Chapter 6 Sepik Expedition; Ins & Outs; 1st Rescue Job; Reward for Valour; ......

SEPIK EXPEDITION, 1945

THE sudden end to the Pacific War no doubt necessitated alterations to many a well conceived and carefully laid plan, and the midnight oil was burnt with no thought for economy at Sixth Division headquarters at Wewak in those first days of peace.

It was vitally necessary that all enemy troops remaining on the New Guinea mainland be disarmed and concentrated in one area as soon as possible. As it was known that enemy forces were scattered over an area of many thousand square miles, the magnitude of the task involved was never underestimated. It was obviously impossible for our forces to collect all the stray parties of Japanese in one gigantic round-up and, consequently, plans were laid for the enemy commander, General Adachi, to instruct his troops to assemble at certain points at different times, when they would be disarmed and transported to Muschu Island for internment.

To local commanders in the coastal and inland sectors, where the Japanese were still an organized force, this did not present any insurmountable difficulties, but Adachi was far from sure as to the strength, location or attitude of his troops scattered throughout the swamps and plains of the Lower and Middle Sepik. It was to cope with this problem that a conference was called between representatives of the Army, Navy and Air Force, and the A.N.G.A.U. District Officer for the Sepik district.

Here it was decided to despatch without delay two parties of A.N.G.A.U. personnel to the Sepik area; first, to contact and instruct Japanese commanders in the terms of surrender and the concentration plan to be immediately carried out, and secondly, to re-establish the pre-war Government Station at Angoram, and to attack the problem of regaining the confidence and co-operation of the local native population.

I had returned to Wewak on 9 September, after many months of operating in the Aitape hinterland and with 16th Infantry Brigade forces in the drive on Maprik. I fondly imagined that the amenities of civilization were shortly to be mine while physical endurance and financial assets could be maintained. In this happy conjecture, however, I was destined to suffer sudden and violent disappointment when the District Officer instructed me to prepare at once for a sojourn of several months among the Nips, the natives, the crocodiles and the mosquitoes of the ill-famed Sepik swamps.

The leader of our little party was my friend in exile and adversity, the Assistant District Officer. He and I and the District Medical Assistant departed overland on 17 September, with a party of some ten native police and a line of carriers.

The A.D.O. anticipated reaching Angoram on the 23rd unless he encountered opposition, in which case he did not anticipate....

The fact that he was armed with a pass signed by General Adachi evidently failed to inspire him with very much confidence. I, as the "Polismasta" (Patrol Officer), accompanied the second party by sea on 22 September. Our little fleet was divided into two parties. The first comprising two L.C.M's and one L.C.I. left at 6 p.m.; the second, M.L's 805 and 809, weighed anchor at midnight and headed for our rendezvous, the eighty miles distant Sepik mouth.

I awoke at 6 next morning as the 805 led the way through the turbulent crosscurrents where the mighty river pours its millions of gallons of dirty brown water, its floating logs and "Islands" and its secrets into the Bismarck Sea. The little craft was jammed with men, stores, "ashcans", ammunition and fuel, and leaving the Sop to escort the slower barges we sped on upstream, the first Allied vessel in those waters for more than three years.

With our Sepik pilot making a general nuisance of himself and loading us with highly inaccurate information, we stayed in midstream until a party of Japanese at Singarin signalled us to draw in to the bank. With guns manned and senses alert we conducted an amusing conversation with a bespectacled Japanese major. We had on board a Nisei interpreter, but I found it more expedient to converse in pidgin in which language many Japs proved themselves remarkably fluent.

Having instructed the major to despatch all his fit men to the coast and to await further orders, we continued upstream, reaching Marienberg at midday. Here at the old mission headquarters we found a large party of Japanese numbering several hundred, all heavily armed, though the majority were in poor physical shape. Several 55- and 75-mm- guns were numbered among their weapons and these were dug in, well camouflaged and commanded both approaches. There was a slight stir when we discovered a 75-mm- fully loaded with its muzzle directed at our flimsy M.L., and the Jap commander's explanation that no gunner was numbered among his men met with ill-concealed doubt. The breechblock was removed before we re-embarked. Several other parties were encountered before we reached Angoram at 3 p.m., but there was no act of violence and all ranks were sullenly respectful wherever we put ashore.

The overland party had arrived safely early that morning and their seven days' trek, though somewhat nerve-racking, had been without serious incident. The old Government buildings were found to be damaged beyond possible repair, the R.A.A.F. having successfully completed the destruction commenced by time, climate, Nips, natives and vermin; but we were still thankful to spread our blankets amid the ruins of the previous patrol officer's dwelling while the Navy craft continued on upstream. It rained that night, not an unusual occurrence, and the bullet-riddled roof would have afforded as much protection had it been constructed of the lace it so much resembled. By dawn we were wet, cold, dirty, miserable and hungry and with the unpredictable Jap as a neighbour, far from secure in our strategic position.

The 809, escorting only two barges, eventually arrived about 8 a.m. The third barge had struck a small mine on the previous day and been left at Marienberg. Our stores were unloaded as rapidly as possible; and while one barge proceeded to the nearby enemy camp to embark those unable to walk I took the other to where the Jap quartermaster had assembled all his heavy arms, equipment and ammunition.

