement of the attack and began harrying the British flanks. A four-hour engagement followed, which only ended when Knox reached the scene at the head of another mounted column commanded by Lieut.-Colonel H.B. De Lisle which included the New South Wales Mounted Rifles under Colonel G.C. Knight and West Australian Mounted Infantry. The New South Wales men were posted on the British left, while the West Australians were sent to the right to engage the Boer defenders of the garden and laager from the north. When De Lisle’s last reserve—80 men of the WAMI under Lieut. H.F. Darling— were brought up at 9.30 a.m., these were ordered to join with men of the British 5th Mounted Infantry in charging the enemy position with the bayonet. According to The Times History: ‘But at the first flash of the steel a white flag went fluttering up, and amid the shouts of the victors, the Boers held up their hands and surrendered’. The Boers had lost at least seventeen men

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killed in the action, along with 114 taken prisoner (of whom seventeen were wounded); British losses amounted to 38 killed and wounded, among them Le Gallais who died of wounds that night. Serious losses of materiel had also been inflicted on the enemy, including six field-guns, a Maxim and a pom-pom, all de Wet’s wagons carrying gun and small-arm ammunition as well as clothing and other supplies. Despite this de Wet remained in the field, and within a fortnight struck back at the British at the head of 1,500 burghers. L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.5 (1907), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Rhenoster Kop, an action during the Second South African War, fought on 29 November 1900 about 32 kilometres east of Pretoria. A British column commanded by Major-General A. Paget, comprising two infantry battalions, nine guns and a mounted brigade which included Australian Bushmen (from Queensland, Tasmania and Victoria) and New Zealand Mounted Rifles, attacked a 1,200-strong commando with two guns led by General Ben Viljoen which had been harassing the railway line to Delagoa Bay. Although numerically weaker, the Boer main body of 650 men occupied a strong defensive position atop a crescent-shaped line of kopjes (hills) covered with rocks and small bushes. The feature—known generally as Rhenoster Kop after the highest point on the south-western end—gave a commanding view of the northern approach over a wide open slope, while deep ravines on both flanks restricted the scope for attacks from these quarters. Paget marched out at 4 a.m. to begin the action with a frontal infantry assault across hundreds of metres of flat grassy ground against the Boers’ left and centre. This movement was soon stalled by the enemy’s


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fire. On the infantry’s left, the Queenslanders and New Zealanders also went into action in a dismounted role—the latter reaching within 400 metres of Boer positions. At the far end of this flank were the Victorians and West Australians, who advanced on foot under the covering fire of a British field battery. This enabled them to secure a rocky ridge opposite the far right end of the enemy’s line, but they were prevented from making further progress by deep ravines across their front; the bulk of the Bushmen were—like the rest of the British force engaged along a front of more than six kilometres—pinned down on the open veldt. The stalemate which had been reached by 7.30 a.m. lasted for the next twelve hours, with the attacking troops forced to remain in their exposed positions under a glaring hot sun while suffering great thirst. At 7 p.m. part of the Boer force under Vecht-General C.H. Müller launched an unsuccessful hour-long counter-attack against the New Zealanders, whose gains were closest to the enemy. Thereafter the troops worked under the cover of darkness to begin digging trenches, aiming to make their positions more secure when the fight resumed next morning. This effort proved to be pointless, as when dawn arrived it was found that the Boers had abandoned the fight and safely withdrawn. In this action—the last pitched battle of its kind during the war—the Boers had suffered 31 casualties and a few men captured, compared to British losses totalling 85 (30 of whom were among the mounted troops). L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.5 (1907), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.3 (1908), London: Hurst & Blackett; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Wolvekuil Kopjes, an action fought on 14 February 1901, during the guerilla phase of the Second South African War, as a result of

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November 1900–February 1901 British attempts to capture the 1,400-strong Boer commando led by General Christiaan de Wet into central Cape Colony from the south of the Orange Free State. On 12 February de Wet failed in an attempt to obtain supplies by raiding Philipstown, 68 kilometres north-west of Colesberg. He was subsequently pursued by a column of nearly 1,100 mounted troops—mainly Australians (from Queensland, Tasmania, Victoria and Western Australia) and New Zealanders— with eight guns and a pom-pom gun, formed into two corps with the whole commanded by Brigadier-General Herbert Plumer, which had been sent south from the Transvaal to help deal with the incursion. Plumer’s force followed de Wet in torrential rain until able to force the Boers to fight a rearguard action at Wolvekuil Kopjes, 32 kilometres north of Philipstown, two days later. The British attack began at 8.45 a.m. with an advance by two squadrons of King’s Dragoon Guards against a salient hill in the Boer’s left centre. This movement was unsupported, and resulted in the party being surrounded and captured. The corps led by Lieut.-Colonel Cradock, composed almost entirely of Australians and New Zealanders, was next sent to attack the enemy right. After a ‘very dashing assault’, during which 23 casualties were sustained, the Boer flank was turned and de Wet forced to abandon the position. Further rainstorms hindered the British effort to bring his flight to a standstill. L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.5 (1907), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Hartebeestfontein, an action fought on 18 February 1901 (during the Second South African War) about 25 kilometres north-west of Klerksdorp in western Transvaal. On receiving information on the 17th that scattered bands of Boers from several


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commandos were concentrating on the village of Hartebeestfontein, Lieut.-General Lord Methuen moved out to attack them with a column of 900 men which included Victorian Bushmen. He was not aware until he approached the enemy position, occupying the Cyferlaagte ridge north of the town, that the burghers originally reported there had been reinforced by a roving force under General J.H. De la Rey and now numbered 1,300—1,400 men. Undeterred by his inferior strength, Methuen resolved to press ahead with his planned attack. The assault which was begun at 8 a.m. initially made no impression on the Boer defence, even after reinforcements (including the Victorians) were sent to bolster the pressure applied against the enemy’s right flank. At 11 a.m. De la Rey made a counter-attack against the British left which was also unsuccessful. Later that afternoon he decided to abandon his positions, leaving eighteen dead on the field. The sharp little action had cost Methuen 49 casualties, three of the dead and eleven of the wounded being Victorians. A month later, the area around Hartebeestfontein was the scene of further clashes between two British columns pursuing De la Rey, after the latter had staged a raid on Lichtenburg in the north on 3 March. A party of New Zealanders and Australian Bushmen from the column led by Major-General J.M. Babington reportedly fought an action on 21 March which was notable for entailing an ‘old-fashioned cavalry charge’ which forced the Boers to flee in terror. While details of this incident are difficult to verify, the New Zealanders and Bushmen undoubtedly played a leading role in chasing down De la Rey’s Boer wagon train three days later at Wildfontein, taking 140 prisoners, several guns and large quantities of rifles and ammunition. L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.5 (1907), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; John Stirling

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(1907) The Colonials in South Africa, 1899–1902, Edinburgh: W. Blackwood & Sons; M.H. Grant, History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.4 (1910), London: Hurst & Blackett; L.M. Field (1979) The Forgotten War, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Grobelaar Recht, near Carolina in the eastern Transvaal, was the scene of a severe engagement on 15 May 1901 involving Boers and a British column commanded by Lieut.-General Sir Bindon Blood which included the Fifth and Sixth West Australian Mounted Infantry contingents. During this action the WAMI lost five men killed (one account says seven) and eight wounded, one of whom later died. The fighting continued next day near Brakpan, at one stage during which the British right flank was forced to retire. Withdrawing under heavy fire, Lieut. Frederick Bell of the Sixth WAMI contingent noticed a wounded man without a horse and returned to take him up behind him. The horse collapsed under their combined weight, whereupon Bell sent the man back on the horse alone and covered his escape by rifle-fire until he was out of danger. For this action Bell was awarded the Victoria Cross. R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Wilmansrust, a humiliating disaster suffered by a portion of the 5th Victorian Mounted Rifles (5 VMR) on 12 June 1901 in the eastern Transvaal, during the Second South African (or Boer) War. Since arriving the previous March, the Victorian regiment had been divided into two battalions and British officers placed over the unit’s own commanders. While containing a leavening of officers and men with military training, including some veterans of earlier contingents who were on a second tour, the great majority of its members were civilian recruits. In just two months the regiment’s strength had also been heavily reduced by sickness, from over 1,000 to little more than


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700—a proportionately far higher rate than experienced in other Australian contingents. On 10 June a column led by MajorGeneral Stuart Beatson, an Indian Army regular, arrived at Olifant’s River 40 kilometres south-west of Middelberg. Here Beatson sent off a flying column, comprising 270 men of the 2nd Battalion, 5 VMR, with two Vickers-Maxim quick-firing guns (popularly known as pom-poms) mounted in Cape carts, to look for a small Boer force reportedly at Boschmansfontein, 40 kilometres to the east. While Major William McKnight was the senior Victorian officer present, the detachment—totalling about 350 men—was under the command of Major Morris, a British artillery officer who had arrived from India with Beatson. After finding that the Boers had already evacuated their camp, Morris began making his way back to rejoin the main body. At about 5 p.m. on 12 June, while still some eighteen kilometres east of Beatson, Morris established a night bivouac on the Middelburg–Ermelo road close to a farm named Wilmansrust. The camp was sited on a slight rise about 100 metres square, with a steep-sided gully all round, and overlooked by higher hills at a distance. The guns were sited in the centre, most of the horses tethered down one side, and the mule wagons secured in the farm’s cattle-kraal nearby which had strong stone walls 1.5 metres high. Outlying picket posts were established by Morris’ adjutant, another British artillery officer. The largest post—comprising an officer and 30 men—occupied a small hill about 1,500 metres to the south-east of the camp. In all, including a party of a dozen men posted within the kraal, some 70 of the camp’s personnel were nominally on guard duty at any one time. (The Times History of the War in South Africa gives a figure of 120, but other accounts contradict this.) The posts, however, were too few in number and spaced too widely apart to effectively provide

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May–June 1901

The disaster which befell the Victorian Mounted Rifles at Wilmansrust, as drawn by English battle artist R. Caton Woodville. This illustration was reproduced in several British war histories, in one with the caption ‘The Australians dropped like rabbits’.

advance warning. Moreover, they had been positioned during daylight hours when their location was easily noted—both by local Boers and a group of General Ben Viljoen’s commando who had been shadowing the column throughout the day at a distance of about two kilometres and frequently engaging in sniping. Having observed the camp’s disposition and security arrangements, the trailing force of Boers—numbering about 150 men under Vecht-General C.H. Müller—decided to attack. Leaving 30 men with their horses, the Boers were guided through the darkness by the farm’s owner along a slight depression between the hills and reached the foot of the camp without being detected. Their approach was also apparently aided by coinciding with the replacement of the personnel manning the daytime observation posts with the night pickets at about 7 p.m., the noises of this changeover having cloaked the enemy movement. By 7.30 p.m. the camp was at rest, the


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troopers having settled down to sleep or read mail just received from Australia. Despite the known proximity of an enemy force, the VMR’s weapons were neatly stacked in piles near where they slept, rather than right alongside them. This was allegedly at Morris’ order, in compliance with drill regulations which were rarely observed during operations on the veldt. The 120 Boers, advancing in extended line, got to within 40 metres of the front of the camp before a whistle blast at 7.45 p.m. signalled the attack. The first Boer volley, fired from the hip as the attackers ran forward, turned the surprised camp into a shambles. Many horses were killed or wounded in this opening fusillade, but the rest stampeded and knocked down men and tents. Some of the VMR reached their rifles but were shot down before they could use them. The fight was over in less than ten minutes, leaving at least fourteen Australians killed and 42 wounded (some accounts refer to eighteen dead and as many as 60 wounded). About 50 men

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evaded capture by fleeing into the darkness, but the remainder of the camp’s occupants were taken prisoner. Taking up lanterns, the Boers collected their own casualties (claimed by McKnight to number ten dead and 30 wounded) then began looting the camp of its two prized guns, plus the Victorians’ rifles, ammunition and stores. Since they did not have the facilities to hold prisoners, the Boers marched their captives nearly two kilometres out onto the veldt and simply released them before themselves making off. They took with them, too, over 100 of the column’s horses, all that had not been killed or broken loose and bolted. Throughout this, the outlying pickets made no attempt at intervention, although their combined numbers nearly matched the remaining Boer strength. The action at Wilmansrust was the most serious reverse to befall any overseas colonial force sent to the conflict in South Africa, and unfortunately was taken as an indictment of the courage and soldierly qualities of Australian contingents generally. There was no denying that a deplorable lack of vigilance and attention to security had been displayed—although the responsibility for this rested squarely on an Imperial and not an Australian officer. Moreover, when the Boer attack began, the camp was overtaken by a mass panic which defied commanders’ efforts to rally the men. Compounding the serious embarrassment engendered by the affair back in Australia was news which became public late in September that three members of 5 VMR had been tried at court martial for inciting mutiny, found guilty, and sentenced to death; these sentences had been subsequently commuted to gaol terms, however, and the men were already in military prisons back in England. Outrage at the secrecy surrounding these proceedings—of which the new federal government was initially ignorant—was fuelled by further press reports that the mutineers had actually been provoked by


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the ‘hostile and offensive attitude’ shown by General Beatson, who had referred to the defenders of Wilmansrust as ‘a lot of white-livered curs’ and uttered other grossly disparaging remarks. These revelations caused debate to refocus on the competence of Imperial officers to command irregular corps, and raised concerns over the situation where Australian soldiers were subject to British military justice—an issue which was a foretaste of the controversy soon engendered by the executions of two other Australians, lieutenants P.J. Handcock and H.H. Morant, in February 1902. In the case of the Wilmansrust mutineers, there was a happier outcome. A review of the court martial discovered flaws in the trial proceedings (the charges having been laid under the wrong sections of the Army Act) and the War Office consequently quashed the convictions on 26 October. The men were immediately released from prison and returned to Australia by the end of the year, albeit still under a cloud of ignominy. Gavin Souter (1976) Lion and Kangaroo, Sydney: William Collins; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service; L.M. Field (1979) The Forgotten War, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Grootvallier (also known as Grootvlei), an action during the Second South African War, fought on 1 August 1901 near the Vaal River in the north-west Orange Free State. A detachment from a British column commanded by Lieut.-Colonel H.B. De Lisle, comprising 200 South Australians led by a British officer, Major J.S.M. Shea, succeeded in locating a night laager (camp) being used by a Boer commando on a farm. Unknown to the British, this camp actually contained the noted enemy general, J.C. Smuts, who was resting while attempting to evade an extensive drive which the British commander-in-chief, General Lord Kitchener, had launched on 29 July. After a silent approach and stealthy

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June–October 1901 reconnaissance, the Australians prepared to assault the enemy position after dark. When they attempted to gallop in on the laager from three sides, however, they met an unexpected obstacle in the form of wire fences and were forced to dismount and rush forward on foot ‘with bayonets fixed’. This delay enabled nearly all of the camp’s 300 occupants (including Smuts) to escape. Nonetheless six Boers were killed in the hand-to-hand fighting which raged at the farmhouse, and twelve prisoners (including two officers) were captured along with a large number of horses. The Australians’ losses were just two men wounded, though Shea’s Indian orderly was killed while riding behind him. The incident was significant enough that several participants were mentioned in Kitchener’s despatches and one man was awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal. L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.5 (1907), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; M.H. Grant, History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.4 (1910), London: Hurst & Blackett; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Bakenlaagte, an action during the Second South African War, fought on 30 October 1901 some 35 kilometres north-west of Bethal in eastern Transvaal, in which Boers attacked and crippled a British column commanded by Lieut.-Colonel G.E. Benson. The column, comprising 600 infantry, 800 mounted infantry (including several squadrons of Scottish Horse, which had been partially raised in Victoria) and 300 wagons, had paused on 28 October at Zwakfontein, 24 kilometres from Bethal. Low supplies prompted Benson to make for Brugspruit on the Delagoa Bay railway, setting off at 4.30 a.m. on the 30th across the open veldt that was still soggy after heavy rain the day before. By 8 a.m. the column came under heavy sniping fire from 500 Boers of the Bethal commando under their commandant, H.S. Grobler, and under this harassment


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and accompanied by cold wind-driven rain showers the advance continued. At about 1 p.m. another commando of 500 burghers arrived under General Louis Botha after a forced ride from near Ermelo. This additional force immediately placed the British rearguard under severe pressure, forcing Benson to return from the main body at the head of two squadrons of Scottish Horse totalling just 96 men (nearly all of them Australians). Realising the gravity of the situation, he ordered a defensive position be taken up on a bare ridge some two kilometres short of where the main body had stopped to establish a new camp. Two 15-pounder guns occupied the centre of the ridge, with mounted infantry and an infantry company hastily adopting posts at some distance on each flank; the 64 gunners crewing the guns were protected by the Scottish Horse and the 30 members of their original escort, making a total of 190 men on what became known as Gun Hill. The Boers concentrated their fire on the guns and within minutes had accounted for all but three of the men manning them. They then charged forward, before dismounting in an area of dead ground just 40 metres in front. Two companies of infantry sent to relieve this pressure failed to reach a position from which they could intervene before the end of the Boer assault came. The enemy simply rose in lines and fired from where they stood, then swept forward to seize the hill from the few defenders still capable of resisting. Despite the efforts of other British guns in the main camp to prevent the Boers carrying away the two 15-pounders, once darkness came these weapons were quickly removed. The Boers also took anything of value from their prisoners, and even from the dead and wounded, leaving most of the British casualties stripped naked on the ground. British losses in the action totalled 238 killed and wounded, and another 120 taken prisoner—about a quarter of the column’s

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Bakenlaagte Farm Camp

Nooitgedact Farm

Scottish Horse

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original strength—while Boer casualties were reportedly about 190, including 60 killed. British losses were worse on Gun Hill, where the defence was practically annihilated; only seventeen of the 190 troops there got away unwounded. Of the Scottish Horse, 33 were killed and another 57 were wounded. Also among the wounded was Benson, who died from his injuries the following morning. The rest of the column remained holed up in the main camp, and succeeded in beating off a night attack after hastily digging trenches and throwing out barbed wire defences. Their position was relieved on the morning of 1 November by the arrival of a column which comprised 700 mounted infantry (including some South Australians) who had made a forced ride of nearly 90 kilometres from Standerton. Although the battle became known as Bakenlaagte after a Boer farm in the vicinity,


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Gun Hill

Kruismentfontein Farm the position of the main camp was actually at the junction of the boundaries with two other farms—Schaapkraal and Nooitgedacht—and the action at Gun Hill took place wholly on land within the latter. While the Scottish Horse was a unit privately raised by the Marquis of Tullibardine, and the Victorians in it were not members of an official contingent of the colonial government, the disaster suffered at Gun Hill was later commemorated by a memorial erected by the Victorian government at Primrose near Germiston, about ten kilometres east of Johannesburg. John Bufton (1905) Tasmanians in the Transvaal War, Hobart: S.G. Loone; L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899– 1902, vol.5 (1907), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

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October 1901–January 1902 Onverwacht, an action fought on 4 January 1902 (during the closing stages of the Second South African War), in south-eastern Transvaal about 30 kilometres east of Ermelo. The engagement arose from British efforts to end the activities of a 750-man force led by the Boer commander-in-chief, General Louis Botha. On New Year’s Day three mounted columns were sent out from Ermelo in an attempt to pin the enemy against another British column operating along the border with Swaziland. On 3 January the column commanded by Brigadier-General Herbert Plumer suffered an embarrassing minor reverse when New Zealanders forming the advance guard were mauled by the enemy, suffering 28 men captured along with several casualties. The next day the Boers succeeded in ambushing one of the two corps comprising Plumer’s column—that led by Major J.M. Vallentin (a British officer), comprising 110 men of the 5th Queensland Imperial Bushmen under Major Frederick Toll along with British mounted troops. After posting part of his command on the main ridge of a group of kopjes (hills) known as Bankkop, there to wait for the arrival of Plumer and the main body, Vallentin took the rest of his corps forward to the next high ground comprising a line of hills called Onverwacht. Riding in advance of this new position with a party, Vallentin was suddenly attacked by a force of 300 Boers who had been waiting concealed in a deep hollow. These pursued Vallentin and his men back to the Onverwacht ridge and immediately forced the entire column to defend its ground. With their numbers swelling to more than 500, the Boers made a determined push to capture the Maxim quick-fire gun (known as a pom-pom) accompanying the corps and prevented its escape by shooting down the horses which pulled it. The gun was pushed into a gully, and the Queenslanders and Hampshire Mounted Infantry defending the weapon were forced to retire. Major Toll led


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his men back from the main ridge on foot, losing one small detachment to enemy capture after all except three men in the group were wounded. Under Vallentin’s orders the Queenslanders and Hampshire then attempted to make a last stand on a confined knob of a small ridge which was practically devoid of cover. Assaults on this position by the Boers twice came to within 30 metres and several enemy were shot down just ten metres in front. After the enemy succeeded in getting in the rear of the knob and effectively isolating it, leaving the defenders subjected to heavy fire on all sides at a range of less than 50 metres, continued resistance became useless. The Boers rushed in to make prisoners of the 70 who remained uninjured, and to take possession of weapons and anything else of use to them. Clothing, including boots, were stripped from the prisoners and even from the dead and wounded. With Plumer’s main body fast approaching, the burghers did not linger for long, but promptly turned loose their captives as they made off with their spoils—using 30 captured horses to carry away this material and their dead and wounded. Fortunately, the pom-pom gun was not part of the booty removed by the departing enemy; this was retrieved by men of the 5th Victorian Mounted Rifles who arrived on the scene, and taken to a new defensive position. Although a pursuit was mounted under the direction of Major Harry Vialls, a West Australian, the Boers made good their escape and were not again engaged. They had lost at least nine men killed (including their leader, Commandant Oppermann), whereas the British column had suffered 65 casualties (29 dead, 45 wounded). Major Vallentin was among the dead. The Queenslanders alone had thirteen men killed and seventeen wounded. Despite the humiliation of this reverse, which demonstrated the military capabilities of the Boers into the war’s very last stages, Plumer was satisfied that no

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Kabakaul Bay

Au ad stra va lia nc n e

To Herbertshöhe (3 Germans, 20 Natives)

N (9 o. 1 20 Ge tre N rm nch at an iv s, es )

Bitapaka, the only significant action arising from the Australian seizure of German New Guinea at the start of the First World War, was fought on 11 September 1914 south of Kabakaul on the north-east coastline of the Gazelle Peninsula, New Britain. At dawn that day a joint army–navy contingent (the Australian Naval & Military Expeditionary Force, or AN&MEF) arrived off Rabaul in ships of the Australian fleet commanded by Rear-Admiral George Patey, to demand the German colony’s surrender. Meanwhile, a 25-man party of naval reservists (with about fifteen others who were to provide medical support and maintain communications) was landed at Kabakaul with orders to capture a radio station believed to be in operation at Bitapaka, seven kilometres to the south. At about 9 a.m., as the Australians pushed inland following a jungle-edged road, two scouts surprised an enemy party of about twenty Melanesian soldiers led by three Germans apparently setting an ambush. They opened fire, wounding one of the Germans and scattering the rest. In addition to the wounded man who surrendered, the other two Germans were soon afterwards captured (one of whom turned out to be the captain commanding the Bitapaka section of the German forces). Reinforcements were called up from the beach at the same time as the advance was resumed. The Australians had only gone some 500 metres when they came under fire from a strongly held trench dug across the road. Joined here by about

No. 2 trench (3 Germans, 20 Natives)

No. 3 trench radio stn Police Barracks

L.S. Amery (ed.) The Times History of the War in South Africa 1899–1902, vol.5 (1907), London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co.; P.L. Murray (1911) Official Records of the Australian Military Contingents to the War in South Africa, Melbourne: Government Printer; R.L. Wallace (1976) The Australians at the Boer War, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

50 more men from the ships, a flanking attack was launched under Lieut.-Commander Charles Elwell shortly after 1 p.m. which caused a white flag to be raised by the trench’s defenders and terms of surrender requested. To this point the Australians had suffered Elwell and three men killed, and five others wounded (two fatally). Accompanied by two Germans from the captured trench to serve as interpreters, the Australians proceeded along the road carrying a flag of truce. The Germans persuaded the garrisons of three more trench obstacles to surrender also—though not before a brisk skirmish took place at the last of these in which three Australians were wounded (one fatally) and one of the interpreters and several Melanesian soldiers killed. Another group of German-led Melanesians was encountered and disarmed before the radio station was reached about 7 p.m. This was found to have been abandoned, the mast dropped but its instruments and machinery intact. The

(12 Germans, 80 Natives)

blame attached to the Queenslanders and pointedly commended Toll for his leadership while recommending several of the Australians for gallantry awards.

(8 Germans, 20 Natives)

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September–November 1914 AN&MEF personnel killed during the day’s fighting were the first Australians to fall in the First World War. Although successful, the operation could scarcely be rated as well managed. The Australian advance had been effectively delayed by a half-trained force of native police and plantation labourers, and this opposition had been overcome only at a cost of seven officers and men killed or died of wounds and five wounded; some Germans present later claimed that two of the Australian fatalities had been shot by their own side in the confused engagement. Against this, Bitapaka’s defenders had suffered one German NCO and about 30 Melanesians killed, and one German and ten Melanesians wounded. It has been claimed that the heavy losses among the Melanesian troops were the result of the Australian practice of bayoneting all those that fell into their hands during the fighting. S.S. Mackenzie (1927) The Australians at Rabaul, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; Hermann Joseph Hiery (1995) The Neglected War, Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press

Cocos Islands, the first engagement fought by a warship of the Royal Australian Navy, occurred on 9 November 1914 off this British-ruled group of 27 small coral islands situated in the Indian Ocean 2,800 kilometres north-west of Perth, Western Australia. The action came about after the light cruiser Emden (3,600 tonnes), a unit of the German Pacific Squadron then enjoying a highly successful career raiding Allied shipping, anchored off Direction Island early on 9 November and sent ashore 43 officers and men to destroy the vital radio and cable station there which connected the Australian, African and Indian telegraph systems. Before this aim could be achieved, the staff of the station managed to send off warning messages of the presence of a ‘strange warship’. Unknown to the Emden’s commander, Captain Karl von Müller, a convoy of 38


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transports carrying the first contingents of Australian and New Zealand troops overseas was at that moment passing just 80 kilometres to the east, escorted by the Australian light cruisers Melbourne and Sydney (5,400 tonnes) and the powerful Japanese battle-cruiser Ibuki (10,000 tonnes). Until the previous day the convoy had been led by the British armoured cruiser Minotaur, but, after that vessel was called away to Mauritius, Melbourne (under Captain Mortimer Silver, RN) had taken over this role. On receipt of the signals from Cocos, Silver’s first instinct was to himself go and investigate. Appreciating his wider responsibility, however, at 7 a.m. he detached Sydney—which was, in any event, then posted on the convoy’s port side nearest to the reported trouble. He had to restrain Ibuki’s captain, Vice-Admiral Kato Kanji, who wished to accompany Sydney. As Sydney steamed westward at 20 knots, her smoke was spotted on the horizon by Emden soon after 9 a.m. At first von Müller thought this came from the collier, Buresk, which was supporting his operations, but less than fifteen minutes later he realised his mistake as what was plainly a British cruiser bore down on him from the north-east. Without waiting to collect the landing party ashore, he moved out to sea to gain room to manoeuvre and prepared for combat. On identifying the class of the enemy ship he had discovered, the commander of Sydney (Captain John Glossop, RN) consulted standard references on board and decided to close to 9,500 yards (8.7 kilometres) before engaging. He believed that this would place him just outside the range of his opponent’s 4.1-inch guns while bringing Emden fully under the fire of his own 6-inch armament. Unknown to him, however, was the fact that the mountings of the German’s guns had undergone elevation modifications which increased their range. No sooner had Glossop closed to 10,500

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yards (9.6 kilometres) and swung onto a parallel course at 9.40 a.m. than Emden opened fire at extreme range. The five shells of this first salvo passed over the top of Sydney but still splashed down within 200 metres of their target, and a hail of further rounds quickly followed. Von Müller had ordered rapid fire so that Emden was reportedly sending off a salvo every six seconds. At least fifteen shells thus found their mark on Sydney—although fortunately no more than five of these actually exploded. All the Australian cruiser’s casualties of four men killed and twelve wounded occurred during these first ten minutes of the action, before Glossop moved back out beyond his opponent’s reach. Initially hampered in returning effective fire through having both range-finders put out of action, Glossop used his superior speed of 27 knots (compared with Emden’s seventeen) to thwart any attempt to get close enough to torpedo him. Once Sydney’s shells began to find their mark, moreover, their effect was decisive, since each 6-inch shell weighed 45 kg (compared with the 17 kg of Emden’s shells) and Sydney eventually succeeded in landing about 100 of these hammer blows upon her lighter adversary. Soon the German vessel was totally wrecked, with its hull holed at numerous points, its superstructure a blazing shambles, half the crew disabled, and steering only possible using the screws. But the Emden continued to fight, with at least one gun still firing at 11 a.m. Realising the hopelessness of his position, von Müller chose to run his ship onto the reef at North Keeling Island to prevent it sinking with so many wounded on board. Once Emden was aground by 11.15 a.m., Glossop decided to go after the enemy’s supply ship, Buresk, which had been hovering on the edge of the action apparently looking for an opportunity to ram him. When the collier was eventually overtaken shortly after noon, a prize crew put on board discovered


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that the German crew had already taken measures to sink the ship and it was beyond saving. On returning to Emden’s shattered remains at 4 p.m., Glossop found the enemy ship still flying its battle ensign. After demands to surrender were ignored, he considered that von Müller was declaring an intention to continue resistance by whatever means was still open to him; he accordingly ordered a further two salvos fired into the wreck. Only then was the white flag raised and the German colours hauled down. There was later some criticism of Glossop’s action at this point, which inevitably caused needless casualties, but there was no doubting that he behaved correctly according to the usages of naval warfare. Even now, Sydney was unable to move directly to the aid of Emden’s surviving crew, since there was still the group of Germans ashore on Direction Island to be dealt with. It was subsequently discovered that this party had commandeered a schooner during the action and managed to sail away in the dusk; after an adventurous journey, they managed to reach Arabia and eventually made their way back to Germany. Not until late on 10 November was Sydney finally able to render medical assistance to the 190 of Emden’s officers and men who had survived the fight, 65 of whom were wounded; eight officers and 126 other ranks had been killed, twenty of them during the final two salvos. After transhipping the survivors into Sydney, Glossop made for Colombo to rejoin the convoy. Despite the immense and widespread jubilation at news of Emden’s destruction, and especially the fact that this had been achieved by a warship of Australia’s new navy, it had been a markedly one-sided contest. Interviewed shortly after the action, Glossop expressed his horror at what he saw of the effects of his fire on his opponent, declaring:

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November 1914

NORTH 10.50

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10.50 10.00

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VOS SAL

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Home Is.

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My God, what a sight! Her captain had been out of action ten minutes after the fight started from lyddite fumes, and everybody on board was demented . . . by shock, and fumes, and the roar of shells bursting among them. She was a shambles. Blood, guts, flesh, and uniforms were all scattered about. One of our shells had landed behind a gun shield, and had blown the whole gun-crew into one pulp. You couldn’t even tell how many men there had been. They must have had forty minutes of hell on that ship, . . . and the survivors were practically madmen.

In reality, Emden’s fate at Sydney’s hands was almost comparable to that which befell HMAS Yarra in a clash with Japanese cruisers 28 years later (see South of Java). Arthur W. Jose (1928) The Royal Australian Navy, 1914–1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; A.B. Paterson (1934) Happy Dispatches, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Broken Hill, an affray on 1 January 1915 caused by two Moslem men who raised the Turkish flag and began shooting at residents of this mining centre in western New South Wales. The men—both longtime residents of the district—were actually Afghans not Turks, though one (an ice-cream vendor) had at one time served in the Sultan’s army and reportedly remained fanatically devoted to Turkey’s cause in the First World War. The other was a former camel-driver who acted as the mullah (religious leader) of the local Moslem community. The first target attacked was a train of 40 open ore-trucks crowded with 1000 people on a holiday picnic to Silverton. Shortly after 10 a.m., as the train was heading west about three kilometres from the town, the two Afghans opened a heavy fire into the exposed passengers from a bank close beside the tramway. The three people killed and six wounded were of all ages, and both sexes. The train was not stopped until out of range, then the alarm was raised by telephone. Police and available troops, as well as some members of the local rifle club,


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were hurriedly assembled to begin a pursuit. In the meantime the two riflemen had gone to a cottage on the town’s outskirts and shot its elderly male resident, before retreating to a low rocky hill north of the town. A policeman who stumbled upon them here was wounded, but the two fugitives were now promptly surrounded. In the firefight which followed, lasting until after midday, one of the Afghans was killed and the other seriously wounded before capture. That night, a large group of outraged citizens gathered in the town centre. In the belief that local residents of German origin had instigated the attack and supplied the weapons used, this mob marched on the nearby German Club and burned the building down. Members of the crowd also decided on a similar demonstration against the Afghan camel camp situated beyond the town limits, but police prohibited a march en masse. When smaller parties eventually reached the camp they found it guarded by ten police and 50 armed soldiers. Rather than take on the inhabitants’ protectors (who were, in any event, the same men who had earlier subdued the two murderers), the crowd of intending avengers dispersed without any further disturbance. E. Scott (1938) Australia during the War, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; Brian Kennedy (1978) Silver, Sin, and Sixpenny Ale, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

First Wassa (also Wozzer or Wazzir), the appellation given to the first of two unheroic riots in the Haret el Wassa (the brothel quarter of Cairo, Egypt) involving troops from Australia and New Zealand. The initial incident occurred on 2 April 1915 (Good Friday), after units of the Australian & New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) received news that their period of training was at an end and that orders had been received for them to embark for long-awaited action. Causes of this disturbance reportedly lay in a desire to exact revenge for past grievances arising from dealings with the district’s

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January–April 1915 denizens—such as diluted liquor, exorbitant prices, and high rates of venereal infection— although wild rumours of stabbings of Anzac men by locals also appear to have played a part. Trouble began soon after 5 p.m. when soldiers began evicting whores and their pimps into the street, and tossing their possessions out after them. Bedding, furniture and clothing—even pianos—were thrown from windows of buildings several storeys high. These materials were piled in the road and set alight. The town picket, drawn from the Australian 9th Light Horse Regiment, came on the scene and tried to clear the men out of the houses being attacked. Five arrests were made, although the crowd—growing larger by the minute— refused to let these men be taken away, snatched rifles from some of the troopers and threw the weapons onto the fires, and succeed in freeing four of the prisoners. British military police (MPs) were summoned, about 30 arriving on horseback to choruses of abuse and a shower of stones and bottles. An ill-advised effort by the MPs to gain control by firing their pistols, supposedly over the rioters’ heads, resulted in the wounding of four men in the throng estimated at 2,000–3,000. This only served to further inflame matters, and forced the police to hastily withdraw. Efforts by the Egyptian fire brigade to douse the bonfires were also frustrated, its hose-lines being cut, its members manhandled (especially after they turned a hose onto the crowd), and the engine itself finally pushed into the flames. Left to themselves, the more unruly elements began to loot some shops and put the torch to a Greek tavern. Shortly after 7 p.m. a second fire engine arrived, this time under cavalry escort which exercised extreme tact, and the various fires were tackled while a still sizeable crowd looked on. Since the ‘Wassa’ was close by Shepheard’s Hotel, where the Anzac commander had his headquarters, armed troops had also been


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called out. After Lancashire Territorials (non-regular British troops who were popular with the colonials) were drawn across the road, the rioters wisely began to disperse and order was eventually restored by 10 p.m. A formal inquiry was convened the following day under Colonel Frederic Hughes, commander of the AIF’s 3rd Light Horse Brigade, to investigate the causes of the riot and establish responsibility for its outbreak. Many New Zealand officers attempted to disclaim that their men had played any part, although the evidence of their presence was quite conclusive—the officer leading the Australian picket was adamant that ‘New Zealanders predominated’. In any event, nine-tenths of those present had been merely spectators. Apportioning blame was next to impossible, however, with few of the 50 witnesses able (or willing) to provide precise information. As the number of men injured by the MPs’ bullets (three Australians and one New Zealander) was roughly in proportion to the size of the respective contingents, it could be said that the ‘honours’ were about equally shared. So too was the damages bill of £1,700. (See also Second Wassa.) Bill Gammage (1974) The Broken Years, Canberra: Australian National University Press; Suzanne Brugger (1980) Australians and Egypt 1914–1919, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press; Kevin Fewster, ‘The Wazza Riots, 1915’, Journal of the Australian War Memorial, no.4, April 1984

Anzac Cove, the name given to the stretch of Turkish coastline on the west coast of the Gallipoli Peninsula upon which the Australian & New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) made an invasion landing on 25 April 1915. The landing, and others by British and French forces further south, marked the start of an eight-month campaign aimed at seizing control of the Dardanelles, the 60-kilometre long strait connecting the Aegean Sea with the Sea of Marmara. Since this waterway was strategically of utmost importance as a naval route between the

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Mediterranean and the Black Sea, and also for the defence of the Turkish capital at Constantinople, the Allied incursion was fiercely (and ultimately successfully) resisted by the Turks. While the concept of the operation was sound, the Allies made the mistake of signalling their intention by using solely naval units to bombard the Turkish forts on the peninsula during February, then attempting to force the strait a month later. The latter effort failed disastrously, thus necessitating a military expedition. At the time of the preliminary bombardment the Dardanelles were only lightly held by two Turkish divisions, but by the time the landing forces arrived this number had risen to six— compared to the five divisions of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force commanded by General Sir Ian Hamilton. Added to the loss of surprise, planning and other arrangements for the landings were mostly inept and inadequate. The northern landing was assigned to the Anzacs under Lieut.-General Sir William Birdwood, whose force comprised the 1st Australian Division (Major-General William Bridges) and the New Zealand & Australian Division (Major-General Sir Alexander Godley). Once ashore, Birdwood’s task was to press inland and sever the Turks’ lines of communication with their forces further south. Bridges’ division was ordered to land first, its objective being a sandy beach north of Gaba Tepe. When the flotilla of lighters and rowing boats began taking ashore the first wave of troops from the transport ships shortly after 4 a.m., however, unsuspected currents swept these craft nearly two kilometres northwards. The covering force was accordingly deposited on more difficult terrain on either side of the headland of Ari Burnu. While this greatly increased the difficulties of the landing, it actually meant the invaders encountered lighter resistance at first than would have been the case had they reached their designated beach.


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The scene in Anzac Cove at about 10.30 a.m. on the day of the landing. Source: Australian War Memorial A834

Four hours after the initial landing, a significant portion of the Australian division was safely ashore and the leading elements were pushing inland through dense scrub amid a maze of steep ridges and narrow gullies. Their advance was cut short when the local Turkish commander, Mustafa Kemal (later known as Kemal Attatürk), rallied his troops in time to seize the crucially important Chunuk Bair and Sari Bair ridges. The Australian failure to take these dominating heights on the first day meant that the beach-head gained was successfully contained by the enemy to a triangular area of about 160 hectares within a perimeter of less than two kilometres; a similar fate met the British landings at Cape Helles. Although both Bridges and Godley argued for the Anzac troops to be immediately re-embarked, this advice was refused. A prolonged siege followed, during which both sides struggled to gain advantage (see Baby 700). A general

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April 1915 Turkish assault on 19 May, undertaken by four divisions totalling 42,000 men, resulted in 10,000 enemy casualties—roughly 3,000 of whom were killed. Notwithstanding a second British landing aimed at expanding the original beach-head, undertaken in August at Suvla Bay six kilometres north of Anzac (see Lone Pine, The Nek and Hill 971), the stalemate continued. On 19–20 December the Allied garrison of Anzac and Suvla was evacuated without loss in a brilliantly executed secret operation, followed by that at Helles on 8 January 1916. The Gallipoli campaign had been a costly failure, claiming 180,000 casualties out of the 480,000 Allied troops committed to the fighting; no precise figure is available for the Turks, but their losses were probably about 220,000. Some 50,000 Australians served at Anzac, and of these more than 26,000 became casualties (some sources say 27,500) including nearly 8,000 killed or died of wounds or disease. In Australia, the experience of Anzac took on a powerful nationalist meaning from 1916, embodied ever since in annual commemoration of the landing anniversary as ‘Anzac Day’. C.E.W. Bean The Story of Anzac, vol.1 (1921) & vol.2 (1924), Sydney: Angus & Robertson; John Robertson (1990) Anzac and Empire, Melbourne: Hamlyn Australia

Sea of Marmara, a naval episode on 25–30 April 1915 in which the Australian submarine AE2 succeeded in penetrating Turkish defences and passing the length of the Dardanelles, the 60-kilometre channel linking the Sea of Marmara with the Aegean Sea, at the same time that an Allied expeditionary force was attempting to seize the Turkish land forts controlling the southern entrance to this strategic waterway (see Anzac). Two submarines (one French, one British) had previously been lost to the strait’s hazards which—apart from natural obstacles such as an unpredictable outward current which could render a submarine


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almost uncontrollable—included minefields, searchlights, shore batteries and naval patrols. If able to reach Chanak, on the eastern shore of the stretch known as the Narrows, the boat’s captain, Lieut.Commander Henry Stoker, RN, was ordered to ‘run amok generally’ by interfering with enemy shipping moving to support Turkish forces on the Gallipoli Peninsula. An initial attempt made during the early morning hours of 24 April turned into a false start, after damage sustained to a hydroplane shaft during a hurried dive forced the submarine to return to base at Tenedos (an island near the mouth of the Dardanelles). Repairs were carried out in time to enable a second attempt to be made at the same time the next day. Cruising slowly on the surface under cover of darkness, AE2 made its way into the entrance of the strait at 2.30 a.m. Two hours later, after about nine kilometres had been covered, the boat’s wash was spotted in the flat calm water by enemy lookouts on the north bank, a gun opened fire and it became necessary to dive. Stoker proceeded through the enemy minefields while still submerged, with tethering wires constantly scraping against the submarine’s hull. By 6 a.m., while approaching the Narrows off Chanak at periscope depth, the boat was engaged by gunfire from forts on both sides of the waterway, and by warships which attempted to ram it. AE2 sank a gunboat with a torpedo before again being forced to submerge during the rest of this critical part of the passage. Twice the vessel hit bottom and slid up on the bank, exposing part of its conning tower to enemy observation and fire, but the crew was able to extricate it on each occasion. When Stoker rose to periscope depth to check position a short time after the second grounding episode, he discovered that the Narrows were well behind but that AE2 was now at the centre of a flotilla of enemy craft which included destroyers and gunboats. At 8.30 a.m. he attempted to throw off his

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pursuers by lying submerged on the bottom, staying thus concealed until the movement of searching vessels overhead ceased during the early hours of the evening. After surfacing during the night to recharge batteries, by 9 a.m. the next day, 26 April, AE2 was able to complete its passage of the Dardanelles and gained the wider spaces of the Sea of Marmara. For the next four days AE2 remained at large within waters which then formed vital lines of internal communication for the Turks. It several times made torpedo attacks on vessels—both warships and freighters— which were encountered, although without succeeding in sinking any of these. The submarine was itself frequently forced to take evasive action against small enemy craft which attacked it, since it lacked a gun with which to defend itself. On the morning of 29 April AE2 was joined off Kara Burnu (at the western end of Artaki Bay) by E14, a British submarine commanded by Lieut.-Commander Edward Boyle, which had followed the Australian boat in making the difficult passage. An arrangement was made to rendezvous again at 10 a.m. the next day, before Stoker took his vessel to a bay north of Marmara Island where the night was spent resting on the bottom. When AE2 arrived at the rendezvous point the next morning, 30 April, it was approached by a torpedo-boat (Sultan Hissar) and forced to dive. At about 10.30 a.m. the submarine inexplicably lost trim, its nose suddenly rising to break the surface about 1.5 kilometres from its original pursuer and a gunboat which had come to its assistance. An attempt to dive became uncontrollable, and efforts to arrest what had become an alarming plummet only led to the submarine again bursting to the surface stern first. Enemy fire quickly holed the engine room, and with no ability to either resist or escape Stoker considered that he had no choice but to scuttle the vessel. After ordering his men onto the deck to be taken off by the Turkish


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torpedo-boat, he took action to flood AE2’s tanks and send it to the bottom in 55 fathoms some 5.5 kilometres north of Kara Burnu at 10.45 a.m. The twenty-man crew became prisoners of the Turks for the next three years. Although AE2 had caused little real damage before being sunk, its penetration of the Dardanelles was of immense psychological importance both for the Turks and the Allies—and notwithstanding that the feat was quickly duplicated by Boyle’s boat, and also E11 commanded by Lieut.-Commander Martin Nasmith. Although the next two submarines were far more effective in disrupting Turkish maritime traffic, the fact is that Stoker’s presence in the Sea of Marmara undoubtedly began that process. Strangely, though, while Boyle and Nasmith were both immediately awarded the Victoria Cross and promoted for their exploits, Stoker’s achievement was recognised with only the Distinguished Service Order, belatedly awarded in 1919. The success of AE2 in getting through had also played an indirect part in influencing the army operation at Gallipoli, being specifically mentioned on 26 April by General Sir Ian Hamilton, the commander of the army expedition, in refusing to countenance proposals from subordinates that his force should be immediately taken back off the peninsula. Although Hamilton had already made his decision to stay, the news of the Australian boat’s success helped to lighten the gloom of events immediately following the Gallipoli landing. Robert Rhodes James (1974) Gallipoli, London: Pan Books; T.R. Frame & G.J. Swinden (1990) First In, Last Out: The Navy at Gallipoli, Kenthurst, NSW: Kangaroo Press

Baby 700, a height at the extreme northeastern angle of the Allied beach-head gained at Anzac (q.v.) in April 1915, became the scene of a major attack by Australian and New Zealand troops on 2 May 1915. Because this feature—in many respects the key to the

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April–May 1915

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Anzac position—was in Turkish hands and enabled the enemy to dominate movement along the valley between the first and second line of ridges inland from the beach, the commander of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (Lieut.-General Sir William Birdwood) decided that it must be captured. He therefore ordered an attack by the New Zealand & Australian Division, with the Australian 4th Brigade (Colonel John Monash) climbing the southern slopes while the New Zealand Infantry Brigade scaled those on the western side, the movement of both brigades being preceded by a combined naval and artillery bombardment. While the Australians went forward at the appointed time of 7.15 p.m. with great gusto, the New Zealanders were delayed during their approach march and were not ready to attack until 90 minutes later. With a tremendous volume of enemy fire sweeping their unsupported left flank, the Australians became pinned down, and by the time the


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New Zealanders joined in they, too, could make no progress. Further efforts to carry out the plan were made during the night, but these proved futile. At dawn some British Marines were also pushed into the fight on the western slopes in a final useless attempt. No accurate tally of casualties was made (or was possible, particularly among the New Zealanders), but it is estimated that about 1,000 men were lost in this action. The effort was wholly in vain, as the crucial apex of Baby 700 stayed in enemy hands for the rest of the campaign. C.E.W. Bean (1921) The Story of Anzac, vol.1, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; Christopher Pugsley (1984) Gallipoli: The New Zealand Story, Auckland: Hodder & Stoughton

Krithia, a Greek village situated seven kilometres from the toe of the Gallipoli Peninsula at Cape Helles and lying at the base of the peak named Achi Baba, was on 8 May 1915 the scene of an attack undertaken by the Australian 2nd Infantry Brigade under Colonel James M’Cay. To assist British forces attempting to advance against growing Turkish opposition to the beach-head established there on 25 April, two brigades— the Australian 2nd and the New Zealand—were transferred from Anzac and brought ashore on 6 May. Both this day and the next the Anzac troops watched French and British forces attempt to advance across the open ground leading to Achi Baba, before the New Zealanders were added to the struggle on the morning of 8 May. When this latest attempt also gained little ground, yet another attack was ordered for 5.30 that same afternoon—this time with the Australians taking part in the centre. No advance warning of involvement was received in the brigade until shortly before 5 p.m. when the order arrived, at which time M’Cay was away visiting the New Zealanders and his men were preparing their evening meal. Despite this inadequate notice, the troops were in position to join in the assault, as required. After advancing over open ground

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The dead of the 2nd Brigade lie in no-man’s-land following the attack at Krithia on 8 May. Source: Australian War Memorial C1079

under fire to reach the leading trenches occupied by British soldiers, within minutes the Australians were called out from this shelter by their brigadier to continue the advance. Pressing on under increasingly heavy fire from enemy small arms and artillery, the Australians covered another 500 metres before being forced to a standstill by their losses. The leading Turkish positions could be observed only some 400 metres ahead, but the village of Krithia was still some 2,000 metres away. The hour-long advance entailed by this attempt had cost 2nd Brigade 1,000 casualties, or one-third of its strength. C.E.W. Bean (1924) The Story of Anzac, vol.2, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Kurna, fought between British and Turkish forces on the Tigris River, Mesopotamia (modern Iraq), on 31 May–1 June 1915. The 6th (Poona) Division of the Indian Army, commanded by Major-General Charles Townshend, undertook a risky frontal assault against the fortified Turkish position which— because of seasonal flooding—stood out of the river’s marshy flats like a string of islands.


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Because of this, Townshend was obliged to embark two of his infantry brigades in some 500 pole-propelled Arab barges called ‘bellums’, which had been armoured with captured steel railway plates. Supporting mountain guns and machine-guns were also mounted on rafts, while heavier artillery were placed aboard accompanying barges and steamers. The sight presented by this curious fleet subsequently caused the battle to be referred to as ‘Townshend’s Regatta’. The operation was a signal success which cost the Turks two gunboats sunk, and seventeen guns and 2,000 men taken as prisoners. Despite the elaborate nature of the works they had been occupying for five months, the bewildered defenders mostly fled after attempting ‘only the merest appearance at a fight’. The Turkish collapse was so dramatic that Townshend’s personal appearance in a gunboat at Amara (145 kilometres upstream) on 2 June was sufficient to bluff the garrison there into surrendering, too, without a shot being fired. The Australian involvement in the action was in the form of several pilots, members of the 45-man detachment of the Australian

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May–August 1915 Flying Corps serving with the composite unit known as ‘Mesopotamian Flight, Royal Flying Corps’. These partly crewed two aircraft which reconnoitred from a landing ground south of Kurna and brought vital and timely information to Townshend’s headquarters regarding the battle’s progress, including news on 1 June that the Turks were abandoning their main position at Bahran Island. They also dropped 20-pound aerial bombs on targets of opportunity and added to the confusion of the enemy’s withdrawal. F.M. Cutlack (1923) The Australian Flying Corps in the Western and Eastern Theatres of War 1914– 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; T.W. White (1928) Guests of the Unspeakable, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Second Wassa, the second riotous outbreak in the Haret el Wassa (the brothel quarter of Cairo, Egypt), occurred on 31 July 1915 before the departure of the AIF 2nd Division for the Gallipoli Peninsula. As with the First Wassa (q.v.), this incident also involved several thousand troops, nearly all Australians although a few British and New Zealand soldiers were present, and again its origins apparently lay in disagreements with some of the Wassa’s prostitutes. Here, too, matters were aggravated by the appearance of military police (MPs) and pickets, both British and Australian, and the fire brigade. MPs attempting to disperse the crowd were beaten back with rocks, bricks, bottles and other missiles, but eventually about 100 gained the upper hand by working their way along the street from both ends simultaneously. A special court of inquiry was convened on 3 August, and at least after this incident attempts were made to provide alternative recreational outlets for military personnel stationed in the Cairo area. The significance of the two riots is open to varying interpretations. The official historian, Charles Bean, saw little difference from ‘what at Oxford and Cambridge and in Australian universities is known as a “rag” ’,


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but for others such as Bill Gammage both incidents ‘betrayed some of the worst aspects of Australian character’. Bill Gammage (1974) The Broken Years, Canberra: Australian National University Press; Suzanne Brugger (1980) Australians and Egypt 1914–1919, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press; Kevin Fewster, ‘The Wazza Riots, 1915’, Journal of the Australian War Memorial, no.4, April 1984

Lone Pine, an action fought on the southern flank of the Anzac (q.v.) position at Gallipoli on 6–9 August 1915, which has become famous as a glorious débâcle. The operation was planned purely as a diversion aimed at drawing Turkish reserves away from a major attack to be launched from the northern end of the perimeter (see Hill 971). It involved the Australian 1st Brigade dashing across the lower half of a wide flat hump known as the 400 Plateau and seizing a network of trenches along its eastern edge. In preparation for the assault, the intended objective was pounded by slow artillery shoots at intervals over the preceding three days. At 4.30 p.m. on 6 August the rate of fire of the guns was increased, and an hour later the troops scrambled out of the trenches in which they had assembled and rushed forward with the setting sun behind them. They were virtually upon the enemy positions before the Turks were able to bring effective fire to bear, but only now discovered that the trenches were roofed over with pine logs which prevented their entry. While some began tearing at the logs to create openings through which to get at their opponents, the majority continued on past the main parapet to the open communication trenches in the rear. Most men jumped down into these and began fighting back towards the covered firing line, using mainly their bayonets to deal with the enemy garrison as they went. A few went on further still, until they stumbled into a depression known as the Cup which sheltered the enemy’s battalion headquarters and support units. Here they were stopped by Turkish troops who quickly

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Men of the 3rd Battalion pictured at 4 p.m. on 6 August while waiting for the start of the assault on Lone Pine. The white armbands and patches were to help distinguish friendly troops once darkness fell. Source: Australian War Memorial G1124

came up to hold this ground. While the attack had achieved its primary goal within half an hour of its commencement, the Australians now in possession of the main Turkish trench-line found themselves in a desperate struggle to maintain their hold. Parties of the troops quickly threw up sandbag barricades to block any enemy approach along communication trenches or continuations of the trenches they were manning. As darkness fell the Turks made their first attempt to push the Australians out using hand grenades, and this effort continued without relent for the next three days. So fierce was the fighting which followed that the 1st Brigade and the 3rd which reinforced it suffered 2,277 casualties; Turkish losses were claimed as 5,000. Seven Victoria Crosses were awarded for this battle. Even though the Australians still held the ground they had won when fighting here subsided on 10 August, in every other respect the battle was a disaster. Apart from being immensely costly as a feint, it had actually succeeded in drawing towards this sector of


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the line major Turkish reinforcements. But as soon as the enemy realised that these were not needed at Lone Pine they were readily at hand to deal with the main British attack as this developed—thereby helping to frustrate the overall plan behind the August offensive. C.E.W. Bean (1924) The Story of Anzac, vol.2, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

The Nek, a narrow saddle running east–west between the ridgeline known as Russell’s Top and Baby 700—the strongest position at Anzac (q.v.)—which was the scene of a tragic assault on 7 August 1915 by Australian lighthorsemen fighting as infantry. Passage over this strip of ground was barred by opposing Turkish and Australian trenches, which faced each other at distances varying from 20 to 60 metres; the edges of both firing lines fell away at each side to the valley floor 150 metres below. Behind the Turkish front-line, moreover, were eight more trenches rising in tiers to the summit of Baby 700, so that annihilating fire could be brought to bear upon any movement not

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August 1915 just from rifles but no fewer than five groups of machine-guns. In ordering a feint to be launched here at dawn the day after Lone Pine (q.v.), aimed at ensuring that Turkish attention continued to be focused on the main Anzac position rather than on activities underway further north (see Hill 971), British commanders were not unmindful of the futility of attacking ‘unaided’. The assault was therefore planned to proceed only after supporting movements had taken place, designed to silence some of the enemy machine-guns or draw off fire while the attack went in. In the event, these other operations either failed or were delayed, so that at the time designated for the attempt the 3rd Light Horse Brigade received no relief from any of them. To make matters worse, an intense artillery barrage that was to begin half an hour before the troops attacked at 4.30 a.m. was mistimed due to the synchronisation of watches having been overlooked. The barrage ended seven minutes earlier than expected, and the Turks were given ample opportunity to recover and re-occupy their parapets. Accordingly, when the first assault line of 150 men rose to the attack—the ground being so narrow that there was no room for more—most fell dead or wounded before they had covered ten metres under the withering fire directed at them. Three more waves were sent forward at intervals and each met the same fate. Since no-one in the later assault lines can have doubted the outcome, there were poignant scenes as men farewelled each other while they waited for the order to attack. By 5.15 a.m. some 300 men of the 8th and 10th Light Horse regiments lay in a huddled mass within an area no larger than a tennis court. In the words of the Official History: At first here and there a man raised his arm to the sky, or tried to drink from his waterbottle. But as the sun of that burning day climbed higher, such


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movement ceased. Over the whole summit the figures lay still in the quivering heat.

At most, the bold display by the lighthorsemen at the Nek may have impeded for a few hours—but did not prevent—the transfer of Turkish reinforcements towards Chunuk Bair, where the New Zealanders were also engaged in a desperate struggle. C.E.W. Bean (1924) The Story of Anzac, vol.2, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; Peter Burness (1996) The Nek, Kenthurst, NSW: Kangaroo Press

Hill 971, known to the Turks as Koja Chemen Tepe, was the chief objective of a British offensive launched at Gallipoli in August 1915 in conjunction with a second landing of troops at Suvla Bay, six kilometres north of Anzac (q.v.). The aim of the offensive was to seize the three main heights of the ridgeline (wrongly called ‘Sari Bair’ by the British) running north-east from the hill known as Baby 700 (q.v.), which formed the apex of Anzac itself—these being Chunuk Bair, Hill Q and Hill 971. Once these dominating peaks of the main range of the Gallipoli Peninsula had been captured, the British expected to be able to march directly to the Narrows of the Dardanelles waterway and achieve a decisive breakthrough in the campaign. The plan devised required that two columns of troops sally from the northern end of the Anzac beach-head on the night of 6 August and seize foothills which commanded routes to the summit of the range. Another two forces would then move through these and take the summits, before co-operating with attacks to be made from the old Anzac perimeter against Baby 700. A feint was ordered for 6 August at the southern end of the Anzac perimeter (see Lone Pine), to tie up Turkish reserves and keep them away from both the northern movements and the landing at Suvla. The British troops involved in the latter operation, undertaken primarily to secure a base at which stores could be laid down to provide

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for the Anzac position’s needs during the coming winter, were also ordered to aid the main attack in any way possible. Despite the high hopes held for this plan, its execution came apart in the incredibly rugged country to be traversed, due to inadequate maps and the confusion involved in moving at night through such terrain. While the covering force succeeded in clearing the foothills, delays put the march of the attacking columns behind schedule. The leading elements of the Australian 4th Brigade under Brigadier-General John Monash, which had furthest to go before getting into position to form the left attacking force to take Hill 971, were harried by constant contacts with small groups of the enemy. The arrival of dawn found Monash unsure of his position in a valley called Arghyl Dere, his men exhausted and the brigade still nowhere near its objective. The right column, comprising the 29th Indian Brigade and the New Zealand Infantry Brigade, had more luck and got almost to the top of Chunuk Bair. After both columns rested up on 7 August, a renewed push was made the next day. This saw the New Zealanders actually attain their objective, but Monash’s troops—ordered to seize a northern spurline known as Adbel Rahman Bair then move south along it to Hill 971— were caught in the open by well-sited Turkish machine-guns and driven back with great slaughter. On 9 August Gurkhas from the 29th Brigade had seized Hill Q as well. This was, however, as close as the plan came to success. The Gurkhas were shelled off their position by British warships which accidentally dropped a salvo short, and soon after the New Zealanders were relieved by British troops on 10 August a massive Turkish counter-attack wrested back control of Chunuk Bair. This was, effectively, the climax of the Gallipoli campaign, since once this vital ground was retaken by the Turks the Allies’ last and best chance of winning at Gallipoli was gone.


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C.E.W. Bean (1924) The Story of Anzac, vol.2, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Hill 60, a low rise on the north-western approaches to Hill 971 (q.v.), which on 21 and 27 August 1915 became the focus of several badly handled attacks which resulted in costly and confused fighting that marked the end of the last major offensive at Gallipoli. The operation was undertaken in an attempt to widen and strengthen the corridor of foreshore which connected newly landed British forces at Suvla Bay with the established beach-head at Anzac (q.v.). While elements of the Suvla force concentrated on seizing a detached foothill of the range behind that beach-head known as the ‘W Hills’, troops from the Anzac position were to capture Hill 60, a low rise on the north-western end of the foothills leading to Hill 971—thereby effectively enabling the two forces to link up. The first attempt made on 21 August enjoyed only mixed success. The W Hills were not taken, but to the south a mixed force of British, Indian, New Zealand and Australian troops (the latter men of the Australian 4th Brigade under Brigadier-General John Monash) managed to gain part of Hill 60 but not the cap of the rise which was well defended by trenches hastily dug by the Turks. In an attempt to press home the attack, a renewed effort against Hill 60 was made on 22 August using a battalion (18th) of the fresh Australian 5th Brigade, part of the 2nd Australian Division then in the process of transferring from Egypt. These were raw troops who were not up to dealing with such a hastily conceived and poorly arranged attack. Although the unit went bravely into action at dawn, it was gradually pushed back after half its strength became casualties—half of these being killed. A further attack was begun on the afternoon of 27 August, the troops advancing after a bombardment. Then followed three days of fighting in which the apparent

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August–November 1915 objective was taken, partly lost, and retaken again. The attacking force included detachments from various British, New Zealand and Australian regiments—in the latter case the 18th Infantry Battalion, the 9th and 10th Light Horse, and a composite group of 250 men from Monash’s 4th Brigade—practically all who were well enough to take part. When this attempt was also spent it was found that the crest of the rise was still beyond the ground taken, but since the aim of effecting a junction with the Suvla force seemed to have been sufficiently attained matters were allowed to rest at this time. C.E.W. Bean (1924) The Story of Anzac, vol.2, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Ctesiphon, fought on 22–25 November 1915 between British and Turkish forces on the Tigris River in Mesopotamia (modern Iraq), only 25 kilometres south-east of Baghdad. After a long but cleverly conducted advance up the Tigris from the Persian Gulf (see Kurna), Major-General Charles Townshend prepared to send his 6th Indian Division against the last major enemy obstacle to Baghdad. This was an extensive and well-defended position lying east of the Tigris, dominated by the huge facade of the ruined palace of the Persian king Chosroes which sat like ‘a giant airship hangar’ in the centre of the Turkish lines. Unknown to Townshend, however, the defenders had been strengthened by a fresh Anatolian division before he could begin his attack. While the severe fighting of the first day succeeded in turning the Turks out of both their first and second lines of trenches, with losses of eight guns and 9,000 men (including 1,300 prisoners), this result cost Townshend some 4,500 casualties of his own—about one-third of his force. Not only was Townshend’s force too weak to renew the attack the next day, but by that evening he found himself beset by counter-attacks mounted by the Turks. These battles


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continued on 24 November, and by the following day had gathered impetus from the arrival of still further fresh troops from the Caucasus. Facing markedly superior enemy numbers, the British had no alternative but to begin a retreat which culminated in defeat at Kut el Amara (see Kut el Amara). The Australian role in this action involved several airmen who were active both in the preparatory phase and during the battle itself. These were members of the Australian Flying Corps serving with No.30 Squadron, Royal Flying Corps—the new name given to Mesopotamian Flight, RFC, from August. To cut off Baghdad’s communication links with outlying bases, a decision was made to attempt to blow up the telegraph line running north and west of the capital. This required an aircraft to fly nearly 100 kilometres from Azizieh to beyond Baghdad, carrying explosives and fuel for the return flight. The mission was attempted on 13 November (the day the 6th Division began its forward march) by an aircraft piloted by Captain Thomas White, AFC. The task was successfully accomplished but resulted in the aircraft and its two-man crew being captured on the ground by Turks and Arabs who were unexpectedly encountered in the vicinity. This was particularly unfortunate as White and his observer had noted the presence of large bodies of troops indicating ‘apparent reinforcement’, which might have given Townshend sufficient forewarning of the difficulties he could expect at Ctesiphon. As a result of White’s capture, only one AFC pilot remained available to take part in the battle itself. This officer did useful service flying reconnaissance patrols which kept Townshend’s headquarters informed of the attack’s progress. F.M. Cutlack (1923) The Australian Flying Corps in the Western and Eastern Theatres of War 1914– 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; T.W. White (1928) Guests of the Unspeakable, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

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Kut el Amara, scene in Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) of the capitulation of 13,000 British and Indian soldiers under Major-General Charles Townshend to Turkish forces on 29 April 1916, after a five-month siege. Townshend’s successful campaign up the Tigris turned sour in late November 1915, when his troops were less than 30 kilometres from Baghdad (see Ctesiphon), and by 3 December he was back in Kut which he had captured in September. Withdrawal further down the river was out of the question, both because of the exhausted state of his 6th Indian Division and the pursuit of his men by a greatly superior enemy force. The latter made a few attempts to carry the town by assault, before settling down to starve out the defenders. The fate of Townshend’s command was sealed when attempts to break the siege from the south in January and February 1916 both failed. The number of Turks investing the place only became progressively stronger, as forces released after the ending of the Dardanelles campaign began arriving. The garrison had already experienced deaths from starvation when Townshend was forced to open the negotiations which resulted in unconditional surrender. Among the troops who passed into Turkish captivity were more than 40 members of No.30 Squadron, Royal Flying Corps—mostly ground staff and mechanics left behind after all flyable aircraft were sent out on 7 December 1915. Included in this group were nine Australian Flying Corps personnel who were serving with the unit; only two of these men were among the 2,000 members of the Kut garrison who survived their captivity. Part of No.30 Squadron was not locked up in Kut, including eight other mechanics and one pilot of the AFC. These played a notable part in attempts to meet part of the beleaguered garrison’s food requirements by aerial delivery. The pilot, Captain Henry


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Petre, flew several missions to air-drop grain and other essentials within the perimeter, while a corporal manufactured parachutes for the safe delivery of breakables—including a millstone for grinding corn. The appearance of German Fokker fighters, however, put a stop to this effort, after some five tonnes of supplies had been thus delivered. With the outcome at Kut now inevitable, Petre and the AFC men were returned to Basra (350 kilometres away to the south-east) and all were transferred to Egypt in early 1916. Their departure ended the involvement of Australian airmen in this theatre. F.M. Cutlack (1923) The Australian Flying Corps in the Western and Eastern Theatres of War 1914– 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; George Odgers (1984) The Royal Australian Air Force: An Illustrated History, Brookvale, NSW: Child & Henry

Um Rakhum, an action fought in Egypt’s western desert adjoining Cyrenaica on 13 December 1915, between pro-Turkish Arabs of a primitive Islamic sect called the Senussi and troops of an improvised British force specially raised to defend the western approaches to the Nile Valley from the Senussi threat. Known as ‘Western Frontier Force’ and under command of an Indian Army officer, Major-General Alexander Wallace, the British column comprised a brigade of infantry and a cavalry brigade. The latter was drawn from the rear details of units fighting on Gallipoli in a dismounted role, and among its four composite regiments was one comprising Australian light horse squadrons commanded by a British regular officer, Major Hon. Dudley Pelham. Artillery support was provided by the Notts Battery, Royal Horse Artillery, equipped with 13-pounder guns. After bringing his troops up to the small fishing village of Mersa Matruh on 9 December, Wallace decided to strike an immediate blow against the enemy. On 11 December a half-battalion was sent out on a fighting reconnaissance towards Duwair

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November–December 1915 Hussein, 26 kilometres to the west, where aerial reconnaissance reports indicated about 1,000 Senussi were assembled. Providing support for this move was a British yeomanry regiment, two guns and four armoured cars. While the infantry marched along the coastal track, the cavalry and guns followed a route further inland grandly called the Khedival Motor Road, initially heading in a south-westerly direction from Matruh. The latter force had covered about fourteen kilometres when a heavy rifle-fire was suddenly opened at close range from the column’s right flank by Arabs occupying a position known as Wadi Senaab. One squadron of the cavalry attempted a charge, with disastrous results, and a flanking movement tried by the armoured cars was stopped when the heavy vehicles became bogged in soft ground. When word of the situation reached the camp at Matruh, a squadron of Australian light horse was sent to the scene. Supported by the 13-pounders, the augmented force cleared the wadi of opposition at a cost to the enemy of 80 dead and seven prisoners; losses on the British side amounted to one officer and fifteen other ranks killed. The infantry, meanwhile, pressed on to a point near the coast called Um Rakhum, where camp was made. They were joined here by the exhausted yeomanry, and the next day by additional troops. The latter included No.4 Company of the Australian Service Corps, from the 1st Australian Divisional Train (forming Western Frontier Force’s supply component). On 13 December the cavalry and infantry again set off towards the objective, the transport elements remaining in the bivouac camp. Only a short distance had been covered when the column was again ambushed by a force of Senussi, 1,500 strong, which lay concealed in another wadi to the left of the axis of advance. The enemy troops were ably directed, and supported by two medium field pieces and three machine-guns. As the action developed


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one of the leading British companies was in peril of being encircled, and attempts to relieve the pressure quickly encountered severe difficulties. The column commander sent an urgent message by heliograph back to Rakhum calling for all reinforcements which could be spared to be sent forward. Among those despatched were 75 Australian Service Corps (ASC) personnel armed with rifles. On arrival, the ASC men performed good service in driving off Arabs who were occupying several gullies, although they were generally untrained for infantry work. During this fighting the Australians lost one man killed, and an officer and five other ranks wounded; the officer subsequently died. Two squadrons of the light horse also arrived on the scene of the action as escort to the Notts Battery crews, the appearance of which on the enemy flank again proved critical to the outcome of the contest. Although forced to come into action at extreme range, one of the 13-pounders succeeded in landing a shell at a point where the Senussi were at their thickest. At this the enemy decided to bring to an end the fight, which had lasted six hours, and withdrew. While the British were left in possession of the field, and had lost only half as many men as the 125 dead suffered by the Senussi, they were in no condition to press on with the original mission. The next day the column returned to Matruh, thereby allowing the enemy to re-occupy the high ground. C.E.W. Bean (1929) The Australian Imperial Force in France 1916, Sydney: Angus & Roberston

Gebel Medwa, an action fought on 25 December 1915 in the Libyan Desert on Egypt’s western frontier ten kilometres south-west of Mersa Matruh, between pro-Turkish Arabs of the Senussi sect and a British expeditionary force under Major-General Alexander Wallace. Following an indecisive action fought at Um Rakhum (q.v.), Wallace’s force was confined to Mersa

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Matruh by bad weather. The Senussi, however, were not so deterred, using the opportunity to occupy positions close to the British base and threatening to bypass it entirely and embark on a march across the desert towards the Nile—the contingency which Wallace was expressly charged with preventing. Determined to strike first as soon as conditions allowed, Wallace sent a column 2,500 strong up the Khedival Road early on Christmas morning. The first, predominant hill—the Gebel Medwa—was taken by the infantry without resistance soon after dawn. By 7 a.m., however, a large Senussi force was encountered in the Wadi Medwa and a fierce contest ensued in which the newly arrived 1st Battalion of the New Zealand Rifle Brigade played a notable supporting role. Meanwhile, the cavalry assigned to cover the advance—including a composite regiment of Australian light horse squadrons under Major Hon. Dudley Pelham (a British


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R. Nile

LIBYAN DESERT

regular)—had embarked on a wide circling movement to the south aimed at turning the enemy’s right flank. The leading squadron of this force, led by Major John Bisdee, VC, encountered some Arab cavalry at sunrise and, deploying at the gallop, easily dispersed them before going on to dislodge the occupants of further Senussi positions. By noon, the centre of the enemy’s position had been driven in and the Senussi main force was retreating along the coast. This development was observed by Pelham, who realised that the opportunity now presented to strike a decisive blow. He sought permission to unleash his lighthorsemen to sever the line of retreat, but—despite repeated pleas—permission to seize the moment was refused by his superiors. The chance to add immensely to the Arab losses (estimated at about 300 dead) was therefore passed up, and the outcome of the action was again inconclusive. The British force returned to Matruh, despite having sustained

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December 1915–January 1916 only thirteen personnel killed and 51 wounded; Australian casualties numbered about seven, including one lighthorseman killed. C.E.W. Bean (1929) The Australian Imperial Force in France 1916, Sydney: Angus & Roberston

Halazin, an action fought on 23 January 1916 in the Libyan Desert on Egypt’s western frontier 35 kilometres south-west of Mersa Matruh, between pro-Turkish Arabs of the Senussi sect and a British expeditionary force under Major-General Alexander Wallace. Following an indecisive action at Gebel Medwa (q.v.), there was little action on this front until the main Senussi camp was located at Halazin on 19 January by the crew of a British aircraft who reported the presence of 300 tents, including that of Sheikh Sayed Ahmed (the Grand Senussi) himself. Wallace decided to mount an attack, buoyed by the fact that many of the improvised units initially scratched together from rear details to form his force had since been replaced by properly formed battalions and regiments. In addition to a newly arrived battalion of South African infantry, he also now had several complete yeomanry units which had become available following the end of the Gallipoli campaign. Although he still had lighthorsemen in his mounted brigade, the Australian presence was reduced on 15 January to just a half-regiment after two squadrons left to return to Egypt. Marching out from Matruh with both his infantry and cavalry brigades, Wallace formed camp on the evening of 22 January only sixteen kilometres from the Senussi encampment. That night there was a torrential rainstorm, which meant the advance was resumed next morning in a quagmire of mud. Conditions were so difficult that armoured cars with the force had to be sent to the rear in case they became bogged in the face of the enemy. Once combat was joined that day, Wallace also


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found himself confronted by a spirited enemy who put heavy pressure on both his flanks. On the left flank in particular, covered by the mounted column, the Senussi attack was so determined that at one point several companies of New Zealand infantry had to be turned about to render assistance to the cavalry. The situation on this front continued to become pressing until the infantry forming the British centre, reinforced by some light horse, broke through the enemy’s main defence line. The Arabs made a general withdrawal through and beyond their tented camp, leaving behind some 200 dead and 500 wounded. Exhaustion, and the sodden ground, again prevented success being exploited with a vigorous pursuit. The action had been hard and costly, with casualties on the British side totalling 312 (though only 21 were killed). Most of the wounded were not retrieved until the following day, being forced to spend an agonising and cold night on the battlefield. The force as a whole had a wretched night, being without food or shelter and forced to drink only muddy rainwater. The troops were withdrawn soon after the fighting ended, so enjoyed little warmth from the blaze made by the Senussi tents. The next day the 1st Australian Divisional Train, which had been stuck fast in mud during 23 January, succeeded in reaching the returning force and was able to relieve many of the shortages while helping to alleviate the sufferings of the wounded, for which it earnt special thanks from Wallace. Although there was a return to Matruh on this occasion, as after previous engagements, the way was finally clear for the British to advance and re-occupy the Egyptian border post at Sollum (Salum). This was accomplished on 14 March 1916, though not before one final large-scale clash at Agagiya, 24 kilometres south-east of Sidi Barrani, on 26 February. The 1st Australian Divisional Train was still serving in support of the advance at the time of this final action,

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but on 7 March was withdrawn back to Egypt to join in the expansion and general reorganisation of the Australian Imperial Force which was then taking place. C.E.W. Bean (1929) The Australian Imperial Force in France 1916, Sydney: Angus & Roberston

Fromelles, a village in northern France south of Armentières, near where Australian troops took part in their first Western Front battle on 19 July 1916. The operation, aimed at seizing German positions in a salient called the ‘Sugar Loaf ’ in front of the Aubers Ridge, was primarily intended as a feint to assist the main offensive which British forces had launched along the Somme River 80 kilometres to the south on 1 July. The plan required the newly arrived Australian 5th Division, commanded by Major-General James M’Cay, to attack the Sugar Loaf from the north, at the same time that the British 61st Division (on the Australians’ right) attacked from the west. Preceded by a seven-hour bombardment, the infantry began the advance at 6 p.m. when there was still two and a half hours of summer daylight left. Although in-

experienced the Australians went forward in fine spirit on a frontage of three brigades: 8th on the left, 14th in the centre, 15th on the right. The 8th and 14th crossed the waterlogged ground with more or less difficulty and succeeded in capturing nearly 1,000 metres of the enemy trenches. In front of the 15th, however, the artillery had been totally ineffective; the Germans were able to man their defences as soon as the barrage lifted and quickly began mowing down the lines of assaulting troops as they emerged from the remains of an orchard. With its supporting formation thus held back, the right flank of the 14th Brigade was now exposed to intense fire from positions in the Sugar Loaf. The attack by the 61st Division had also encountered severe difficulties, the ranks of the British infantry being cut down by fire from machine-guns and artillery. Though the German lines were entered at a few isolated points, the attackers here were quickly driven out again. This left the Australians to bear the brunt of counterattacks mounted by the German 6th Bavarian Division whose troops had been manning

