Pacific Front; Milne Bay

Sea Patrol by B31154

PACIFIC FRONT

to cover their operations. Not only has this been substantiated in the Pacific, but overwhelming proof has been given of the deadliness of the air weapon against the naval weapon. The Battle of the Bismarck Sea was a shattering blow to any who still believed that ships could outfight aeroplanes. In that action, the air weapon's victory was complete and devastating. The action was unique, as the only example in history of a full-scale battle between naval vessels and shore-based aeroplanes. The Japanese sea task force was obliterated by the air weapon acting independently and without assistance from any other arm. Once the Japanese top-cover ~ad been destroyed, the ships were practically defenceless. Under the curtain of fire from low-flying strafers and attack bombers, they were impotent, and even heavy, high-level bombers were able to throw caution to the winds. and add to the carnage from low altitude

Successful Allied operations in this area have all borne the imprint of solid air preparation. "Support" from the air is not sufficient for land troops; the air must be "controlled" before they can hope to move successfully. In modern war the infantry are no longer front-line troops - that distinction must go now to the air weapon. Because of its speed and flexibility, the air weapon can and does perform its work far in advance of the slower moving land and sea forces. It is thus able to extend "no-man's-land" into a vast area which acts as a buffer to its land or sea forces. until it has so softened the enemy that it is possible for the secondary forces to move up and complete in detail the work generally begun in the air.

This air support has invariably been given to the Allied land forces in the South-west Pacific since air superiority has been in our hands, and it must largely be credited with the successes which our land and sea forces have gained. There seems little doubt that the ground troops will be the first to admit that this is so. This is written innocently of all desire to detract from the vital, and even ultimate, part played by the sister Services, for it has never been claimed that the air weapon alone can gain complete victories.

In the war in the South-west Pacific area, the land forces exploit and consolidate the openings which the air arm alone can make without the incidence of casualties at a rate which could not be borne.

It has been shown that it can win battles-as for instance the Bismarck Sea engagement and that it can rob the enemy of the wherewithal to fight; but that is all.

The air, the land, and the sea forces, perfectly co-ordinated and organized, acting in perfect unison, with perfect timing, are unbeatable, except when opposed to similar forces better co-ordinated, organized and timed.

The South-west Pacific area has provided some perfect examples of "combined operations". In his initial victorious drive in Malaya, the Japanese threw British tacticians into turmoil and confusion, and their strongest defences and best-laid plans crumbled under the swift strokes from air, sea and land, which were rained upon them. The enemy's co-ordination was perfect, his timing was superb. Blows from the air, outflanking moves by sea, infiltration by land, quickly exposed the fallacy of the British conception of static defence. The enemy continued these tactics throughout, and they never once failed him, until the Coral Sea and Bismarck Sea battles; and then it was the air weapon operating with the naval weapon, or just the air weapon alone, which turned the tide against him.

Since then this same keen weapon has been turned against the Japanese. Two perfect combined operations, from the Allies' point of view, were the assaults on Lae and Salamaua. The technique used there was the Japanese technique-at all events, it was of that pattern. So was that used by the Allies in the Solomons.

To use the air weapon effectively there is one pre-essential - the possession of airfields and it has been for airfields that the Southwest Pacific Battle has been waged. Possession and dispossession of bases from which to operate bombers and fighters is the difference between victory and defeat.

That brings us right back to the beginning. Australia was important to the Allies because it remained the only land mass spacious enough from which launch the counter-offensive, when it should be mounted, against the encroaching enemy.

Australia must be the springboard. She must be dotted with airfields, for they were the key to all future operations. Thus the retention of New Guinea was important, for it contains good harbours and is the key to control of Torres Strait and the Coral Sea by air and sea forces. Thus: possession of New Guinea would have given the enemy a suitable base from which to launch the *invasion forces against Australia under the cover of shore-based aircraft. The Jap used the Pacific islands as stepping-stones to Australia. He captured New Ireland and New Britain, and came perilously close to snatching the southern shores of New Guinea from us. Milne Bay proved the turning point. It, too, was a battle for an airfield, and it was won for us primarily by the air weapon, wielded by two Australian Kittyhawk
fighter squadrons.