It afforded me, my police and native carriers, a great deal of amusement and satisfaction to stand idly by and watch our would-be conquerors load the barge with their own equipment. Also to witness the fact that the Australian Army at the peak of a "paper war" is merely illiterate in comparison with the Jap, who, until ordered to desist, checked off each round of ammunition against a file of lists thick enough to make the Doomsday Book resemble a Reader's Digest by comparison.

Their horror and consternation knew no bounds when I ordered the ammunition, including grenades and mortar bombs, to be dumped into the river. Nothing short of a pencilled notation on his lists and a signature would appease the unfortunate Q.M., who firmly believed that otherwise his only recourse was hara-kiri and an honourable death.

The barges left that afternoon, and when, on the 26th, the two M.L's returned and headed for Wewak, the three of us were left to glorious isolation and the tender mercies of several hundred Nips.

The local Japanese commander, Major General Kauwakubo, was a venerable old villain who spent his time trying to convince himself that he hated the British more than he hated General Adachi, which at least kept his mind occupied and his spleen directed away from us. The liaison officer appointed to wait on us daily and receive instructions was a Captain Namura, ex-railway porter and veteran of the Chinese wars. His assistant was Sergeant Kita who suffered from mild St Vitus's Dance and an unreasoning, though not entirely unreasonable, fear of my native police sergeant. He resembled a well-formed rat and oozed affability and unctuous humbleness. It later gave me the greatest pleasure to help sift evidence against him for the War Crimes Commission.

In contrast, Namura. was friendly without being familiar, helpful but not obsequious, a soldier and, to Jap standards, a gentleman.

A few days later we received information that the Japs were still holding as prisoners thirteen members of the Indian Army captured at Singapore and brought to New Guinea as slave labour. Namura was ordered to bring these men to us without further delay.

They arrived on the next afternoon-eleven of the most pitiful human skeletons left to breathe.

Two others had died the previous night, and Namura was so soundly and eloquently berated that he was too ashamed to come near us for several days.

The officer in charge of the Indian party was Jemadar Chet Singh, a well-spoken, well-educated officer, whose extravagant use of English in vehemently declaring his undying gratitude proved extremely embarrassing to us. He and his men were the survivors of many hundreds of Indians who died of starvation, sickness and ill-treatment in the Sepik swamps; and it was with particular regret that I later learned that all but himself were killed in an air crash in New Britain while en route to India.

With no means of communication except a daily reconnaissance plane which would circle the station (our rations were dropped unceremoniously in bags from passing "kai bombers"), our position remained somewhat insecure until the return of the barges and escorting H.D.M.L. 1356 on ii October. These barges evacuated the remaining Japanese from the area while I accompanied the naval craft on a record-breaking voyage upstream as far as Ambunti, 250 miles from the river mouth, getting into touch with natives and telling them of Japan's defeat and the return of the "Gavman".

On the departure of the vessel we were again left to our own devices, to do battle with the unending flow of complaints, disorders and unrest which is the lot of those who would administer in a savage land. For months the A.D.O. contended with shortages of supplies and equipment in trying to build a new station on the ruins of what was once Angoram; saving a little here, cutting a little there, so that another hundred patients could be fed and treated at the native hospital; administering justice in tribal and inter-village disputes with an impartial and saint-like patience.

The "dakata" performed skin-grafts, amputations and all types of operations with makeshift instruments; his theatre a stinking native hut, his assistants un skilled "dakatabois", his audience painted savages and his reward a broad grin or the soft "Teink iu Masta" from a shy and grateful mother. I myself spent scorching days in an open canoe and lonely nights in isolated, disease-filled villages, my friends six native constables and a pistol, my potential enemies disease, accident and 50,000 savages.

Today Angoram is the administrative centre for a thickly populated sub-district; and as the sun casts long shadows over the dirty brown waters of the mighty river, as the sky is filled with the awakening clouds of flying foxes and the air with faint throb of a distant garamut, there is left only the memory of the Sepik Expedition, 1945.

P. E. FIENBERG, SECOND A.I.F.

INS AND OUTS

CLIMBED up the steps in Martin Place and there it was in front of me: a square, squat, flimsy wooden building with its unpainted drabness relieved only by the colourful splashes of the recruiting posters pasted on it. I'd come two thousand miles to find that particular building, and now, having found it, I wasn't so certain.

I lit a cigarette. "Give it another few weeks," I decided. A grey-headed Old Digger in a shiny blue suit halted smartly beside me.

"There she is, Dig." He winked in the direction of the poster plastered hut, made a snappy right turn and marched toward it.

At the hut they gave me booklets, which I didn't read, and directed me to the building over the way. Here, in a long hall furnished ominously in a style reminiscent of both a school a dentist's waiting-room, I filled in forms and the helpfully-watchful eyes of blokes of with R.S.L. badges. This was easy. Just a scratch of the pen and I was a soldier - so I thought. Next stop was the Town Hall. Two waist-coated civvy doctors and a uniformed sergeant marshalled us through. "Hands on your hips and bend your knees," said the Doc at he head of my queue. I thought of my crook nee, souvenir of an old horse-fall and knew I could not do it. So I wouldn't be a soldier after all. I wasn't sure whether I was glad or sorry.

"Arms above your head and touch your toes," ordered the second doctor. I failed to get past my shin. Bit out of condition, huh? You'll be right after a week or two."