German troops re-occupy their lines at Fromelles after the Australian withdrawal on 20 July. Some of the Australians who formerly held the position are lying in the mud and water in the foreground. Source: Australian War Memorial A1562



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July–August 1916 the lines they had entered and seized. The first of these blows fell on the left or eastern flank about dusk, and although it was beaten off a second and stronger assault followed at about 1 a.m. directed at both ends of the Australian line. After fierce fighting, by 4 a.m. the majority of the 8th Brigade was forced to retire across no-man’s-land from the section of enemy frontline it had occupied. At 8 a.m. the 14th Brigade was also ordered to withdraw. The assault and the night-time fighting which followed had resulted in the 5th Division sustaining 5,533 casualties, including 400 men taken prisoner; the 61st Division also lost 1,547. The Germans apparently suffered casualties of little more than 1,000 (including 140 captured)—threequarters of these in units opposing the Australians. That the operation had been totally misconceived from the first was emphasised when the Germans established within a few hours that it was purely a demonstration, so that any British hopes of drawing or tying down enemy forces to this area went unrealised. In the meantime the 5th Division had been temporarily wrecked as a fighting formation and was not again fit for offensive action for many months. C.E.W. Bean (1929) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1916, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Pozières, part of the Somme battlefield in northern France, between 23 July and 5 August 1916 became the scene of several major attacks by the Australian divisions of I Anzac Corps commanded by Lieut.General Sir William Birdwood. The 1st Division (Major-General Harold Walker) became the first force of Australians employed in attempts to capture the ruined village of Pozières. Following a heavy bombardment of the German defences, Walker’s 1st and 3rd brigades attacked from the south at 12.30 a.m. on 23 July. They quickly took the enemy front trenches, then pushed on in two further stages at half-hour intervals


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to reach the main road through the village. The German garrison, members of the 117th Division, were killed, captured or fled north—some being chased back to the German second line occupying a long low ridge lying 500—700 metres behind the village known as ‘Pozières Heights’. At dawn the enemy made a battalion-strong counter-attack, but this was beaten back by machine-gun fire. During the following night reinforcing troops of the 2nd Brigade secured the rest of the village, and three more attempts by the enemy to reclaim their lost ground under cover of the dark were also frustrated. The Australians had not only wrested this important bastion in the German line from the enemy’s grasp, but this was the sole sector of the front in which operations mounted by the British Fourth Army had enjoyed any significant success. This fact alone ensured that the enemy would make a major effort to reverse the 1st Division’s gains, beginning from 7 a.m. on 24 July with a preparatory bombardment which involved the guns of practically all units within range of this one narrow point in the line. The constant and methodical pounding of shells over the next three days was far worse than anything Australian troops had previously experienced, and produced a casualty toll which far exceeded the cost of originally taking the position. By 27 July the 1st Division had suffered 5,285 casualties and was at the end of its endurance. It was accordingly withdrawn and its place taken by the 2nd Division under Major-General Gordon Legge. With the commander of the British Reserve Army, General Sir Hubert Gough, eager for further quick progress, Legge and his staff came under intense pressure to prepare to assault the old German second line (known as the ‘O.G. Lines’) running along Pozières Heights. Expecting that his own artillery preparation would have cut through the enemy’s wire defences by the

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night of 28 July, Legge gave orders for an attack for 12.15 a.m. on the 29th. The attempt failed, however, when troops moving into position for the assault were detected by the Germans, and part of the enemy entanglements in the centre was found to be still intact. The Australians were pushed back with 2,000 casualties which, when added to those sustained through enemy bombardment during the days of preparation, meant that the 2nd Division had already lost about 3,500 men. Although his superiors placed the blame on his ‘over-confidence’, Legge pleaded for a second opportunity. July 30th was set down as the date for the renewed attempt, but as preparations proceeded over the subsequent days it became steadily apparent that this timing could not be met. Intensive enemy artillery barrages constantly disrupted the work of digging new approach and forming-up trenches which were considered essential to the success of the venture. The attack was deferred firstly until 2 August, then again postponed for 24 hours. Assembling before dusk on 4 August, the three brigades of 2nd Division went forward at 9.15 p.m. after an intense artillery barrage lasting only three minutes. On a frontage of seven battalions and attacking in four waves, the Australians were into the German positions often before the defenders had time to emerge from their dugouts to man their posts after the bombardment. The lines of assaulting infantry swept north-east over the crest and were soon firmly in control of the O.G. Lines. Enemy attempts to throw back the attackers at dawn next day were defeated, but an intense German bombardment on the newly won ground added greatly to the cost of the victory. By the evening of 6 August, when Legge’s troops were relieved by the 4th Australian Division and came out of the line, the 2nd Division’s losses over the preceding twelve days totalled 6,848 men. C.E.W. Bean (1929) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1916, Sydney: Angus & Robertson;


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Peter Charlton (1986) Pozières 1916, North Ryde, NSW: Methuen Haynes; C.D. Coulthard-Clark (1988) No Australian Need Apply, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Romani, an action fought on 4–5 August 1916 in the Sinai Desert 35 kilometres east of the Suez Canal, took place amid towering sand-dunes astride the old caravan route to Palestine skirting the Mediterranean Sea. After Turkish raids had inflicted some damage to British outposts in this area during April, Romani was occupied by the 52nd (Lowland) Infantry Division and the Anzac Mounted Division, the latter at that time comprising two brigades of Australian light horse under Major-General Harry Chauvel. From here the mounted troops undertook a vigorous program of desert patrols, aimed at keeping the enemy away from this route to the canal and detecting any approach that was made. On 18 July, aerial reconnaissance had discovered the presence of four large bodies of Turkish troops a few days’ march beyond the line of British outposts. The next fortnight involved continual skirmishing in the midsummer heat, during which it was established from enemy prisoners that the Turkish force comprised a reinforced division of 12,000–14,000 men under command of a German general, Kress von Kressenstein. During the night of 2–3 August the Turks advanced to Katia, eight kilometres south-east of Romani, and it was concluded that an attack on the main British position was imminent. In the expectation that the enemy planned to envelop the southern end of the Romani defences, before sweeping onto the camps and railway behind them, Chauvel positioned his 1st Brigade—all that was available to him since his 2nd Brigade was out on reconnaissance—in small posts covering a frontage of five kilometres south of the 52nd Division’s lines. The Turks were in the process of forming-up on their start-lines for an assault when they unexpectedly

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August–September 1916 bumped into the Australians at about midnight on 3 August. After adjusting their plans, the Turks came on an hour later. In the fighting that quickly developed, the 500 rifles in Chauvel’s screen of outposts were opposed by up to 8,000 Turks. Under the weight of the unrelenting enemy pressure, the lighthorsemen fell back steadily. At 4.30 a.m., when it appeared that the Turks’ outflanking movement must succeed, Chauvel brought in his 2nd Brigade into line on the right flank of the 1st. As the Turks continued to feel their way around the southern flank of the defence, Chauvel began moving troops from the left of his line to keep extending his right, with the 52nd Division taking over the parts of his front that had to be thus vacated. Despite these tactics, by 7 a.m. the enemy had gained a long sandhill dubbed Wellington Ridge flanking the camps. The Australians had been pushed back to a towering sand-dune called Mount Royston, their front now facing due south. At about 7 a.m. the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade and a brigade of British yeomanry, having been sent forward from reserve positions closer to the canal, were ordered into action against the enemy’s now exposed flank. These forces were not in position to commence a counter-attack on Mount Royston until nearly 2 p.m. The fight continued throughout the afternoon, but by the time a brigade from a British infantry division in reserve, the 42nd (Lancashire), also neared the scene at about 6 p.m. the Turks had begun surrendering in large numbers. Meanwhile Chauvel’s brigades had managed to maintain their positions in the centre, but were too tired for any further counter-stroke to be attempted. At 4 a.m. on 5 August the 1st and 2nd Light Horse Brigades, together with adjoining infantry, advanced with the bayonet. Except at one point, Turkish resistance on Wellington Ridge was quickly


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subdued. With the enemy flank now crushed, Chauvel was instructed at 6.30 a.m. to undertake a pursuit using all available mounted troops. This now involved the 3rd Brigade of his own division, which had arrived from the canal zone. The 3rd Light Horse Brigade had a major success south of Katia, when a Turkish strongpoint was rushed at about 4 p.m. and resulted in the capture of 425 enemy and seven machine-guns. Elsewhere on this front the Turkish positions proved too strong and well protected by fire, so that Katia itself remained untaken. The British forces were compelled to retire, essentially through lack of water for the horses, but during the night the Turks took the opportunity to abandon the place anyway. Thus the threat to Romani had been decisively eliminated, although the failure of the British command to turn the Turkish defeat into a rout has largely obscured the significance of the victory. The brunt of the fighting had fallen upon the Anzac Mounted Division, which suffered over 900 of the 1,130 casualties (including 202 killed) on the British side. Turkish losses are unknown but were estimated at 9,000; 1,250 dead were buried by the victors and nearly 4,000 were taken prisoner. H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; A.J. Hill (1978) Chauvel of the Light Horse, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Mouquet Farm, situated about 1.7 kilometres north-west of the heights behind the village of Pozières (q.v.), between 8 August and 3 September 1916 became the focus of nine separate attacks by the three Australian divisions of I Anzac Corps. The purpose of these operations was to extend British control of the ridge extending from Pozières towards the ruined town of Thiepval, with the aim of driving a wedge behind the salient held by the Germans there. The 4th Division under Major-General Sir Herbert Cox—having relieved the 2nd

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on 6–7 August—was the first to press the advance in this direction. After a week of constant attacking the line had been carried forward to the fringe of the farm. The toll upon the 4th Division due largely to incessant German shelling, however, had been 4,649 casualties and it was replaced by the 1st Division (Major-General Harold Walker). Restored to only two-thirds its normal strength after losses at Pozières, this formation could make only very small gains and on 22 August—having lost another 2,650 men—it again handed over to the 2nd Division (Major-General Gordon Legge). A dawn attack launched on 26 August actually succeeded in reaching the farm, but with this success came the discovery of deep shelters which were now filled by troops of the German Guard Reserve Corps. The Australians could not hold their gains and were pushed out again. After the 2nd Division had suffered another 1,268 casualties, the 4th Division was brought back again and made further attacks on the nights of 27 and 29 August. The second of these again occupied the farm, but the attackers’ strength was insufficient to cope with the counter-attacks. This achievement was repeated on 3 September, but after fierce fighting the objective was again lost. At a cost of another 2,409 casualties the 4th Division had extended the gains in this sector as far as they could be achieved. As a result Mouquet Farm was practically half-surrounded on its north-eastern face, but the place was still in enemy hands when the I Anzac Corps was withdrawn from the Somme on 5 September. It did not finally fall until a further three weeks—after British forces had swept past in a wider offensive and left it as an isolated outpost. The 11,000 Australian casualties sustained in battling for this objective meant that in just six weeks since entering the Somme front, I Anzac Corps losses had reached 23,000 (of whom 6,741 had been killed)—which was broadly comparable to


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the toll sustained by the AIF in the eight-month Gallipoli campaign. C.E.W. Bean (1929) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1916, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Gueudecourt, a village on the Somme battlefield in northern France, became the scene of two attacks by Australian troops in November 1916 which were made amid conditions rated as the most difficult ever faced by the AIF. The British offensive of this front in September—during which I Anzac Corps was resting in the Ypres sector after its losses at Pozières and Mouquet Farm (q.v.)—had advanced the line into a valley below the Bapaume heights. Here the onset of Autumn rains turned the ground into a quagmire, and attacks against the German lines by the British Fourth and Fifth Armies during October all failed totally with heavy losses. In mid-October I Anzac Corps (1st, 2nd, 4th and 5th Australian Divisions) arrived to replace the central army corps of the Fourth Army. On 5 November a brigade each of 1st and 2nd Divisions carried out attacks aimed at capturing two salients, one immediately north of Gueudecourt and the other (called ‘the Maze’) some two kilometres west. The first operation nearest Gueudecourt, launched in rain soon after midnight, was a nightmare. The assault troops, men of the 1st Brigade, struggled through mud to reach the frontline and were half-exhausted before the attack began. As they went forward the waterlogged ground was so treacherous that they slipped and slithered while trying to keep pace with the barrage protecting their advance. Although part of the attacking force succeeded in entering the enemy trenches, it was found impossible to hang on to these gains. Although the weather had cleared by the time the 7th Brigade attacked the Maze at 9.10 a.m., in conjunction with three battalions of the British 50th (Northumbrian) Division acting on its left, the

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September–November 1916

The German ‘trenches’ at The Maze, just west of Gueudecourt, which the 2nd Division attacked on 5 and 14 November under indescribably muddy conditions. Source: Australian War Memorial E220


Men of the 9th Light Horse Regiment attacking at Magdhaba. Source: Australian War Memorial A225


outcome here was the same. The assault got too far behind their protective barrage, so that the German garrison had ample time to rally in defence of their posts and pin down the attackers in the craterfield between the opposing lines. Part of a battalion managed to seize a small foothold inside the Maze’s defences, and held on despite the enemy’s best efforts to drive them out, but even this tiny gain was lost a few days later. The whole venture cost the 7th Brigade 819 casualties, while the 1st Brigade lost 208 men. A repeat of the attack against the Maze was made at 6.45 a.m. on 14 November by


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two battalions of the 7th Brigade and two of the 5th. This time about 500 metres of the enemy line on the west face of the salient was taken, and the gain was held until the afternoon of 16 November when the Germans countered with a surprise bombing attack in strength. This recaptured the position after about an hour, the Australians being forced to retire over the open ground except for about 20 men who were taken prisoner. Australian casualties in the initial attack had numbered 901, while another 82 were lost when the Germans retook their trenches. The 50th Division, again operating

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on the Australian left, sustained an additional 500–600 casualties. C.E.W. Bean (1929) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1916, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Magdhaba, was fought on 23 December 1916 in the northern Sinai Desert, 35 kilometres south-east of the Mediterranean coastal town of El Arish and about 30 kilometres west of the border with Palestine. Following their defeat at Romani (q.v.), Turkish forces were thrown onto the defensive and retreated to Bird el Abd and subsequently Salmana, in each case abandoning their positions once attacked by British mounted troops— principally Australians and New Zealanders of the Anzac Mounted Division led by Major-General Harry Chauvel. After El Arish was vacated by the enemy and duly occupied by British forces on 21 December, the way into Palestine was barred by two principal Turkish blocking forces: at Magdhaba and Rafa. On the night of 22 December Chauvel was ordered to move against the inland base at Magdhaba. Available to him was his mounted division, less one brigade but with the newly formed Imperial Camel Corps (and attached battery of mountain guns) taking its place. Marching in the early hours of 23 December, by daybreak Chauvel’s troops had closed on the enemy-held village. As soon as the Turks’ dispositions were clearly established by low-flying aircraft from No.1 Squadron, Australian Flying Corps, Chauvel gave his orders. The Camel Corps was sent from the north-west directly at the nearest redoubt lying east of the Wadi el Arish, while the other brigades detoured around the northern flank, where the firm ground best suited horses, to attack from the north and north-east; one regiment was sent on a wide circling movement to the east then south to cross the wadi and take up position in rear of the enemy position. A hard fight followed in which the attackers made slow progress crossing open


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ground under heavy fire. Soon after 1 p.m., upon learning that sources of water apart from the wells at Magdhaba were denied to him, Chauvel decided to call off the attack. The recall reached the commander of the 1st Brigade, Brigadier-General Charles Cox, just as his troops were preparing to assault the main enemy redoubt with the bayonet. He temporarily misplaced the message until the attack was underway, and his men’s success a few minutes later showed Chauvel that victory was actually at hand. By 4.30 p.m. the Turkish garrison surrendered; few escaped. The number of enemy killed has been put at about 300— certainly nearly 100 were collected on the field for burial—and just short of 1,300 were captured. The 10th Light Horse Regiment, providing the blocking force south of the wadi, alone accounted for 722 of the prisoners. Chauvel’s losses were trifling: only 146 casualties, of whom 22 were killed. After setting fire to the village and leaving two regiments to clear the battlefield of dead and wounded, the remainder of the column returned to El Arish. H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; A.J. Hill (1978) Chauvel of the Light Horse, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Rafa, the site of a former Egyptian police post on the Mediterranean border with Palestine, is the name generally given to an action between British and Turkish forces on 9 January 1917 which was actually fought about 1.5 kilometres to the south on ground known as El Magruntein. Following the capture of the other main Turkish post inland at Magdhaba (q.v.) a fortnight earlier, the British commander of what was called the Desert Column, Lieut.-General Sir Philip Chetwode, prepared to take Rafa as well. Aerial patrols reported that place to be held by 2,000–3,000 enemy troops, who were busily digging in. Available for this operation was the Anzac Mounted Division (1st and 3rd Australian Light Horse brigades and the

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December 1916–March 1917 New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade) commanded by Major-General Harry Chauvel, reinforced by three of the four battalions of the Imperial Camel Corps (which also contained many Australians) and the 5th Mounted Brigade, a British yeomanry outfit. After a period spent in reconnoitring routes and compiling plans of the Turkish defences from the air, Chauvel’s troops commenced their march from El Arish at dusk on 8 January. Moving first to Sheikh Zowaiid, an Arab village sixteen kilometres short of the objective which was seized and sealed to prevent a warning being carried to the enemy, by dawn the attacking force had entirely surrounded Rafa and was in position to attack. Only at this stage was the true difficulty of the operation apparent to Chetwode and Chauvel. The Turks occupied a network of trenches rising in tiers around an earthen redoubt on a central knoll, and although these works were not protected by wire they completely dominated the long bare slopes leading up to them. Once commenced at 10 a.m. the British assault—as at Magdhaba—made only slow progress. For the first time use was made of aircraft to direct the fire of artillery using radio, but despite this innovation the attack lacked the weight of guns to destroy the enemy’s defences or their spirit. By midafternoon the force’s reserves had all been committed, ammunition was getting short, and Chetwode was beginning to fret about whether success could be achieved in time to meet the pressing need for water for both his men and horses. When news reached him at about 4 p.m. that two strong groups of Turkish reinforcements, probably 2,500 men, were approaching from the east and north-east, Chetwode decided soon afterwards to break off the fight and withdraw. Acting on this order, Chauvel had issued the necessary instructions to his brigades. As at Magdhaba, however, the recall was


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ignored at unit level where the troops were determined to bring the action to a climax. The New Zealanders and the Camel Corps both succeeded in overrunning the redoubts in front of them, and within a short period the entire Turkish defence collapsed. Of the garrison, some 200 were killed and 1,602 taken prisoner (including 168 wounded); only a few escaped into the darkness which soon afterwards enveloped the battlefield. British losses totalled 486, including 71 killed. With his flankguards already exchanging fire at long range with the approaching Turkish reinforcements, Chauvel did not attempt to hold the ground just won but withdrew to Sheikh Zowaiid where water and supplies had been dumped. The enemy did not re-occupy the defences, however, and—apart from a fruitless clash by cavalry and camelry the next morning with two light horse regiments left to cover a field ambulance while it searched for wounded— left the British in uncontested possession of Rafa. H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Baghdad, the action in Mesopotamia (presentday Iraq) which resulted in the capture of this city from the Turks by British forces under Lieut.-General Sir Stanley Maude on 11 March 1917. On 5 March Maude advanced from Aziziyeh, on the Tigris River 80 kilometres south-east of Baghdad, with his two Army Corps (each of two infantry divisions) and an Indian cavalry division of two brigades. Strong Turkish resistance was encountered at the Diala River, which flowed into the Tigris from the north-east, but by 10 March the British had bridged that obstacle, whereupon the enemy abandoned the city and enabled its occupation the next day. Australian involvement in this operation was as members of the 1st (Anzac) Wireless Signal Squadron, a unit then two-thirds

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Australian and one-third from New Zealand. The squadron provided twelve mobile transmitting stations throughout the force, and during the march into Baghdad those operating with the cavalry were among the first troops into the city. Over the next few days two Anzac stations continued to provide Maude’s primary communications back to Basra, the main British base on the Persian Gulf. Keast Burke (ed.) (1927) With Horse and Morse in Mesopotamia, Sydney: A&NZ Wireless Signal Squadron History Committee

First Gaza, fought on 26–27 March 1917, was the first British attempt to capture the major Turkish centre lying 32 kilometres inside the border of Palestine. Having captured Rafa (q.v.) at the start of the year and subsequently cleared out the remaining garrisons of Turks within Sinai, the British were now ready to strike deep into the enemy’s own territory. Available for this operation were three British infantry divisions, two mounted divisions and a Camel brigade—a total of about 22,000 men. Each of the mounted divisions contained two Australian light horse brigades, comprising half their strength; the Anzac Mounted Division was under the command of Major-General Harry Chauvel, the Imperial Mounted Division under a British officer, Major-General Henry Hodgson. In the pre-dawn hours of 26 March, Chauvel’s division led off the march from the attacking force’s advanced base around Deir el Belah, some sixteen kilometres southwest of Gaza. Its route took it ten kilometres east of the town, then west towards the Mediterranean, so that the Anzac Mounted was effectively astride the enemy’s rear and able to join in the assault from both north and east. Hodgson’s division, with the Camel Brigade and a New Zealand armoured car patrol also moved out onto the eastern flank, to prevent any attempt at reinforcement of the enemy garrison (thought to number about 4,000) from that quarter. With Gaza thus


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cut off, the 53rd Infantry Division— supported by the 54th Division—moved up on the town’s southern approaches to complete its encirclement. Delays experienced by the infantry due to unseasonal fog meant that it was nearly noon before the attack began, and nearly sunset before the heights of Ali Muntar which commanded the town from the southeast were in British hands. Meanwhile the men of Chauvel’s division had captured other high ground to the north and were pressing on the town’s outskirts. Even though the enemy’s resistance was clearly crumbling, the failure to have achieved a decisive success before nightfall prompted the British high command to call off the assault, as had happened at Magdhaba (q.v.) and Rafa, for fear of the mounted troops being left without water. With the discovery that the Gaza garrison was larger than believed, and several large columns of Turkish reinforcements— one reported as 3,000 strong—sighted approaching from the north-east, east and south-east, the order for Chauvel and Hodgson’s divisions to withdraw was given at about 6 p.m. Although some of the mounted troops had already penetrated into the town’s northern and eastern streets, this time there was no question of defying the recall order. Chauvel himself protested, but for his men there was nothing to do but shoulder their dismay and disgust at being forced to surrender a victory which they considered had already been won. After collecting their wounded and some of their dead, they came away in the darkness without any hostile follow-up by the enemy, bringing with them over 460 prisoners and two captured guns. Even the reinforcements which had earlier seemed so threatening on the flanks were held off with ease. The British infantry maintained their positions on Gaza’s southern outskirts for the night, but vacated the Ali Muntar heights. Ordered to re-occupy this position the next morning, the infantry initially found it

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March–April 1917 unoccupied by the enemy but were unable to properly secure it before the Turks forced them off again. They, too, were withdrawn by dawn on 28 March, finally confirming the failure of the coup de main against Gaza essentially due to a command fiasco. The attempt had cost the British nearly 4,000 casualties, 3,000 of these in the infantry; the Turks had lost perhaps 2,500. H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; A.J. Hill (1978) Chauvel of the Light Horse, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

First Bullecourt, the battle on 11 April 1917 to capture a strongpoint in the string of defences across northern France which the Germans called the Siegfried Line but which were known to the Allies as the Hindenburg Line. Following their heavy losses in the Somme campaign during 1916, the next March the Germans made a deliberate withdrawal into a shorter line fifteen to 50 kilometres to their rear. In response to discovery of this move, the two Australian divisions of I Anzac Corps then in the line around Flers (2nd and 5th) were ordered to send out columns to follow up the enemy retirement in conjunction with British formations on both flanks. After a period of comparatively rapid advance, during late March and early April these operations became more intense as the Australians found themselves up against strong rearguard forces which the Germans had left behind in outpost villages to impose delay. Several resulting actions were fiercely fought encounters entailing moderately heavy casualties—377 at Lagnicourt on 26– 27 March; more than 600 at Noreuil on 2 April; and 649 at Hermies, Boursies and Demicourt on 8–9 April. The last-mentioned series of actions coincided with the stroke undertaken at Arras by the British Third Army at the start of a new great offensive. It was to assist this operation that the Fifth Army (which included I Anzac Corps) was tasked with attacking the Hindenburg Line south


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of Arras. The point selected for attack was Bullecourt, which—now heavily fortified— had been incorporated into the German defences as an advanced bastion. Carriage of the attack was entrusted to two brigades (4th and 12th) of the 4th Australian Division which were marched up in extreme haste. These were to strike east of the village and then swing left and advance along the trench system from the flank. Upon their success, the British 62nd Division on the Australian left would also move forward to capture the village itself and link up for a push through into the rear of the German defences. A surprise element would be a dozen British tanks leading the assault— the first time these machines had been used in the Fifth Army—and their task was to break down the enemy’s formidable wire entanglements for the following infantry. During the attack launched at 4.30 a.m. on 11 April both brigades succeeded in penetrating the front line of trenches and seizing part of the second line, but without the benefit of any support from the tanks which by 7 a.m. were all burning wrecks littering the battlefield: only four even reached the enemy wire, and just one got to the first trench-line. The troops had achieved almost the impossible in advancing without a protective artillery barrage or the gunfire support which the tanks had been meant to provide. While the Australians had got inside the Hindenburg Line, they now found themselves fighting without support and cut off from reinforcements. In the mistaken belief that attack parties had passed deep into enemy rear positions, Allied artillery was prohibited from firing—thereby giving the Germans a free hand in dealing with the penetration. In addition, the enemy resistance encountered grew steadily as members of the 27th Württemberg Division emerged from deep shelters on the flanks and even in rear of the assault waves. Half an hour after midday the survivors began

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limping back away from their untenable gain. Barely 660 men out of 3,000 members of the 4th Brigade remained alive or uninjured, and the 12th Brigade had suffered 950 casualties; 1,170 of the attackers had passed into enemy hands as prisoners—the largest number of Australians captured in a single battle. The adverse impression about the utility of tanks would remain with Australians for more than a year. C.E.W. Bean (1933) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1917, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Lagnicourt, a village about 3.5 kilometres in front of the Hindenburg Line in northern France, which on 15 April 1917 became the scene for a major German counter-attack. Noting the thinness with which part of the British Fifth Army front was being held— both as a measure to increase reserves needed for the main British thrust at Arras and by the local concentration entailed by operations against Bullecourt (q.v.)—the commander of the German XIV Reserve Corps (General Otto von Moser) decided to launch a counterstroke. The brunt of this attack fell on the 1st Australian Division holding ground along twelve kilometres of front. Attacking with the greater part of four


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divisions (23 battalions!) before dawn, the Germans pushed forward to seize seven villages in front of their line. Their object was to hold these only for the day, capturing or destroying the artillery and supplies found here before retiring again that night. The thrust quickly brought the enemy into Lagnicourt, behind which the 1st Division’s batteries were located. The village was overrun, as were several batteries west of there, before the attackers moved against Noreuil further up the valley where massed batteries were also located. Four Australian battalions in support or reserve about Lagnicourt—little more than 4,000 men as against some 16,000 Germans in this area—counter-attacked so vigorously shortly after 7 a.m. that the enemy was driven out of the village. Recovering 21 guns which the enemy had captured and held for two hours, it was found that only five of these had been damaged. The German foray was thus defeated. Australian casualties were 1,010, including 300 taken prisoner, whereas the enemy’s losses amounted to 2,313, of whom 362 were captured. C.E.W. Bean (1933) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1917, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Second Gaza, fought on 19 April 1917, this action occurred as a result of a renewed British attempt to capture the Turkish coastal strongpoint situated on the edge of sanddunes three kilometres inland. The British commander of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force, General Sir Archibald Murray, determined on a direct frontal assault by three British infantry divisions, the Imperial Mounted Division (which was half Australian) and the Imperial Camel Corps (also half Australian) both fighting in a dismounted role. Intended to help the attack were six tanks and a supply of gas-shells, which had been recently received and not previously employed in this theatre of war. Supporting the main thrust was the Anzac Mounted Division (half Australian) under

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April–May 1917 Major-General Harry Chauvel. This attack was even less successful than the first assault three weeks earlier, as the Turks were both better prepared and numerically stronger than before. The infantry fought hard to reach the ridge southeast of the town, where a few of them—in conjunction with a larger party of Australians from the Camel Corps and a tank—managed to capture one redoubt. Another was seized by other Australian camel troops and lighthorsemen of the Imperial Mounted Division, but with heavy losses. Chauvel’s division, given the task of keeping away any enemy reinforcements attempting to intervene from the east, went into action against the Turkish 3rd Cavalry Division and easily drove it off. The whole effort was a dismal failure which cost the attacking force over 6,000 casualties—5,000 among the infantry, 547 in the Imperial Mounted Division, 345 in the Camel Corps and 105 in the Anzac Mounted Division. The attack never seriously threatened the Turkish defence of the town, and, far from helping British aims in the area, gave a significant boost to enemy morale and convinced them that they could continue to hold southern Palestine. H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; A.J. Hill (1978) Chauvel of the Light Horse, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Second Bullecourt, the renewed attempt to seize an advanced bastion of the Hindenburg Line (see First Bullecourt), took place on 3–17 May 1917. Again, enveloping attacks were to be made by the 2nd Australian Division and the British 62nd Division— the former striking east of the village (now reduced to rubble), the latter to the west. Following the failure of the first attack, which had been hastily devised by the British Fifth Army, the staff of I Anzac Corps insisted on having a greater say in preparations. This time there would be no tanks working with the Australians (there was with the British)


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and the mistake of dispensing with a protective barrage for the infantry was not repeated. This operation was to form the extreme right portion of a resumed offensive being launched on 3 May by British forces along a front of 25 kilometres, in conjunction with a French offensive further south to begin the following day. The attack went in at 3.45 a.m. on the planned date. On the Australian side the advancing 5th and 6th brigades encountered deadly fire while breaching wire entanglements, but part of the latter succeeded in breaking into the enemy trenches and seized a foothold of several bays. On the left the 62nd Division also managed to seize part of the enemy line but could not take the village, which was one of its objectives. Attempts were made to expand the gains made by the Australians by bombing up the trenches, but these were furiously resisted by troops of the 27th Württemberg Division forming the garrison. Despite the strength of the enemy’s counter-attacks, the gap seized—about 600 metres—was still held as night fell, and at 1 a.m. on 4 May the weary 6th Brigade was relieved by troops of the 1st Division. German efforts to dislodge the Australians followed for the next fortnight, producing some of the most intense trench fighting of the war. On 7 May a renewed effort by the British on the left, this time by the 7th Division, succeeded in reaching the eastern side of Bullecourt and linking up with the Australians. The next day the 5th Australian Division was brought up and took over from the 1st Division the defence of the eastern part of the line. Efforts by both British and Australian troops to steadily consolidate their hold were interrupted by a final furious counter-attack on 15 May, and when this was repulsed the enemy decided to withdraw entirely from around what was left of Bullecourt. Although this battle had resulted in a remarkable victory, the effort had cost the AIF 7,482 casualties. Instead of a subsidiary

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attack as part of a wider Allied offensive, Bullecourt had become the focus of practically the whole British front when operations elsewhere failed; the French advance did not proceed at all. This meant that the struggle for a small, tactically useless piece of ground had assumed an importance out of all proportion to the original rationale. Moreover, it had drawn in not one but three Australian divisions and left them all in serious need of rest and recovery. The drain on reinforcements entailed by this effort had wider implications too, ending plans to continue expanding the AIF. C.E.W. Bean (1933) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1917, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

North Sea, an unusual action fought on 4 May 1917 in waters south-east of Rosyth, Scotland, in which a British naval force of two light cruisers and four destroyers avoided numerous enemy submarines and bombing attacks mounted by the five-engined Zeppelin L43, flagship of the German Naval Airship Division. The surface force under Captain John Dumaresq (an Australian serving in the Royal Navy), who commanded HMAS Sydney and was also second-incommand of the 2nd Light Cruiser Squadron, had been sent the previous day to sweep the channels between the mouths of the Forth and Humber estuaries. Shortly after 10 a.m. a small vessel was sighted to the east of the course being steered by Dumaresq’s ships, and a destroyer (Obdurate) detached to investigate this craft. At 10.25 an airship was spotted by the cruiser Dublin rapidly approaching from the east at a distance of about 27 kilometres. Both cruisers raced in the dirigible’s direction and opened fire at extreme range. At this point Obdurate, having just reached the suspicious vessel, sighted two submarines—one of which attacked her. The destroyer’s captain responded by dropping several depth charges, but when he sighted the Zeppelin he, too, set off in pursuit of it. Before


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Obdurate had got within 6.5 kilometres, however, the German airship rose steeply and veered off to the south-east. Between 10.50 and 11.20 a.m. Dublin made three submarine sightings, and twice saw torpedo tracks indicating that she had been the target of unsuccessful attacks. Dumaresq, concluding that he was being lured into a prepared killing ground for enemy submarines, instructed Obdurate to finish checking the identity of the suspect vessel first sighted (which turned out to be an innocent Dutch fishing boat) while ordering his force to resume its original course. The sight of the British warships apparently retreating prompted the German airship to resume stalking them. Soon after midday Dumaresq ordered both cruisers to turn back on their course so as to engage the Zeppelin at a range of about 6,400 metres. This manoeuvre goaded the airship’s captain into making a direct but high-level attack on the force. The Zeppelin moved first against Dublin but its efforts to gain a bomb-dropping position were frustrated by the cruiser swerving sharply to starboard. An attempt to close on Obdurate was more successful and three bombs landed within ten metres of the destroyer, flinging shrapnel splinters onto her decks. Twenty minutes later L43 overflew the wildly zigzagging Sydney and dropped ten or twelve bombs, six of these in two salvos, but without scoring any hits. The warships were equally unsuccessful in hitting the airship with their high-angle guns, Dublin firing off 90 rounds and Sydney 69 rounds. Eventually both cruisers had expended their anti-aircraft ammunition, and L43 all its bombs, which brought the engagement to a fruitless end at about 2.30 p.m. During the last stage of the action the German captain apparently sought to summon another airship to his assistance, and in fact a second Zeppelin was sighted in the far distance to the north-east shortly before 1 p.m., but in the event did not approach and join in.

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May–June 1917 Arthur W. Jose (1928) The Royal Australian Navy 1914–1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Messines, a major action in the Flanders region of southern Belgium, undertaken on 7 June 1917 for the purpose of capturing the Wytschaete–Messines ridge south of the British salient at Ypres. Since these low heights—part of the crescent of high ground running east of the battered town—were occupied by the Germans and overlooked British positions, the ridge’s capture was essential to plans for an offensive to occupy the Belgian coast. Three army corps were allocated to the task, one of these being II Anzac commanded by Lieut.-General Sir Alexander Godley which comprised three divisions: the 25th British, the New Zealand and the 3rd Australian (Major-General John Monash). In addition, the 4th Australian Division (Major-General William Holmes) was sent to reinforce the corps. A seven-day preliminary bombardment began on 31 May. At 3.10 a.m. on 7 June mines containing a million pounds of ammonal, placed in nineteen tunnels which had been dug under and behind the German

lines during the preceding two years by Canadian, Australian and British miners, were detonated. The resultant explosions created massive craters, obliterated enemy frontline positions and left survivors stunned and demoralised. The British advance was rapid and largely unopposed, so that by 5.30 a.m. the heights had been easily occupied in one of the most complete local victories yet seen in the war. Stunning though this success had been, there was drama in the 3rd Division when Monash’s men were caught in a German attack using phosgene shells while on approach through Ploegsteert Wood to its start-lines. Some 500 men were gassed and temporarily put out of action, and hundreds more fell to shrapnel rounds, but the division proceeded and was in its correct position for the attack. A further hitch developed that afternoon, when reserve formations moved through to press the advance down the eastern slopes against the German depth positions known as the Oostaverne Line. Delays held back the British corps moving in the centre, forcing the 4th Australian

Messines village under German bombardment the day after the 3rd Division’s attack. The River Douve, which the Australians crossed, runs across the middle distance. Source: Australian War Memorial H12264



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Division to attempt to plug a widening gap so that by the end of the day it was effectively holding half the battlefront. During this battle the Australians also encountered for the first time the German innovation of concrete blockhouses, which were dubbed ‘pillboxes’. Despite strong enemy counter-attacks the next day, and heavy casualties due to artillery fire—from both German and Allied batteries which mistakenly targeted friendly troops—the attacking forces were able to continue expanding their gains to the final objectives laid down for them. For the Australians, success in this operation came at the price of nearly 6,800 casualties, close on two-thirds of these in the 3rd Division. Total losses in II Anzac Corps were about 13,900—slightly more than the combined total of the two other British corps involved. German losses for the same period were about 23,000, including 7,548 missing. C.E.W. Bean (1933) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1917, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; P.A. Pedersen (1985) Monash as Military Commander, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Third Ypres, the collective name given to the campaign fought between September and November 1917 aimed at capturing the Gheluvelt Plateau in southern Belgium. The operations followed earlier campaigns over the same ground, the first during October– November 1914 and the second in April–May 1915. This time they were directed by General Sir Herbert Plumer, commander of the British Second Army, who decided on a stepby-step approach of limited advances preceded by heavy artillery bombardment. Once each attack had attained its objective, the attacking troops were to be protected by further barrages while they consolidated their positions—this measure being necessary to thwart the German tactics of dealing with each penetration of their line with an immediate counter-attack by formations held well back specifically for this purpose.


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When Plumer requested fresh troops he was given I Anzac Corps under Lieut.General Sir William Birdwood. The actions in which the Australians took part are listed individually (see Menin Road, Polygon Wood, Broodseinde, Poelcappelle and Passchendaele). Menin Road, the first operation of the Third Battle of Ypres in which Australians took part, was fought on 20 September 1917. In preparation for this attack, the 1st and 2nd Australian divisions took over a portion of the frontline east of the town, on the main ridge at Glencorse Wood and a spur just north of there called Westhoek Ridge. I Anzac Corps formed the left flank of the Second Army for this attack, while north of the Australians would be three divisions of the Fifth Army—thus making for an attack frontage of thirteen kilometres. Following an intense artillery barrage, the two Australian divisions advanced at 5.40 a.m.—the first time two AIF formations had attacked side by side. Moving in two bounds with a one-hour and a two-hour pause in between, they covered the 1,500 metres to their final objective and were able to secure this with minimal interference from the enemy, who were unable to deliver counter-attacks because of the British standing barrage. Despite the effective cover thus provided the infantry, the troops still had much hard fighting against pillboxes and other strongpoints. Enemy artillery fire was also brought to bear, and at one stage the Australians were accidentally hit by their own guns. While this battle proved the worth of step-by-step tactics, the two AIF divisions still sustained 5,013 casualties and the total British loss was between 20,000–25,000 men. The Germans had suffered to about an equal extent, but whereas the attackers were elated the effect on the enemy was practically crushing. C.E.W. Bean (1933) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1917, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

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June–September 1917

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Polygon Wood, fought on 26 September 1917, following the successful outcome of the British attack at Menin Road (q.v.). The two Australian divisions used in that attack were quickly relieved—on the right the 5th replacing the 1st, on the left the 4th replacing the 2nd—and preparations were put in train for the next blow in the sequence. Another advance of some 1,500 metres was intended, this time through the shattered remains of a young plantation. The day before the scheduled operation, a German counter-thrust fell upon the British 10th Corps immediately south of the 5th Division’s flank. This was a potentially disastrous event, because although the 15th Brigade helped its neighbouring British units to fight off the attack and secure its own start-line for the next day, it was not possible to clear all the enemy from this area. Thus the Australian right faced the prospect of having its flank insecure when the time came for the advance.


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At 5.50 a.m. on the 26th the protective artillery barrage descended as planned, and the two Australian divisions went forward behind it at the centre of a front extending nearly ten kilometres. All the objectives along the Australian front and points north were, with minor exceptions, quickly captured. On the exposed southern flank, the 15th Brigade—reinforced by two battalions of the 8th Brigade—managed to take not only its own final objective but also part of that of the 10th Corps. Again, any German counterattack was thwarted by the curtain of artillery fire lowered as soon as the troops had reached their positions. Australian losses in the action amounted to 5,770 men. C.E.W. Bean (1933) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1917, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Ramadi, an action fought in Mesopotamia on 28 September 1917, on the Euphrates River about 110 kilometres west of Baghdad. Realising that a Turko-German offensive was

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in preparation aimed at retaking Baghdad (q.v.), which had fallen to the British in March, Lieut.-General Sir Stanley Maude was determined to deliver the first stroke as part of a strategy of active defence. He accordingly moved against Ar Ramadi, where the Turks held a strong position, delivering a feint against the enemy’s left flank between Lake Habbaniyah and the Euphrates while sending a column of cavalry supported by part of the infantry across desert to attack the opposite flank. When Maude commenced his attack on 28 September, the cavalry—having successfully passed around the enemy’s line—cut across and by 4 p.m. were digging in and shelling the Turkish rear. This ensured that enemy attempts at escape were futile and the entire garrison of 8,545 men was taken captive, at a cost of only 995 British casualties (many of whom were only slightly wounded by high-bursting enemy shrapnel). Throughout the action the British cavalry’s progress was reported (often under shrapnel fire) by a transmitting station of the 1st Australian Wireless Signal Squadron, which was formerly an ‘Anzac’ unit but had become wholly Australian following the withdrawal of the New Zealanders earlier that year; another station from the same unit was with the infantry. A few members of a second signal squadron newly arrived from Australia for service with the Indian Cavalry Division were also attached to the attacking force, purely to obtain experience.

kilometres north, so that its front now lay opposite the village of Broodseinde, and II Anzac was brought into the line on its left. Along slightly more than 4.5 kilometres of front there were now four Anzac divisions in line, in order from left to right (north to south): New Zealand, 3rd, 2nd and 1st Australian. While the New Zealanders faced Abraham Heights, the Australians had as their objective the main ridge which adjoined these at Broodseinde. Fearing that the fine weather which had accompanied operations over the preceding fortnight might change, preparations for the attack were hurried forward. On the night before the scheduled start, rain began to fall; it was, however, decided to persist with the planned advance. At dawn on the 4th, 40 minutes before the scheduled start-time at 6 a.m., the 1st and 2nd Divisions were suddenly assailed by a mortar barrage which fell on the shell-holes where they were waiting. Although considerable casualties were suffered in this bombardment, the troops could only wait it out. Precisely at 6 a.m. the British barrage descended, whereupon the Australians rose to their feet and advanced—only to be met by a line of troops from the German 212th Regiment which also jumped to their feet at that moment 30 metres away. These had been in the process of advancing behind their own barrage in an attempt to recapture some of the ground earlier lost. The Germans hesitated momentarily, evidently dis-

C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Broodseinde, fought on 4 October 1917, was the next operation launched by the British Second Army as part of the Third Battle of Ypres after Polygon Wood (q.v.). In an operation involving twelve divisions advancing on a front of thirteen kilometres, the centre comprised I and II Anzac Corps fighting side by side for the first time. The former had been sideslipped about three


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Troops of the 24th Battalion man the frontline on Broodseinde Ridge on 5 October. Source: Australian War Memorial E1831

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September–October 1917 concerted to find themselves confronted by a bigger attack than their own. The Australians opened fire with their Lewis guns and the enemy promptly broke, pursued by the waves of attackers. Following the usual stiff fighting around pillboxes, the Australians gained all their objectives on the ridge—though at the cost of 6,500 men; the New Zealanders suffered a further 1,700 casualties. Along the whole line the attack had been successful, thereby giving the British their first glimpse of the Flemish lowlands since May 1915. C.E.W. Bean (1933) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1917, Sydney: Angus & Robertson: P.A. Pedersen (1985) Monash as Military Commander, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Poelcappelle, an attack launched on 9 October 1917, as a direct consequence of the apparent easy success five days earlier of the British stroke at Broodseinde (q.v.). Despite the rain which had begun on the eve of that battle and had become torrential since then, British planners were convinced that a further hammerblow at the German line would be sufficient to shatter the enemy’s morale. This view ignored indications that the step-by-step approach pursued since 20 September could not be repeated indefinitely, regardless of the weather. In fact, even without the onset of rain the low-lying ground now being encountered was poorly drained and so sodden that passage was difficult. This meant that guns and ammunition needed for the protective barrages integral to the British tactics were having difficulty getting forward anyway, whereas recent augmentation of the German artillery’s strength meant that enemy barrages were increasing in ferocity. British optimism was also fuelled by the relatively large number of enemy dead found on the Broodseinde battlefield, it not being then realised that this derived from a change in German tactics aimed at overcoming the inability to get counter-attack formations


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forward for use when needed. At Broodseinde the enemy front areas had been packed with troops to meet the expected assault, with the result that both garrison and reaction forces were caught by the covering British barrages. In such a climate of deceptive expectation, the operation at Poelcappelle was launched along a front of more than twelve kilometres at 5.20 a.m. on 9 October, the aim being to approach the considerable village of Passchendaele on the next section of the main ridge. The main effort along the Anzac front involved two British divisions then manning the II Anzac Corps line, with the 2nd Australian Division going forward from the I Anzac Corps area on the right to secure their southern flank by seizing another ridge called the Keiberg. The whole advance foundered in the mud, and although the Australians made some ground for a time they could not hold these gains without support and were driven back. The misguided venture resulted in 1,250 Australian casualties, for no purpose. C.E.W. Bean (1933) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1917, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Passchendaele, the last Australian attack during the Third Battle of Ypres, took place on 12 October 1917. Notwithstanding the failure of the operation at Poelcappelle (q.v.) three days earlier, due to the impossible conditions created by heavy rain which was still falling, the commander of the British Second Army (Sir Herbert Plumer) was not deterred from continuing his step-by-step tactics—instead he hurried forward arrangements for delivering the next blow against Passchendaele. The attempt involved two divisions of II Anzac Corps (3rd Australian Division, under Major-General John Monash, and the New Zealand Division) on the right flank, advancing with five British divisions. The attack, launched at dawn, stood practically no chance of success. The

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protective artillery barrage was virtually useless, since the troops could not keep up with it in the mud and were lucky if they could even stay on their feet. In the II Anzac’s sector, the New Zealanders (fighting on the left) were pinned down by enemy pillboxes while the 3rd Division became bogged down in a valley below Passchendaele itself. A few Australians on the right reached the edge of the village, supported by a brigade of the 4th Australian Division (of I Anzac Corps) on their right who moved forward against an adjoining ridge called the Keiberg. Being too weak to hold their ground, however, both groups of Australians were eventually forced to give up these gains and fall back. This futile effort, often dignified with the title of First Battle of Passchendaele, cost the two divisions of II Anzac about 3,000 casualties each and the 4th Division another 1,000. Due to the heavy losses sustained by the Anzac Corps—38,000 in the five Australian divisions alone—Plumer was obliged to begin withdrawing them for rest and to bring in the Canadian Corps to complete the job of capturing the Passchendaele heights. Between 26 October and 10 November the Canadians undertook five operations which ultimately resulted in the objective being taken. During the first of these attacks I Anzac Corps provided some support on the Canadians’ southern flank, but by 15 November the last of the Australian divisions was following the others to the relative quiet of the Messines front. C.E.W. Bean (1933) The Australian Imperial Force in France, 1917, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; P.A. Pedersen (1985) Monash as Military Commander, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Beersheba, the most famous mounted charge involving Australians, was carried out by lighthorsemen against Turkish fixed defences in Palestine on 31 October 1917. After two previous British failures that year to take the strategic coastal city of Gaza (q.v.), preparations were made for a third attempt by the newly appointed commander-in-chief


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of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force, General Sir Edmund Allenby. The plan he devised entailed turning the left flank of the Turkish defensive line which rested on Beersheba, a small town situated in the desert about 43 kilometres south-east of Gaza. To this end British infantry corps were to make frontal attacks against both ends of the Turkish line simultaneously, while the Desert Mounted Corps (commanded by Australian Lieut.General Harry Chauvel) made a wide circling movement to approach Beersheba in the rear, from the east and north. On 27 October the 15,000 Australian and New Zealand horsemen in the two divisions of the Desert Mounted Corps available to Chauvel embarked on a series of night marches which took them east, to concentration areas at the water-points of Khelasa and Asluj more than ten kilometres south of Beersheba. Three days later they were positioned in readiness for the 25,000 men of the British 20th Corps to begin their assault on Beersheba from the west and south-west at dawn on the 31st. Chauvel’s first assigned objective was to capture enemy positions beside the Hebron road behind the town, thereby completing its encirclement. Stubborn resistance was overcome to take these posts by 3 p.m., by which stage the seizure of the town itself was becoming critical because of the attackers’ need for water. With only two hours remaining before nightfall Chauvel decided to send in Brig.General William Grant’s 4th Light Horse Brigade, which so far had been hardly involved in the day’s fighting; ‘Put Grant straight at it’ was his terse instruction. Although the conventional use of light horse units was as mounted infantry only, the urgency of the situation prompted Grant to adopt the hazardous cavalry-style tactic of an open charge. Concealed behind a ridge some eight kilometres south-east of the objective, the two leading regiments of Grant’s brigade—the 4th from Victoria on the right, and the 12th from New South

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October 1917


The charge of the 4th Light Horse at Beersheba, captured on film by a member of an Australian rangefinding party operating from a knoll in front of the Turkish positions before the charge was ordered. The authenticity of the photograph has been hotly debated over the years, amid claims that it actually showed a re-enactment staged for an official cinematographer at Belah (on the coast) in about February 1918, but more recent opinion favours the view that it truly depicts the charge under way. Source: Australian War Memorial A 2684

Wales on the left—were drawn up in three lines 300–500 metres apart, with five metres spacing between men. As neither unit was equipped with the normal shock action cavalry weapons of lance or sabre, the troops were ordered to carry their long bayonets in their hands. At 4.30 p.m., just on sunset, the attack force moved off at the trot with Grant initially at its head. The 400–500 horsemen were already at the gallop when they crested the ridge and came into Turkish view, but the speed and momentum of their charge quickly carried them through the curtain of fire from enemy field-guns, machine-guns and rifles. The Turkish positions—unprotected by wire—were breached without difficulty by the leading ranks, who leapt their horses over the trenches before dismounting and engaging the defenders in brutal hand-tohand combat. Two squadrons of the 12th Regiment raced on into the town, in time to prevent the destruction of all but two of seventeen wells by the fleeing Turks. Within an hour of the charge’s commencement all resistance collapsed, as those defenders who


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could made a rush for the safety of hills to the north and north-west. Nine guns and more than 1,000 prisoners were taken from the reinforced 27th Division occupying the town, and the commander of the Turkish 3rd Corps himself barely escaped capture. All this at a cost to the Australians of only 31 killed and 36 wounded. The dramatic fall of Beersheba opened the way for the whole Turkish defensive line to be outflanked and rolled up from east to west. After further heavy fighting, the Turks abandoned Gaza on 6 November and began a northerly retreat deeper into Palestine. The charge was a truly memorable and heroic feat of arms, fully deserving of the epic status it has subsequently achieved. The absence of the sort of casualties which might have been expected from an assault across nearly 6,000 metres of open ground swept by automatic weapons owed much to the speed of the unexpected attack. This was later discovered to have caused many Turks to forget to make range adjustments on their weapon sights, with the result that during the final stages of the charge much of the

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defenders’ fire had passed harmlessly over the Australians’ heads. H.S. Gullett (1923) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Khuweilfe, a prominent hill eighteen kilometres north of Beersheba, became the scene of an unexpected fight on 1–8 November 1917 initially between Australian lighthorsemen and Turkish forces. The action was triggered when a small detachment of 70 men under Lieut.-Colonel S.F. Newcombe, pressed ahead of the Desert Mounted Corps in the wake of the fall of Beersheba (q.v.) to search for water towards Nejile, in hill country beside the road to Hebron. Detecting this movement and concluding that the British were aiming to thrust north to Jerusalem via Hebron, which housed the headquarters of the Turkish 7th Army, the enemy quickly committed six battalions in this area and began transferring some reserve units from Gaza. The latter deployments actually played into British hands, since they weakened Gaza’s defences when a third (and ultimately successful) attempt to capture that place was launched on the night of 1 November. In the meantime the commander of Desert Mounted Corps, Lieut.-General Harry Chauvel, suddenly found his force presented with a serious obstacle at Tell el Khuweilfe at the very time that his superior (General Allenby) was counting on its availability for mobile operations to exploit any breaches in the enemy’s defensive line between Hebron and Gaza. For five days Chauvel used his lighthorsemen, British yeomanry and New Zealanders, along with infantry from the British 53rd Division and men of the Camel Brigade which were placed under his command, in attempts to push the Turks off the dominating ridge. The fighting in the waterless and rocky country was extremely difficult, and at times the attackers found themselves under immense pressure.


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Although the operation served a valuable purpose in drawing in a large part of the enemy’s own reserves, it seriously blunted Chauvel’s ability to undertake vigorous pursuit of an expected Turkish withdrawal. In preparation for an infantry assault by the British 20th Corps at Qawuka, eighteen kilometres to the west, on 6 November Chauvel was ordered to hand over conduct of the fight at Khuweilfe to Major-General G. de S. Barrow’s Yeomanry Division. The enemy-held hill was not finally taken until two days later, its capture being accomplished by troops of the 53rd Division. By then the Desert Mounted Corps was already moving to exploit the 20th Corps’ success against the Turkish centre, but being without its Yeomanry Division and three other brigades (Camels, New Zealanders, and 3rd Light Horse) the advance towards Huj and Jemmamah was slow. Although the overall outcome of the operation (the fall of Gaza) was achieved on 7 November, this result had not come as spectacularly as had been hoped. H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Daur, an action fought in Mesopotamia on 2 November 1917, on the west bank of the Tigris River about 140 kilometres north of Baghdad, was brought about when the commander of the British expeditionary force, Lieut.-General Sir Stanley Maude, decided to move against the Turkish garrison of 4,500 men with twenty guns opposite Daur (or Ad Dawr). To spare the attacking troops from extreme daytime temperatures, a night approach was employed which entailed some units marching from up to 50 kilometres away. In an attempt to prevent an enemy withdrawal the same tactic used five weeks earlier against Ramadi (q.v.) was followed, involving the cavalry division being sent out on a secret movement to sweep around the right flank of the Turkish position. Again, during this operation the cavalry

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November 1917–March 1918 was supported by the 1st Australian Wireless Signal Squadron which provided three radio stations. Some of the unit’s motorbikemounted despatch riders were also used as guides for ten armoured cars employed during the night march. This time, however, the mounted troops lost direction slightly in the dark, bumped into the enemy they were trying to bypass and disclosed their presence. In the subsequent fighting, infantry of the 7th (Meerut) Division managed to capture two lines of trenches by 9.30 a.m., but the cavalry column was delayed and bombed from the air, with the result that the bulk of the enemy were able to retire into stronger defences at Tikrit fifteen kilometres further up the river. This position was also carried by the British three days later, but the Turkish 18th Corps was able to escape intact albeit after being forced to burn part of its stores. C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

First Amman, scene of a strong British raid on Turkish forces on 27–30 March 1918, aimed at cutting the Hejaz railway line running south from Damascus. The operation began on 22 March with the building of bridges across the River Jordan, by which the British 60th (London) Division and Anzac Mounted Division—the latter commanded by Major-General Edward Chaytor, a New Zealander—were able to cross onto the east bank and push into the precipitous hills which rose 1,200 metres to the plateau on which the objective lay. Rain made going extremely difficult along two of the three main tracks by which the raiding force moved, but by the evening of the 25th the village of Es Salt (at the head of the northernmost route) had been taken. On the morning of the 27th Chaytor ordered his division to begin the attack on Amman itself. The 2nd Australian Light Horse Brigade under Brig.-General Granville Ryrie attacked from the north-west, while the Imperial Camel Brigade (which also


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included large numbers of Australians) came in from the west, and the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade from the south. In total, the three brigades numbered about 3,000 rifles in the firing line, and were supported by a single battery of mountain guns; against this strength the Turks presented about 4,000 men in well-prepared positions, well supported by machine-guns and fifteen artillery pieces. During two days of stiff fighting, the raiders succeeded in blowing up large sections of the railway line south of Amman, and a two-span stone bridge on the track north of the town (which was, however, speedily repaired and enabled a troop train to bring reinforcements for the garrison on 29 March). Turkish resistance, bolstered by a battalion of the German Asia Corps (actually only of brigade strength), proved impossible to overcome, even after British infantry arrived and entered into the fight. On 30 March the attacking force was ordered to pull back, this movement being commenced that night. Withdrawal proved to be an especially difficult undertaking, after large numbers of local inhabitants who had welcomed the troops and now feared retribution by the Turks joined in. By 2 April the raiders were safely back across the Jordan. The venture had cost a total of 1,200 British casualties; 724 were in the Anzac Mounted Division, of whom 118 were killed and 55 missing. The Turks were estimated to have suffered an equal number of killed and wounded, a claim which may well be exaggerated, but in addition were known to have lost 615 officers and men who were taken prisoner. H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Hébuterne, lying roughly midway between Arras and Amiens in northern France, was the scene of several sharp actions fought between 27 March and 5 April 1918. This was the first of many battles involving

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Australians during the great German offensive launched on 21 March against the thinly spread British Fifth and Third armies in this region. Since November 1917 the five Australian divisions had been holding the relatively quiet Messines sector in Flanders, and at this time they were formed into an Australian Corps under command of General Sir William Birdwood. In response to the grave news of enemy breakthroughs which had forced the frontline back onto the old battlefields of the Somme, however, by 25 March the 3rd and 4th Australian divisions were dispatched south towards Amiens. Here they were committed piecemeal to plugging gaps in the disintegrating British line and helping to stem the German tide. At dusk on 26 March the 4th Brigade (Brig.-General Charles Brand), the leading element of the 4th Division, was sent into the ruined village of Hébuterne to relieve exhausted remnants of the British 19th Division. The first German attack came at noon the next day from the south-west, aimed at passing between the positions occupied by the Australians and the New Zealand Division posted further south. This was beaten back, as were several half-hearted attempts the following day. While the Australians were able to hold their ground with relative ease, the security of their position was threatened by German efforts to drive in the flank of the British 62nd Division north of them and thereby open a gap. The task of the defenders was, however, partly assisted by rain which began falling from about 4 p.m. on the 28th and served to seriously impede the enemy’s movements. In fighting over the next few days, the position around the village was progressively stabilised. On 5 April the Australians took part in an early morning attack aimed at clearing the enemy from a wood on its left (northern) flank, and several hours later repelled a heavy German attack aimed at both themselves and the New Zealanders


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on their right. The ability of the tired and fully extended German advance-guard to brush aside the defensive line hastily thrown up here, and continue to push on, had clearly been reduced. The 4th Brigade stayed for nearly a month, remaining separated from the rest of its parent division and passing under command of the British 37th Division. C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

First Dernancourt, another action resulting from the German offensive of March 1918, involving troops of the 4th Australian Division, on 28 March 1918. As a result of a British division being mistakenly withdrawn from the positions it was holding protecting Albert, the 12th and 13th brigades were ordered south from their positions in support of the 4th Brigade at Hébuterne (q.v.) to fill the gap. Marching through the night of 26 March across part of the German front, the next day they occupied positions around Dernancourt—a village on the River Ancre close by the south-western outskirts of Albert, which itself was already in enemy hands—relieving exhausted troops of a Scottish division. Here, with the 3rd Australian Division in the vicinity of Morlancourt (q.v.) further south, and the British 35th Division holding a short sector in between, they formed the southern flank of the British Third Army. On 28 March the Germans attempted to continue their advance, crossing the Ancre and the Albert–Amiens railway between Albert and Buire. The first movement, carried out in early morning mist, was detected by the battalions of the 12th Brigade and repulsed. Fighting along the whole front between Dernancourt and Albert then erupted, but all the attacks mounted by the 50th (Prussian) Reserve Division were beaten back—on the right with the assistance of the 19th Northumberland Fusiliers of the 35th Division. The day’s

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March–April 1918 action had cost the Germans 550 casualties, and the Australians at least 137. C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

First Morlancourt, an action on 28–30 March 1918 which took place largely in parallel with the fight at Dernancourt (q.v.) which lay less than three kilometres to the north. It was into the triangular peninsula between the River Ancre in the north and the River Somme in the south—upon which the right flank of the British Third Army and the left of the Fifth were respectively anchored— that the 3rd Australian Division under Major-General Sir John Monash was sent on 27 March. The positions initially occupied by Monash’s troops, running from Méricourt to Sailly-le-Sec, lay about three kilometres behind those held by flanking formations, so shortly before noon the next day he was ordered to move forward about 2,000 metres to occupy the ridgeline overlooking Morlancourt from the west and thereby considerably straighten the line. Advancing after 4.30 p.m.—the 10th Brigade on the left and 11th on the right— the 3rd Division enjoyed little support from artillery since few guns were yet in range. When strong resistance began to be encountered on the bare steep slopes from enemy machine-guns and artillery, progress was slowed and on the left eventually stopped after only 500 metres. Monash ordered the march to be resumed after dark, by which time a light drizzle was falling. The advance became stalled by Germans holding a copse in the centre, and on the extreme right troops sent to secure the village of Sailly-Laurette beside the Somme stumbled into an ambush by enemy outposts containing six or seven machine-guns and nearly 100 men were lost. All up, the day’s activity had cost some 300 casualties. Giving up hopes of an advance without effective artillery support, Monash ordered his batteries to take up new positions during


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the remaining hours of darkness. The guns proceeded to hammer the obstacles encountered in the centre during 29 March, forcing the enemy to abandon these posts, and the Australian line began digging in on the forward slope of the spurlines it now occupied. The 11th Brigade, holding the southern portion of the division’s front, was forced to defend its ground when attacked at noon on 30 March by a fresh enemy division. The initial German deployment was stopped at heavy cost to the attacking troops, as was a second attempt two hours later and a third made about 4 p.m. The 11th Brigade easily held its positions, sustaining about 150 casualties. The enemy loss was several times that number, though nothing like some estimates which ran to 3,000–4,000 killed. C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

First Villers-Bretonneux, a major action fought on 4 April 1918, after the Germans renewed their March offensive aiming for the road and rail junction centre of Amiens. An important gain won in the initial drive had been the advancement of the frontline to within a few kilometres of VillersBretonneux, a point on the plateau south of the Somme River from which it was possible to overlook the flats of the Somme, Avre and Noye and from where there was the prospect of bringing Amiens itself—barely sixteen kilometres away—under artillery fire. When the Germans struck again with fifteen divisions along a front of 34 kilometres, this sector of the line was accordingly a particular focus of attention. In response to the previous perilous position at this point, the 9th Brigade of the 3rd Australian Division (under Brig.-General Charles Rosenthal) had been sent here on 29 March to prevent the Germans driving a wedge between the remnants of the British Fifth Army—now no more than a corps— and the French First Army to the south. An enemy thrust the next day against Hamel,

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To Hamel

Vaire Wood

Accroche Wood

Villers-Bretonneux To Warfusée To Amiens

Maximum extent of German advance Counterattacks German front after battle

Cachy

0

Marcelcave

1

2 kms

Hangard Wood

only five kilometres north-east of VillersBretonneux, had been repulsed, but valuable gains were made four kilometres south— about Hangard village on the River Luce. A battalion of the 9th Brigade (the 33rd) had become involved in the fighting here, in conjunction with the British 12th Lancer Regiment, in what became known as ‘Lancer Wood’. At the moment that the new German blow fell five days later, only one widely extended battalion (the 35th) of the Australian brigade was protecting the front of VillersBretonneux; the other three battalions lay in support behind the village. Two British divisions protected the flanks north and south, towards Hamel and Lancer Wood respectively, but both were tired after being engaged further south until recently relieved by the French. When the 18th Division on the south was attacked it held at first, but the 14th Division at Hamel did not; the Germans broke through here and captured


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Lancer Wood

the town. The Australian 35th Battalion was forced to swing back its left flank to avoid being enveloped. The situation on the northern edges of Villers-Bretonneux was restored by the 33rd Battalion acting in conjunction with British cavalry. On the northern edge of the 14th Division’s area, the situation was stabilised by the 15th Brigade of the 5th Australian Division under Brig.-General Harold Elliott. This was guarding the bridges across the Somme in rear of 3rd Australian Division and, as soon as fleeing British troops arrived in its lines, began organising a stopgap force west of Hamel. Later that afternoon, the brigade’s two reserve battalions were sent across the Somme and took over the defence of vital high ground west of Hamel, thereby ensuring that the German advance got no further in that direction. Meanwhile, a new German thrust in midafternoon drove back part of the 18th Division in the south and brought the enemy

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April 1918 to the outskirts of Villers-Bretonneux. The fall of the village appeared certain at this juncture until the 9th Brigade’s 36th Battalion, lying in wait just south of the township, launched an unexpected and spectacular bayonet charge at 5 p.m. Joined by a company of the 35th Battalion on its left and about 180 men from the British 7th Battalion of the Queen’s (Royal West Surrey) Regiment on the right, and supported by the 6th London Battalion as a second wave, this assault line was first sighted by the Germans—themselves advancing in five waves from the Monument Wood—at a distance of about 400 metres as it crested a rise at a jog-trot. The enemy at first hesitated, then backed into the cover of the wood. Although the attackers lost heavily, they succeeded in driving the enemy back more than a kilometre to a line just north of Lancer Wood. Shortly after the counter-attack ended, movement by British cavalry squadrons on the township’s northern outskirts (in which the Australian 33rd and 34th battalions joined) helped advance that part of the line and the crisis was past. Villers-Bretonneux had been held, but at a cost to the 9th Brigade of 665 casualties. C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Second Dernancourt, took place on 5 April 1918 as a result of the renewed German offensive, in the same area as the first battle of this name. Following the successful defence along the River Ancre on 28 March, the British 35th Division’s positions between Buire and Dernancourt had been taken over by the Australian 13th Brigade (Brig.-General William Glasgow), which came into line beside the 12th Brigade (Brig.-General John Gellibrand) holding between Dernancourt and Albert. Thus the bulk of the 4th Australian Division commanded by MajorGeneral Ewen Sinclair-Maclagan was here employed, the 4th Brigade still being


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required to assist in the defence of Hébuterne (q.v.) fifteen kilometres to the north. Soon after daylight, German artillery and mortar fire began falling on the 12th Brigade’s forward posts along the railway line north of the river as well as supporting positions on a bare hill further back. Under cover of morning mist enemy infantry then succeeded in penetrating the Australian line, using a railway bridge just west of Dernancourt (where the fronts of the two brigades joined) to get behind the outposts lining the railway embankment. The breakthrough on the 12th Brigade’s right flank extended as far as the support line and enabled the Germans, by bringing forward a field-gun, to threaten the brigade’s left flank to the north. Faced with being enveloped otherwise, the 48th Battalion holding the northern part of the line pulled back shortly after noon. Although half surrounded, the unit ably and calmly extricated itself in a fighting withdrawal. At 5.15 p.m. the reserves of both brigades launched a spirited counter-attack from behind the hill. Although the troops met intense fire as they advanced over the crest, they drove the Germans part of the way back down the hillside before being forced to halt. At this point, the action effectively ended. The understrength 4th Division had just faced the strongest attack mounted against Australians in the war—an assault by two and a half German divisions. It had suffered 1,230 casualties, but inflicted between 1,300–1,600 upon the enemy. Arriving from Flanders on 7–8 April, the 2nd Australian Division took over the Dernancourt positions and relieved the 4th Division. C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Hangard Wood, scene of an ill-conceived attack on 7 April 1918 against German positions south of Villers-Bretonneux (q.v.). Following the successful defence of that village on 4 April, the Australian 5th Brigade

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(under Brig.-General Robert Smith) was detached from its parent division—the 2nd, fresh from Flanders—to take over the frontline south of that place to where the British Fourth Army joined with French forces on the River Luce. As a preliminary to a larger operation aimed at returning the front some distance to the east of its present alignment, the Australians were ordered to ‘clean up the woods and ravine north and north-east of Hangard’. This entailed making an attack against the eastern half of the woods which the Germans had captured three days earlier. Although wearied by the process of relieving the British troops already in the vicinity, the Australian 19th and 20th battalions were eager to take on the task when orders reached them about midnight on the 6th for an assault at dawn. The forces involved were small—in several places no more than platoon posts of about 25 men, while the main attack was entrusted to just two companies. The northern assault party, despite showing great dash in the delivery of their attack, could find no tenable position upon which to base a defence once they had gained their objective. The southern force found itself subjected to searching fire from enemy machine-guns across the ravine, and with dead-ground on both flanks which left them vulnerable to counter-attack. From this quarter the Germans launched just such an attack at 6 a.m. and overran the Australians’ southern posts. Although continuations of this attack were beaten off, there was no viable alternative for the attack parties but to withdraw to their lines. The attempt had cost 151 casualties in the two companies required to carry forward the attack. It was nonetheless remarkable that the enemy forces they engaged—two battalions of a regiment of the 24th (Saxon) Reserve Division—suffered vastly more loss, apparently more than 600. The Australians continued to be involved in minor operations here until withdrawn and returned to the


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Australian Corps on 19 April. In fighting on 15 April another 84 casualties were sustained by one of the 5th Brigade’s battalions, though German losses were again worse—nearly 500 in another of the Saxon division’s regiments. C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Hazebrouck, an action during what is more generally called the Battle of the Lys in April 1918, caused when the Germans launched an extension of their offensive begun on 21 March. The enemy aimed their blow between Armentières and La Bassée, at a section of the front held by the Portuguese Corps—who they rightly assessed had little commitment to fighting for the Allies’ cause. When attacked on 9 April, the Portuguese broke. A second stroke the next day, falling north of Armentières, carried the German offensive towards Messines and placed in peril the whole of the British front in Flanders. Also threatened was Hazebrouck, a crucial rail centre, some 30 kilometres west of Armentières. The defences of the Messines sector had been vacated barely a week earlier by the 1st and 2nd Australian divisions, these being sent to follow the rest of the Australian Corps towards Amiens. Even so, some Australian units which remained—artillery and tunnellers mostly—became caught up in this fighting associated with the British withdrawal. The 1st Division, under MajorGeneral Harold Walker, was hastily re-entrained and returned north. Arriving on 12 April, the Australians became part of the British Second Army reserve and took up defensive positions about eight kilometres east of Hazebrouck, extending south from Strazeele to in front of the Nieppe Forest. By dusk the next day, all retreating troops had passed through and the Australian posts were effectively the new frontline; both the division’s flanks touched with British formations—on the left the 33rd Division, on the right the 5th Division.

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April 1918 After an artillery barrage beginning at 6.30 a.m. on 14 April, the Germans launched their attacks. These were broken up by answering British guns, and by devastating rifle and machine-gun fire whenever the enemy ranks reached close range. Nowhere were the Australian posts seriously threatened. When the enemy attacks against the 33rd Division saw the town of Meteren fall on 16 April, the 1st Brigade (holding the left of the Australian front) was required to push out its flank in this direction, to support a counter-attack ordered to be made at dusk by the French 133rd Division but which never took place. While the Australian front was thus extended, the next morning it was subjected to another heavy bombardment foretelling an attack to follow. The enemy were easily driven off, however, and repeated attempts to advance throughout the day were defeated before they could get underway. The next day, 18 April, the Australian Division was ordered to sideslip further north and relieve the French at Meteren. This was accomplished by inserting the 3rd Brigade (under Brig.-General Gordon Bennett), until then in reserve, on the 1st Brigade’s left, and withdrawing the 2nd Brigade from the right into reserve after its positions were taken over by the 31st Division. Following this adjustment, an attempt was made by the 3rd Brigade to recapture Meteren in a twophase operation carried out over successive nights. The first phase (on 22–23 April) went smoothly, but the second was sharply repulsed—bringing casualties in the failed attempt to about 200. Nonetheless the Allied line in this area had been stabilised, and the Germans confined their efforts to seizing high ground west of Messines. C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Zeebrugge, a naval operation conducted against the Flanders coast on 22–23 April 1918, aimed at closing off the Belgian port


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of Bruges from use as a base for German submarines. The port itself lay thirteen kilometres inland, its access to the sea being via a ship canal exiting at Zeebrugge or a series of minor waterways leading into Ostend harbour. Both exits were vulnerable to blockage if ships could be sunk in their narrow mouths, although such an enterprise was an especially difficult undertaking. Not only was the entrance at Zeebrugge shielded by a 2.5-kilometre-long mole, swinging in an arc from west of the canal mouth to provide a barrier against fierce North Sea storms and creating an artificial harbour, but the whole stretch of coastline from Nieuport to Knokke was heavily fortified by more than 200 German guns ranging in calibre from 3.5 inches to 15 inches. In February 1918 a call was made among naval units in Britain, seeking volunteers for ‘special service’. Men from the RAN battlecruiser Australia (then in port at Rosyth, Scotland) offered themselves, and one officer and ten ratings (five seamen, five stokers) were chosen. These were detached for training at Chatham depot, before being assigned to ships in the attacking force. The core of this force was five old light cruisers specially prepared as blockships—three (Thetis, Intrepid and Iphigenia) planned for use at Zeebrugge, the other two (Brilliant and Sirius) against Ostend. The stokers from Australia joined the crew of Thetis, the leader of the ships to block the channel, while the seamen joined HMS Vindictive as bomberthrowers in a storming party to be landed on the Zeebrugge mole. The officer, Artificer Engineer William Edgar, was placed in charge of the engine room of the Mersey ferry-boat Iris, whose role was to attend Vindictive during the landing of the storming party. The attacking force sailed late on the afternoon of 22 April, 146 vessels making for Ostend while 76 headed for Zeebrugge. The latter group was nearing its objectives when the Germans opened fire at 11.50 p.m.

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Although lashed by fire from the defenders’ guns, Vindictive succeeded in reaching the mole although sadly out of position, and— with the assistance of Daffodil, one of the two supporting ferry-boats—managed to land her storming parties. A company of naval assault personnel in Iris could not also be put ashore, however, because of the water turbulence and the fact that the scaling ladders carried on board were too short. The success of the submarine C3 in reaching its assigned position under a section of viaduct near the mole’s land-end, before tonnes of high explosive packed on board were detonated, ensured that the garrison did not receive reinforcements which made the storming parties’ task impossible. Meanwhile the three blockships charged forward, making for the canal mouth. Subjected to massive enemy fire and caught in a strong current, Thetis missed the gap in the enemy’s net defences and became ensnarled, trailing this wreckage which eventually pulled her up 300 metres short of the canal mouth where she went aground. The two vessels following managed to get inside the two piers which jutted out into the sea from either side of the entrance, before charges were blown which put them on the silty bottom. The crews of all three ships were taken off by a motor launch, but only after the storm of fire directed at this vessel had caused heavy casualties among the men packing its decks. An hour after the action began the signal was given for the attackers to withdraw. Retrieving as many of the assault personnel as could get back, Vindictive and her two ferry-boat consorts pulled away from the mole while making thick smoke to mask their escape. At this moment Iris had the misfortune to be hit by heavy shells fired blind by the enemy through the smokescreen. The explosions caused heavy casualties and set the vessel on fire, but Iris still managed to reach Dover at 2.45 p.m. that same day under her own power.


