oggbashan
Dying Truth seeker
- Joined
- Jul 3, 2002
- Posts
- 56,017
Yesterday, 25 April, was ANZAC Day and I missed it. 
On that day I remember one of my father's friends who had gone to my Australian School with his older brothers.
His three older brothers volunteered for the First World War. Two were killed at Gallipoli and one on the Western Front. They are shown on the school's War Memorial and also on other boards for Sporting and Academic achievement.
He also volunteered but was injured at Gallipoli and sent back to Australia. He became an instructor for new recruits.
During WW2 he was an Australian Civil Service officer partly responsible for the supply chain for troops fighting the Japanese in New Guinea on the Kokoda Trail. He knew there were severe problems in getting the supppies through the jungle so he decided to go with the next supply column to see for himself and whether there was any better way that goods could be moved.
The column was about two miles from the fighting front when it was attacked by a Japanese force that had outflanked the Australians. Several of the soldiers escorting the column were killed. He, although a civilian, grabbed a Bren gun from a dead soldier and defended the column for half an hour, killing at least fifty Japanese by himself.
When he returned to base, the Australian authorities had a problem. Should they give him a medal, or prosecute him for war crimes, having killed so many as a civilian? He claimed that his WAS in uniform because he was wearing his Australian slouch hat from WW1 even though he had left the Army reserve list in 1928, and the Japanese didn't care whether he was a civilian or not. They were trying to kill him.
In the end the authorities did neither. He didn't get a medal or a court-martial. What he did get was free beers from the soldiers he had saved and a legendary status on ANZAC days.
They don't make them like him anymore.
On that day I remember one of my father's friends who had gone to my Australian School with his older brothers.
His three older brothers volunteered for the First World War. Two were killed at Gallipoli and one on the Western Front. They are shown on the school's War Memorial and also on other boards for Sporting and Academic achievement.
He also volunteered but was injured at Gallipoli and sent back to Australia. He became an instructor for new recruits.
During WW2 he was an Australian Civil Service officer partly responsible for the supply chain for troops fighting the Japanese in New Guinea on the Kokoda Trail. He knew there were severe problems in getting the supppies through the jungle so he decided to go with the next supply column to see for himself and whether there was any better way that goods could be moved.
The column was about two miles from the fighting front when it was attacked by a Japanese force that had outflanked the Australians. Several of the soldiers escorting the column were killed. He, although a civilian, grabbed a Bren gun from a dead soldier and defended the column for half an hour, killing at least fifty Japanese by himself.
When he returned to base, the Australian authorities had a problem. Should they give him a medal, or prosecute him for war crimes, having killed so many as a civilian? He claimed that his WAS in uniform because he was wearing his Australian slouch hat from WW1 even though he had left the Army reserve list in 1928, and the Japanese didn't care whether he was a civilian or not. They were trying to kill him.
In the end the authorities did neither. He didn't get a medal or a court-martial. What he did get was free beers from the soldiers he had saved and a legendary status on ANZAC days.
They don't make them like him anymore.