All the stories of Army life that I had main actor always cobbered up with the first bloke he met in the Service and remained sworn mates with him thereafter. My first acquaintance was a stumpy Italian with a skinful, a spare flask of rum and some very objectionable habits and sayings. He, being
what he was, tried very hard to get the seat in the big car alongside the girl who drove us out to Paddington. I was lucky enough to fore-stall him and get the position myself. She was a very nice girl and I was sorry that the trip was so short.

She waved me a friendly goodbye and passed out of my life. My Italian friend did not stay in my circle of acquaintances very long either. Waiting without knowing why or for how long was too much for his excitable Latin temperament. He talked his way out of the gate and the next time I saw him he was doing well in the King's Cross liquor business. Two others of our party from the Town Hall dropped out of sight soon after we entered Paddington, leaving me with a rather nice bloke called Jack, and an Old Soldier.

We went on waiting. At irregular intervals bus-loads of travel-worn fellow-sufferers arrived to help us wait. About noon the Comforts Fund or someone started dispensing hot pies and lukewarm tea in a marquee erected on the well-trampled, drought-dried lawn. We ate and did some more waiting.

"Stick to me," said the Old Soldier. "I know the ropes."

But I lost him during the medical examination which was far more thorough than the preliminary one at the Town Hall. And then:

"What branch of the Service would you prefer? "

"Light Horse."

"You've come to the wrong war, soldier."

"Well," I asked, thinking of that crook knee, "somewhere where I won't have to walk."

"Drive a car or truck?"

"No," I admitted.

"Stick him in the Arty. Next table, please."

"Repeat after me," he said. He spoke so fast that the oath became a meaningless gabble and its whole significance was lost.

"Outside and over to the X-ray."

I looked around for Jack. His papers, which had been immediately after mine, had somehow got mixed up in another group.

After having my insides photographed I was sent into the next building where there was a tunic worn previously by the biggest soldier in the First A.I.F. and a comb once owned by the dirtiest soldier in the First Fleet.

I felt, and, as my pay book later proved, also looked like a trans-Pacific Public Enemy. I had been sworn in for twenty minutes and already felt that I wanted to get out.

But that same voice which had been controlling my destinies through all those previous occasions rang again in my ears:

"Form up in two ranks!"

For the first time I regarded its owner. He was fully nineteen. His chinstrap looked a lot stronger than his chin, his nose practically indistinguishable from the rest of his face, and his eyes a weak, watery blue. But his trousers had a crease you could trim your fingernails on and his boots fairly shone.

"Pick up your kit," he screamed at us.

I'd had it. I'd been prepared for a lot of things in the Army but being bossed around by a kid wasn't one of them. I felt mutinous.

"You're in the Army now," murmured the Old Soldier, rejoining me in the X-ray room. I picked up my kit.

A giggle-suited party engaged in some unenthusiastic emu bobbing regarded us with dispassionate contempt.

"Thank Heaven," prayed one of them, "we got a Navy."

Our embryo field-marshal took a deep breath, screwed up his face and shrieked "Party! Right turn! Quick march!"

"You'll be sorry," chorused the emu bobbers.

We shuffled off toward the Showground.

I was in.

* * * * * * * *

The set-up for getting out was perfectly simple, so I thought. I was an NX number bound for Perth for a manpower release. I wanted permission to break my Journey in Melbourne to collect my civvy clothes from relative's home. G.D.D. (Showground) assured me that it could be arranged; but they couldn't do it. That was a job for L.T.D. Marrickville. L T D was lust as assuring. "You see them at the office at Camp Pell."

"But," I queried "what if we don't stage Camp Pell? "

"G.D.D. personnel" - he made assurance doubly sure "always stop at Camp Pell."

We didn't.

That was the beginning of it. I was handled artistically from that point on. Everyone who has been through it knows.

I ran foul of pickets, R.T.0's, draft conducting officers, military police. Even the Y.M.C.A could do nothing for me. I eventually made my way across Australia, a saddened, disillusioned man. Sick, sore and sorry, fed up with everything military, I arrived at Claremont, Western Australia, for a meal, a bath, an X-ray, a dental check-up and a weekend leave-pass.

On the Monday I was dragged like a pull-through. But to my disappointment I was not psycho-analyzed. Perhaps they considered that anyone who was actually anxious to give up the tax-free comfort of Army life on the Atherton Tablelands to go chasing wild cattle around the Northern Territory, was beyond any care or treatment. But anyhow, at 2-30 P-m- that day when I knocked on the canteen window for my month's smoking, I was still un-psyched.

The girl in the canteen loved me not. She told an inquiring friend at the other end of the room that I was "just another cocky going home to milk Poppa's cows". I didn't bother to correct her. I just stowed that weed about me and headed for the gate.

"Got a pass, soldier?" asked the guard.

"Something better than that," I informed him, reaching for my wallet.

"Leave it, brother" he commented. "I can see it in your face."

I walked through the gate. A ginger-headed capitalist, who probably started wearing clothes about the same time I started wearing gaiters, loaded my kit on to his billy-cart. It was five weeks short of four years since I had passed into Sydney Showground and here I was at last with sixty days' pay in lieu of leave in my pocket and a lot of memories, grave and gay, in my heart.

A chap in jungle-green trousers and a grey sports coat offered me a lift to the station in a rattle-trap civilian truck.

"Discharged, Dig?

"Yes."

"You'll be sorry."

I climbed into the back of his truck.

I was out.

TOM A. RONAN, SECOND A.I.F.