From the date of Milne Bay, Allied air strength began to overtake that of the enemy, until to-day our superiority is unquestionable. his superiority is not due only to greater numbers, it is because of direct intrinsic superiority of the aircraft in operation, the men ho man them, and those who service them
in short, to all men (and in some cases, women) who work for the R.A.A.F., the R.A.F., and the U.S. Air Force on the ground or in the air. Among the aircraft whose superiority is unchallenged by those of the enemy, the honours must be divided between British, Australian and American types.

Among these are Lockheed Lightnings, whose capacity for high-altitude fighting has baffled the Japs; Flying Fortresses and Liberators, heavy high-altitude, long-range bombers; Spitfire single-seat fighters; ground strafing Beaufighters, Mitchells and Bostons; and Beaufort torpedo-bombers.
Two other factors remain to be mentioned as having had considerable effect on Australia's improved outlook. One of these was the rapid recovery of the U.S. forces from the stunning blow of Pearl Harbour, and the efficient naval and air patrol by those forces of the eastern Australian life-lines.

Without this, communications would have been cut, and the retention of the Australian base, and the building up of strength here, would have been jeopardized, delayed, and perhaps impossible. While
the U.S. forces held and protected the extreme right wing, R.A.A.F. aircraft policed the nearer approaches. Between them, they made the waters to and of Australia safe f or convoys of men and materials. They did more than this, they conserved shipping losses and made work in repair and building yards possible, unmolested by enemy raids.

The second factor is a deterioration of Japanese morale. This is not wishful thinking, it is fact. Operations in Malaya in the early stages of the Pacific war revealed the Japanese as a fanatical fighter on land and in the air. Even to-day there is no documented instance of a Japanese aviator having baled out. Yet there are definite indications that the Japanese morale is lower than it was. In the early stages he was in the ascendant, now he is on the defensive and, indeed, on the retreat. There have been recent occasions when Japanese land forces made wholesale evacuations, taking with them, it is to be supposed, the remnants of that fatalism which postulates that it is glorious to die. That glory, it is to be presumed, is being reserved for some future entry into Takama-No-Hara. Our airmen, too, have complained that the Japanese pilots are more reluctant to give battle than they used to be.

In the past few months, it has been observed that while the Japanese still retain strong land, sea, and air forces, they have been unwilling to risk them in any attempt to regain the offensive. This can only be taken as a tribute to Allied air power, which has consistently paved the way to the destruction and seizure of Japanese bases in New Guinea and the Solomons.

At the outbreak of war with Japan, the R.A.A.F. had only a few reconnaissance squadrons which gave battle to the enemy at points as widely separated as Singapore, Ambon and Rabaul. The two years which have elapsed have seen a steady expansion of our contribution to the Allied Air Forces, in which the R.A.A.F. has played its part with distinction in all roles to which it has been assigned. It has not vet reached the peak of its strength, and will go forward into 1944 building new strength, re-arming with more modern equipment as it becomes available, exerting the maximum effort to exact from the Japanese usurious interest for setbacks in Malaya, and playing its part in the drive towards Japan.

MILNE BAY

Two more equally ineffective raids followed within a week, and some days later an announcer on short-wave from Tokyo, with a flair for fiction that provided much amusement for the supposed victims, broadcast this "news": "On July 25-26 a large formation of Japanese bombers raided the port of Townsville on the north-east coast of Queensland. Bombs were dropped on the docks, airfields and oil dumps. On July 28 and 29 Townsville was again raided and bombs were dropped on military objectives and the city. When large fires were witnessed the raiders returned to their base. These are the largest Japanese raids made since the fall of Singapore."

Port Moresby, principal Allied base in New Guinea, had attracted the attention of the Japanese air force consistently for months. The seventy-seventh raid on this port where, with the influx of American aircraft, troops and material, the strength of the Allies was gradually mounting, was made on August i. From then until August 17, there was a strange lull in his activity in this area, but raid No. 78 was a determined attack which hinted at things to come. The Jap was making ready to strike, and the keen brains in the War Room, with intelligence information being fed to them steadily from many sources, were estimating and planning to anticipate his next move.

Down at Milne Bay the scene was perhaps one of the strangest in the history of Australia at war. R.A.A.F. fighting, bombing and reconnaissance crews, with their ground staffs, were working in the sweaty heat, cheek by jowl with Australian infantry and artillery and U.S. engineers and anti-aircraft batteries. The weather was foul. It rained almost incessantly. The jungle steamed and mosquitoes took toll of troops not yet properly malaria conscious. 