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While the Zeebrugge raid had broadly achieved its goal, that on Ostend failed completely. The action of the Germans late on the afternoon of 22 April in shifting or removing two marker buoys critical to accurate navigation meant that the attacking squadron lost its way. The two blockships went ashore on the sand north of their intended mark, their crews also being picked up by motor launches. The failure of this part of the operation prompted a second attempt against Ostend on 9–10 May, this time using the battered Vindictive as blockship. It, too, failed to quite achieve the desired result, in that the old cruiser sank just clear of the central channel into the harbour. This mattered less, however, since only small shallow-draught vessels could use the canal system here, and ocean-going submarines and destroyers already at Bruges were thus bottled up. And although the Germans managed to bring Zeebrugge back into service by removing the piers and dredging the sides of the canal, this still only made possible the passage of small submarines at high tide. In addition to restricting the use of the port facilities at Bruges, the Allies had won a significant moral victory with this epic raid. Eleven Victoria Crosses were won during the combined operation of 22–23 April. Although heavy, losses had not been crushing; in the 1,784-strong Zeebrugge assault force, for example, there were 170 killed and 400 wounded. None of the Australians present were among the casualties—Australia was, in fact, the only ship providing volunteers who did not post losses. This was purely by good luck, since one of the stokers in Thetis recorded that on making their way from the wrecked blockship they were obliged to row a lifeboat some 800 metres under fire before being picked up by a motor launch. At the height of Iris’s withdrawal, Edgar had also braved fire on the upper deck to turn on the vessel’s smoke apparatus; his service in the action earned

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April–May 1918 him the Distinguished Service Cross and promotion to Engineer Lieutenant rank. Three of the RAN seamen in Vindictive were also awarded Distinguished Service Medals. Arthur W. Jose (1928) The Royal Australian Navy, 1914–1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; James J. Atkinson (1986) By Skill & Valour, Sydney: Spink & Son

Second Villers-Bretonneux, an action on 24–25 April 1918, precipitated when the village at the centre of the fight three weeks earlier was captured from British troops that had relieved the forces (including the Australian 9th Brigade) originally involved in its defence. The German attack, launched by four divisions in mist at dawn on the 24th, followed a heavy bombardment the preceding night in which various types of gas—especially mustard—were used; it was also supported by tanks, the first time the enemy had used armoured vehicles in this role. Initially the defenders had little answer to the German advance, apart from three tanks which engaged in a duel with an equal number of the enemy vehicles—another first in the history of warfare—and drove them off. The commander of the British 3rd Corps borrowed two Australian brigades, the 13th of the 4th Division (Brig.-General William Glasgow) and the 15th of the 5th Division (Brig.-General Harold Elliott), and set them the main task of retaking the township. The plan of attack, settled after some dispute with the headquarters of the British 8th Division which was to control it, entailed Glasgow’s brigade sweeping past VillersBretonneux to the south while Elliott’s pushed past to the north. Setting off at 10 p.m., the 13th Brigade became engaged in an intense firefight with enemy machineguns in a wood before being able to proceed with its mission. During the succeeding hours of darkness the two brigades linked up east of the village, thereby largely completing the encirclement of the enemy inside although there was a gap through


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which part of the trapped garrison escaped. The clearance of Villers-Bretonneux, undertaken after dawn on the 25th, was accomplished with extreme ferocity by the Australians entering from the east and British troops from the north and west. Few prisoners were taken, and those enemy not killed were driven out without difficulty. The counter-attack had cost 1,469 AIF casualties, and the 14th Brigade which was present also suffered 338 casualties—chiefly to enemy gas. The action had, however, restored stability to this portion of the battlefield, and as well added greatly to the reputation of the Australian infantry on the Western Front. The next day the Moroccan Division of the French Army advanced through the Australian positions south of VillersBretonneux under orders to retake the Hangard Wood, which had also been lost to the enemy on 24 April. This attempt failed with heavy loss, as did an attack by the Australian 12th Brigade in the early hours of 3 May against Monument Wood close by the eastern edge of the township. The 48th Battalion which made the assault lost 155 men, but inflicted on the enemy Jäger troops it met an almost equal number of casualties. C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Es Salt, an Arab village 23 kilometres west of Amman, Palestine, which became the scene for heavy fighting between British and Turkish forces on 30 April–3 May 1918. The village had been seized before by British troops, during the raid on Amman (q.v.) a month earlier, but possession had been relinquished following the failure of that operation. This second large-scale sortie was launched because the commander of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force, General Sir Edmund Allenby, wished to use the plateau on which Es Salt stood as the launching point for a movement against the vital railway junction town of Deraa. Command of the operation

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was given to Lieut.-General Sir Harry Chauvel, who had available both the Australian Mounted Division (Major-General Henry Hodgson) and Anzac Mounted Division (Major-General Edward Chaytor), along with the 60th (London) Division. Using the British infantry to attack eastwards into the foothills of Tel Nimrin, above the bridgehead held around the Ghoraniye crossing on the Jordan, Chauvel sent two light horse brigades of Hodgson’s division north up the east bank of the river to seize the crucial crossing at Jisr ed Damieh, nineteen kilometres north-west of Es Salt, and prevent the movement of Turkish reinforcements from Nablus. While the 4th Brigade remained to hold this position, the other (the 3rd) was ordered to turn its attention down the track from Damieh to Es Salt itself. Another of Hodgson’s brigades following along behind, the British 5th Mounted, was to turn east at an earlier track—at Umm esh Shert—and by this parallel route also make for Es Salt. With the town captured, the plan called for one of Hodgson’s brigades and one of Chaytor’s (the 2nd Light Horse, which had been sent around the southern flank) to advance down from Es Salt into the rear of the Turkish positions opposing the 60th Division. Initially the operation went perfectly, and by the evening of 30 April Es Salt had been seized after a brilliant fight. Thereafter serious difficulties arose which brought the plan undone. The 4th Brigade, left to guard the Damieh crossing, came under heavy pressure from the Turks early on the morning of 1 May and was forced back—thereby allowing some of the enemy to advance towards Es Salt and into the rear of the lighthorsemen holding the town. Although the Australians were reinforced by some regiments of New Zealanders and British yeomanry, the defenders were forced to give still further ground, during which nine British guns were lost to the enemy. Although the threat to the left flank of the 60th Division’s


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advance was thus checked, the infantry were themselves making little progress during repeated attacks against the Turkish defenders in the foothills, nor could the mounted brigades moving against the rear of the enemy positions make any headway. With the tide of battle against him, Chauvel decided on 3 May to withdraw. Not only was the enemy being strongly reinforced, but co-operation promised by elements of the Arab army raised in rebellion against the Turks had failed to materialise. Again, the retreat was complicated by a mass of refugees which came away from Es Salt with the troops and caused congestion along the roads. The operation had cost Chauvel’s mounted brigades 50 killed, 278 wounded and 37 men missing; the infantry had suffered another 1,116 casualties. Apart from more than 1,000 taken prisoner, the Turks were estimated to have lost over 1,500 in killed and wounded. Despite this balanced outcome, the sortie had clearly been a failure, although it did have a valuable outcome in encouraging the enemy to believe (wrongly) that Allenby’s next stroke was also planned for this area. H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Second Morlancourt, a series of small thrusts carried out during 4–9 May 1918 against the new German forward line established between the Ancre and Somme rivers to protect Morlancourt. The operations, conducted by the 9th Brigade of the 3rd Australian Division, had the effect of capturing the enemy’s frontline and taking 170 prisoners for the relatively low cost of 264 casualties. This success provoked a German response shortly before 4 a.m. on 14 May, but the 200 attackers were cut off after penetrating the Australian positions (now held by troops of the 5th Brigade of the 2nd Division) and lost another 48 men captured; Australian casualties were 60 killed or wounded.

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May–June 1918 C.E.W. Bean (1942) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Allied Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Ville-sur-Ancre, located about three kilometres west of Dernancourt, was the scene of a successful attack by the 6th Brigade of the 2nd Australian Division at 2 a.m. on 19 May 1918. In a cleverly planned operation which required the river to be bridged, the attackers passed pincer movements around the northern and southern sides of the hamlet before raiding parties were sent through to clear the place. Australian casualties were 418, but German losses included 330 prisoners and 45 machine-guns captured. C.E.W. Bean (1942) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Allied Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Heligoland Bight, a minor action on 1 June 1918 involving aircraft launched from the Australian light cruisers Melbourne and Sydney, which represented the first use of airpower in combat by the RAN. During a three-month refit carried out at the Royal Navy dockyard at Chatham in the last quarter of 1917, Sydney had acquired a revolving aircraft launching platform fitted behind and partly over the forward 6-inch gun turret. This enabled the ship to take on board a Sopwith Camel scout for operational use, probably in February 1918. After being similarly fitted with a platform the following month, Melbourne also began operating a Camel in May that year. When Admiral David Beatty, commanderin-chief of the Grand Fleet, sent a large force to raid enemy minesweepers in the Heligoland Bight on 1 June, both Australian ships were with the Second Light Cruiser Squadron which led the operation. Included in the main body were two heavy cruisers (Courageous and Glorious) which had been fitted out to carry aircraft, escorted by nine destroyers, and the First Battle Cruiser Squadron with Beatty in HMS Lion. Late in the afternoon, with the operation well


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underway, two enemy seaplanes suddenly broke through cloud cover overhead, passing the cruiser force and making directly towards the battle-cruisers beyond. After dropping five bombs, the enemy machines turned and within five minutes were repassing the light cruisers on their way back to base to report what they had sighted. Meanwhile, Sydney and Melbourne had each launched their own aircraft, getting these aloft in the creditable time of just two minutes. The pilot of Melbourne’s aircraft lost sight of the quarry as he climbed through the clouds, but Sydney’s aviator, Flight Lieutenant A.G. Sharwood, RAF, kept the enemy planes in view and steadily overhauled them in the course of a 100-kilometre pursuit. Eventually getting within range, he opened fire on one of the aircraft and observed it drop down through the mist in a spinning dive. Sharwood was about to follow his opponent down when he spotted another enemy machine behind him, presumably the first seaplane’s partner, and was obliged to turn to meet this threat. In the short combat which followed, one of the Camel’s guns ran out of ammunition and the other jammed soon afterwards, forcing Sharwood to disengage and head back towards the fleet. With petrol running low, Sharwood was beginning to despair of finding the ships when he sighted two British light cruisers with several destroyers and turned towards them. One of these vessels fired at him before he was able to identify himself, but he was then able to descend to make a landing on the water ahead of one of the destroyers— the only way cruiser-launched aircraft could be recovered at that time. Forced to cling for twenty minutes to the tail of his ditched machine, which fortunately stayed afloat, he was eventually picked up and his Camel subsequently salvaged. Although the incident was not generally regarded as significant, it was actually a useful early demonstration within the RAN of the utility of seaborne airpower in support of naval operations.

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Keith Isaacs (1971) Military Aircraft of Australia 1909–1918, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Third Morlancourt, an attack carried out on 10 June 1918 by 7th Brigade of the 2nd Australian Division against the southern portion of the Morlancourt spur which overlooked the village of Sailly-Laurette on the Somme. Launched at dusk under cover of an accurate barrage, the operation was a complete success and resulted in the taking of 325 German prisoners at a cost of 400 Australian casualties. C.E.W. Bean (1942) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Allied Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Hamel, the first set-piece operation planned and conducted under Lieut.-General Sir John Monash, the newly appointed commander of the Australian Corps, took place on 4 July 1918. The action was actually a fairly small affair—little more than divisional scale—but has since become famous as a model of the completely successful all-arms battle. In particular, the methodical and thorough way in which preparations were made, the new procedures devised, and the use of conferencing as a means to both inform and consult subordinates, set new standards of generalship which were emulated subsequently by other commanders on the Western Front. In reality, the scale and nature of the operation left little to chance. Its purpose was limited to straightening the line by carrying it eastwards no further than two kilometres on a frontage of 6.5 kilometres. Covering this movement were 650 guns, and the advancing infantry was supported by the British 5th Tank Brigade containing no less than 60 of the latest Mark V tanks. Overcoming the Australians’ unhappy experience of working with tanks at the First Battle of Bullecourt (q.v.), these armoured vehicles were ordered to accompany the assault troops immediately behind the creeping barrage, operating under infantry control to break down wire obstacles


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encountered and deal with troublesome enemy strongpoints. Monash’s main worries were concerned with the manning levels in his divisions, the ranks of which were already reduced by losses and being thinned even more by an influenza epidemic. To avoid totally crippling any one of the divisions, he resorted to assembling an assault force using a brigade from each of the 2nd (contributing the 6th Brigade), 3rd (11th Brigade) and 4th (4th Brigade). Command of this force in the attack was given to Major-General Ewan Maclagan, the General Officer Commanding 4th Australian Division, from whose sector it would primarily be launched. Bolstering the Australian strength were four companies of troops from the American 33rd Division, which were attached by platoons to Australian battalions to gain combat experience. Arrangements for the operation were developed with remarkable attention to detail. To mask the sound of the tanks moving into position during the night of 3 July, Allied aircraft bombed Hamel and enemy rear areas. Several diversions were also planned, The ground seized by the Australian Corps at Hamel, pictured on the morning of the battle. The attack proceeded up the far slope as far as the shattered remains of the Vaire and Arroche Woods on the skyline in the centre of the picture. Visible in the middle ground are two ammunition parachutes, aerial resupply of forward troops being one of the many new features of this operation. Source: Australian War Memorial E3840


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June–July 1918 the main one requiring the 15th Brigade of the 5th Australian Division to strike beyond Ville north of the River Somme. To lighten the normal burden of the advancing infantry, innovative use was made of carrier tanks to bring forward supplies and of air-dropping ammunition to the forward troops. The result of all this effort was that the assault met with outstanding success. The attack was over barely 90 minutes after it started at 3.10 a.m., and all objectives had been seized for a cost of just 1,062 Australian and 176 American casualties; the 15th Brigade’s diversion added another 142 to the tally, making a total of less than 1,400. German casualties were assessed at considerably more than 2,000, including 1,600 taken prisoner. In addition, the enemy lost 200 machine-guns and trench mortars, plus some anti-tank weapons. C.E.W. Bean (1942) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Allied Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; P.A. Pedersen (1985) Monash as Military Commander, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Abu Tellul, a prominent hill on the west bank of the Jordan River in Palestine, was the scene of a strong attack upon Australian outposts on the night of 14 July 1918. The height, and another called Musallabeh immediately north of it, formed a crucial bastion at the junction of the British defensive line running both west and south from here along the Jordan Valley. Covering this important ground was a line of posts which were either dug or built up with stone sangars, and protected by curtains of barbed wire; these were situated 400–1,000 metres apart, and often separated by ravines. An attack was fully anticipated, and it was also recognised that when such an attempt was made the position might for a time be surrounded and isolated. The Australian lighthorsemen who held it—men of the 1st Brigade commanded by Brig.General Charles Cox—were, however, confident of their ability to hold out in such circumstances.


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When the attack came at about 3.30 a.m., following a heavy artillery barrage, it was spearheaded by two battalions of the German Asia Corps (about 1,000 men) ahead of three Turkish regiments. Although one of the posts quickly became untenable and was abandoned under heavy pressure, elsewhere the Australians held firm and when ground was lost—as at Musallabeh for a time—made spirited counter-attacks. Sunrise revealed all the posts now isolated and under repeated assault by waves of enemy infantry, but with the defenders unwavering in their resistance. The position became critical once the Germans, having penetrated the outpost line, began climbing Abu Tellul’s slopes. In savage fighting, which took place in temperatures already exceeding 38°C in the shade at 7 a.m., they succeeded in overwhelming one group of defenders, and reduced another to just three unwounded men. At this juncture, however, Cox’s reserve regiment counter-attacked with the bayonet, catching the Germans off balance and chasing them down into the valley between the two main ridgelines. Here the retreating enemy were caught in crossfire from the outposts they had bypassed and were effectively trapped. A similar bayonet charge at about 8 a.m. on a feature between the two heights met with equal success, and by 9 a.m. the enemy had been pushed back out beyond the outpost line and the situation restored. The attack cost the enemy at least 105 dead and 45 wounded (these being found within the Australian-held ground), and as well 425 prisoners were taken; 358 of the latter were Germans. This was, in fact, the only time in which the Asia Corps was known to have carried the primary role in an attack, or—as the Official History puts it—the German infantry was used as ‘stormtroops’ in Palestine. As well, 41 machine-guns were taken from the enemy as a result of the action. Australian losses amounted to 31 killed and 46 wounded.

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Musallabeh n &ack a rm att Ge ish rk Tu

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H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Karawaran, a village in northern Persia (now Iran) about 50 kilometres south of Lake Urmia, was the scene of a desperate rearguard action against Turkish troops and marauding Kurds and Persians fought on 6– 7 August 1918 by members of a special British group known as ‘Dunsterforce’. The unit—named after its commander, MajorGeneral Lionel Dunsterville—included some 47 officers and non-commissioned officers recruited from the AIF in France and Palestine in its eventual strength of 450, and had been raised for the task of guarding against German penetration of Asia by mobilising and organising resistance by the peoples of the Caucasus region. Attempts to render support to Christian Assyrians and Armenians who were fighting the Turkish 5th and 6th divisions at Urmia, a city on the western side of the lake, were


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Ri

Counterattacks 1

2

3 kms

forestalled when the Turks gained entry to that place on 30 July and put 80,000 of its population to flight. A twenty-strong party of Dunsterforce (half of whom were Australians or New Zealanders) and a squadron of British cavalry, which had been detached to escort a convoy carrying money, machine-guns and ammunition from Bijar, met the mass of refugees on the road on 4 August. The commander of the Dunsterforce party, Captain Stanley Savige (an Australian), rode forward the next day to the rear of the column, which he found under attack from local tribesmen but protected by a small rearguard organised by an American missionary, Dr W.A. Shedd. Obtaining permission from his superiors in the British mission, Savige again rode out on 6 August with a party of eight (two of whom were also Australian) to give what assistance was possible against the raiders. Finding Shedd with 24 armed refugees at the tail of the withdrawing column, Savige

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August 1918 relieved him (but took over his men) before riding further on to find better ground on which to fight. At a village apparently named Karawaran, lying south of the town of Miandoab, the rearguard discovered a force of Turkish cavalry engaged in looting. These they drove out, and were also forced to fight off about 100 tribesmen who were riding about the valley in search of plunder, before falling back ten kilometres to spend the night in another village. The fight began again the next morning, this time against a party of 150 mounted Kurds who approached directly while others rode around hilly country on both flanks. Savige’s men, with no more than twelve of Shedd’s original party, mounted a hasty defence from a hill behind the village which checked the enemy horsemen. Then followed a sustained withdrawal which barely succeeded in keeping the pressing enemy away from the rear of the refugee column. The strength of the defence was slowly reduced by the death of one of the Dunsterforce men, and the desertion of all but two of the volunteers, and after seven hours of relentless fighting the remainder were close to exhaustion. The rearguard was saved from being overrun by the timely arrival of a dozen British cavalrymen who had been policing the road when they intercepted a message from Savige appealing for reinforcement. A short time later a party of 50 Christian tribesmen also arrived to lend support, at which the Turks and others made off. Although the pursuit of the fleeing refugees was continued until the column’s tail-end reached Bijar on 17 August, at no stage did the task of defence again result in such fierce combat. The loss of some 30,000 people in the retreat from Urmia made it perhaps one of the most dreadful episodes of the war. S.G. Savige (1919) Stalky’s Forlorn Hope, Melbourne: Alexander McCubbin; C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson


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Amiens, or the Third Battle of the Somme, is the name given to the blow delivered on 8 August 1918 against German forces by the British Fourth Army and the French First Army. The British part of the operation— aimed at driving the enemy east, away from Amiens, for a distance of up to eleven kilometres—was launched by three corps: the British 3rd north of the Somme River; the Australian south of that river and north of the Amiens–Chaulnes railway line; and the Canadian on the Australian right, between the railway and the Amiens–Roye road. The Canadians were brought down from Arras in great secrecy, while the Australian Corps was augmented by the return of its 1st Division from the Lys front. Guns were silently registered onto their targets rather than ranged by firing a few rounds. Also assisting the success of the attack were 430 British tanks, whose assembly was carefully masked using aircraft noise—a device successfully employed by Monash at Hamel (q.v.). The battlefield was thickly covered in fog when massed British guns brought down the creeping barrage which signalled the start of the advance at 4.20 a.m. Little more than three hours later the enemy’s front trench system had been overrun. In the Australian Corps sector, the 4th and 5th divisions passed through the 2nd and 3rd divisions, who had led the assault until then, and pushed ahead to the second line of objectives another three kilometres further on. By midafternoon these, too, had been taken. For a time the British corps in the north had fallen behind the required rate of progress, thereby allowing the 4th Division’s left flank to be exposed to fire from enemy forces north of the Somme around Cérisy, in what was called the Chipilly Peninsula. Despite this, the Australians pressed their advance to the second objectives—catching in the process hundreds of German support and reserve troops in the Morcourt valley—then continued on with the third and final stage,

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Elements of the 5th Brigade wait north of Warfusée-Abancourt for the start of the Second Phase of the Amiens battle, 8 August 1918. Source: Australian War Memorial E3883

still with the enemy firing into their flank and rear. By nightfall both the Allied armies had reached their final objectives south of the Somme. A shattering blow had been dealt to the enemy, who suffered 27,000 casualties (including 16,000 prisoners, 7,925 taken by Australians) and 450 guns captured. Among the latter was an 11-inch gun mounted on a railway carriage, with which the enemy had been shelling Amiens from near Harbonnières; this was attacked by a British aircraft, then British cavalry, and finally secured by Australian infantry. All this had been won for a cost to the attackers of 9,000 casualties (about 2,000 of whom were Australian). In the words of General Erich Ludendorff, 8 August had been the German Army’s ‘black day’ of the war which showed the conflict’s final outcome now to be inevitable. The advance was continued on 9 August, the main emphasis being on the southern front with the Australians mainly engaged in pushing out apace to cover the Canadians’ northern flank. This gave rise to further actions over the next three days (see Lihons, Etinehem and Proyart), however, in the


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face of stiffening enemy resistance, progress was not as spectacular as on this first day, nor were arrangements so well co-ordinated. As a consequence, by 14 August AIF losses climbed to 6,000 (1st Division 1,931; 2nd Division 1,295; 3rd Division 1,095; 4th Division 784; and 5th Division 886)—most of these being incurred during 9–12 August. C.E.W. Bean (1942) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Allied Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Lihons, fought on 9–11 August 1918, involved the 1st, 2nd and 5th Australian divisions while trying to support an advance of the Canadian Corps towards Chaulnes. Following their own successful advance the day before (see Amiens), the Australian Corps was ordered to push forward the right of its line about Harbonnières and seize the ruined village of Lihons. This meant making an easterly advance of some seven kilometres and the capture of a considerable hill lying just west of the objective, the rounded summit of which was being used by German batteries. This section of the Australian line was then held by the 5th Australian Division, but the corps commander (Lieut-General

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August 1918 Sir John Monash) had decided to bring up the 1st Division—freshly arrived from further north the previous day—and insert it on the right of the 5th, since any advance made was constantly expanding his front. The 5th’s role was therefore confined to securing what would become the 1st’s left flank, by using its 8th Brigade to capture the village of Vauvillers, before itself being relieved by 2nd Division. After it was realised that the 1st Division was in no position to go forward with the Canadian left when the latter began their advance at 11 a.m. on 9 August, the 5th Division’s 15th Brigade (Brig.-General Harold Elliott) stepped into this role at short notice. This proved a difficult task, since the lead battalions had barely gone 100 metres before they were pinned down by enemy machine-guns and a fierce fight began. On the 5th Division’s left an equally difficult fight broke out in front of Vauvillers for the 8th Brigade. Meanwhile the 1st and 2nd divisions had been taking up positions south-west and north of Harbonnières, and when these movements were observed by the enemy resistance began to crumble. By the time troops of the 1st Division had come up and begun to pass through the 5th at 1.45 p.m., Vauvillers had been taken along with some hundreds of German prisoners. The advance towards Lihons was now pressed on the south by the 2nd Brigade (Brig.-General James Heane). Though bombed by enemy aircraft and shelled by guns on Lihons hill, progress was helped by the fact that the 6th Canadian Brigade on the right had got far ahead and was thus effectively outflanking the German defenders. Although the guns on the hill did dreadful execution to tanks supporting the advance, soon putting all of these out of action, by mid-afternoon the attack was about a kilometre short of its objective; about 5 p.m. elements of the brigade had attained part of the crest and were holding on. At 4.30 p.m. the brigades of the 2nd


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Division moved forward on the 1st Division’s left and, leap-frogging the 8th Brigade, began driving back the Germans who had delayed progress in this quarter. The village of Framerville was captured and by 8 p.m. most of the day’s objectives had been attained, except on the right where the 2nd’s line met with the 1st’s; here the troops were still 500 metres or so short. The operation was resumed at 8 a.m., chiefly by the 2nd and 3rd brigades of 1st Division who moved directly against Lihons hill, but also by a battalion of the 7th Brigade of 2nd Division which kept up the left flank. By the time the Canadians again went forward south of the railway line, the Australians were locked in a bitter struggle for the crest. German resistance continued for the rest of 10 August, and Monash ordered that the fight be resumed at 4 a.m. the next day. A formal assault by the 2nd and 3rd brigades, conducted in heavy fog, carried the back slopes of Lihons hill and the village beyond. Severe fighting again followed as the Germans countered, first with a gas barrage and then with infantry attacks. These failed to expel the Australians from their gains and by that night the attack in this sector effectively ended. Meanwhile the 2nd Division had also been engaged to the north, the principal role falling to the 5th Brigade which attacked from Framerville to beyond Rainecourt until checked by machine-gun fire from the direction of Proyart. The three days leading up to this point had been extremely costly, far more so than during the first day of the Battle of Amiens. The 1st Division’s 2nd and 3rd brigades alone suffered nearly 1,600 casualties in this period, while even the 2nd Division lost 280 men on just the last day. All too often the various attacks ordered were disjointed and inadequately co-ordinated. In the view of the Official History, the manner in which ‘brigadiers and battalion commanders [were] rushed into half-known situations in newly

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captured territory...furnish a classic example of how not to follow up a great attack’.

completed the task of clearing the ground, taking 100 prisoners.

C.E.W. Bean (1942) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Allied Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson


Etinehem, an action fought along the Somme River on 10–13 August 1918, was the result of difficulties encountered during the great attack made two days earlier by the British Fourth Army which included the Australian Corps under Lieut.-General Sir John Monash (see Amiens). Then, the British 3rd Corps’ slow progress north of the Somme had enabled German forces in two ‘peninsulas’ formed by bends in the river— at Chipilly and Etinehem—to enfilade the 4th Australian Division during its advance and obliged it to stop short of its final objective at Méricourt. While fighting continued in the south of the Australian Corps’ sector during 9 August (see Lihons), Monash made plans to eliminate the Germans holding the ridges and gullies about Etinehem on the following day. Obtaining permission from the army commander (General Sir Henry Rawlinson) to take over responsibility for the immediate area of the north bank, Monash pushed across the 13th Brigade of the 4th Division (Brig.-General Sydney Herring) which he combined with the American 131st Regiment to form a composite division known as Liaison Force. On the night of the 10th this column advanced east across country, parallel to the Bray–Corbie road, with two tanks moving noisily (deliberately) along the road itself. The effect on the overstrained enemy was as expected, prompting a panic-stricken withdrawal through Bray and allowing the Australian force to establish themselves across the head of the Etinehem spur. Although German troops subsequently recovered, and began filtering back to resume such of their positions as remained viable, their grasp of the peninsula had been fatally weakened. During the night of 12–13 August Herring

Proyart, an action which took place on 10–12 August 1918, was mounted by the 3rd Australian Division under Major-General John Gellibrand as a counterpart to the operation against the Etinehem ‘peninsula’ (q.v.). At the same time as Monash formed a column to clear the northern bank of the Somme River, he tasked the 10th Brigade (Brig.-General Walter McNicoll) with launching an easterly night movement on the opposite bank, travelling along a Roman road past Proyart with orders to then swing in to the river towards Chuignolles. The intention was to entrap the Germans within an enclave containing Méricourt, before the 3rd Division’s other brigades set to ‘mopping up’ this area. McNicoll’s column was also assisted by tanks—six of them, from the 8th Tank Battalion—but in this case it was not made clear that their role was to overawe and panic the enemy. The column was bombed by an enemy aircraft soon after 10 p.m., then fiercely engaged by German machine-guns which totally disorganised the lead battalion and caused casualties to a quarter of its strength, so that a withdrawal became necessary before daylight arrived and left what remained of the force dangerously exposed. During the next day Gellibrand decided to push forward his 11th Brigade during the night of 11–12 August with the object of sealing the mouth of the Méricourt ‘peninsula’ formed on the south side of the looping river. This effort resulted in some 350 prisoners being taken, at a cost of 74 Australian casualties. Having achieved this much, during the daylight hours of the 12th Gellibrand set to ‘nibbling’ his way up to and through Proyart using patrols. Beyond the village the troops began encountering


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August–September 1918 strong enemy forces, these being seen to receive considerable reinforcement about 6 p.m. Although counter-attacked, the Australians held their newly acquired ground. C.E.W. Bean (1942) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Allied Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Lille, situated fifteen kilometres south-east of Armentières, France, was the scene of two famous air raids against German airfields on the city’s western outskirts on 16 and 17 August 1918. Both attacks involved No.2 and No.4 squadrons of the Australian Flying Corps (the former equipped with S.E.5a fighters and the latter with Sopwith Camel scouts) along with two British squadrons of the 80th Wing, Royal Air Force—a total of 60–65 aircraft. The first raid was directed against Haubourdin, five kilometres southwest of the city, and the second at Lomme an equal distance to the city’s north-west. The attacks were effectively carried out by the two Australian squadrons—No.4 (under Captain Harry Cobby) leading, followed by No.2 (Captain Murray Jones)—while the British squadrons kept guard above against approaching enemy aircraft. In what the Official History terms ‘a riot of destruction’, 54 enemy aircraft were wrecked on the ground along with workshops and hangars. F.M. Cutlack (1923) The Australian Flying Corps in the Western and Eastern Theatres of War, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Chuignes, an action fought on 23 August 1918, took place in a long valley running south of the Somme filled with woods. For more than a week after the post-Amiens battles (see Lihons, Etinehem and Proyart) the British Fourth Army remained practically stationary, awaiting a new advance by the Third Army south of Arras on 21 August aimed at Bapaume. The next day the British 3rd Corps would enter the battle, and also the 3rd Australian Division (now located north of the Somme) with an attack north of Bray. Finally, the rest of the Australian Corps under


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Lieut.-General Sir John Monash was to join in another day later, striking for a plateau beyond the Froissy valley. With a brigade of the British 32nd Division operating on their right (southern) flank against the village of Herleville, two brigades of the 1st Australian Division commanded by Major-General William Glasgow attacked towards Chuignes. Each of the attacking brigades was accompanied by a dozen Mark V tanks and several carrier tanks. Once these had won the western side of the valley, Monash planned to push through the 1st Division’s 3rd Brigade across the valley and onto its eastern heights. The operation, launched behind a tremendous barrage at 4.45 a.m., was a stunning success. Although confronted with stubborn opposition which claimed about 1,000 Australian casualties, the Germans were routed with the loss of 2,000 prisoners. C.E.W. Bean (1942) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Allied Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Baku, an oil port and town on the west coast of the Caspian Sea, was the scene of desperate fighting between Turkish forces and a special British unit known as ‘Dunsterforce’ and their Armenian and Russian allies between 26 August and 14 September 1918. In line with its goal of organising resistance to Turkish and German advances in the region, Dunsterforce—under its commander, Major-General Lionel Dunsterville—had attempted to bolster the local forces totalling 6,000 men which were holding a 20-kilometre-long defensive line across the Baku Peninsula against some 14,000 Turkish troops. Apart from the small number of Dunsterforce members advising local commanders, elements of the British 39th Brigade were obtained from Mesopotamia totalling about 1,000 infantry and one artillery battery. Following the communist revolution in Russia, the task of Dunsterville’s mission was an immensely complicated undertaking.

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Russia’s formal withdrawal from the war meant that many Russian Army units were disinclined to fight, while Bolshevik sympathies among large sections of the local populace caused the British presence to be widely viewed with suspicion and hostility. Instead of accepting the assistance of Dunsterville’s ‘advisers’ (several of whom were Australians), local authorities largely expected the British to carry the weight of the fighting for them. Consequently, when the Turks attacked on 26 and 31 August, the Armenian levies promptly melted away or failed to give support. After the first two Turkish assaults succeeded in making significant gains against the right flank of the town’s defences, Dunsterville told the local leaders that he would withdraw his troops whenever it was necessary to save them from destruction. When he next advised them that he intended to leave Baku entirely, he was warned that any attempt to sail away from the port would be resisted. Although not intimidated by this,

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he decided to remain, and was encouraged by an apparent improvement in affairs during the next fortnight. When a deserter from the Turkish lines disclosed that a further assault was to be expected on 14 September, this news was awaited with greater confidence. In the event, the Turkish attack met with the same absence of fight by the local troops: first reports that morning were of the enemy advancing at the run upon the town. The British, acting with a handful of Cossacks, stemmed the Turkish advance through the rest of the day, but Dunsterville immediately prepared to make good his threat to withdraw once night arrived. The local authorities initially acquiesced in his plans, then attempted to prevent the evacuation. Despite this, the whole of the British force successfully got off under cover of dark and was taken to Enzeli. Two Australians, Major H.B. Suttor and Sergeant A.L. Bullen, although left behind through not being notified of the departure, subsequently

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September 1918 escaped in a refugee boat to Krasnovodsk. C.E.W. Bean (1937) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Main German Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Mont St Quentin, the heights which overlook the ancient town of Péronne on the Somme River from the north at a distance of three kilometres, on 31 August–2 September 1918 became the scene of a famous action involving the Australian Corps under Lieut.General Sir John Monash. Advancing on the town from the west—his divisions astride the river, but mainly on the south bank— Monash decided on an attempt to surprise the German defence by transferring his weight to the far bank and capturing the crucial heights from the north-west and west. After stiff fighting on 29–30 August to seize hills which dominated the river crossings and the planned approach route, the 5th Brigade of the 2nd Division was moved into position ready to storm the heights at 5 a.m. on the 31st. Due to losses in this brigade, like all the others at this time, the two assaulting battalions and the two following in the second wave had only about 300 men each—a dangerously small number for such a difficult assault.

Under cover of an artillery bombardment, the attack began on time with the infantry advancing while yelling wildly to disguise their thin numbers. Immediately they began encountering crowds of bewildered enemy troops who surrendered without resistance, though they were members of a division— the 2nd Guard—which was one of the best in the German Army. As the Australians reached and crossed the summit, pressing the attack among the support and reserve troops located here, masses more Germans were sent fleeing down the slopes. Although the mountain was thus captured, the small size of the assault force meant that Australian possession of the prize was still only slender. When the 2nd Guard Division mounted a counter-attack, the battalions of the 5th Brigade were pushed back out of Mont St Quentin village and over the crest, but they hung on just below the summit. The next day the 6th Brigade (then part of the 3rd Australian Division) was pushed through the 5th and retook the summit at its second attempt. This development was followed up by the 14th Brigade of the 5th Division, which had also been brought around onto this side and now captured the

Troops of the 21st Battalion attacking at Mont St Quentin on 1 September 1918. Source: Australian War Memorial E3104



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woods north of Péronne. When a shortlived panic swept the German defenders, this brigade crossed the moat and captured the main part of the town. The Australian gains were consolidated further on 2 September, when the 2nd Division’s 7th Brigade pushed beyond the mountain and the 15th Brigade (5th Division) took the rest of Péronne. The whole of this brilliant operation had cost the Australian divisions slightly more than 3,000 casualties but had accounted for 2,600 enemy prisoners and dealt—as the Official History observes—‘a stunning blow to five German divisions’. To many minds the battle was the crowning achievement of the AIF, if not of the entire war. C.E.W. Bean (1942) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Allied Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Hindenburg Outpost Line, an action fought on 18 September 1918, which involved the 1st and 4th Australian divisions in breaching the forward edge of the main German defensive line across the Picardy region of northern France. By this stage the Hindenburg defences had been developed into a complex network of great depth, bristling with wire obstacles and well protected by numerous machine-guns. The British forces closing from the west were confronted not just by the main system of the original Hindenburg Line and the outpost line in front, but also the three lines of trenches they themselves had constructed to face it; the latter, overrun by the Germans in March and left empty for the six months since, had been occupied by the enemy and incorporated into the overall system. Initially the British had no idea upon which of these various lines the Germans would choose to fight. It was only after the Australians had succeeded in capturing the first line of defences (the old British reserve trenches) on 11 September, using the tactics of aggressive patrolling dubbed ‘peaceful penetration’, that it was established that the Germans intended to mount their main


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resistance from what was formerly the British main line of defences. Behind this the old British and German outpost lines had been merged into a system to presently house reserves. Still behind this was the main system of the original Hindenburg Line— situated east of the Mont St Quentin Canal which connected the sources of the Somme and Scheldt rivers and built partly over the Bellicourt tunnel (through which the canal ran)—and further systems known as the Nauroy and Beaurevoir lines, though these were held only by emergency garrisons if at all. Recognising the colossal strength of the whole complex confronting his forces, the British Fourth Army commander (General Sir Henry Rawlinson) obtained approval to make a formal assault against the old British lines—aimed in the first instance with determining whether it was possible to break through the Hindenburg main line. This meant piercing the German defences at least as far as the old Hindenburg outpost line, from where it would be possible to overlook the rest of the formidable system. For this operation the Australian Corps under Lieut.General Sir John Monash was given the main task of piercing the enemy centre; the British 3rd and 9th corps, on the Australians’ northern and southern flanks respectively, had supporting roles. Following a very heavy artillery barrage, Monash launched his attack at dawn in drizzling rain and dense fog. The mist (and smoke-shells) enabled troops of the 1st Division on the left to bypass and cut off many of the German defenders, and by this means fight their way through the two remaining old British lines to reach and seize the outpost system of the Hindenburg Line itself. Part of the 4th Division, advancing on the southern flank, used the gains made by their colleagues of the 1st to gain entry into the German trenches, then bombed their way down the line to take their objective. The Australian casualty toll of 1,260 was

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September 1918 relatively light for the type of fighting in which the 6,800 troops found themselves involved; moreover, they had taken 4,300 prisoners and captured 76 guns. Progress by neither of the flanking corps was as advanced or complete. C.E.W. Bean (1942) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Allied Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Megiddo, the name given to the great northern cavalry drive which split apart the Turkish defence of Palestine on 19–21 September 1918 and brought the war in the Near East to an end five weeks later. After encouraging the Turks to believe that his next offensive would take place inland, along the section of battlefront facing the Jordan River, the British commander-in-chief, General Sir Edmund Allenby, took the enemy by surprise by launching his main assault on the coastal plain of Sharon. To this end he had secretly moved the Desert Mounted Corps (4th and 5th divisions of Indian cavalry plus Australian Mounted Division), under the command of Lieut.-General Sir Harry Chauvel, from the Jordan Valley into olive and orange groves near modern Tel Aviv in readiness to exploit the anticipated breakthrough. To conceal their departure from their former base areas, elaborate deception measures were taken. Before the 383-gun cannonade and infantry assault at dawn on 19 September, British and Australian aircraft had also bombed out key Turkish communications centres. This ensured that large sections of the enemy line remained unaware when Chauvel’s corps passed through the gap created on the Mediterranean flank at 9 a.m. on the 19th and immediately began sweeping north and north-east, aiming to get astride the enemy’s vital routes for supply and reinforcement (and withdrawal). Many units were taken completely by surprise when Chauvel’s horsemen appeared in rear of their positions, and within 24 hours the cavalry’s advance had carried it 50–65 kilometres into the Turks’ rear. The Turkish Eighth Army


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had effectively ceased to exist, and the Seventh Army next in line on its left flank was reeling back and attempting to escape impending catastrophe by getting away across the Jordan to join the demoralised but still largely intact Fourth Army. After crossing the Carmel Range, by dawn on the 20th Chauvel’s troops had reached Lejjun near the ancient fortress of Megiddo, on the edge of the plain of Esdraelon (the Armageddon of the Old Testament). While part of the 5th Division made for Haifa, the rest swung east and that evening had reached Nazareth. Here they almost captured Field Marshal Liman von Sanders, the German who had taken over supreme command in Palestine in February, but a spirited resistance by his headquarters staff enabled him to escape along the road to Tiberias. Meanwhile the 4th Division, which had also swung east, made for Beisan—the seizure of which cut the main Turkish line of communications across the Jordan. The Australian Mounted Division, moving as corps reserve during the drive up the coast, was now swung south-east towards Jenin with the aim of blocking the main escape route as the enemy’s centre attempted to fall back from the disaster inflicted at Sharon. The 3rd Light Horse Brigade (under Brig.General Lachlan Wilson) was in Jenin by the evening of the 20th and by next morning had taken 8,000 prisoners. Other actions which also flowed from Sharon are Nablus, Wady Fara and (Second) Amman (qq.v). H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Nablus, the action following the British breakthrough at Sharon (see Megiddo) on 19 September 1918 which saw the Turkish Seventh Army under Mustafa Kemal (later known as Kemal Attatürk) put to flight and forced to make a hasty and costly retreat north-east across the Jordan. After creating the gap in the Turkish defences on the coastal plain for the cavalry to pass through, the

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British 21st Corps wheeled north-east towards the hills to attack Tul Keram which contained the headquarters of the already overwhelmed Turkish Eighth Army. The left flank of this advance was protected and pressed ahead by the 5th Light Horse Brigade under Brig.-General George MacarthurOnslow. Passing north of the town, the task of cleaning out the pockets of resistance was left to the infantry and the lighthorsemen concentrated on the column of Turks fleeing east along the road to Anebta and Nablus. By 6 p.m. the Australians had captured 2,000 prisoners and fifteen guns. Moving during the early hours of 20 September, Macarthur-Onslow’s brigade pressed on across the trackless hills northeast of Tul Keram. The purpose was to reach Ajjeh, a point on the railway line running north to Jenin, and to destroy the track to cut off this avenue of escape for Turks in the area around Samaria and Nablus. By 7 a.m. the leading Australian elements had achieved this objective. After re-assembling at Tul Keram, the 5th Brigade was ordered to resume an easterly advance the next morning down the road from Anebta towards


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Nablus. Troops from several British infantry divisions were already moving up against these places from the south, so that the route of the Australian horsemen effectively brought them in upon the enemy rear. Enemy resistance—already weakened by masses of troops in disorganised flight—quickly began to collapse in the face of this vice-like movement, so that by nightfall the Seventh Army was in full retreat. H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Wady Fara, an action fought on 21 September 1918 north-east of Nablus, Palestine, following Allied successes in the battles of Sharon and Nablus (q.v.), chiefly remembered for providing an early and graphic demonstration of the destructive effects of air power against ground troops. After Allied mounted troops had burst through the Turkish defensive line north of Jaffa on 19 September and pushed rapidly north towards Haifa as well as east towards Lake Tiberias, the Turkish Seventh Army in positions around Nablus faced being surrounded unless it withdrew east across the River Jordan. The main escape route was along an old Roman road which followed the precipitous valleys of the Wady Beidan and Wady Fara, much of it bounded by steep barren hills and sheer drops. Shortly before 6 a.m. on the 21st, a reconnaissance patrol of two Bristol Fighter aircraft from No.1 Squadron, Australian Flying Corps, sighted huge enemy columns streaming away from Nablus along this route. They immediately swooped down to attack, scoring five direct bomb hits on transport vehicles and expending 600 rounds of machine-gun fire into the mass of troops, horses and wagons. A Turkish retreat in this direction was fully anticipated, so that one of the Bristol machines had been specially fitted with a radio and given instructions to signal the map reference of any suitable target found.

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September 1918 The remainder of No.1 Squadron at Ramleh, twenty kilometres south-east of Jaffa, and the 40th (Army) Wing of the Royal Air Force—commanded by Lieut.-Colonel Richard Williams of the AFC and comprising another three squadrons of DH9 bombers and SE5a fighters—were standing by with bombs fitted (a total of 70–80 aircraft). No sooner had the scouts’ report been received than arrangements were begun to send off flights of three or four machines at intervals which ensured that one group was always arriving over the target as the previous lot departed. Williams’ orders were for the aircraft to bomb singly, beginning at the head of the column and moving back along it. The attack, having begun at 6.30–7 a.m., continued until midday. The Australian No.1 Squadron alone dropped three tonnes of bombs and expended nearly 24,000 machine-gun bullets. In addition to the aircraft under Williams’ command, machines from the RAF’s 5th (Corps) Wing also took part—making a total of seven squadrons which were involved in the action. The result was as chilling as it was decisive, amounting to the complete disintegration of the bulk of the Turkish Seventh Army. The nature of the terrain allowed little movement off the road except on foot or, in places, on horseback, so that the mass of wheeled transport simply had nowhere to go. In the words of Cutlack, the official historian: The panic and the slaughter beggared all description. The long, winding, hopeless column of traffic was so broken and wrecked…that the bombing machines gave up all attempt to estimate the losses under the attack, and were sickened of the slaughter. In all the history of war there can be few more striking records of wholesale destruction.

When the scene was reached by British ground forces the next day the enemy materiél collected was found to total 87 artillery pieces and nearly 1,000 vehicles of


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all descriptions. Casualties among the estimated 7,000 Turkish troops in the column were not established, but were undoubtedly heavy. The British loss was two aircraft, one of these being a DH9 aircraft of No.144 Squadron, RAF, which was not believed to have been a casualty of enemy fire. F.M. Cutlack (1923) The Australian Flying Corps in the Western and Eastern Theatres of War 1914– 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson; Sir Richard Williams (1977) These are facts, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Second Amman, an action which resulted in this town’s occupation by British forces on 25 September 1918, as a direct consequence of the Turkish disaster at Sharon (q.v.) six days earlier. For the first days after the British breakthrough on the coast plain, the Turkish Fourth Army centred on Amman had continued to strongly defend its positions east of the Jordan River. By the morning of 22 September, however, elements of the Anzac Mounted Division (under MajorGeneral Edward Chaytor) began to detect signs of a withdrawal underway opposite them, the Turks moving back into the hills away from the river and east towards Amman with the apparent intention of thence making off north to Damascus. Chaytor quickly began pressing onto the enemy’s heels, but determined resistance by the Turkish rearguard enabled the main body to get away so that the prisoner haul when Amman was finally taken was only 2,360 and six guns. Chaytor next turned his attention to a body of 5,000–6,000 Turks at that moment retreating towards him from the positions they formerly occupied at Maan in Arabia, about 200 kilometres south. With its rail lines of supply severed by the British advance, this column faced being destroyed by the army of Hejaz Arabs under Emir Feisal, elements of which were already engaged in constant harassment. Having reached Ziza less than 30 kilometres from

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Amman but finding their escape route cut off, the enemy column surrendered on 29 September—but only after Anzac mounted troops arrived to provide protection from the 10,000 Arab tribesmen who were waiting to swoop on them. With this, the haul amassed by the division over nine days of operations amounted to 10,300 prisoners and 57 guns, along with much other equipment, all for a cost of 139 casualties (only 27 of whom were killed).



Semakh, at the southern end of Lake Tiberias in northern Palestine, was the scene of a short sharp action on 25 September 1918 in which Australian lighthorsemen were pitted against a mixed forced of Turks and Germans. Being eager to prevent the enemy from occupying effective blocking positions west and south of the lake, from where movements against Damascus or the important railway junction at Deraa might be opposed, the commander of the Desert Mounted Corps, Lieut.-General Sir Harry Chauvel, sent the 4th Light Horse Brigade under Brig.-General William Grant to seize Semakh. The importance of the place had already been appreciated by the German commander of Turkish forces in Palestine, Field Marshal Liman von Sanders, and the small garrison available for defence had been stiffened by the addition of German machine-gunners and command entrusted to a German officer. Marching by moonlight with only one regiment and part of another, Grant was approaching Semakh from the south shortly before dawn on the 25th when his leading troops were heavily fired on. Although the situation was obscure the order was immediately given to charge, whereupon the men drew swords and set off at the gallop towards the flashes of the enemy machineguns—two squadrons of the 11th Regiment heading for the eastern end of the town, two


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The aftermath of the charge by the 11th Light Horse at Semakh. Source: Australian War Memorial B284

squadrons of the 12th Regiment making for the western end. The fight which followed in and around the railway station and other buildings lasted an hour. Once it was over at 5.30 a.m., 100 of the town’s defenders were dead and 365 captured—nearly all those killed and half those taken prisoner (many of whom were wounded) being found to be German. The Australians suffered 78 casualties (including fourteen killed) and had nearly half their horses hit. Although costly, the affair could have only been worse had Grant delayed to bring up more of his brigade, as daylight revealed that the town’s buildings dominated approaches over bare open plain for several kilometres. H.S. Gullett (1944) The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

St Quentin Canal, scene of an attack on 29 September–1 October 1918 by the Australian Corps commanded by Lieut.-General Sir John Monash, aimed at breaking through the main defence system of the Hindenburg Line. The German complex of trenches had been constructed mainly east of the St Quentin Canal (connecting the sources of the Somme and Scheldt rivers) to utilise that waterway as an additional obstacle to

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September–October 1918 an attacker, except where the canal passed into a tunnel for nearly six kilometres through hills between Bellicourt and Venhuille; here it actually bulged west beyond the line followed by the canal underground. Monash was ordered to make his assault along this section of front, since the canal posed no obstacle at this point except that the tunnel possibly provided deep shelter for enemy reserves. The importance of this bridged approach was, however, obvious to the Germans and the defences of the area had been thickened accordingly. With the divisions which had taken the Hindenburg Outpost Line (q.v.) now in need of rest, Monash found himself with only two divisions—the 3rd and 5th—in reasonable condition for combat. For the operation contemplated, therefore, the Australian Corps was reinforced by two American divisions—the 27th (New York) and 30th (Tennessee)—which took over the left and right sectors of the corps area. These formations contained as many as three times the number of infantry available in any of the Australian divisions at this time, but the troops were newly trained and lacked battle experience. To overcome this deficiency, the 1st and 4th divisions were each required to provide about 200 experienced officers and men for an advisory ‘mission’ to assist in preparing the Americans for the coming operation. In the plan which Monash devised—as usual, elaborate but carefully constructed— he decided to utilise the Americans to attack the first objective, the main Hindenburg Line above the tunnel, and also the second line a kilometre or more behind that. He would then pass through the two Australian divisions to carry on the assault for another four kilometres through the third and final objective, the Beaurevoir Line. Since concealment of the point of attack was an impossibility, a two-day preliminary bombardment was settled upon. Apart from smashing up the defences, this would use a


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consignment of 30,000 mustard-gas shells just arrived from English factories. Tanks would also be used in the attack; 60 supporting the Americans in the first phase, 30 with the Australians in the second. Monash’s plan did not envisage flanking corps trying to cross the sections of canal on either flank, since he considered this likely to be too costly, but in the event Rawlinson directed that the British 9th Corps would make such an attempt at the Bellicourt end of the tunnel in the south. A major problem which quickly emerged was, however, the fact that the chosen start-line for the attack had not yet been secured, and would entail a separate preliminary operation to wrest control of the required ground from the enemy. This attack, launched at 5.30 a.m. on 27 September by a regiment of the 27th Division, failed—largely due to the Americans not heeding advice about clearing trenches and dugouts properly, and thus leaving significant pockets of Germans who emerged behind the attackers with machineguns. The consequence of this botched attempt was that capture of the start-line became the first requirement of the main attack launched at 5.55 a.m. two days later. In the confusion of this advance, carried out amid thick mist made worse by smoke, the Americans were reported to be on their objective when they were not. The men of the 3rd Australian Division, going forward at 9 a.m. to begin the second phase, thus found themselves engaged in securing even the first phase objective. With all the tanks knocked out by mines and enemy fire, and use of artillery disallowed because of uncertainty concerning the positions actually reached and held by the Americans, the situation in the centre and left degenerated into a desperate struggle by small parties to overcome enemy strongpoints with Lewis guns and hand grenades. This fighting raged for the next three days on this part of the battlefront.

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Montbrehain, fought on 5 October 1918, was the last action involving Australian infantry on the Western Front during the First World War. Following the successful breaching of the main Hindenburg Line on 29 September–1 October (see St Quentin Canal), the exhausted and depleted 3rd and 5th Australian divisions which took part in that attack were relieved by the 2nd Australian Division under Major-General Charles Rosenthal on the nights of 1 and 2

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Kaukab, an action fought on 30 September 1918 about sixteen kilometres south-west of Damascus, brought about when a Turkish column attempted to block the advance by leading elements of the Australian Mounted Division (Major-General Henry Hodgson) towards the city. The Turks, numbering several thousand, were themselves falling back north-east on Damascus, but when they sighted the 4th Australian Light Horse Brigade (Colonel Murray Bourchier) they moved across its path and took up position along a ridge with the clear intention of making a stand. Hodgson ordered Bourchier’s 4th and 12th regiments to prepare to charge with the sword across the two-kilometrewide stony valley separating the two forces, while the 5th Light Horse Brigade (Brig.General George Macarthur-Onslow)— ignoring the enemy’s line—pushed past the western flank and kept going. Although their position was well covered by many machine-guns, the Turks had no


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guns with which to reply to the fire opened up on them by the British horse artillery in Hodgson’s force. As the latter began bombarding the Turkish machine-gun posts over open sights, and with MacarthurOnslow’s brigade (French cavalry on distinctive grey horses being prominent) moving ominously in their rear, the Turks lost all heart for a fight. The Australians were expecting a hot reception by the time Bourchier finally gave the order to advance soon after 11 a.m., but in the event the action was bloodless. The German machinegunners abandoned their weapons without firing a shot at the charging lines of horsemen and joined in the general flight. Twelve machine-guns were thus captured, and 22 prisoners, for no loss to the attackers.

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To the south matters had gone somewhat better. The 30th Division made good progress, thanks to the accuracy of the bombardment, and enabled the 5th Australian Division to pass through and capture Bellicourt village at the mouth of the canal. The situation to the north now placed this gain in peril, since German fire from this flank stopped any further movement forward. The battle might have lapsed into stalemate at this point, but for the astonishing achievement of the flanking British 9th Corps in getting across the canal and striking out halfway towards the Beaurevoir Line. This success threatened the Germans with being outflanked and forced their gradual withdrawal. The whole operation up to 2 October had cost the two Australian divisions involved 2,577 casualties, but the main Hindenburg Line had been breached.

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October 1918–August 1919 October. The next day this formation was set to the task of breaching the final network of defences called the Beaurevoir system. The attack—begun at 6.05 a.m. by the 5th and 7th brigades (between them totalling no more than 2,500 men)—was launched from around Estrées and directed at Beaurevoir village. Further south, the British 46th Division of the 9th Corps was to attack towards Montbrehain, capitalising on a small breach of the German system won at a salient east of Joncourt a day or so earlier. The Australian attack was a success, though it was stopped just short of its goal; the British, too, broke through and for a time held Montbrehain village until driven out after midday. After a mishandled attempt to press ahead against Beaurevoir early on 4 October, before noon that day the 2nd Division’s 6th Brigade was ordered to make an attack on Montbrehain the following morning. The operation was a brilliant success, the attackers taking 400 Germans captive. The victory was gained, however, at a cost of 430 casualties—a tally which, at that stage of the war, was more commensurate with participation in a general attack rather than a relatively small local attack. That night the 6th Brigade followed the remainder of the AIF out of the frontline and into a rest area west of Abbeville. C.E.W. Bean (1942) The Australian Imperial Force in France during the Allied Offensive, 1918, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Merivale Street, a violent clash fought on 24 March 1919 between police and returned AIF soldiers in South Brisbane, Queensland, was the most serious of the so-called ‘Red Flag Riots’. The previous afternoon some 400 leftists had staged a peaceful march to protest the continued enforcement of restrictions under the War Precautions Act. Nearly all those involved had carried red flags in defiance of the law, provoking several minor scuffles with returned men. Alarmed by this demonstration, a large crowd of


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mainly ex-soldiers (some in uniform) broke up the usual Sunday evening gathering of radicals at North Quay before setting off at 7.30 p.m. for the Russian Hall in Merivale Street—the base of the Russian Workers’ Association. When the mob approached, three shots were fired from the building before the police arrived and forced the crowd to disperse. Enraged by the resistance shown by the ‘Bolsheviks’, and incited by unknown agitators, the next night another crowd estimated to number up to 8,000 again marched on Merivale Street. This time, however, the hall was cordoned off by 40 police armed with rifles and bayonets, personally directed by the police commissioner, Frederick Urquhart. In the ensuing clash over 100 men received bayonet wounds, including Urquhart himself who was stabbed in the shoulder when forced backwards onto the bayonet of one of his own men. Fourteen policemen were hurt— two receiving bullet wounds (including a mounted trooper shot twice in the back)— and three police horses were shot, one of these being killed. Nineteen of the injured were serious enough to require their removal in ambulances. In anticipation of further trouble, the next day the state government ordered the closure of all city hotels. Another meeting of returned soldiers that night attracted an attendance of over 12,000, after which several hundred men smashed the office windows of the Daily Standard newspaper which had criticised them. A meeting the next night drew 7,000 but was free from further violence, enabling a return to normal by 28 March. Gavin Souter (1976) Lion and Kangaroo, Sydney: William Collins; Frank Cain (1983) The Origins of Political Surveillance in Australia, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Emptsa, a town in northern Russia about 200 kilometres south of Archangel (now Arkhangel’sk) on the railway line to Vologda, which on 29 August 1919 was the scene of an

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action between Bolsheviks and British troops and their White Russian allies. The British were part of a two-brigade expedition, the North Russia Relief Force, which had arrived in mid-1919 to cover the withdrawal of a detachment of advisers sent the previous year to train White Russian forces. Among its members were 100–120 ex-AIF men recruited in England and enlisted mainly in the 45th Battalion, Royal Fusiliers, and the 201st Machine Gun Battalion. While these volunteers were no longer the responsibility of the Australian government, within their units they still formed a distinctive national group. The attack on Emptsa was undertaken to enable White forces to consolidate their positions before the final British withdrawal, and involved the Australians spearheading the assault with White Russian support. Although the Bolsheviks

were taken by surprise, some put up a spirited fight before the defenders fell back across the river and demolished the steel railway bridge behind them. Over 1,000 Bolsheviks were taken prisoner during the day. A highlight of the engagement was the part played by Sergeant Samuel Pearse of the 45th Battalion, a Welsh-born Victorian, in assaulting the enemy battery position north of the town. After cutting his way through barbed-wire obstacles under heavy rifle and machine-gun fire, he saw that fire from a blockhouse was harassing the advance and causing casualties. He accordingly single-handedly charged the blockhouse and killed its occupants with hand grenades, moments before being himself cut down by another enemy machine-gun. For his bravery Pearce was subsequently awarded the Victoria Cross—one of only two such awards for

The Australian Section of the 201st Special Battalion, Machine Gun Corps, British North Russian Relief Force, pose with an Australian flag beside the railway just before moving off to attack Emptsa. Source: Australian War Memorial A3723



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1919–1927 service in northern Russia (and both of which were to ex-AIF soldiers). Lionel Wigmore (1963) They Dared Mightily, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Peter Burness, ‘The Forgotten War in North Russia’, Defence Force Journal, no.22, May–June 1980

Malaita, a punitive expedition to the British Solomon Islands Protectorate (BSIP) undertaken in October–November 1927 in response to a ‘native uprising’, involving a warship of the Royal Australian Navy. On 3 October an incident occurred at Sinalagu (Diamond Harbour), on Malaita Island, in which two white officials collecting taxes and nine of their fifteen-strong Melanesian police escort were killed; several of the Melanesians who attacked them were also killed or wounded. The surviving police fled to two boats anchored in the harbour, and by this means word of the massacre reached Tulagi, the administrative centre for BSIP, some eighteen hours later. In the belief that the attack presaged a full-scale uprising, the Resident Commissioner cabled London asking that a warship be despatched to the scene, a request which was duly passed to the Australian government. On 10 October the RAN’s light cruiser Adelaide—which had just returned from a cruise to the Solomon Islands—left Sydney for Tulagi, arriving four days later. Staying just long enough to leave a twelve-man party to assist in meeting the expedition’s communications requirements, the commanding officer of Adelaide, Captain G. Harrison (a Royal Navy officer), set course for Malaita. On arrival on the 16th, the scene of the massacre at Gwee’abe village was inspected and the victims—who were found hastily buried in shallow graves—were reburied. A camp was then established on the beach and a party of five officers and 70 ratings landed the next day. By nightfall on 18 October fully 150 of the ship’s company were ashore at the beach base. In the next few days a platoon of sailors from Adelaide assisted the new District


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Officer for Malaita and a number of his native police in establishing a new camp inland at the deserted village of Furingudu, to serve as a staging post for further forays into the hinterland, and a further two platoons of RAN sailors then moved up to this camp. On 21 October the expedition was joined by 28 white civilians who arrived in the vessel Ranadi to assist in suppressing what was still assumed to be a rebellion. Two days later the RAN fleet auxiliary Biloela also arrived carrying stores and coal for Adelaide. On the 26th the combined naval and civilian force left the first inland base to establish yet another camp at Falavalo (known locally as Tafaanikova), a village situated more than 760 metres above sealevel. It was from here that the main activity of the expedition took place, as groups of native police daily moved out to scour the surrounding country. These patrols succeeded in capturing several natives implicated in the killings, and others were shot who may well have been innocent of any involvement. The naval personnel took no part in these operations, but provided the logistic and communications support necessary to maintain them. During this period they experienced mainly discord with the undisciplined civilian auxiliaries, as well as health problems such as dysentery, malaria or septic sores. By mid-November the need for the Adelaide’s presence had diminished, although the efforts of the police continued into December when nearly all those who had taken part in the massacre had been captured or forced to surrender. After moving stores and equipment back to the beach base, the Australian sailors returned to their ship and the cruiser sailed on the 16th, arriving in Sydney on the 18th. This was the last such expedition in which the RAN became involved, and there was subsequently some debate about the usefulness of the exercise. Further questions were raised in federal

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parliament about the wisdom of the government’s policy in acceding to British requests to employ RAN ships in operations outside Australia. G.J. Swinden, ‘HMAS Adelaide and the 1927 Malaita Expedition’, Naval Historical Review, new series vol.15, no.2, June 1994

Rothbury, an incident which took place in the Maitland district of New South Wales on 16 December 1929, involving police and striking coalminers. Trouble had been brewing on the coalfields since early in the year, after the National and Country Party coalition government led by Thomas Bavin introduced a plan requiring a reduction in the price of coal and also miners’ wages. When the miners rejected the scheme, the Northern Collieries’ Association began a lock-out of workers on 2 March. By October coal was allegedly in short supply in Sydney, prompting a government decision to lease the Rothbury mine and introduce ‘free labour’—that is, non-union volunteers (or ‘scabs’ as the unionists called them)— recruited in Sydney. To resist this attempt to break the strike, 8,000 miners converged on Rothbury to picket the colliery. When the volunteers were moved into the pit under police protection, an angry demonstration followed which was allegedly orchestrated by a minority of communists armed with sticks and stones. In the wild riot which developed, the police fired their pistols—supposedly over the heads of the miners opposing them, though several men running up a slope behind were hit by bullets. One young miner was thus killed, and nine others received gunshot wounds. More than 40 miners suffered various other injuries, and seven police were hit by stones and pieces of wood. Although some of the miners were subsequently sent to gaol on charges of rioting, the state’s pits stayed closed until May 1930. The clash, which became known as ‘the Battle of Rothbury’, was significant as one of the very few occasions in Australian history


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in which men rebelling against authority during industrial disputes were fired upon. Public disquiet over the tragedy was possibly a factor in the landslide victory scored against Bavin by the Labor Party under J.T. Lang at the October 1930 election, and it has been claimed that the affair made sure that the Miners’ Federation stayed under communist control for nearly the whole of the next twenty years. The Australian Encyclopaedia (1958), vol.7, Sydney: Angus & Robertson

Dingbat Flat, the appellation given to a shameful occurrence at Kalgoorlie, Western Australia, on 30 January 1934. The episode was only one of a series of public disturbances which took place over the Australia Day long weekend, but is notable for frequently being referred to as a ‘battle’. The trigger for the riots was a bar-room scuffle at an Italian-owned hotel in Hannan Street on Sunday, 28 January, which resulted in a prominent local athlete receiving accidental injuries from which he died the next day. Rumours immediately began circulating that the victim had been stabbed or kicked to death by a mob of Italians, thereby building on strong anti-foreigner feelings already present in the town. Warnings of impending trouble were initially ignored by authorities, so that there was no strong police presence when, early on the evening of the 29th, a crowd of several hundred people (including women and children) began gathering outside the hotel which was the scene of the original affray. Within hours this gathering had erupted into a full-scale riot involving several thousand people, which saw numerous foreign-owned businesses along Hannan Street wrecked and set on fire. Before midnight the crowd moved to the adjoining town of Boulder, where scenes of burning and looting were repeated before the antics of rioters began to die down from about 1.30 a.m. on Tuesday, 30 January. With the return to work that day, miners

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1929–1934 at two leases decided not to commence until an assurance was obtained from the companies that ‘no foreigner who was not naturalised [would] be allowed to work on the mines’. This caused work to stop at all other mines too, following a mass meeting held at the main intersection of Boulder, and the scheduling of a further mass meeting that evening to decide the issues. Meanwhile, rumours circulated that the residents of Dingbat Flat—an area of about 170 houses and camps adjacent to the Boulder railway station housing Italians and Slavs, mostly young, single males but including some families—were preparing to defend themselves, sending away their women and children and sharpening knives for a counter-attack into Kalgoorlie. While that night’s mass meeting of miners was underway in Boulder, the proceedings were abruptly interrupted by sounds of explosions from the direction of the railway station. A rush of the meeting’s participants to the scene of the noises revealed half a dozen men who had attempted a sortie into Dingbat Flat but been repulsed, and were now left with buckshot wounds and in one case a knife wound for their trouble. Incensed by the presumption of the ‘dings’ in drawing English-Australian blood, members of the crowd prepared to respond in kind and hurried away to search for firearms. Although attempts to seize weapons from a store and the police station in Kalgoorlie both failed, the crowd at the railway station succeeded in gathering sufficient to prompt them to take on the foreigners. The Flat’s residents were, in fact, prepared for an onslaught to the extent that they had manned a drainage ditch which ran parallel to the railway line and formed a natural earthen redoubt, and had manufactured a quantity of jam-tin bombs. They had few firearms, however, and when the rioting unionists charged across the railway footbridge which was the only way to assail


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their position, this rush quickly succeeded after being opposed by a brief burst of riflefire and exploding bombs. A mêlée now ensued, with the Flat’s defenders pursued through the camps and houses. After the residents had been routed, most structures on the Flat were set alight, along with two nearby pubs. With nothing connected with foreigners left to destroy, the rioters then began to disperse. Although numerous injuries were received on both sides, surprisingly there were only two deaths in what was described as a ‘pitched battle’—a young Australian fatally stabbed in the earlier clash, and a Montenegrin who was found shot in the head after the later fracas. In the wake of these sensational events, the state government sent in a detachment of 33 police and 140 special constables. These forced all hotels to close and began arresting people found with pilfered and looted goods. Others took supplies of food and water out to foreigners hiding in the bush who were too afraid to return, despite enduring daytime temperatures above 38°C without shelter. Apart from national and international condemnation of the riots, the effects continued to be felt for some time. Altogether 88 men and four women were charged with offences arising from the disturbances, a number of whom received gaol sentences. Damage costing approximately £100,000 ($200,000) had also been caused to five hotels, four clubs, two boarding-houses, eight cafes and fish shops, 49 houses and 68 camps—the majority of the latter on Dingbat Flat. Even after the worst traces of the affair had been erased, the memory of ‘The Battle of Dingbat Flat’ lingered on in ‘the understandable bitterness against their unjust treatment that many of the victims harboured’. Rolf Gerritsen, ‘The 1934 Kalgoorlie Riots: A Western Australian Crowd’, University Studies in History, vol.5, no.3, 1969

Korewa Island, an incident which took place

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on 3 or 4 April 1937 off Korewa (Guribah) or North-West Crocodile Island about 40 kilometres north-east of Milingimbi in the Northern Territory, involving Japanese pearlluggers and the patrol launch Larrakia commanded by Captain Theo Haultain. The 14-metre vessel was originally acquired in 1936 as a crash rescue craft to serve on standby for Qantas aircraft crossing the Timor Sea on the Darwin–Singapore run, but was also used part-time by the newlyestablished Northern Territory Patrol Service of the Customs Department. Following up reports that Japanese pearling crews were entering Australian territorial waters and illegally landing within Aboriginal reserves for wood and water, and to rest and trade in Aboriginal women, Larrakia came across a dozen luggers anchored off Korewa at midday. After positioning a Vickers machine-gun onto its mount and loading this weapon, Haultain approached downwind from the north-east. Immediately the launch was sighted, five of the vessels attempted to flee—four going out to sea; the fifth towards Korewa’s sister island, North-East Crocodile. Concentrating first on the group of four, as soon as the range had narrowed to 600 metres Haultain fired a warning rifle-shot across the bow of the leading boat. This was ignored, as were nine further rounds. The machine-gun was then brought into action at 400 metres and, after three successive bursts were fired ahead of the first boat, it and one other lugger turned about and returned to where the other seven remained at anchor. A further burst caused a third of the escapees to do likewise. According to Haultain, it was not until rounds were placed to within metres of the fourth boat’s stern that its master, too, gave up and allowed himself to be escorted back to the others. After Haultain boarded the largest of the luggers, a vessel named Takachiho Maru No.1, Larrakia sped off in pursuit of the fifth vessel attempting to escape in the


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opposite direction. The launch made a dramatic return, however, when Haultain accidentally discharged his pistol and his crew, hearing this, feared he was under attack on the Takachiho. After firing a machinegun burst directly above the Japanese vessel, the gunners were about to fire again—this time directly at the lugger—when Haultain managed to signal that he was safe. Nearly 1,000 rounds had been fired in the course of the entire incident. While local Aborigines on the island were being questioned, two more Japanese boats were seen to approach. Larrakia slipped out from behind the line of detained vessels and caught these, too, without any attempt being made to escape. Soon afterwards, a fleet of a further 35 boats was also seen approaching but, realising that it was completely beyond one vessel to handle a ‘catch’ of this size, Haultain settled for sending one of the luggers under his coxswain to warn them away. After reporting to Darwin that he was now holding thirteen luggers and requesting instructions, Haultain was informed at nearly 8 p.m. that current provisions of the Customs Act required that foreign vessels found inside territorial waters be given twelve hours in which to put to sea before they were liable to arrest. On receipt of this advice the detained luggers were warned and released, after the name of the master of each was recorded. When news of the incident became known down south, there was great excitement in the press focused on whether international complications would result from the Japanese vessels being fired on. In the event, ructions from this occurrence were muted and inconsequential compared to later developments. Because of the deficiency recognised within existing Australian laws, amendments were subsequently made to the Aboriginal Ordinance which introduced high penalties (including confiscation) for foreign vessels trespassing on the coast within Aboriginal reserves. It was only when

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1937–1940 Larrakia made arrests under these new provisions in June, August and September 1937, that the issue of Japanese encroachment became a hot political issue. Argus (Melbourne), 6 April 1937; C.T.G. Haultain (1971) Watch off Arnhem Land, Canberra: Roebuck Society; Alan Powell (1988) The Shadow’s Edge, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

France, the battle launched on 10 May 1940 when German forces attacked through Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg, and forced the capitulation of France on 22 June. Some 40 Australian airmen took part in this brief campaign as members of Royal Air Force squadrons, and ten of them were lost in action. Three were killed while flying protective sorties over the Dunkirk beachheads during the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force in late May and early June. While none of these pilots were in formed units of the Royal Australian Air Force or retained a formal association with that service, many had received their initial flying training in the RAAF before being seconded (and then usually transferred) to the RAF. Under these arrangements, the pilots concerned were permitted to wear out their RAAF uniforms before being required to replace them with RAF clothing. It is recorded that at least one man, Flying Officer Leslie Clisby, was still wearing his RAAF tunic—although in an advanced state of disrepair—when shot down over Neuville, France, on 14 May. At the time of his death, Clisby was officially credited with having destroyed fourteen enemy aircraft in combat (his unofficial tally was reportedly nineteen, and possibly higher). Awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, Clisby was arguably the first ‘Australian’ air ace of the Second World War. Lex McAulay (1991) Six Aces: Australian Fighter Pilots 1939—45, Brunswick, Vic.: Banner Books

North of Benghazi, a minor naval clash fought on the evening of 28 June 1940, occurred


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when the British navy’s 7th Cruiser Squadron (which included the Australian light cruiser Sydney) intercepted three Italian destroyers conveying troops and supplies to north Africa. The British cruisers were themselves providing protection to two convoys making for Egypt when reports from flying boats enabled the enemy ships to be intercepted about 190 kilometres north of the Libyan coast. After the destroyers were sighted at 6.30 p.m. a southerly chase began, the cruisers opening fire at a range of 16.5 kilometres. Although by 7.20 p.m. the range was down to less than thirteen kilometres, the light was rapidly failing. A few minutes later, however, a hit was seen to be scored on one of the enemy ships, Espero, and by 8 p.m. she had been disabled and stopped. The pursuit was continued for ten more minutes before the commander of the British squadron called it off and altered course towards Malta. Sydney (under Captain John Collins) was detached with orders to sink the Italian ship which had fallen victim to the cruisers’ guns. As Sydney approached Espero, however, two shots were fired from the enemy ship at a distance of about 5.5 kilometres—these being accurate in line but falling about 200 metres short. Collins had no alternative but to return fire, scoring hits from four salvos which set the Italian on fire amidships and forward. In the glare of the flames, some of 225 crew and passengers from the destroyer could be seen jumping overboard. At 8.40 p.m. Espero sank, thereby becoming the first Italian surface vessel destroyed in the war. At considerable risk to her own safety from enemy submarines, Sydney stayed at the scene for nearly two hours collecting as many survivors as could be located in the dark. Eventually—after leaving a cutter containing provisions for any survivors still in the water—the Australian cruiser departed, taking with her 47 men from Espero (three of whom died of their wounds en route to Alexandria).