FIRST RESCUE JOB

THE message about the downed pilot came by phone on Wednesday night, 23 June 43, as I lay in my bed in what was once the maternity ward of the old Darwin Civil Hospital. It was then the headquarters of the Marine Section, R.A.A.F.

It wasn't known whether the pilot was ashore or still floating in his dinghy. A shore party was making its way through the scrub to where the crashed plane was believed to be: near the beach. It wasn't a daring assignment, but, if there were any sort of a sea outside the boom, it wasn't going to be a picnic with the sort of rescue boat we had, the 057 which was a converted target-boat with an eggshell hull.

We slipped the buoy on the ebb-tide at daybreak. It gave us an additional three or four knots on the outward journey, and this was important. We had to search the coastal area westward of the boom defence for thirty miles. We had tinned food, bread, tea and sugar, water, blankets and stretchers in the space abaft the cable locker.

A dozen panniers for the "go" gun, a long grass-line tow, and two spare mud-hooks were stowed aft. A dinghy was lashed athwart-ships. There were four men in the crew. All this aboard a forty-foot vessel with a beam like a pencil, and nearly all engine below. This was the pride of the Marine Section going to sea on the first real job they had since the raids started.

Approaching the boom, we signalled for passage. The two gate-vessels dropped the wire, and over we went into the open sea. We turned almost immediately to meet the Navy's interception boat. She was wallowing toward us, engines idling. All day, all night she was there, like a fat, benevolent, but efficient policeman. Her guns alone prevented her from being altogether comic. I slid alongside, careful of paint and fender. "R.A.A.F. boat, rescue job, be back about sundown probably," I yelled to the skipper on the bridge, who was eating his breakfast standing up. He waved his hand, full of sandwich, and we went ahead to turn westward. I handed over to Ted Sloan and rolled a cigarette.

In the blue distance, suspended above the water in mirage effect, was the "first light" as we called it. Beyond this point we had never ventured. We were harbour sailors, limited by the type of boats with which we were equipped - a miscellaneous collection of salvaged and scrounged vessels. The Navy, with their seaworthy long range "Fairmiles", usually carried out rescue jobs.

By the time we breasted the light we knew we were at sea. Solid water was coming over the bow, and frequently an engine would race as a screw pushed air instead of water. This happened so often that we thought several times we had lost a screw. Visibility was spasmodic. Top of a swell, and we saw for miles; in the trough, it was like being in a submarine without a periscope, only much wetter. We were keeping about two miles off the coast; we had no charts, but we knew it was a bad place for reefs.

It was therefore only luck that we saw the signal from the beach near the light. Someone was waving something. This was off the programme, but we had been out about two hours. It was just possible they had a message, as a wireless station was close by. As we carefully neared the shore we saw it was a party of six men. An officer, a medical orderly, and some willing helpers. They said they knew roughly where the pilot was, and that we were to take them aboard. We could take only the officer and medical orderly, and used the dinghy for this operation. It wasn't easy, and I was wishing I had served my apprenticeship in a surf club instead of in the Navy by the time we got them aboard and stowed the dinghy.

Two hours later we ran into some smooth water outside a large cove. We were about twenty miles from Darwin as the crow flies, and were glad of the rest from the continual buffeting. Our passengers were feeling seedy, and one said something about the seams through which water was seeping. I was wondering about the hull myself. We had kept unceasing watch, as well as we could, along the shoreline and at sea. The pilot had been down long enough to make the beach, if unhurt. If he were not ashore, it was likely that he was miles out of our range, and still drifting with the current.

Then one of the crew shouted, and pointed to the most distant bend of the cove. It was three miles inshore, and there was a light flashing against the background of green. Our man? I thought it must be. We tried to read the flashes, but if it were Morse, it was most unorthodox. I sent, "R.A.A.F. boat coming ", with the Aldis lamp. The flashing continued as we moved shoreward, but we gave up trying
to read it. We opened up to full speed, which was one qualification 057 did have, in smooth water. There was plenty of crystal clear water, and in places the bottom showed, before the mirror effect was broken by our bows. Close in, we had to move between patches of mangroves, but it was deep enough
for us almost to nose the beach.

The pilot was so pleased to see us that he met us halfway in his rubber dinghy, tired as he was. He told us all about the crash, while we anchored for lunch. He was a flying officer and was he hungry and thirsty! He drank three pint mugs of tea, got "stuck into" the tinned sausages, as if they were never seen up north, and smoked with absolute sensuality. In fact he managed these things with such enthusiasm, he seemed to be eating, drinking, smoking, and talking simultaneously. A pocket mirror used as a heliograph with no real attempt at letters explained why we couldn't read his signals.

The return journey was not without incident. After repeating our surf-riding performance at the light, we left the passengers we had picked up there, and turned for the home run to the boom.

It was here that an Army unit stationed on the coast decided we were the enemy trying to beat the harbour defences! Either that, or they were browned off with inaction, and wanted some practice. Whatever it was, there was nothing "phoney" about the ammunition they started to fire at us!

The pilot was resting below; we were at peace with the world. The sea was calm, and I was rolling another cigarette. I almost dropped it when the sea ahead of us suddenly ripped with spray as if a shoal of fish had broken surface. A second later we heard the tearing rattle of machine guns from the shore. Ted Sloan at the wheel throttled down to dead slow, and several more bursts ruptured the smooth water, closer this time.

The pilot came on deck. "What's up?" he asked.

"I think we're target for today'!" I replied, trying to look as though we were used to that sort of thing every time we went out.