But the work went on, Kittyhawks, Hudsons, Beauforts, Beaufighters, all of them manned by men of the R.A.A.F., came and went on their various sorties and patrols, their reconnaissance and bombing, missions. Ground staffs slopped around in thick mud, slaving to "get ready", maintaining aircraft that took off from the one air strip that was serviceable -serviceable only because of the perforated steel matting that had been laid-and wrestled with those that bogged down when they taxied through the slush once they were off the runway.

Meanwhile pilots, navigators and air-gunners flew in lowering weather. They took off and landed again In a slather of water and slush, cursing the "clouds full of rocks" as they called the mountain-pierced overcast. And all the while the enemy was using this cursed weather as cover for stealthy moves.

Into this scene had come the men of R.A.A.F. Seventy-five and Seventy-six fighter squadrons with their Kittyhawks. Seventy five was led by Squadron-Leader Les. Jackson, later to win the D.F.C., whose brother, the late Squadron-Leader John Jackson, D.F.C., of imperishable memory, had led it in the days not so very long before, when the fate of Port Moresby was so precariously in the balance. John Jackson had ended one of the most

brilliant fighter pilot careers in the gallant stand of Seventy-five at Moresby, passing on to his brother a legacy of superb leadership which he accepted so humbly, and in which he acquitted himself so truly, that the name of Jackson became even more beloved in the R.A.A.F. than it was when John Jackson first added to R.A.A.F. fighter history in the Western Desert campaign.

Seventy-six squadron, though its battle honours were at that time fewer, had already a magnificent tradition linked with the names of men like Turnbull and Truscott. Squadron Leader Peter Turnbull, D.F.C., came to Milne Bay as the squadron's commander, with Squadron-Leader Keith Truscott, D.F.C. and Bar, fresh from Spitfire honours in England, as his second-in-command. Both Seventy-five and Seventy-six had a backing of virile, experienced pilots, and behind them again, splendid material in comparative youngsters who had not yet been in battle, but who were thirsting for it. How these men of Seventy-five and Seventy-six acquitted themselves makes one of the finest stories in the history of the whole war in the air.

And so the fighter boys came and began to settle down as best they could beside their comrades of the Australian Army. That in itself was to become history for reasons that at the time did not occur to many. But the Army troops thrilled at the presence of fighter cover and, as the campaign wore on and their understanding of what these airmen meant to them and to the whole outcome of the battle grew, they were to stand and cheer excitedly at their prowess in the air. 

Milne Bay was becoming a hot spot. The enemy had greedy eyes on it and began to strike. On August 4 he made his first attack with four Zeros and a two-seater reconnaissance floatplane. The Kitties went up-it was Seventy-six's combat. Flight-Lieutenant C. N. Wawn, D.F.C., formerly noted as a Spitfire pilot, was flight leader. In the heavy overcast-the cloud ceil-g was only a few hundred feet-the enemy aircraft were hard to find, but Flying-Officer Bott and Sergeant P. Dempster got on the tail of one Zero and saw it crash in the sea.

They were awarded half a "scalp" each.

Flying Officer Peter Ash and Sergeant Douglas Gray, who were returning from a patrol, sighted the reconnaissance plane and Ash made short work of it, sending it crashing in the jungle about seven miles from the runway.

A week later the "Nips" returned. Seven Zeros swooped to strafe but again Seventy-five and Seventy-six, with the aid of Australian and American anti-aircraft gunners, baffled them. Two Zeros came down in flames and three others were probably destroyed, The other two retreated, damaged by the Kittyhawks' fire. But in that combat Seventy-five lost two fine airmen. Flying-Officer Mark Sheldon, former Spitfire pilot, was shot down and killed and Warrant-Officer Shelley was reported missing and was not seen again. 

Seventy-six also paid toll-Sergeant George Inkster was killed when attempting a parachute jump at very low level from his aircraft wrecked in combat. Pilot-Officer Angus McLeod was reported missing. The successful Kittyhawk pilots in this interception were Flight-Lieutenant Wawn of Seventy-six and Flying-Officer Geoff C. Atherton of Seventy-five who later, as Squadron-Leader Atherton, commanded this famous fighter unit.