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G. Hermon Gill (1957) Royal Australian Navy 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Calabria, a major naval action off the coast of southern Italy on 9 July 1940, was the first collision between British and Italian battle fleets of the Second World War. On 7 July Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham left Alexandria, in Egypt, with his fleet of 25 ships which included three veteran battleships (Warspite, Royal Sovereign and Malaya) and the small aircraft-carrier Eagle; with this force were four Australian vessels: the light cruiser Sydney and aging destroyers Stuart, Vampire and Voyager. Cunningham’s primary concern was to cover the movement of two convoys carrying evacuees and stores from Malta to Alexandria, but he was also looking for any opportunity to engage and destroy the main Italian fleet—despite it being larger, faster and more modern than his own. A submarine report on the morning of 8 July revealed that the Italian fleet was also at sea, Cunningham suspecting that it was covering an important convoy of its own between the Italian mainland and Libya. As the British fleet continued to move westward throughout the rest of the day, closing towards the toe of the Italian peninsula, it was subjected to heavy high-level bombing attacks by aircraft operating from bases in the Dodecanese Islands. Most ships experienced near-misses, but the attacks were mainly ineffectual; only the last of the day gave the enemy any satisfaction, scoring a direct hit on the bridge of the British cruiser Gloucester which killed eighteen (including the captain) and wounded nine others. During the afternoon meanwhile, Cunningham received an aircraft sighting report of an Italian force north of Benghazi which included two battleships in company with cruisers and destroyers. He accordingly determined to move his fleet at top speed towards Taranto, in an effort to get between the enemy force and its base. At 2.45 p.m. the next day, ships in


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Cunningham’s force sighted smoke on the horizon to the south-west, and some twenty minutes later the enemy fleet of two battleships, sixteen cruisers and 24 destroyers under Admiral Domenico Cavagnari was within view. The Italians fired the first salvos at 3.14 p.m. at a range of 21.5 kilometres, but this was not returned from the British side for another eight minutes. Then the British cruisers Neptune and Liverpool opened up, followed a few moments later by Sydney. Neither side scored hits initially, and the action continued for half an hour without advantage to either side. At 3.53 p.m. Cunningham’s flagship (Warspite) began a duel with both enemy battleships, Giulio Cesare (Cavagnari’s flagship) and Conte di Cavour, and at 4 p.m. succeeded in straddling the former with a salvo of 15-inch rounds. One shell hit the base of the enemy ship’s foremost funnel, causing casualties and considerable damage which included putting some of its secondary armament and four boiler rooms out of action and reducing speed from 27 knots to eighteen. The enemy immediately sought to break contact under a smokescreen. Warspite ceased fire at 4.04 p.m. and the British cruisers and destroyers dashed forward to engage the flotillas of enemy destroyers which were attempting to shield the main fleet’s retirement. HMAS Stuart, the oldest destroyer present that day, was in the van when she raced in at 4.19 p.m. to fire an opening salvo at a range of 11.5 kilometres, and appeared to score a hit. Sydney was among several ships which succeeded in landing shells on another smoke-laying destroyer for ten minutes, causing severe damage. The gun battle came to an end by about 4.40 p.m., and the Italian air force then continued the action with high-level bombing attacks which lasted for the next two and a half hours but without effect. Although the pursuit was maintained by Cunningham to within 40 kilometres of the

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July 1940 Calabrian coastline, it was clear that the Italian ships could not be intercepted and the action was called off. The material damage inflicted during the battle was minor, but the British had achieved moral ascendancy over their opponents which was a factor of vital importance in the Mediterranean conflict. Apart from being the first fleet action to take place in the Mediterranean since the Napoleonic Wars, Calabria was also the first fleet action in which Australian ships had ever taken part. G. Hermon Gill (1957) Royal Australian Navy 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Britain, the battle—actually a four-month air campaign—fought between the Royal Air Force and German Luftwaffe between 10 July and 31 October 1940, preparatory to the planned German invasion of the British homeland. On 30 June—a week after the end of the German campaign which resulted in the fall of France—the German Air Minister, Hermann Goering, issued general directions for forthcoming operations against Britain. Three days later operations began with regular attacks against shipping in the English Channel and ports and harbours in the south of England. As the RAF responded to these attacks, from 13 August the focus shifted to aerial combat between the fighter aircraft of both sides, then to a German offensive against British airfields in early September, followed by a concerted bombing program against London which lasted until the end of that month, and finally a series of minor raids. In the course of the campaign the Germans were never able to achieve ascendancy over the British, despite the very heavy losses suffered by the defenders. Indeed, by the battle’s end, 24 of the RAF’s 62 fighter squadrons were fit for service only in ‘quiet’ areas. The aerial stalemate which was achieved meant that the planned invasion—tentatively scheduled for 21


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September—became increasingly unlikely. British bombers successfully attacked the ports where the German invasion forces were being assembled on 13 September, and naval ships bombarded them as well; the invasion was postponed indefinitely four days later. Throughout the period of this epic struggle, there was only one formed unit of the Royal Australian Air Force present in Britain—this being No.10 Squadron, a flying boat unit attached to the RAF’s Coastal Command. Officially it was only units of Fighter Command which were the mainstay of the successful defence, and as such entitled to wear the ‘Battle of Britain Clasp’, although members of Coastal and Bomber commands killed during the battle are so acknowledged on the Roll of Honour at Westminster Abbey. In addition to the sole RAAF squadron, moreover, there are more than 100 other Australians recognised as having fought in RAF units during the period of the action: more than 30 in Fighter Command squadrons (of whom twelve were killed, and one shot down and captured); 26 in Coastal Command (eight of whom were killed); and 47 in Bomber Command (five killed, six captured). Even allowing for argument over the degree to which some of these might properly be regarded as ‘Australian’, there seems little reason to question that Australians did take part in this battle. Dennis Newton (1990) A Few of ‘The Few’: Australians and the Battle of Britain, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Cape Spada, a naval clash off the north-western tip of Crete on 19 July 1940, in which the Australian light cruiser Sydney played a notable role. The action came about when Sydney and a British destroyer were detailed to provide cover for four other destroyers engaged in anti-submarine operations along the northern coast of the island. At 7.20 a.m. the sub-hunting destroyers sighted, and were sighted by, two Italian cruisers passing through the

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Antikithera Channel west of Crete: Giovanni Della Bande Nere (the flagship of ViceAdmiral Ferdinand Casardi) and its sister ship Bartolomeo Colleoni. Within minutes Casardi opened fire on the smaller and lighter British vessels, which immediately sped away to the north-east towards where the Sydney was located. Alerted by a radio message from the destroyers, the commander of Sydney (Captain John Collins) altered his course to the south and proceeded at full speed. At 8.20 a.m. the two forces were closing on each other, although only Collins knew of his opponent’s presence. The Australian ship’s opening salvos—fired ten minutes later at a range of eighteen kilometres—came as a complete surprise to Casardi as they splashed down near his flagship. Assessing that he was up against two British cruisers, Casardi decided not to press the issue that day—a choice that proved to be sensible a few minutes later when Sydney scored a hit against his ship. This passed through Bande Nere’s forward funnel and exploded on deck, killing four sailors. The two Italian cruisers then turned away to the south-east, with the British warships in pursuit. Collins concentrated his attention on Colleoni, which had become the rearmost of his opponents, and his fire was joined by the destroyers. A shell from Sydney struck Colleoni in the boiler room, setting her on fire and bringing her to a stop at 9.38 a.m. Leaving the destroyers to finish off the Italian with torpedoes, Collins continued the chase after Banda Nere. Unable to overhaul Casardi, however, he broke off the effort at 10.25 a.m.—by which time Sydney’s guns were down to the last ten rounds in the forward turrets. Only one enemy hit had landed on the Australian cruiser during the action, this holing her foremost funnel but causing no casualties. Meanwhile the Colleoni had sunk at 9.58 a.m., the 545 survivors from her crew being rescued by three of the British destroyers who were then heavily bombed by the Italian air force. The


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The Italian cruiser Bartolomeo Colleoni being torpedoed by a British destroyer after being stopped, damaged and set on fire by shells from HMAS Sydney. Source: Australian War Memorial P1528/08

Sydney’s success in this action inevitably led to parallels being drawn with the Sydney– Emden clash fought in the early stages of the First World War. G. Hermon Gill (1957) Royal Australian Navy 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Berbera, a minor episode during the Italian invasion of British Somaliland in August 1940, which involved three crew members from HMAS Hobart. The Australian light cruiser had been involved in bringing British troops from Aden to reinforce the garrison at Berbera, and on 8 August used the RAAF Walrus amphibian it carried on board to mount a bombing attack against Zeila, just inside the border with French Somaliland (now Djibouti). In response to a request from the army ashore for artillery support, three volunteers from the ship were landed on the evening of 9 August with a 3-pounder Hotchkiss saluting gun which had been given an improvised mounting. Dressed in military uniform the three sailors, with their gun and 64 rounds of ammunition, joined the main British defence line at Tug Argan Gap (some 60 kilometres south of Berbera) early the following morning. In the fighting which preceded the British evacuation on 15–19 August, the Australians were reported as ‘missing,

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July–September 1940 believed dead’; in fact, they had been captured and were duly recovered from a prison camp at Eritrea in April 1941 after the fall of Italian East Africa to the British. Several times during the weeks it operated at Berbera, Hobart had come under air attack but escaped with nothing more than superficial damage from bomb splinters. G. Hermon Gill (1957) Royal Australian Navy 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Dakar, the main port of the French colony of West Africa, was the scene of fighting on 23–25 September 1940 between Vichy French forces and an Anglo-French expedition sent to establish Free French control in the area. A large naval force (which included the Australian heavy cruiser Australia, commanded by Captain R.R. Stewart, RN) had been assembled to protect the landing of some 7,000 troops, most of whom were British. The Free French commander, General Charles de Gaulle, accompanied the expedition, hoping to persuade the Vichy garrison at Dakar to transfer its allegiance without bloodshed. This hope was dispelled soon after the armada’s arrival off Cape Verde on 23 September, when a motor boat carrying De Gaulle’s representative tried to enter the harbour under the protection of a white flag but was fired upon. Free French airmen who flew off the British aircraft-carrier Ark Royal were arrested as soon as they touched down at Wackem airfield at Dakar, and Free French sloops with landing parties were also opposed. Shortly after 10 a.m. batteries in the forts ashore opened fire on the assembly of waiting warships. Australia had several shells land close to her, but intercepted and turned back to port two destroyers which tried to put to sea. A carrier aircraft reported an enemy destroyer lying off an island near the entrance to Dakar and Australia was sent with two destroyers to investigate shortly after 4 p.m. Upon sighting the vessel, L’Audacieux, the


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heavy cruiser opened up with 8-inch guns at 4.27 p.m. and after three minutes (and eight salvos) had reduced it to a blazing shambles; the French vessel managed to fire only two rounds and two torpedos in reply. The next day Australia and the British cruiser Devonshire, in company with three destroyers, were sent into the bay off Dakar to engage shipping targets within the harbour. Visibility was extremely poor when this operation got underway at 9.30 a.m., and for much of the bombardment the British warships had little other than enemy gunflashes at which to aim. Shortly after the cruisers were ordered to withdraw at 10.24 a.m. several Martin bombers of the Vichy forces came overhead and attacked them, and a second attack was made about 11.30 a.m.; on both occasions bombs missed Australia by about 50 metres. The next day, 25 September, the Australian cruiser was again given the task of engaging enemy warships inside the harbour while battleships and other cruisers struck at different targets. After launching Australia’s Walrus amphibian aircraft to spot for the guns, Stewart moved in to begin firing from a range of just under 24 kilometres at 9.04 a.m. Australia herself came under fire, and although she appeared to score a hit on one enemy cruiser (whose fire then became noticeably ragged) she was herself hit twice by 6-inch shells; these rounds, striking the officers’ galley and in an engine room store, caused some structural damage but no casualties. Ordered to withdraw at 9.16 a.m., Stewart was in the process of complying when the ship’s Walrus was seen to be shot down by an enemy Curtiss fighter with the loss of its three-man crew. Shortly after noon that day it was learnt that the British government had decided to call off the operation at Dakar. The enterprise had seen severe damage caused to four British naval units, including a battleship and a cruiser, and lesser damage to others— including Australia. Vichy forces had suffered

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four vessels (two submarines, two destroyers) destroyed, and damage to the battleship Richelieu; French casualties totalled 203 killed and 393 wounded. G. Hermon Gill (1957) Royal Australian Navy 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Strait of Otranto, a minor naval action which took place on 12 November 1940, when a British force of three cruisers (one of which was HMAS Sydney) and two destroyers entered the Adriatic Sea looking for Italian naval targets. In the words of Sydney’s commander, Captain John Collins, this enterprise was a case of deliberately ‘looking for trouble’, it not being known until afterwards that its purpose was to help distract attention from a major blow being aimed simultaneously against the main Italian fleet base at Taranto. The British ships proceeded north during the night of 11 November without incident as far as a line drawn notionally between Bari and Durazzo, before turning at 1 a.m. on the 12th for the return run southwards. Twenty minutes later the raiders encountered six darkened enemy ships— four merchantmen and two destroyers —passing across their front making for the Italian mainland. After one of the British destroyers opened fire at 1.27 a.m., action became general. Sydney attacked the leading freighter at a range of eleven kilometres and set it on fire, and during the next 23 minutes the other three merchantmen were either sunk or damaged and left burning. One of the convoy’s escorts was also hit, but none of the ships of the raiding force suffered any damage or casualties—although a torpedo was seen to pass under Sydney’s stern at 1.40 a.m. G. Hermon Gill (1957) Royal Australian Navy 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Bardia, the harbour town 24 kilometres inside the eastern frontier of Libya, was on 3–5 January 1941 the scene of a notable action


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between Italian forces and the 6th Australian Division under Major-General Iven Mackay. The battle occurred as a consequence of the invasion launched by the Italian Tenth Army under General Annibale Bergonzoli in September 1940, which advanced and occupied Sidi Barrani, also on the Mediterranean coast some 80 kilometres inside Egypt. Although heavily outnumbered, British forces under General Sir Archibald Wavell expelled the enemy from this foothold on 9 December—virtually destroying four divisions and taking 38,000 prisoners—then began pursuing the Italians back towards the frontier. Following Sidi Barrani, the 6th Australian Division was moved forward from its camps around Alexandria to replace the 4th Indian Division. By 19 December Australian units had begun relieving British infantry in front of Bardia and engaging in patrols to test the defences of the town, which had been turned into a formidable fortress behind a wide perimeter of concrete posts built underground behind anti-tank ditches and wide belts of barbed wire. In the last week of the month Mackay was told to prepare to attack; his orders for the operation, issued on 1 January, required the attempt to be made two days later. At 5.30 a.m. on 3 January the attack was launched from the west against the centre of the Italian position by a battalion of the Australian 16th Brigade, supported by British tanks, artillery and aircraft. The troops wore their greatcoats to keep out the intense cold of the desert at early morning, and entered the fight singing and shouting. After blowing holes through wire obstacles, the infantry captured a number of enemy posts within half an hour—thus establishing a breach in the perimeter. Further battalions were pushed through this hole, while the sides of anti-tank ditches were broken down to make a way for the armoured vehicles. The 17th Brigade, attacking on the right of the 16th, also penetrated the enemy line and turned

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November 1940–January 1941


Heavily laden Australian infantrymen advance into Bardia wearing greatcoats and sweaters for protection against the desert cold. Source: Australian War Memorial 69221

its attention towards the southern end of the position. Fighting continued into the next day, with the 16th Brigade under Brigadier Arthur Allen ordered to encircle the town itself. By the end of 4 January the Italian position had been effectively cut in two, with 30,000 members of the garrison captured. On 5 January, the 19th Brigade was brought into action against the south of the Italian line and completed rounding up what remained of the garrison. In all 40,000 prisoners were taken, along with masses of weapons and other equipment; four generals were among the captured, though not Bergonzoli who set out for Tobruk on foot. The precise number of enemy casualties is not known, but the 6th Division’s losses were 130 killed or died of wounds, and 326 wounded. Gavin Long (1952) To Benghazi, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Tobruk (Capture), the action fought on 21– 22 January 1941 which resulted in the taking of this port town in north Africa by troops of the 6th Australian Division under Major-General Iven Mackay. Immediately after the fall of Bardia (q.v.), the British 7th Armoured Division moved west against the next main Italian fortress at Tobruk, some 113 kilometres along the Mediterranean coast, and surrounded it. By 7 January Australian infantry had also arrived and taken up position outside the southern face of the enemy perimeter which ran in a semi-circle


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some 13–14 kilometres out from the town. As at Bardia, this comprised defensive posts dug into the desert floor, protected by an anti-tank ditch and barbed-wire obstacles. For the next fortnight the Australians sent out nightly patrols to explore the Italian positions, look for mines and booby traps, and gain familiarity with the ground. On 21 January the 6th Division launched a pre-dawn attack. During the previous two nights RAF bombers had attacked the fortress, and before the main assault targets within the enemy perimeter were also blasted by naval gunfire. While 88 British artillery pieces laid down a barrage, the 16th Brigade moved up close to a 600-metre segment of the Italian line on the southern side between the roads leading to El Adem and Bardia. After engineers had disarmed mines and blown gaps in the wire, the leading battalion went forward and—after a series of sharp fights—succeeded in capturing five enemy posts. With a breakthrough achieved, the sides of the anti-tank ditch were broken down to enable the passage of tanks. Frequently acting with armoured support, the Australian troops began fighting east and west along the line of defensive posts still held by the enemy—thus widening the gap which had been won. Following the 16th Brigade, the 17th Brigade passed through, then the 19th Brigade at 7.55 a.m. The latter fanned out northwards, moving deep into the enemy enclave until the left flank encountered a string of posts around the Bardia–El Adem road junction. Here two battalions swung north-west and from 11 a.m. began a long drive along the escarpment towards the aerodrome and the town beyond. The troops encountered fierce opposition from machine-gun posts, artillery and stationary tanks dug into the ground, but the headquarters directing the Italian defence was captured—along with the 22nd Corps commander, General Petassi Manella. By nightfall the Australians had seized the whole

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of the eastern half of the fortress, except for some pockets of resistance at the extreme eastern end. Mackay gave orders for the final blows which were expected to bring the operation to a close the next day, but on 22 January it was discovered that the remainder of the enemy garrison had little interest in continuing the fight. Thousands of depot troops in the town and about 1,500 personnel at the naval station (including the admiral commanding it) readily surrendered, as did the headquarters of the Italian 61st Division and its commander. Along the perimeter the Australians simply moved from post to post collecting prisoners. Eventually the number of captives totalled about 25,000, and the haul of major weapons and equipment captured included 208 field and medium guns, 23 medium tanks and 200 vehicles. Australian casualties in the action numbered 49 dead or died of wounds and 306 wounded. Gavin Long (1952) To Benghazi, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Derna, an action fought in Cyrenaica, north Africa, on 25–29 January 1941 along the coastal route between Tobruk and Benghazi. Following the capture of Tobruk (q.v.), two brigades of the 6th Australian Division under Major-General Iven Mackay moved west along the road, paralleling the British 7th Armoured Division further inland. The Italians had positioned the 86th Bersaglieri Regiment as a rearguard at Derna, a town of 10,000 residents lying at the mouth of an immense wadi (dry watercourse) extending nearly twenty kilometres inland and in places more than 1.5 kilometres wide and 210 metres deep. When the leading Australian battalion of the 19th Brigade (commanded by Brigadier Horace Robertson) arrived soon after midday on 25 January, they advanced against the airfield (which was situated beside the road) across the flat bare plain which capped the eastern escarpment. Attempts to secure the


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airfield at 1.30 a.m. came under heavy machine-gun and artillery fire from enemy positions on the ridgeline about three kilometres away. Although some of the attacking infantry reached a hangar shortly before dusk, it was discovered that positions just beyond were held by Italian tanks and truck-mounted machine-guns in hull-down positions. Other Australians reached the edge of the escarpment at the north-eastern corner of the airfield, from where they could overlook Derna and the coast. After a prolonged firefight the next morning, by 9 a.m. the enemy had been cleared from the ridgeline west of the airfield and the Australians held the whole of the eastern escarpment. Meanwhile, Robertson had also sent another battalion well to the south with orders to get across the wadi and block enemy movement along the road running south from Derna along the western escarpment. By midnight on the 25th this object had been achieved, with two companies established in positions on the far side of the huge ravine. When Robertson received information the next morning that the enemy had withdrawn from forward positions, he ordered his troops to follow them up and advance on Derna. The information was found to be wrong at the northern edge of the airfield, where the troops met strong resistance still coming from old stone forts dominating the road into town. An attempt by another group on the right flank to climb down from the escarpment and push along the beach met with determined opposition too. The party sent across the wadi on the left was subjected to a bold attack during the morning of the 26th, but beat it off after about 40 Italians were killed and 56 surrendered. The next day Robertson reinforced his foothold across the wadi, in preparation for ordering an advance from this direction against the southern end of Derna itself. This group came under strong attack during the day from a force of at least a thousand enemy, and it struggled to hang on to its

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January–March 1941

by part of the 6th Australian Cavalry Regiment operating from a base at Siwa, an oasis on the Egyptian side of the frontier. The Australians, at first numbering no more than 200 men under Lieut.-Colonel Maurice Fergusson, succeeded in driving in the enemy’s advanced posts and confining the garrison to the Giarabub fortress. The balance of forces shifted markedly during the siege which developed, with Ferguson receiving minor supplementation at the same time that most of the Libyan troops deserted. By mid-March, nonetheless, some 1,500 Italians remained in occupation of what was still a very strong tactical position; not only were the defenders well entrenched, but they were well supplied with artillery. On 10 March the commander of the Australian 18th Brigade, Brigadier George Wootten, was ordered to take a reinforced battalion—the largest force which could be supported so deep in the desert—and capture Giarabub. After making a reconnaissance he decided to attack from the south, in which direction marshy ground made going difficult and from which the enemy was least likely to expect any assault to come. At 5.15 a.m. on the 21st, during a

MEDITERRANEAN

Tobruk

Bardia

Salum

Gavin Long (1952) To Benghazi, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Giarabub, an oasis in the Libyan Desert 230 kilometres south of Bardia (q.v.), which on 21 March 1941 became the scene of an action between Italian and Australian forces. Since December 1940 the enemy garrison of this isolated outpost on the edge of the Sahara, originally comprising some 2,000 Italian and Libyan troops, had been harassed


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Sidi Barrani

Giarabub Attack by 2/9 Bn

Mersa Matruh

International Boundary

positions. Further to the left the 6th Division’s cavalry squadron also came under hot fire and suffered casualties, confirming that the Italians were determinedly maintaining their rearguard role. On the right, a fort on the heights above the town was captured, and some posts cleared or captured during the night. The situation in the immediate vicinity of Derna was largely unchanged during 28 January, with the Australians unable to make any advance against the well-positioned enemy on the western escarpment—even though they had cleared the eastern side and effectively dominated movement within the town. On the Australian left flank, however, events were making the Italian position increasingly untenable and hastening the moment when the rearguard would have to withdraw or be cut off. The arrival of the 17th Brigade under Brigadier Stanley Savige had enabled the Australian line to be extended further south, thereby threatening to get around the Italian right flank and move in behind against the town of Giovanni Berta 35 kilometres west of Derna. Accordingly, during the night of 29 January, the Italians slipped away and left the town to be occupied the following morning. Precise casualty figures for the action at Derna are not recorded but on the Australian side were in the order of eight killed, 38 wounded and four (including one of the wounded) taken prisoner. No fewer than 413 Italians were captured.

Siwa 0

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60 kms

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dense dust storm which reduced visibility to 50 metres, the 2/9th Battalion attacked as planned at the same time that the cavalry made a demonstration by advancing against the north where the Italian defences were strongest. Bitter fighting ensued, but by 2 p.m. the Italians had surrendered. The attackers suffered 94 casualties (seventeen killed), while the Italians had about 250 men killed and 1,300 taken prisoner (of whom about 100 were wounded). In addition, the Australians captured 36 guns, 100 machineguns and large quantities of ammunition. Gavin Long (1952) To Benghazi, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Matapan, a major sea engagement fought off Cape Matapan in southern Greece on 28– 29 March 1941 between British and Italian naval forces. The action came about as a result of Britain’s decision to despatch a military expedition in support of the Greek government, which had successfully repelled an Italian invasion launched through Albania in November 1940 but was facing the imminent prospect of a renewed German offensive through Bulgaria. In an attempt to disrupt the flow of British troops north from Egypt, in late March the Italian fleet put to sea under its commander-in-chief, Admiral Angelo Iachino, with the aim of attacking the convoy route. Forewarned of enemy intentions through the decoding of intercepted radio signals, the British commander, Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham, ordered his light force patrolling in the Aegean Sea—four cruisers (including HMAS Perth) and nine destroyers—to concentrate and rendezvous with him south of Crete at daylight on 28 March. Cunningham himself sailed from Alexandria on the 27th with three battleships and an aircraft-carrier, in company with nine ships of the 14th Destroyer Flotilla; among the latter group was HMAS Stuart commanded by Captain Hector Waller, who was also in charge of a


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division of five destroyers (including his own ship). At 8.12 a.m. on the 28th the light force under Vice-Admiral Henry Pridham-Wippell came into contact with a group of three Italian 10,000-tonne cruisers mounting 8-inch guns, which fired on him at a range of about 21 kilometres. The British cruisers returned fire and steered south-east, hoping to draw the enemy towards the main battlefleet then steaming northwards. After a while the enemy broke contact, prompting Pridham-Wippell to turn west in the hope of re-establishing contact and luring the enemy on. The tactic worked in that a few minutes before 11 a.m. an Italian battleship, the Vittorio Veneto, was sighted, accompanied by a screen of destroyers, and the British ships soon found themselves being pursued by this force off their port quarter and the three heavy cruisers to starboard. Salvos of 15-inch rounds splashed down around several of Pridham-Wippell’s cruisers. By this stage Cunningham was close enough to make himself a factor in the battle. He ordered an airstrike flown off the carrier Formidable to attack Iachino’s battleship, while other aircraft took off from Maleme in Crete to deal with the cruisers; RAF Blenheim bombers from Greece also arrived to add their weight to the attack on Vittorio Veneto. Although none of Iachino’s ships were hit in any of these attacks, the Italians decided to break off the action and turn away to the north-west. Matters now turned into a reverse chase, with Pridham-Wippell’s cruisers shadowing the enemy ships while Cunningham’s larger but slower force struggled to catch up. During the afternoon another airstrike succeeded in torpedoing Vittorio Veneto, causing the battleship to stop, develop a list to port and settle by the stern. She soon got underway again, however, and though her speed was reduced it was still enough to keep her out of range of Cunningham’s guns. The opportunity to inflict major loss to the

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March 1941

GREECE C. Matapan

Kithera Island Antikithera Island

Italian ships sunk

Maleme British Light Forces (including HMAS Perth)

0

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enemy thus seemed to have been missed. A second airstrike flown off from Formidable attacked the Italian fleet after dark and scored another torpedo hit, this time against the heavy cruiser Pola which was stopped dead in the water. Believing that his British opponents were 120–145 kilometres behind him (when they were actually less than half that distance), Iachino took the decision to detach two cruisers, Zara and Fiume— sister-ships of Pola—and send these back, with four destroyers, to render assistance to the stricken cruiser. It was these ships’ misfortune to encounter Cunningham’s main battlefleet soon after 10 p.m. Warned by radar that there was a large ship lying stationary in front thirteen or so kilometres away, Cunningham was next advised at 10.25 p.m. of other large vessels passing across the bows of his fleet from right to left. Three minutes later a British destroyer switched on its searchlight to reveal the Italian ships in line at a range of a little over 3.5 kilometres. Cunningham’s three battleships opened fire and quickly demolished Zara and Fiume, overwhelming them before they could offer any resistance.


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CRETE

Gavdhos Island Italian fleet Cunningham’s battle squadron

A few minutes later three of the Italian destroyers made an attack from out of the darkness, but they were engaged by the destroyer division led by Waller in Stuart. In the highly confused hour which followed, the Italian destroyers were driven off— though not before two of these ships, Alfieri and Carducci, had been sunk. During the early hours of 29 March, the damaged Pola was also found and despatched, along with the shattered remains of Zara and Fiume. At dawn, aircraft from Formidable could find no trace of any more enemy ships and the battle was clearly ended. The British destroyers returned to the scene of the night’s action and commenced picking up survivors from the water, but this operation had to be suspended after German dive-bombers appeared overhead and commenced attacks. After sending an uncoded radio message to the Italian Admiralty telling them of the exact location of the survivors still awaiting rescue, Cunningham ordered the British fleet to withdraw to Alexandria. His ships took with them about 900 of 2,400 men who formerly crewed the enemy ships sunk; another 270 were rescued in subsequent days by Greek

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destroyers and an Italian hospital ship which was sent out for this purpose. Against the enemy’s loss of five ships and 1,230 lives, the British loss amounted to just five aircraft—the crew of one of which was saved. The battle’s most important consequence was in ending any sign of offensive spirit on the part of the Italian navy at the first occasion when such was shown. G. Hermon Gill (1957) Royal Australian Navy 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Er Regima, an action fought on 4 April 1941 east of Benghazi in Libya, following the start of a counter-offensive launched against British forces in north Africa by the German Afrika Korps under General Erwin Rommel. After achieving the destruction of most of the British 2nd Armoured Division’s tanks in actions at Marsa Brega and Agedabia, on 31 March and 2 April respectively, Rommel moved north to occupy Benghazi and north-east against Mechili (q.v.). In response to this advance, which threatened to outflank and cut off units in the Benghazi area, the 9th Division was ordered to withdraw east to Derna. While the German advance-guard entered and occupied Benghazi during the morning of 4 April, the departure of the Australians was covered by a rearguard positioned in the pass at Er Regima. This was the 2/13th Battalion under Lieut.-Colonel F.A. Burrows, whose three lightly armed companies were deployed to hold a front of some eleven kilometres. Against this thin defensive line, the Germans sent a force in the early afternoon of about 3,000 men comprising lorry-mounted infantry supported by tanks and armoured cars. The Australians fought tenaciously, but were unable to prevent the enemy from infiltrating or outflanking their extended positions and, bit by bit, were forced to yield ground. As there was no transport available to get them away, however, Burrows’ troops had no alternative but to continue their rearguard


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action, at least until dark. This they managed to do, in the face of gradual encirclement, until 10 p.m. After withdrawing from their positions, the men moved off by foot down the road but were met about 30 minutes later by trucks which carried them about sixteen kilometres east of Barce to rest. In this fight—the first encounter with German troops during the Second World War—the Australians suffered five killed and 93 wounded or captured. Barton Maughan (1966) Tobruk and El Alamein, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Mechili, site of an old Italian fort in the desert 70 kilometres south-west of Derna in Cyrenaica, on 6–8 April 1941 became the scene of an unsuccessful action by British forces attempting to hold this place against the advancing German Afrika Korps. Following two sharp defeats at Marsa Brega (31 March) and Agedabia (2 April), the remnants of the British 2nd Armoured Division under Major-General M.D. Gambier-Parry had fallen back here, joining the 3rd Indian Motor Brigade (to which was attached the 2/3rd Australian Anti-Tank Regiment under Lieut.-Colonel E.E. Munro) which had arrived on 4 April. From early on 6 April the British garrison was in contact with increasing numbers of enemy, and it was clear that the German intention was to encircle the base and capture the dumps of stores (sufficient to maintain the armoured division for 30 days) which had been built up. After several demands for the British to surrender had been received and curtly refused, at dusk on 7 April Gambier-Parry was ordered to withdraw the garrison to El Adem. An attempt to break out of the defensive perimeter through enemy lines to the east was made at 6.30 a.m. the next morning. This initially seemed to be succeeding, but the timing of the operation crossed with the main attack which General Rommel, the Afrika Korps commander who

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April 1941 was present, had himself arranged. Eventually only a small portion of the British force got away, by charging west in their vehicles at full speed. The majority of the garrison—about 3,000 men (including 102 Australians)—were captured. Barton Maughan (1966) Tobruk and El Alamein, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Tobruk (Siege), the protracted defence by British (including Australian) forces to prevent this important north African port being captured by the Germans, lasting from 11 April until 7 December 1941. The place was originally taken from the Italians by the 6th Australian Division on 21–22 January 1941 (q.v.), and it was largely as a result of the series of reverses suffered by Axis forces up to this point that significant German reinforcements were despatched to the theatre in the form of the Afrika Korps. During the second week of March, the 9th Australian Division commanded by MajorGeneral Leslie Morshead took over from the 6th Division which was required for the forthcoming campaign in Greece. In the last week of that same month the Germans under General Erwin Rommel launched a counter-offensive in Cyrenaica, in front of which the depleted British forces were forced to withdraw. Under cover of rearguard operations mounted at Er Regima and Mechili (qq.v.), the 9th Division was able to retreat from around Benghazi to Derna, and by 9 April pulled back inside the Tobruk perimeter. Already there was the 18th Brigade of the 7th Australian Division, which had arrived two days earlier with other reinforcements. Now available for Tobruk’s defence were 31,000 men—of which 24,000 were fighting troops. After Lieut.-General Sir Philip Neame, who held military command in Cyrenaica, was captured during the British withdrawal, his place was taken by the commander of the 7th Australian Division, Major-General John Lavarack. The British


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commander-in-chief in the Middle East (General Sir Archibald Wavell) gave Lavarack written orders to hold Tobruk for ‘about two months’, until a force could be sent from the Egyptian frontier to its relief. On 10 April an enemy force approached Tobruk from the west but was driven off. The next day, however, the Germans got astride the road to the east, effectively cutting all land links into the place and bringing it under siege. Rommel attacked on the night of 13 April, striking with a tank regiment and a machine-gun battalion at a sector of the perimeter just west of the El Adem road which was manned by the 20th Australian Brigade. A party of Germans managed to get inside the wire, establishing themselves with two guns, a mortar and eight machine-guns, but were expelled by seven Australians who counter-attacked with grenades and bayonets. At dawn the next day 50 enemy tanks with infantry support attempted to push towards the escarpment overlooking the port. These were also thrown back, with seventeen tanks destroyed by gunfire from the Royal Horse Artillery. By 8.30 a.m. the action was over, 150 Germans having been killed and 250 taken prisoner within the perimeter; the Australian losses were 26 killed and 64 wounded. Before making a second attempt to break into Tobruk, Rommel built up his forces outside and subjected the harbour and its defences to concerted air attacks which were aimed at severing or reducing the amount of resupply coming in by sea. The garrison responded with vigorous efforts to strengthen the perimeter, and an aggressive program of night-raids and patrols. The latter produced some spectacular successes, as during the night of 16 April when the 2/48th Battalion captured 803 prisoners—including almost a complete battalion of the Italian 62nd Regiment, Trento Division—at a cost of just two casualties. Rommel’s next attack was delivered on 30 April, falling against the high ground on

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the western side called Ras El Medauuar (or Hill 209) manned by the 2/24th Battalion. After perimeter posts had been heavily dive-bombed and shelled in the afternoon, German pioneers and machine-gunners advanced at dusk to disarm mines and blast gaps in the wire obstacles through which tanks then passed. After confused fighting which lasted all night, the arrival of dawn revealed the enemy in possession of seven perimeter posts and with 40 tanks holding ground around Hill 209. The German armoured vehicles resumed their push east, but were stopped by a minefield which damaged or disabled about half their number. More tanks with infantry moved through and attempted to push south behind adjoining sections of the Australian line. By 9.30 a.m. they had gone about five kilometres, but were then confronted by British cruiser tanks and after an hour-long firefight turned around. The Australian posts south of Hill 209 held out determinedly against the enemy advance, giving rise to severe fighting in which the Germans used flamethrowers to overcome resistance. By dark the enemy had seized fifteen posts and widened the breach gained in the perimeter to nearly five kilometres. The salient driven into the Tobruk defences was also nearly five kilometres deep. At 7.15 p.m. the 2/48th attempted to regain the ground lost with a counter-attack on Hill 209. This failed, and by 9.30 p.m. the attacking companies were forced to withdraw after suffering heavy casualties. It was expected that Rommel would attempt to press ahead with his attack the next day, but on both 2 and 3 May the Germans remained on the defensive (having lost more than half the tanks in their attack force). On the night of 3 May a larger-scale effort to expel the enemy and restore the perimeter was launched by the 18th Australian Brigade, but this made little headway and resulted in the recapture of only one post at the southern end of the breach in the perimeter. At this


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point the German operation ended, with both sides consolidating or adjusting to the changed frontline. The three-day battle had cost 954 German and Italian casualties, while the garrison’s losses totalled 797. In an effort to relieve Tobruk, Wavell ordered an attack to be made against German forces on the Egyptian frontier on 15 May. In conjunction with this attempt, the garrison at Tobruk was instructed to mount a strong demonstration to ensure that the bulk of the enemy forces opposing it remained tied down. After some initial success the operation foundered, and the heavy fighting which erupted at Tobruk made little difference to the positions held by both sides. After receiving considerable reinforcements, on 16 June Wavell made a second attempt at lifting the siege at Tobruk with an operation codenamed ‘Battleaxe’. This offensive also failed after Rommel brought up tanks from Tobruk and counter-attacked, forcing the British-Indian force to withdraw after losing more than half its tanks. Making the best of the situation confronting his division, Morshead had meanwhile ordered his men to resume aggressive raiding and patrols. By this process a considerable proportion of ground was progressively whittled away from the enemy-held salient during June, and by early July the line had been driven west by nearly two kilometres thus reducing the depth of the bulge in the perimeter. The scale of enemy air attacks during these months had, however, created difficulties in maintaining supplies of food and other essentials to the troops locked up in Tobruk, and to ease the supply problems the size of the garrison was greatly reduced so that only 22,000 men remained (only 1,400 of these in base units). On 2 August another effort was made by the defenders to expel the Germans and straighten the line. In a carefully planned operation, attacks were launched against the neck of the salient from both north and south which were supported by more than 60 guns.

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April 1941


Australian Bren gunners manning the Tobruk perimeter in August 1941, opposing enemy positions about 400 metres away. Source: Australian War Memorial 9510

The enemy was ready, however, and responded swiftly with artillery so that the companies making the assault suffered heavy casualties. This was, as it happened, effectively the last major action during the siege involving Australians. As a result of representations made by Lieut.-General Sir Thomas Blamey, commander of the AIF, the Australian war cabinet pressed the British government for the relief of Australian units caught up in the siege. During August the 18th Brigade was brought out by sea and sent to rejoin its own division in Syria. After prolonged argument between governments the 9th Division followed in September and October, after handing over to the 70th British Division. Thereafter there was little Australian involvement in the conduct of the siege, except for the presence of one battalion (the 2/13th). The convoy carrying this unit had been attacked by German aircraft on 25 October (the last night of the relief) and


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forced to turn back to Tobruk. The battalion accordingly remained as part of the garrison until 21 November, when it took part in an operation to break out to the east and link up with 30th British Corps which three days earlier had launched a third attempt (Operation ‘Crusader’) to thrust west from Egypt. Again, Rommel’s armoured divisions reacted strongly and exacted a fearsome toll of the British tanks, but the British aim was eventually achieved. The Australians were engaged at Ed Duda on 30 November, when they were called upon to recapture vital ground in a night bayonet attack which took 167 prisoners for the cost of seven men wounded, two mortally. As a result of a British flanking move, Rommel was prompted to relinquish his efforts to keep Tobruk bottled up. After initially withdrawing his forces from the eastern sector of the perimeter, by 7 December he had abandoned entirely the area between Tobruk and the Egyptian

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frontier and pulled his forces further to the west. Although this date is usually regarded as the last day of the siege, in fact it had ceased to be effective some days earlier. On 16 December the 2/13th Battalion moved out by road to rejoin the 9th Division in Palestine. Participation in the epic eightmonth siege had cost the Australian formations involved 3,009 casualties (including 832 killed) and 941 men taken prisoner. Barton Maughan (1966) Tobruk and El Alamein, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Vevi Pass, an action fought on 11–13 April 1941, aimed at halting a German push into central Greece from Monastir in Yugoslavia. At this stage the main Anglo-Greek army resisting German invasion in the north was manning a defensive line in mountains around Veria, south-west of Salonika, so that an enemy advance from further west would gravely threaten the rear of this position. To shore up the left flank and prevent a collapse, a force was hurriedly assembled under Major-General Iven Mackay, commander of the 6th Australian Division, and sent to defend the Florina Gap. This force comprised a mixture of British, Australian and New Zealand units. The infantry component consisted of the two available battalions of the 19th Australian Brigade under Brigadier George Vasey, with the balance made up of the British 1st Armoured Brigade, three artillery units, elements of an anti-tank regiment and a machine-gun battalion. On 9 April Vasey positioned his troops astride a small pass just south of the town of Vevi, where the road passed through a defile ranging from 100 to 400 metres in width. In the centre he placed the 1st Rangers (the motorised battalion of the 1st Armoured Brigade), with the 27th New Zealand Machine Gun Battalion (less two companies). His own battalions took up positions on steep, bare and partly snow-covered hills on either side: the 2/4th on the left and the 2/8th on


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the right. The rest of the 1st Armoured Brigade, forming Mackay’s reserve, was held in the rear with the lead element holding a rearguard position around Sotir. Both flanks were anchored on Greek units—the 21st Regiment on the left and the Dodecanese Regiment on the right—but even so, Vasey’s front extended some sixteen kilometres and was obviously spread very thinly. The next morning contact was made with patrols of the enemy advance-guard, the SS Leibstandarte ‘Adolf Hitler’ Division. Realising that the main defensive line at Veria was rapidly becoming untenable, during 10 April the Greek commander-in-chief ordered a retirement to a new line in front of Mount Olympus, centred on Servia just south of the Aliakmon River. To allow time for this move to be accomplished, Mackay was instructed to hold the Germans at Vevi until the night of 12–13 April before himself withdrawing to the Aliakmon. During near-blizzard conditions on the afternoon of the 11th, the Germans launched an infantry attack astride the road. This continued well into the night but was beaten off after severe losses had been inflicted on the enemy. The next morning the Germans resumed their attack, this time with tanks in support. At about 11 a.m. the 1st Rangers, apparently uncertain about the security of their position, began withdrawing without Vasey’s knowledge. As a consequence, the New Zealand machine-gunners were forced to retire during the afternoon, followed by the Royal Horse Artillery after it found itself without infantry protection. After contact was lost with his right-hand battalion at about 4.30 p.m. Vasey became aware of the deteriorating situation and that hopes of conducting a co-ordinated withdrawal had evaporated. By dusk the forward posts of the 2/8th Battalion had been overrun by enemy tanks and the unit began breaking up into small parties making their way across country to the south. The 2/4th was told to pull back

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April 1941 too, making their way by foot as best as they could manage. The first of the Australian infantry began reaching the crossroads south of Sotir, where vehicles were assembled to take them south, at about 11 p.m. Eventually some 250 members of the 2/8th were collected, though only about 50 of these retained their weapons so that the unit’s further effectiveness was minimal. The retirement of the 2/4th on the left had been far more organised, and the unit arrived virtually intact except for the loss of 70 men from the company on the extreme left flank who had unwittingly stumbled into a German blocking position and were captured. With the Germans undertaking little further offensive action in the dark, the remnants of 19th Brigade occupied a rearguard position around Sotir for the rest of the night. Vasey ordered the troops to hold their ground until 9 a.m. the next day, but after a fierce firefight began between the German 9th Panzer Division and the

British armour at 7.30 a.m., preparations for a pull-out were begun sooner. By the evening of 13 April the last of this Allied force had withdrawn within the Aliakmon Line. As a result of this one fight Vasey’s brigade had been reduced to a strength of under 900 men, and one of his two battalions reported a total strength of little more than 300 all ranks; at least 123 Australians had been captured by the Germans at Vevi. Gavin Long (1953) Greece, Crete and Syria, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; David Horner (1992) General Vasey’s War, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Tempe Gorge (or Pinios Gorge), an action fought on 18 April 1941 during the British withdrawal through central Greece ahead of invading German forces. On 16 April the Australian 16th Brigade under Brigadier Arthur Allen was ordered to hold the narrow steep-sided defile through which the Pinios River ran for about eight kilometres east of the village of Tempe, flanked by a road and

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railway leading to the town of Larisa. This latter centre was itself a crucial junction, since its seizure by enemy forces driving down from the north-east would cut off the escape route for all British units still north of this point. In addition to the two battalions of his own brigade (the 2/2nd and 2/3rd), Allen had available the New Zealand 21st Battalion. These he disposed along the southern slopes overlooking the gorge: the New Zealanders on the right (eastern) flank, the 2/2nd in the centre, with two companies of the 2/3rd holding the left. At 7 a.m. on 18 April German mountain troops attacked from the village of Gonnos against the 2/2nd Battalion, followed before midday by a heavy attack with tanks and infantry against the 21st Battalion. Fierce fighting continued all day but Allen’s troops successfully held up the enemy advance until nightfall, even after both the 2/2nd and the New Zealanders had been cut off and driven from their positions into the hills behind the road. In what Allen later described as a ‘fantastic battle’, there had been no time to dig weapon pits and all elements of the units—even headquarters—found themselves in the frontline. As a result of this rearguard action, the rest of the British force was able to withdraw during the night and by dawn on 19 April was south of Larisa and making for a new defensive line being established across the Thermopylae Peninsula. The cost to 16th Brigade had been more than 80 killed or wounded, and about 120 taken prisoner (some of whom were also wounded). Gavin Long (1953) Greece, Crete and Syria, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Brallos Pass, the scene of heavy fighting on 24 April 1941 during the German invasion of Greece, brought on when advancing invaders attempted to drive in the defensive line established by British forces across the Thermopylae Peninsula. The line was held by the New Zealanders on the right, covering


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the coastal plain behind the Sperkhios River, while elements of the 6th Australian Division under Major-General Iven Mackay were charged with defending against enemy movement over the mountain range on the left. The main route in the Australian’s sector was via a road which wound some seven kilometres from the plain to the high pass at Brallos. The task of denying this approach to the Germans was entrusted to Brigadier George Vasey’s 19th Brigade, reinforced by a battalion from the 16th Brigade; the western flank was protected by the 17th Brigade under Brigadier Stanley Savige. By 20 April the Germans had reached Lamia, the town on the far bank of the Sperkhios, and the battle was plainly about to begin. It was at this point that Vasey, recognising that his men were about to enter an uneven and desperate engagement, issued a famous order in which he declared, ‘Here we bloody well are and here we bloody well stay’. The Australian positions were subjected to air attacks on both 20 and 21 April, and the next day the guns which Vasey had deployed forward to prevent the enemy repairing the demolished bridge outside Lamia were engaged by German artillery until their position was destroyed. Meanwhile enemy patrols seized ground to the west which overlooked the two battalions in their blocking positions astride the road. During the morning of 22 April Vasey was advised of the decision taken to withdraw all British forces from Greece, and that to enable evacuation to take place his brigade was to form a rearguard in its present position until the night of the 24th. After a quiet day on 23 April, that night Vasey began pulling back his forward battalions into new positions further up the escarpment. These were in their fresh locations when the Germans began their assault at 11.30 a.m. the next day. The 2/11th Battalion, holding forward on ground to the right of the road immediately north of Brallos village, began exchanging fire with troops of the 5th Panzer

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April–May 1941 Division. Meanwhile, elements of the German 6th Mountain Division moved up a railway cutting that ran parallel to the road, and prepared to attack Brallos from the west, threatening to get in behind the 2/11th and cut off its route of withdrawal. The mountain troops pressed their attack shortly before 5 p.m., and the battalion was forced to pull back its left flank slightly after taking about a dozen casualties. The position was maintained, however, with the assistance of supporting artillery fire by the 2/2nd Field Regiment. Despite the strength of the resistance mounted by the Australians, by nightfall the enemy’s advance had raised a serious concern that the Germans might reach the guns before the time scheduled for evacuation. At 6 p.m. Vasey gave orders for the withdrawal to be accelerated by half an hour. Accordingly, at 8 p.m. the main body of the brigade embarked in vehicles and drove away down the peninsula to Megara, on the coast west of Athens. The 2/11th Battalion remained in action, covered by the 2/2nd Regiment’s guns until 8.30 p.m. when these were hitched to their tractors and also driven away. At 9 p.m. the battalion began its withdrawal, with forward elements ‘leap-frogging’ through rear-posts. As pressure from the Germans was not maintained, the last of the troops got away safely in their trucks at 10.15 p.m. Gavin Long (1953) Greece, Crete and Syria, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; David Horner (1992) General Vasey’s War, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Retimo, an action fought on the north coast of Crete on 20–30 May 1941, during the German airborne invasion of the island. Following the Allied evacuation from Greece in April, some 30,000 British, Australian and New Zealand troops were assembled to repel an expected attempt to add Crete to the German list of victories. In addition, there were eleven battalions of Greeks, totalling 11,000 men, but these were all largely


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untrained and poorly armed. The Allied forces were also only lightly armed, having lost practically all their heavy weapons in getting off Greece. These available forces were positioned around the four most likely landing places on the island—each located along the narrow northern coastal plain, and connected by a single road. The New Zealanders defended the Maleme–Canea area at the western end, while a short distance away an improvised force of mainly composite Australian units was stationed south of Suda Bay under Lieut.-Colonel William Cremor. About 30 kilometres to the east, around Retimo, Brigadier George Vasey commanded another force of four Australian and three Greek battalions, while another 60 kilometres to the east a British brigade (with one Australian battalion, the 2/4th, attached) held Heraklion. In the main Australian sector at Retimo, Vasey placed two battalions of his 19th Brigade (2/1st and 2/11th), with the Greeks, to cover the Retimo airfield under Lieut.-Colonel Ian Campbell, while his headquarters and the other two Australian battalions (2/7th and 2/8th) guarded against any possible landing in Georgioupolis Bay sixteen kilometres to the west. When the German attack came on 20 May, Retimo was the target of two enemy parachute battalions—about 1,500 men— who were dropped east and west of the Australian positions at about 4 p.m. Seven of the transport planes were shot down, and most of the German paratroops were quickly overcome. Part of the invading force, however, was able to establish itself in a strong position on a vital ridge overlooking the eastern end of the airfield, while others managed to cut the road heading west to Suda Bay and beyond—to where the heaviest and main landing had been carried out during the morning using both parachute and glider forces. Campbell ordered an attack to be made by the 2/1st Battalion against the enemy foothold at dawn the next day. This

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was successful in driving the Germans off the hill, but enemy parties were able to remain astride the roads to both east and west. Despite further attempts to deal with these blocking forces on 22 May, Campbell was unable to open these roads. Elsewhere, another attempted landing by four battalions at Heraklion on 20 May had been defeated with very heavy loss. Over 1,000 enemy parachutists were killed—90 of these by the 2/4th Battalion, for the loss of only three Australians killed and a number wounded. At Maleme, however, control of the airfield was lost by the afternoon of 21 May—enabling the Germans to use it to reinforce their position. An attempted counter-attack that night, by a New Zealand battalion and one of Vasey’s units brought up from Georgioupolis, temporarily gained some ground but could not recapture the airfield. The Germans were thus able to commence outflanking the defenders using inland routes through the hills, and by 23 May the New Zealanders were forced to start withdrawing eastwards—their left flank protected by Vasey’s two battalions from Georgioupolis. Campbell’s force at Retimo continued to fight, and early on 28 May made yet another effort to push the enemy off the western road. Now out of contact with the rest of the Allied force, he was unaware that the decision had been made the previous day to withdraw from Crete. The Maleme–Suda Bay and Heraklion sectors were abandoned during 28 May as the defending troops made their way over the mountain range to beaches on the south coast, where naval forces from Egypt embarked them over three consecutive nights. When a message sent to him failed to arrive, Campbell and his men were left at the mercy of powerful German forces which were converging on them. After German tanks and artillery appeared from the west on the morning of 30 May, it was obvious that further resistance was futile and Campbell surrendered. Some of his troops


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managed to scatter into the hills and by individual enterprise were eventually able to reach Egypt; the majority, however, were among the 3,100 Australians made prisoner. In all, 12,000 Allied troops were captured by the Germans on Crete. Australian casualties during the fighting were 274 killed and 507 wounded. Gavin Long (1953) Greece, Crete and Syria, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; David Horner (1992) General Vasey’s War, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Litani River, in the southern Lebanon, was the scene of severe fighting on 9 June 1941 at the commencement of the British campaign to wrest control of the French colonies of Syria and Lebanon from the pro-German Vichy government. On the first day of the campaign (8 June), the 21st Australian Brigade under Brigadier Jack Stevens attacked north from Britishcontrolled Palestine along the coastal road. By nightfall the brigade was east of Tyre, with its advance-guard on slopes overlooking the Litani where heavy fire from French forces had brought the advance to a halt. The next day’s operations entailed forcing a crossing of the Litani, in conjunction with a landing by a British commando battalion from the sea. The latter group was intended to come ashore north of the river mouth before dawn, with the aim of seizing the arched stone bridge before the French defenders could demolish it. This plan miscarried, and when the 2/16th Battalion advanced at 5.30 a.m. they saw the bridge blown up in front of them. Under fire from enemy mortars and machine-guns located on a ridge on the northern bank which dominated the river, and for a time from two French destroyers which began shelling from a point off the shore, the Australians brought up a canvas assault boat and began putting across small groups of men at a point east of the wrecked bridge. At a cost of five casualties, two platoons totalling about 70 men were able to establish

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May–June 1941 themselves on the far bank. Early in the afternoon, the troops across the river launched an attack on the enemy-held ridge. Although the advance was over open ground, accurate fire from supporting artillery enabled the platoons to overrun the ridge in about 25 minutes with only three casualties. Enemy losses were about 30 killed, 38 prisoners and eleven machine-guns captured. Fighting west along the ridgeline, by 4 p.m. the position had been cleared of defenders—twelve more of whom were captured along with a 75-mm fieldgun and two machine-guns. Attempts to force another crossing west of the wrecked bridge were also successful but at greater cost. A party of the 2/16th carried forward assault boats to a group of commandos who had mistakenly come ashore south of the river mouth, but heavy fire brought onto this force caused about a quarter of its members to become casualties. After the sole surviving boat was used to carry two loads of commandos and Australians across, these attacked an enemy redoubt and took 35 prisoners. During the night part of the 2/27th Battalion crossed the river and overcame the remaining enemy defences blocking the brigade’s progress. Gavin Long (1953) Greece, Crete and Syria, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Merdjayoun, a town in southern Lebanon about 40 kilometres north-east of Tyre, which on 11–27 June 1941 was the scene of bitter fighting between British–Australian and Vichy French forces. When the British invasion of Syria and Lebanon commenced on 8 June, the 25th Australian Brigade under Brigadier A.R. Baxter-Cox advanced in two columns—the right one against Khiam, the left upon Merdjayoun. Both encountered determined resistance, and although Khiam was briefly entered that day the occupying party was quickly forced to withdraw, while the leading troops of the left column found themselves pinned down in open country


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south of Khirbe, some six kilometres short of Merdjayoun. The next day the fort at Khiam was captured by the 2/33rd Battalion, but the 2/ 31st Battalion group was unable to make any progress against Merdjayoun. A set-piece battle was planned for 11 June, employing heavy supporting artillery. Under cover of this barrage the town was duly taken, along with the village of Ibeles Saki further east which was captured by the 2/25th Battalion. Following this success the commander of 7th Australian Division, Major-General John Lavarack, decided to switch the focus of the advance by Baxter-Cox’s brigade to the north, towards Jezzine, rather than east—against Damascus—as originally planned. The 2/ 33rd Battalion and a company of the 2/5th were left to hold the ground just won, along with the Scots Greys and part of the 6th Australian Cavalry, a field battery and the 2/ 2nd Pioneer Battalion. Taking advantage of the diminution of strength in this sector, the French counter-attacked on 15 June with an infantry regiment, tanks, and heavy artillery support. The defenders were forced out of their positions, even though their own artillery knocked out a number of the enemy tanks, and the next day the French had regained possession of both Merdjayoun and Ibeles Saki. Lavarack rushed the 2/ 25th Battalion back to the area, along with other reinforcements, and placed command of this augmented force under his artillery commander, Brigadier Frank Berryman. On 17 June Berryman ordered the recapture of Merdjayoun by part of the 2/ 2nd Pioneers and the 2/25th Battalion. The town was now strongly held, however, and the attack failed. The Pioneers (who were fighting as infantry for the first time) lost 27 killed and 46 wounded; nine of the wounded and 29 others were captured by French tanks which emerged from the town. Another attempt was made two days later, on 19 June, only to be again repulsed with the loss of

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about 25 killed and 60 wounded; after the action 73 men were missing, some of whom were later found to have been killed or wounded. Berryman now switched direction to his right flank and decided to attack Ibeles Saki on 23 June using the 2/33rd and the 2nd Battalion, King’s Own Regiment. The Australian advance, made behind a strong artillery barrage, gained its objective after hand-to-hand fighting with the Algerian troops defending it. The position was held against four counter-attacks which again resulted in close combat with grenades and bayonets. The English attack initially failed, but when resumed early the next morning met with little resistance. Also on the morning of the 24th a patrol from the Pioneers discovered that the French had abandoned Merdjayoun. Although the Australians were now back in the positions held before the French counter-attack ten days earlier, this was not the end of the fighting. On 27 June Berryman launched another attack by a company of the Pioneers against a ridge north of the town. The position was taken, but only because the enemy garrison (two battalions) had withdrawn temporarily to avoid the supporting barrage. The French quickly counter-attacked and drove the Australians off, accounting for half the attacking company in casualties or prisoners. Two days later the positions held by the Australians around Merdjayoun were progressively taken over by the 23rd British Brigade. The fighting in this one sector of the battlefront had drawn in a substantial proportion of the enemy forces available to resist the whole British advance, with the result that almost one-third of all casualties suffered by the 7th Australian Division during the Syrian campaign occurred here. In the fighting between 16–29 June these losses totalled 300 killed and wounded, and another 209 taken prisoner.


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Gavin Long (1953) Greece, Crete and Syria, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Damascus, scene of heavy fighting involving Australian infantry on 20–21 June 1941, during the British campaign to wrest control of Syria and Lebanon from Vichy French forces. At the start of the campaign on 8 June the 5th Indian Brigade had advanced from the south and south-west, aiming to form a bridgehead through which two understrength Free French brigades would pass to complete the city’s capture. Dogged enemy resistance caused the advance to be stalled at Kiswe, sixteen kilometres short of Damascus, until a night attack by the Indian Brigade on 15 June broke the deadlock. An attempt made three days later to press on with the attack through Mezze, on the city’s western outskirts, resulted in disaster on 19 June, when the attacking battalions were surrounded inside that place (and eventually forced to surrender the next day). In response to these changing fortunes, the 2/3rd Battalion of the 6th Australian Division (newly arrived from Palestine) was sent to bolster the British force on this front. Reaching the rear of the remainder of the Indian Brigade astride the Kuneitra road on 20 June, that same evening the unit was ordered to attack the stone forts occupying the bare western heights which dominated the road and Mezze from the west. One company was, however, given the task of skirting around the left flank and cutting the road running away to the north-west towards Beirut. During a very confused night of activity, the Australians succeeded in occupying several of the forts but were then attacked and 59 members of the battalion— including the commanding officer and most of headquarters company—were taken prisoner. Other elements of the battalion reversed this situation between 8 and 10 a.m. the next day, taking the remaining enemy forts and securing the release of their captured personnel. Meanwhile, the company sent to establish

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a road-block had achieved its objective too. This party succeeded in maintaining their position in the Barada Gorge despite intermittent forays by the French during the next twelve hours to clear them away using tanks and armoured cars as well as infantry. All the enemy efforts were beaten off or held, and the position was progressively strengthened. It was largely because of the success of this party that the defenders of Damascus surrendered at about 11 a.m. Gavin Long (1953) Greece, Crete and Syria, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Damour, an action fought on 6–9 July 1941 along the coastal road to Beirut, which was then the main military base and administrative centre for Vichy French forces in Syria. The ravine through which the Damour


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River flows, located about twenty kilometres south of the city, represented the last major natural obstacle for British forces which had been pressing north from Palestine since 8 June. By this stage in the campaign Allied operations in Syria were under the command of Lieut.-General John Lavarack and his headquarters of 1st Australian Corps. The main force available to him in this sector was the 7th Australian Division under Major-General Arthur Allen, reinforced by the 17th Brigade of the 6th Australian Division. After closing up to the Damour River and seizing the heights overlooking it from the south at the end of June, the 21st Australian Brigade had been scouting the ravine wall and suitable crossing points. On 4 July Allen issued his orders for a

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full-scale attack which aimed at encircling the defending French in their positions. The operation began with a silent advance by the 21st Brigade before midnight on 5 July, during which the river was crossed and an approach made along a goat-track upon the enemy-held village of El Boum on the northern heights. At 12.35 a.m. on 6 July a heavy barrage was fired by 60 guns and the Australian infantry charged into the village with bayonets fixed. The attackers met no resistance, as the French had hastily withdrawn immediately before their arrival. Elements of the 2/14th and 2/ 27th battalions then fanned out into the mountains, aiming to prevent any French reinforcements reaching the town of Damour from the east. On the left flank of this movement, the 2/ 16th Battalion crossed the Damour closer to the coast and prepared to deliver a frontal assault against French posts in the heights at El Atiqa just east of the road. The enemy here were in well-sited positions and inflicted sharp losses—27 dead and 74 wounded— but the Australians gained important ground and kept the defenders pinned down. Meanwhile, from El Boum two battalions of Brigadier Stanley Savige’s 17th Brigade, the 2/3rd and 2/5th, moved through the 21st Brigade and by nightfall on 8 July were astride the road north of Damour. With the town now effectively cut off, a company of the 2/ 14th moved in from the east and was forced to endure being shelled by both friendly and enemy artillery. At 4 a.m. on 9 July troops of the 6th Australian Cavalry passed right through Damour, establishing that the enemy had abandoned their positions and withdrawn during the night. With the Australians now on the doorstep of Beirut itself, the Vichy French commander, General Henri Dentz, sought an armistice and by 12 July the campaign was over. Gavin Long (1953) Greece, Crete and Syria, Canberra: Australian War Memorial


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Carnarvon, scene of a naval clash off the West Australian coast on 19 November 1941, between the disguised German commerce raider Kormoran (formerly the HamburgAmerika liner Steiermark) and the RAN light cruiser Sydney. At about 4 p.m. on the 19th, Kormoran (under Commander Anton Detmers) was steering north-east approximately 240 kilometres south-west of Carnarvon when she encountered Sydney heading south to Fremantle after escorting a troopship to the Sunda Strait. As soon as the two ships sighted each other at a range of nineteen kilometres, Detmers immediately rounded Kormoran onto a reverse course and increased speed, while sending his crew to action stations. Sydney’s commander, Captain Joseph Burnett, ordered the cruiser turned onto a converging course and steadily narrowed the distance between the two vessels. Seeking to avoid combat with such a heavily armed opponent, when challenged to identify herself the German ship hoisted Dutch colours and claimed to be called Straat Malakka. To continue the deception, Detmers also caused a radio message to be sent off in the name of the Straat Malakka advising that she was being approached by a ‘suspicious ship’—a signal picked up by stations on the Australian mainland, and presumably by Sydney also. Although Burnett kept the cruiser’s guns and torpedo tubes trained on the supposed freighter, apparently he was sufficiently satisfied to close to within only 1,600 metres of Kormoran’s starboard side. Detmers was thus presented with the Australian cruiser as a target at virtually point-blank range, when Burnett called on him to show the ‘secret sign’ appropriate to the ship he claimed to be. Realising that his bluff had been called, the German captain promptly dropped the deception. Striking the Dutch flag and hoisting German colours, at 5.30 p.m. he gave the order to fire with guns and torpedoes. Because the range was

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July–November 1941 so close, Kormoran poured forth fire not only from her six 5.9-inch main guns, but from her 3.7-inch and anti-aircraft machine-guns as well. After two quick salvos established the range, within four seconds of opening the engagement Kormoran had scored hits on Sydney’s bridge and director tower, while further salvos immediately following also impacted on the bridge and amidships, destroying too the cruiser’s aircraft where it sat on the catapult ready for launch with engine running. Thus severely impaired from the outset in her ability to respond, Sydney’s return fire was initially ineffective. Her first full salvo passed harmlessly over the raider, and there was no opportunity for a second as the cruiser’s forward gun turrets were put out of action moments later. Only after the German vessel’s fifth or sixth salvos had increased the damage on board, was the foremost of the two rear turrets able to commence ‘fast and accurate fire’ which hit Kormoran in the funnel and engine room. As the raider continued to send destructive rounds into the stricken Australian ship, a torpedo inflicted further damage under the inoperable forward turrets. The cruiser turned sharply in towards Kormoran, as though attempting to ram her opponent— receiving a further salvo as she did so which blew one of the forward turrets overboard. The two ships did not collide, with Sydney passing under the raider’s stern and running on a southerly course as she began losing way. She was by this time low in the water but still giving fight, and at 5.45 p.m. fired four torpedoes at Kormoran as the German steered away from her at a range of about five kilometres. The raider’s engines were beginning to fail right at this moment, but still enabled the ship to clear the torpedoes’ path before completely breaking down. Detmers responded with a torpedo of his own at about 6 p.m., but this also missed— passing by Sydney’s stern. While the Australian cruiser was now a


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crippled wreck with most of its forward superstructure ablaze, Detmers and his crew were also in severe difficulty. Fire had taken hold in Kormoran’s damaged engine room, leaving the vessel without propulsion and in peril of being blown apart by the load of 200 mines which she carried on board. Her armament systems were still fully operative, however, and continued to engage Sydney until 6.25 p.m. when a final shot was fired at a distance of about ten kilometres. At this point Detmers initiated arrangements to abandon ship, and by 9 p.m. most of the Kormoran’s boats and rafts had pulled away. The last personnel on board cast off about midnight, after igniting scuttling charges which had been prepared—their departure hastened by a dramatic build-up in smoke which indicated that flames were approaching the mining deck. Half an hour later the mines exploded, taking the ship rapidly to the bottom. For the next five days, there was no knowledge of the engagement having been fought, and its outcome. Sydney’s lateness in arriving at Fremantle did not give rise to serious concern until 23 November, and it was not until the following day that continuous attempts were made to establish radio contact and an air search by RAAF aircraft initiated off the West Australian coastline. The first intimation of what had happened came on the evening of the 24th, when a British tanker reported having picked up 25 German seamen from a raft. An intensive air and sea search off Carnarvon subsequently led to the rescue of 315 survivors from the Kormoran’s crew of 393 officers and men, along with two of four Chinese who were prisoners from one of the raider’s earlier victims. While it was now confirmed that an action had occurred at sea, there was still nothing known regarding Sydney’s fate. Intensive interrogation of Kormoran survivors produced no more information than that the Australian cruiser had last been seen drifting off into

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the night towards the south-east, her location discernible only by a glow in the dark and later flickerings which disappeared from view by midnight. That the cruiser had subsequently sunk there can be no doubt, but a major puzzle associated with this tragedy was the total absence of any survivors from her complement of 645 officers and men. Indeed, a Carley life float which had been damaged by shellfire and two lifebelts were the only pieces of wreckage ever recovered from the ship, whose loss remains the severest blow suffered by the RAN in its history. For a time suspicion focused on the Kormoran’s crew, who were known to have previously machine-gunned survivors of a British tanker sunk in the Atlantic. Despite continuing attention devoted to the Sydney– Kormoran fight by writers and historians, nothing has since emerged to shed new light on the mystery regarding this action. G. Hermon Gill (1957) Royal Australian Navy 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Michael Montgomery (1981) Who Sank the Sydney?, North Ryde, NSW: Cassell; Barbara Winter (1984), HMAS Sydney. Fact, Fantasy and Fraud, Brisbane: Boolarong Publications; Tom Frame (1993) HMAS Sydney: Loss and Controversy, Sydney: Hodder & Stoughton

Malta, a concerted air campaign conducted by the German and Italian air forces against British forces garrisoning this Mediterranean island from December 1941 until May 1942. The first air raid on the island occurred on 11 June 1940, and for the next six months attacks were carried out solely by Italian aircraft. In December 1940, however, German squadrons moved into Sicily and the air war hotted up until May 1941, when the Germans withdrew in preparation for their campaign in Russia. After that offensive stalled, attention was again focused by the Germans on the Mediterranean, and the Second Air Fleet under Generalfeldmarschall Albert Kesselring was withdrawn from Russia to Sicily with orders to reduce Malta’s defences in preparation for a combined air and sea invasion


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(codenamed Operation Hercules) planned for mid-1942. The battle for Malta effectively began on 22 December 1941, when the Germans resumed attacks with increasing intensity until 9 May 1942 when Kesselring—claiming the island had been ‘neutralised’—began removing some of his air groups for service elsewhere. Thereafter the campaign steadily tapered off until November, by which time the emphasis of British operations had switched entirely from defensive interceptions to aggressive search and destroy sorties against the enemy over Italian territory. Before the Germans called off their planned invasion 14,000 tonnes of bombs had been dropped on the island, causing the Maltese population 5,316 casualties (1,484 killed, 54 missing, 3,778 wounded). To oppose the enemy’s aerial onslaught, the Royal Air Force deployed a number of Hurricane and Spitfire fighter squadrons. Among the pilots in these British units were 47 Australians—many of them members of the Royal Australian Air Force trained under the Empire Air Training Scheme. The first of this group arrived in November 1941 and by December 1942 a total of fifteen had been killed in action. Lex McAulay (1989) Against All Odds: RAAF Pilots in the Battle for Malta 1942, Milsons Point, NSW: Century Hutchinson

Rangoon, capital of Burma, was the focus of a five-month air campaign (December 1941 until March 1942) fought ahead of Japanese ground forces invading from neighbouring Thailand. The clash began on 23 December 1941 when the Japanese Army Air Force attacked Rangoon with 80 aircraft, in an attempt to deliver a ‘knock out’ blow to the city’s defences. The enemy planes were met by Brewster Buffalo fighters of the Royal Air Force and a squadron of Curtiss Tomahawks flown by pilots of the American Volunteer Group led by Colonel Claire Chennault. Although unable to prevent the bombing which caused 2,000 casualties among the

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November 1941–January 1942 civilian population, the defenders were able to shoot down 27 Japanese aircraft for the loss of just six of their own. As the Japanese advanced towards Moulmein, Burma’s second-largest city, two RAF squadrons of Blenheim light bombers were sent to Burma from the Middle East along with three squadrons of Hurricane fighters. These kept up a determined resistance to repeated enemy air raids, including another full-scale effort late in February 1942 to gain aerial ascendancy over the capital. The Allied pilots accounted for at least 37 aircraft destroyed, whereupon the Japanese did not again attempt to seriously contest control of air space over Rangoon until after the city had been occupied by their ground troops on 8 March. By this stage the Allied squadrons had been withdrawn to airfields in India and continued the fight from there. Throughout the air campaign fought from Rangoon, the RAF units engaged in the fighting comprised a significant proportion of Royal Australian Air Force pilots who had been trained under the Empire Air Training Scheme for active service abroad. Among these was Pilot Officer W. Storey, who flew Hurricanes with 135 Squadron after his arrival at Rangoon on 19 January 1942; by the time his squadron was taken off operations in May 1943, Storey had shot down eight enemy aircraft over Burma. Lex McAulay (1991) Six Aces: Australian Fighter Pilots 1939–45, Brunswick, Vic.: Banner Books

Gemas, in Negri Sembilan province of Malaya, on 14–15 January 1942 was the scene of the first contact between Australian troops and invading Japanese forces. The 2/30th Battalion of the 27th Brigade (8th Australian Division), commanded by Lieut.-Colonel Frederick Galleghan, was ordered to mount an ambush on the main road eleven kilometres west of Gemas—at a point where a wooden bridge over the Gemencheh Creek brought traffic into a long cutting through


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dense bush. The 2/30th’s B Company under Captain Desmond Duffy was placed in ambush at this position, about five kilometres ahead of that occupied by the rest of the battalion. At 4 p.m., 200–300 Japanese soldiers riding bicycles entered the ambush site but were allowed to pass through. Behind this advance group came another 700–800, and it was when this body was in the cutting that explosives laid on the bridge behind them were detonated to cut off their escape. Some hundreds of the Japanese crowded on the road were cut down with machine-gun fire and grenades. What had been a flawless plan up to that point then came unstuck, when it was found that a telephone line back to the main battalion position had gone dead and the ambush party was unable to call on artillery fire to deal with enemy forces travelling behind those which had been hit. After an action lasting only twenty minutes the forward company was itself obliged to withdraw through the jungle ahead of fast pursuing enemy forces, avoiding the area now occupied by the Japanese advance-guard which had been let through the ambush site initially. By 9 a.m. the next day—at which stage the ambushers were still fighting their way back—the forward posts in the main battalion position astride the road were confronted by Japanese tanks. Australian anti-tank guns destroyed five of these vehicles and disabled another, and the enemy pulled back for a time—encouraged to do so by a counter-attack by another 2/30th company. That afternoon the Japanese came on again but were driven off, whereupon it was decided to conduct an orderly withdrawal before the enemy’s pressure became too great. In this initial clash, the Australians had lost 81 personnel killed, wounded or missing, but inflicted casualties on the 5th Japanese Division estimated to number 1,000. Lionel Wigmore (1957) The Japanese Thrust, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

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Bakri, an action fought in southern Malaya on 18–20 January 1942, during the Japanese invasion of the peninsula. After the raw and partly trained 45th Indian Brigade found itself engaged on 15 January by the veteran Japanese Imperial Guards division at the Muar River on the west coast, the commander of the British defence in this area, Major-General Gordon Bennett (an Australian), sent two battalions of the 8th Australian Division as reinforcements—the 2/29th from the 27th Brigade and the 2/ 19th from the 22nd Brigade. The 2/29th reached Bakri, some fifteen kilometres inland to the east, on the afternoon of 17 January and took up position forward of the town on the Indian Brigade’s right flank. That night the Indians were driven back to within two kilometres of Bakri, but re-established their line during the early hours of the next day. During the morning of 18 January, eight Japanese light tanks attacked up the road to Bakri but were met by Australian 2-pounder anti-tank guns in a cutting which destroyed

all of the enemy vehicles. As this action was raging the 2/19th Battalion was arriving at Parit Sulong, some 25 kilometres further down the road. This unit was hurried forward to provide depth to the 2/29th’s blocking position, but had to clear a path through a Japanese force which had already cut the road behind the forward Australian battalion. The next day the 2/19th attacked along the Muar road, in an effort to regain contact with one of the battalions of the Indian Brigade which had become cut off. Using outflanking tactics, the Australians succeeded in routing the Japanese—but were themselves cut off when the enemy moved in behind them to create a new road-block. At this stage the 45th Brigade’s headquarters suffered a direct bomb hit from enemy aircraft, in which the commander was stunned and nearly all his staff killed or wounded. The CO of the 2/19th, Liuet.Colonel Charles Anderson, now took command and decided on a withdrawal down

A 2-pounder gun of the 2/4th Anti-Tank Regiment engaging Japanese tanks at Bakri on 18 January 1942. Source: Australian War Memorial 11302



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January 1942 the road towards Parit Sulong. He delayed initiating this movement, however, until the missing Indian unit turned up, and in the meantime both Australian battalions became heavily engaged. The withdrawal finally got underway on the morning of the following day, 20 January, and entailed fighting through an enemy cordon. Anderson led the leading Australian elements in achieving the initial break-out, but further along the road another Japanese blocking force was encountered. While he was preparing another attack by three companies to overcome this obstacle, the rearguard of the column was also obliged to turn and deal with an enemy force which was closely following. In the latter action, the brigadier of the 45th Indian Brigade was killed; Anderson’s attack succeeded brilliantly in putting the enemy to flight. That night Anderson learnt that Parit Sulong was already in Japanese hands, as a result of an enemy landing further along the coast from Muar—at Batu Pahat—which had forced back Indian troops defending in this area and allowed a northern advance inland. The Australian–Indian force retiring from Muar was now effectively cut off. The next day Anderson attacked around Parit Sulong in an attempt to re-open the column’s escape route. The enemy was found to be too strongly established, however, and by nightfall only limited headway had been achieved. By this stage Anderson’s force was low on ammunition for its guns and mortars, and moreover was weighed down by many wounded. After an attack by a British battalion east of the obstructing enemy failed to materialise, it was clear that the column’s position was parlous. Early on the morning of 22 January Japanese tanks broke into the Australian perimeter from the rear, and were only stopped by gunfire. The force now came under aerial bombardment, to add to the enemy artillery fire which had been practically constant during the withdrawal. Recognising that a mass withdrawal was


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impossible, at 9 a.m. Anderson ordered the destruction of all guns and vehicles, then instructed all who were able to disperse eastwards in small parties. By this means a total of 271 members of the 2/19th Battalion and 130 of the 2/29th were able to escape to British lines at Yong Peng about 25 kilometres away. All but a few of 150 wounded Australians and Indians left behind at Parit Sulong were butchered by the Japanese. Lionel Wigmore (1957) The Japanese Thrust, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Rabaul, the port town at the northern end of New Britain island, on 23 January 1942 was the scene of a shortlived action between the Australian garrison and a 5,000-strong Japanese invasion force. At the time that the South Seas Force under Major-General Tomitaro Horii reached the area from Truk, the Australian military force defending the place comprised a battalion group of 1,400 men commanded by Colonel J.J. Scanlan. Large-scale air attacks beginning on 20 January had already virtually eliminated No.24 Squadron, RAAF, under Wing Commander John Lerew, leaving it with just one Hudson bomber and two Wirraway armed training aircraft. With Scanlan’s concurrence the surviving aircraft were flown out on 21–22 January and the remaining 130 RAAF personnel had withdrawn down the east coast where they were subsequently evacuated by flying boats on 23–24 January. Meanwhile, Japanese landing craft arrived in Blanche Bay about 1 a.m. on the 23rd and an hour later began landing troops around the crater of Vulcan volcano on the western shore. The Australians opened fire on these landing parties with mortars and small arms from two defended localities south of the bay. The eastern group was fairly quickly compelled to withdraw, and by dawn the western group around Vulcan found itself under heavy air attack and in danger of being outflanked and cut off by enemy ground

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attacks. A withdrawal inland was commenced at 7 a.m. to reserve positions around the now cratered Vunakanau airfield. Still under heavy pressure from the Japanese, Scanlan realised that further prolonging the action was pointless and ordered his force to disperse to the south-east and south-west. The losses inflicted on the Japanese had been slight—reportedly only sixteen killed and 49 ‘injured’ (presumably wounded in action). Australian casualties during the day’s fighting were also relatively light, at 26 killed. Worse was to follow over the next few weeks, as groups of the Australian force were captured or surrendered to the enemy. On 4 March 160 prisoners were murdered by their captors at Tol and Waitavalo plantations on the south coast, but at least 400 were taken off the island in mass rescues carried out during late March and early April. Some small parties were still escaping from New Britain as late as May. Lionel Wigmore (1957) The Japanese Thrust, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Jemaluang, located about sixteen kilometres south of Mersing on the east coast of the Malayan peninsula, on 26–27 January 1942 was the scene of a successful ambush by the 22nd Australian Brigade against invading Japanese forces. Early that morning an enemy sea convoy was reported by Australian airmen some 30 kilometres off Endau, north of Mersing, and clearly bound for the former place. Despite two air raids made on the ships that afternoon, a force of Japanese troops got ashore to join others who had been active in the area for some days. On the basis of this fresh landing, the 22nd Brigade which was defending around Mersing expected to be heavily attacked soon and mounted a large-scale ambush at the point where the road south to Jemaluang passed by the Nithsdale and Joo Lye rubber estates. Execution of this operation was given to the 2/18th Battalion commanded by Lieut.-Colonel A. Varley, supported by two


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batteries of the 2/10th Field Regiment. The plan devised called for two rifle companies of the battalion to adopt positions at intervals along and on opposite sides of the road, with the other two companies to position themselves astride the road further on. The intention was to allow up to a battalion of enemy troops to enter the ambush area and proceed until the first of the Australian blocking positions actually astride the road was encountered. These Japanese would then be pounded by the artillery, along with the battalion’s own mortars and machine-guns, while the most northerly of the ambush companies then advanced south into the enemy’s rear under cover of a barrage. Japanese caught between these two Australian elements would also be trapped directly in front of the second company lying beside the road, which was to join in despatching any who survived the initial bombardment. Having done as much destruction as possible, the whole battalion was then to withdraw south towards Jemaluang. After dark, parties of Japanese in increasing numbers were seen marching down the road in column of route. These were estimated to total about a battalion and were allowed to enter the ambush site unmolested. As they came up against the blocking company they probed and attacked the edge of the Australian position from 2 a.m. until 3 a.m., when the ambush was finally sprung. Although the gun and mortar fire which fell savagely mauled the enemy within the ambush zone, the company conducting the southwards sweep encountered stronger resistance than anticipated and was still heavily engaged several hours later when daylight came. Upon receiving an order from brigade headquarters at about 8 a.m. to withdraw, Varley reluctantly complied—leaving his two forward companies to fight their way out. In the final count, the 2/18th Battalion was found to have lost 98 personnel killed

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or missing in the operation—the worst toll being in the forward sweeping company which emerged with men enough to form only one platoon. Enemy losses were undoubtedly far heavier, with one Japanese account describing the action as ‘an appalling hand-to-hand battle’. As a result of the setback suffered in the ambush, Jemaluang was not occupied by the enemy until two days later. Lionel Wigmore (1957) The Japanese Thrust, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Ambon, lying in the Banda Sea between the Celebes and western New Guinea, from 31 January to 3 February 1942 was the scene of bitter fighting between the island’s Australian and Dutch garrison and invading Japanese forces. Following Japan’s entry into the war in early December 1941, the 2/21st Battalion (part of the 23rd Brigade of the 8th Australian Division) was sent to Ambon with anti-tank, engineer and other detachments which brought its strength to about 1,100 men. Known as ‘Gull Force’, the battalion group arrived on 17 December to join some 2,600


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Netherlands East Indies troops commanded by Lieut.-Colonel J.R.L. Kapitz. The role of these troops were to defend the Bay of Ambon and two airfields—at Laha and Liang—from which Dutch aircraft and two flights of Hudson bombers from No.13 Squadron, RAAF, operated. The Australians were given the specific tasks of defending Laha and also an area south of Ambon town across the bay. On 6 January 1942 the island’s defenders suffered their first air attack from the Japanese, who had moved into the northern Celebes. After the enemy seized the valuable airfield at Kendari (on the south-eastern coast of Celebes less than 650 kilometres from Ambon) on 24 January, recommendations were made for the evacuation of Allied troops but this advice was rejected. The garrison subsequently experienced air raids of increasing frequency and intensity during the rest of January, from enemy aircraft operating from two carriers. On 30 January the last of the defending aircraft were withdrawn, though not before they reported sighting an invasion force on its way to the island. During the night of 30–31 January the Japanese convoy arrived and landed three battalions of the 228th Regiment and about a battalion of naval troops, under command of Major-General Takeo Ito, at several points on both the north and south coasts. Those coming ashore on the Laitimor Peninsula thrust north and west towards the peninsula’s neck and against Ambon town. Some Dutch defenders surrendered around Paso on the afternoon of 31 January, while the Australians guarding Ambon itself were pushed west into a confined area at the far western end of the peninsula. The Dutch capitulated on 1 February, and two days later the Australian commander, Lieut.-Colonel W.J.R. Scott, decided to do likewise with that part of Gull Force with him. To this point the Australians in the eastern part of the island had suffered fifteen killed.