"Lovely! I suppose a man'll get shot or drowned on top of it all now," he said, half serious, half jesting.

Another salvo, over-ranged, fell the other side of us.

"Turn her round and present the stern!" I said to Ted. I grabbed the Aldis, and spelt out "R.A.A.F." slowly. We waited awhile before increasing speed and perhaps inviting shots intended to stop us, but they seemed to be satisfied. No answering signal came from the shore so Ted pushed all three throttles forward and we shot through the gates. The men on the gate-ships grinned from the upper decks. It must have been funny from their point of view. I suppose it was, too, but we hadn't noticed it while it was on.

Moving down past the Marine Section jetty we swung about completely, and approached the buoy against the tide. A launch came out to pick us up, and we went ashore in triumph. Not because there is anything particularly triumphant about picking up one pilot, but a precedent had been established, and we were pleased about it.

Strangely enough, in spite of all the excellent boats the section acquired later, they never again had the opportunity of a rescue job which was all to the good. But, as a doctor desires patients, so do a rescue craft and its crew desire rescues.

G. B. H. SAUNDERS, R.A.A.F.

REWARD FOR VALOUR

THE dark red of the telephone cable blended well with the edge of the muddy jungle road that ran forward to the Battalion.

In a shallow depression behind a fallen log at the side of the road, Signalman Mackay pressed his body to the ground and tried to calm his racing pulse.

A hundred yards ahead the road took a bend to the right. A few minutes before he'd started around that bend but hadn't got far. Two jeeps, part of the battalion supply train, were crashed into the trees at the edge of the timber. Slumped forward over the steering wheels, the two drivers were huddled in death. Bullet holes peppered the bodies of the vehicles.

It hadn't been hard to picture what had happened. The Sig sergeant had been right. The Japs had cut the road.

Mackay had thought of the N.C.O.'s words. "The Battalion's line is out. Probably cut. It's up to you, Mac; there's not another man available. The rest of the team are laying a line to the other brigade. You'll have to go alone, but for heaven's sake, man, get the line through. The Brig's screaming. There's been no word for an hour."

He remembered, as he lay panting behind the log, how he had eased his rifle forward and moved towards the first jeep. He'd noticed the cable was tangled in the bumper where it rested against a sapling and there, he felt sure, was the break in the line. He'd taken only a few steps when something whined over his head and tore into the trees beside him. The crack of a rifle came from the ridge to his left.

Here the road furrowed the side of a hill. The edge along which the cable was laid sloped gently down to the river below. On the steeper side the timber gave way to volcanic rock and grassland. The Japs had climbed the hill and were dug in behind an outcrop of granite covering the bend in the road. Anything that moved came under their fire.

Another shot had followed the first, then another, and the linesman, as the screaming lead whined and thudded round him, had turned and run. His rifle slipped from his grasp and fell unheeded. The test phone he carried had clanged and bumped against his side. Around the bend was safety. His heavy boots had ploughed through the soft mud of the road as he raced on. The chatter of machine guns from behind had added more speed to his flying feet. He had reached the fallen log and thrown himself behind it.

Sweat still ran from his forehead. His hands were clammy. His heart pounded as though his chest would burst and a lump in his throat seemed to be choking him. Beside him the phone lay where he had dropped it when he dived. He pulled his tin hat a shade further over his brow and lay still.

For two minute- it seemed like hours - the Japs continued their fire. Then, as suddenly as it began, it ceased. Only the chirping of the insects broke the silence.

The pliers in his belt were hurting his side. He moved to ease them. His hand came in contact with the steel case of his phone. Its coldness steadied his tremors. His mind cleared again.

It was all so new to Mackay. Two weeks ago he'd been just another reinforcement. Now he was in action. It didn't seem right somehow. This wasn't what he'd thought Signals were like. Back in the training camps he'd learnt to lay cable from a moving truck. He'd learnt to mend a broken wire with pliers and tape. He'd learnt to install a switchboard. There'd been lectures on electricity: voltage, resistances, insulators, currents and circuits. He'd repaired minor faults in telephones and generators, and learnt many other things so important to the training of a linesman. But not this.

No one had told him he'd have to go alone to mend a break which was covered by enemy fire. He hadn't been told how to crawl on his belly through flying lead. Why couldn't the sergeant have sent a more experienced man? Why did the section have to be so short-handed? Why couldn't the Battalion Sigs mend the break? Why did he have to go forward? Why? Why? Hell, he just couldn't.

He wiped the sweat from his face on the sleeve of his shirt. The movement rustled the letter in his pocket. The last one he'd received. From his son. He'd written and told him he'd joined a fighting unit. He pulled it out and spread the pages in front of him.

"Gee, dad," he read again, "it must be great to be fighting the Japs at last. Mum and I are proud. of you. I told all the kids my father's in action. Hurry up and win a medal, won't you, dad. I'll . . ." The words blurred before his eyes.

A medal. Hell! Here he was shivering behind a log. Only heroes got medals. He wasn't a hero.

His lips moved in prayer. "Please God, they don't expect me to go up there." His teeth clenched. "I can't. I can't go up there again."

He thought of his boy again. He thought of the pride that would have been in his voice as he told of his dad. He remembered the sergeant's words. "For heaven's sake, get the line through. The Brig's screaming. It's up to you."

