Not all wartime heroes wore uniforms. In the heart of WWII, in 1942, my great uncle, a metallurgist, was working in the jungles of Papua New Guinea as Japanese bombs fell on goldfields and airstrips.
Unable to fight, due to deafness, he carried on his duty in the shadows...until the order came to flee. What followed was a gruelling jungle escape on foot, a rice bowl in his pack and enemy planes overhead.
This is a piece of family history long buried and largely forgotten. It's a story of endurance, of quiet courage, and of the forgotten Battle of Wau....a turning point that helped swing the Pacific war.
Mum and I had been going through what might be called family archives a few years ago.... when my late Dad spotted one and rescued it, saying, “This is worth saving.”
He was right. Had he not seen it, it might have been lost forever.
And so the story begins:
“ I was the Mill Manager at Wau and responsible for the smelting of all gold produced in the area. The women and children were being evacuated and we carried on running the works. When the Japs bombed Bulolo and Salomoa during January ’42, orders were given to close down the works and evacuate the area. One plane came in from Moresby and the older and sick men were taken out first.
We were waiting at the ‘drome one morning; the plane came in and was getting ready to load. An air raid warning went off and Jap planes could be seen coming from over the hills from the coast. The pilot took off, and, keeping low, went off to Moresby. We at the ‘drome scattered – the majority went to the creek to hide. I went back to the dry water race and kept my head down as the bombs started to fall. Some landed in the ‘drome and a few buildings were hit – a large number of bombs landed in the area where the men had hid. Several suffered broken bones but none were killed. Though I was 50 yards away, all I did was stop a lump of dirt and grass with my back.
The place he was ordered to leave - Wau - was no ordinary town. Within weeks of his evacuation, it became the site of one of the most dramatic and underappreciated battles of the Pacific War.
The Battle of Wau: A Forgotten Fight for the Jungle Airstrip
The Battle of Wau, fought in January 1943, saw Australian forces, primarily from the 17th Brigade. defend the small airstrip at Wau from a Japanese assault. The Japanese Okabe Detachment had crossed the mountains in a desperate push to take the valley and its crucial airfield.
Despite the almost impassable terrain, poor weather, and limited resources, the Australians. many airlifted in by Dakota transport planes under fire, held firm. The airstrip, which had once seen my uncle off, became the focal point of the struggle. Its loss would have meant disaster for Allied plans in New Guinea.
But the Australians held. The Japanese were driven back, marking the end of their offensive momentum in the New Guinea campaign. Wau became one of the first major Australian victories of 1943, a turning point in the long fight for the island.
Meanwhile, my great uncle and his group had begun their own long journey out of the jungle:
The pilot came back in a day or two and started taking the older ones out again. He only made a few trips before he crashed in Cairns, I think it was, when taking off for another trip. He was killed. We were then told to walk to the south coast as it was considered safer than Wau, where we were.
footage shown is from 1943, after the evacuation of the civilians
We travelled by lorry to the start of the track to the coast. The track had no name at the time we walked it as far as I know. We carried bedrolls and a few things we could fit in a backpack. We had a few native boys to carry the food which was mainly rice. A bit of meat, bread and biscuits for a few days. But we ate mostly rice.
We would start walking about 8 am and might have a spell at midday, finishing about 4 pm. It was not particularly hot as the ridge we had to climb was 2000 to 3000 feet above sea level but some of the ridges we had to climb were rather steep. We had to hold on to trees and scrub to help us walk up the slopes. Mosquitoes were bad. Malaria was a risk because of the mossies. Lean to shelters were built from branches of trees and roofed with palm leaves on a floor of saplings. They were normally beside a creek and we would sit down for a meal of rice. The going was anything but level. We climbed up and up and down all day so we always slept pretty well at night.
We could see the Aussie planes flying over to attack the Japs – the natives were a bit scared of the planes so I explained to them that they were not “ Japan man “ planes but Aussies. I only met one native man with a child on our walk. We were not far from the coast and he couldn’t speak pidgin but, with sign language, he explained that the planes were flying all over and that we were not too far from our destination.
After about 10 days, we reached the mission station at Lakekamu River. From there, we went by native canoes to the coast and boarded a lugger to Yule Island mission station. A day or two there and then another lugger to Port Moresby. We just got to the wharf when the air raid warning went off. Many jumped for the wharf. I noticed that the skipper had re started the engines and I decided to stay on board. As it happened, no bombs were dropped on the town. We were collected after the raid and driven to an army camp on the Lolakie river. After a few days, we were shipped out by boat to Townsville.
I tried to sign up, again, but was rejected for NCUR and NZ forces. I had a dose or two of malaria and had an attack of rheumatic fever but not that bad really. Apparently my heart had been affected so I couldn’t serve because of that, and of course, my deafness.
I was one of the first groups to walk out, but many in other groups were in their 70’s. We were lucky that we didn’t get too much rain on our walk.
Salamoa was destroyed by the Japanese bombing and was never rebuilt. “
After the war, my great uncle became a metallurgist in Mount Isa, Queensland. He never married, and was known for being thrifty with both words and money. As a child, I found him miserly and reclusive. But this tale helped me see him differently.
Perhaps he never stopped tasting the memory of rice in a leaf hut. Perhaps he never forgot the bombs, the jungle, or the shame of being turned away from military service. Perhaps walking out of the jungle left him changed in ways words could never express.
He taught me something without ever saying it. That when the mountain seems too steep, and you can’t go on, you keep going anyway.
Fortunately, the Australian's managed to win back the area one year later.
I still remember Mum talking of the thrill of going down to Mechanics Bay in Auckland.
A big flying boat was due to land on the water, and they were there to meet him, arriving back from the war-torn New Guinea. He had walked out of the jungle with others to safety. That moment of reunion must have been unforgettable.
I hope you have enjoyed reading something from my family history.
Shaydee
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