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Meanwhile, two companies of the 2/21st Battalion at Laha which were attacked on 31 January fought until they, too, were compelled to surrender at 10 a.m. on 2 February. Details of events here are sketchy, but it appears that about 150 Australians and a few Dutch and Indonesians were captured after this action. These were brutally murdered by the Japanese in mass executions conducted on 6 February, and between 15–20 February, so that the Australian death toll in this part of the island eventually totalled 309. Several small parties did manage to escape from the island and made their way back to Australia, but at least 791 surviving members of the Ambon garrison became prisoners of the Japanese Navy. Lionel Wigmore (1957) The Japanese Thrust, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Joan Beaumont (1988) Gull Force, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Singapore, supposedly Britain’s impregnable island fortress in South-east Asia, became the scene of the worst reverse of arms suffered by Australian military forces in war when the entire garrison was forced to surrender to invading Japanese after a defence lasting from 8–15 February 1942. In a rapid campaign begun on 8 December 1941, a Japanese force of just three divisions under General Tomoyuki Yamashita had succeeded in driving all British Empire forces from the Malayan peninsula and investing the 85,000 survivors on Singapore Island by 31 January 1942. After a week of preparations the enemy was ready to undertake the conquest of the main British bastion. The British ground commander at Singapore, Lieut.-General Arthur Percival, ignored advice that the north-west represented the direction of attack which the Japanese would most likely use. The Straits of Johore separating the island from the mainland was narrowest here, and a series of river mouths on the north bank provided best cover for launching


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amphibious craft. Instead of covering this area with his most complete and freshest formation, the 18th British Division, Percival gave this sector of the defence to the 8th Australian Division commanded by Major-General Gordon Bennett. This formation consisted of only two brigades (22nd and 27th), and both had been reduced to half-strength after hard fighting during the withdrawal from Malaya. Compounding his fundamental error, Percival insisted on the Australians adopting positions well forward—supposedly to cover the waterway. This actually meant that they were immediately committed once the battle started and had no flexibility to react or adjust when precise details of the enemy’s attack became known—a factor of critical importance in a defence lacking significant reserve forces in depth. The program of air and artillery bombardment which the Japanese implemented against the island, aimed particularly at the four airfields, terrorised the civilian population—swollen by refugees to twice its normal size of half a million. On 8 February the barrage intensified and began concentrating on the area west of Kranji held by the 22nd Brigade commanded by Brigadier H.B. Taylor. Soon after 10 p.m. the Japanese crossed the straits in barges and boats to attack the stretch of shoreline manned by the 2/20th Battalion and a company of Chinese. The defenders inflicted heavy casualties but were too thinly spread to cope with the weight of the attack they faced. By 1 a.m. on 9 February, the enemy were established on the south bank of the straits in considerable strength. As the Japanese advanced, other parts of the 22nd Brigade’s position were engaged and the Australians forced to pull back. Bennett sent another battalion as reinforcements, but by 6 a.m. Taylor considered the situation was becoming desperate. On 10 February the Japanese Guards Division also crossed over the straits, in the

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February 1942

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area east of the initial lodgement held by the 27th Brigade. By that night the western half of the island had been effectively lost, and the British defensive line was steadily contracting in a south-easterly direction. The two Australian brigades were still heavily engaged in the northern sector, the 27th between Mandai Road and Bukit Panjang, the 22nd on the strategic higher ground around Bukit Timah. On the morning of 12 February an attempted Japanese tank-thrust up the Bukit Timah Road towards Singapore was turned back, but already the ultimate fate of the island was clear. Nursing staff from military hospitals were embarked and every possible vessel was ordered to leave. In an attempt to shorten his line and thus increase the amount of artillery support which could be delivered against individual enemy attacks, Percival drew his forces back into a close perimeter 40 kilometres long around Singapore city. This measure worked to the extent that the Japanese assault was


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not pressed with as much effect on 13 February, and in this short breathing space the idea of a counter-attack was considered by Percival and his senior commanders. Prospects of success were so slim, however, that the proposal was abandoned. Conditions continued to deteriorate, and by 15 February—with water supplies becoming critical and the Japanese making fresh gains in the sector held by the 3rd Indian Corps— Percival accepted that surrender had become necessary. After obtaining a meeting with Yamashita that day, at 8.30 p.m. he ordered his troops to cease fighting. The capitulation at Singapore came as a profound shock to the whole of the British empire. Not only had popular opinion been persuaded by politicians over many years that the island’s defences were invincible, but the more than 130,000 British and Dominion troops who by now were prisoners of the supposedly inferior Japanese was a keenly felt humiliation. Australia’s share in

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the débâcle was not inconsiderable, with 1,789 troops killed and another 14,972 (including 1,306 wounded) taken prisoner, thereby ensuring that the defeat became no less a cause of soul-searching and recrimination in Australia, as in Britain. A particular focus of much controversy and acrimony became the decision of General Bennett to flee the island in the last moments of the defence, an action which was subsequently criticised by both a military court of inquiry and a government-appointed commission. Fifty years later attempts would be made by some British writers to shift the blame for Singapore onto the performance of Australian troops, but there is no reason to doubt that the direct causes of the disaster were, from first to last, in British hands. Not only had the Australians achieved the few outstanding tactical successes against the Japanese during the Malayan campaign (see Gemas, Bakri and Jemaluang) but in fighting terms their contribution had been second to none. Although comprising only 13 per cent of the garrison’s ground troops, they had sustained 73 per cent of its battle deaths. The search for scapegoats also tends to underrate the brilliance of the operation mounted by the Japanese, a campaign which saw them conquer Singapore at a cost claimed at only 1,714 killed and 3,378 wounded. Lionel Wigmore (1957) The Japanese Thrust, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Darwin, an air campaign mounted by Japanese forces against Australia’s major northern port city, in what was the first time that Australia as a sovereign state had come under direct attack from a foreign enemy. Although other northern centres were also raided from the air in this period, Darwin was the principal target of the Japanese. In the twenty-month period between 19 February 1942 and 12 November 1943, a total of 64 attacks took place.


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The first and biggest raid was that of 19 February which was carried out by two formations of naval aircraft. The first wave (of 188) was launched from four aircraftcarriers of the First Carrier Fleet under Vice-Admiral Chuichi Nagumo, positioned in the Arafura Sea off the eastern tip of Timor about 350 kilometres north-west of Darwin, while the second (comprising 54 land-based machines of the 1st Air Attack Force) flew off from captured airfields at Kendari in the Celebes and at Ambon. The object of the attack was to eliminate Darwin’s utility as a base from which the Allies could interfere with the Japanese invasion of Timor, which was due to begin the following day, and also the invasion of Java which was in preparation. The capacity of Darwin-based forces to cause problems for either of these operations, however, had been overestimated. This has led to suggestions in later years that the Japanese used ‘a sledgehammer to crack an egg’. Darwin nonetheless represented a most attractive target at the time, with 47 naval and merchant ships crowded in the harbour. The air defences for so important a base were totally inadequate, comprising just two RAAF squadrons—nos.12 and 13— equipped with a mixture of modern Lockheed Hudson and obsolete Avro Anson medium bomber and reconnaissance aircraft, and Australian-made Wirraway advanced trainers. Due to dispersal policies, only nine Hudsons and five unserviceable Wirraways were at Darwin on 19 February; six of the Hudsons were aircraft of No.2 Squadron, RAAF, which had just arrived that morning on evacuation from Timor. Also present were ten P40 Kittyhawk fighters of the US Army Air Force, which were staging through on their way to Java. Early warning of the incoming raiders was available to Darwin’s defenders from several sources—among them a navy coastwatcher on Melville Island and a Catholic missionary on Bathurst Island—but, through confusion,

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February 1942 these reports were not handled expeditiously by RAAF operations staff. The information was also passed to the senior naval officer, Captain Edward Thomas, who was reportedly expecting precisely such an attack by the enemy, yet he failed to override a decision at the Area Combined Headquarters to disregard the reports. Consequently, when the alert was finally sounded at 9.58 a.m. the first group of 27 Japanese bombers were already practically over the town, approaching from the south-east at 14,000 feet. The attack commenced when nine low-flying Zero fighters strafed an auxiliary minesweeper, HMAS Gunbar, as she passed through the harbour boom moments before the first air-raid siren wailed the alarm. Other shipping riding at anchor was then subjected to devastating pattern-bombing, divebombing and machine-gun sweeps which sank three naval vessels and five merchantmen, and saw another ten ships of various types damaged. More bombs fell in the town itself, adding some fifteen civilians to the day’s death toll of at least 243; this figure was not necessarily complete but merely represented the best assessment possible at the time. The number of wounded was not less than 250, and according to some sources went as high as 320. While the largest number of casualties were among ships’ crews, equally bad was the scene at the wharf. Here, a hit from just one heavy bomb at the land-end of the jetty killed 21 labourers gathered for their morning break, blew a locomotive into the sea, and demolished a span so that men remaining on the wharf were separated from the shore. Several vessels anchored alongside, denied any hope of manoeuvring out of danger, were ‘sitting ducks’. The 6,600-tonne motor vessel Neptuna was set on fire and blew apart after flames reached 200 depth charges stored in her hold. Allied fighter opposition to the attack was quickly brushed aside and destroyed. Four


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of five Kittyhawks on patrol over the town when the first Japanese planes arrived were shot down, as were all five of another flight which had been refuelling and attempted to get airborne as the attack commenced. Darwin was completely at the mercy of the Japanese by the time the ‘all clear’ was sounded at 10.40 a.m. Eighty minutes later, the second wave of aircraft arrived to renew the assault for a further twenty minutes. This time the focus was the RAAF station, which was subjected to medium-level pattern-bombing. Only six lives were lost here, but nine aircraft were destroyed on the ground—including six Hudsons—and most of the base’s buildings were wrecked. Local reaction to this first attack later attracted severe criticism, so that—even though news of the extent of the disaster was strictly suppressed—the government felt it necessary to appoint a commission of inquiry under Justice Charles Lowe to examine events surrounding it. Both civilians and servicemen were accused of fleeing the town in panic, or of engaging in unrestrained looting of damaged and abandoned premises. Incidents of both undoubtedly occurred amid the confusion and muddle which inevitably followed such an event, but their extent and nature have been greatly exaggerated. By many reliable accounts, the exodus which Bombs fall along the foreshore of Darwin Harbour and inland during the first Japanese air-raid, 19 February 1942. Source: Australian War Memorial 12953


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did take place (in the expectation that the raid was the prelude to a seaborne invasion) was hurried yet otherwise quite orderly. Irrespective of the controversy generated, it remained indisputable that the Japanese had scored a major success at very little cost. In addition to the damage inflicted at Darwin, the flight-path of the attacking formations had accidentally passed over two Filipino-manned ships carrying supplies for US forces besieged on Corregidor, and a US Navy Catalina amphibious aircraft; all were destroyed. Claims of the number of attacking aircraft lost during 19 February vary widely, from two which the Japanese officially admitted to the five ‘certainties’ and five ‘probables’ maintained by the Australian services; the best and most plausible estimate is seven. The pilot of a Zero which crash-landed on Melville Island was captured by a Tiwi Aborigine and delivered into army hands, becoming the first prisoner of war taken on Australian soil. Although further air attacks were made at irregular intervals, it was not until 25 April that a comparatively large number of aircraft (24 bombers with twelve escorting fighters) were again used. The raid launched two days later from Koepang was even larger, this time comprising sixteen bombers and 27 fighters, but losses caused by bombing during the month were—with a couple of exceptions— not very extensive. On 2 April a fuel storage tank was hit and about 30,000 gallons (136,000 litres) burned, while on 27 April buildings, water and power supply lines received significant damage. Four raids in June were on a similar scale (18–27 bombers), but thereafter mainly small numbers of aircraft were used in ineffective night attacks. The enemy returned in force on 30 July when 27 bombers and 15–20 fighters appeared over the town, and three raids on 23, 26 and 27 November were again relatively heavy, with 12–18 bombers being employed. By the first months of 1943 the attacks


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were becoming less frequent but still occasionally involved large numbers of aircraft. That on 15 March—Darwin’s fiftythird raid—saw 24 bombers and fifteen fighters engaged; that on 20 June used 30 bombers and 21 fighters, and was undertaken for the first time by the Japanese Army’s 7th Air Division on Timor. Not just Darwin but inland airstrips up to 100 kilometres to the south were targets of the Japanese campaign. Hughes was attacked in August and again in November 1942, Livingstone in September 1942, Batchelor and Pell in October 1942, while Coomalie was hit on 2 March 1943. Initially unable to match the Japanese in numbers or operational performance of aircraft, nor tactics, the Allied air units progressively built up in the area and became more proficient, and increasingly exacted a toll on the enemy’s raiding missions. Particularly notable for its success in the air was the USAAF’s 49th Fighter Group. By the time the three squadrons of this formation left the area in September 1942, their members claimed 75 enemy machines shot down for the loss of twenty of their own aircraft, and they had virtually put a stop to daylight raids. The arrival at Darwin in January 1943 of three squadrons of Mark V Spitfire fighters, specially sent out from England amid great secrecy in June 1942, decisively tipped the balance against the Japanese. Although these units—formed into No.1 Fighter Wing, RAAF, under Group Captain Allan Walters and later Group Captain Clive Caldwell— had some setbacks in gaining this ascendancy, by mid-year the rate of Japanese losses had become so severe as to make Darwin an unprofitable target. Despite the Fighter Wing losing 44 of its own aircraft in its first six months of combat, only seventeen had been directly caused by enemy action; and in return, the Spitfires had accounted for 63 Japanese machines and probably destroyed thirteen more. Public awareness of what happened at

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February 1942 Darwin in February 1942 did not become widespread until 1945, when the report of the Lowe commission was finally released. The myth of the ‘shameful’ evacuation stemmed from half-true publicity generated by newspapers at that time and perpetuated since by several sensationalised accounts. Alan Powell (1988) The Shadow’s Edge, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Timor, island in the Netherlands East Indies (now Indonesia) which became the scene of fighting on 20–23 February 1942 after Japanese forces invaded aiming to secure a base within fighter aircraft range of Australia. A body of 1,400 Australians known as ‘Sparrow Force’ had been sent in December 1941 to reinforce the Dutch and Portuguese garrisons, about 500 and 150 strong respectively. The Australians were commanded by Lieut.-Colonel William Leggatt and comprised the 2/40th Battalion (part of the 23rd Brigade of the 8th Australian Division), the 2/2nd Independent Company and other detachments. While the battalion was located around Koepang at the south-western end of the island, to defend the bay and nearby Penfui airfield from which a flight of Hudson bombers of No.2 Squadron, RAAF, operated, the independent company went to Dili on the north coast, in the Portuguese zone of control. On 26 and 30 January Penfui was raided by Japanese aircraft, heightening expectations of an invasion in the near future. As a result of the clear threat posed to Australia’s international air links should Timor fall under enemy occupation, the government prepared to send a further reinforcement of a pioneer battalion as soon as shipping became available in mid-February, while the Americans also proposed to despatch an artillery battalion. In the event the arrival of these additional forces was delayed when the convoy carrying them was attacked by enemy aircraft at sea, and stopped by the mass air raid of Darwin


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on 19 February (q.v.). In anticipation of their arrival, however, an enlarged headquarters element for Sparrow Force had reached Koepang under Brigadier William Veale on 12 February. On the 19th the RAAF force at Penfui was withdrawn to Darwin. With its departure went the main reason for the ground force’s retention; the Australian troops remained, however, because it was too late to evacuate them. About midnight on 19–20 February Japanese warships began shelling Dili, and soon afterwards troops were landed and advanced on the airfield less than two kilometres west of the town. A section of the 2/2nd Independent Company posted there inflicted severe losses on the enemy before withdrawing into the hinterland after cratering the airstrip. During the early hours of 20 February two battalions of the 228th Regimental Group of the Japanese 38th Division—the same force used in the attack on Ambon (q.v.)—also came ashore at the Paha River south of Koepang and advanced with light tanks in two columns upon the town which was heavily bombed. Later the same morning 300 paratroops of the 3rd Yokosuka Special Naval Landing Force landed 22 kilometres east of Koepang, aiming to cut off the defenders’ access to the island’s interior. The Australians put up a spirited fight for Koepang and took a heavy toll of the attackers, killing all but 78 of the paratroopers. This effort could not be maintained against the enemy’s overwhelming numbers, however, especially once the invaders succeeded in cutting off the bulk of the troops under Leggatt from Sparrow Force’s administrative base at Champlong (in the foothills 40 kilometres to the east of Koepang) where Veale was located. After three days of valiant resistance, Leggatt’s men were short of food, water and ammunition, and carrying a column of 132 sick or wounded men. Faced with a grim choice between surrender or annihilation,

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Leggatt surrendered at 9 a.m. on 23 February with 1,137 men. Joined by some small parties who evaded capture, Veale withdrew with 250 men towards the Portuguese part of the island to join with the independent company in mounting a guerilla warfare campaign which lasted a further year. The initial attack on Timor had cost the lives of 84 Australians and several hundred of the 5,500 Japanese troops involved. Lionel Wigmore (1957) The Japanese Thrust, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Peter Henning (1995) Doomed Battalion, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Java Sea, a naval engagement fought off the northern coast of Java, about 140 kilometres north of Surabaya, on 27 February 1942. When reports were received of Japanese invasion convoys proceeding south towards the western and eastern ends of the island simultaneously, the commander of Dutch naval forces in the eastern area, Rear-Admiral Karel Doorman, sailed from Surabaya with the aim of damaging and delaying the enemy force then transiting the Macassar Strait. Under his command were five cruisers— two Dutch (de Ruyter and Java), one British (Exeter), one American (Houston) and one Australian (Perth)—and nine destroyers. At 4.12 p.m. the Allied force, steering north-west, sighted the first of three flotillas of Japanese ships which were found to comprise four cruisers (two heavy, two light) and twelve to fourteen destroyers. With both sides adopting westerly courses, first fire was exchanged four minutes later—though initially only the heavy cruisers Exeter and Houston were engaged because of the long range. At 4.25 p.m. Perth (commanded by Captain Hector Waller) joined in the action by firing on a group of destroyers which seemed to be moving in to attack. A hit appeared to be scored on one of the enemy, whereupon the ships of this flotilla retired behind smoke. At 4.30 p.m. the Japanese launched the


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first of a series of torpedo attacks, but scored no hits. They then continued the gunfight at long range from behind a protective smokescreen, using spotting float-planes to ensure that their fall of shot remained very accurate. Soon after 5 p.m. an 8-inch shell from one of the enemy cruisers found its mark in Exeter’s boiler room, temporarily reducing her speed to eleven knots. At the same time part of the Japanese force made a second torpedo attack, scoring a hit against one of the Dutch destroyers, Kortenaer, which quickly blew up, capsized and went under in two halves. Perth was close behind Kortenaer during that ship’s last moments, having moved in to Exeter’s assistance by shielding her with smoke while she got underway again at fifteen knots. In the confusion which was beginning to cloak the scene of the battle, Doorman in his flagship de Ruyter tried to re-form his line. Signalling to all vessels to follow him, he steamed first south-east, then turned to the north-west again at 5.25 p.m. to resume the fight. The order was given for three British destroyers to attack, but as these dashed forward through the smoke—which had reduced visibility to less than a kilometre—one of these ships (Electra) came into close contact with three enemy destroyers. In a rapid exchange of fire Electra was immobilised and subsequently received such punishing fire that she sank at about 6 p.m. In the meantime Doorman sent the damaged Exeter out of action towards Surabaya, under escort of a Dutch destroyer. By 6.30 p.m., with contact between the opposing forces lost for the time being, Doorman went in search of the enemy’s troop convoy which was away to the north-west. Alerted to this move by shadowing aircraft, the Japanese again attacked at 7.27 p.m. Six minutes later Perth and Houston were both firing on enemy ships, but were forced to break off when another torpedo attack was seen to have been launched against them. Contact was lost for a time as Doorman led

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February–March 1942 his force south to waters close inshore. It was here that, at 9.25 p.m., the British destroyer Jupiter suddenly exploded. Although initially thought to have been torpedoed, the vessel had probably struck a mine laid by the Dutch earlier that day; the destroyer sank four hours later. Doorman now took his reduced force north once more, with this move, too, reported by the shadowing enemy aircraft. Just before 11 p.m. the Japanese ships were again sighted and firing broke out. The Japanese also launched torpedoes, securing hits on both the Dutch cruisers; these blew up and sank within minutes about 40 kilometres south-west of Bawean Island, Doorman going down with his ship. Accepting that to remain was merely an act of suicide, Waller took Houston under command and, after making a feint to the south-east, withdrew at high speed for Tanjong Priok (the port of Batavia, now called Jakarta). The battle had resulted in the virtual destruction of the Allied squadron, with the only known result being that the Japanese deferred their invasion of Java by one day. At the western end of the island that same day, a separate Allied squadron sailed north from Tanjong Priok in search of the second convoy of Japanese transports coming from Cam Ranh Bay. In this force was the Australian light cruiser Hobart commanded by Captain Harry Howden, leading two British light cruisers and two destroyers. After finding no enemy south of Banka Island, Howden took his ships back to Batavia. There Hobart experienced a near-miss in an enemy air attack, the bomb causing slight damage to the ship and wounding five crew members. Howden put to sea again that night and sailed through Sunda Strait to Ceylon. The two sequels to the Java Sea battle both came on 1 March, the first when the damaged Exeter—ordered to withdraw to Colombo via Sunda Strait, in company with destroyers Encounter and USS Pope—was intercepted about 9.35 a.m. near the south


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coast of Borneo by eight enemy cruisers and destroyers. After a short running fight, all three Allied ships were sunk in the three hours before 2 p.m. The second major sequel was the action fought at Bantam Bay (q.v.). G. Hermon Gill (1957) Royal Australian Navy 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Bantam Bay, a one-sided naval action fought on 28 February–1 March 1942 just east of the Sunda Strait, at the western end of the island of Java, which resulted in the loss of the American heavy cruiser Houston and the Australian light cruiser Perth to overwhelming Japanese forces. Following the disastrous Java Sea battle (q.v.), the two cruisers reached Tanjong Priok at 1.30 p.m. on 28 February and refuelled. The commanding officer of Perth, Captain Hector Waller, was now ordered to make for Tjilatjap (on Java’s south coast) in company with Houston. Information given to Waller before he sailed at 7 p.m. led him to believe that he would not encounter enemy forces. As the Allied ships approached the entrance to Sunda Strait from the east soon after 11 p.m. a vessel was sighted lying close to St Nicholas Point at a distance of about eight kilometres. Expecting this to be an Allied corvette on patrol, the ship was signalled. Only when it began to make off under cover of smoke was it identified from its silhouette as a Japanese destroyer. Waller immediately brought Perth to action stations and ordered the forward gun turrets to open fire. Swinging north to bring the ship’s full broadside to bear, other enemy ships were next sighted lying across this path, with the result that Perth—with Houston following about a kilometre behind—continued swinging to starboard, eventually going around in a full circle which took both ships close by islands in Bantam Bay. Under fire now from enemy destroyers and cruisers in all directions, the Allied ships put up a valiant fight with guns and torpedoes. With so many targets to engage

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all at once, a number of Japanese vessels were able to approach at close range—as in the case of two destroyers which reached to within less than three kilometres before illuminating the cruisers with their searchlights at 11.50 p.m. At about this time Perth suffered a serious hit from an enemy shell which holed her forward on the starboard side, near the waterline. Other hits were received, and Waller decided to make a dash for the Strait in the hope of forcing a way through what was plainly the only avenue of escape. He had barely ordered full speed when the Australian cruiser was struck in the forward engine room by a torpedo about five minutes after midnight. A second torpedo hit was sustained a few minutes later. Recognising that Perth’s fate was sealed, Waller gave the order for his crew to abandon ship. As this instruction was being implemented the cruiser suffered two more hits from torpedoes, as well as a large number of shells. About twenty minutes later she


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0 2 4 6 8 10 kms heeled over and sank. By this time Houston was still fighting but badly on fire. A short time after being hit by torpedoes, the American ship also went down. Of Perth’s complement of 680 naval and six RAAF personnel, 353 (including Captain Waller) were lost in action; another four men died of their injuries after reaching shore. The remainder became prisoners of the Japanese, and during their time in captivity another 106 died from ill-treatment, illness or as a result of Allied action. G. Hermon Gill (1957) Royal Australian Navy 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Broome, the pearling town on the north coast of Western Australia, was subjected to four Japanese air attacks between March 1942 and August 1943. The first attack came while the limited port facilities were heavily stretched coping with a large influx of refugees fleeing the Japanese invasion of the Netherlands East Indies. During the last

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March 1942 stages of this evacuation, flying boats and land planes had been operating a shuttle service from Broome to bring out thousands of Allied personnel and Dutch civilians from Tjilatjap, on the south coast of Java. As a consequence, there were sixteen big flying boats moored in Roebuck Bay at dawn on 3 March—all highly vulnerable in an area only 2,400 metres long and 1,200 metres wide. The appearance of a Japanese reconnaissance plane about 3 p.m. the previous day had been an unmistakable portent that an enemy attack was possible, indeed likely, yet pilots ignored warnings to leave at the first opportunity after daybreak. Only one aircraft—a small float-plane from the American cruiser Houston, sunk two days earlier in the Bantam Bay battle (q.v.)—had taken off from the alighting area that morning before nine long-range Zero fighters dropped down from the overcast at 9.20 a.m. Six of the attacking aircraft, flying in line-ahead formation, swept in from the sea and crossed the harbour entrance at a height of about 500 feet, while another three circled overhead as a protection against opposing fighters (of which there were none). Three of the Zeros concentrated on strafing the moored flying boats, their explosive bullets quickly accounting for every one of them. Several of the trapped aircraft had been almost ready for take-off and were filled with passengers, many of them women and children, who were forced to take to the water. The Japanese pilots showed restraint in not further attacking those thus rendered helpless, or a party of 25 evacuees who were gathered on the wharf about to board their aircraft, but casualties were nonetheless heavy. While these scenes were being played out on the harbour, the second attack group of three Zeros turned their attention to the aerodrome. Seven Allied aircraft had been standing there when the attack began: a RAAF Hudson bomber, a Dutch Lodestar bomber and a Dutch DC–3 cargo plane,


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and two American B–17E Flying Fortress and two B–24 Liberator bombers. One of the Liberators, carrying 33 passengers and crew, attempted to take off as the Zeros began their attack runs. It was promptly shot down into the sea in flames, and the other machines were all destroyed on the ground. Within fifteen minutes the Japanese pilots had fulfilled their mission and departed on a return course for their base. When about 80 kilometres north of Broome they encountered another Dutch DC–3, one of the last Allied aircraft to escape from Java, which happened to be carrying a large quantity of diamonds. This was also promptly shot down, raising the Zeros’ tally of Allied aircraft destroyed to 24. In fact, the pilot of this machine managed to crash-land on the beach at Carnot Bay, from where a number of its passengers were rescued by missionaries from Beagle Bay several days later. The number of people killed in the raid has never been determined accurately but is estimated at 70, including 32 who perished in the downed Liberator; approximately another 30 people were wounded. As Gillison’s volume of the Official History states: The evacuation of civilians from Java was conducted with inevitable haste and later, in the war cemetery at Broome, the graves of 29 unidentified victims of the raid gave solemn proof of the absence of records listing the names of the passengers embarked in Java.

The Japanese attackers did not escape unscathed, having been forced to fly through a considerable volume of machine-gun and rifle fire from the flying boats and personnel on the shore. Most notable was a Dutch air force crewman who took up a machine-gun which had been removed from its mountings for repair and cradled it in his arms to engage any Zero which came within range, despite suffering burns to his arm supporting the gun’s barrel. One of the attackers was shot down and crashed, and damage from ground

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fire forced another to ditch near Roti Island while returning to base at Koepang in Timor (the pilot not being rescued until 21 March). Bullet holes were found in six of the seven aircraft which reached their base safely. At 10.45 a.m. on 20 March Broome’s aerodrome was the target of a raid by seven bombers. During this attack the north–south runway was cratered and rendered temporarily unusable by several explosions, a Stinson civil aircraft was burnt out, but there was only one fatal casualty recorded. Further attacks on 27 August 1942 and 16 August 1943 produced neither damage nor casualties. Douglas Gillison (1962) Royal Australian Air Force 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Wyndham, the West Australian coastal town close by the border with the Northern Territory, which was twice attacked by Japanese aircraft in March 1942. The first raid, carried out shortly after 10 a.m. on 3 March 1942—the same day as Broome, Western Australia (q.v.), was similarly hit— involved eight Zero fighters from Koepang, in Timor. A RAAF DH–84 Dragon navigation training aircraft, which had just landed, was caught on the ground and set alight by strafing. Also set on fire was the airfield hangar and a fuel dump comprising a large quantity of 44-gallon drums which had been delivered only a week earlier. A second aircraft, a Lockheed 10 operating a commercial service for MacRobertson-Miller Aviation Co., had cleared the area just minutes before the enemy fighters arrived and thus escaped being caught up in the raid. The second attack, again focused on the aerodrome, was conducted by seven bombers on 23 March. This saw a chain of about 30 large craters blasted along the runway, but there was no other damage. An hour later three Zeros appeared and made low-level strafing runs, but with little significant effect. Douglas Gillison (1962) Royal Australian Air Force 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial


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South of Java, a naval action fought on 4 March 1942 in the Indian Ocean approximately 500 kilometres south of central Java, in which the Australian sloop Yarra was sunk by a vastly superior Japanese force. On 27 February, during the Japanese invasion of the Netherlands East Indies (modern Indonesia), Yarra’s captain, Lieut.-Commander Robert Rankin, was ordered to escort a convoy of three ships—a tanker, a depot ship and a small minesweeper—away from the fighting to Fremantle, Western Australia. At 6.30 a.m. on 4 March, while steering south-east in a glorious sunrise, the convoy sighted enemy warships directly behind them. These were three heavy cruisers and two destroyers of Vice-Admiral Nobutake Kondo’s Second Fleet, which vastly outclassed the little 1060-tonne Yarra in size, speed and main armament. Whereas the sloop mounted just three 4-inch guns and could manage seventeen knots, the Japanese cruisers each carried ten 8-inch guns and steamed at 30 knots. Undaunted by the unequal odds, Rankin radioed a report of the enemy sighting and ordered the convoy to scatter. He then turned Yarra and took station between the enemy and the ships he was ordered to protect, while making smoke in a vain effort to give them a chance to get away. There was, however, no escape for any of the four vessels. The enemy ships opened fire while staying well outside Yarra’s range and, aided by two aircraft catapulted from the cruisers, the action became essentially a matter of target practice. By 7.30 a.m. all three of the ships in the convoy had been sunk. Yarra itself was still barely afloat, battered almost beyond recognition, listing heavily to port, and with two of her guns knocked out of action. The sloop was also on fire amid a high column of smoke, drifting helplessly after shells had wrecked her engine room and steering. Rankin gave the order to abandon ship,

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March 1942 moments before a salvo of 8-inch shells struck the bridge and killed him and everyone on duty there. Not all the crew followed this instruction, however, as the last remaining gun was seen to continue firing until silenced not long before a barrage of close-range shelling by the destroyers—plus bombs dropped from the cruisers’ aircraft—sent Yarra to the bottom soon after 8 a.m. One of the destroyers picked up a boatload of survivors from the tanker which had been sunk, but the Japanese ships then departed to the north-east without bothering about more than 100 others left adrift on the water. Among the latter were 34 personnel from Yarra, who had watched the sloop’s last moments from two Carley floats. By the time they were eventually rescued on 9 March, their number was reduced by wounds, exposure and thirst to just thirteen—all that remained out of Yarra’s total complement of 151 officers and men. Although Rankin’s action in pitting his small ship against the adversary which Yarra faced that day might be judged in hindsight to have been little more than ‘sacrificial slaughter’, there is little doubt that he had no option at the time but to put up the best fight possible. The fact that all four ships were clearly doomed from the start makes even more remarkable the gallant way in which this outcome was resisted. For many, this action is regarded as the finest moment in Australian naval history. G. Hermon Gill (1957) Royal Australian Navy 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Horn Island, one of a cluster of islands off the northernmost tip of Cape York Peninsula, Queensland, was the target for a series of seven Japanese air raids during the period March–August 1942 and a further one-off attack in June 1943, by virtue of being the main tactical base for Allied air operations in the Torres Strait. Unlike at Darwin (q.v.), the first raid on 14 March 1942 failed to achieve surprise after a naval watching


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station at Kerema, on the south coast of New Guinea, radioed a warning as the attack group (eight ‘Nell’ heavy bombers, escorted by at least nine—some records say twelve— ‘Zero’ fighters) passed overhead en route from their base at Lae. Thus alerted, personnel on Horn Island and nearby Thursday Island had moved to dispersed shelters before the first of 32 bombs began falling shortly after midday. Subsequent strafing passes by the Zeros accounted for one RAAF Hudson bomber destroyed on the ground, and another set on fire which was quickly extinguished; both these aircraft belonged to No.32 Squadron, RAAF, based at Port Moresby, and had only arrived at Horn Island the previous evening. The airstrip at Horn was normally the home of only the RAAF’s No.24 Squadron, equipped with Wirraways—a type quite outclassed by the Japanese Zero. The attackers received a nasty surprise, however, when they were engaged by nine US Army Air Force P40 Kittyhawk fighters, which happened to be visiting on a training flight. In the ensuing fight the Japanese had two fighters destroyed—one by a Kittyhawk whose pilot rammed a wing-tip through his opponent’s cockpit after his guns jammed; the Americans also claimed a bomber downed, but Japanese records claimed that all these returned to base. Apart from the Kittyhawk damaged in the mid-air collision (but which landed safely), the Americans lost only one other aircraft. The pilot of this machine lost his bearings and strayed out over the Gulf of Carpentaria, until forced to bail out when the Kittyhawk ran out of fuel off Bremmer Island; rescued by Aborigines, he reached Darwin on 2 March. Having been bruised in this first encounter, the Japanese returned with twenty Zeros in the early afternoon of 18 March. The American Kittyhawks had already returned south, however, and there was little in the way of worthwhile targets offering. Most of the enemy aircraft accordingly reconnoitred

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Cape York, while nine of their number circled Horn and Thursday islands until satisfied that nothing of interest remained, before departing again in formation. The next month a further moderately heavy attack was made by eight Nells and six Zeros. Again, there was no opposition, and the bombers were unhindered as they dropped 40 bombs in the vicinity of the runway. Three Zeros then descended to make strafing runs which accounted for two Wirraways of No.24 Squadron on the ground (one damaged, the other destroyed); by this time the RAAF unit had moved to Townsville, and these machines happened to be at Horn only because they had suffered minor accidents and were in need of repair. There was reportedly one fatality among the island’s AIF garrison. The fourth attack took place on 11 May, this time involving nine bombers and an equal number of escorting Zeros. The 45 bombs dropped from 11.20 a.m. until after midday landed around the dispersal bays and completed the destruction of the Wirraway damaged in the previous raid. There was also some equipment losses (such as a refuelling unit and photographic gear) but no casualties. As was the practice on earlier occasions, several of the Zeros engaged in strafing runs but without adding materially to the attack’s results. The next raid, at midday on 7 June, was by far the heaviest and most destructive. After a lone reconnaissance aircraft appeared overhead during the morning and presumably reported the absence of any defending aircraft, an unescorted formation of sixteen Nells arrived to deliver 180–200 bombs onto the airfield. There was extensive damage caused to tent-lines, buildings and equipment at the RAAF station, and three airmen were wounded—one seriously. No raids followed for more than seven weeks, and when the attacks resumed they no longer came during daylight hours. Over a period of eleven minutes commencing at 2.16 a.m. on 30 July a lone bomber—in this


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case a four-engined ‘Emily’ flying boat sent from Rabaul on an armed reconnaissance— dropped seven bombs which impacted on the airfield’s dispersal area. Five Hudson bombers of No.32 Squadron were damaged, although only one seriously. A further attack was made by two enemy aircraft of the same type at 3.40 a.m. on 1 August, but this time the eight bombs dropped landed harmlessly in the sea. A similar occurrence nearly a year later was an even paler imitation of the previous mission. After a single incoming aircraft was detected by radar at midnight on 17–18 June 1943, an air-raid alarm was sounded and several RAAF Boomerang fighters were scrambled to attempt an interception. The Horn Island searchlights picked out what appeared to be an enemy flying boat on a reconnaissance mission, and although the aircraft escaped the searchlight beams the crew promptly jettisoned their bombs into the sea and flew away. This was, Gillison records, ‘the last Japanese aircraft over north-eastern Australia’. Douglas Gillison (1962) Royal Australian Air Force 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Robert Piper, ‘Horn Island Air Raids’, AOPA, December 1987

Derby, the port town situated on King Sound in the far north of Western Australia, was the scene of an air raid by eight Japanese Zero fighters on 20 March 1942. No damage was caused, nor were there any casualties. Port Moresby, an air battle over the administrative capital of the Australian territory of Papua, waged from 21 March until 9 May 1942 by Australian and American pilots against attacking Japanese forces. The RAAF’s No.75 Squadron, newly formed with American P40 Kittyhawk fighters under the command of Squadron Leader John Jackson, was the first Allied air unit to arrive—undertaking its first combat sortie less than two hours after the leading element flew in on 21 March. Thereafter the squadron was in almost daily combat above

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March–April 1942 the town, or striking at the enemy’s own bases at Lae from which many of the raids against Moresby were mounted. By 30 March the Australian unit had lost eleven of its machines due to a combination of combat losses, enemy ground strafing and accidents, and only the arrival of five replacements kept the unit’s strength up to ten serviceable aircraft. On the last day of March Port Moresby’s defenders were joined by the American 8th Bombardment Squadron equipped with A24 dive-bombers, and the next day the Australians flew escort for them on a mission against Lae. Five days later six P39 Airacobras of the American 36th Pursuit Squadron arrived, but these stayed only two weeks to gain combat experience before returning to Townsville. By the end of the month 75 Squadron had fought itself practically to a standstill, with just three Kittyhawks still able to fly combat missions by 1 May. At this point, however, the 36th Pursuit Squadron arrived in full—accompanied by its sister 35th Squadron—to provide for the Australians’ relief. On 7 May, 75 Squadron’s ground personnel embarked for passage to Townsville, followed two days later by the squadron’s three surviving aircraft. The withdrawal of the Australian squadron coincided with the battle of the Coral Sea (q.v.), which engagement thwarted a Japanese naval attack and invasion against Port Moresby and effectively ended the immediate threat. During their part in the defence of the town, the Australian pilots had definitely destroyed eighteen enemy aircraft and probably four others, while another 29 were damaged in air combat; 35 were destroyed or damaged on the ground by the squadron’s strafing operations. This achievement had come at a cost to 75 Squadron of 21 aircraft and twelve pilots. David Wilson (1991) The Decisive Factor: 75 & 76 Squadrons—Port Moresby and Milne Bay 1942, Brunswick, Vic.: Banner Books

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town 330 kilometres south of Darwin, was subjected to a Japanese air attack on 22 March 1942. In what Gillison’s volume of the Official History described as ‘more an armed reconnaissance than a raid’, the group of nine bombers came over in perfect formation at high altitude and dropped a single stick of bombs. Some damage was caused to a hospital constructed beside one end of the aerodrome, which had become the northern terminus for civil aircraft, but there were only two casualties (one Aborigine killed and another wounded). Douglas Gillison (1962) Royal Australian Air Force 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Colombo, scene of a notable air battle on 5 April 1942, fought after the Japanese First Carrier Fleet under Vice-Admiral Chuichi Nagumo launched a strike against Ceylon from a point in the Indian Ocean south of the island. The attack wave of 50 Type–99 bombers protected by 35 Zero fighters was engaged at 8 a.m. by 36 Hurricane fighters of two Royal Air Force squadrons in which Australians served in substantial numbers. Six Fulmar fighters of the Fleet Air Arm also took off to join in the action. At least seventeen and perhaps as many as nineteen enemy aircraft were shot down by the defending aircraft and anti-aircraft batteries, for the loss of fifteen Hurricanes and four of the Fulmars. Among the Australian pilots lost in the action was Flying Officer G. Caswell, who was killed after downing two enemy machines. Douglas Gillison (1962) Royal Australian Air Force 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Trincomalee, an air and sea action fought on 9 April 1942 following the Japanese raid against Colombo (q.v.) four days earlier. On this occasion the enemy attack wave, launched from a point in the Bay of Bengal off the north-east coast of Ceylon, comprised about 55 bombers and 40–60 escorting Zeros. As they approached the

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British naval base which was their target at 7 a.m., the Japanese planes were met by seventeen RAF Hurricane and six naval Fulmar fighters. Although major damage was caused on the ground by the enemy bombs, fifteen of the attackers were shot down for the loss of eight Hurricanes and three Fulmars; another nine Japanese were claimed as destroyed by anti-aircraft fire. Among the pilots flying the Hurricanes were members of the Royal Australian Air Force, including Pilot Officer L. Rawnsley, who was wounded and forced to land during the raid. While this action was in progress, a strike against the Japanese carrier force was mounted from Colombo by Blenheim bombers of No.11 Squadron, another RAF unit in which many RAAF members were serving. Nine of the ten aircraft which took off found the enemy fleet of some 40 ships and took part in a forlorn bombing attack made from 11,000 feet. None of the attackers’ bombs scored any hits, only near-misses, but as they passed overhead they were subjected to a terrific barrage from the ships which damaged many of the planes. As they departed the area the bombers were also forced to engage in a running battle with about 50 enemy fighters. Five of the bombers were shot down, though not without destroying four of the Japanese planes; the four Blenheims that survived were so damaged, however, that they were subsequently unserviceable. Among the air crews lost in the action were nine RAAF members. Also while the raid on Trincomalee was in progress, the small British aircraft-carrier Hermes and her escort, the Australian destroyer Vampire, were close to the island’s shore only about 100 kilometres to the south. After the morning’s raid had ended, they set course for the naval base to carry out urgently needed refuelling. They were sighted and reported by Japanese reconnaissance aircraft, however, and the enemy carriers sent off an


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attack force of 85 bombers and nine fighters which found them off Batticaloa at 10.35 a.m. Although the ships fought back bravely with anti-aircraft fire which accounted for four aircraft, within twenty minutes both had been overwhelmed and sunk. After finding herself the focus of attack of sixteen bombers, Vampire was stopped by a direct hit in her boiler room, then ravaged by four direct hits in quick succession. The order to abandon ship had already been given by the destroyer’s captain, Commander W.T.A. Moran, when a further hit broke the ship in two. All the destroyer’s crew were later rescued, except for Moran and seven ratings who lost their lives. Douglas Gillison (1962) Royal Australian Air Force 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; G. Hermon Gill (1968) Royal Australian Navy 1942–1945, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Coral Sea, a series of separate but connected naval engagements fought mostly in waters east of Papua during 4–8 May 1942, between several groups of Japanese and Allied (US and Australian) warships. The action was precipitated by Japanese attempts to send an invasion force by sea to capture Port Moresby, the Allies’ principal northern airbase—thereby preventing its use against Japanese movements in the islands while enabling Japanese air dominance to be extended over northern Queensland. To achieve the objective assigned to him the commander-in-chief of the Japanese Fourth Fleet at Rabaul, Vice-Admiral Shigeyoshi Inoue, had at his disposal a dozen troop transports and 51 warships to provide for their protection (including three aircraftcarriers), divided into no fewer than six manoeuvre groups. Combat vessels available to the Allied commander, Rear-Admiral Jack Fletcher, were less than half that number, but among these were two large aircraftcarriers. Also included in the Allied force was a group of six cruisers and destroyers commanded by Rear-Admiral John Crace,

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April–May 1942 an Australian-born officer of the Royal Navy who was on loan to Australia’s squadron. Two of the three cruisers in Crace’s group were RAN ships Australia and Hobart. The battle began in earnest on 4 May, the day after a seaborne Japanese force occupied unopposed the former Australian advanced operational base at Tulagi, in the Solomon Islands, when Fletcher responded to news of this event by launching air attacks from his carriers located south of Guadalcanal. The main naval units supporting the Japanese landing had already departed, but the first of Fletcher’s three waves of strikes caught by surprise the Japanese ashore. By mid-afternoon some losses had been inflicted which included minor vessels and reconnaissance aircraft. By the afternoon of 6 May the combined Allied force was engaged in refuelling some 600 kilometres south-west of Guadalcanal when reports were received that enemy troop transports had been spotted steaming from Rabaul on a course which would take them to Port Moresby. Fletcher immediately adopted a north-westerly course which would enable him to intercept these ships as they rounded the southern tip of Papua. By early the following morning further reports seemed to indicate that Japanese carriers, which were known from signals intelligence to be present, were also situated to his north— away to starboard from his present course. Soon after 6 a.m. Fletcher accordingly detached Crace from the main force, ordering him to maintain his course and deal with the transports if they passed through the Jomard Passage. Meanwhile, he intended to steer away north in search of the carriers which were his main adversaries. The rest of 7 May dissolved into a series of confused and indecisive attempts by both sides to inflict serious damage on the other. Fletcher’s aircraft succeeded in finding and sinking a small auxiliary carrier covering the transports, but could not locate the big fleet carriers. For their part, Inoue’s planes


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Bombs from high-level Japanese bombers straddle HMAS Australia at the Coral Sea battle. Source: Author’s collection

attacked and destroyed the large oiler supplying Fletcher’s fuel requirements, but could not find him. During the midafternoon Crace’s ships, too, came under attack from aircraft operating from Rabaul but escaped without sustaining significant damage. The diverging paths followed by Fletcher and Crace throughout this day meant, however, that the latter’s ships became further separated from the main Allied body and were unable to give, or receive, support. Due to the observance of radio silence, Crace was largely left in the dark even as to what was happening. By the morning of 8 May both sides had worked out that the other was within striking distance and despatched scout planes; both found each other at about the same time, and launched attack formations of aircraft which arrived over their opponent’s carriers more or less simultaneously. In the ensuing exchange of blows, both American carriers suffered multiple hits (though without either being put out of action) while one of the Japanese carriers was seriously damaged and forced to retire. Neither side sought to prolong the battle, which was effectively over by midday. Later that afternoon, fires aboard the USS Lexington became uncontrollable and forced that carrier to be abandoned and sunk—belatedly adding a most serious loss to what had otherwise been a quite

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favourable Allied outcome. While Fletcher’s departure south out of the combat zone was initially matched by the northwards exit of Inoue’s ships, the following day the latter received orders from his superiors in Japan to resume the hunt for the main Allied force. This effort was maintained throughout 9 May before being abandoned, at which time Crace’s ships were the only Allied vessels still in the Coral Sea— albeit more than 1,000 kilometres away to the west of the searching enemy. Concluding that Fletcher’s need for replenishment must have caused his retirement by then, by 7 p.m. Crace broke off and headed for anchorage in north Queensland. Although the popular belief that the Coral Sea battle saved Australia from invasion is a misconception, the outcome of this action was nonetheless one of the decisive events of 1942 which foreshadowed the defeat of Japan’s ambitions in the Pacific. Coming after a succession of Allied reversals in Malaya, the East Indies and the Philippines, the blunting of the Japanese offensive was an immense psychological relief to Australians. There is, therefore, a symbolic aptness to the celebration of post-war anniversaries of the battle as reaffirmation of the continuing strength and warmth of the Australian– American alliance. Chris Coulthard-Clark (1991) Action Stations Coral Sea, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Sydney Harbour, on the night of 31 May–1 June 1942 was the scene of a raid by three Japanese midget submarines. These 24-metre long and 46-tonne craft, each of which carried two torpedoes and a two-man crew, were transported into eastern Australian waters from Japan’s central Pacific naval base at Truk clamped to the upper decks of large ‘mother’ submarines—I–22, I–24 and I–27. Two boats of the larger class, I–21 and I–29, were already in the Sydney area to carry out reconnaissance, and at dawn on 23 May a Glen float-plane sent off from


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I–29 made a successful reconnaissance flight which went unnoticed by Australian authorities but which confirmed for the Japanese the presence of major Allied warships in the harbour. By the night of 29 May all five submarines of the attacking flotilla were assembled about 55 kilometres north-east of Sydney, generally off Broken Bay. At 3.45 a.m. the following day, a float-plane was sent off from I–21 to conduct a second reconnaissance of the harbour, arriving over the target area at 600 feet about 4.30 a.m. This time the aerial intruder was observed and noted, but no significance was attached to what was thought to be an aircraft from an American cruiser. The float-plane capsized and sank when landing back alongside I–21, but the crew was rescued to confirm that worthwhile naval targets remained in port. On receipt of this news the officer commanding the mission, Captain Hankyu Sasaki, decided to launch the planned attack that night. Between 5.20 and 5.40 p.m., the submarines—Midget 14, Midget A and Midget 21—were released from their mother ships eleven kilometres east of Sydney Heads. The first of these craft (Midget 14) entered the harbour at 8 p.m. At this stage of the war the harbour defences were far from complete, with underwater indicator loops (sensors which registered the passage of vessels over them) at the outer Heads out of action. Only the centre section of an anti-submarine boom net stretching from Georges Head to Green Point had also been constructed then, but Midget 14 had the misfortune to become entangled in this. It was duly detected and reported at 9.30 p.m., and an hour later harbour defence craft located it. Before an attack could be made on the submarine, the craft was destroyed by demolition charges fired by its own crew. Meanwhile Midget A had also made its way into the harbour at 9.48 p.m. This craft avoided the boom net and made its way up the length of the waterway towards the

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May–June 1942


The remains of one of the Japanese midget submarines involved in the Sydney raid on the night of 31 May–1 June 1942 is hoisted to the surface. Source: Australian War Memorial 60696

anchorage area off Potts Point. As it did so, the submarine was seen and fired upon by the American heavy cruiser Chicago (at 10.50 p.m.) and the RAN corvette Geelong (11.10 p.m.), but escaped these encounters without sustaining any damage. Shortly before 11 p.m. Midget 21, the third boat, made its entry into the harbour too, but was almost immediately spotted by harbour defence craft and subjected to a depth charge attack by HMAS Yandra. While Midget 21 was effectively diverting attention at the bottom of the harbour, Midget A prepared to make a torpedo attack against Chicago—greatly assisted by the illumination of floodlights at Garden Island, where construction of a graving dock was in


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progress. The lights were finally switched off at 12.25 a.m., just a few minutes before Midget A was ready to fire her torpedoes. Both missed their target—one running aground on Garden Island and failing to explode, the other passing harmlessly beneath a Dutch submarine K–9 and the depot ship Kuttabul but sinking the latter when it exploded on hitting the sea wall against which the converted harbour ferry was moored. Nineteen Australian and two British naval ratings sleeping on board Kuttabul were killed and ten others were wounded. Allied warships in port promptly moved away from their moorings and began to put to sea, while harbour defence craft mounted a full-scale search for one or more enemy submarines.

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Salamaua, an isthmus town on the north coast of New Guinea, on 29 June 1942 was the scene of a spectacular and highly successful raid mounted by Australian troops against the 300-strong Japanese force garrisoning the place. The operation, undertaken by some 70 men of the New Guinea Volunteer Rifles and the 2/5th Independent Company, resulted in 100 Japanese being killed and large-scale destruction being caused to enemy airfield facilities, such as the radio

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Newcastle, the major industrial centre 160 kilometres north of Sydney, New South Wales, was the scene of a 16–20 minute bombardment from the Japanese submarine I–21 on 8 June 1942 which coincided with a

G. Hermon Gill (1968) Royal Australian Navy 1942–1945, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; David Jenkins (1992) Battle Surface!, Milsons Point, NSW: Random House

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G. Hermon Gill (1968) Royal Australian Navy 1942–1945, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

similar attack on Sydney (see Sydney Harbour). At 2.15 a.m. the first of a total of 34 shells were fired (eight of which were ‘star shells’ to provide illumination) from a position at sea approximately 9,000 metres north-east of Fort Scratchley, with most landing in the vicinity of the power station and Customs House. Although all but one round failed to explode, some damage was caused to buildings and houses near Parnell Place (behind Fort Scratchley) but no casualties. The attack ceased a few minutes after the guns of the fort fired four rounds in reply.

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Having expended its torpedoes Midget A made its way back down the harbour, eluding the intensive search effort; it is believed to have made good its escape at 1.58 a.m. but is now known to have failed to rendezvous with the mother ships waiting off Port Hacking, so that it certainly sank—if not inside Sydney Harbour then somewhere outside the Heads. Midget 21, meanwhile, having survived Yandra’s efforts to sink it, proceeded up the harbour at 3 a.m. Several sightings of this craft were reported before HMAS Sea Mist positively located it in Taylor Bay at 5 a.m. and began an attack with depth charges. Joined by two other harbour defence craft, the search was continued until 8.27 a.m. when the submarine was located in a stationary position on the harbour bed, with its engines still running. Divers later that morning investigated the wrecked boat, the crew of which had shot themselves rather than submit to capture. As a sequel to the failed attack on the harbour, a week later Sydney was again subjected to attack by Japanese submarines—this time with gunfire. Beginning at about 12.15 a.m. on 8 June, the Japanese vessel I–24 fired ten rounds during a fiveminute period from a position 6.5 kilometres east of Cape Banks. Only four of these shells, which landed in residential areas in the eastern Sydney suburbs of Rose Bay, Woollahra, Bondi, Vaucluse and Bellevue Hill, actually exploded—and none caused much damage or serious injury. Their effect was purely of a token nature, but this attack—and one conducted at the same time on Newcastle (q.v.)—brought the war home to Australians in a particularly forceful way.

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June–July 1942 station and supply dumps; only three Australians were wounded, none seriously. Dudley McCarthy (1959) South-West Pacific Area—First Year: Kokoda to Wau, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Townsville, the target of three Japanese night air raids during 26–29 July 1942, at the time when this city on Queensland’s north-east coastline had become the most important Allied air base in Australia. The first attack was carried out by three Kawanisi H8-K2 ‘Emily’ aircraft (large four-engine flying boats) in the early hours of 26 July, about 40 minutes after midnight. This was more in the nature of a nuisance raid and entailed just six bombs dropped over the harbour area. All landed harmlessly in the sea several hundred metres off the wharf. The attackers were successfully illuminated by searchlight beams but there was no attempt at fighter-interception on this occasion. Two days later, at 2.25 a.m. on the 28th, a single flying boat jettisoned a stick of eight bombs harmlessly into the Many Peaks Range outside the town. Apart from more than 70 rounds of defensive gunfire from the anti-aircraft batteries, the Japanese aircraft also drew the attention of six American Airacobra fighters which took off in an unsuccessful effort to catch and engage the intruder. The same thing happened at practically the identical time the following morning (2.27 a.m. on the 29th), when another of the enemy’s giant four-engined flying boats appeared. This time seven bombs were dropped—six going harmlessly into the sea while the seventh landed near the town’s racecourse but without doing any more damage than breaking a few windows. Four Airacobras were sent off to intercept, one of which succeeded in getting close enough to open fire on the Japanese machine. The latter appeared to receive several hits, but without suffering any impediment to its safe return to base at Rabaul.


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Douglas Gillison (1962) Royal Australian Air Force 1939–1942, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Ruin Ridge, a disastrous action fought in western Egypt on 27 July 1942, after German and Italian forces under General Erwin Rommel had advanced to El Alamein barely 110 kilometres from Alexandria. After mounting several attempts to force the enemy back, the commander of the British Eighth Army, General Sir Claude Auchinleck, ordered a two-pronged attack to be launched on the night of 26 July aimed at breaking through the German lines on the Miteirya Ridge south of Tel el Eisa. The operation was to be conducted by a British brigade and the 2/28th Battalion of the 9th Australian Division. Moving at midnight, initially the attack enjoyed success despite coming under fire from enemy field-guns, mortars and machine-guns. By soon after 1 a.m. the leading companies of the Australian unit were on the high ground known as Ruin Ridge which was their objective, and set about clearing it with the bayonet. Then things began to go wrong: the attackers were cut by unsubdued enemy posts to its rear, communications were lost, three company commanders were wounded, and heavy losses occurred among vehicles critical to taking forward ammunition. Shortly before dawn, eighteen trucks disgorged German troops on the battalion’s right flank and the fighting became more intense. At 9 a.m. radio contact was finally regained, only for the battalion to report that it was ‘in trouble’. Attempts by British tanks to reach the embattled battalion shortly before 10 a.m. were seen to fail after 22 vehicles were knocked out by enemy fire. By this stage the Australians were battling enemy tanks from three directions and, after the first company was overrun, it was clear that further resistance was futile. A few minutes after 10 a.m. the unit’s commander, Lieut.-Colonel L. McCarter, accepted the inevitable and surrendered. The Australians

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were quickly rounded up and marched eight kilometres behind the German lines, being forced to move through some artillery fire still being brought down by British guns which caused more casualties. As a result of this failed operation, 65 officers and men in the attacking group were killed or wounded, and another 489 taken prisoner. Included were not just the infantry but supporting detachments of anti-tank gunners, engineers and machine-gunners. The 69th British Brigade which also took part had suffered similarly, losing about 600 men. Barton Maughan (1966) Tobruk and El Alamein, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Kokoda Trail, scene of a bitterly fought and difficult offensive in New Guinea during July–November 1942, in which the Japanese sought to capture Port Moresby by an overland route following the defeat of a naval operation to seize that place (see Coral Sea). The Japanese began landing near Gona on the north coast on the night of 21–22 July, their original intention being to conduct a reconnaissance to test the feasibility of using a route through the mountains, but this effort quickly became a full-scale offensive. The plan developed by the enemy envisaged the overland thrust being supported by an amphibious operation launched simultaneously from the eastern flank, using Samarai Island as an intermediate base. The Japanese were not then aware of the Australian presence on the eastern tip of Papua which represented a serious obstacle to this plan (and duly precipitated another major battle—see Milne Bay). Initially the South Seas Force under Major-General Tomitaro Horii made rapid and easy progress. The Papuan Infantry Battalion (a Melanesian unit 310 strong) and elements of the 39th Australian Battalion (a militia unit) clashed with the enemy near Awala on 23 July, before falling back on Kokoda. There a confused night action


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occurred on 28–29 July which resulted in the Australians being forced out. An attempt was made to retake Kokoda on 8 August, but both sides sustained severe casualties and the 39th Battalion and PIB were again obliged to fall back on Deniki. After several Japanese attacks were beaten off over the next week, on 14 August the Australians began a withdrawal along the jungle track (later dubbed the ‘Kokoda Trail’) over the Owen Stanley Range towards Isurava. For ten days after the abandonment of Deniki the Australians were not heavily pressed by the Japanese. During that time the 39th Battalion was joined by the 53rd Battalion and the headquarters of the 30th Brigade under Brigadier Selwyn Porter, and by 23 August the 21st Brigade commanded by Brigadier Arnold Potts had also arrived at Isurava. While this augmentation of strength was invaluable to stopping the enemy’s progress, the commander of 1st Australian Corps at Port Moresby, Lieut.-General Sydney Rowell, faced a major problem in keeping up an adequate quantity of supplies to even such a meagre force as had been deployed forward. The tired 39th Battalion was accordingly withdrawn to ease the pressure. On 26 August the Japanese resumed their advance, and fairly quickly Potts’ brigade was forced to mount a series of desperate delaying actions as it fell back first to Eora Creek on 30 August, then to Templeton’s Crossing on 2 September and Efogi on 5 September. Although Australian resistance was becoming increasingly better organised, and the Japanese beginning to feel the strain of their own extended supply line, the effectiveness of units involved in the defence was noticeably reduced through exhaustion and sickness entailed in operating over such harsh terrain. On 10 September Potts handed over command to Brigadier Porter, who withdrew his troops (now called ‘Maroubra Force’) to Ioribaiwa. The Japanese attacked here the next day, but made little progress. Not only was their advance losing impetus

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July 1942

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CORAL SEA but the Australians were beginning to feel the benefits of the arrival of fresh units. By now the fighting along the track involved brigades of the seasoned AIF 7th Division under Major-General Arthur Allen, and on 14 September command in the forward area was passed to Brigadier Kenneth Eather. Severe fighting continued around Ioribaiwa for a week, prompting a further withdrawal on 17 September to Imita Ridge, the last effective barrier which was virtually within sight of Port Moresby. This proved to be the limit of the enemy advance, since not only had the South Seas Force outrun its own supply lines but General Horii was ordered onto the defensive because of the reverse sustained by other Japanese forces in operations at Guadalcanal. After he received instructions to establish a primary defensive position on the north coast, he began withdrawing on 24 September. Under


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Eather’s determined leadership, the retiring enemy were followed back up the trail by the Australians until Kokoda was retaken on 2 November. In the campaign to this point 607 Australians had been killed and 1,015 sustained wounds in battle; estimates put the rate of sickness at between twice to three times that of combat casualties. No overall figures for losses among the 6,000 troops committed along the track by the Japanese are available, but captured documents dated 2 November 1942 reveal that in the case of two of the five enemy battalions involved the numbers killed, wounded or sick were over 75 per cent of original strength. Raymond Paull (1958) Retreat from Kokoda, London: William Heinemann; Dudley McCarthy (1959) South-West Pacific Area—First Year: Kokoda to Wau, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Lex McAulay (1991) Blood and Iron, Sydney: Hutchinson Australia

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Port Hedland, situated on the central north coast of Western Australia some 600 kilometres south-west of Broome, was the target of two minor Japanese air attacks in 1942–43. The first raid, on 30 July 1942, resulted in slight damage to the runway of the town’s airfield and one casualty; in the second, on 17 August 1943, neither damage nor casualties were caused. Mossman, the sugar-growing district 77 kilometres further north along the coast from Cairns, Queensland, was subjected to a minor but notable Japanese air attack at about 3.30 a.m. on 31 July 1942. Kawanisi H8-K2 ‘Emily’ flying boats had been active several times during the preceding week in making nuisance raids against Townsville (q.v.), and the lone machine of the same type involved on this occasion was apparently searching for the Allied airfield at Cairns to mount a similar attack against that target. When the crew of the Japanese aircraft saw lights on the ground they assumed Cairns to be the source and released the aircraft’s load of eight bombs. Most of the missiles landed harmlessly in bush alongside the Daintree Road—a fact which escaped the notice of local authorities at the time, who believed that a single bomb had been dropped which fell west of the Bamboo Creek Road about 1.5 kilometres north of the Miallo post office. Shrapnel from this explosion struck a house twenty metres away occupied by an Italian sugarcane farmer, Emilio Zullo, his wife, daughter and nephew. Two-year-old Carmela (‘Mele’) Zullo, lying in her cot, suffered a scalp wound and thus became the first civilian air-raid casualty on Australia’s east coast. Vera Bradley (1995) I Didn’t Know That, Moorooka, Qld: Boolarong Press

Savo Island, a major naval action fought in the early hours of 9 August 1942 in the southern Solomon Islands, in which a Japanese striking force surprised and


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defeated US and Australian warships supporting landings by US Marines on the Japanese-held islands of Guadalcanal and Tulagi. The operation, codenamed ‘Watchtower’ and launched on 7 August, marked the beginning of the Allied offensive against Rabaul, Japan’s major base in the South-west Pacific. Its timing was opportune because the Japanese were about to complete the construction of a major airfield on Guadalcanal which would have threatened Allied lines of communication between America and Australia, and the success of Watchtower. The 77 Allied ships assembled for the expeditionary force, including three aircraft-carriers with some 230 aircraft, represented the largest display of sea power seen in the South Pacific until that time. To protect the transports and supply ships off the landing beaches against air, submarine and surface attack, a powerful screening force was provided under Rear-Admiral Victor Crutchley (a Royal Navy officer then serving on loan with the RAN). By day the screening force was concentrated in the vicinity of the landing beaches. At night, while some destroyers continued to screen the beach areas, the rest of the force formed an outer shield astride the routes likely to be used by any Japanese force seeking to gain entry into what was later known as Iron Bottom Sound. Two groups each comprising three heavy cruisers and two destroyers patrolled the western approaches north and south of Savo Island, while a third group of two light cruisers (one of which was HMAS Hobart) and two destroyers guarded the less likely eastern approach. To seaward of each of the heavy cruiser groups Crutchley placed a radar-equipped destroyer as a picket, to provide early warning of any attack from the direction of Rabaul. In response to the Allied attack on Guadalcanal, Vice-Admiral Gunichi Mikawa (the Japanese naval area commander) decided to make a surface night strike. As his force of five heavy cruisers, two light

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July–August 1942


The Australian heavy cruiser Canberra lies shattered, listing and abandoned the morning after the devastating Japanese night attack. Source: Author’s collection

cruisers and one destroyer made its way south from the northern Solomons during the daylight hours of 8 August, it was detected and reported by two RAAF Hudson bombers on reconnaissance. Although Mikawa assumed that he had lost the element of surprise, in fact the radio reports sent by these aircraft contained errors of ship identification which obscured the significance of what had been sighted. Moreover, handling delays within the Allied message system resulted in this crucial intelligence not reaching the Allied commanders off Guadalcanal until the evening, too late for follow-up action to be taken in daylight to confirm any of the sightings. Both factors lulled the recipients of these reports into believing that the sightings referred to other than an enemy striking force headed in their direction. Approaching shortly before midnight, Mikawa formed his ships into a single line which extended over seven kilometres and


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prepared to pass south of Savo Island. In doing so, he steamed between the two picket destroyers (one of which came within less than two kilometres); neither of the US ships detected the enemy column in the dark— despite the advantage conferred by radar—yet they were themselves observed visually by the Japanese. Mikawa’s ships also passed another destroyer which was departing the sound en route to Sydney for repair of damage suffered in a torpedo bombing attack earlier that day; this vessel sailed down the entire length of the Japanese line at a distance of a kilometre, again without seeing a thing. Three reconnaissance aircraft catapulted from the Japanese cruisers before midnight were also heard and sighted—both visually and on radar—as they circled for 80 minutes over the sound, yet no particular significance was attached to their presence. Mikawa’s column first encountered the southern patrol group comprising HMAS Canberra and USS Chicago; the third cruiser

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in this group, HMAS Australia (Crutchley’s flagship) was absent because the admiral had been summoned to a meeting with the US Amphibious Force commander in the anchorage off Guadalcanal. What followed was a model night action and tactical masterpiece. The Japanese began by launching torpedoes at long range, waiting until these were about to cross their opponent’s line before ordering the aircraft overhead to drop illuminating flares and opening fire at 1.43 a.m. The torpedoes missed Canberra, but two hit Chicago—one causing slight damage forward and the other failing to explode amidships. The Australian cruiser was now alert to the Japanese presence, and was on the point of returning fire as soon as a target could be acquired when all power (both steam and electric) was suddenly lost throughout the ship. Unable to manoeuvre, or even to transmit a radio warning, Canberra was reduced to a disabled wreck within ten minutes. Despite the torpedo damage sustained by Chicago, this ship had her main armament fully operable and was still capable of 25 knots. Inexplicably, however, her captain turned away and proceeded westward out of the action, leaving Canberra to her fate and making no attempt even to report the enemy to the rest of the Allied force. With the southern group thus easily swept aside, the Japanese then swung north to engage the second patrol group with gun and torpedo. The three US heavy cruisers in this group—Vincennes, Astoria and Quincy—had failed to benefit from the noise of battle to the south and were swiftly annihilated. At 2.16 a.m. the Japanese ceased fire and sailed back out of the sound to the north-west, having inflicted in just over half an hour a crushing defeat on the Allies at virtually no cost to themselves; the only consolation was that Mikawa had not succeeded in getting in amongst the helpless transports, where potentially losses would have been enormous.