He pulled the phone to him. Better hurry. The Japs might send out a search party. He'd lain there long enough. He eased himself around the log and further down the slope into the timber. Lucky the jungle was thick thereabouts. He took his bearings and fixed the position of the first jeep. Eighty yards in a direct line 'Mould bring him just past the bend in the road. He stood up. No sound. He could see the Japs' position, but the timber screened him from their view.

He lengthened the straps of the phone and threw it over his head and shoulders as he'd slung his schoolbag when he was a kid. He needed both hands. Movement in the jungle was easily detected. Cautiously he pushed aside a vine which barred his path and moved forward. Thorns tore at his shirt. Dead twigs scratched at his face as he crept up towards the road. His boots slipped on mossy logs as he clambered over them and he barked his shins. The phone caught in protruding branches and banged against his back. The going was difficult, but he pushed on.

In twenty minutes he covered sixty yards. He should see the jeep soon if his direction were right. A few steps further on, the muddy road showed like a ribbon of light through the green timber. The red cable could just be seen. A little to the left the dull bodies of the wrecked vehicles were visible. He altered his course.

His breath hammered in his throat. His feet trod even more warily. He replaced every branch as carefully as he moved it. His jungle-green clothes blended with the shadows. Silent prayers welled through his closed mouth.

A fallen tree barred his path. Too large to climb over. Inwards from the road, its leafy branches tangled in the timber below. It would take him ages to get through that. The other end was only a yard or two from the edge of the road. He might be seen. Worth the risk, he thought.

He dropped to his knees and crawled along the side of the log. Once the phone caught in a low bush and stirred the leaves. He dropped flat, every nerve tingling as he waited for the crashing volley from the enemy opposite. It never came. He crawled on. Another few feet and he was at the end of the log. The cable almost touched the end. He wondered if he should try to raise the Battalion. Better not, he decided. Even if he did, he would still have to mend the break.

Getting around the log was going to be the. worst. Its end was in plain view of the Japs. He almost gave it up. He thought of the letter again. "A hero." Hell, he wondered if the boy would ever know how scared he was at this minute.

Inch by inch, he edged his way around. His body pressed even closer to the earth. His eyes searched the ridge opposite. He saw a slight movement behind the rock. His breath almost stopped. He felt sure the pounding of his heart could be heard over there. One final wriggle and he was around the log. He breathed easier and sidled a few yards down the slope.

For two minutes he rested. He could see the break in the wire now. He crawled towards it.

Another foot. Six inches. His outstretched hand was close to the broken cable. He pulled himself on to his elbows. The wheel of the jeep shielded him a little from the enemy position. His hand reached slowly out and grasped one end of the wire. Fingers which seemed all thumbs untangled it from the bumper bar. It came loose in his hand. With his tongue between his teeth, he freed the other end. He drew both ends carefully towards him.

They felt like steel hawsers as he pulled. The strain on the wire warned him to go easy. Too much weight and he'd rustle the bushes. He huddled against the wheel of the jeep.

"God," he prayed. "Don't let them see me."

Shaking hands withdrew his pliers and bared the ends of the wire. The pounding in his ears was his own pulse. The lessons his instructor had taught him flashed through his brain. Funny, he thought, at a time like this.

"Left over right, right over left. Make sure the copper isn't broken short." There, it was done. Now for the test.

His lips moved again, "Dear God, let there be only one break."

The phone rattled as he shifted it from his back. " Quiet," he muttered. "Careful."

He connected the wire to one terminal. The pliers made a good earth. The handset went to his ear. "Hero," he was thinking. "My boy wants a medal. Hell, all I want is the Battalion."

He touched the generator handle. It felt good to him. There was a load on the line anyway.

A voice answered, "Brigade here."

Mackay's voice came back in a whisper, "Linesman here. Can you raise Battalion?"

"I'll try. Mind your ear."

The dull whirring seemed to crash through the quiet of the jungle. Mackay's hand shot towards the receiver but jarred against the broken bumper. The smashed headlight tinkled to the ground. The bushes around him shuddered violently.

From the ridge opposite a shot rang out. Three more followed in quick succession. The machine guns opened up again. Lead slammed into the jeep and the trees near by. Mackay felt a tearing pain in his leg. He grabbed the handset and worked the pressel switch.

"Linesman here. Can you hear me?"

The voice which answered sent a thrill through the linesman's body. Gone was his fear of death. Forgotten were the bullets which thudded around him. He hadn't failed. The line was through.

"Nth Battalion answering. Thank heaven the line's O.K. The Old Man's. .

The voice cut off.

Something like a mule kicked Mackay in the face. His body sagged. A jagged hole in his forehead spurted blood. Another slug tore into his body. He didn't feel it.

The phone beside him whirred and crackled again. It was the Sig sergeant's voice.

"Good work, Mackay."

Only the buzzing insects and the jungle heard. Mackay was dead.

A few days later, after the Japs had been cleared from the ridge and the linesman's body recovered, his sergeant and O.C. section were discussing his meritorious conduct.

"Don't you think, sir," the N.C.O. suggested, "Mackay deserves a decoration for this? You can recommend it, can't you?"

The officer lit a cigarette before replying.

"I could, Sergeant, and I would. But . . ." He paused to blow two long shafts of smoke through his nostrils. "Unfortunately, it would not be of any use you see, the only British decoration awarded posthumously is the Victoria Cross, and Mackay's act, gallant as it was, was not one for which a V.C. would be given."

He puffed his cigarette again before continuing. "Of course, if he had lived....."