These raids kept an edge on the squadrons' fighting spirit which might well have been dulled by almost intolerable conditions. Bully beef and "M and V" (as the tinned ration of meat and vegetables is known to all Australian fighting-troops) with the invaluable but monotonous "dog" biscuit, were staple diet. Men sweated and steamed and stank in rain and sweat-sodden clothing. Rain was, in fact the common denominator. Six inches fell one day, with four inches the day after. Occasionally the clouds would open and Milne Bay would sparkle in sunshine, but the troops still struggled in a slough that bogged down aircraft and vehicles of all kinds. Watchers beside the only serviceable runway gazed incredulously as aircraft, slithering and skidding fantastically, somehow managed to drag themselves off ~he ground and avoided "pranging" in the coconut palms at the sides of the runway when they landed again.

While the ground staffs strove to make their camps more habitable and to carry out the normal tasks of feeding men and tending aircraft in these acutely abnormal conditions, the fighter pilots flew, ate, slept, or shuffled and dealt the cards for seemingly interminable games of Slippery Sam and Rickety Kate. Always their ears were tuned for the cry, "It's on! "-for the call that would send them racing to their aircraft for a scramble against a cunning, determined enemy.

There were of course the squadrons' songs, songs that have became famous; songs that were composed in the mud and filth of Milne Bay, or on the other side of the world. It didn't matter which. They all had the same defiant psychology behind them-defiance of the enemy, defiance of death. Some day the full significance of these songs will be appreciated. Some verses were happily boastful, some were gloomy, dirge-like and foreboding. Some poked their tongue out at authority, and some were cheerfully, hilariously obscene. If the night were fine, shadowy groups of men would gather to sing with carefree voices through a long repertoire of choruses, while around them in the darkness a myriad of fireflies sparkled amorously among the tall, motionless coconut palms.

These fighter squadrons were doing the job magnificently, but their story is by no means the whole story of the air combat that played such a vital part in winning the Milne Bay battle. There were the Hudson crews, whose work was nothing if not magnificent. On them rested the tremendous responsibility of reconnaissance. The Kittyhawks maintained almost continuous patrols over the Milne Bay area, but the really critical spot lay beyond their range-out where seemingly perpetually bad weather hung over the sea, shrouding in mysterious silence all the possible movements of an enemy task force. The Hudson crews were relied on to find out what was "cookin"' and they flew day and night, only aircraft maintenance and the barest requirements in sleep and food preventing them from flying twenty-four hours a day. 

The strain was telling, but they would never admit it. They made lone armed reconnaissance flights and frequently went into action against enemy warships, submarines or cargo vessels-bombing and strafing and watching and reporting information on which the success of the whole Papuan campaign might well depend. Hudson pilots engaged in the battle included Flight-Lieutenant D. W. Colquhoun (now Wing-Commander, D.F.C., A.F.C.), Flight-Lieutenant L. W. Manning, who had scored hits on a Jap seaplane tender, Flight-Lieutenant H. A. Robertson, Flying-Officer W. A. Willman, Pilot-Officer R.
Shore and Sergeant W. Stutt.

Then there were the Beaufort torpedo-bombers and those superb long-range strafing aircraft, the Beaufighters; but while these squadrons played an invaluable part, they were neither so exclusively concerned in the battle at Milne Bay nor so deeply identified with it historically. Their stories cover a \v1der range of action and in detail must be recorded in other phases of the war history of the
R.A.A.F. in the South-west Pacific, On August 24 the Japanese air force struck at Milne Bay again.

This time there were twelve aircraft, at least ten of them Zeros. Again the Kittyhawks intercepted, shooting down two for certain, two probably, and damaging others which disappeared in the dense
cloudbank and whose fate could not be checked.

Combat among heavy clouds has an uncanny quality. Fighter pilots have to be swift and sure with their gunnery to score at all. If in trouble with an enemy, the cloud offers kindly cover, but so it does too for the enemy when you have him in trouble. In this particular interception the final assessment divided
one of the certain kills between four pilots-the flight leader, Flight-Lieutenant V. Sullivan, Sergeant B. Carroll, Sergeant R. Glassop and Pilot-Officer Giffin, all of Seventy-six.