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As it was, the attack had resulted in the destruction of four Allied capital ships and another four ships had been damaged. The US Navy had suffered 1,593 casualties (including 939 killed or died of wounds), the RAN 193 (84 killed or died of wounds, including Canberra’s commanding officer Captain Frank Getting). Losses on the Australian cruiser were comparatively light because she remained afloat until morning, enabling two destroyers to proceed alongside and embark all survivors, including the seriously wounded. She was eventually sunk at 8 a.m. by US destroyers, in anticipation of an Allied withdrawal. American accounts of the battle have often attributed the Japanese success to various alleged Australian failings, such as the inadequacy of the warning received from the RAAF reconnaissance planes, the patrol plan devised by Crutchley, or even lax vigilance on the part of Canberra which allowed that ship to be put out of action without firing a single shot in her own defence. Although the Australian cruiser had the misfortune to be Mikawa’s first victim, she was not unprepared for battle and was, in fact, alert to the presence of enemy ships in the sound before firing began. There is persuasive evidence that her inability to fight back was due to suffering crippling damage when inadvertently torpedoed by an escorting American destroyer, USS Bagley, which was also attempting to engage the Japanese in the opening moments of combat. While there were undoubtedly a combination of factors which contributed to the disaster, none is so glaring as the failure of the three US destroyers which Mikawa’s force passed as it entered Iron Bottom Sound, since this was decisive in allowing the Japanese to achieve surprise. Bruce Loxton with Chris Coulthard-Clark (1994) The Shame of Savo: Anatomy of a Naval Disaster, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Dieppe, the seaport on the northern French coast, which was the scene of a famous

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August 1942 commando raid against occupying German forces on 19 August 1942. The operation, undertaken in response to Soviet pressure for a second front to be opened in western Europe, was intended primarily to test the enemy’s defences and gain information on conditions to be expected in a large-scale assault on a strongly held channel port. The plan required landings to be made at half a dozen points, preceded by an intense naval bombardment after which cannon-firing Spitfire and Hurricane fighter aircraft would attack the main defences. In practice, the operation was a disaster, even though some useful lessons were learnt. The ships carrying the attacking force encountered some German armed trawlers while still eleven kilometres from shore; the latter opened fire and were quickly joined by other enemy vessels. With the defences thus aroused, the landings were made under fire and much of the raiding force was pinned down on the beach. As a result few of the shore installations which had been targeted were destroyed, and there were heavy casualties. Some 3,600 of the 6,000 British, Canadian, American and Free French troops taking part were lost before the landing zone could be evacuated. In addition, the operation cost a destroyer sunk, 30 tanks, 33 landing craft and 106 aircraft. German losses were about 600 men and perhaps 50 aircraft. The only Australian involvement in the operation was in the person of Air Commodore Adrian Cole, a member of the Royal Australian Air Force who was embarked in the destroyer Calpe to co-ordinate air support for the operation. He was on the bridge when the vessel was strafed by German fighters, and was wounded by cannon shell fragments. For his work during the raid he was awarded the Distinguished Service Order. Milne Bay, at the far south-eastern tip of the New Guinea mainland, was the scene of


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fighting on 25 August–7 September 1942 which resulted in the first defeat of a Japanese amphibious landing during the Second World War. The operation was undertaken by the Japanese to secure a base from which to provide air and naval support for an attempt being made simultaneously to capture Port Moresby by the overland route across the Owen Stanley mountain range (see Kokoda Trail). To seize the Allied airstrips which were known to have been established at Milne Bay, and which were believed to be protected by only a few companies of infantry, a force of 2,000 marines were put ashore shortly before midnight on 25 August. The landing was made between Wahahuba and Ahioma instead of the intended site at Rabi, and meant that the marines had to travel more than eleven kilometres along the northern shore of the bay to reach the most easterly of the three Allied airfields—known simply as ‘No.3 Strip’—near Gili Gili. Compounding this initial mistake was a grave intelligence error which underestimated the size of the Allied defending force. Instead of two or three companies, the garrison actually totalled 8,824 personnel—7,459 Australians and 1,365 Americans. Most of the US Army personnel were engineers involved in airfield construction, but at least 4,500 of the troops were infantry—members of two Australian infantry brigades (one militia, the other AIF) grouped together as ‘Milne Force’ under Major-General Cyril Clowes. In addition there were two Kittyhawk fighter units (No.75 and No.76 squadrons, RAAF) using the main airstrip already finished at Milne Bay—‘No.1 Strip’ which had been named Gurney Field. During the first few days after their landing, the Japanese pressed steadily westwards. With the support of two light tanks which had been got ashore, they drove the defenders from positions around KB Mission on the night of 27–28 August and

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reached the edge of No.3 Strip. There were no further attacks made during the next two days or nights, apart from one by Japanese warships which entered the harbour about midnight on the 29th to shell positions around Gili Gili. (During that night another 800 marines were also put ashore.) The awaited assault against the airstrip finally came at 3 a.m. on 31 August, falling upon the 25th and 61st Militia battalions and the American 43rd Engineer Regiment. In three frenzied charges across open ground, the Japanese lost heavily to the defenders’ machine-guns and artillery, and by dawn had withdrawn again. At 9 a.m. Clowes launched his counter-offensive by sending the 2/12th AIF


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Battalion after the retreating enemy. Determined resistance was encountered from rearguards, and that night a flank attack had to be beaten off in a savage two-hour battle, but by 4 September the advance— now employing two battalions—had pushed back the enemy about ten kilometres towards the eastern end of the northern peninsula. Resistance stiffened throughout that day and the next, until on 6 September the 2/9th Battalion found itself in the midst of what had plainly been the enemy’s main base. By this stage the bulk of the surviving marines in the landing party had been removed by Japanese ships which entered the bay nightly from 3 September. On the night of 6 September enemy warships had caught the

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August–September 1942 British merchant vessel Anshun unloading supplies and sank it offshore, then shelled positions around Gili Gili before making off. The warships returned the next night and again fired on shore positions, but the battle was now clearly over. Clowes had what was subsequently discovered to be a substantial preponderance of numbers over the Japanese, but this fact had never been clear to him throughout the action. Thinking he might be dealing with a landing force of up to 5,000 men, and expecting further landings on either of the peninsulas north and south of him which would put large bodies of enemy troops in the flank or rear of his main position at the western end of the bay, he had been obliged to play a cautious hand and initially keep the bulk of his own units in reserve. The defenders had been assisted, however, by the atrocious conditions ashore, which saw the Japanese lose the advantage of their tanks when these vehicles were both found bogged on 30 August. Also greatly aiding the defence was the presence of the RAAF Kittyhawks, which daily flew off from Gurney Field to strafe the enemy’s positions, and destroyed fuel dumps, landing barges and other targets; aircraft from different RAAF units— Beaufighters of No.30 Squadron and Beauforts of No.100 Squadron—also arrived to make use of the Milne Bay airfields. In the assessment of some, air power had perhaps been the decisive factor in determining the outcome. All told, the action had resulted in 373 Australian casualties (of whom 167 were either killed or missing) as well as fourteen deaths among the American army units present—mainly the 43rd Engineer Regiment. For the Japanese the toll was much higher, with only 1,318 of the 2,800 troops put ashore in the area having been evacuated by naval vessels. Allied estimates put the number of enemy troops killed locally at 750; the rest were mostly tracked down and killed by Australian patrols as


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they attempted to make their way overland to the Japanese base at Buna. On this scale the battle for Milne Bay was a relatively minor affair, but its implications for the Allies were profound in that it represented the first occasion in which a Japanese operation of this kind had miscarried so badly. It was here, as several commentators later pointed out, that the myth of Japanese invincibility was dispelled. Dudley McCarthy (1959) South-West Pacific Area—First Year: Kokoda to Wau, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Tel el Eisa, located about fifteen kilometres west of El Alamein in western Egypt, on 1 September 1942 was the scene of a famous raid launched by the 20th Australian Brigade. The attack (codenamed ‘Operation Bulimba’) involved the 2/15th Battalion under Lieut.-Colonel R.W.G. Ogle first crossing an enemy minefield and seizing a heavily fortified desert strongpoint known as West Point 23 about three kilometres south-west of Tel el Eisa. Once this had been accomplished, another raiding force built around a squadron of the 40th Royal Tank Regiment was to move through to cut the principal enemy supply route from the coast to Axis forces in the south. During the initial phase of the operation, launched before dawn, the Australians captured their objective in the face of strong resistance from the garrison. The enemy counter-attacked before the tank force got underway, however, and because it was assessed that the second part of the operation could not then be safely carried through, the 2/15th was ordered to withdraw. This it did in brilliant fashion, despite continuing heavy fire and suffering more casualties. In all, the raid had cost the Australians 39 killed, 109 wounded and 25 men missing. At least 150 Germans were killed and 140 were taken prisoner. Barton Maughan (1966) Tobruk and El Alamein, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

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El Alamein, lying beside the Mediterranean coast of western Egypt some 110 kilometres from Alexandria, on 23 October–5 November 1942 was the scene of one of the great battles of the Second World War. The British offensive involved 220,000 men of the Eighth Army (including the 9th Australian Division under Lieut.-General Sir Leslie Morshead) along with 1,100 tanks and about 900 field and medium guns. Against this force, the Axis commander (Field Marshal Erwin Rommel) had 180,000 men in four German and eight Italian divisions, 600 tanks and 500 guns. The plan of battle prepared by the British commander, Lieut.-General Bernard Montgomery, called for the main assault to be delivered on the right flank (at the northern end of the line) by the 30th Corps, while to the south the 13th Corps undertook two lesser thrusts. The four infantry divisions of 30th Corps—Scottish, South African, New Zealand as well as Australian—were to attack in line abreast, driving a wedge through the enemy defences on a front of 14.6 kilometres and to a depth of about 5.5 kilometres. After the infantry had won their objectives, by no later than 3 a.m. on 24 October, the 1st and 10th Armoured divisions of the 10th Corps would move through to exploit these gains and break the enemy line. Within the 30th Corps area, the 9th Australian Division held the right (or far northern end) of the front, with the 51st Highland Division on its left. For Morshead’s troops, the plan entailed the 24th Brigade simulating an attack in the positions it already held, while the 20th and 26th brigades (on the left and in centre respectively) pushed out due west to engage the enemy. At 9.40 p.m. on 23 October the battle opened with a thundering counter-battery bombardment which lasted fifteen minutes. After a five-minute pause, the crossed beams of two searchlights in the night sky signalled the start of the attack, and another tremendous barrage erupted which shook


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the desert ground. Behind this covering fire, the troops began advancing. In the Australian sector the 26th Brigade made good progress and succeeded in reaching its final objectives. The first phase of the 20th Brigade’s attack went well, too, but then its battalion leading onto the final objective found the enemy minefields to be strongly defended and sustained severe casualties in bitter fighting. Further south the 51st Division also encountered great difficulties. Since that meant the northern corridor had not been cleared, the planned sortie by the 1st Armoured Division could not take place. Although the final objectives for 30th Corps were duly attained by the night of 24 October, the enemy had been granted enough time to reposition and establish a new frontline. Quickly adjusting to this turn of events, Montgomery switched the focus of his attacks. Ordering the 13th Corps to go onto the defensive, he scrapped the planned armoured sortie but set 10th Corps to continue the westward pressure in a bridgehead won in front of the New Zealanders, and turned the 30th Corps’ attack north towards the coast. This change of axis threatened to cut off the German 164th Division and was calculated to draw a fierce enemy response. As the right-hand formation, 9th Australian Division was the part of 30th Corps principally concerned by this new role. On the night of 25 October Morshead’s troops prepared to launch another major attack at midnight, followed by two more equally exhausting night attacks on 28 and 30 October. Each of these increased the threat posed to the enemy’s main line of communications along the coast, thereby prompting Rommel to concentrate his Afrika Korps, 90th Light Division and a large part of the Italian mobile troops against this sector of the front. The Axis forces were now seriously unbalanced, and conditions created which were ripe for Montgomery to launch

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a decisive blow where the enemy line had been weakened. The point he chose was in the centre, at the junction of the Italian and German forces. Assigning the New Zealanders the task of making the hole through which he would push the 1st Armoured Division, Montgomery decided on the night of 1 November for the commencement of what was dubbed ‘Operation Supercharge’. In the course of creating this crucial opportunity, however, and until Supercharge began, the Australians were forced to endure not only the burden of their own attacks but the weight of the enemy forces which their activity had drawn in upon them. In this process the 9th Division was becoming seriously depleted. During the Australians’ second attack on 28 October, for instance, the Germans made no less than 25 counter-attacks against the attacking troops—who withstood them all. The third attack on 30 October saw four Australian battalions actually secure a position astride


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the crucial coast road, and called forth attacks by the 90th Light Division and 21st Panzer Division of almost unbelievable ferocity. Again, the Australians held their ground, forcing the withdrawal of most of the German infantry from positions to the east of that point. By 31 October several units of the 26th Brigade were down to mere skeletons (the 2/48th Battalion contained only 41 men, instead of the 686 all ranks it had had a week earlier), and Morshead could see his division being virtually destroyed in front of him. That night he relieved the 26th Brigade with the 24th Brigade, the changeover being completed by 3.30 a.m. on 1 November. Morshead’s timing proved to be critical, for the next morning the full fury of two German divisions fell on these fresh troops—pressure which the replaced units could not possibly have withstood. That night, at 1.05 a.m. on 2 November, Operation Supercharge was launched and

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ushered in the final phase of the battle. The break-out operation upon which Montgomery was pinning his hopes proved more difficult than expected, and there were heavy losses among the British armoured forces. The 51st Division was initially checked when it attacked on 3 November, but the next morning one of its attached brigades burst through the enemy line across a front of more than six kilometres. British armour poured through the gap created, and the Axis collapse began. The capture of the commander of the Afrika Korps, General Ritter von Thoma, at midday on 4 November was an early indicator of the scale of the calamity confronting Rommel’s forces. Despite a directive received on 5 November from the German leader Adolf Hitler insisting on a fight to the finish, Rommel had already ordered a withdrawal to Fuka to avoid a complete encirclement of his shattered forces. The victory gained at El Alamein was, in every sense, the beginning of the end; the Axis retreat in north Africa continued until the remnants surrendered in Tunis in May 1943. With the focus of fighting suddenly switched to just south of Tel el Eisa, the pressure at last came off the Australians. No longer facing ceaseless counter-attacks, the 9th Division’s part in El Alamein was practically over—apart from the inevitable patrols. The division’s last casualties were suffered on 4 November, and the last prisoners captured next day. In the great battle which was then ending the Australians had suffered 620 killed, 1,944 wounded and 130 taken prisoner—a casualty toll which was one-fifth of the Eighth Army’s entire losses of 13,560 killed, wounded and missing. Barton Maughan (1966) Tobruk and El Alamein, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Gona, a former mission station on the north coast of New Guinea, was the northernmost of three Japanese enclaves extending over


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eighteen kilometres to Cape Endaiadere and the first to be captured by Allied forces in fighting lasting from 22 November until 9 December 1942. Here—as at Buna and Sanananda (qq.v.)—the Japanese had sited strongly entrenched defensive positions on the only dry ground available, thereby ensuring that any approach by attacking Allied forces would be through pestilential swamps which made disease at least as big a factor to be overcome as bullets. The task of capturing Gona was given to the 25th Australian Brigade commanded by Brigadier Kenneth Eather, which had an effective strength of only about 850 men after its exertions on the Kokoda Trail (q.v.). Deciding to advance directly against the enemy position on 22 November, Eather pushed the 2/33rd Battalion forward from the south while the 2/31st Battalion moved around onto the right flank in preparation for an assault from the east in the evening. The attack reached the forward Japanese pits but cost the attacking formation 65 casualties—one-quarter of its strength. A defensive perimeter was formed, and the attack was continued from the east the next day in a fruitless effort which cost the 2/25 Battalion another 64 casualties. By the end of this day’s fighting Eather’s brigade was down to only 736 men. After the enemy position was subjected to aerial bombardment on 24 November, a further unsuccessful attack was made from the south-west with the support of the 3rd Militia Battalion, but at least casualties were light. On 28 November, with the 21st Australian Brigade under Brigadier Iven Dougherty having arrived to reinforce the 25th, a renewed effort to take Gona was made by one of newly arrived units. This, too, failed— as did other attempts on subsequent days. An attack carried forward with fixed bayonets on 1 December actually succeeded in reaching the centre of the enemy defences but was there largely wiped out. As a result of the almost disastrous rate of

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November 1942 depletion among units, largely due to sickness, the commander of the 7th Australian Division (Major-General George Vasey) had the 21st Brigade relieve the 25th and reinforced the former with an additional battalion. Thus strengthened—but still numbering only 800 men—Dougherty launched another attack at about midday on 8 December. In this determined effort, half the Japanese posts were overrun that evening. Now confined to a small area, the garrison made a desperate bid to break out through the Australian lines, giving rise to severe fighting in which at least 100 Japanese were killed. When Australian patrols swept through the remnant of the enemy stronghold the next day they found few survivors from among the original 800–900 defenders, but 638 bodies were later collected for burial. For the 21st Brigade’s four battalions the capture of Gona had come at a cost of 530 men lost in battle and sickness. Dudley McCarthy (1959) South-West Pacific Area—First Year: Kokoda to Wau, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Peter Brune (1994) Gona’s Gone!, Sydney: Allen & Unwin in association with Headquarters Training Command, Australian Army; Lex McAulay (1992) To the Bitter End, Sydney: Random House Australia

Brisbane, the most notable of many wartime riots between US and Australian servicemen, took place in the Queensland capital on the nights of both 26 and 27 November 1942. The disturbances were the consequence of a rapid influx of American troops into Australia’s main cities as part of the Allied build-up in the South-west Pacific theatre during the Second World War. This was nowhere more evident than in Brisbane which saw its pre-war population of 325,000 swollen by about 90,000 Americans, quite apart from Australian base, training and militia units stationed in and around the metropolitan area. Pressure on available female company, accommodation, transport, entertainment and food led to resentment and jealousy which frequently found


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expression in noisy brawls. Shortly before 7 p.m. on the evening of 26 November, three drunken Australian soldiers collided into an American private leaving the Australian Army canteen in Adelaide Street and an exchange of angry words followed. Almost immediately a US Military Policeman (MP) intervened and demanded to see the American’s leave pass. At this, the Australians turned their hostility onto the policeman—an almost traditional target for expressing resentment of authority—and he was punched in the mouth. The disturbance was observed by the MP’s companions at the US Post Exchange (or PX store) 50 metres further along the same street, at the Creek Street intersection, and they rushed to his aid. Wielding batons through the small crowd which was beginning to assemble, they gathered up their fallen colleague and carried him into the PX. The high-handed behaviour of the US service police now transferred the focus of the disturbance to outside the PX, and by 7.15 p.m. there was about 100 Australian soldiers pressing against a makeshift cordon of MPs while attempting to get inside. Frantic calls for assistance led to the arrival of American police reinforcements, which were needed to deal with a crowd which rapidly swelled to about 3,000 as more and more soldiers became involved—American as well as Australian—all threatening violence to the MPs. Rocks and other missiles were thrown at the premises, breaking windows and occasionally hitting the MPs as the tension continued to build. The appearance of Australian provosts did nothing to defuse the situation, with witnesses later attesting to having seen some of these men remove their armbands and melt into the crowd. Some members of a hastily drawn-together Australian picket were also observed handing over their rifles to the rioters, though fortunately their commander had made sure that the weapons

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were not loaded. Such evidence of collusion nonetheless induced fear among the Americans outside the PX, especially when these men found themselves being jostled and menaced. About 8 p.m. one MP in front of the building was spotted carrying a 12-gauge shotgun used for riot control, and attempts were made by members of the crowd to wrest this from him. The weapon discharged three times, spraying those mobbing the man with buckshot pellets. Eight Australian soldiers and a civilian fell wounded, one of the former dying of his injuries; at least seven other Australians (some of them civilians) were hurt by batons. The casualties were not all on one side: by the time the trouble ended about 10.15 p.m. eight Americans (all reportedly MPs) were badly hurt and another ten suffered lesser injuries. Although the military authorities attempted to remove the focal point for clashes by temporarily closing the Australian canteen and the PX (which was extensively damaged anyway), the next night ugly scenes were repeated in inner Brisbane between 8 p.m. and midnight. This time, on account of the shootings, the tone was vindictively anti-American instead of anti-MP as before. Australians vented their anger and frustration by bashing and kicking any American ‘GI’ they encountered, and by the following morning a further two MPs and eleven US Army and Navy personnel (including four officers) had been hospitalised. Australian civilian and military police were evidently fearful of intervening, with at least one reliable witness complaining of having seen a group of 25–30 Australian soldiers sweeping through Queen Street assaulting Americans for almost two hours while civilian police and Australian provosts meekly followed without hindering them. By the next night, 28 November, firm measures were finally taken to contain the violence, including the bringing in of additional Australian military police and


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some men of an Independent Company to provide town pickets. While matters in Brisbane were thus brought under control, the causes of such episodes remained unresolved. There were similar subsequent flare-ups during 1943–44 in Melbourne, Sydney, Perth and Rockhampton (Queensland). Large-scale though some of these disturbances were (see also Rockhampton), none matched the ferocity of the so-called ‘Battle of Brisbane’ (or the ‘Battle of the Canteens’ as it is also sometimes called). National Times, 10–15 February 1975; John Hammond Moore (1981) Over-Sexed, Over-Paid, & Over Here, St Lucia: University of Queensland Press; E. Daniel Potts & Annette Potts (1985) Yanks Down Under 1941–45, Melbourne: Oxford University Press

Buna, a village amid coconut plantations on the north coast of New Guinea at which the Japanese had established their base for supporting an overland attack on Port Moresby, was the scene of grim fighting involving Australians from 18 December 1942 until 2 January 1943. The network of Japanese defensive positions, extending east from Buna village to Cape Endaiadere, had been the focus of operations for two columns from the 32nd American Division since November 1942. Despite sustaining nearly 500 casualties, the US troops had made little progress. As a result of this situation, in early December the 18th Australian Brigade and a tank squadron of the 2/6th Australian Armoured Regiment were ordered to the area, and the troops of the right flank American column (called Warren Force) were brought under command of the Australian brigade’s commander, Brigadier George Wootten. On 14 December the western American column (Urbana Force) entered Buna village after its Japanese defenders were ferried away at night. Two days later Wootten launched the first phase of a thrust from the east, aimed at capturing the area between two airfields dubbed ‘New Strip’ and ‘Old

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November 1942–January 1943 Strip’ and the sea. Six days later this phase of the operation came to end with the 18th Brigade having succeeded in pressing forward to the north-western end of Old Strip, and preparations were made for the second stage—involving a westward sweep along and astride the airfield itself. This effort began the next day, 24 December, carried forward by the 2/10th Battalion supported by the only four tanks which were still operational, with a battalion of the 126th American Regiment moving on its left flank. This advance began well but stalled under heavy enemy fire which quickly accounted for all the tanks. An attempt to resume the advance on 29 December also foundered, but on 1 January 1943—after the arrival of a fresh battalion from Goodenough Island and six more tanks—another effort was made. This attack

swept through the open plantation, dealing with one Japanese bunker after another, and by 2 January had reached Giropa Point, thereby completing the capture of the Buna area in conjunction with a fresh attack by Urbana Force which also took the old government station. The operation had cost the Allies 2,870 battle casualties—913 of which were among Australian units (863 in the 18th Brigade, including 306 killed). The Japanese had lost a minimum of 1,390 killed—this number being counted bodies, exclusive of those killed or buried alive in blown-up structures; 900 of these were in the area contested by 18th Brigade/Warren Force. No more than 50 prisoners were taken from the whole of the Buna garrison, which was stark testimony of the determination of the defenders to accept death rather than surrender and to the savagery

During the final stage of the battle for Buna on 1–2 January 1943, a 2-inch mortar crew from the 2/12th Battalion use the shelter of a coconut tree to fire at 25 Japanese fleeing from a pill-box 150 metres away, which has been wrecked by gunfire from the American-built M3 ‘General Stuart’ light tank of the 2/6th Armoured Regiment alongside. Source: Australian War Memorial 14000



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of the conflict which resulted. Dudley McCarthy (1959) South-West Pacific Area—First Year: Kokoda to Wau, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Lex McAulay (1992) To the Bitter End, Sydney: Random House Australia

Sanananda, the last Japanese enclave remaining in the Buna–Gona area after the Allied reduction of both these other strongpoints on the New Guinea north coast, was itself finally taken in fighting on 12–18 January 1943. An advance by the 16th Australian Brigade in November 1942, working along the track leading to the Japanese positions, had been halted by the commander of the 7th Australian Division (Major-General George Vasey) after the attacking force became seriously weakened by casualties and sickness. The 126th American Regiment was sent into the area, and then the 30th Australian Brigade to relieve the 16th Brigade. After the 30th also suffered severely—with one battalion sustaining nearly 60 per cent casualties in an attack on 7 December—Vasey decided to suspend further full-scale operations in this sector until fresh units were brought up from Port Moresby. Once the advance was resumed on 19 December, the augmented attacking force enjoyed only mixed success over the next few days. One action involving the newly arrived Australian 7th Cavalry Regiment resulted in disastrous casualties (including the unit’s commander) and several pockets of the attackers becoming isolated behind enemy lines. By 21 December Vasey and the commander of 1st Australian Corps, Lieut.-General Edmund Herring, had agreed that progress on this front was impossible with the troops available. A fresh American regiment (the 163rd) and the 39th Australian battalion from Gona were therefore concentrated here, and plans made for a renewed effort against Sanananda once Buna had been been overcome. These involved a thrust by Vasey’s division north along the track towards Sanananda Point and Cape


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Killerton, in conjunction with an advance along the coast by an American column from Buna. On 12 January Vasey began his part of the operation by sending forward the 18th Brigade to press in on the Japanese blocking the Sanananda Track. The troops on the left flank, however, came up against a gun which destroyed or holed two of three tanks providing supporting fire, while the third vehicle was set on fire by a mine. Practically no progress was made by the infantry, which had nonetheless suffered more than 100 casualties. Despite this Allied setback, the Japanese began to withdraw from their forward positions that night and the next. Patrols soon were reporting the abandonment of enemy positions elsewhere, and that the Japanese survivors were being taken away in barges. Quickly following up on the enemy retirement, by 18 January Australian elements had reached Cape Killerton and taken Sanananda village. This left only the Japanese force which had been blocking the track and was now effectively encircled. Costly fighting continued here for a few days more, but the last main position was overrun on 21 January and by the next day the last organised resistance was broken. The elimination of the Japanese hold at Sanananda had cost about 2,100 Allied casualties, with the Australian share of this grim tally being more than l,400 (including almost 600 killed or missing). Some 1,500– 1,600 Japanese had died in fighting along the Sanananda Track, and about 1,200 sick and wounded had been removed by sea during the period 13–20 January. About 1,000 escaped destruction, moving overland to the west of Gona. Dudley McCarthy (1959) South-West Pacific Area—First Year: Kokoda to Wau, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Wau, prior to the Second World War a mining centre in the New Guinea interior, lying some 50 kilometres south-west of Salamaua, was

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January 1943 the scene of severe fighting on 28 January–1 February 1943. Following the loss of the bridgehead at Buna and Gona (qq.v.), the Japanese recognised the grave threat now posed to their important bases at Salamaua and Lae, 40 kilometres further along the coast of the Huon Gulf, whilever Wau remained in Allied hands. Accordingly, the Japanese 102nd Regiment of 2,500–3,000 men was sent via Mubo to capture Wau using a secondary route known as the Black Cat Track. In anticipation of some such Japanese move, the small Australian garrison (known as ‘Kanga Force’)—comprising two independent companies and the New Guinea Volunteer Rifles—was reinforced by the 17th Brigade of the 6th Australian Division flown in from Milne Bay. The first battalion of the brigade had largely arrived by 19 January, and two days later it was discovered that the Japanese were in strength along the Black Cat and also steadily cutting their way along a disused parallel trail to Wandumi. The 17th Brigade’s commander, Brigadier M.J. Moten, having taken over from Kanga Force, decided to move out his 2/6th Battalion into the area east of Wau with the aim of disrupting the enemy’s approach. This deployment was commenced on 26 January, and two days later the first clash occurred at Wandumi, when a reinforced company of the 2/6th was repeatedly attacked and forced to mount a counter-attack with bayonets. ‘Hundreds’ of Japanese were reportedly seen as moving past the Australian outpost on their way to Wau. Soon several of the Australian companies were effectively tied up in positions east of Wau, while the main Japanese column was approaching Wau itself where there were few Australian troops remaining. Bad weather on 28 January also prevented further troops from being ferried into the airfield, so that the position was beginning to look grim. By the night of the 28th the Japanese were within three kilometres of the Wau


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airstrip, and from the next morning their fire was actually falling on the forward Australian positions. The airfield’s defences were then manned by two companies of the 2/5th Battalion, the arrival of which had been interrupted by the weather. Throughout that day, however, further planeloads of troops continued to arrive until eventually 60 landings had been made and more than 800 men delivered, comprising the balance of the 2/5th Battalion and the whole of the 2/ 7th. Since the airfield was under direct enemy fire, the arriving troops were in action from the moment they left the transports; some were wounded in fighting at the edge of the strip and were loaded straight back on the aircraft that had brought them. Before dawn on 30 January the Japanese made their main attack, leading to hard fighting throughout the rest of the morning. Aircraft were still landing on the airfield throughout the action, however, and these delivered two field-guns which were in action by 11.30 a.m. That afternoon the 2/7th launched a counter-attack which killed many Japanese. Over the next two days the initiative progressively passed to the Australians, whose strength by 1 February had been built up to 3,166 all ranks. These began a series of persistent attacks which inflicted sharp losses on the enemy. By the time the Japanese launched a strong air attack against Wau on 6 February, which was opposed by Allied aircraft and resulted in substantial losses of Japanese planes, the 102nd Regiment was already in retreat. By 9 February the Wau valley had been cleared of enemy forces and by the end of the month these were all back around Mubo, having lost about 1,200 killed in the failed operation. Australian losses are not clearly enumerated but would appear to have been under 300 up to 15 February. Dudley McCarthy (1959) South-West Pacific Area—First Year: Kokoda to Wau, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Bismarck Sea, the naval action in which a

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Japanese convoy of eight transport ships and eight escorting destroyers was almost annihilated by Allied air attacks, was fought off the northern coast of New Guinea on 2– 3 March 1943. The action was the result of a Japanese decision to reinforce their garrison at Lae with 6,000 troops of the 51st Division sent by sea from the major base at Rabaul, repeating an operation successfully mounted in January. On this occasion, however, intercepted radio messages gave the Allies warning of the planned move, enabling extensive preparations to be made by the advanced echelon of the US 5th Air Force at Port Moresby under Major-General Ennis Whitehead, and No.9 Operational Group of the Royal Australian Air Force led by Air Commodore Joseph Hewitt. These included modifying the armament of some B–25 Mitchell bombers for the role of ‘commerce destroying’ and refining crew skills in the co-ordination techniques entailed in mounting multi-directional and multi-level attack. The convoy departed Rabaul on 28 February and was sighted two days later in the Bismarck Sea west of New Britain. Allied air attacks began that day but were hampered by bad weather, with the result that only one transport was sunk. An RAAF Catalina amphibian continued to shadow the convoy during the night, confirming its destination as Lae. The ships had entered the Huon Gulf the next morning when they were torpedo-bombed by two separate Beaufort aircraft of No.100 Squadron RAAF amid low cloud and poor light before 7.00 a.m. These attacks were without result, but three hours later the convoy was found again in bright sunlight and came under sustained and devastating assault from the air. Led by Beaufighters of the RAAF’s No.30 Squadron, the Allied attack was carried through by American B–17 Flying Fortress and B–25 Mitchell bombers, as well as A–20 Bostons of the US 3rd Attack Group and the RAAF No.22 Squadron. Over the next six hours all


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A Japanese transport on fire during the Bismarck Sea battle, photographed from an attacking Beaufighter of No.30 Squadron, RAAF. Source: Australian War Memorial 127965

the remaining transports were destroyed, along with half the escorting warships (and those not sunk were damaged). Air sweeps over the Huon Gulf were maintained for several more days, and barges and rafts found carrying Japanese survivors were attacked to prevent these from getting ashore. Of the troops originally embarked in the convoy, 2,890—or nearly half—are believed to have perished in this awesome display of air power. Lex McAulay (1991) Battle of the Bismarck Sea, New York: St Martin’s Press

Rockhampton, a confrontation—possibly apocryphal—between Australian and American servicemen based in Queensland, supposed to have happened sometime in 1943. The incident reportedly occurred when two troop trains—one carrying US Army personnel who were proceeding on southern leave, the other containing Australian commandos bound for active service in the northern islands—were pulled up alongside each other on Denison Street near the Rockhampton railway station. Occupants of the American train allegedly shouted, ‘Go up and fight Aussies, and we’ll look after your wives and sweethearts’, provoking a furious response which ended in serious injuries and at least one American killed. Precise details of what became known as

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March–May 1943 the ‘Battle of the Trains’ are hard to establish. According to rumours which circulated at the time, the commandos bailed up the engine drivers to prevent them moving the trains—and also civilian police who were called to the scene—while they stripped palings from the picket fences of neighbouring houses and proceeded to exact retribution. The absence of authoritative information about the incident has usually been attributed to the heavy suppression of news at the time in the interests of Allied relations, and also because other disorderly encounters on troop trains—common enough occurrences at the time—have become confused with this one. Despite the story’s widespread appeal, and the fact that it is plausible, the scarcity of witnesses to any such confrontation provides grounds for doubting that it is based on actual events. E. Daniel Potts & Annette Potts (1985) Yanks Down Under 1941–45, Melbourne: Oxford University Press; Libby Connors, Lynette Finch, Kay Saunders & Helen Tayor (1992) Australia’s Frontline, St Lucia, Qld: University of Queensland Press

Mubo, an action fought twenty kilometres south of Salamaua in New Guinea, when a company of the Australian 2/7th Battalion was surrounded and attacked by Japanese forces on 9–11 May 1943. The Australians had followed the Japanese into the Mubo area following the latter’s failed attempt to capture Wau (q.v.) in January. After establishing a base camp on Lababia Ridge two kilometres south-west of Mubo, the battalion became involved in a series of futile attacks aimed at seizing a feature on the same ridgeline known as the Pimple. In preparation for a third attempt at capturing this position, a company led by Captain L.V. Tatterson went forward on 7 May and moved into an attacking position. The attack quickly stalled under enemy covering fire and at dusk the troops were withdrawn further back on the spurline. Tatterson’s men were still maintaining a


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defensive perimeter more than a kilometre north of the battalion base camp on the morning of 9 May, when it came under attack from Japanese forces. Initially thinking he was being probed by an enemy patrol, he quickly realised that he was about to be encircled in preparation for a full-scale assault. By 3.30 p.m. the enemy had achieved the object of isolating the Australian company, and then made the first of a total of eight attacks—the most determined of these occurring on the afternoon of 10 May. At 7 a.m. the next day the Australian company position was again heavily fired upon, but there was no infantry follow-up. Early that afternoon a relieving force of 60 men arrived to find Tatterson’s company still holding out. It had suffered twelve casualties during the action, but the enemy’s losses were conservatively estimated at 100 (including 50 killed). Later information indicated that the company had withstood an assault by more than 500 troops of the Japanese 102nd and 115th regiments. David Dexter (1961) The New Guinea Offensives, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Exmouth Gulf, on the West Australian coast north of Carnarvon, was raided twice by Japanese aircraft on 20–22 May 1943 and once more in September of that year. Shortly before 11 p.m. on 20 May two aircraft were detected by radar, approaching North West Cape from the north. Two Boomerang fighters of No.85 Squadron, RAAF, were scrambled from the Potshot airfield (later renamed Learmonth) but in the bad weather failed to find the enemy aircraft, which dropped a single bomb harmlessly into the Exmouth Gulf before departing northwards again. At 10.38 the following night what was thought to be a single aircraft was picked up by radar, approaching from the direction of Barrow Island directly towards Onslow, on the eastern edge of the Gulf ’s entrance. The raider was tracked as it crossed the coast

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just east of the town and flew inland, apparently engaged on a moonlight reconnaissance. After circling east of Minderoo, it proceeded towards Yanrey and Giralia before turning north. About twenty minutes after midnight on 22 May the raider overflew Potshot, dropping nine bombs which landed in a line 200 metres from shore some three kilometres north of the airfield campsite, before departing northwards out over the sea. Again two Boomerangs were sent up in an attempt to make an interception, and on this occasion the pilot of one of the fighters sighted engine exhaust flames which indicated two aircraft flying in a tight formation. He dived towards the enemy machines and followed them for a time, until forced to return to base when he began running low on fuel. Japanese aircraft paid a final visit to the area on the night of 15–16 September 1943. About midnight at least two raiders entered Exmouth Gulf before turning to approach Onslow from the west. After passing over the town they continued following the coast in a north-easterly direction for some 40 kilometres, but then reversed course and bore back down on Onslow to release their bombs. At 1.30 a.m. on 16 September a series of heavy explosions were clearly heard and felt in the town, although the point of impact was evidently some distance to the south-west. Not until the following day, however, were craters found in a tidal flat seven kilometres away; this had all the appearance of an airfield and presumably was mistaken for a military target. There was no damage or casualties. George Odgers (1957) Air War Against Japan 1943–1945, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Lababia Ridge, an action fought in New Guinea on 20–23 June 1943, on a feature in the Mubo area twenty kilometres south of Salamaua. Following their repulse near the Pimple above Mubo (q.v.) on 9–11 May, the Japanese moved forward with a patrol on


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the afternoon of 20 June against the Australian base camp on Lababia Ridge which contained a company of the 2/6th Battalion under Captain W.R. Dexter. After some initial exchanges things went quiet in front of the Australian position until the following morning, when the enemy was seen assembling for an assault which came at 11 a.m. A stronger attack followed at about 2 p.m., during which the Japanese launched a bayonet charge which was stopped just ten metres short of the forward Australian posts. That night a second company of the 2/6th arrived to reinforce the defence, and the Japanese withdrew. On 22 and 23 June further enemy attacks were made, during which the defenders were greatly heartened to receive supporting fire from Australian Beaufighter aircraft that strafed along the approaches in use by the Japanese. By 1.30 p.m. on the 23rd the enemy had withdrawn and firing ceased. The Australians on Lababia Ridge—originally only 80 strong and after reinforcement still numbering only 150—had repulsed two battalions of the Japanese 66th Regiment totalling about 1,500 troops. The enemy had lost 172 men in their assaults, including 41 killed, compared with Australian casualties of eleven killed and twelve wounded. David Dexter (1961) The New Guinea Offensives, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Sicily, scene of an Allied air and sea invasion launched on the night of 9–10 July 1943, which saw the island’s Italian and German defenders overcome by the end of August. Australian participation in this operation was in the form of two squadrons of Kittyhawk fighters, No.3 RAAF and No.450 RAF (which was a designated ‘Australian’ unit under arrangements covering the Empire Air Training Scheme), and two minesweeping flotillas (21st and 22nd) comprising eight RAN corvettes. Initially operating from airfields on Malta, on 17 July the two air squadrons moved base to Sicily itself—op-

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May–September 1943 erating firstly from Pachino and later Agnone. Lae, the major town at the head of the Huon Gulf on the northern New Guinea coast, in September 1943 became the focus of a major combined land, sea and air operation by Australian and American forces which led to its capture from the Japanese. The operation began on 4 September with an amphibious landing by the 20th and 26th brigades of the 9th Australian Division on beaches east of Lae, in preparation for an advance along the coast; these landings were unopposed except for enemy air attacks which caused 35 casualties (including seven killed) among the assault formations. Later air raids added another 120 casualties to the tally, but well before noon that day no less than 7,800 troops had been safely put ashore. The second phase of the operation, an airborne drop of three battalions of American paratroops (plus Australian gunners of the 2/4th Field Regiment with eight ‘short’ 25-pounder guns) over airfields at Nadzab in the Markham Valley north-west of Lae, was accomplished — again without opposition — on 5 September. After the airfields had been secured, preparations were begun to enable the 7th Australian Division to fly in from 7 September and complete what was the virtual encirclement of the Japanese garrison at Lae. By 16 September Lae was in Allied hands, having fallen to the converging attack of the two Australian divisions. About 1,500 Japanese were killed, and some 2,000 taken prisoner, but the majority of the garrison managed to escape. Australian battle losses were 547, including 38 killed in the 7th Division, and 77 killed and 73 missing in the 9th; far worse were the 151 casualties (including 59 killed) sustained at Port Moresby when a Liberator bomber crashed and exploded among 7th Division personnel waiting to board their transports for Nadzab. David Dexter (1961) The New Guinea Offensives, Canberra: Australian War Memorial


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Salamaua, the other major Japanese base area on the Huon Gulf of New Guinea in addition to Lae (q.v.), was captured by Australian forces in fighting on 9–11 September 1943. In conjunction with the Allied drive to take Lae, the 5th Australian Division under Major-General Edward Milford was ordered to close in on Salamaua from the inland route from Wau along which it had been operating. As the Lae operation unfolded, the Japanese drew on the garrison at Salamaua by transferring 5,000–6,000 troops north on barges, thereby leaving the southern base itself ripe for assault. On 9 September the 42nd Battalion captured the important feature called Charlie Hill, four kilometres south of the Salamaua airfield, and by the evening of the next day Japanese resistance south of the Francisco River had collapsed. At this juncture heavy rain delayed the Australian advance, enabling the bulk of the enemy garrison to get away. By 11 September the Australians were in possession of the airfield after briefly battling with a rearguard, and thereby ended a campaign to capture the place which had lasted seven months. The three Australian brigades that took part, firstly under the headquarters of the 3rd Division and then the 5th, had since April sustained 1,083 casualties (including 343 killed). Japanese losses in the same period were estimated at 8,100, including 2,722 killed. David Dexter (1961) The New Guinea Offensives, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Kaiapit, an action fought in the upper Markham Valley of New Guinea on 19–20 September 1943, in which the Australian 2/ 6th Independent Company captured an area required for the establishment of an airfield and held it against a counter-attack. The enemy outpost was seized on the afternoon of 19 September by the 190-strong Australian party in a series of determined charges, often using grenades and bayonets. Nine Australians became casualties in this action,

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A dead Japanese lies in Kaiapit village after the fight by the 2/6th Independent Company on 19–20 September 1943. Source: Australian War Memorial 15886

including two killed, but about 30 Japanese killed were left behind when the defenders fled. Six more Japanese were killed that night when they inadvertently walked into the captured position. The next morning the enemy counter-attacked, but were driven off. The Australians then attacked again, killing another 170 Japanese but losing twelve of their own men killed and another sixteen wounded. The Kaiapit area was now firmly under Australian control. David Dexter (1961) The New Guinea Offensives, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Finschhafen, situated on the eastern end of the Huon Peninsula of New Guinea, was the scene of some bitter fighting from 22 September until 2 October 1943 following an Allied amphibious landing. After the fall of Lae (q.v.), the decision was taken to press ahead with the capture of Finschhafen as quickly as possible, to provide an air and naval base for future operations by the


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American Sixth Army against New Britain. The 20th Brigade of the 9th Australian Division (commanded by Brigadier Victor Windeyer) was accordingly landed on Scarlet Beach, some ten kilometres north of Finschhafen, at 4.45 a.m. on 22 September, with orders to move along the coast against the objective. The plan for the operation also required a battalion of the Australian 4th Brigade to march overland from Lae to join in the attack. Although the landing met only light opposition on the beach from about 400 Japanese troops, the Allied convoy involved was subjected to heavy attack by 60–70 enemy aircraft once daylight came. Despite this, the southern advance was got underway. Strong resistance was encountered at Katika, but that afternoon the Japanese abandoned their positions and by dusk the Australians were halfway to their objective. The next day a new defensive position was encountered along the Bumi River, and

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September 1943 Windeyer was forced to employ flanking tactics by throwing out one battalion to the right to attack from the west. Meanwhile it was discovered that the Japanese were also strongly posted at Sattelberg, about eight kilometres inland from Scarlet Beach, and were thus well placed to attack the Australians’ exposed lines of communication with their supply base there. Windeyer was accordingly forced to watch his rear while still pushing on hard against Finschhafen. His appeals for extra troops were not met until 30 September. In the meantime the 20th Brigade had seen some hard fighting, turning out Japanese marines from their positions along the Bumi on 26 September and pressing on towards Kakakog. The Japanese here made

another determined stand and were only overcome on 1 October after an air and artillery bombardment, losing 80–100 killed. By this stage the 22nd Battalion (the 4th Brigade unit advancing along the coast from Lae) reported signs that the enemy were in the process of evacuating Finschhafen. By the following day the leading elements of Windeyer’s brigade were in the town, having met no opposition, and were able to hail the men of the 22nd Battalion across the Mape River at Langemak Bay. The capture of Finschhafen had cost the 20th Brigade 358 casualties, of whom 73 were killed; another 391 had been evacuated sick during the operation though numbers of these men were back with their units before 2 October. Japanese losses had been

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heavy, but it was known that the bulk of enemy forces had merely yielded the coastal strip and were assembling in the west in preparation for contesting the Australian gains (see Sattelberg). David Dexter (1961) The New Guinea Offensives, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Keppel Harbour, the anchorage of the port of Singapore, was the scene of a successful raid (codenamed ‘Jaywick’) by Australian Z Special Unit commandos against Japanese shipping on the night of 26–27 September 1943. The operation was launched from Exmouth Gulf in Western Australia on 2 September, and involved a twenty-metre wooden vessel named Krait which had been used in Singapore waters before the war. Sailing in her were a crew of eight and a raiding party of six men under a British officer, Captain Ivan Lyon; apart from Lyon, four others were British while the remainder were Australian army and naval personnel. After safely reaching an islet only eleven kilometres south of Singapore, the raiders launched three rubber and canvas canoes and paddled into Keppel Harbour under the cover of darkness. Without being discovered, they attached timed limpet mines to Japanese merchant vessels found there and at the wharves at nearby Bukum Island. They then withdrew to another small, uninhabited island named Dongas to rest in hiding, with one canoe boat crew taking refuge in mangrove swamps on nearby Batam Island. The mines exploded over a twenty-minute period from 5.15 a.m., sinking seven ships totalling 35,000 tonnes. The canoeists then paddled another 80 kilometres to rendezvous with Krait at Pompong Island on 2 October, before returning to Exmouth Gulf on 19 October. An attempt to repeat the exploit a year later in an operation codenamed ‘Rimau’ was an abortive disaster, and resulted in all the raiding party being killed or captured by the Japanese; those captured were executed in


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July 1945, shortly before Singapore was retaken by the Allies. Sattelberg, a mountain mission station located about 9,000 metres above sea level only eight kilometres inland from Scarlet Beach on the Huon Peninsula, between 3 October and 25 November 1943 became a major focus of fighting after the fall of Finschhafen (q.v.). Because of their dominating position in the area, possession of the Sattelberg heights became the next priority for the 9th Australian Division. The elements of the 20th Brigade which had captured Finschhafen quickly discovered the scale and difficulty of this task, as not only was the bulk of the 5,000-strong enemy garrison originally in the area still largely intact but the Japanese had since moved the main body of their 20th Division from Bogadjim to provide reinforcement. By 3 October the Australian 2/43rd Battalion, which had undertaken a blocking role on the track leading from the coast, had come under severe pressure at Jivevaneng about five kilometres short of Sattelberg. To assist in maintaining this position, the 2/ 17th Battalion was sent to seize Kumawa just to the south and thereby cut Japanese lines of communication. This latter move, carried out on 5 October, provoked a strong counter-attack. Other enemy forces had begun to threaten the Australian beach-head from the north also, necessitating the posting of further units north of the Song River. In response to these growing threats, the 20th Brigade was now hurriedly reinforced by the 24th Brigade; by 11 October the commander of the 9th Division, Major-General George Wootten, had also established his headquarters ashore at Langemak Bay south of Finschhafen. While Wootten was making preparations for an advance against Settelberg, he learned of Japanese plans to attack him and decided to deal with this threat first. The enemy assault by two regiments began on 16

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September 1943–January 1944 October, the first thrust coming at Jivevaneng where it was successfully contained. In the pre-dawn hours of the next day a seaborne assault was made by about 70 enemy troops in three barges against the northern end of Scarlet Beach. This, too, was successfully dealt with, the attackers being almost all killed. The main assault followed later that same morning and was aimed at high ground at Katika less than three kilometres west of Scarlet Beach. Wootten was preparing to launch a counter-attack with the 2/28th Battalion on 18 October when the enemy again attacked, leading to heavy fighting. By the next day, however, the situation had been sufficiently restored for the Australians to go onto the offensive. Wootten’s position was also greatly strengthened on 20 October by the arrival of the 26th Brigade Group, which included tanks, at Langemak Bay. When the enemy attack finally subsided, the bodies of 679 Japanese were counted and it was estimated that the failed attempt had probably cost at least 1,500 casualties; Australian losses were 228, including 49 killed. The operation which Wootten had planned entailed all three brigades of his division, and necessitated the bringing of the 4th Brigade from Lae to provide for the defence of the growing base. The advance made steady progress over the next weeks, but on 22–23 November the Australians had to repel a second enemy counter-offensive although this developed little of the impetus of the first. By this stage Wootten’s troops had reached the southern slopes of the Sattelberg feature, inching their way ahead with the aid of daily air strikes and the supporting fire of tanks, mortars and artillery. On 24 November the leading element of the 2/48th Battalion fought its way forward to gain a toehold on the heights. The next day the Japanese abandoned their positions. While the capture of Sattelberg had come at a relatively light cost for the attacking Australians (only 49 killed and 118 wounded


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in the period 17–25 November), the losses of the Japanese had clearly been heavy— though impossible to assess accurately. David Dexter (1961) The New Guinea Offensives, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

John’s Knoll, an action fought on 12–13 October 1943 in the foothills of the Finisterre mountain range north-west of Lae in New Guinea, as the Australian 21st Brigade under Brigadier Ivan Dougherty pushed north from Dumpu in the Ramu Valley to get astride the main Japanese route to Bogadjim on the coast. Leading the advance, the 2/27th Battalion strove to secure dominating positions at the eastern edge of Shaggy Ridge (q.v.) and was heavily attacked after establishing itself on features dubbed ‘Trevor’s Ridge’ and ‘John’s Knoll’. At the latter point, fighting went on all day until the enemy were finally driven back before nightfall. By the time a supply column of Melanesian bearers arrived at 2 a.m. on 13 October with rations and ammunition, the Australians had only enough ammunition to continue fighting for another fifteen minutes. In the action 200 Japanese were killed for the loss of just seven Australians killed and 28 wounded. David Dexter (1961) The New Guinea Offensives, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Shaggy Ridge, a steep-sided razor-back spur about 6.5 kilometres long in New Guinea north-west of Lae, scene of grim fighting on 19–31 January 1944 by the 7th Australian Division aimed at cutting the main Japanese routes through the Finisterre mountain range. The commander of the 7th Division, Major-General George Vasey, set the 18th Brigade under Brigadier Frederick Chilton the task of capturing the key feature known as the Kankiryo Saddle at the northern end of Shaggy Ridge. The plan devised by Chilton required one battalion to fight along the main ridge while his other two battalions moved along parallel ridgelines which converged

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Troops of the 2/9th Battalion dug in on a newlyoccupied feature of Shaggy Ridge, 23 January 1944. Source: Australian War Memorial 64255

towards the Kankiryo Saddle. The main assault was intended to emanate from the left flanking unit, coming across Canning’s Saddle from the south-west. The 18th Brigade began its operation on 19 January. The enemy mounted a vigorous defence, contesting each Australian advance with determined counter-attacks, but by 26 January Kankiryo Saddle had been captured. The Japanese remained in strength at Crater Hill, however, overlooking the saddle from the north-east. Although surrounded in this position, the enemy continued to fight on, though under constant patrol pressure as well as air and artillery bombardment. Resistance here did not finally collapse until 31 January, with the survivors withdrawing towards Paipa. The actions fought in this area had resulted in an estimated 500 Japanese casualties, with 244 bodies being collected by Australians for burial; the 18th Brigade suffered 46 killed and 147 wounded. David Dexter (1961) The New Guinea Offensives, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Cowra, a mass break-out by Japanese prisoners-of-war from a detention camp three kilometres north-east of Cowra, New South Wales, on 5 August 1944. The camp, officially No.12 POW Group, was actually a complex of four individual seventeen-acre (6.9 hectares) camps separated by internal


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crossroads, each camp originally built to accommodate 1,000 inmates. At the time of the incident, the north-eastern quarter (Camp B) housed 1,104 Japanese non-commissioned officers and other ranks. The Japanese officers were held separately in a compound of Camp D, lying diagonally opposite B’s southern vertex, which they shared with Koreans and Formosans who had served as labourers with the Japanese Army. The other two camps (A & C) were occupied by Italian prisoners. Following a warning from a Korean informant in June that a mass escape was planned, measures were implemented to strengthen the camp’s defences which included obtaining more automatic weapons. A decision was also taken to separate Japanese officers and NCOs from the 700 other ranks, by removing the latter to another camp at Hay, New South Wales, on 7 August. News of this intended transfer—formally given to Camp B leaders at 1.30 p.m. on 4 August—caused immediate and intense agitation among the prisoners, who reportedly had resolved already to erase their sense of personal ‘shame’ (the product of a traditional Japanese view of capture in battle as dishonour) by a desperate venture likely to result in death. At about 1.50 a.m. the following morning, on the pre-arranged signal of a bugle call, nearly the entire population of Camp B raced from their huts armed with knives and improvised weapons such as clubs. The outer perimeter fence was stormed at two points, prisoners using blankets and baseball gloves to minimise the obstacle presented by barbed wire. Others rushed the fence and main gate on the camp’s western side, a large number reaching the internal thoroughfare known as ‘Broadway’ with the aim of freeing the officers in Camp D. Behind those engaged in the break-out, other prisoners set fire to eighteen of Camp B’s twenty huts while those incapable of taking an active part committed suicide by hanging or stabbing, their bodies

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January–August 1944


Blankets drape barbed-wire fences following the mass break-out by Japanese prisoners at Cowra. Source: Australian War Memorial 73485

incinerated in the flames. The camp’s guards, members of the 22nd Australian Garrison Battalion, opened fire and struck down a large number of escapees. Prisoners who got outside the camp boundaries initially moved against the living quarters of the garrison until driven off, whereupon they dispersed into the countryside. Several guard-posts outside the perimeter were also attacked and overrun; in one case the escapees succeeded in taking over a truck-mounted Vickers machine-gun after killing its two-man crew, but failed in their efforts to get the weapon into action against the Australians. A total of three guards died in the fighting, and four others were wounded (three by stray bullets). Firing continued for several hours as resistance was overcome and those prisoners willing to surrender were rounded up. Of Camp B’s original population, nearly two-thirds (726) remained within the confines of the camp complex, alive or dead; 378 had succeeded in scaling the outer perimeter, and of these 334 remained alive


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to flee into the surrounding district. This made Cowra the largest POW break-out recorded, far eclipsing the so-called ‘Great Escape’ by 76 Allied prisoners from Stalag Luft III at Sagan, Germany, on 24–25 March 1944. With the assistance of young recruits from the nearby army training camp, operations were mounted over the next nine days to apprehend the Japanese escapees, in the course of which one Australian officer was fatally stabbed. Many of the fugitives chose suicide rather than recapture, with the result that only 309 were taken back into custody alive. Total Japanese casualties from the mutiny were 231 men killed or died of wounds, and a further 108 wounded. The bravery of the two guards killed defending their Vickers gun was recognised with the George Cross, although these awards were not made public until September 1950. Harry Gordon (1978) Die like the Carp!, Stanmore, NSW: Cassell; Hugh Clarke (1994) Escape to Death, Milsons Point, NSW: Random House

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at the enemy approaching in line—a classic case of the naval manoeuvre known as ‘crossing the T’. Radar-directed fire from the American battleships’ 14-inch and 16-inch guns continued the destruction of Nishimura’s squadron. By the time Shima’s following ships arrived in the strait several hours later, there was little to be done to retrieve Japanese fortunes, so he turned about and joined the battered remnants of Nishimura’s force in retreat. An American destroyer completed the destruction of Yamashiro just before daylight, and other Japanese ships were sunk by air attacks in ensuing days. The sole Allied casualty of the action had been a US destroyer which was damaged. From the Australian perspective, the battle of Surigao Strait was notable because of the involvement of two RAN ships—the heavy cruiser Shropshire and the destroyer Arunta. The latter took part in the frenzied torpedo attacks which preceded the main gun battle, firing four tubes at the Japanese destroyer Shigure at a range of under 6,000 metres but missing the target. Shropshire joined two American light cruisers in engaging Yamashiro, firing 32 broadsides from her eight 8-inch guns in just fourteen minutes at ranges between twelve and fourteen kilometres. G. Hermon Gill (1968) Royal Australian Navy 1942–1945, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

US battleships

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Surigao Strait, lying between Leyte and Dinagat islands in the Philippines, on 25 October 1944 was the scene of one of four naval actions which are collectively known as the Battle for Leyte Gulf. The clash occurred when a force of Japanese ships under Vice-Admiral Shoji Nishimura, comprising two battleships, a cruiser and four destroyers, attempted to pass from the Sulu Sea into Leyte Gulf; supporting Nishimura’s ships was a second force of three cruisers and nine destroyers under Vice-Admiral Kiyohide Shima. Upon learning of Nishimura’s approach from the west, Vice-Admiral Thomas Kinkaid, commander of the Allied naval force covering the amphibious landings by troops of the US Sixth Army on the east coast of Leyte Island, sent Rear-Admiral Jesse Oldendorf with his six battleships (and escorting cruisers and destroyers) to picket the northern end of the Surigao Strait and await the enemy’s arrival. As the Japanese entered the passage in the early hours of 25 October, they were met by destroyer and torpedo boat attacks which sank two destroyers and the battleship Fuso and damaged the other battleship in the force, Yamashiro. Nishimura was then engaged by Oldendorf ’s heavy ships, arrayed in line so that the full weight of their main armament could be directed down the strait

Lingayen Gulf, on the north-east coast of Luzon Island in the Philippines, in January 1945 was the scene of an American amphibious landing which gave rise to significant action at sea for Australian warships participating in the operation. The date scheduled for the landing was 9 January, but as the Allied armada sailed west from Leyte from 2 January—moving through the Sulu and South China seas—its various component forces were repeatedly attacked by Japanese aircraft and surface ships. At 7.30 a.m. on 3 January the Australian frigate

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October 1944–January 1945 Gascoyne—among the ships screening the leading group of minesweepers and hydrographic ships—was near-missed by a bomb which luckily failed to explode. Two days later the same vessel, with the sloop HMAS Warrego and an American destroyer, were about 150 kilometres west of Subic Bay when they engaged two Japanese destroyers with gunfire soon after 4 p.m.; the enemy ships quickly turned and fled back towards Manila. It was shortly after the latter action that the Bombardment and Fire Support Group, following along behind, also came under heavy and sustained air attack. The group comprised a formidable array of battleships, escort carriers, cruisers and destroyers—all high value targets for the enemy aircraft. Since the Leyte Gulf operation in October 1944 (see Surigao Strait), the Japanese pilots had been known to use suicide tactics against Allied ships with increasing frequency. Indeed, during the Leyte landing, the heavy cruiser Australia had been the victim of one such attack, but (having undergone repairs) this ship was now back in service and sailing with the Bombardment and Fire Support Group along with three other Australian ships—the heavy cruiser Shropshire, and destroyers Arunta and Warramunga. The group of heavy ships was subjected to repeated attacks, commencing at 4.15 p.m. and lasting for two and a half hours, by 50–60 aircraft. Seven vessels were hit and damaged by kamikaze (suicide) pilots, including Australia and Arunta. The former took a direct hit amidships on the port side upper deck, suffering slight material damage but casualties of 25 killed and 30 wounded. Arunta’s attacker missed making direct contact by only a few metres, crashing into the sea close by the port side. A bomb carried by the plane, however, blew several holes in the ship’s hull, killing two men and causing damage to the steering. Despite their damage and losses, both Australian ships were able


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to carry on with their roles. On 6 January Australia and Shropshire entered Lingayen Gulf to take part in a bombardment mission. Vessels taking part in operations were sporadically attacked throughout the day, and several were damaged by suicide planes. About ten minutes after noon Shropshire was near-missed in one such attack, and several of the smaller Australian vessels were in action against the aircraft. At 5.34 p.m. Australia fell victim to a second attacker, on this occasion a Navy type ‘Val’ dive-bomber which hit the cruiser’s upper deck amidships on the starboard side. Although material damage was again limited, there was a high casualty toll—fourteen killed and 26 wounded. Australia still carried on, but at about 7.30 a.m. on 8 January she was struck twice more. The first of the attackers was shot down twenty metres short of its target and only the plane’s wreckage skidded into the ship’s side, causing little damage. Twenty minutes later a second aircraft suffered a similar fate. This time, however, a bomb the plane was carrying detonated close beside or against the cruiser’s side at the waterline, and blew open a large hole in the hull which caused flooding. Although the ship took on a list of five degrees she still carried on, and actually completed her bombardment duties that day. At 1 p.m. the next day, the day of the troop landing, the unlucky ship was hit a further time—this time losing the top third of her funnel. Since Australia had already completed her bombardment tasks several hours earlier, she was ordered home to Australia for repairs. During the Lingayen operation one other Australian vessel, the LSI (Landing Ship, Infantry) Westralia, had a narrow brush with a kamikaze. The ship, one of three such Australian transports in the Lingayen Attack Force, was carrying 880 members of the 37th American Division when she was attacked at 6.50 p.m. on 8 January. The

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enemy aircraft went into a steep dive which was clearly aimed at the ship’s bridge, but the gun crews kept their calm and put up such a well-aimed barrage that the attacker eventually crashed in a mass of wreckage about three metres astern. The ship was showered with debris which slightly wounded one crewman, but the ship’s own gunnery was credited with saving it from destruction. G. Hermon Gill (1968) Royal Australian Navy 1942–1945, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Slater’s Knoll, a feature lying close beside the Puriata River on Bougainville Island, was the scene of bitter fighting from 19 March until 5 April 1945 between Australian and Japanese troops. In early March the 25th Battalion of the 7th Australian Brigade resumed a southwards advance along the south-west coast towards major concentrations of Japanese forces at Buin. After the Puriata was crossed on 4 March and enemy defenders pushed off Slater’s Knoll, resistance became stronger and it was realised that the Japanese intended to contest the Australian advance much more vigorously than hitherto. The troops holding the perimeter on Slater’s began receiving heavy machine-gun fire and it was also found that the enemy were digging themselves fresh defensive positions astride the Buin road only a few hundred metres from the Australian posts. When the battalion commander (Lieut.-Colonel J.G. McKinna) attempted to move off Slater’s on 11 March by sending a company a kilometre or so ahead towards Tokinotu, this advance was met with strong Japanese resistance. The company formed a perimeter, in which it was attacked three times on 15 March, and again on the 16th and 17th. With this body under fire from three sides, it was realised that a strong Japanese force was moving about in the area between the forward company and the perimeter at Slater’s Knoll. To relieve this


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situation, McKinna launched a two-company thrust astride the road on 19 March with the aim of clearing as far forward as Tokinotu. This move had not gone far when the east flank company encountered Japanese in an extensive system of pillboxes. After a two-hour firefight the Australians charged the position with bayonets, only to be forced back 45 minutes later having suffered five killed and seventeen wounded (three fatally). The Japanese had lost 23 killed in the strongpoint, as well as a further six seen to fall as the retreating enemy reached their rear positions. On 22 March the positions to which the Japanese had fallen back were subjected to air attack by New Zealand Corsairs, and also heavily shelled. The enemy pits were then attacked again, and within an hour had been taken at a cost of five wounded Australians; eighteen dead Japanese remained in the position. Although Slater’s Knoll was now some distance behind the forward Australian lines, it was still the focus of enemy attention. At 8.15 p.m. on 27 March the rear of the perimeter was suddenly assailed by about 100 Japanese, who rushed forward screaming with fixed bayonets. The attack was beaten off, as were several following efforts. Other Australian positions nearby were similarly assaulted, prompting the decision to move some Matilda tanks forward to Slater’s. Clashes continued on a frequent basis for the next few days, as captured papers revealed that a fresh enemy regiment was preparing to mount a new attack. At 5 a.m. on 5 March the perimeter at Slater’s Knoll— then manned by only 129 men—came under fierce assault from two directions. For more than an hour the Japanese kept up the attack, with many falling only a few metres from the defenders’ weapon pits. At dawn nearly 300 bodies were found strewn over a patch of ground less than 200 metres square. This action was the culmination of ten days of fighting in which the Japanese—then estimated to have a strength in the area of

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April–May 1945 2,400—had lost at least 620 men killed and 1,000 wounded. Casualties in the 25th Battalion, which bore the brunt of fighting about Slater’s Knoll, for the whole of the period January to April had been 189 killed and wounded. Gavin Long (1963) The Final Campaigns, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Wewak, scene of the last Australian campaign on mainland New Guinea, was finally captured from the Japanese on 11–15 May 1945. The campaign began late in 1944 when the 6th Australian Division commanded by Major-General Jack Stevens took over from the American 11th Corps at Aitape, where it had been landed in April 1944 in a move deliberately intended to bypass large enemy garrisons at points north of Lae— particularly around Wewak, where the Japanese Eighteenth Army was based. The task assigned to the Australians was to mount a limited offensive to cut off the enemy from resupply points along the coastal strip, and to force them inland where they must becoming increasingly ineffective as a military force. The Australian offensive, beginning in November 1944, was directed east along the coast from Aitape but also south of the Torricelli mountain range where the Japanese were drawing food supplies from local gardens. By late March the advance had reached Dagua, within 40 kilometres of Wewak, and witnessed some of the most severe fighting of the campaign. Preparations were put in train to seize Wewak by an amphibious assault, combined with a final push along the coast from the west. The seaborne landing, carried out by two Commando squadrons, went ashore at Dove Bay east of Wewak on 11 May and was intended to cut the coastal road on that side; it met with very slight opposition. The advancing 19th Brigade found the going heavier as it seized Wewak Point on 10 May and moved to take the airfield on 11 May.


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Considerable fighting was needed to finally secure the area surrounding Wewak, but by 15 May the Australians had gained complete control of the coastal zone. Although the capture of Wewak forced the Japanese inland and broke their formations into groups of smaller size, the enemy force—still numbering some 35,000 men—retained a capacity for resistance. The reduction of Japanese forces in the Aitape– Wewak area had still not been completed at the time of the Japanese capitulation in August. The 6th Division’s advance had cost it 442 men killed and 1,141 wounded; Japanese losses were put at 9,000 killed and only 269 taken prisoner. Gavin Long (1963) The Final Campaigns, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Tarakan, an island off the north-east coast of Borneo, on 1 May 1945 was the scene of an invasion landing by an Australian brigade group (‘Oboe One Force’) under Brigadier David Whitehead. This comprised the three infantry battalions of the 26th Brigade of the 9th Australian Division (2/23rd, 2/24th and 2/48th), two pioneer battalions, the 2/ 4th Commando Squadron, 2/7th Field Regiment and several smaller engineer, armoured and machine-gun units—in all, nearly 12,000 men. The operation was primarily intended to seize the airfield, which was needed to create a base for air and naval units supporting further operations against Japanese forces in Borneo. The assault was preceded by an extensive program of air bombardment from 12 April to suppress enemy opposition. The day before the landing the commandos went ashore on Sadau Island (between Tarakan and the main island of Borneo), with a battery of artillery. From here, the guns were to protect engineers making gaps in the obstacles protecting the beach at Lingkas, just south of the town of Tarakan, across which the landings were to take place. The next day, after a heavy air and naval

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bombardment, the 2/23rd and 2/48th battalions waded ashore without meeting any opposition on the beaches. Enemy fire was encountered as the troops pushed north towards the town, but casualties were still very light and by nightfall a beach-head had been gained 2.5 kilometres wide and up to two kilometres deep. As the attackers pressed on inland in succeeding days, they met with increasingly determined resistance, so that it was not until 5 May that the Australian flag was finally hoisted over the airfield. Even after this, pockets of the Japanese—unable to withdraw from the island and unwilling to surrender—continued to fight on doggedly. What had been originally envisaged as a three-week operation ultimately turned into a difficult and exhausting two-month campaign which saw 225 Australians killed and another 669 wounded, and claimed the lives of 1,540 Japanese or three-quarters of the island’s garrison of about 2,100. Some 300 Japanese were still at liberty until after the cease-fire in August. Even with the airfield in Australian hands the object of the invasion was not fully realised, since the area had been badly cratered by Allied bombing and was also waterlogged. Despite prodigious repair efforts by airfield construction personnel, it took eight weeks for the strip to become usable—too late for its intended role in subsequent Oboe operations. As a consequence it has generally been held that the costs of the operation were not justified by its results. Gavin Long (1963) The Final Campaigns, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Peter Stanley (1997) Tarakan: An Australian Tragedy, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Labuan–Brunei Bay, on the north-west coast of Borneo, was the scene of landings on 10 and 16 June 1945 which formed the second phase of the Allies’ campaign to seize the island from the Japanese. The operation, codenamed ‘Oboe 6’, was conducted by the


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9th Australian Division commanded by Major-General George Wootten—less the 26th Brigade which was still engaged at Tarakan (q.v.)—and involved a total of more than 29,000 men. The objective of the invasion force was to secure the ground needed for an advanced fleet base to be established, and also to protect oil and rubber-producing facilities in the area. On the morning of 10 June, following a heavy air and naval bombardment, the 24th Brigade (2/28th and 2/43rd battalions) was put ashore on the southern end of Labuan Island in the entrance to Brunei Bay. At the same time the 20th Brigade was landed on the southern edge of the bay—the 2/17th Battalion securing a beach-head at Brunei Bluff on the mainland of Borneo itself, just north of the town of Brooketon; the 2/15th seizing the small Muara Island close by. The enemy had retired to defensive positions away from the beach-front, so there was no opposition to any of these landings; Muara was quickly found to be ungarrisoned by the enemy anyway. On Labuan, the town and airfield were both secured by dusk at a cost of only a few casualties to steadily increasing Japanese resistance. When the Australians pressed their attack over the next two days, however, the surviving Japanese withdrew into a stronghold dug into a tangle of jungle-covered ridges on the edge of a mangrove swamp little more than a kilometre west of the airfield. Realising that a full-scale attack would be needed to subdue the enemy resisting in what became known as ‘The Pocket’, a five-day barrage was laid down before infantry and tanks advanced on 15 June. After only a few posts were taken, but two tanks damaged by the defenders, it was decided to continue the bombardment before making a further attempt. In addition to artillery, gunfire from the Australian cruiser Shropshire and aerial bombing was also brought to bear. On 21 June two companies again assaulted The Pocket, supported by

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May–June 1945

Australian landings 10 June Beaufort Labuan I.

Weston BRUNEI BAY

on

Australian landing 16 June

Br

oo

ke t

Muara I.

Brunei

tanks (some with flamethrowers). About 180 Japanese were killed in the attack, bringing to 389 the number of enemy dead since the Labuan landing; Australian dead numbered 34. For the battalions in the southern landings, things had been remarkably quiet initially. The 2/17th Battalion saw few Japanese as it advanced south down the peninsula, and by 13 June the town of Brunei was entered. The 2/17th was then pushed through and moved further south still, to strengthen the Australian position. On 16 June a new landing was made at the north-eastern end of Brunei Bay, with the 2/32nd Battalion put ashore at Padas Bay to seize the town of Weston. From here reconnaissance patrols were to be pushed across-country towards Beaufort about 23 kilometres inland to the north-east. The latter place was found to be strongly defended by 800–1,000 Japanese, so on 27 June a decisive attack was opened there by the 2/43rd Battalion. While one


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company secured the town, another made a gruelling march over the hills to take up ambush positions at a track junction likely to be used in any enemy withdrawal. After considerable fighting in and around Beaufort, the Japanese began pulling back on 28 June —along the routes they were expected to take. By the next morning more than 100 had been killed. Around Brunei town, the 20th Brigade continued to extend the division’s grip beyond the bay. The two battalions originally landed were joined by the 2/13th Battalion and now proceeded to advance south-west along the coast towards Kuching, taking Miri and Lutong, also Seria, together with the immediate hinterland. By cessation of hostilities in August, Australian Army casualties in north Borneo totalled 114 killed or died of wounds and 221 injured. The number of dead Japanese seen and counted was 1,234, while 130 had been taken prisoner.

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Gavin Long (1963) The Final Campaigns, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Balikpapan, an oil port on the south-east coast of Borneo, on 1 July 1945 became the scene of the largest (and last) Australian amphibious landing of the Second World War. The purpose of the operation was to secure the port and oilfields in the area, and to establish a base from which to launch an expedition against Java. These objectives had some point when the operation was conceived in late 1944, but the changing military circumstances since that time had made its implementation appear less and less necessary. In May General Sir Thomas Blamey, the Commander-in-Chief of Australian Military Forces, had proposed abandoning the project but was overruled by the American theatre commander, General Douglas MacArthur, who persuaded the Australian government that cancellation would ‘disorganise completely . . . the strategic plan of the Joint Chiefs of Staff ’. Some 33,000 personnel were assembled for the operation, the bulk of these— 21,000—being troops of the 7th Australian Division under Major-General Edward Milford, while the rest were members of base units, the Royal Australian Air Force, and others. Milford’s plan of attack called for an assault by two brigades against the beach at Klandasan, near Balikpapan’s built-up area. This would mean delivering the troops into the teeth of the enemy’s main defences, but Milford reasoned this approach was fully justified considering the massive fire support available to suppress Japanese resistance beforehand; it also avoided the likely high cost of landing the troops some distance away and requiring them to fight onto these same objectives. In accordance with this plan, a program of air bombardment aimed at saturating Balikpapan’s defence system and enemy air bases within range commenced twenty days before the scheduled date of the landings. On 15 June a naval covering force which


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included six cruisers (two of these Australian) arrived and commenced a two-week pounding of shore targets during which 23,000 shells were fired. On the day of the landing, vessels lying offshore fired another 17,250 shells and rockets onto known and suspected Japanese positions. After it seemed that all enemy posts would have been effectively smothered, at 9 a.m. the troops of the 18th and 21st brigades were sent in. As expected, the actual landing was unopposed and the first resistance was encountered only when the advance off the beach got underway. The task of securing the high ground behind Klandasan and Balikpapan town belonged to the 18th Brigade, operating on the left. The area was riddled with tunnels and pillboxes, and littered with thousands of mines and booby traps. An attack carried out by the 2/10th Battalion without naval or artillery support suffered many casualties, but had taken the objectives by shortly after 2 p.m. By nightfall the beach-head had been pushed two kilometres inland. The 21st Brigade on the right had the role of pressing east along the coast, towards the airfield at Sepinggang five kilometres away and another at Manggar about ten kilometres beyond that. Its advance at first met with only intermittent gun and mortar fire, but by the end of the day had been confronted with strong opposition. Not until the next day, 2 July, was Sepinggang airfield seized. On that same day the 25th Brigade came ashore and, while the 18th Brigade continued the process of securing the town and harbour, moved past Balikpapan’s eastern outskirts astride a road dubbed the ‘Milford Highway’ towards Batuchampar, some ten kilometres inland. Here it encountered elements of a Japanese battalion well dug-in in jungle positions and heavy fighting began which claimed 56 Australian casualties on 5–6 July alone. Meanwhile, by 4 July the 21st Brigade had reached and occupied Manggar, but had

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1945–1950


The first assault wave of the 7th Division going ashore at Balikpapan in a LCVP on 1 July 1945. Source: Australian War Memorial 128283

some hard fighting during 6–9 July to overrun a stronghold containing gun and mortar positions which had been sited to cover the airstrip. As the port facilities had been largely captured by 4 July, Milford was keen to open these and reduce the problems being experienced in landing sufficient stores across an open beach. The naval commander demurred, however, because of the possibility that the Japanese had positioned artillery on the western shore of Balikpapan Bay. To deal with this risk, on the afternoon of 5 July a battalion group of the 18th Brigade was put ashore at Penadjam and began fanning out. Little opposition was encountered in this area for another two days. By 9 July all enemy resistance in the immediate coastal area had been overcome, and only towards Batuchampar were the Japanese still fighting resolutely. Even here,


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however, it was found that the enemy suddenly abandoned their positions on the evening of 21 July and made a long withdrawal into the rugged hills. By the time of the cease-fire, the Australians had lost 229 men killed or died of wounds and another 634 injured. Japanese losses were at least 1,783 killed (these being bodies counted, but did not include others buried in blown-up tunnels); only 63 surrendered or allowed themselves to be taken prisoner. Gavin Long (1963) The Final Campaigns, Canberra: Australian War Memorial

Sariwon, a bizarre one-sided action which occurred on 17 October 1950 during the United Nations (UN) counter-offensive launched against North Korean communist forces which had invaded the southern Republic of Korea. By 16 October the North Koreans were in rapid retreat and struggling

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to concentrate on their capital, Pyongyang, while American troops had occupied the village of Sohung little more than 70 kilometres directly to the south-east. The 27th British Commonwealth Brigade (which included the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment, or 3 RAR) was ordered to take over the advance the next day with the object of capturing Sariwon, an industrial town also reputed to be an important military training centre, located about 40 kilometres by road to the west of Sohung and only 54 kilometres south of Pyongyang. The brigade set off at 6.40 a.m., with two British companies of the Argyll and Sutherland Highland Regiment in the van sitting atop of Sherman tanks and riding in trucks. Virtually no opposition was encountered until anti-tank and automatic fire was received from an enemy road-block six kilometres east of Sariwon. This resistance was quickly swept aside in a copybook attack by the Argylls, who then entered the heavily bombed and largely deserted town; while one company established a strongpoint, the other fanned out across the northern suburbs. Ordered to pass through and cut the road north-west of Sariwon, the Australian battalion advanced a further eight kilometres across the rolling plain country through which the road passed before taking up a defensive position at last light. Many North Korean units, falling back under pressure from the 24th US Infantry Division on the left flank, clearly had no idea that UN forces had taken Sariwon or even that they were in the area. Throughout the day large numbers of enemy continued to enter the town by the truckload and on foot from the south and south-west. The arrival at 6 p.m. of the main body of 27 Brigade was several times followed by scenes of absurd confusion, with trucks of both sides sometimes parking on opposite sides of the street without either being immediately aware of the other’s identity. At least one party of Argylls was mistaken by North


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Koreans for Russian allies before the error was discovered and shooting began at very close quarters. Groups of enemy who either escaped contact with the Argylls inside Sariwon or else bypassed the town began blundering into the blocking position established further along the road by 3 RAR. The commander of the Australian battalion, Lieut.-Colonel Charles Green, was preparing to launch a co-ordinated attack on enemy positions in front of him early next morning, but instead found himself obliged to turn around his reserve company to face the way they had come to deal with enemy contacts at both ends of his perimeter. Meanwhile, a marching column of North Koreans stumbled upon 3 RAR’s second-in-command, Major Ian Ferguson, who was waiting with a party of six guides in an apple orchard between the battalion position and Sariwon for the arrival of the unit’s ration vehicles. Again, the enemy at first took the strangers to be Russians, but shots were soon fired and the enemy column dispersed to adopt fire positions. After Ferguson radioed for assistance, B Company under Major George Thirlwell was sent out to help clear the enemy presence away from the battalion’s rear. Upon the arrival of these troops, Ferguson mounted a tank with Thirlwell and an interpreter and drove down the road calling on the North Koreans to surrender as they were surrounded. Deceived by this bold bluff, more than 1,500 enemy soldiers were taken prisoner—Ferguson later claimed the total figure was 1,982—along with their weapons, which included some anti-tank guns, many automatic weapons and mortars. At 11 p.m. a convoy of the 7th US Cavalry Regiment, their vehicle lights turned on, drove into 3 RAR’s lines from the north. This unit had followed tracks to the east of the 27th Brigade’s advance and reached the main road again at Hwangju, a few kilometres north of the Australian road-block. The

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October 1950 American movement had trapped further large numbers of enemy, and after a brisk fight another 1,700 prisoners had been taken, with whom the 7th Cavalry returned. The capture of Sariwon, and the accompanying North Korean losses of at least 215 personnel killed and a large number of prisoners, had been accomplished at a cost of just one man killed and three wounded (all among the Argylls). Although warmly praised for their part in the highly successful action by Major-General Hobart Gay, commander of the 1st US Cavalry Division under whom the 27th Brigade had been placed, the Australians themselves understandably regarded the action as a pretty tame affair. Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Yongju, an action fought on 22 October 1950 during the United Nations (UN) counteroffensive against North Korean communist forces which had invaded the southern Republic of Korea. The North Korean capital, Pyongyang, was captured on 19 October, and the next day the 187th US Airborne Regimental Combat Team was dropped by parachute at Sukchon and Sunchon, 40 kilometres to the north and in advance of UN spearheads, with the twin objectives of releasing a trainload of American prisoners and cutting enemy retreat routes up the west coast of the Korean peninsula. By this stage, however, the bulk of the enemy’s forces had already escaped across the Chongchon River, leaving a single regiment of some 2,500 men to impose delay on the following UN forces from high ground east of Yongju, a small town twelve kilometres south of Sukchon. The paratroop landings met with little resistance until elements of the American airborne force began a southerly advance to clear the road from Sukchon on 21 October. They soon found themselves engaged in heavy fighting about three kilometres north


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of Yongju, and appealed for assistance from other UN forces at Pyongyang. At this time the 27th British Commonwealth Brigade (which included the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment, or 3 RAR), was leading the advance of the UN’s Eighth Army, and was hurriedly ordered forward. With British troops of the Argyll and Sutherland Highland Regiment in the lead, the brigade pushed up the road until fired upon from hills a little to the south of Yongju; the Argylls deployed and cleared the hills just on dusk. Elements of the American airborne force had already occupied the town itself. About midnight, the North Koreans attempted to break out from what had now effectively become an encirclement and triggered heavy fighting which lasted throughout the remaining hours of darkness. By dawn on 22 October the Americans again appealed for assistance, and the Argylls moved into Yongju to clear and burn the town. At 7 a.m. 3 RAR was ordered to lead a brigade advance through Yongju towards Sukchon, following the road which skirted the higher ground to the north-east in a westerly arc. With C Company leading atop Sherman tanks, the advance had covered one and a half kilometres before coming under fire at 9 a.m. from an apple orchard on its right flank. Sukchon

187th US Airborne RCT

Attempted breakout

Attempted breakout 3 RAR

239th NK Regt

Yongju

0 Pyongyang

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When the commanding officer of 3 RAR, Lieut.-Colonel Charles Green, advised the brigade headquarters that he was about to attack, he was informed that the 187th Airborne force was about 1,500 metres further north, but that because their precise location was unknown he could not use artillery or mortar fire to support his assault. Undeterred by this, the tanks carrying C Company swung eastwards towards the enemy positions in the orchard. When close to the objective, the troops jumped to the ground and launched a determined bayonet charge. In most instances the North Korean soldiers left their fire positions or pits and fled, suffering heavy casualties from both C Company and tankfire. Green’s own tactical headquarters, moving behind the assault formation, encountered a large band of enemy and was forced to withstand attack by fighting back to back. Many enemy attempted to escape from the ever-decreasing gap between the American positions and 3 RAR by fleeing westwards across the open paddy fields. Those not cut down by tank and small-arms fire sought concealment among rice stooks and haystacks, from where they kept up sniping fire on the Australians. D Company was then called in to clear out pockets of enemy remaining within the battalion area, before moving forward to make contact with 503rd US Airborne Battalion—the nearest element of the 187th Airborne force—which had itself been in action since 6 a.m. and suffered some casualties. The fighting was largely over by midday but later the whole area had to be carefully cleared, as the enemy who had not fled would not surrender but remained low, often feigning death, until individually flushed out. The British commander of 27th Brigade, Brigadier Aubrey Coad, was deeply impressed to watch men of 3 RAR conduct a sweep as though ‘driving snipe’, potting each enemy soldier who bolted when a pile of straw was kicked:


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Up with a rifle, down with a North Korean, and the Australians thoroughly enjoyed it! They did that the whole day, and they really were absolutely in their element.