The sergeant interrupted. I see what you mean, sir. If he'd lived, he'd have got a D.C.M. or something." He thought for a moment, then shrugged. "It's tough, isn't it?"

The officer agreed.

"It's tough, all right, Sergeant. But war's like that - not all the heroes get medals! "

E. CHILLCOT TOPFER, SECOND A.I.F.

"DO ME A FAVOUR?"

ABOUT eight o'clock one night when we were in the Middle East I am spine bashing when the company sergeant-major comes into my tent, and in a man-to-man kind of tone asks me would I like to do him a favour. Well, when you are doing favours in the Army it is not a bad thing to be doing them for sergeant-majors and this one in particular; not so much because he remembers when you do him a good turn but because he doesn't forget when you knock him back and it is on such things as this that a leave-pass or even an extra stripe may sometimes depend.

So I say in a man-to-man tone: "Sure, Charlie, what's the drill?"

"Well, Alec, you know the bunch of reinforcements that came in yesterday? They came and asked me would I just give them leave for the evening, said they wanted to go to the movies. They've only landed from Aussie about a week ago. I suppose you know that no reinforcements are to be given leave until they've been on the strength of the unit for at least one month? I didn't want to let them go but they made such a moan that in the end I wrote out the passes. Well, just now headquarters rings up and instructs us to send 'em out tonight with their gear to Ack Section.

"You know what these wallahs at H.Q. are like-when they decide they want something done they always want it done in a hurry."

"They just don't understand I say sympathetically.

"You said it! Well, would you get out the thirty-hundredweight and see if you can pick them up? I know it's a bit rough asking a man to go chasing after them at this time of night, but you see what a spot I'm in just through being big-hearted. . . ."

"That's the trouble, Charlie, if you don't mind me saying so-you're inclined to be too easygoing at times and it's not everyone around here appreciates what you do for them. How will I know these 'reos'? "

"Well, there's only nine of them and they're in charge of a corporal who stutters, by the name of Haggerty."

"That's a big help! " I murmur, with a man-to-man grin.

"I know, Alec, but I thought if anyone would help me out it would be you. I might be able to do you a favour one of these days. The Old Man would raise hell if it came out that I'd let these 'reos' have leave contrary to Standing Orders, and it's not everyone I could trust to keep their mouth shut."

"That's O.K. You can trust me, Chicka. IT take my mate Robbo with me. He's discreet."

"O.K. I didn't think you'd let me down."

"By the way, Chicka," I say, pulling on the beetle-crushers, "I should nearly be due for my third 'dog's leg'. . . ."

"Funny thing, Al, I was only talking to the Skipper about you the other day. . . ."

"Well," says my mate Robbo as we scorch along towards the town, "if this is the first time since leaving Aussie that these 'reos' have been off the chain it's a moral we won't find them sitting nice and quiet in the picture show. They're more likely to be up to their gills in steak and eggs down at Joe-the-Greek's, or round at the Boomerang Bar."

"You've got something there, Robbo," I say, "I know I wouldn't be watching Donald-ruddy-Duck if I was in their shoes. Anyway, I'll turn left here and we'll look in and see if they're at Joe's."

Joe's joint is packed with representatives of the United Nations all arguing the toss about who's been in the war the longest and who's done the most stoush. We look the place over but no sign of our "reos" and then, when some of the United Nations turn on a "blue" over the question of who has the best artillery and start heaving bottles at one another to back up their arguments, Robbo and I decide to continue our search somewhere else.

We go to a joint called the Alhambra where they run a nice dance, with real high-class hostesses. As far as the "reos" are concerned we do not have any luck here either, but seeing we are Australians, and not being quite sure of the nature of our business, the proprietor decides to play safe and pours us a snort each of cognac out of a bottle he's got under the counter for emergencies of this kind, and tells us that he has a cousin who owns a barber shop in Melbourne. He is very pleased when it turns out that I know his cousin so well. . . . in fact, I tell him, I get my hair cut at his cousin's shop twice a week and, on the strength of that, he invites us to have a dance, on the house.

Robbo nearly overdoes it by trying to make out he went to school with this cousin, which is ridiculous on account of the cousin went to school in Armenia, and I am not sure that Robbo ever went to school anyway. I look coldly at my mate, and he says hurriedly that it must have been some other bloke.

As it is, we are just about old friends of the family when suddenly the proprietor has to go and ring up the provosts because there's a bit of a blue looks like developing shortly, over in one comer, and it seems he does not like these disturbances in his place - it is hard to concentrate when people are throwing chairs about recklessly.

Robbo and I do not like provosts even when we are in town on official business, so we clear out before they arrive.

Well, by the time a couple of hours have passed, Robbo and I have visited just about all the joints in town without finding the "reos" but we've met a lot of our mates, got stuck into a game of swy somehow for an hour or so, and, on the whole, had a highly enjoyable and profitable evening.

The nearest we have come to finding our men is a stuttering corporal in the Paris Bar, but unfortunately this corporal does his stuttering in Free French; anyway his name is not Haggerty but Dubois.

There are still one or two places that we haven't looked in but, as Robbo points out, we are a bit overdue and Chicka might be worrying about us, and I just have not got the heart to go on with the search under such conditions. The only thing to do is admit failure, get in the thirty-hundredweight, and go back to camp, though I am sorry that I have not succeeded in doing this favour for the C.S.M. But no one can say that I have not tried.