On that day, too, seven barges were sighted near Tufi, about one hundred miles up the north coast from Milne Bay, indicating that the enemy was closing in. All squadrons were on the alert. The next day-August 25- brought an early sighting report from Flight-Lieutenant H. A. Robertson, a Hudson pilot; a convoy of seven enemy ships-three cruisers, two large transports and two destroyers or
corvettes. Robertson's seaward reconnaissance flights had been of inestimable value. He earned the highest possible praise from all at Milne Bay who knew of his work-work almost to the point of collapse. He was later mentioned in dispatches.

This, the latest of "Robbie's" sightings, meant that "it was on".

While the attack was being planned, nine Kittyhawks from Seventy-five shook showers of mud off them as they took off to attack the barges which had been reported near Tufi the day before. They caught the enemy just as his troops were about to land on Goodenough Island. They went in to the kill. Some of the Japs were slain in the water and on the beach and most of the remainder were killed or captured later by Australian infantry. All the barges were wrecked by the blazing guns of the Kittyhawks, which loosed ten thousand rounds into them. The fighter pilots flew back leaving a great column of smoke rising from the enemy's funeral pyre. The flight leaders in this attack were two brilliant Seventy-five pilots-Flight-Lieutenant John W. Piper, D.F.C., and Atherton.

That day, though really the prelude to the ferocious battle that was to follow, was stormy enough in itself. The convoy sighted by Robertson was now perilously close to Milne Bay and still shielded by the weather front. But low ceiling or not, Hudson bombers and Kittyhawks-the fighters carrying bombs took off to attack. Plunging through dense cloud the aircraft came on the enemy invasion force about eight miles east of Normanby Island, the most southern of the D'Entrecasteaux Group which dominated the northern approach to Milne Bay. Turnbull led the attacking formation of Kittyhawks and Truscott led a second formation to serve as top cover and decoy for the enemy's formidable ack-ack. Swooping in to little more than mast height through a storm of anti-aircraft fire, the R.A.A.F. pilots bombed and strafed. Their bombs caught one of the smaller warships and so damaged it that later it sank. They damaged two other ships and their raking fire in strafing passes killed and wounded troops crowded on the ships' decks.

But still the enemy came on.

The Hudsons and the Kittyhawks returned to base in darkness. The flare path was alight but so thick was the weather that they were unable to see it until almost touching down. That they landed at all was a miracle. Throughout that night few men slept, except those so exhausted that sleep could no longer be denied.

But the enemy still came on. Reports reached the squadrons that at I.30 a.m. on August 26 the enemy invasion force had landed east of what was known as the K.B. Mission on the northern shore of Milne Bay. About fifteen barges, including three large enough to carry tanks or vehicles, had been used in the landing.

So at dawn the battle was begun at "full' bore" as the fighter pilots put it. Roaring off the water-logged runway only a few miles from the front line, Kittyhawks and Hudsons scudded under the low ceiling of dense cloud to bomb and strafe the landing-craft and the supply dumps that the enemy had put ashore during the night. The steel hulls of the barges were ripped and the vessels sunk by machine guns while bursting bombs shattered everything along the foreshore, setting fire to the dumps, and bursting hundreds of drums of petrol that had drifted in to the beach-petrol with which to refuel aircraft which the Japs planned were to use the Milne Bay aerodrome for attacks on Port Moresby and other Allied bases. So confident of this was the eneniA7 that he even brought belly tanks for his aircraft in some of his invasion barges.

While American Flying Fortresses with support from several Mitchells and Marauders, attacked the retiring enemy ships-the Fortresses sank one transport and damaged others -the valiant Hudson crews battled on, helping the Kitty-hawks in their non-stop assault. The work of the Hudson squadron which bore the brunt of the seaward reconnaissance, and which made so many strikes on the enemy in these days of tense action, is given a place to itself in the story of the R.A.A.F. in the North-eastern Sector of this period.

The last two barges found by the Kittyhawks just before night fell contained thirty or forty Japanese. Few lived to reach the shore. Then, diving on the enemy  positions with their guns blazing, the Kittyhawks swept the foreshore and combed the jungle in which ,the Japanese had taken cover. Piper found a truck laden with ammunition and exploded it.

For the R.A.A.F. August 27 was a day of high tension, intense work, furious fighting and some tragedy. The Kittyhawk pilots continued their non-stop strafing, belching eighty-five thousand rounds from their guns into jungle and plantation, and causing havoc among the enemy troops. On this day the enemy tried to counter the Allied air attacks. Five dive bombers-the first Japanese dive bombers to attack in New Guinea - accompanied by ten Zeros, struck at the aerodrome. Later it was learned that had the enemy's plans gone as ordered, his invasion force should have been in possession of the runway. 