This engagement—often referred to as the ‘Apple Orchard action’—was the Australians’ first major battle in Korea, and 3 RAR had performed with distinction. At a cost of only seven men wounded, they had inflicted casualties on the enemy of approximately 150 killed and taken 239 of the brigade’s 800 prisoners that day. Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Kujin, an action fought on 25–26 October 1950 during the advance of United Nations (UN) forces towards the Manchurian border during the Korean War. After the Chongchon River had been crossed, the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (or 3 RAR) was ordered to resume leading the advance by the 27th British Commonwealth Brigade towards Pakchon. At 4 p.m. on 25 October, B Company of 3 RAR had reached Kujin— a village three kilometres south of Pakchon where the main road to Manchuria diverged west across the Taeryong River via a 300-metre concrete bridge—only to find that one span of the bridge had been demolished. Using debris from the destroyed span, elements of a platoon crossed to reconnoitre the far bank and—after establishing that the enemy was in possession of the high ground there—the Australians withdrew to enable an airstrike to be brought in between 5.15 and 5.30 p.m. After sending D Company into Pakchon to clear out that town and ensure that his right flank was secure, the commander of 3 RAR, Lieut.-Colonel Charles Green, was concerned not to allow the enemy time to strengthen their positions across the river. At 7 p.m. he accordingly sent A and B companies over to the western side, again using the broken span, with orders

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October 1950 to scale the bank and establish defensive positions on the crest 400 metres from the river—one on either side of the road. This objective was achieved, but shortly after B Company was in position on the right (or northern) side the enemy was detected forming up for a frontal assault and mortar fire had to be brought in to break up these preparations. Enemy mortar rounds also began falling on the company positions, although this form of harassment was less effective than aimed small-arms fire which began after 10.30 p.m. In response to renewed concentrations of enemy preparing to attack, further fire missions of artillery and mortars were brought at 11 p.m., and reinforcements were despatched to A Company across the bridge in the dark. At about 4 a.m. on 26 October the North Koreans pushed their assault against both companies with the support of T–34 tanks. One tank pressed to within ten metres of B Company headquarters, while another rumbled up the road in front of A Company leading two jeeps, a motorcycle and about 60 infantry. The Australians did not open up until the whole enemy force was within their field of fire, but then began a fusillade which forced the abandonment of all the vehicles except the tank which shot its way out. Dawn the next day found the Australians still in possession of their bridgehead across the Taeryong. At 7 a.m. airstrikes were called in onto enemy-held ridges further west of the ones held by 3 RAR, and after the way ahead was reported clear the remaining companies moved across from the eastern bank later that morning. The action—often referred to as the ‘Battle of the Broken Bridge’—had cost eight Australian lives and seen 22 men wounded; enemy losses were over 100 killed and some 350 prisoners. Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Chongju, an action fought in Korea on 29


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October 1950, during the advance by United Nations (UN) forces towards the Yalu River forming the boundary between communist North Korea and China. Having led the advance north up the west coast of the Korean peninsula to the Taeryong River, on 27 October the 27th British Commonwealth Brigade—which included the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (3 RAR)— turned west and continued the drive towards the mouth of the Yalu. On 29 October, six kilometres short of the town of Chongju, 3 RAR took over as the leading battalion of the brigade. At 10 a.m. a Mosquito spotter aircraft reported a strong enemy presence, both infantry and tanks, on a thickly wooded ridgeline astride the line of advance. These forces were occupying carefully sited and well-prepared positions on the forward slopes at either side of the road, and even the tanks were dug in and camouflaged. Eight American airstrikes were called in to blast the North Korean positions among the pine trees with napalm and rockets, and these accounted for seven Russian-made T–34/ 85 tanks and two SU–76 self-propelled guns. An attack launched by D Company against the ridge south of the road at 2.30 p.m. met heavy resistance, during which one of the Sherman tanks supporting the Australians was hit by an armour-piercing shell through the turret. A company machine-gunner, in turn, accounted for a North Korean tank, sending a well-directed burst which set alight the vehicle’s auxiliary petrol tanks and caused its ammunition to explode. Despite the strength of enemy opposition, the company’s objectives had been secured two hours later. A Company, also supported by tanks, next launched an attack against enemy entrenched on the ridge to the north of the road. Again, heavy resistance had to be overcome—three T–34s being destroyed by the company’s bazookas (3.5-inch rocket launchers) alone—before its objectives were also attained by 5.30 p.m. B Company then

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moved forward to occupy, unopposed, a position astride the road and between the first two companies; battalion headquarters moved in behind B Company, while C Company took up position across the rear as unit reserve. With counter-attacks fully expected, 3 RAR began digging in. Bringing up substantial reinforcements, the North Koreans moved first against D Company on the southern flank between 7 and 8 p.m. The weight of this assault fell on a single platoon and resulted in the company perimeter being penetrated, but was repulsed by charges from the other two platoons after two hours of hard fighting. Some North Koreans managed to reach behind the company, placing the battalion headquarters under fire and cutting it off from contact with D Company until these enemy personnel were hunted out. At 9.30 p.m. the enemy’s focus shifted to the northern position with a furious assault against A Company. This failed, too, being dispersed with the help of artillery and mortar fire which was brought in to within ten metres of the forward Australian weapon pits. The enemy gave up and withdrew at 10.15 p.m., although for the next 45 minutes a self-propelled gun continued to shell the battalion periodically by firing armour-piercing rounds mainly along the road. Apart from the thirteen destroyed armoured vehicles left on the battlefield, over 150 enemy bodies were counted within the battalion defensive positions the next morning. During 30 October 3 RAR advanced to high ground overlooking Chongju, killing another twelve North Koreans and taking ten prisoners along the way. At 3 p.m. the town was cleared without opposition by other elements of the brigade. Australian casualties in the action were nine killed—including 3 RAR’s commanding officer, freakishly wounded by one of six random enemy gun rounds fired at dusk on 30 October—and 30 wounded. Norman Bartlett (ed.) (1957) With the Australians


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in Korea, 2nd edn, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Pakchon, an action fought on 5 November 1950, four days after the entry of communist Chinese forces into the Korean War. Following the capture of Chongju (q.v.) on 30 October, 27th British Commonweath Brigade (which included the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment, or 3 RAR) was withdrawn to the Pakchon area where it had previously fought (see Kujin). Here it was ordered to join in a rearguard operation defending the lower crossings of the Taeryong and Chongchon rivers. With the 1st Battalion of the Middlesex Regiment, 3 RAR held positions around the town of Pakchon while further upstream—on the brigade’s right—was the 24th US Infantry Division. During the night of 4–5 November, the Chinese and North Koreans launched a full-scale attack which pushed a regiment of the American division back nearly two kilometres. The enemy then turned west to advance between the two rivers, in a movement which threatened 27th Brigade’s rear. At 8 a.m. the next day the 161st US Field Artillery Battalion which was supporting the brigade from a position beside the road about three kilometres south of Pakchon came under attack, finding itself forced to fire its guns over open sights at point-blank range. The brigade’s reserve battalion (Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders), in position around Kujin, hurried to the Americans’ assistance, arriving to find them out of shells and with dead Chinese heaped within 30 metres of the guns’ muzzles. While the Argylls succeeded in clearing the ground around the American gunlines by 10 a.m., it was realised that the enemy was still trying to cut the road further south and thereby isolate 27th Brigade north of

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October–November 1950


Troops from C Company, 3 RAR, and an American Patton tank fire on fleeing enemy after capturing a hilltop during the battle for the Pakchon–Sinanju road, 7 November 1950. Source: Australian War Memorial 146976

the Chongchon. The Argylls then attacked an enemy force holding a ridgeline one kilometre east of the road and about two kilometres north of the village of Maenjung-dong. The hill, about 45 metres high, gave a clear field of fire westwards over 500 metres of paddy fields running down to the Taeryong and dominated the road which ran beside the river. Although the British troops were able to briefly occupy this feature, they were unable to hold it against Chinese counter-attacks. It was against this position that 3 RAR, making its way out of Pakchon, was now sent. Before beginning its assault at 2 p.m., the Australian unit came under mortar fire but had the immense satisfaction of seeing the enemy positions suffer an airstrike from a flight of Mustang fighters from the RAAF’s No.77 Squadron, the aircraft raking the ridgeline with rockets and machine-gun fire. Despite precipitous terrain and the enemy’s superior numbers, 3 RAR succeeded in taking the objective after a fierce two-hour contest, thereby enabling the Middlesex battalion, brigade headquarters and


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supporting units to escape down the road. The Middlesex and Argylls both took up new positions behind 3 RAR and east of Maenjung-dong, so as to cover the Chongchon River crossing at Anju. In the face of heavy counter-attacks which began soon after dark, at 8 p.m. the commanding officer of 3 RAR, Lieut.Colonel F.S. Walsh, ordered his companies to withdraw from the crest and to concentrate in new positions in paddy fields around where the road crossed a railway line. The 27th Brigade’s commander, Brigadier Aubrey Coad, was alarmed to learn that the high ground which he regarded as vital to holding the flank of his position had been thus relinquished and immediately countermanded Walsh’s orders. It was too late to halt the movement, however, and only D Company (on the southern right flank) was able to re-occupy its position. In the event, enemy pressure ceased after midnight. The next morning members of 3 RAR saw small parties of Chinese and North Koreans withdrawing northwards, and it was realised that the first phase of the Chinese

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offensive had ended. The battle had cost the brigade twelve killed and 70 wounded— all except six of the wounded being Australians. The enemy’s losses are unknown, since most were removed from the field, but were estimated at 200 dead and another 200 wounded. Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Uijongbu, a series of actions fought during the Korean War on 1–4 January 1951 as United Nations (UN) forces fell back during the second Chinese offensive, launched at the end of November 1950. During December the 27th British Commonwealth Brigade (which included the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment, or 3 RAR) had conducted an orderly retreat southwards, covering more than 300 kilometres in nine days. At Uijongbu, an important town situated in a long flat valley twenty kilometres north of Seoul, the brigade became part of a UN rearguard stretched across the approaches to the South Korean capital. Early on 1 January the 27th Brigade was ordered north to help cover the main withdrawal route for the UN Eighth Army. The Australians were sent the furthest forward to Tokchon, ten kilometres from Uijongbu, and by nightfall were in difficulties after advanced Chinese elements had infiltrated UN lines and cut them off. Ordered to move in its transport back down the road towards Seoul, the unit had reached about 1,500 metres south of Tokchon when it was fired at from both sides of the road. The lead vehicles, carrying the company commanders to a rendezvous with the commanding officer, Lieut.-Colonel Ian Ferguson, were forced to run an enemy gauntlet but luckily escaped with only one man wounded. A and C Companies then deployed and swept the roadsides clear, killing seven enemy for the loss of four men wounded.


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When the 27th Brigade reassembled in north-east Seoul the next day, 3 RAR and the 1st Battalion of the Middlesex Regiment were assigned to manning the capital’s perimeter and sending out company-strength patrols, while the 1st Battalion of the Argyll and Sutherland Highland Regiment protected the main bridges south out of the city across the Han River. On 3 January the Australians and Middlesex battalion were again sent north along the Uijongbu road, to occupy covering positions on the mountain ridge just north of Seoul until the last elements of the Eighth Army passed through at 10 p.m. About an hour later, the covering force was in contact with the enemy’s forward patrols. Enemy probes and attacks continued throughout the night but were repulsed, and at 5.30 a.m. the next day the Australians began pulling in their outposts in preparation for a return to Seoul and to prevent them being cut off by further large groups of enemy pushing in from the west. Instead of a major attack developing as expected, enemy activity had ceased half an hour later, and it was not until 8.30 a.m. that the brigade received orders to withdraw. As the last company of 3 RAR mounted their trucks they observed Chinese troops moving into the positions that had just been vacated. At 4 p.m. on 4 January 3 RAR was again ordered to withdraw, the pull-out commencing at 8.30 p.m. Passing through the Argylls’ lines, 3 RAR were the last troops to cross the railway bridge over the Han River south of Seoul before it was blown up by US Army engineers. After the Argylls withdrew from their covering positions also—becoming the last UN troops out of the capital—the brigade continued to move southwards amid a general exodus of refugees, until reaching Yoda-nae about 160 kilometres to the south late during the night of 4 January. Norman Barlett (ed.) (1957) With the Australians in Korea, 2nd edn, Canberra: Australian War

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January–April 1951 Memorial; Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Kapyong, the most famous action fought by Australian troops during the Korean War, took place on 23–24 April 1951 north of the Pukhan River about 60 kilometres north-east of the South Korean capital, Seoul. The battle was precipitated by the communist Chinese spring offensive launched on the night of 22 April, which involved 337,000 men driving for Seoul and another 149,000 attacking further east in the central sector. At 8.30 a.m. the next day, the 27th British Commonwealth Brigade (which included the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment, or 3 RAR) was ordered forward to the valley of the Kapyong River, through which ran an important route southwards. At this stage the move was precautionary, since the central sector was only at risk if the South Korean 6th Division defending the northern approaches to the Kapyong valley collapsed. This had not yet happened, although the 6th Division had already begun to waver under the weight of the enemy onslaught. Faced with a requirement to cover a seven-kilometre front, the commander of the 27th Brigade accepted that it was not possible to establish a continuous defensive line, and instead created strongpoints which would block and hopefully contain any enemy advance. The two battalions initially available were placed across the valley: 3 RAR on high ground to the east of the river, the 2nd Battalion of Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry (2 PPCLI) to the west. When 1st Battalion of the Middlesex Regiment—then forward with the South Korean division—returned, it was placed in the rear, directly beside the river’s west bank. In support were the guns of 16th New Zealand Field Regiment (initially also forward with the 6th Division), a company of American heavy mortars and a company


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of fifteen Sherman tanks of the 72nd US Tank Battalion. The Australians spent the afternoon digging in on the hill slopes covered in patches of low scrub, or constructing sangars where the ground was too rocky for this to be done. By evening the first signs of a South Korean retreat were in evidence, an initial trickle of withdrawing troops on the road through the battalion position turning into a flood shortly after nightfall. Mingling with the fleeing Koreans were the advance elements of the Chinese, who succeeded in infiltrating between A and B companies astride the road and largely surrounding the latter before moving through into the rear positions. At 9.30 p.m., aided by the light of a full moon, the Chinese launched their first attack against a platoon of the American tanks which, unwisely, had been posted forward on the road without any infantry support. Initially beaten back, a stronger attack a hour later forced the tanks’ withdrawal. With main force elements of the pursuing Chinese now arriving, probes and assaults on A and B companies began and continued throughout the night. The Chinese charged forward repeatedly in waves, each heralded by showers of grenades and fire from 60mm and 81-mm mortars. As the Australians mowed down each successive onrush, Chinese officers regrouped their men using whistle blasts and bugle calls and came again—disregarding the growing heaps of their own dead and wounded which littered the hillsides. When posts were overrun, the defenders hurriedly mounted counterattacks to retake the positions. D Company (holding a feature on the right flank known as Hill 504) was not heavily engaged during the night, and C Company was attacked only once, but battalion headquarters—located more than 1,500 metres back towards the reserve battalion— found itself so heavily pressed that soon after 5 a.m. it was forced to withdraw in small

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0 groups inside the Middlesex perimeter. The New Zealand gunline was also probed and forced to move to a new location around 3 a.m., from which it came back into action again an hour later. The American heavy mortar company simply fled, abandoning most of its weapons and vehicles. As daylight approached, the Chinese were now in a highly exposed position in the low open ground in front of A and B companies. Fire from artillery, mortars and tanks arrived in support of the Australians, and the Chinese were forced to withdraw leaving behind hundreds of casualties. Although the companies’ situation had thus improved, the overall position still remained perilous with the bulk of the unit now effectively cut off four kilometres behind the enemy front. At 7.15 a.m. B Company (occupying a low ridge on the left, between a tributary stream of the Kapyong River and the road) was ordered to leave its position and join the other companies on higher ground. It withdrew as instructed, bringing along several dozen hungry and exhausted Chinese prisoners (only eight of whom were


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wounded) taken by a dawn clearing patrol. Two hours later the decision was rescinded and the company was ordered back to re-occupy ground which was realised as necessary to a planned counter-offensive. A desperate bayonet charge was needed before the company was halfway back to its original location, now held in strength by the Chinese, and the attempt was abandoned. Finding the front companies impossible to shift, the Chinese switched attention to D Company. From 7 a.m. until 10.30 a.m., and at 11.30 a.m. for another two hours they delivered a series of relentless attacks. Aided by the supporting fire of the New Zealand guns, these assaults were also repulsed and heavy casualties inflicted. Disaster almost achieved what the enemy could not, when an airstrike called in during mid-afternoon against the Chinese was wrongly marked by the spotter plane and napalm was accidentally delivered onto the company position, killing two men and wounding several others. The attack by two US Corsairs was broken off after an officer ran out under enemy fire waving the marker panel used to

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April–September 1951 identify friendly troops. Shortly after the misdirected airstrike, orders arrived for the Australian companies to abandon their defences and withdraw through the Middlesex to new positions in the rear. Effecting this plan was not easy, since the companies were still in contact with the Chinese. It was nonetheless begun late in the afternoon of 24 April, and a clean break with pursuing enemy was accomplished after dark, allowing all elements of the battalion to get away by 11.30 p.m. Although brief in duration, the savage battle at Kapyong had been crucial in blunting the enemy advance and preventing a breakthrough on the United Nations Command’s central front. In opposing the assaults of the Chinese 60th Division, 3 RAR had lost 32 men killed, 59 wounded and three missing (taken prisoner); the cost to the Canadians was ten dead and 23 wounded. Counted in killed alone, enemy casualties were over 500 men. Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Han River, the scene of two notable naval incidents on 28 and 30 September 1951 during the Korean War. From July that year small United Nations (UN) warships— including the RAN frigate Murchison—had begun operating in the Han River estuary, north-west of the South Korean capital, Seoul. By careful navigation these vessels were able to penetrate 50 kilometres inland from the Yellow Sea, reaching an anchorage some six kilometres wide from which radiated a number of narrow channels, still navigable during high tide. From this point a range of important targets on the communist-controlled north bank could be engaged with naval gunfire. For the first two months, enemy opposition to UN use of the waterway was limited to sniping from the riverbank and occasional rounds from Chinese 75-mm field-guns


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which were then quickly withdrawn from range. On the afternoon of 28 September, however, Murchison (under Lieut.Commander Allen Dollard) was the first UN ship to encounter a heightened enemy challenge. After earlier moving to the west of the main anchorage to bombard railway yards in the town of Yonan, eight kilometres from the river, Murchison had turned east at twelve knots along the channel between mudflats and the northern bank. As it neared the mouth of the Yesong River, the vessel was ambushed from the shore at a range of 2,000 metres by enemy concealed in three nearby villages who opened up with entrenched 75s, mortars and small-arms. Fire was returned with the ship’s 4-inch main armament and Bofors guns, direct hits being achieved on one 75 and a trench in which (according to later information) the enemy lost 40 men killed. Although struck by smallarms rounds and shrapnel, Murchison sustained no serious damage and suffered only one man wounded. Two days later, on 30 September, Murchison was on the same stretch of river when she was engaged in a repeat of the earlier action. The exchange of fire this time was heavier and more accurate than before, and the frigate was hit by several 50-mm anti-tank rounds which passed straight through its hull and also a 75-mm round which exploded in the engine room, though without any vital effect. The enemy’s fire slackened as the ship moved away westward, just before Dollard was obliged to slow nearly to a halt as a misty rain squall from the sea reduced visibility to an extent too dangerous for safe navigation. Once able to proceed, the ship had gone further west when it was suddenly engaged by a second group of enemy weapons at a range of only 600 metres. Fire was again vigorously returned, and the ship’s guns were later claimed to have destroyed several of the enemy’s positions. As a result of the day’s action, three sailors were wounded—one

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seriously—and the vessel carried seven shell holes as well as extensive scars from shrapnel and bullets; one Bofors had also been damaged and put out of action. Murchison had won an enviable name for fine seamanship and steadiness under fire, but in the face of the new danger posed to UN ships the river patrols were increasingly restricted and finally ended during November. Norman Bartlett (ed.) (1957) With the Australians in Korea, 2nd edn, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Maryang San, an outstanding action of the Korean War, fought by the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (3 RAR) on 2–8 October 1951 during a limited United Nations Command offensive codenamed


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‘Operation Commando’. Under the plans for this operation, four UN divisions were to advance to a new forward defence line after pushing back communist Chinese forces entrenched in rugged mountain country north of the 38th parallel. In the east-central sector occupied by 1st Commonwealth Division since July, the major task of capturing two dominant features—Hill 355 (known locally as Kowang San) and Hill 317 (Maryang San)—was allotted to the 28th British Commonwealth Brigade, which included 3 RAR. The enemy positions to be attacked by 28th Brigade were extremely strong, being well fortified and held by two regiments. A two-phase assault was accordingly devised, with Kowang San to be taken first on 3 October by a British battalion. The Australian battalion, under Lieut.-Colonel Francis Hassett, was to support this attack with other

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September–October 1951 elements of the brigade, and then carry out the second-phase assault on Maryang San. At the same time as 3 RAR made its attack, the 1st Battalion of the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers would launch itself against a lesser feature known as Hill 217. Stubborn resistance encountered during the initial phase meant that Hill 355 was not finally secured until the afternoon of 4 October, and Hassett was not ready to implement his plan until the early hours of the following day. The approach to the steep eastern slopes of Maryang San was across a wide, open valley easily dominated by crossfire from Chinese positions—a fact which had defeated three previous attempts to assault the hill. Hassett had therefore decided to cross the valley under cover of darkness and position his troops on the enemy’s flank, in the foothills, until ready to begin scaling the position at first light. Under cover of a diversion created on the left by A Company,

B Company would clear the lower slopes before D Company passed through and stormed the main heights. The attack on Maryang San was initiated at 4 a.m. on 5 October, under a heavy blanket of mist which added confusion to the Australian advance but also obscured their movement. The lifting of the mist at 11.20 a.m. suddenly left D Company dangerously exposed still only halfway up the slope. The Chinese, apparently expecting an attack from the north, did not immediately respond and it was this slight delay which allowed the assaulting company to overwhelm the enemy in a fierce firefight lasting twenty minutes. For the loss of three killed and twelve wounded, 3 RAR had gained the first main line of defences and taken ten prisoners. The Chinese had still to be pushed off the three ridgeline positions which they held, and which they furiously defended. The central feature was taken the next morning,

Machine-gunners supporting the attack on Hill 317 by C Company, 3 RAR, October 1951. Source: Australian War Memorial HOBJ2432



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then had to be held against enemy counter-attack, and it was not until the evening of 6 October that the crest of Hill 317 was finally secured. The Australians were then called on to give assistance to the Northumberland Fusiliers, who had taken 100 casualties while vainly trying to take Hill 217. It was arranged for 3 RAR to attack the ‘Hinge’ feature, which was adjacent to 217 and dominated it from the north, at 8 a.m. on 7 October. The position was taken and held against enemy counter-attacks throughout that night and until 5 a.m. on the 8th, when the Chinese finally gave up and thus also surrendered control of Hill 217. The Australian battalion was relieved four hours later, having lost twenty killed and 104 wounded (fifteen so slightly that they stayed on duty). Based on body count alone, the enemy had suffered 283 killed in 3 RAR’s area, and lost 50 men taken prisoner; these figures do not include casualties from supporting guns, tanks and medium machine-guns, so that overall Chinese losses were certainly considerably higher. Sadly, Hill 317 was subsequently retaken by the Chinese a month later while manned by a British battalion: it was not regained. Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Sunchon, the largest air-to-air action fought by the Royal Australian Air Force during the Korean War, occurred north of the North Korean capital of Pyongyang on 1 December 1951. Twelve Meteor F.8 jets of No.77 Squadron, RAAF, were on a fighter sweep at 19,000 feet over Sunchon when they were attacked by 40–50 Soviet-made MiG–15s of the Chinese Air Force. The ensuing ten-minute action ranged far across North Korea at altitudes between 20,000–33,000 feet and saw the first losses inflicted on the enemy’s superior aircraft by RAAF pilots, with one MiG definitely shot down and another probably destroyed. This outcome


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was only achieved, though, at a cost of three Australian machines; two of the pilots landed safely in enemy territory and became prisoners of war, while the third was presumed killed. As a result of this and earlier clashes which had demonstrated the Meteor’s inferiority in aerial combat, 77 Squadron was ordered to cease flying fighter interception operations and assigned to different roles, mainly ground attack. Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service; David Wilson (1994) Lion over Korea, Canberra: Banner Books

Wonsan, a resoundingly successful ground attack operation carried out along the east coast of North Korea by No.77 Squadron of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) on 16 March 1953. A pair of Meteor F.8 fighters on a dawn road patrol south of Wonsan sighted a Chinese convoy of about 140 trucks extending over a distance of roughly five kilometres. The column was moving slowly and virtually bumper to bumper on a narrow road running down from a saddleback, with steep cliffs and sheer drops on either side. Vehicles at the head and rear of the line were attacked with rockets and destroyed, thereby trapping all the remaining trucks in between. Another section of Meteors on a mission nearby was then called in, but since the target was too large for just four aircraft to deal with, still more Meteors were requested from the squadron base at Kimpo. Aircraft were also sent from other United Nations Command bases, and by midday more than two-thirds of the convoy had been destroyed or damaged. While strafing along the line of vehicles with cannonfire, the Meteor pilots had to zigzag to avoid the hazard posed by surrounding hills. Adding to the danger were the Chinese troops in the trucks, who dismounted and maintained a steady flow of small-arms fire; many of the soldiers climbed the adjoining heights to shoot across

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1951–1953 at the aircraft as they passed. Although several Meteors were hit, none were lost in what Bartlett described as ‘one of the biggest lorry-busting forays in the Korean War’. Norman Bartlett (ed.) (1957) With the Australians in Korea, 2nd edn, Canberra: Australian War Memorial; Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service; David Wilson (1994) Lion over Korea, Canberra: Banner Books

Samichon River, scene of the final action of the Korean War involving Australians, occurred on 24–26 July 1953. Two battalions of the Royal Australian Regiment (2 RAR and 3 RAR) were then holding positions in the Hook—an exposed and heavily defended part of the United Nations frontline on high ground about a kilometre west of the Samichon. Although it was known that agreement regarding an armistice was close, the Chinese communist forces nonetheless delivered a final attack against portions of the line held by 2 RAR and the 7th American Marine Regiment (located to the south-west or left of the Australians). First indications of an impending attack were received after dark when the Australian company actually in the Hook was probed by an enemy force about 50 strong, at the same time that the marines had a similar contact. The Australian line was then subjected to heavy artillery and mortar bombardment at 8 p.m., following which waves of assaulting Chinese infantry surged against the defenders’ positions at 8.50 p.m. until forced to withdraw. After a further bombardment, the Chinese came on again at 11.25 p.m. but in a furious fight involving grenades and small-arms were again repelled with heavy casualties. Australian losses during the night amounted to two killed and fourteen wounded. The defenders were forced to endure steady shelling throughout the next day, 25 July, and after dark the Hook was again approached by a party of twenty enemy troops. This was fired on at 9 p.m. by an


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Australian patrol and forced to withdraw, leaving behind one man killed. Two hours later the enemy’s mortar and artillery barrage dramatically intensified, to be followed 40 minutes later by another determined infantry charge against the Americans on the left. The Australian positions were not directly attacked, but 2 RAR’s companies engaged the enemy out in no-man’s-land and a medium machine-gun platoon from the unit which was stationed in a marine outpost found itself in the thick of things—as it had the previous night also, suffering on this night five wounded in addition to three the night before. The savage struggle in the American lines raged at close quarters for an hour before the Chinese were driven back. Although small-arms fire continued to be exchanged for the next couple of hours, at 3 a.m. on 26 July the volume of both this and enemy shelling subsided. When dawn came the only activity observed in front of the Australian and American positions which had been attacked was by Chinese stretcher parties clearing away the wounded. The number of communist dead was estimated at 2,000– 3,000. Casualties sustained by 2 RAR in the two nights of fighting were five killed and 24 wounded. There were no further attacks before the cease-fire came into effect the following day. Robert O’Neill (1985) Australia in the Korean War 1950–53, vol.2: Combat Operations, Canberra: Australian War Memorial & Australian Government Publishing Service

Bongsu Forest, an airstrike against communist terrorists carried out by Lincoln bombers of No.1 Squadron, RAAF, during the Malayan Emergency. According to a Royal Air Force history published by the British Ministry of Defence, an intensive attack in November 1953 by seven RAAF Lincolns ‘succeeded in killing three of Chin Peng’s bodyguard and wounding three others although the Secretary-General of the Malayan Communist Party (MCP) himself escaped

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injury’. The account does not more precisely identify the date and location of this potentially momentous achievement, but seems to imply that it happened during the protracted combined operation codenamed ‘Sword’ lasting from July 1953 until March 1954. The focus of this effort was known terrorist strongholds in an area of 100 square miles (259 square kilometres) of the Bongsu Forest Reserve near Kulim in Southern Kedah. Unfortunately RAAF records do not show that any missions flown by the Australian squadron during November 1953 involved as many as seven Lincolns. Five attacks were mounted in support of ‘Operation Sword’ in that month—on the 16th, 20th, 21st, 23rd and 24th—the largest being the first and last of these, which entailed five and six aircraft respectively. The unit also carried out raids against targets in different areas, however, the largest being by six bombers against the Tapok Forest Reserve in Pahang on 14 November. That any of these missions almost produced such a decisive outcome as eliminating the leader of the communist insurgency was evidently unknown within No.1 Squadron at the time.

Ninety-eight 1,000-pound (450-kilogram) bombs were dropped on the target zone by the Australian aircraft, which then returned to base at Tengah, Singapore, re-armed, and made a second strike on the same position later in the day. In all 88 tonnes of ordnance was delivered onto the target. The bombs were spaced to achieve an interval of 80 metres, producing sufficient concussion to kill all life between the blasts. Ground troops who subsequently entered the area found that the object had been successfully achieved, the bombs having effectively straddled the camp and its 21 occupants. The bodies of fourteen terrorists were identifiable, including Goh Peng Tuan, the notorious political commissar of southern Johore. Many of the dead had been apparently caught in the middle of a training Mosaic of bomb-bay photographs from the strike by No.1 Squadron, RAAF, which killed eighteen communist terrorists. Source: RAAF Museum, Point Cook

Malcolm Postage (1992) Operation Firedog, London: HMSO

Kluang, an air bombing mission against communist terrorists during the Malayan Emergency, was carried out by Australian and British aircraft on 21 February 1956. The strike—dubbed ‘Operation Kingly Pile’—was mounted after months of preparation against an identified jungle base camp of the 7th Independent Platoon, Malayan Races Liberation Army, located in swampy country in the Kluang–Rengam area of central Johore. The first wave of aircraft comprised seven Lincoln medium bombers of No.1 Squadron, RAAF, led by Wing Commander Kenneth Robertson, followed by four Canberra jet bombers of No.12 Squadron, RAF.


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1953–1956 session or lecture, as they were reportedly found still holding notebooks in their hands. Some commentators claim that the raid also accounted for all the remaining terrorists in the camp, their bodies having been completely disintegrated by the force of the explosions; others state that a deputy section leader and six others survived and escaped, although all wounded, and that within a year sufficient new recruits had been obtained to bring the unit back up to full strength. Whatever the truth, the raid was unquestionably the most successful of more than 4,000 sorties flown by the Australian Lincolns in the Malayan campaign between 1950 and 1958. Richard Clutterbuck (1967) The Long Long War, London: Cassell; Malcolm Postgate (1992) Operation Firedog, London: HMSO; Steve Eather (1996) Odd Jobs, Point Cook, Vic.: RAAF Museum

Sungei Bemban, an incident which was the single most intense action fought by Australian ground troops during the Malayan Emergency, took place on 22 June 1956 in the state of Perak about 1.5 kilometres south of the rubber-producing area of Sungei Siput. The clash began soon after 3 p.m., when up to 25 communist terrorists, members of the 13/15th Independent Platoon of the Malayan Races Liberation Army, ambushed a five-man reconnaissance patrol from a platoon of A Company, 2nd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (or 2 RAR), about 400 metres north of the platoon’s base at the Sungei Bemban reservoir. The patrol was returning along a track which paralleled the pipeline leading from the reservoir to Sungei Siput when the guerillas detonated a landmine and opened fire with submachine guns from well-prepared positions. The Australians suffered no casualties from the initial explosion, but in the following exchange of fire the patrol leader was killed outright and another man was critically wounded and soon died. The position of the remaining four members of the patrol was


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perilous, since they could not see the enemy firing at them from concealed pits in the jungle undergrowth and shouting that they heard indicated that the guerillas were receiving reinforcements from the north. The continuous volume of fire returned by the patrol’s Bren gun ensured, however, that the ambushers did not immediately attempt to overrun them. The sound of heavy firing quickly drew two other Australian parties to the scene. A second six-man patrol which had rested with the first barely fifteen minutes earlier was first to arrive. Hurrying south along the track, its members came to within 50 metres of where the ambush survivors were pinned down before they were also fired on from the ambush position. The patrol commander, Corporal L.H. Rodgers, sent four of his men to outflank the guerillas from high ground to the north-east, while he and the remaining man (an Iban tracker)—both being wounded—attempted to hold the enemy’s attention. When the flanking group opened fire and began an assault, Rodgers and the tracker also charged forward. In the resulting fight, one of the four Australians in the flanking party was killed along with one guerilla; another guerilla was wounded as he fled into the jungle. Meanwhile the platoon commander, Lieut. A.W. Campbell, ran up along the track from the patrol base near the reservoir accompanied by two men. They arrived at the scene of the action just as the ambush party was dispersing, with a group of guerillas observed moving into the undergrowth towards the south-east. Fire was still coming from the ambush position, however, but stopped after Campbell lobbed two hand grenades into it. As the remaining guerillas split into two groups and fled, one lot heading south-east and the other crossing the track and making for the river to the west, Campbell and his men pursued the latter and succeeded in killing one guerilla and recovering his weapon.

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River

To Sungei Siput

2nd Aust. patrol Ts oup of 6 C escaping gr ambushed patrol CT Ambush Party

Group from Aust. patrol base

pipeline

Main withdrawal route

0

50 metres

After a third six-man patrol which had originally been operating to the south-west of the reservoir also reached the area, Campbell conducted a sweep of the ambush site and also began the evacuation of the three members of his platoon who were now wounded, in addition to the three dead. A follow-up patrol launched the next morning found blood trails which indicated that several guerillas had sustained serious wounds, as well as the two terrorists whose bodies remained in the ambush position. The enemy’s presumed casualties could not, however, conceal the fact that the communists had nearly succeeded in wiping out an Australian patrol, and were only frustrated in this object by the vigorous reaction of a second patrol which had fortuitously been present in the immediate vicinity. From this experience, the Australians learnt not to underestimate their adversaries. David Horner (ed.) (1990) Duty First, Sydney: Allen & Unwin; Peter Dennis & Jeffrey Grey (1996) Emergency and Confrontation, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Klawang, an airstrike against communist terrorists during the Malayan Emergency, was carried out at midnight on 13–14 May 1957 by five Lincoln bombers of No.1 Squadron, RAAF, operating under radar control. The target was a camp of the 3rd Independent Platoon, Malayan Races Liberation Army, located eleven kilometres north-west of Klawang in the Jelebu district


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of Negri Sembilan. The 70,000 pounds (31.7 tonnes) of bombs dropped during the attack killed four terrorists, and mortally wounded Teng Fook Loong (the leading communist figure in the Negri Sembilan area, popularly known as Mr Ten Foot Long). Teng, formerly prominent in the British-backed antiJapanese underground during the Second World War, succumbed to his injuries some ten hours later; his wife was among the terrorists killed outright in the raid. This successful strike, and further air harassment in conjunction with ground force operations, contributed to the surrender of the remaining members of the 3rd Platoon in the neighbourhood of Seremban during October. Malcolm Postgate (1992) Operation Firedog, London: HMSO; Steve Eather (1996) Odd Jobs, Point Cook, Vic.: RAAF Museum

Sungei Siput, an action fought during the Malayan Emergency between communist terrorists and troops from the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (or 3 RAR), took place on 20 November 1958 in jungle about sixteen kilometres north-east of Sungei Siput in the state of Perak. After a 3 RAR patrol came across fresh traces of a five-man group of enemy guerillas, the unit’s tracker team of eleven men commanded by Lieut. Claude Ducker was deployed to follow the trail. A few hours later Ducker’s party was moving up a rocky ridgeline when two large sheets of green plastic were sighted about 40 metres ahead. Realising that the plastic was probably providing shelter for a terrorist camp that was in current use, if not occupied just then, Ducker divided his force into two. Leaving six men on the spurline as a blocking group, he took the remaining four with him around the left flank of the camp to the higher ground in rear of it—his intention being to assault downhill into the enemy position and drive any guerillas discovered towards the weapons of the bulk of his team. Once the attack group reached its position above the camp, Ducker could see that a

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1956–1964 group of terrorists were actually present; this fact had also been observed by the stop group’s members who, while Ducker’s party was creeping forward, located and covered individual occupants. Ducker promptly initiated an assault by hurling a hand grenade, before his men advanced while firing. The guerillas responded by also throwing a grenade, and returned fire for several seconds before fleeing—as expected—downhill, into the waiting stop group. Three terrorists were shot dead in the action, one of these being found to be a woman armed with a Sten gun. One of the two men killed was identified as a member of the communists’ district committee who had participated in the 1951 ambush which resulted in the assassination of Sir Hugh Gurney, Britain’s High Commissioner. A subsequent search of the area failed to locate the other two terrorists presumed to Australian attack group

shelters

rocks

steep rocky cliff

CT hit creek

fleeing CTs killed

Australian stop group


0

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10

20 metres approx.

have formed part of the group using the camp, but did recover a large quantity of food, ammunition and other supplies. Despite the action’s small scale, in the context of the latter part of the Emergency it was undoubtedly important—not least for its contribution to the ongoing destruction of the communist organisation in Perak. Accordingly, the incident received wide publicity in the leading newspapers across Malaya and Singapore and was hailed as a major military success. David Horner (ed.) (1990) Duty First, Sydney: Allen & Unwin; Peter Dennis & Jeffrey Grey (1996) Emergency and Confrontation, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Sungei Kesang, an incident which took place some 32 kilometres south-east of Malacca in Western Malaysia on 29–30 October 1964 during the ‘Confrontation’ campaign mounted by Indonesia following the creation of the Federation of Malaysia in 1963. In the early morning hours of the 29th two parties of Indonesian infiltrators totalling 52 men were landed from five fishing boats on either side of the mouth of the Sungei (River) Kesang. Local fishermen promptly reported the presence of these intruders to police, who then cordoned off the southern area of the landing zone; twenty of the infiltrators surrendered to the police during the morning. Troops of 28th Brigade, the main component of the British Commonwealth Far East Strategic Reserve based in Malaysia, were hurried to the scene from Terendak Camp at Malacca under command of Lieut.-Colonel Bruce McDonald, the commanding officer of 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (3 RAR). McDonald had available to him D Company of his own unit and personnel of 102 Field Battery, Royal Australian Artillery, working in an infantry role, along with 1st Battalion of the Royal New Zealand Infantry Regiment, 1/10 Gurkha Rifles, and a squadron of 4 Royal Tank Regiment. These he deployed as an inner and outer cordon while trying to

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induce the remaining Indonesians to submit. Warned by one of the captives that the force intended to resist strongly, McDonald ensured that his men remained vigilant. When the Indonesians duly tried to break out shortly before midnight, they were met with small-arms fire from one of the 3 RAR platoons and abandoned the attempt. In line with a plan agreed with the commander of 28th Brigade, the next morning McDonald began a process of graduated pressure on the enemy group. After the men of 102 Battery, reverting to their artillery role, fired mortars and some artillery rounds into the Indonesian position, all but two of the infiltrators promptly gave themselves up to D Company, 3 RAR, when it followed up with a sweep through the area. By 6.30 p.m. on 30 October, the troops of 28th Brigade were on their way back to barracks. The remaining two Indonesians, one of whom was wounded, were captured by local civilians three weeks later. By any objective measure, this attempt to foment revolt by such means was an abject failure— as were all other landings in the Indonesian campaign against the Malaysian mainland up to March 1965. David Horner (ed.) (1990) Duty First, Sydney: Allen & Unwin; Peter Dennis & Jeffrey Grey (1996) Emergency and Confrontation, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Singapore Strait, a minor incident on 13 December 1964 which was the only naval engagement involving a Royal Australian Navy vessel during the period of Indonesian ‘confrontation’ against the newly created nation of Malaysia. In the face of escalating Indonesian threats, RAN ships were committed to naval patrol and escort operations in Malyasian waters to counter seaborne infiltration and the threat of light naval raids. HMAS Teal, a coastal minesweeper, was on one such night patrol in the Singapore Strait when it was engaged with an automatic weapon by a vessel which then steered towards Indonesian waters. Fire was


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returned, killing three of seven Indonesians on board the intruding boat, which was handed over to Singaporean police. Jeffrey Grey (1998) Up Top: The Royal Australian Navy and Southeast Asian Conflicts 1955–1972; Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Sungei Koemba, was the scene of two clashes between Indonesian and Australian ground troops in May–June 1965, during the ‘Confrontation’ campaign mounted by Indonesia following the creation of the Federation of Malaysia in 1963. To counter the growing threat posed to the new federation’s Borneo territories of Sabah and Sarawak by so-called Indonesian ‘volunteers’, during the latter half of 1964 British forces assisting in the defence of Malaysia began to conduct highly secret patrols up to 10,000 yards (9,140 metres) into the Indonesian territory of Kalimantan for the purpose of disrupting the movement and resupply of Indonesian forces and keeping the enemy off balance. After the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (3 RAR) was sent to Sarawak in March 1965, it too was authorised to engage in such operations (which were known by the codename of ‘Claret’). Initially, 3 RAR’s companies were deployed along the border to assist in guarding an important line of approach towards the Sarawak capital of Kuching, only 50 kilometres away. In late April, however, the first cross-border reconnaissance patrols were carried out by the Australians, and on 24 May the first fighting patrol into Indonesian territory was undertaken by B Company (based at Bukit Knuckle) under Major William Broderick. After a company patrol base was established on high ground overlooking the Sungei (River) Koemba on 26 May, three men accompanied Lieut. Patrick Beale forward on a reconnaissance. These returned to report the presence of an enemy party beside the river, the members of which could be heard talking loudly and firing random shots, apparently totally

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1964–1965 unconcerned with any security precautions. The next morning Broderick’s force moved down the spurline to establish a firm base, from which Beale then took a fighting patrol which included four Bren light machineguns. The latter party encountered a track alongside the Koemba, beyond which lay the river; to the north, across the shallow stream, the enemy party could also be heard still moving around. Beale deployed his force into an ambush position covering both the track and a bend in the river, which was 30 metres wide at this point. At about 11.30 a.m., only 40 minutes after the site was occupied, motors were heard approaching along the river and two boats— each about three metres long, powered by outboard engines and containing five armed men—presently came into view. In one boat was a fair-haired European, later identified as a Dutch mercenary. When both boats were only 35 metres away, Beale sprang the ambush. The boats were raked with automatic fire and emptied of their occupants; two men who tried to swim for the opposite bank were killed in the water. One boat was sunk and the other allowed to drift downstream empty. Unknown to Beale when he initiated the action, two more boats had been following the first two and were just nearing the right hand extremity of the ambush position when the firing began. The sentry on this flank had seen their approach, however, and—as soon as the ambush was sprung—directed rapid and accurate fire into the first of them at a range of only ten metres, killing all five occupants. The last boat immediately pulled into the near bank out of sight and avoided the fate of the others. Although the sentry threw two grenades and saturated the area with fire, any effect on the last group of five men was unobserved. Meanwhile the enemy across the river began to respond with heavy though unaimed fire from automatic small-arms. As the ambush party withdrew to the firm base, a


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forward observer accompanying the company brought in artillery and mortar rounds with great accuracy onto the abandoned position and helped reduce the volume of enemy fire encountered during the force’s retirement. By 3 p.m. the whole force had recrossed the border without having suffered any losses, but having accounted for at least fifteen of the enemy on this occasion. A second ambush was successfully mounted along the Koemba a fortnight later, on 12 June, by a platoon of C Company from Serikin. This was under the command of Lieut. Robert Guest, even though the company commander, Major Ivor Hodgkinson, was present. A position a little downstream from the previous month’s successful action, more towards the Indonesian base at Siding, was occupied early on the morning of 11 June, and although two boats moved past the site later that day and three more the next morning fire was withheld due to the apparent civilian nature of these craft. At 10.45 a.m., however, the left flank sentry signalled the approach of an enemy party on foot along the river bank. Since the ambush had been laid to cover traffic on the water, the Australians were not well positioned to meet this threat. Perhaps it was hoped the enemy party might pass by, but it seems that the Indonesians were aware of the presence of what they assumed was a small Australian reconnaissance party and were looking for them. Ten minutes later the enemy patrol contacted the left extremity of the ambush party, prompting the sentry on this flank to open fire with a long burst which killed three Indonesians. A fourth was cut down moments later as the enemy—numbering at least half a dozen men—broke to the right off the track, continuing their advance in a direction which brought them into the rear of Guest’s platoon. Immediately responding to this situation, Major Hodgkinson left his position and crept around into a small gully on the enemy’s

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line of approach, from where he was able to kill two Indonesians and seriously wound a third. Meanwhile Guest withdrew the right hand elements of his platoon and swung these out to deliver a flanking counter-attack which killed the Indonesian already wounded by Hodgkinson and one other; yet another was badly wounded and seen crawling away. Only one member of the enemy patrol escaped back down the path unharmed when the action ended less than ten minutes after it began. Again there were no Australian casualties. Pausing only to collect some weapons and equipment which identified the Indonesians encountered as members of 440 Battalion, the company patrol withdrew under defensive artillery fire. After harbouring for the night, the patrol recrossed the border without further incident the next day. David Horner (ed.) (1990) Duty First, Sydney: Allen & Unwin; Peter Dennis & Jeffrey Grey (1996) Emergency and Confrontation, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Kindau, in Kalimantan (Indonesian Borneo), was the scene of an action involving Indonesian and Australian troops on 15 June 1965 during the ‘Confrontation’ campaign mounted by Indonesia following the creation of the Federation of Malaysia in 1963. This was the third of four highly successful ambushes mounted from Malaysian territory in Sarawak by elements of the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (3 RAR) under the program of secret cross-border activities known as ‘Claret’ operations, and came just three days after the second ambush carried out on the Sungei Koemba (q.v.). On the same day that C Company had its action, a platoon from A Company based at Stass occupied an ambush position in thick swampy jungle 1,300 metres inside Indonesian territory, along a track running west from the border. This patrol was under Second Lieut. Douglas Byers, who had orders to intercept an Indonesian force, earlier seen moving into Sarawak, whenever it attempted


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to return. The ambush was laid along the southern edge of the track, with the eastern (right) flank guarded by three men across a small creek and the west flank 75 metres away protected by four men who had set up two Claymore mines; in between lay the main ambush party of fourteen men, while directly behind them was a firm base containing six men (including a forward observer) and a 2-inch mortar. After laying quietly in position for three days, the ambush saw at a few minutes before 1.30 p.m. a large party of Indonesians approaching from the east. The members of the enemy patrol were moving in close formation with their weapons slung, with little concern for security. When about 25 Indonesians were within the ambush area, Byers triggered the attack with a burst of submachine gun fire at a range of only six metres. The opening fusillade killed at least twelve of the enemy, but the leading three in the column were unscathed and bolted down the track to the west. The left flank sentries fired their Claymores and the three were killed instantaneously. Because of the size of the enemy patrol, numbering at least 50–60 (and perhaps as many as 100), only the leading elements had been caught in the trap. The rear elements now moved up and opened a heavy fire into the ambush position from the east, also throwing grenades although none of these exploded. Supporting the enemy response was a machine-gun and a mortar, the former being quickly silenced by the Australians’ return fire while the mortar was put out of action after the forward observer brought counter-fire to bear from supporting artillery and 3-inch mortars. The battle which followed was nonetheless intense, and was later described as ‘hand-to-hand’. At 1.45 p.m. Byers commenced a withdrawal, his men carrying one of their number who had suffered a gunshot wound to the knee. While 105-mm and 5.5-inch artillery rounds pounded the enemy position,

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June–November 1965 the platoon moved rapidly back through the firm base and regained the border by 4 p.m. It was now discovered that the Australians had a second casualty (a private with a minor thigh wound caused by mortar shrapnel), but against this seventeen Indonesian dead had been counted along with seven wounded. An estimate of 25 enemy killed in the ambush was not unreasonable, and the total toll was probably much higher in view of the accurate and heavy artillery fire employed afterwards. Later intelligence information received indicated that the Indonesian force contacted were regulars recently arrived at Kindau and engaged on their first operation. Unlike the earlier successes, this action did not remain unpublicised after an enterprising journalist managed to interview one of the Australian wounded. Authorities nonetheless managed to preserve the fiction that the incident occurred within Malaysian territory. David Horner (ed.) (1990) Duty First, Sydney: Allen & Unwin; Peter Dennis & Jeffrey Grey (1996) Emergency and Confrontation, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Babang, in Kalimantan (Indonesian Borneo), was the scene of an action involving Indonesian and Australian troops on 12 July 1965 during the ‘Confrontation’ campaign mounted by Indonesia following the creation of the Federation of Malaysia in 1963. This was the last of four highly successful ambushes mounted from Malaysian territory in Sarawak by elements of the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (3 RAR) under the program of secret cross-border activities known as ‘Claret’ operations (see also Sungei Koemba and Kindau). On 10 July a platoon from C Company left Serikin to mount an ambush along a well-used track leading to the Indonesian base at Babang, west of Gunong Jagoi ridge on the border. The patrol was under Lieut. Robert Guest, who had led the second ambush on the Sungei Koemba the previous month, and was again accompanied by the


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company commander, the battalion’s intelligence officer and a fire control party. The ambush position was occupied the next morning, and about midday on 12 July a party of about 30 Indonesians approached from the direction of Babang. Although the enemy moved stealthily and at the alert, the ambush party had known for an hour of their departure from Babang by the sounds of birds and jungle animals that had been disturbed. When the leading Indonesian scout spotted one of the Australians lying in wait and moved forward to investigate, the intelligence officer with the patrol was forced to shoot this enemy and thus spring the ambush. The initial bursts of fire accounted for eleven of the Indonesians, six of whom were killed outright, but the remainder immediately commenced to assault the left flank of the position. This move was disrupted by a Claymore mine fired by the sentries here, but the Indonesians maintained their attack and thereby posed a threat to the Australians’ escape route. Guest began a staged withdrawal towards the patrol’s firm base 200 metres in the rear, and succeeded in breaking contact with the enemy. The forward observer with the party now called in defensive artillery fire, and when the Indonesians replied with rounds from an 81-mm mortar further fire had to be directed against this too. The patrol returned to Serikin the next day, having inflicted a known toll on the Indonesians of thirteen killed and five wounded, although casualties were thought to be higher still; the Australians escaped without loss. David Horner (ed.) (1990) Duty First, Sydney: Allen & Unwin; Peter Dennis & Jeffrey Grey (1996) Emergency and Confrontation, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Gang Toi, a low-lying ridge of hills in northern Bien Hoa Province of the Republic of Vietnam, which on 8 November 1965 was the scene of the first set-piece action pitting Viet Cong forces against troops of the 1st

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Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (1 RAR). Since arriving in June as the initial Australian ground combat force committed to the war in South Vietnam, 1 RAR had been integrated into the US 173rd Airborne Brigade which defended the growing airbase outside the city of Bien Hoa, 30 kilometres north of the capital, Saigon. On 5 November, the unit began a routine search-and-destroy operation with one of the brigade’s two US battalions into War Zone D, the communists’ designation for a major base area in rainforest twenty kilometres north-east of the Bien Hoa base. The search boundaries allocated to the American 1/503 Battalion and 1 RAR were separated by the Song (River) Dong Nai, with the latter ordered to operate east of the river. Unknown to the allies, this area was defended by the Viet Cong 271st Main Force Regiment and included an enemy headquarters recently formed to co-ordinate the defence of the region; the position occupied by the new headquarters was on the plateau atop the Gang Toi hills which formed part of 1 RAR’s objective. By the second day of the operation (codenamed ‘Hump’) A Company of 1 RAR, under Major John Healy, made contact with a number of enemy patrols and a small number of casualties were received on both sides. No major actions resulted, however, and on the morning of the 8th the commanding officer of 1 RAR visited Healy by helicopter and instructed him to head for a rendezvous from which the whole battalion would be lifted out the next day. The route which Healy decided to follow by compass cut across the northern edge of the Gang Tois. The company had not gone very far up a gentle spurline leading to the plateau (marked on the map as Hill 82) before it experienced the first of several minor contacts with single or pairs of enemy soldiers which by mid-afternoon had resulted in three VC killed. Evidence of heavy enemy use was

1R

also located in a open area criss-crossed with tracks and containing clusters of wooden benches, all indicating a training area close by a camp. Soon afterwards, at about 3.30 p.m., an empty complex of dugouts and bunkers was discovered which was large enough to accommodate a company. Meanwhile, the Australians clearly heard the increasing crescendo of firing across the Dong Nai which indicated that 1/503rd had become engaged in a major battle. Since 1 RAR was not called on for assistance, however, Healy continued to press on. At about 4.30 p.m. the lead scouts of 1 Platoon had just reached the top of the ridge when a withering fire was received from concealed bunkers astride the company’s line of march. Bursts from at least three enemy machine-guns, supported by rifles and grenades, swept downhill through the lead section to envelop the platoon headquarters, so that within the first minutes of the action the Australians had suffered five casualties. All the wounded except one (who lay directly in front of the bunkers exposed to further hits, and was probably already dead) managed to crawl back down the hill, but the lead platoon was effectively pinned down. The rearmost platoon, which had itself just engaged and killed two VC moving along a

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November 1965–January 1966 creek, was ordered forward to make a left flank attack on the enemy position. This group had just adopted assault formation and commenced to advance when its left half was also caught in intense machine-gun fire from another portion of the bunker system. The platoon attempted to push forward using fire and movement, but in the process lost one machine-gunner who fell only fifteen metres in front of the enemy position. Although one of his colleagues reached this man and established that he was dead, all efforts to drag the corpse out of the line of fire were fruitless. When the enemy launched an attempt to encircle this Australian flanking force, the platoon commander was compelled to withdraw down the hill although fortunately this movement was accomplished without further loss. Under covering artillery fire, which was brought in and carefully adjusted by a New Zealand forward observer accompanying the company, Healy now proceeded to withdraw his entire force. With dusk fast approaching (the fight had been raging for two hours), and estimating that he was up against an enemy force equal in size to his own, he considered that he had no choice but to leave the battlefield to the enemy—along with the unrecoverable bodies of the two Australians killed in the action. While 1 RAR had suffered a mauling in this contest, their experience was minor compared to that of the 1/503rd which suffered nearly 100 casualties (40 of these killed) in vicious hand-to-hand fighting. At least the Americans could claim a body count of over 400 enemy killed. The Australians thirsted for a rematch and began planning a full-scale battalion attack on Hill 82. Scheduled to take place on 14 November, the assault was deferred and later abandoned as the unit became absorbed in other operations. Bob Breen (1988) First to Fight, Sydney: Allen & Unwin; Ian McNeill (1993) To Long Tan, Sydney: Allen & Unwin


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Ho Bo Woods, situated twenty kilometres north of Cu Chi in Binh Duong Province of the Republic of Vietnam, in January 1966 became the scene of a major action involving troops of the 1st Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (1 RAR). The area was known to contain the headquarters of the Saigon-Cholon-Gia Dinh Special Sector Committee, which controlled all Viet Cong activity around the South Vietnamese capital, Saigon. Although its precise location was unknown, the headquarters was believed to be concealed in an underground bunker system. On 8 January a search-and-destroy operation codenamed ‘Crimp’ was launched, involving the US 173rd Airborne Brigade (which included 1 RAR) and 3rd Infantry Brigade under the command of the American 1st Infantry Division. This began with airmobile assaults by 173 Brigade in the north and west, and 3 Brigade in the south, aimed at sealing off the area in preparation for sweeping movements designed to push trapped enemy east where they would be pinned against the Saigon River. Within this scheme, 1 RAR’s role was to establish a blocking position in a village beside the river on the northern edge of 173 Brigade’s area of operations. As matters turned out, this plan—if adhered to—would have seen the Australians delivered by helicopter directly on top of the enemy complex being sought. In the event, the landing zone to be used by 1 RAR was changed at the last moment— after an aerial reconnaissance by the unit’s operations officer on 7 January revealed that the enemy had made preparations to deal with any such insertions into the designated area. The Australians were lifted instead into an alternative site three kilometres to the south-west, and moved on foot towards what was to have been their start-point. No sooner had the leading elements of D Company, commanded by Major Ian Fisher, emerged into the cleared area of the original landing

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zone than the forward platoon received fire from the treeline on the north-east corner opposite. During the action which followed, six men of this platoon were wounded by VC firing from concealed positions, and two medics who tried to treat the casualties under fire were shot dead. Meanwhile, the commanding officer of 1 RAR, Lieut.-Colonel Alex Preece, attempted to push other companies around either side of where D Company was in contact and on towards the unit’s blocking position. Soon these elements were engaged, too, forced to fight through a maze of fortifications over ground honeycombed with tunnels and heavily seeded with booby traps. So far the Australians were the only allied troops to encounter resistance that first day, and Preece began to suspect that the enemy headquarters which was the whole operation’s objective was actually under his battalion’s feet. He responded by drawing his companies together into a defensive perimeter, tempting the VC to make a counter-attack. As the Australians sat atop their human anthill, they found that enemy individuals and small groups were able to pop up and disappear at will within the perimeter. Random actions continued into the night, although Preece felt obliged to give strict orders that fire was not to be opened unless an enemy target was positively identified; not only was he fearful of accidents leading to casualties among his own men, but a considerable number of civilians—including women and children—had been found to be present in the area. By the end of this first day’s fighting alone, 1 RAR had suffered three men killed, fifteen wounded and three cases of severe shock necessitating evacuation. The next day the process began of breaking into and exploring the enemy tunnels. Whereas the normal US Army practice was to seal, blow up or attempt to render unusable such systems before quickly


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moving on, the Australians spent the next few days sending down sapper teams to laboriously search and map the extent of the complex they had found; in the course of these efforts one engineer corporal was asphyxiated, and further deaths were caused by enemy snipers and other incidents. By 13 January over seventeen kilometres of tunnels had been charted—a fraction of what was plainly a vast network constructed on three separate levels; only after the war was it learnt that the Cu Chi system actually entailed more than 200 kilometres of tunnels over an area of 56 square kilometres. More importantly, a large quantity of documents (nearly 7,500, totalling over 100,000 pages) were recovered from inside the tunnels, along with 90 weapons, thousands of rounds of ammunition, and enough equipment, food and other supplies to fill eight 21⁄2-ton trucks. The information contained in the documents alone provided what was regarded as the allies’ first major intelligence coup of the war. By the time 1 RAR returned to base at Bien Hoa on 14 January the unit had sustained eight dead and 29 wounded, having killed 27 Viet Cong and with a further 30 thought likely to have been wounded. The US paratroopers, who also came up against heavy opposition, suffered 22 dead and 106 wounded. Enemy casualties for the whole operation were put at 128 confirmed killed with another 190 regarded as ‘probable’. Regardless of the size of the VC losses on this occasion, the Ho Bo Woods remained in use as a major enemy transit and supply base throughout the war. Bob Breen (1988) First to Fight, Sydney: Allen & Unwin; Ian McNeill (1993) To Long Tan, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Suoi Bong Trang, situated in central Binh Duong Province of the Republic of Vietnam (about 30 kilometres north-west of Bien Hoa airbase), on the night of 23–24 February 1966 became the scene of a major action involving troops of the 1st Battalion of the Royal

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January–February 1966 Australian Regiment (1 RAR). On 19 February the battalion was detached from the formation with which it normally served, the US 173rd Airborne Brigade, and placed under the operational control of the US 1st Infantry Brigade for a security operation codenamed ‘Rolling Stone’. This entailed providing protection to a US engineer battalion engaged in constructing a road between Routes 13 and 16, west of Ben Cat, which was being subjected to repeated sniping, mine incidents and sabotage raids by Viet Cong (VC) Local Force elements. In accordance with the role required of 1 RAR, the unit’s commanding officer, Lieut.-Colonel Alex Preece, instituted a constant program of aggressive and dispersed patrolling. Within two days this succeeded in reducing the level of enemy harassment of the engineers, but by 22 February the Australians noted that in several contacts they were now opposed not only by local VC but Main Force elements armed with new weapons. When a North Vietnamese engineer officer was killed in an ambush that night, intelligence staff concluded that a major attack in the area was imminent. The next day Preece moved to set up a defensive position beside the Suoi (Creek) Bong Trang, and recommended to the engineers that they relocate their base camp to join 1 RAR. The headquarters of 1 Brigade, located a kilometre further along the creekline to the east, also adopted a heightened defensive stance; a US infantry battalion was withdrawn from the field to man improved defences freshly dug around the headquarters perimeter by the engineers, joined by a platoon of M48 tanks and an additional field-gun battery. These precautionary moves proved to be just in time, since at that very moment three VC Main Force battalions normally located 25 kilometres to the west were moving to attack 1 Brigade’s headquarters, previously noted as a lightly defended or ‘soft’ target. By 8 p.m. the 2,000 troops in the attacking force had


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assembled near the village of Ap Bo, about three kilometres south-east of their objective, and were preparing an assault which would begin from the east before switching around the north to resume from the west. At about 10 p.m., mysterious lights were sighted from the north side of 1 RAR’s perimeter—these subsequently proving to be markers for the enemy forces moving into forming-up places. Sporadic firing followed around the brigade headquarters about midnight, but the expected attack on the nearby American base did not come until 2.25 a.m. on 24 February. Then, an initial enemy mortar barrage signalled that the VC assault troops were on their way. At this point the US commander unleashed the full weight of his own firepower, in combination with another eight supporting artillery units. Because the VC had not conducted a lastminute reconnaissance of their target, it had not been realised that the route chosen for the initial attack carried the enemy troops directly into the mouths of the American tanks and field-guns already within the perimeter. Firing cannister and splintex rounds, these proceeded to mow down the enemy’s close-packed assault formations, aided by prepositioned banks of Claymore mines. While the camp containing the engineers and 1 RAR was not initially the focus of attack, it was not entirely ignored by the enemy. Rounds from 60-mm mortars positioned midway between the two defended bases began striking the engineer camp, killing a sapper and wounding several more. Since rounds from these weapons were also impacting on Brigade Headquarters there was some confusion initially over who was responsible, with both the commander of 1 Brigade and Preece accusing each other of firing on their positions. Once US aircraft arrived overhead and began illuminating the battlefield, the Australians were able to join in the action by firing at the masses of enemy seen milling

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around in some confusion. A small 1 RAR standing patrol on listening watch outside the main battalion position when the attack began had several contacts with enemy parties before it was withdrawn, without loss to itself but having killed and wounded several of the opposition. Even after the VC began retreating at 4 a.m., fire was maintained against parties whose line of withdrawal carried them past the Australians. Once the action ended, the bodies of 89 enemy were found outside 1 RAR’s position, although the majority of these had fallen to American fire and the supporting artillery, so that only eighteen VC were credited to the unit. Two Australians were slightly wounded, whereas the Americans had sustained eleven killed and 72 wounded. Total enemy losses could merely be estimated. Although 154 bodies were pushed into a bomb crater for burial, one Australian estimate put at 200 the number of VC casualties that had been carried away by their retreating comrades; countless other enemy bodies had been totally disintegrated by artillery and tank fire, forming a red pulp which covered those rubber trees still left standing. Despite the impressive scale of the victory won, there was no pursuit of the retreating Viet Cong—priority being given to securing the battlefield and evacuating the seriously injured. Bob Breen (1988) First to Fight, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Long Tan, the best-known battle of the Vietnam War in which Australians were involved, occurred in Phuoc Tuy Province on 18 August 1966. The action was fought a little over two months after the 1st Australian Task Force (1 ATF)—comprising two infantry battalions of the Royal Australian Regiment (5 RAR and 6 RAR) and supporting arms—arrived in South Vietnam and established an operational base at Nui Dat, in the centre of Phuoc Tuy.


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Shortly before 2.45 a.m. on 17 August, Nui Dat was hit by a twenty-minute barrage from Viet Cong mortars and recoilless rifles firing from the east which left 24 personnel wounded, two seriously. As 5 RAR was absent on operations to the north the base was not at full strength at this time, and was further weakened by having several elements of 6 RAR also on patrol. Nonetheless, the next morning B Company of 6 RAR was sent out from the perimeter to locate the firing positions and establish in which direction the enemy responsible for the attack had withdrawn. At midday on 18 August, D Company (commanded by Major Harry Smith) relieved B Company and took over the pursuit. That afternoon a sweep was begun of a rubber plantation north of the derelict village of Long Tan, situated four kilometres east of Nui Dat. At 3.40 p.m. 11 Platoon clashed briefly with a squad of six to eight Viet Cong, the enemy fleeing eastwards after one man was hit by Australian fire. A weapon dropped by this party was found to be a Russian automatic AK47 rifle, a type not normally carried by VC Local Force units, and the fact that group had been dressed in khaki uniforms also drew comment within the company. It was not then realised, however, that such dress and equipment indicated the presence of enemy Main Force soldiers, not merely provincial troops. Not long after resuming its advance, at 4.08 p.m., 11 Platoon came under devastating small-arms fire and rocketpropelled grenades from its front and both flanks. The weight of this fire—believed to come from at least an enemy company-sized force—immediately pinned down the Australians, at the very moment when torrential monsoon rain broke across the area. Within less than twenty minutes this leading group of Australians had a third of its strength either killed or wounded, and was receiving mortar fire as well. Artillery counter-fire was called in, but shortly afterwards the aerial of

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The commander of 12 Platoon D Company, 6RAR, surveys the Long Tan rubber plantation on 19 August 1966, scene of the previous day’s battle. Enemy dead still lie beside the heavy machine-gun they manned during the fighting. Source: Australian War Memorial FOR/66/0658/VN

the platoon’s radio was shot away and communications were lost. In response to 11 Platoon’s plight, shortly after 5 p.m. 10 Platoon on the left flank was ordered to wheel south and move to its support. Within minutes 10 Platoon, too, came under heavy fire from three sides, its radio also hit and put out of action. Communications were restored shortly afterwards by a runner from company headquarters who carried a spare radio set through enemy fire—killing two enemy along the way—while calling out in the blinding rain until he found 10 Platoon’s position. Still 100–150 metres short of 11 Platoon’s location and unable to do anything to assist it to withdraw, 10 Platoon was ordered to fall back towards company headquarters. This movement was accomplished under cover of artillery fire, the wounded being carried back. All this time 11 Platoon was still fighting hard, although cut off and with its effective strength of 28 men reduced to less than


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half. After its radio was repaired and contact restored, a steady hail of artillery was directed onto enemy positions. This initially had little effect on the leading VC assault troops, estimated to be from at least two companies, behind whom the weight of this fire fell. Despite the high risk involved, the sergeant now leading the Australian defence adjusted the barrage to within 50 metres of his position so that shells scythed through the enemy formations. At 5.15 p.m. 12 Platoon set off from company headquarters towards the south-east in an attempt to link up with 11 Platoon and enable the survivors to be extricated. After pressing steadily forward for some 40 minutes, this group succeeded in reaching within about 75 metres of the embattled platoon before enemy pressure from three sides forced it to halt. With visibility down to about 70 metres in the rain, the commander of 12 Platoon ordered coloured smoke thrown to signal the presence and location of his men. Shortly afterwards, the dozen or so

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members of 11 Platoon able to do so raced to join them—though not before one was killed and two others wounded. As this was happening, two RAAF UH– 1B Iroquois helicopters had arrived overhead of company headquarters at 6 p.m. and managed to drop boxes of ammunition wrapped in blankets. This resupply was received at a critical moment, as the ammunition remaining within the company by this point was down to about 100 rounds. By 6.10 p.m. 12 Platoon was back within the perimeter with what remained of 11 Platoon, and at last Smith had all the elements of his company that were still capable of fighting collected in one area. The action continued in heavy rain as darkness fell, the enemy engaging in repeated human wave assaults from the east, south-east and south. These attacks were broken up partly by D Company’s fire, but mostly by the effective barrages called in by the attached forward observer, a New Zealander, from the regiment of three field batteries (two Australian, one New Zealand) operating in support of 1 ATF from gunlines within the Nui Dat base. Also available was the fire of a US battery of medium artillery. As it happened, the conditions were technically near perfect for the type of support required of the guns on this occasion, and the slaughter caused among the enemy’s ranks by the nearly 3,500 artillery rounds fired during the battle was immense. Meanwhile, at 5.45 p.m., A Company of 6 RAR had left Nui Dat mounted in M113 armoured personnel carriers under the personal orders of the unit’s commanding officer, Lieut.-Colonel Colin Townsend. An element of the recently returned 5 RAR was also placed on standby, while others took over the defence of 6 RAR’s sector of the base perimeter. At about 7 p.m. the carriers were able to reach D Company after fighting past groups of enemy encountered on the route through the plantation. A 30-strong party from B Company 6 RAR, ordered to


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turn around while returning to Nui Dat once relieved by Smith at midday, also reached D Company’s position on foot at this time. After the carriers made an easterly assault past the D Company position, continuing for 500 metres through the forming-up places being used by the enemy, they returned to join the defenders at 7.10 p.m. The Viet Cong were then still pressing an attack from the north-east but broke this off soon afterwards. All across the front, enemy figures were seen rising up from the ground and disappearing back among the rubber trees. The firing suddenly stopped, and although the augmented Australian force waited for a renewal of the enemy’s major assaults, the battle was in fact over. Because of the dark, no attempt was made to secure the battlefield or locate the missing until next day, priority being given to evacuating D Company’s many casualties. The enemy force engaged in the action comprised the Viet Cong 275th Main Force Regiment reinforced by at least one North Vietnamese Army battalion, and a Local Force unit, D445 Battalion—a total of approximately 2,500 men, as many as 1,000 of whom actually came into direct contact with D Company. When the enemy forces eventually withdrew they left behind 245 bodies, although a further unknown number of killed had already been removed and others had been simply shredded into unidentifiable remains. In 1 ATF, D Company lost seventeen of its 100 members killed and nineteen wounded—two of whom were not recovered until the following day, having spent a terrifying night watching the Viet Cong evacuate their casualties which were estimated to number in the hundreds. Three members of other Australian sub-units were wounded, one of whom later died, and three suffered such severe battle stress that they had to be evacuated. The Australians’ stunning victory did more than simply enhance their fighting reputation, since unquestionably the enemy

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August 1966–October 1967 force encountered by D Company had been preparing a decisive action against 1 ATF— although opinion remains divided on whether this was to have been an attack on the Nui Dat base or a crushing ambush of part of the Task Force. This meeting engagement destroyed the possibility of getting in an early politically wounding blow against the recent Australian deployment, and placed Viet Cong plans in the province on the back foot for some time. This should not obscure the fact that 1 ATF had been ill-prepared for a contest with an enemy force of the magnitude which materialised at Long Tan, or that the outcome of the action had come very close to being a catastrophe for the Australians. Lex McAulay (1986) The Battle of Long Tan, Hawthorn, Vic.: Hutchinson Australia; Ian McNeill (1993) To Long Tan, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Ap My An, an action fought on 17 February 1967 in Phuoc Tuy province, South Vietnam, between the 6th Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (6 RAR) and the Viet Cong D445 Battalion. At 6 a.m. on 17 February two companies of Viet Cong moved into the important coastal village of Phuoc Hai to engage South Vietnamese government forces. After five hours fighting, the attackers withdrew north-east. Believing the enemy were following their usual pattern of attacking then escaping to the safety of their jungle bases, the commander of the 1st Australian Task Force (1 ATF), Brigadier Stuart Graham, decided to attempt to block the attackers’ route of withdrawal. He ordered three companies of 6 RAR to land in helicopters just north of the hamlet of Ap My An, linking up there with the battalion’s fourth company which would travel overland in the armoured personnel carriers of A Squadron, 3rd Cavalry Regiment. The whole force would immediately begin patrolling westwards, in what was codenamed “Operation Bribie”. Contrary to the Australian expectation, the Viet Cong were not intending to simply


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withdraw. The attack on Phuoc Hai had been mounted precisely to provoke a reaction from 1 ATF. Anticipating that a relief column would move by road, an extensive ambush had been set in dwellings alongside Route 44 leading into the village. In the event, this trap was avoided by the decision of the APC commander, Major Gordon Murphy, to travel cross-country, and the enemy’s end purpose was not even known until after the battle. Meanwhile A Company, the first element of the force inserted by helicopter, landed soon after lunchtime and advanced into the rainforest. It had not gone far when it came under concentrated rifle and machine-gun fire, from what was subsequently found to be a prepared position containing an enemy force of up to a battalion in size. Initially thinking he was up against no more than a company, the commander of 6 RAR, Lieut.-Colonel Colin Townsend, launched a quick attack using two companies at 3.35 p.m. The advancing troops came under constant sniper fire from enemy hidden in trees, and machine-guns previously not identified also began firing, so that the assault quickly faltered. Attempts to regain momentum, including a bayonet charge by one platoon, all failed. Unable to go forward, and under fire from all sides while warding off counter-attacks, the foremost Australians also could not extract themselves. Eventually, relief came with the arrival of the eleven APCs which had earlier reached the landing zone and been held around the edge of the jungle. These fought their way to the scene of the fighting at 6.15 p.m. and began taking on board the wounded. At 6.50 p.m. the companies broke contact and moved back into a night harbour position near the clearing, leaving the abandoned battlefield to be pounded by mortars, artillery and air strikes. When 6 RAR returned to the area of the firefight next morning, it was found that the enemy had gone. The vicious action had cost 6 RAR seven men killed and 26 wounded, while the

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cavalry also had a man killed and another wounded, and an APC destroyed. The bodies of only eight Viet Cong were found still in the battle area, but obviously many more had been removed. Intelligence assessments finally put the enemy loss at between 50 and 70 killed. The action had clearly been no Australian victory. Instead, it was perhaps the closest Australians came to defeat in a major battle in Vietnam. Despite showing courage and determination, the Australians had been matched by an enemy equally tenacious and disciplined. Ian McNeill, ‘Vietnam 1967: Operation Bribie’, Wartime: Official Magazine of the Australian War Memorial, no.1, November 1997.