It just goes to show that some people do not know the meaning of the word gratitude, and do not appreciate it when a man tries to do them a favour. How was I to know that just after Robbo and I left the camp to go and search for his reinforcements, the C.S.M. should get stricken with a bright idea and ring up the picture-show and ask the manager to flash a slide on the screen telling Corporal Haggerty and the others to report back to camp at once? And who would have guessed that this Haggerty and the others would actually be sitting there in the Bijou watching the show after all?

61t just goes to show," says my mate Robbo, as we're cleaning up our gear to go on guard duty the following evening, "it just goes to show the kind of people they're letting into the Army these days."

I do not answer. I am thinking about that third stripe. I am thinking that the Sergeants' Mess seems a long way off. It was too bad of Robbo to run the thirty-hundredweight into a ditch on the way back.

MAX COOLAHAN, SECOND A.I.F.

TOMMY DAVIS, A.B.

TOMMY DAVIS didn't want to join the Navy.

He would have preferred the Air Force and he already had a brother in the A.I.F.; but his parents were very keen for him to enlist in the senior Service. So Tommy found himself arriving at Flinders Naval Depot as a raw recruit and, after six months there, drafted to a seagoing ship. He had been assessed as "an average rating, making good progress". Owing to keenness at gun drill, he had gained some "time" which would help him in his promotion to Able Seaman later on. "Time gained" was all very nice, he told himself; but he still wasn't happy.

His first ship was the sloop Roper and when he carried his bag and hammock down to the mess deck that was to be his new abode he felt as much at home as a cat in a pond. He had never been aboard a ship in his life, he knew practically nothing about seamanship, he was surrounded by a crowd of fellows who seemed very tough and indifferent, and he felt certain he was going to be seasick as soon as they put to sea. Tommy Davis was not altogether happy in the Navy.

Shortly after Tommy joined Roper she sailed. He was very seasick. After a brief voyage she commenced mine sweeping. n spite of himself, he found it interesting work.

It was not a back-breaking existence. There was plenty of time off, with books, gramophones and a radio to while away the time. The other ratings turned out to be good fellows; there was a spirit of friendship throughout the ship. They had sing-songs, boxing and games in their leisure periods. When he could, Tommy lay on the forecastle with nothing on but a pair of shorts and browned himself under the sun's rays.

At first he sneered, to himself, at the ship's routine. Some of it seemed silly to him, unnecessary. Later, he began to see the reason for it all. At nights he would lie in his ham

mock and ponder on the Navy, on all aspects of it-what an enormous organization it really was, the result of centuries of experience. He tried, for a change, to think of things the Navy way and was surprised to find how easy it was and how contented it made him.

After three months in the ship Tommy passed his examination and was rated Able Seaman. By this time he knew a good deal about seamanship. It was not difficult, the Seamanship Manual was a joy to read and there were plenty of people willing to teach him. He was slowly being converted to the naval method of doing things; he began to notice things around him, and to know that there are better ways of occupying one's mind than sitting on deck looking through picture magazines. His divisional officer's periodical report on him read: "An average worker; should do well with more experience."

Tommy Davis was beginning to like the Navy.

During his fifth month in Roper she was engaged in a sweep of some days' duration off a well-known headland. Up and down she steamed, clearing a path for the convoy everybody aboard knew was coming. Suddenly the signal was hoisted, "Reduce speed; in sweeps together." All the ships hove in their sweeps and formed up in line abreast facing the area they had just swept. The men crowded to the forecastles of their ships to get a grandstand view. They had not long to wait. A number of wisps of smoke appeared over the horizon. Soon a forest of masts came into view and before a quarter of an hour had passed the whole convoy was before them. And what a sight it was!

Tommy, perched up on top of a gunshield, devoured the scene with greedy eyes. It was worth while scrubbing decks and chipping rusty steel to see such visions of victory as

this. Leading the convoy came two big cruisers, symbolic of the mighty power of the British Navy. Behind them came the precious transports, huge vessels whose names were household words throughout the Empire, with their priceless cargoes of men in khaki. Some of them had never been in Australian waters before. All were packed full with men of the A.I.F. To the watchers aboard the sweepers the troops were Just a continuous brown smudge along the liners' decks. There seemed to be an incredible number of them.

As the convoy passed the warships the sailors cheered and a faint answering cheer came from the soldiers. Around the troopships darted vicious-looking destroyers. A third cruiser, keeping a watchful eye on the rear of the convoy, brought up astern while overhead bombers of the Royal Australian Air Force roared. Inside them keen experienced eyes searched the sea for submarines. Tommy watched the aircraft with interest; they looked so independent, with the boundless sky their territory. He might easily have been in one of them.

It was indeed an inspiring spectacle, a sight to gladden the heart of any red-blooded Britisher. Every one of those transports was a wonderful target. Every U-boat commander must dream of the day when he would sight such a vessel through his periscope.

Tommy's eyes were glued to the convoy until it finally disappeared below the horizon. Curling smoke from the big ships seemed to be waving goodbye to the naval vessels to which they owed their safe passage. It was due to the Navy that there were no horned spheres of death lurking below the surface. Only in this way would victory be achieved, by the closest co-operation between the three Services.

As Tommy climbed down from his seat on the gunshield his eyes were wet and he was shaking with excitement. He knew his own brother was in one of those ships.

Tommy Davis was proud to be in the Navy.

W N SWAN RAN