Suoi Chau Pha, an action fought on 6 August 1967 north-west of Nui Dat, South Vietnam, between 7th Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (7 RAR) and the 3rd Battalion of 274th (Dong Nai) Regiment, a Viet Cong (VC) Main Force unit. On 4 August the Australian unit began Operation Ballarat, moving into its assigned area on foot and carrying rations for five days. This stealthy insertion caused the enemy to be caught by surprise, and led to several contacts with Australian patrols. On 6 August, a platoon of A Company ambushed and killed two VC scouts. The Australians prepared to launch a quick attack to sweep up any enemy following along behind, but ran into heavy fire from a large body of roughly equal size. Having lost the initiative and suffered several casualties itself, the Australian platoon went to ground. The Australian company commander now came forward and ordered one of his rear platoons to make a right flanking attack. This movement had just been initiated when the assaulting troops ran into another VC platoon, the forward element of an enemy company, doing exactly the same thing. The two platoons on both sides became locked in a furious firefight at a range of 20–30 metres. While the action was still continuing


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RAAF helicopters arrived in the rear of A Company’s position and began winching out wounded men, who had to be tied to stretchers. The lead aircraft was hit by eleven rounds of fire, its pilot and a crewman wounded, but other RAAF and US Army helicopters persisted until all the casualties were evacuated. Responding to reports that scores of VC were massing for an attack, the artillery forward observer acccompanying A Company called in a firemission which proved decisive. The rounds, falling amid a blinding monsoonal downpour, created a hellish atmosphere of noise and limited visibility. Some rounds fell close to members of the second Australian platoon and wounded several, but had the desired effect of scything through the enemy assault force and reserve troops not directly engaged in the battle. Having taken heavy losses to his reconnaissance platoon and at least one company, the commander of 3 Battalion 274 Regiment chose to withdraw. As well as seven enemy confirmed killed by body count, another five dead were seen but their bodies not recovered; the number of enemy wounded was put at 28. Artillery barrages during the savage four-hour engagement were, however, estimated to have caused another 200 VC casualties. Six Australians had been killed and nineteen wounded. David Horner (ed.) (1990) Duty First, Sydney: Allen & Unwin; Michael O’Brien (1995) Conscripts and Regulars, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Cape Lai, a naval incident on 18 October 1967 in which the RAN’s guided missile destroyer Perth was hit by fire while engaging enemy artillery positions in North Vietnam. The previous month Perth had joined warships of the US Seventh Fleet for duty in the Vietnam area, and on this occasion she was operating just north of the Demilitarised Zone which separated North and South Vietnam at the 17th Parallel. Since enemy coastal defence sites here frequently engaged

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October 1967–May 1968 vessels as far as 24 kilometres out to sea, all bombardment missions were carried out at high speed. Despite following this practice, Perth was struck by a shell which wounded four of its crew—two seriously—in what was the only time an Australian warship suffered casualties from enemy fire during the Vietnam War. Although RAN destroyers several times duelled with shore batteries while serving with US Seventh Fleet warships off the coast of North Vietnam, only on two other occasions did enemy rounds land close enough to even drop shrapnel onto ships’ decks. George Odgers (1982) The Royal Australian Navy: an illustrated history, Hornsby, NSW: Child & Henry Publishing

Bien Hoa, a series of contacts between units of the 1st Austraian Task Force (1 ATF) and communist forces in South Vietnam, which occurred between 24 January and 1 March 1968. Forewarned of the enemy’s intention of launching a major offensive under cover of the Buddhist Tet festival (marking the Chinese lunar New Year), 1 ATF was moved from its normal operating base in Phuoc Tuy Province to assist in defending the vital Bien Hoa–Long Binh complex near Saigon. The role of the Australians was to deny the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army forces access to the area and to suitable sites for launching rocket attacks on the military bases and installations. Initially only two battalions—2 RAR and 7 RAR—took part, but within a few days a company of 3 RAR was also brought to assist with the defence of Fire Support Base ‘Andersen’, which was established about a kilometre north of the village of Trang Bom. Australian involvement—codenamed ‘Operation Coburg’—began with a series of twelve minor patrol clashes up to 31 January which saw 22 enemy killed. During early February the nature of these contacts changed, as the Australians found themselves increasingly encountering company-size groups from Viet Cong Main Force units in


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static base camps; in a further 29 clashes during this phase another 64 enemy were killed. The highlight of 1 ATF’s involvement in operations around Bien Hoa came later in the month, however, when the Andersen base was repeatedly subjected to major ground assaults. The first of these occurred on the night of 17–18 February, and was followed by further attacks on the night of 19–20 February and early on the morning of 28 February. The base had been deliberately sited astride the Viet Cong communications, so that it was fully expected that the enemy would make efforts to eliminate it. The first assault was preceded by a heavy rocket and mortar barrage, followed by two waves of infantry which hit the south-western portion of the perimeter manned by 3 RAR’s battalion echelon and mortar platoon, along with an American medium artillery battery. The perimeter wire was breached by the enemy, but the attack was driven back by the weight of machine-gun fire from armoured personnel carriers and the American gunners. A second assault shortly afterwards, this time from the north, was stopped short of the wire by small-arms fire from the forward weapon pits. By the time of the second attack two nights later, the base had been reinforced by C Company of 3 RAR. The enemy assault, launched from the south-east and preceded by heavy machine-gun fire, was stopped before reaching the wire. The attackers were able, however, to hit positions within the perimeter with rifle grenades and also struck the assault pioneer lines with two satchel charges. The final attack on 28 February also began with a mortar attack, but the assault wave was broken up by fire from the 3 RAR mortars and the enemy was forced to withdraw to the east. Casualties on the last occasion were three Australians wounded. David Horner (ed.) (1990) Duty First, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

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Coral–Balmoral, a notable series of actions fought in South Vietnam during May 1968, involving attacks by communist forces against fire support bases ‘Coral’ and ‘Balmoral’ situated north of Saigon. Upon receipt of intelligence reports of an impending communist offensive aimed at influencing peace talks then underway, the 1st Australian Task Force (1 ATF) was ordered to move from its normal area of operations in Phuoc Tuy Province to an area east of Lai Khe. As was the case just three months earlier (see Bien Hoa), its role was to take up positions astride enemy infiltration routes into the capital and to block and disrupt enemy movements. Moving with two battalions—3 RAR and 1 RAR—into its new area of operations, 1 ATF acted to establish first a fire support base (named Coral) on 12 May. This was secured by 3 RAR, but was only partly constructed—due to delays in flying in the second battalion until 5 p.m. that day—when

To Lai Khe

the enemy attacked in strength at 1.45 a.m. the next day. After an initial barrage of rockets, mortars and small-arms fire, about 400 troops of the 141st North Vietnamese Regiment rushed the base, quickly overrunning the 1 RAR mortar platoon position and killing five of the platoon’s eighteen members while wounding eight others. The enemy’s assault also forced the abandonment of a pit containing a gun of the 102nd Field Battery, but two of the battery’s other guns engaged the enemy over open sights—firing splintex rounds containing hundreds of small darts. These caused terrible execution among the attackers’ ranks, forcing the North Vietnamese to withdraw leaving behind 51 dead and one prisoner. The action continued until 8 a.m., with the defenders receiving extensive support from American fixed-wing and helicopter gunships. By the time the fighting was over, Australian losses totalled ten killed and 25 wounded. At 2.15 a.m. on 16 May Coral again came

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May–June 1968 under attack, with a heavy and accurate mortar barrage preceding an assault fifteen minutes later by a regiment-sized force. Three companies of 1 RAR were manning the perimeter on this occasion and all were heavily engaged, with part of the A Company position being captured for a period. By the time the enemy withdrew six hours later, the base’s Australian defenders had suffered five killed and nineteen wounded while the American battery in the base also sustained two wounded. The enemy’s losses were a minimum of 34, this being the number of bodies found, but marks indicated that a much larger number of casualties had been dragged away. Later intelligence claims were made that only about 100 of the 790 North Vietnamese regulars who took part in the attack survived without being killed or wounded. The acting commander of 1 ATF, Colonel Donald Dunstan, decided to establish 3 RAR in a new fire support base named ‘Balmoral’ about six kilometres to the north of Coral. An element of the armoured squadron equipped with Centurion tanks was summoned from the Australian base at Nui Dat on 21 May, and these vehicles arrived in a column on the 23rd—just a day after the Coral base had been subjected to another attack. After an accurate rocket and mortar barrage the enemy had been forming up for a ground assault when they were hit by 1 RAR’s own mortars and broken up. Although there were further bombardments at Coral on 26 and 28 May, and some notable patrol actions, the main focus of the enemy’s attention now shifted to the new base at Balmoral. On 24–25 May the Balmoral base was occupied by elements of 3 RAR supported by tanks. The latter arrived from Coral just a matter of hours before two battalions of North Vietnamese Army regulars launched a ferocious attack. After an accurate barrage of rocket and mortar launched at 3.45 a.m. on 26 May, the enemy assaulted the section


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of perimeter manned by D Company of 3 RAR and were thrown back by the combined firepower of the infantry supported by two tanks. When daylight arrived the enemy outside Coral found themselves under attack, as a troop of Centurions moved out with supporting infantry to blast at a bunker system found hidden in jungle. A large number of bunkers were destroyed, along with their occupants, without any Australians becoming casualties. A second regimental thrust was made against Balmoral at 2.30 a.m. on 28 May, but this assault was broken after only about 30 minutes—again with the assistance of supporting fire from the tanks, artillery and mortars. The North Vietnamese left 55 of their number dead in front of the base, along with six who were taken prisoner; another twelve were considered to have been possibly killed in the failed attack. The Australians lost one man killed and six wounded. Lex McAulay (1988) The Battle of Coral, Sydney: Century Hutchinson

Binh Ba, a fierce action fought on 6–7 June 1969 in central Phuoc Tuy Province of the Republic of Vietnam, in a village located five kilometres north of the operational base occupied by the 1st Australian Task Force (1 ATF) at Nui Dat. The village and its northern hamlet of Duc Trung, formerly home to over 2,000 people who were mostly tappers employed in the surrounding French-owned Gallia rubber plantation, was practically destroyed in close-quarter—often house-to-house—fighting during this battle between Australian troops and a strong combined force of communist guerillas (Viet Cong) and North Vietnamese Army (NVA) regulars. The engagement began after the enemy force—comprising a company from the NVA 33 Regiment, elements of the Viet Cong D440 Local Force Battalion, the Binh Ba and Ngai Giao Guerilla squads and the Chau Duc District Company—occupied the tidy,

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D Company, 5RAR, supported by Centurion tanks, sweep towards the edge of a rubber plantation at Binh Ba, 6 June 1969. Source: Australian War Memorial BEL/69/382/VN

rectangular-shaped town on the night of 5– 6 June. The following morning South Vietnamese government troops from within the Duc Thanh district were sent to expel the intruders. Initially it was believed that the group was of about platoon strength (30 men), however, after a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) was fired at an Australian Centurion tank moving north along the road through the village, the district commander asked 1 ATF for assistance in the task of clearing Binh Ba. The Task Force ready reaction force (D Company of 5 RAR under Major Murray Blake, a troop of tanks from B Squadron, 1st Armoured Regiment, and a troop of armoured personnel carriers (or APCs) from B Squadron, 3 Cavalry Regiment) were despatched, and reached an assembly area just south of the village by about 10.30 a.m. Meanwhile, the Vietnamese district chief had been evacuating the town’s population, and deploying his Regional Force troops into blocking positions to prevent the enemy’s escape. Once the Australians were given the all clear to proceed, an assault was launched through the village from east to west. This was led by the four tanks, with the infantry remaining mounted in the APCs following. From the moment that the formation reached the edge of the village at 11.20 a.m.,


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the Australians came under light fire. By the time the marketplace had been reached in the town’s centre the weight of opposing fire—including from machine-guns as well as further RPGs—made clear that the enemy’s strength in the town was more likely a battalion than one or even two platoons. Moreover, two RAAF Bushrangers (helicopter gunships) now reported other large enemy parties moving to the south and west of the village, indicating that the enemy’s original occupying force had back-up. The attack was accordingly swung left, to clear out to the town’s southern edge before moving around to the western outskirts to deal with enemy movements in this area. As the Australian armoured vehicles rumbled into the rubber trees on the town’s western side, they clashed with an enemy company which was forming up in preparation for a counter-attack into the village and heavy casualties were inflicted on the guerillas. Bolstered now by B Company of 5 RAR (under Major Rein Harring) which took up blocking positions to the south and east of Binh Ba, at 2 p.m. the attack force prepared to assault back through the village—this time from west to east, with the infantry leading on foot and the armoured fighting vehicles moving behind in support. The advance was slow, due to the need for the troops to clear houses of enemy who shot from windows and doorways before retreating into tunnels as the Australians passed. Each time the force was fired from a building, tank rounds were used to breach the walls for a small team which entered and went from room to room until resistance was quelled. This work continued all afternoon, stopping only at last light when an exhausted D Company and the armour occupied a defensive position for the night. At this time the village was still not totally secure. At 6 a.m. on 7 June B Company intercepted an enemy company attempting to enter the town, and fire from small arms

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1968–1971 and the tanks forced the guerillas to withdraw. Blake’s company (with a platoon of B Company under command) resumed the task of clearing Binh Ba, meeting only sporadic resistance. Later in the morning, however, Vietnamese Regional and Popular Forces in blocking positions around Duc Trung came under attack, and both 5 RAR’s Assault Pioneer Platoon and Harring’s company were deployed to provide assistance. Further close-quarter fighting followed. Blake’s men and the armour began yet another assault, but withdrew to allow the Vietnamese troops to complete the sweep. By that evening the village was finally pronounced cleared of enemy and both Australian companies adopted blocking positions around it. A final sweep was carried out next morning to ensure that no enemy remained, before the 1 ATF elements involved in the action returned to Nui Dat later that same day. In the course of the engagement at least 91 enemy were killed and eleven prisoners taken. The losses suffered by 33 NVA Regiment alone were sufficient to cause it to move out of Phuoc Tuy into the adjoining Long Khanh Province. Although 1 ATF would continue to occasionally encounter enemy main force units, the battle of Binh Ba effectively marked the end of such large-scale clashes. David Horner (ed.) (1990) Duty First, Sydney: Allen & Unwin

Long Khanh, an action fought in Long Khanh Province of South Vietnam on 7 June 1971 by troops of the 1st Australian Task Force. The engagement occurred during a ‘search and clear’ operation, codenamed ‘Overlord’, launched to counter a reported concentration of communist insurgent forces—both North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong—in an area 30 kilometres north of the task force base at Nui Dat, in Phuoc Tuy Province. The main part of this operation was allocated to the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Australian


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Regiment (3 RAR) under Lieut.-Colonel Peter Scott, while 4 RAR (with two New Zealand companies) and a battalion of the US 1st Cavalry Division took up positions aimed at preventing enemy escape. Australian armour (tanks and armoured personel carriers or APCs) and artillery (both Australian and American) were also involved. The operation commenced on 5 June with the deployment of forces, with signs of a strong enemy presence in the area being detected as soon as 3 RAR began patrolling. Blocking elements also had sightings and contacts with enemy parties, all of which appeared to be fleeing north. Late on the afternoon on 6 June, a platoon of B Company had located what was thought to be the main enemy position. With dusk not far off, however, it was decided not to press ahead until the following morning. A few shots were exchanged with individuals in the enemy camp before the platoon broke contact and withdrew into a night defensive position. After a half-hour preparatory artillery barrage the platoon resumed its advance at 6.30 a.m., there being little expectation— based on previous enemy practice—that the position would be found still occupied. In the event, the assault had proceeded only about 90 metres when the Australians came under heavy fire from the front and both flanks, and suffered several casualties. Effectively pinned down on the edge of a strongly defended and well-concealed bunker system, the platoon commander decided against risking heavy losses through attempting withdrawal and instead maintained his position with the support of RAAF and US helicopter gunships, and suppressive fire from guns and mortars. Meanwhile, Lieut.-Colonel Scott began organising another assault using the battalion reserve (D Company) mounted in APCs and with tank support against the flank and rear of the bunker complex. Two troops of tanks spearheading the assault through the jungle from the north were soon receiving heavy

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fire from mainly small arms, although rocket-propelled grenades were fired at the leading tanks—one of which sustained slight external damage. That the enemy rounds were coming from all sides at this point left no doubt that the bunker system which had been encountered was much larger than first realised, and caused the tanks to halt their advance while D Company was brought up in the APCs to begin its assault. While this move was in preparation, the platoon originally in contact began to run short of ammunition. Enemy soldiers were seen emerging from their bunkers in an attempt to outflank the heavily outnumbered Australians, and only the continuous, heavy and effective supporting fire of guns, mortars and helicopter gunships prevented the platoon from being overrun at this point. Between 9–9.15 a.m. the headquarters and other platoons of B Company had managed to link up and provide reinforcement, and this fact—combined with an aerial resupply of ammunition—staved off the immediate danger to the small force in contact for the previous two hours. A second attempt to resupply the company by RAAF helicopter at about 11 a.m. resulted in disaster. Enemy ground fire was seen to hit the aircraft in the fuselage, causing it to crash and explode on impact. Two crew members were killed, and the other two were injured; the 3 RAR padmaster was also injured. A second winch point had to be established in the rear of the company perimeter to enable casualty evacuation and resupply to continue. By mid-afternoon, D Company was in position and began pushing through the bunker system from the north-east with the support of the tanks. Although little resistance was encountered and the volume of enemy fire was rapidly diminishing, progress was slowed by the thick vegetation, the sheer size of the position (which extended beyond both edges of the assaulting company’s formation—it was subsequently


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found to cover nearly a square kilometre) and the need to search each bunker for any evidence of the enemy. Once the tanks and D Company linked up with B Company and established a defensive position for the night, the action was effectively over. After massively underestimating the nature of the enemy objective against which they had sent a platoon, the Australians had succeeded in pushing the enemy—members of the 3/33 NVA Regiment—out of a valuable base complex intended for long-term occupation and use. What was more, even as the assault on this camp had been underway, a platoon of C Company of 3 RAR had located a second major bunker system to the south. This separate base, apparently used by the Viet Cong’s D445 Provincial Mobile Battalion, had also been captured after it was hastily abandoned. Apart from this outcome, the tangible gains from the contact had been small. Although blood trails and human fragments found within the first bunker system provided evidence that casualties had been heavy, the enemy had taken care to remove their dead from the scene where possible and only five bodies were recovered. On this score, the enemy’s losses seemed to scarcely outweigh the Australian casualties of three killed (two RAAF, and an artillery forward observer) and six members of B Company wounded. Moreover the purpose of the enemy’s spirited resistance had been to gain time for an orderly evacuation of personnel and stores, an objective which was plainly achieved. The enemy in the area were also not cowed by the loss of their base camps, as an ambush of APCs carried out on 12 June—apparently by 274 Regiment of the Viet Cong 5th Division—testified. The seven Australians killed and three wounded during this subsequent action were the most casualties sustained before Operation Overlord ended on 14 June. Michael English (1995) The Battle of Long Khanh, Sydney: Army Doctrine Centre

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September–October 1990


A Squirrel helicopter (right) from HMAS Darwin provides cover while a boarding party from a British Lynx is lowered onto the Iraqi ship Tadmur to enforce United Nations sanctions in September 1990. Source: Australian War Memorial P1575.002

Gulf of Oman, a series of incidents during September–October 1990 in which warships enforced maritime trade sanctions imposed by the United Nations Organisation against Iraq, following that country’s invasion of Kuwait on 2 August. The Australian vessels involved were units of a three-ship RAN task group under Commodore Donald Chalmers, part of a multi-national naval force (MNNF) operating in the Gulf of Oman to control shipping passing through the Strait of Hormuz. Although initially empowered only to identify and warn any vessels encountered, from 10 September the MNNF was authorised to halt, divert or if necessary board and seize any ships attempting to breach the UN blockade. On 14 September the frigates Darwin and Adelaide were called upon to assist US and British ships in intercepting the 40,000-tonne Iraqi merchantman Al Fao, which had entered the Gulf of Oman and was heading towards the strait. Several calls to stop and warning machine-gun fire from


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a US frigate had gone unheeded by the ship, whose master claimed he needed approval from Baghdad. While Adelaide and HMS York positioned themselves to prevent the Al Fao from entering Iranian territorial waters, the action of Darwin in firing further warning shots from a .50-calibre machinegun across the Iraqi’s bows finally brought the vessel to a halt at 4.50 p.m. It was another three hours, however, before the captain lowered a ladder and permitted an American–Australian search party on board to carry out an inspection. Once it was confirmed that Al Fao was in ballast, the vessel was permitted to proceed into the Arabian (or Persian) Gulf. On 8 October Darwin and Adelaide were separately involved in two similar incidents south of Ra’s al Hadd, near Masirah Island off Oman. When the 6,000-tonne Iraqi cargo ship Al Wasitti also refused to comply with orders to stop, warning shots were fired across her bow—initially from a machine-gun, but then from Adelaide’s

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76-mm gun. This was thus the first time an RAN vessel had fired its main gun armament in anger since the Vietnam conflict. Marines from a British ship were then landed by rope from helicopters to seize control of the bridge of both Iraqi vessels, after which boarding teams from other warships were sent by boat. While the Al Wasitti was established to be empty and allowed to proceed, the other vessel—the 3,500-tonne tanker Tadmur— was found to be carrying prohibited cargo. With a combined British–American– Australian party embarked until the next day, the ship was diverted to Muscat. Darwin had resumed patrol duty when word was received that the Tadmur had been mistakenly released at Muscat, still carrying her illegal cargo. Adelaide was among the vessels assigned to again apprehend her, and only after six tonnes of goods had been taken off with the assistance of Adelaide’s Seahawk helicopter was the Tadmur permitted to proceed on its way to Iraq. Yet another notably difficult interception involved the 155,000-tonne supertanker Amuriyah on 28 October. The master of this vessel brazenly invited the most drastic measures to be applied against him by ignoring all warnings—including radio calls, sirens sounded at close quarters, a written message displayed from a helicopter sent by Darwin to hover near the ship’s bridge, aggressive manoeuvring, and buzzing by two fighters from the US aircraft-carrier Independence. Warning shots were tried next, with Darwin firing 200 .50-calibre rounds (initially at 300 metres but later just 100 metres in front of the tanker’s bows) and a US warship sending a similar warning with 5-inch rounds. When 30 US marines were eventually landed by helicopter on the tanker’s foredeck at about 9.20 a.m., the Iraqi captain ordered water-cannon used against them. Other measures taken to frustrate the boarders included switching off onboard lights and locking compartments; one Iraqi attacked a marine with an axe until forcibly


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restrained. The search of the Amuriyah was accomplished with its master and engineer both in handcuffs. Only once it was certain that the vessel had no cargo was it permitted to proceed at about 3 p.m. During the first three months of the MNNF’s operations, nineteen merchant ships deemed to be breaching the UN embargo were diverted to ports. Eleven of these had initially refused to stop when challenged, and in ten cases warning shots had to be fired to enforce compliance. RAN ships were involved in five of the latter instances. Tom Frame (1992) Pacific Partners: A History of Australian–American Naval Relations, Sydney: Hodder & Stoughton; David Horner (1992) The Gulf Commitment: The Australian Defence Force’s First War, Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press

Baidoa, a series of small scale clashes fought between 16 February and 26 March 1993 in this town in south-west Somalia, between troops of the 1st Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (1 RAR) and bandit gangs. Following the collapse of government in Somalia, the Australian troops had been sent in mid-January as part of a United Nations effort to ensure that humanitarian food aid reached the starving population, despite a reign of terror by lawless elements. Deploying immediately to Baidoa, the Australians quickly made their impact felt on the local scene. On the afternoon of 16 February one patrol, responding to a report of a bandit kidnapping, freed the victims after exchanging fire with a gunman who fled into the Governor’s House. When the patrol stormed the house they captured four armed Somali men who surrendered their weapons, one of which had just been fired. At about 2 a.m. the next day another patrol was fired on from the town’s pump house, where a group of bandits had been forcing a local technician to help them dismantle the pump that drew water from three wells sunk on the banks of the river bed. After an eight minute battle, two severely wounded bandits

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1993–1999 were recovered (one of whom died before reaching hospital), as was the technician who had been shot in the legs by the departing bandits. Another bandit was captured. Blood traces found later showed that at least one of a group which had escaped in the dark beneath a bridge had also been wounded. No Australians were hit. On 19 February a patrol operating in the Khaat Market was fired on at 3.30 a.m. when it disturbed a group of bandits in an alley who were about to loot a warehouse. In the opening burst of fire, the patrol’s signaller was shot in the shoulder. The bandits escaped without casualties. Just before 2 a.m. on 21 February, another patrol was ambushed in the same alley. This time the Australians responded to the long bursts of automatic fire directed at them by putting a 66-mm anti-tank rocket into the building, whereupon all firing ceased. When other parties of Australians arrived on the scene to make a search of the building, they discovered four concussed Somalis lying in the rubble. Three AK-47 weapons were also captured. The bandits were all found to be employees of a non-government relief organization working in the town, whose activities the men were supposed to guard. In another night incident on 27 February, intended to reduce bandit extortion of women drawing water at an area of wells, a four-man Australian patrol challenged three Somali men they encountered—one of whom was openly carrying a rifle. The armed man instantly raised his weapon to his shoulder, whereupon he was shot dead. His two companions also produced weapons and opened fire, before managing to slip away in the darkness. A month later, on 26 March, another night incident occurred at the compound of the Medecins Sans Frontieres aid organization, which was suspected to be a hiding place for bandits. When two Somali men were sighted inside and challenged, one of them produced a rifle and prepared to fire. In the


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brief but very confused action that ensued, one Somali man was killed by the original patrol. A quick reaction force arriving on the scene was engaged by a second armed man, and in responding to this contact threw a grenade which accidentally wounded two patrol members, fortunately only slightly. A search of the compound revealed a blood trail and also a Somali woman cowering in shock on a verandah of the main building. Subsequent investigation showed that the two Somali men were MSF guards who themselves thought they were under attack from bandits. Bob Breen (1998) A Little Bit of Hope: Australian Force—Somalia, Sydney, NSW: Allen & Unwin

Suai, a small-scale action on 6 October 1999 between Australian troops of the United Nations International Force East Timor (Interfet) and a party of local militia opposed to East Timorese moves towards independence from Indonesia. Fought 4 kilometres outside Suai, itself about 15 kilometres from the border with Indonesiancontrolled West Timor, this was the first direct combat engagement involving members of the peacekeeping force since Interfet’s arrival two weeks earlier. Following a day-long operation to secure Suai, over 100 militia members had been detained and loaded onto their own trucks to take them back to the capital, Dili, for further screening. Shortly after setting off, the road convoy was fired upon at 5.25 p.m. in what was apparently a hasty ambush. Two Australians, members of the Special Air Service Regiment travelling in the same light vehicle, were wounded in the initial firing— one in the neck, the other in the left leg and wrist—but still joined their companions in the ensuing firefight, during which two militiamen were killed. Two more militia members who escaped later died of their wounds. Bob Breen (2000) Mission Accomplished, East Timor, Sydney, NSW: Allen & Unwin

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The Intelligence Officer of 2 RAR and a signaller hurry to the scene of the firefight at Motaain between Indonesian border guards and an Australian patrol. Source: Defence–Australia Photographer: CPL Darren Hilder

Motaain, an action fought on 10 October 1999 at the border between West and East Timor, between troops of the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Australian Regiment (2 RAR) and Indonesian soldiers and police. The incident occurred when a platoon patrol moving along the road from Batugade towards Motaain, a collection of hamlets virtually straddling the border, was fired upon shortly after 1 p.m. Fire was returned and a gunfight ensued in which hundreds of rounds were exchanged. There were no Australian casualties, but one Indonesian policeman was killed and two others seriously wounded. Subsequent consultations with an Indonesian officer present revealed a discrepancy in maps being carried by both sides, with it appearing that Motaain actually lay in Indonesian territory. Bob Breen (2000) Mission Accomplished, East Timor, Sydney, NSW: Allen & Unwin


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Aidabasalala, a short sharp action fought on 16 October 1999 near the border between West and East Timor, between proIndonesian militiamen and an Australian reconnaissance patrol comprising six members of the Special Air Service Regiment. At about 7 a.m., the patrol was fired on by a party of more than twenty militiamen. The attack was beaten off after three militia members were killed and another three wounded. The sound of firing brought more militiamen onto the scene, so that the Australians were attacked a further three times over the next two hours while they made their way to a landing zone where they were lifted off by an Australian Blackhawk helicopter. Bob Breen (2000) Mission Accomplished, East Timor, Sydney, NSW: Allen & Unwin

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INDEX

Abbott, Lieut. E., 1 Aborigines (tribes): Amangu, 23; Bidjigal, 1–2; Darambal, 27; Dharuk, 1; Gamaraigal, 1; Gayiri, 30–31; Gundungurra, 4; Guugu– Yimidhirr, 43–44; Jagara, 22; Kalkadoon, 51–52; Kamilaroi, 12– 13; Karadjari, 38–39; Kaytej, 44–45; Konongwootong, 16; Kumulmar, 49; Milmenrura, 16– 19; Moomairremener, 3–4; Nyungar, 10–11; Panuba, 55, 56– 57; Parnkalla, 20–21; Pitjantjatjara, 41–43; Taungurong, 13–14; Taribelang, 23–24, 25; Unmatjera, 51; Warumungu, 28– 29; Waveroo, 13–14; Wiradjuri, 5–6; Wurrunjerri, 15; Yiman, 27 Abu Tellul, 149 Adelaide, HMAS (I), 167; (II) 292 AE2 (Australian submarine), 103– 104 Aidabasalala, 296 Airey, Lieut.-Colonel H.P., 54, 82– 83 Al Fao, 292 Al Wasitti, 292 Allen, Maj.-General A.S., 177, 187– 188, 193, 223 Allenby, General Sir E.H.H., 134, 136, 145–146, 159 Ambon, 201–202 Amiens, 151–152 Amman (Raid), 137; (Capture), 161–162 Amuriyah, 292–293 Anderson (Fire Support Base), 286 Anderson, Lieut.-Colonel C.G.W., 198–199 Anna’s Reservoir, 51 Anthony, Captain G., 48–49 Antill, Captain J.M., 71 Anzac Cove, 101–103 Ap My An, 285 Appin, 4 Armit, Sub-Inspector W.E., 49 Arthur, Lieut.-Colonel G., 8, 10 Arunta, HMAS, 248, 249 Attack Creek, 28–29 Auchinleck, General Sir C.J.E., 221

L’Audacieux (French destroyer), 175 Australia, HMS (I), 143–144; (II), 175–176, 217, 226, 249 AUSTRALIAN IMPERIAL FORCE (AIF): I Anzac Corps, 117, 119–120, 125, 127, 130, 132, 133, 134 II Anzac Corps, 129–130, 132, 133–134 Australian & New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC), 100, 101–103, 105 Australian Corps, 138, 142, 148– 149, 151, 152–153, 154, 155, 157–158, 162 Australian Flying Corps, 107, 111, 112, 122; 1 Squadron, 122, 160; 2 Squadron, 155; 4 Squadron, 155 Desert Mounted Corps, 134, 136, 159 1st Division, 102, 117, 120, 126, 127, 130, 132, 142, 151–152, 153, 155, 158 2nd Division, 107, 110, 117–118, 120, 125, 127, 130, 132, 133, 146, 147, 148, 151–152, 153, 157–158, 164–165 3rd Division, 129–130, 132, 133– 134, 138, 139, 140, 146, 148, 151–152, 154, 155, 157, 163, 164 4th Division, 118, 119, 125, 129– 130, 131, 134, 138, 141, 148, 151–152, 154, 158 5th Division, 116–117, 120, 125, 127, 131, 149, 151–152, 153, 157, 163, 164 Anzac Mounted Division, 118– 119, 122–123, 124, 127, 137, 146, 161–162 Australian & New Zealand Division, 102, 105 Australian Mounted Division, 146, 159, 164 Imperial Mounted Division, 124, 126–127 1st Infantry Brigade, 107, 117, 120, 143 2nd Infantry Brigade, 105, 117, 143, 153

3rd Infantry Brigade, 108, 117, 143, 153, 155 4th Infantry Brigade, 105, 109, 110–111, 125–126, 138, 148 5th Infantry Brigade, 110, 121, 127, 141–142, 146, 153, 157, 165 6th Infantry Brigade, 127, 147, 148, 157, 165 7th Infantry Brigade, 120–121, 148, 153, 158, 165 8th Infantry Brigade, 116–117, 131, 153 9th Infantry Brigade, 139, 141, 146 10th Infantry Brigade, 139, 154 11th Infantry Brigade, 139, 148, 154 12th Infantry Brigade, 125–126, 138, 141 13th Infantry Brigade, 138, 141, 145, 154 14th Infantry Brigade, 116–117, 145, 157 15th Infantry Brigade, 116, 131, 140, 145, 149, 153, 158 1st Light Horse Brigade, 118–119, 122, 149 2nd Light Horse Brigade, 118– 119, 137, 146 3rd Light Horse Brigade, 109, 119, 123, 136, 146, 159 4th Light Horse Brigade, 134– 136, 146, 162, 164 5th Light Horse Brigade, 160, 164 18th Infantry Battalion, 110–111 19th Infantry Battalion, 142 20th Infantry Battalion, 142 33rd Infantry Battalion, 140, 141 34th Infantry Battalion, 141 35th Infantry Battalion, 140–141 36th Infantry Battalion, 141 48th Infantry Battalion, 141, 145 4th Light Horse Regiment, 135, 164 8th Light Horse Regiment, 109 9th Light Horse Regiment, 101, 111 10th Light Horse Regiment, 109, 111, 122

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Index 11th Light Horse Regiment, 162 12th Light Horse Regiment, 135, 162, 164 1st (Anzac) Wireless Signal Squadron, 123–124 1st Australian Wireless Signal Squadron, 132, 137 SECOND AIF: 1st Corps, 193, 222, 236 6th Division, 176–178, 179, 183, 186, 188, 192, 193, 237, 251 7th Division, 183, 191–192, 193, 223, 233, 236, 241, 245, 254 8th Division, 197, 198, 201, 202, 207 9th Division, 182, 183, 185, 221, 230–232, 241, 242, 244, 251, 252 16th Infantry Brigade, 176–177, 187, 188, 236 17th Infantry Brigade, 176–177, 179, 188, 193, 194, 237 18th Infantry Brigade, 179, 183– 185, 234–235, 236, 245–246, 254–255 19th Infantry Brigade, 177, 178, 186–187, 188, 189, 251 20th Infantry Brigade, 183, 229, 230, 241, 242–243, 244, 252, 253 21st Infantry Brigade, 190, 193– 194, 222, 232–233, 245, 254–255 22nd Infantry Brigade, 198, 200, 202–203 23rd Infantry Brigade, 201, 207 24th Infantry Brigade, 230–231, 244, 252 25th Infantry Brigade, 191, 232– 233, 254 26th Infantry Brigade, 230–231, 241, 245, 251–252 27th Infantry Brigade, 197, 198, 202–203 6th Cavalry Regiment, 179–180, 191, 194 7th Cavalry Regiment, 236 2/1st Infantry Battalion, 189 2/2nd Field Regiment, 189 2/2nd Infantry Battalion, 188 2/2nd Pioneer Battalion, 191–192 2/3rd Anti-Tank Regiment, 182 2/3rd Infantry Battalion, 188, 192, 194 2/4th Field Regiment, 241 2/4th Infantry Battalion, 186–187, 189–190 2/5th Infantry Battalion, 191, 194, 237 2/6th Armoured Regiment, 234


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2/6th Infantry Battalion, 237, 240 2/7th Field Regiment, 251 2/7th Infantry Battalion, 189, 237, 239 2/8th Infantry Battalion, 186–187, 189 2/9th Infantry Battalion, 180, 228 2/10th Field Regiment, 200 2/10th Infantry Battalion, 235, 254 2/11th Infantry Battalion, 188– 189 2/12th Infantry Battalion, 228 2/13th Infantry Battalion, 182, 185–186, 253 2/14th Infantry Battalion, 194 2/15th Infantry Battalion, 229, 252 2/16th Infantry Battalion, 190– 191, 194 2/17th Infantry Battalion, 244, 252–253 2/18th Infantry Battalion, 200 2/19th Infantry Battalion, 198– 199 2/20th Infantry Battalion, 202 2/21st Infantry Battalion, 201–202 2/23rd Infantry Battalion, 251– 252 2/24th Infantry Battalion, 184, 251 2/25th Infantry Battalion, 191, 232 2/27th Infantry Battalion, 191, 194, 245 2/28th Infantry Battalion, 221– 222, 245, 252 2/29th Infantry Battalion, 198– 199 2/30th Infantry Battalion, 197 2/31st Infantry Battalion, 191, 232 2/32nd Infantry Battalion, 253 2/33rd Infantry Battalion, 191, 192, 232 2/40th Infantry Battalion, 207 2/43rd Infantry Battalion, 244, 252, 253 2/48th Infantry Battalion, 183, 184, 231, 245, 251–252 2/2nd Independent Company, 207 2/5th Independent Company, 220 2/6th Independent Company, 241–242 2/4th Commando Squadron, 251 AUSTRALIAN MILITARY FORCES, in World War II: 3rd Division, 241 5th Division, 241 4th Infantry Brigade, 242–243, 245

7th Infantry Brigade, 250 30th Infantry Brigade, 222, 236 3rd Infantry Battalion, 232 22nd Garrison Battalion, 247 22nd Infantry Battalion, 243 25th Infantry Battalion, 228, 250– 251 39th Infantry Battalion, 222, 236 42nd Infantry Battalion, 241 53rd Infantry Battalion, 222 61st Infantry Battalion, 228 New Guinea Volunteer Rifles, 220, 237 Papuan Infantry Battalion, 222 AUSTRALIAN REGULAR ARMY: 1 ATF, 282, 284, 285, 287, 288, 289, 290, 291 1 RAR, 278–279, 280, 281–282, 294 2 RAR, 269, 271, 286, 287, 296 3 RAR, 256, 257–258, 259–260, 261–262, 263–265, 266–267, 269, 272, 273–274, 275–276, 277, 286–287, 288, 290 4 RAR, 290 5 RAR, 282, 289 6 RAR, 282–285 7 RAR, 285, 286 1st Armoured Regiment, 289 3rd Cavalry Regiment, 285, 290 102nd Field Battery, 273–274, 287 Special Air Service regiment, 295, 296 Australian Naval & Military Expeditionary Force, 96–97 Babang, 277 Babington, Maj.-General J.M., 89 Baby 700, 104–105, 108, 109 Baden-Powell, Colonel R.S.S., 78, 82, 85 Baghdad, 123–124 Baidoa, 294 Bakenkop, see Leeuw Kop Bakenlaagte, 93–94 Bakri, 198–199 Baku, 155–157 Balikpapan, 254–255 Balmoral (Fire Support Base), 287– 288 Bantham Bay, 209–210 Bardia, 176–177 Barfold, 15 Barrow, Maj.-General G. de S., 136 Barrow Creek, 44–45 Bartolomeo Colleoni (Italian cruiser), 174 Basilisk, HMS, 40–41

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Bathurst Emergency, 5–6 Bathurst Rebellion, 6–8 Battle Camp, 43–44 Battle Mountain, 51–52 Baxter-Cox, Brigadier A.R., 191 Beale, Lieut. P.W., 274–275 Beatson, Maj.-General S., 90, 92 Beaurevoir Line, 158, 163, 164 Beersheba, 134–136 Behn River, 54–55 Bell, Lieut. F.W., 90 Belmont, 57–58 Benghazi, 171 Bennett, Maj.-General H.G., 143, 198, 202, 204 Benson, Lieut.-Colonel G.E., 93–94 Berbera, 174–175 Bergonzoli, General A., 176 Berryman, Brigadier F.H., 191–192 Biddle, R., 20–21 Bien Hoa, 286–287 Bingera, 23–24 Binh Ba, 288–290 Birdwood, General Sir W.R., 102, 105, 117, 130, 138 Bisdee, Major J.H., 114 Bismarck Sea, 237–238 Bitapaka, 96–97 Black Line, 8–10 Blake, Major M.P., 289–290 Blamey, General Sir T.A., 185, 254 Blaxland, G., 23–24, 25 Blood, Lieut.-General Sir B., 90 Blucher, 5 Bongsu Forest, 269–270 Boomer, 6 Botany Bay, 1 Botha, General L., 76–77, 78, 93, 95 Botha, General P., 74–75 Bothaville, 87–88 Bouchier, Colonel M.W.J., 164 Bowman, Dr W., 15 Brakpan, 90 Brallos Pass, 188–189 Brand, Brig.-General C.H., 138 Bridges, Maj.-General W.T., 102 Brisbane, 233–234 Brisbane, Maj.-General Sir T.M., 5– 6 Britain, 173 BRITISH ARMY: Second Army, 130, 133 Third Army, 125, 138, 139, 155 Fourth Army, 117, 120, 142, 151, 154, 155, 158 Fifth Army, 120, 125, 126, 130, 138, 139


300

Eighth Army, 221, 230, 232 Reserve Army, 117 Desert Column, 122 Dunsterforce, 150–151, 155 Egyptian Expeditionary Force, 126, 134, 145 North Russian Relief Force, 166 3rd Corps, 145, 151, 154, 155, 158 9th Corps, 158, 163, 164, 165 10th Corps, 131, 230 13th Corps, 230 20th Corps, 134, 136 21st Corps, 160 30th Corps, 185, 230 1st Division, 67 1st Armoured Division, 230–231 1st Commonwealth Division, 266 2nd Armoured Division, 182 5th Division, 142 7th Division, 71, 127 7th Armoured Division, 177 8th Division, 145 9th Division, 74 10th Armoured Division, 230 11th Division, 76 14th Division, 140 18th Division, 140, 202 19th Division, 138 25th Division, 129 31st Division, 143 32nd Division, 155 33rd Division, 142–143 35th Division, 138, 141 37th Division, 138 42nd (Lancashire) Division, 119 46th Division, 165 50th (Northumbrian) Division, 120, 122 51st (Highland) Division, 230, 232 52nd (Lowland) Division, 118– 119 53rd Division, 124, 136 54th Division, 124 60th (London) Division, 137, 146 61st Division, 116–117 62nd Division, 125, 127, 138 70th Division, 185 Cavalry Division, 67, 68 Yeomanry Division, 136 1st Armoured Brigade, 186 1st Cavalry Brigade, 72, 77 5th Tank Brigade, 148 23rd Infantry Brigade, 192 27th British Commonwealth Brigade, 256–257, 258, 259, 260, 262, 263 28th British Commonwealth

Brigade, 266, 273–274 39th Infantry Brigade, 155 69th Infantry Brigade, 222 4th Royal Tank Regiment, 273 9th Lancer Regiment, 57, 59 12th Lancer Regiment, 140 12th Regiment, 26, 30 18th Regiment, 32 21st Regiment, 10 39th Regiment, 7, 8 40th Regiment, 5, 26 40th Royal Tank Regiment, 229 43rd Light Infantry Regiment, 36 46th Regiment, 4 48th Regiment, 4–5 50th Regiment, 10 65th Regiment, 32 68th Light Infantry Regiment, 36 70th Regiment, 32 96th Regiment, 20 99th Regiment, 22 1st Battalion, Argyll and Sutherland Highland Regiment, 256–257, 260–261 1st Battalion, Middlesex Regiment, 260–261, 262, 263 1st Battalion, Royal Northumberland Fusiliers, 267 2nd Battalion, King’s Own Regiment, 192 6th London Battalion, 141 8th Tank Battalion, 154 45th Battalion, Royal Fusiliers, 166 201st Machine Gun Battalion, 166 Black Watch, 62, 70 Grenadier Guards, 58 Gurkha Rifles, 273 Hampshire Mounted Infantry, 95 Imperial Camel Brigade, 124, 136, 137 Imperial Camel Corps, 122, 123, 126 Inniskilling Dragoons, 65, 66 King’s Dragoon Guards, 89 New South Wales Corps, 3 19th Northumberland Fusiliers, 138 Queen’s (Royal West Surrey) Regiment, 141 Scottish Horse, 93–94 Wiltshire Regiment, 66 G Battery, Royal Horse Artillery, 63 Notts Battery, Royal Horse Artillery, 112–113 Q Battery, Royal Horse Artillery, 73

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Index British Commonwealth Far East Strategic Reserve, 273 Broadwood, Colonel R.G., 73–74, 77 Broderick, Major W.P., 274–275 Broken Hill, 100 Broodseinde, 132–133 Brookfield, Colonel A.M., 81 Broome, 210–212 Brown, M., 38–39 Browne, Lieut. J., 7, 8 Brunei Bay, 252–253 Buffels Hoek, 85–86 Bullecourt (First), 125–126; (Second), 127–128 Bullen, Sergeant A.L., 156 Buna, 234–236 Buresk (German collier), 97–98 Burges, L., 38–39 Burnett, Captain J., 194 Burrows, Lieut.-Colonel F.A., 182 Byers, Second Lieut. D.R., 276– 277 Cadden, Police Corporal, 57 Cairo, 100–101, 107 Calabria, 172–173 Caldwell, Group Captain C.R., 206 Calyute, 10 Cameron, Lieut.-General D.A., 34, 36 Campbell, Lieut. A.W., 271–272 Campbell, Lieut.-Colonel I.R., 189–190 Canadian troops in South Africa, 69, 75, 78; on Western Front, 134, 151, 152–153; in Korea, 263, 265 Canberra, HMAS (I), 225–226 Cape Helles, 102–103, 105 Cape Lai, 285–286 Cape Spada, 173–174 Carbucky, 24–25 Carey, Brig.-General G.J., 33–34 Carnarvon, 194–196 Carrington, Lieut.-General Sir F., 84, 85–86 Casardi, Vice-Admiral F., 174 Castle Hill, 2 Caswell, Flying Officer G., 215 Catalpa (American barque), 48–49 Cavagnari, Admiral D., 172 Chalmers, Commodore D., 292 Chauvel, Lieut.-General Sir H.G., 64, 118–119, 122, 123, 124, 127, 134, 136, 146, 159, 162 Chaytor, Maj.-General E.W.C., 137, 146, 161 Chennault, Colonel C., 196


301

Chetwode, Lieut.-General Sir P.W., 122–123 Chicago, USS, 219, 225–226 Chilton, Brigadier F.O., 245 Chin Peng, 269 CHINESE AIR FORCE, 267 CHINESE ARMY: 60th Division, 265 Chinese miners, 30, 43–44 Chitral, 55–56 Chongju, 259–260 Chuignes, 155 Chunuk Bair, 102, 109–110 Claret operations (Borneo), 274– 277 Clements, Maj.-General R.A.P., 66 Clisby, Flying Officer L., 171 Clowes, Maj.-General C.A., 227 Coad, Brigadier B.A., 258, 261 Cobban, Ensign G., 12 Cobby, Captain A.H., 155 Cocos Islands, 97–100 Coetzee Drift, 75–76 Cole, Air Commodore A.T., 227 Collins, Captain J.A., 171, 174, 176 Colombo, 215 Conciliation Creek, 28 Coomooboolaroo, 39–40 Coppock, J., 15 Coral (Fire Support Base), 287–288 Coral Sea, 216–218 Cowra, 246–247 Cox, Brig.-General C.F., 72, 122, 149 Cox, Maj.-General Sir H.V., 119 Crace, Rear-Admiral J.G., 216–218 Cradock, Lieut.-Colonel, 89 Creen Creek, 49 Cremor, Lieut.-Colonel W.E., 189 Cronje, General P.A., 59, 62, 67, 68–70 Crossley, J., 13–14 Crutchley, Rear-Admiral V.A.C., 224, 226 Ctesiphon, 111 Cullinlaringo, 30–31 Cunningham, Admiral Sir A.B., 172, 180–181 Cunningham, P., 2–3 Dakar, 175–176 Damascus, 192 Damour, 193–194 Dana, W., 23 Darling, Lieut. H.F., 87 Darwin, 204–207 Darwin, HMAS, 292–293 Daur, 136–137

De la Rey, General J.H., 59, 71, 75– 76, 79, 84–85, 89 De Lisle, Lieut.-Colonel H. de B., 80, 87, 92 De Wet, General C., 70, 73–74, 82, 83, 87–88, 89 De Wet, General P., 81–82 Demicourt, 125 Dentz, General H., 194 Derby, 214 Derna, 178–179 Dernancourt (First), 138–139; (Second), 141 Detmers, Commander A., 194–195 Dexter, Captain W.R., 240 Diamond Hill, 78–81 Dieppe, 226–227 Dingbat Flat, 168–169 Dixon, Rev. J., 3 Dollard, Lieut.-Commander A.N., 265 Doorman, Rear-Admiral K.W.F.M., 208–209 Dougherty, Brigadier I.N., 232–233, 245 Dowling, Lieut. W.V., 64–65 Drewry, Sub-Inspector E., 55 Driefontein, 70–71 Dronfield, 68 Dublin, HMS, 128 Ducker, Lieut. C.H., 272–273 Duffy, Captain D.J., 197 Dumaresq, Captain J.S., 128 Dunstan, Colonel D.B., 287 Dunsterville, Maj.-General L.C., 150, 155–156 Durelle, 4 Dyas, Sub-Inspector G., 43 Eather, Brigadier K.W., 223, 232 Eddy, Major G.A., 66 Edgar, Artificer Engineer W., 143– 144 El Alamein, 230–232 El Magruntein, 122 Elands River, 84–85 Elliott, Brig.-General H.E., 140, 145, 153 Elwell, Lieut.-Commander C.B., 96 Elworthy, Captain, 72 Emden (German cruiser), 97–100 Empire Air Training Scheme, 196, 197 Emptsa, 165–167 Enslin, see Graspan Entwistle, R., 6–8 Er Regima, 182 Es Salt, 145–146 Espero (Italian destroyer), 171

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Etinehem, 154 Eumeralla, 21–22 Eureka Stockade, 25–27 Exmouth Gulf, 239 Faithful, G., 13–14 Favourite, HMS, 19–20 Fawn, HMS, 30 Fenians, 48–49 Ferguson, Lieut.-Colonel I.B., 256, 262 Fergusson, Lieut.-Colonel M.A., 179 Fiaschi, Major T.H., 69 Field, H., 16–17 Field, Lieut. W.G., 17–18 Fighting Hills, 16 Finschhafen, 242–244 Fisher, Major I., 280 FitzGerald, Commander C., 23 Fletcher, Rear-Admiral F.J., 216– 218 Floraville, 31 Forrest, J., 46 Forster, W., 24 Fourie, General P.J., 80 France, 171 Francisco, D., 38–39 Fraser family, 27–28 Fremantle, Maj.-General A.J., 53 French, Lieut.-General J.D.P., 67, 68, 70, 71, 73, 77, 79 FRENCH ARMY: First Army, 139, 151 133rd Division, 143 Moroccan Division, 145 Fromelles, 116 Galleghan, Lieut.-Colonel F.G., 197 Gallipoli Peninsula, 101–105, 107– 111 Gang Toi, 277–279 Gascoyne, HMAS, 249 Gaza (First), 124–125; (Second), 126–127; (Third), 134, 135, 136 Gebel Medwa, 113–115 Geelong, HMAS, 219 Gellibrand, Maj.-General J., 141, 154 Gemas, 197 Georgette (steamer), 48–49 Geraldton, 23 GERMAN AIR FORCE, in World War II, 173, 196 GERMAN ARMY, in World War I: see following units: Asia Corps, 137, 149; XIV Reserve Corps, 126; 2nd Guard Division, 157; 6th Bavarian Division, 116; 24th (Saxon) Reserve Division, 142;


302

27th Württemberg Division, 125, 127; 50th (Prussian) Reserve Division, 138; 117th Division, 117; 212th Regiment, 132; in World War II: Afrika Korps, 182, 230, 232; SS Leibstandarte ‘Adolf Hitler’ Division, 186; 5th Panzer Division, 188–189; 6th Mountain Division, 189; 21st Panzer Division, 231; 90th Light Division, 230, 231; 164th Division, 230 Getting, Captain F.E., 226 Giarabub, 179–180 Gilbert, J., 23 Gilberton, 44 Giles, E., 41–43, 46–47 Giovanni Della Banda Nere (Italian cruiser), 174 Glasgow, Maj.-General T.W., 141, 145, 155 Glenrowan, 49–51 Glossop, Captain J.C.T., 97–100 Godley, Lieut.-General Sir A.J., 102, 129 Goering, H., 173 Goh Peng Tuan, 270 Gona, 222, 232–233 Gough, General Sir H. de la P., 117 Graham, Lieut.-General Sir G., 53 Graham, Maj.-General S.C., 285 Grant, Brig.-General W., 134–135, 162 Graspan, 58–59 Green, Lieut.-Colonel C.H., 256, 257, 258, 260 Greer, Colonel H.H., 36 Gregory, A., 23 Grieve, Lieut. G.J., 70 Grobelaar Recht, 90 Grobler, General E.R., 66 Grobler, Commandant H.S., 93 Grootvallier, 92–93 Guest, Lieut. R.L., 275–276, 277 Gueudecourt, 120–121 Gull Force, see Ambon Gunbar, HMAS, 205 Halazin, 115–116 Hamel, 139–140, 148–149 Hamilton, General Sir I.S.M., 74– 75, 79–80, 102 Han River, 265–266 Hangard Wood, 140, 141–142, 145 Hannan, Corporal P., 13 Hannay, Colonel O.C., 68 Hare, Superintendent F.A., 50 Harring, Major R.E., 289–90 Harrison, Captain G., 167 Harrison, Lieut. H.B.R., 36

Hartebeestfontein, 89 Hassett, Lieut.-Colonel F.G., 266– 267 Haultain, Captain C.T.G., 170 Hayter, Lieut. F., 41 Hazebrouck, 142–143 Healy, Major J.B., 278–279 Heane, Brig.-General J., 153 Hébuterne, 137–138 Heidelberg, 16 Hejaz, Arab Army of, 161 Heligoland Bight, 147 Henry, Lieut.-Colonel St G.C., 74 Herford, Captain W.V., 34 Heron, Lieut. R.M., 64 Herring, Lieut.-General E.F., 236 Herring, Brig.-General S.C.E., 154 Hewitt, Air Commodore J.E., 238 Hill, Acting Sub-Inspector C., 39– 40 Hill 60, 110–111 Hill 971, 109–110 Hindenburg Line, 125, 126, 127, 158–159, 162–163 Hmawang, 54–55 Ho Bo Woods, 279–280 Hobart, HMAS (I), 174–175, 209, 217, 224 Hodgkinson, Major I.R.J., 275–276 Hodgson, Maj.-General H.W., 124, 146, 164 Holmes, Maj.-General W., 75, 129 Hore, Lieut.-Colonel C.O., 84 Horii, Maj.-General T., 199, 222, 223 Horn Island, 213–214 Hornet Bank, 27–28 Houston, USS, 208–210 Houtnek, 74–75 Howden, Captain H.L., 209 Howse, Captain N.R., 83–84 Huddart, Midshipman C., 59 Hughes, Colonel F.G., 101 Hunter brothers, 21 Hutton, Maj.-General E.T.H., 75– 76, 77 Hyde Park, 6 I-21 (Japanese submarine), 218, 219 I-24 (Japanese submarine), 218– 219 I-29 (Japanese submarine), 218 Iachino, Admiral A., 180–181 INDIAN ARMY, in World War I, see following units: Cavalry Division, 132; 6th (Poona) Division, 106, 111, 112; 7th (Meerut) Division, 137; 29th

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Index Brigade, 109; 15th Sikh Regiment, 53–54; in World War II: 3rd Corps, 203; 4th Division, 176; 3rd Motor Brigade, 182; 5th Infantry Brigade, 192; 45th Infantry Brigade, 198–199 INDONESIAN ARMY: 440th Battalion, 276 Inman, H., 16–17 Inoue, Vice-Admiral S., 216–218 International Force East Timor, 295 Islands (The), 16–18 ITALIAN ARMY, see following units: Tenth Army, 176; 22nd Corps, 177; 61st Division, 178; 62nd Regiment, 183; 86th Bersaglieri Regiment, 178 ITALIAN NAVY: in World War II, 171, 172–173, 176, 180–182; see also individual ships Ito, Maj.-General T., 201 Jackie Jackie, 16 Jackson, Squadron Leader J.F., 214 Jandamarra, 55, 56–57 JAPANESE ARMY: Eighteenth Army, 251; 5th Division, 197; 20th Division, 244; 51st Division, 238; Imperial Guards Division, 198, 202; 66th Regiment, 240; 102nd Regiment, 237, 239; 115th Regiment, 239; 228th Regiment, 201, 207; 1st Air Attack Force, 204; 7th Air Division, 206 JAPANESE NAVY: First Carrier Fleet, 204, 215; Second Fleet, 212; Fourth Fleet, 216; 3rd Yokosuka Special Naval Landing Force, 207 Japanese pearl-luggers, 170 Jardine brothers, 37–38 Java, 212 Java Sea, 208–209 Jemaluang, 200–201 John’s Knoll, 245 Johnson, W., 3 Johnston, Major G., 3 Johnstone, Sub-Inspector R.A., 41 Jones, Captain A.M., 155 Kaiapit, 241–242 Kalgoorlie, see Dingbat Flat Kanabygal, 4 Kapitz, Lieut.-Colonel J.R.L., 201 Kapyong, 263–265 Karawaran, 150–151 Karee Siding, 71–71 Katherine, 215 Kaukab, 164 Kellie, Captain C.W., 78 Kelly gang, 49–51


303

Kemal General Mustafa, 102, 159 Keppel Harbour, 244 Kesselring, Generalfeldmarschall A., 196 Khar, 55 Khuweilfe, 136 Kimberley, 66–68 Kindau, 276–277 Kinkaid, Vice-Admiral T.C., 248 Kitchener, General Lord, 68, 85 Klawang, 272 Klip Drift, 67 Kluang, 270–271 Knight, Lieut.-Colonel G.C., 72, 79, 87 Knox, Maj.-General C.E., 87 Kokoda Trail, 222–223 Kondo, Vice-Admiral N., 212 Korewa Island, 169–171 Kormoran (German raider), 194– 196 Koster River, 82–83 Krait, 244 Kressenstein, General K. von, 118 Krithia, 105–106 Kujin, 258–259 Kurna, 106–107 Kut el Amara, 112 Kuttabul (depot ship), 219 L43 (German Zeppelin), 128 La Grange Bay, 38–39 Lababia Ridge, 240 Labuan, 252–253 Lae, 241 Lagnicourt, 125, 126 Lalor, P., 26–27 Lambing Flat, 29–30 Langhorne, C., 18 Larrakia (customs patrol launch), 170–171 Launceston, 6 Lavarack, Lieut.-General J.D., 183, 191, 193 Le Gallais, Colonel P.W.J., 71, 87– 88 Leeuw Kop, 80–82 Leggatt, Lieut.-Colonel W.W., 207– 208 Legge, Maj.-General J.G., 117–118, 120 Leichhardt, Dr F.W.L., 22–23 Lemmer, General H.L., 82, 84, 85– 86 Lerew, Wing Commander J.M., 199 Leyte Gulf, see Surigao Strait Lihons, 152–153 Lille, 155 Lingayen Gulf, 248–250

Litani River, 190–191 Lone Pine, 107–108 Long Khanh, 290–292 Long Tan, 282–285 Low, Maj.-General Sir R., 55–56 Lusk, Lieut. D.H., 33 Lys (Battle of), 151; see also Hazebrouck Macalister, Lieut. L., 8 MacArthur, General D., 254 McCarter, Lieut.-Colonel L., 221 Macarthur-Onslow, Brig.-General G.M., 160, 164 Macarthur-Onslow, Captain J.W., 56 M’Cay, Maj.-General J.W., 105, 116 McDonald, Lieut.-Colonel B.A., 273–274 MacGregor, S., 21 Mackay, Maj.-General I.G., 176, 177–178, 186, 188 McKinna, Lieut.-Colonel J.G., 250 McKnight, Major W., 90–91 Macmillan, A., 43–44 McNicoll, Brig.-General W.R., 154 McPherson, Major D., 7 Macquarie, Maj.-General L., 4 Mafeking, 78 Magdhaba, 122 Magersfontein, 60–63, 67 Mahon, Colonel B.T., 78 Malaita, 167 Malakand Pass, 55 Malta, 196 Manella, General P., 177 Maria (brig), 40–41 Marmara (Sea), 103–104 Martyr, Colonel C.G., 74 Maryang San, 266–267 Matapan, 180–182 Matarikoriko, 29 Maude, Lieut.-General Sir S., 123– 124, 132, 136 Maur River, 198 Mechili, 182–183 Megiddo, 159 Melbourne, HMAS (I), 147 Menin Road, 130, 131 Merdjayoun, 191–192 Merivale Street, 165 Mersa Matruh, 112–116 Messines, 129–130 Methuen, Lieut.-General Lord, 57– 60, 63, 67, 89 Micki, 57 Mikawa, Vice-Admiral G., 224, 226 Milford, Maj.-General E.J., 241, 254–255

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Milne Bay, 227–229 Mitchell, Major T.L., 11 Mitchell River, 37–38 Modder River, 59–60 Monash, Lieut.-General Sir J., 105, 109, 110–111, 129, 133–134, 139, 148, 153, 154, 155, 157, 158, 162–163 Mont St Quentin, 157 Montbrehain, 164–165 Montgomery, Lieut.-General B.L., 230–232 Moor, Major H.G., 65, 80, 82 Moore, Lieut. W., 3–4 Moore, Captain W., 36 Moorhouse, Dr M., 18–19 Moran, Commander W.T.A., 216 Moresby, Captain J., 41 Morisset, Major J.T., 5–6 Morlancourt (First), 139; (Second), 146; (Third), 148 Morris, Major, 90–91 Morshead, Lieut.-General Sir L.J., 183–184, 230–231 Moser, General O. von, 126 Mossman, 224 Motaain, 296 Moten, Brigadier M.J., 237 Mount Dispersion, 11 Mouquet Farm, 119–120 Mubo, 239–240 Müller, Vecht-General C.H., 88, 91 Müller, Captain K. von, 97–98 Mulligan, J., 45 Multi-National Naval Force, 292– 293 Multuggerah, 22 Munro, Lieut.-Colonel E.E., 182 Murchison, HMAS, 265–266 Murphy, Major G.J., 285 Murrabit, 23 Murray, General Sir A.J., 126 Nablus, 159–160 Nagumo, Vice-Admiral C., 204, 215 Nassau River, 22–23 Nek (The), 108–109 NEW SOUTH WALES military forces: in Sudan, 52–54; in Burma, 54; in India, 55–56; in South Africa, see following units: Army Medical Corps, 67, 77, 79, 82, 83–84 1st Australian Horse, 64–65, 71, 72, 77, 79 Imperial Bushmen, 82, 84 Lancers, 57, 59, 60, 63, 64–65, 67, 68, 71, 72, 77, 79 Mounted Rifles, 56, 67, 68, 70,


304

71, 72, 75–76, 80–81, 82, 83, 87 Naval Brigade, in China, 86–87 NEW ZEALAND military forces: in South Africa, 75, 88–89; at Gallipoli, 102, 105, 109, 110; in Senussi campaign, 114, 115; in Sinai, 119, 123; Palestine, 137; NZ Division in Belgium, 129, 132, 133–134, France, 138; in World War II, 186, 188, 189–190, 230–231; in Korea, 263–264; in Malaysia, 273 Newcastle, 220 Newcombe, Lieut.-Colonel S.F., 136 Ngarbi, 21 Nishimura, Vice-Admiral S., 248 Noreuil, 125, 126 North Sea, 128–129 NORTH VIETNAMESE ARMY: 33rd Regiment, 289, 290, 291; 141st Regiment, 287 Norton, Captain A.E.M., 81 Nunn, Major J., 12–13 Obdurate, HMS, 128 O’Connell, M.C., 25 Officer (stream), 41–43 Ogle, Lieut.-Colonel R.W.G., 229 O’Halloran, Major T.S., 17, 18 Oldendorf, Rear-Admiral J.B., 248 Olivier, General J.H., 72–73 Oman (Gulf), 292–293 One Tree Hill, 22 Onverwacht, 95–96 Orakau, 33–36 Osborne, Lieut. S.F., 57, 59, 60 Oscar Range, 56–57 Osman Digna, 53 Otranto (Strait), 176 Paardeberg, 68–70 Paddy’s Island, 25 Paget, Maj.-General A.H., 81–82, 88 Pakchon, 260–262 Palmer River, 45–46 Palmietfontein, 82 Pao-ting fu, 87 Parramatta, 1–2, 3 Paschen, Sub-Inspector, 40 Passchendaele, 133–134 Paterson, Captain W., 1 Peitang, 86–87 Pelham, Major Hon. D.R.H., 112, 114 Pemulwuy, 1–2 Perceval, Lieut. J.S., 33 Percival, Lieut.-General A.E., 202– 203

Peri (schooner), 41 Péronne, 157–158 Perth, HMAS (I), 180, 208–210; (II), 285–286 Petre, Captain H.A., 112 Phillip, Captain A., 1 Phuoc Hai, 285 Pilcher, Lieut.-Colonel T.D., 63–64 Pinjarra, 10–11 Pink Hill, 66 Pittwater, 6 Plumer, General Sir H.C.O., 78, 89, 95, 130, 133–134 Poelcappelle, 133 Poingdestre, Sub-Inspector L.J., 49 Polygon Wood, 131 Poplar Grove, 70 Port Hedland, 224 Port Lincoln, 20–21 Port Moresby, 214–215 Porter, Brigadier S.H.W.C., 222 Porter, Colonel T.C., 72, 77 Portugese Corps, 142 Potts, Brigadier A.W., 222 Pozières, 117–118 Pratt, Maj.-General T.S., 29 Preece, Lieut.-Colonel A.E., 280, 281 Prinsloo, Commandant J., 58 Proyart, 154–155 Pukekohe East, 31–32 Queensland Imperial Bushmen, 82, 84, 88, 95–96 Queensland Mounted Infantry, 63– 64, 67, 68, 70, 74, 75, 78 Queensland Native Mounted Police Corps, 27, 31, 39, 49, 51 Rabaul, 199–200 Rafa, 122–123 Ramadi, 131–132 Rangoon, 196–197 Rankin, Lieut.-Commander R.W., 212–213 Rannes, 27 Rawlinson, General Sir H.S., 154, 158, 163 Rawnsley, Pilot Officer L., 216 Red Flag riots, 165 Republic of North-eastern Victoria, 51 Retimo, 189–190 Rhenoster Kop, 88 Ribbon Gang, 6, 7 Richmond Hill, 1 Ridley, Brig.-General C.P., 82, 83 Risdon Cove, 3–4 River Plenty, 4–5

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Index Roberts, Field Marshal Lord, 67, 68–69, 70, 71, 72, 74, 75–77, 78– 80 Robertson, Brigadier H.C.H., 178 Robertson, Wing Commander K.V., 270 Robinson, W., 18–19 Rockhampton, 238–239 Rodgers, Corporal L.H., 271 Romani, 118–119 Rommel, Field Marshal E., 182, 183–185, 221, 230 Rose, Major, 81–82 Rosenthal, Maj.-General C., 139, 164 Rothbury, 168 Rottnest Island, 47–49 Rouse Hill, 3 Rowell, Lieut.-General S.F., 222 ROYAL AIR FORCE: in World War I, see following units: 5th (Corps) Wing, 161; 40th (Army) Wing, 161; 80th Wing, 155; 144 Squadron, 161; in World War II, 171, 177, 180, 196–197, 215– 216, 240; in Malaya, 270 ROYAL AUSTRALIAN AIR FORCE, in World War II, 173, 174, 175, 195, 196–197, 210, 211, 212, 225–226; see also following units: 9 Operational Group, 238; 1 Fighter Wing, 206; 2 Squadron, 204, 207; 3 Squadron, 240; 10 Squadron, 173; 12 Squadron, 204; 13 squadron, 201, 204; 22 Squadron, 238; 24 Squadron, 199, 213–214; 30 Squadron, 229, 238; 32 Squadron, 213–214; 75 Squadron, 214–215, 227, 229; 76 Squadron, 227, 229; 85 Squadron, 239; 100 Squadron, 229, 238; in Korea: 77 Squadron, 261, 267–269; in Malaya: 1 Squadron, 269–271, 272; in Vietnam: 9 Squadron, 284, 285, 289, 291 ROYAL AUSTRALIAN NAVY: 97– 98, 128, 147, 166–167, 172, 176, 196, 240; see also individual ships Rufus River, 18–19 Ruin Ridge, 221–222 Russell, Lieut. F.B., 16 Ryrie, Brig.-General G. de L., 137 Sabben, Lieut., 40–41 St George, Commissioner H., 43– 44 St Quentin Canal, 158, 162–164 Salamaua (Raid), 220; (Capture), 241


305

Samichon River, 269 Sanananda, 236 Sanders, Field Marshal L. von, 159, 162 Sannah’s Post, 72–74 Sariwon, 255–257 Sasaki, Captain H., 218 Sattelberg, 243, 244–245 Savige, Brigadier S.G., 150–151, 179, 188 Savo Island, 224–226 Scanlan, Colonel J.J., 199–200 Schultze, Private H., 58 Scott, Lieut.-Colonel F.P., 290 Scott, Lieut.-Colonel W.J.R., 201 Sea Mist, HMAS, 220 Semakh, 162 Senussi, 112–116 Shaggy Ridge, 245–246 Sharwood, Flight Lieut. A.G., 147 Shaw, Sub-Inspector J., 19 Shea, Major J.S.M., 92–93 Shedd, Dr W.A., 150–151 Sheikh Sayed Ahmed, 115 Shima, Vice-Admiral K., 248 Shropshire, HMAS, 248, 249, 252 Sicily, 240–241 Sinclair-Maclagan, Maj.-General E.G., 141, 148 Singapore, 202–204 Singapore Strait, 274 Siwa, 179 Slater’s Knoll, 250–251 Slaughterhouse Creek, see Waterloo Creek Slingersfontein, 64–66 Smith, Major H.A., 282 Smith, Brig.-General R., 142 Smuts, General J.C., 85, 92–93 Smuts, general T., 72 Somme (Third Battle of), see Amiens South Australian Imperial Bushmen, 81–82 South Australian Mounted Infantry, 66, 83 SOUTH KOREAN ARMY: 6th Division, 263 Sparrow, Lieut. H.G.B., 53 Sparrow Force, see Timor Stevens, Maj.-General J.E.S., 190, 251 Stewart, Captain R.R., 175 Steyn, M.J., 87 Stinkhoutboom, 83–84 Stirling, Captain Sir J., 10–11 Stoker, Lieut.-Commander H.H.G.D., 103–104

Storey, Pilot Officer W., 197 Stuart, HMAS, 172, 180–181 Stuart, J.McD., 28–29 Stubbs, C., 20 Suai, 295 Sunchon, 267–268 Sungei Bemban, 271–272 Sungei Kesang, 273–274 Sungei Koemba, 274–276 Sungei Siput, 272–273 Sunnyside, 63–64 Suoi Bong Trang, 280–282 Suoi Chau Pha, 285 Surigao Strait, 248 Suttor, Major H.B., 156 Suttor, W., 7 Suvla Bay, 103, 109, 110 Sydney, HMAS (I), 97–100, 128, 147; (II), 171, 172, 173–174, 176, 194–196 Sydney harbour, 218–220 Sydney Town, 19–20 Tadmur, 292 Takdul, 53–54 Tam O’Shanter Point, 40–41 Tamai, 52–53 Tarakan, 251–252 Tasmanian defence forces, 73 Tasmanian Imperial Bushmen, 81– 82, 84, 88 Tatterson, Captain L.V., 239 Taylor, Brigadier H.B., 202 Te Ranga, 36–37 Teal, HMAS, 274 Tel el Eisa, 229 Tempe Gorge, 187–188 Teng Fook Loong, 272 Theron’s Scouts, 82, 83 Thetis, HMS, 143–144 Thirlwell, Major G.M., 256 Thomas, Captain E.P., 205 Thomas, Captain J., 26 Timor, 207–208 Titi Hill, 32–33 Tobruk (Capture), 177–178; (Siege), 183–186 Toll, Major F.W., 95–96 Townsend, Lieut.-Colonel C.M., 284, 285 Townshend, Maj.-General C.V.F., 106–107, 111, 112 Townsville, 221 Trincomalee, 215–216 Tucker, Lieut.-General C., 71–72 TURKISH ARMY: Fourth Army, 159, 161 Seventh Army, 136, 159, 160, 161

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Eighth Army, 159–160 3rd Corps, 135 18th Corps, 137 3rd Cavalry Division, 127 5th Division, 150 6th Division, 150 27th Division, 135 Uijongbu, 262 Ularring, 46–47 Um Rakhum, 112–113 Umphelby, Lieut.-Colonel C.E., 71 UNITED STATES ARMY, in World War I: 27th (New York) Division, 163; 30th (Tennessee) Division, 163, 164; 33rd Division, 148– 149; 131st Regiment, 154; in World War II: Sixth Army, 242, 248; 11th Corps, 251; 32nd Division, 234; 43rd Engineer Regiment, 228–229; 126th Infantry Regiment, 235, 236; 163rd Infantry Regiment, 236; in Korea: 1st Cavalry Division, 257; 24th Division, 256, 260; 7th Cavalry Regiment, 256; 7th Marine Regiment, 269; 187th Airborne Regimental Combat Team, 257–258; 72nd Tank Battalion, 263; 161st Field Artillery Battalion, 260; 503rd Airborne Battalion, 258; in Vietnam: 1st Division, 279; 1st Cavalry Division, 290; 1st Infantry Brigade, 281; 3rd Infantry Brigade, 279; 173rd Airborne Brigade, 278, 279; 1/503rd Battalion, 278–279 UNITED STATES ARMY AIR FORCE: 204, 206, 213, 215; 5th Air Force, 238; 3rd Attack Group, 238; 8th Bombardment Squadron, 215; 35th Pursuit Squadron, 215; 36th Pursuit Squadron, 215 UNITED STATES NAVY: Seventh Fleet, 286 Urquhart, Police Commissioner F.C., 51–52, 165 Vallentin, Major J.M., 95 Vampire, HMAS (I), 172, 216


306

Varley, Lieut.-Colonel A.L., 200 Vasey, Maj.-General G.A., 186–187, 188–189, 233, 236, 245 Veale, Brigadier W.C.D., 207–208 Vevi Pass, 186–187 Vialls, Major H.G., 83, 95 Vichy French forces, 175–176, 190–194 Victoria, HMCS, 29 Victorian Imperial Bushmen, 82, 84, 88, 89 Victorian Mounted Rifles, 60, 66, 90–92, 95 Victorian Naval Brigade, in China, 86–87 VIET CONG: 271st Main Force Regiment, 278; 274th (Dong Nai) Main Force Regiment, 285, 291; 275th Main Force Regiment, 284; D440 Local Force Battalion, 285, 289; D445 Local Force Battalion, 284, 291; Chau Doc District Company, 289 Viljoen, General B., 88, 91 Villers-Bretonneux (First), 139– 141; (Second), 145 Ville-sur-Ancre, 147 Vindictive, HMS, 143–145 Vinegar Hill, 2–3 Voyager, HMAS (I), 172 Wady Fara, 160–161 Waikato Militia: 1st Regiment, 32, 33, 36; 2nd Regiment, 33–34, 36; 3rd Regiment, 34 Walch, Lieut. J.C., 73 Walker, Sub-Lieut. F., 24–25, 27, 28, 31 Walker, Maj.-General H.B., 117, 120, 142 Wallace, Maj.-General A., 112, 113–114, 115 Waller, Captain H.M.L., 180–181, 208–210 Wallis, Captain J., 4 Walpole, Captain H., 8 Walsh, Lieut.-Colonel F.S., 261 Walters, Group Captain A.L., 206 Warramunga, HMAS, 249

Warrego, HMAS, 249 Wassa (First), 100–101; (Second), 107 Waterloo Creek, 12–13 Wau, 236–137 Wauchope, Maj.-General A.J., 62 Wavell, General Sir A.P., 176, 183, 184 Weld Springs, 46 West Australia Hill, 66 Western Australian Imperial Bushmen, 81, 82, 84 Western Australian Mounted Infantry, 65, 76, 80, 82, 87, 90 Western Frontier Force, 112–116 Westralia, 249–250 Wewak, 251 White, Captain T.W., 111 Whitehead, Brigadier D.A., 251 Whitehead, Maj.-General E.C., 238 Whyte brothers, 16 Wildfontein, 89 Williams, Lieut.-Colonel R., 161 Wills, H., 31 Willshire, Constable W., 51 Wilmansrust, 90–92 Wilson, Brig.-General L.C., 159 Windeyer, Brigadier W.J.V., 242– 243 Winding Swamp, 13–14 Windjana Gorge, 55 Windradyne, 5–6 Wolvekuil Kopjes, 88–89 Wonsan, 268–269 Wootten, Maj.-General G.F., 179, 234, 244–245, 252 Wyndham, 212 Yamashita, General T., 202–203 Yandra, HMAS, 219–220 Yarra, HMAS (II), 212–213 Yongju, 257–258 Ypres (Third), 130–131, 132, 133– 134 Zand River, 76–77 Zeebrugge, 143–144 Zeppelins, 128

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