This was what the enemy pilots expected to find when they circled  over it to land. They had other thoughts when they came in, for, though the opposition was not great in numbers - a substantial proportion of the R.A.A.F. fighters were on the ground refuelling and replenishing their ammunition-their reception was hot. Twelve Kittyhawks met the Japs, in a cloud-filled sky. Four of the Zeros and two of the dive bombers did land - but in crumpled burning masses, shot down by the interceptors; two dive bombers were probably destroyed and another was damaged, while the ack-ack gunners, sweating and slaving while their guns grew hot, brought down at least one dive bomber and damaged two others.

About the same time a flight of U.S. Marauders was on strike, looking for enemy shipping targets. They ran into several Zeros which gave fight. Two Zeros were destroyed and two probably destroyed. As the Marauders were moving away to continue their search, two Kittyhawks coming in from a patrol, flown by Squadron-Leader Les. Jackson and Flying-Officer Roy Riddle of Seventy-five, saw a Zero in the water close shore-one of the Marauders' victims-being strafed by two other Zeros, apparently in the hope of destroying it and so preventing its capture. Jackson and Riddle selected a Zero apiece and both Zeros were wiped out.

While the air battle was at its height, some of the Kittyhawk pilots were grounded from time to time to enable their aircraft to be refuelled.

Among them was Turnbull. To him inaction was intolerable. Like a flash he was into an ack-ack gun pit at the edge of the runway firing at every enemy aircraft that came within range. Immediately the raid was over he was in the air again, blazing at the Japanese troops that were gradually pressing back the Australian infantry. On the previous night it was learned from the Army that the enemy had succeeded in landing at least two light tanks with which they were making slow but gradual progress down the one boggy road from K.B. Mission towards the aerodrome. In a strafing run Turnbull sighted one of these tanks and immediately dived on it with his guns firing. The Kittyhawk failed to come out of that dive.

And so died a magnificent pilot and most gallant man. The loss to the squadron was more than any member could trust himself to speak about. Some time later the crashed aircraft, with the body of the pilot beside it, was found at the foot of a tall, scarred palm, and those whom he had loved and who loved him, buried him close to the scene of the last of his magnificent series of air battles.

• Later, a member of the ground staff of Seventy-six wrote in homage to his leader:

With their leader dead, Seventy-six fought on, as he would have wished, gallantly and with a new and ardent sense of vengeance, for a personal score to be settled with the Japs. They fought under a new leader, one who was to take his place in their hearts just as Turnbull had done. Truscott, who succeeded Turnbull, and who also has since given his life, had an infinite capacity for drawing the men of his squadron round him like a family of younger brothers. Under him they fought with fine fury and gloried in it.

Seventy-five and Seventy-six fired 198,000 rounds of 0.5 ammunition in action against the enemy during the Milne Bay battle.

The day after Turnbull died was one of intense anxiety for the army and air Commanders in the field-Major-General Cyril Clowes and Group-Captain W. H. Garing  D.F.C. The enemy were still advancing. slowly it was true, and at great cost. Loath as they were to take such action, it was decided that because of the proximity of the enemy to the aerodrome - they were only three miles off, yet Kittyhawks and Hudsons were taking off, and going into action almost before their undercarriages were up - all aircraft based on Milne Bay should be moved back to another base. Garing, remained with the ground staff, while the air crews. for the safety of their aircraft, went unwillingly back.

Garing knew, as the entire flying personnel of the R.A.A.F. knows, what tremendous debts are owed to the around staff. At Milne Bay this was deeper perhaps than it had ever been in Australian territory. Ceaselessly and eagerly fitters, riggers, armourers, engineers, transport drivers, cooks and mess-men, men of the intelligence, administrative and medical sections; everyone, in fact, who went to make up the squadrons' "families" on the ground, gave everything they possessed in strength and keenness. Every available man, many who had never handled an ammunition belt in their lives before, slaved to belt ammunition for the Kittyhawks; aircraft were patched, repaired, refuelled, bombed up, dragged through deep mud, shepherded on to the runway, and sent off to battle. It went on unceasingly while the rain poured, enemy aircraft tried to bomb and strafe, and-this a new and disconcerting phase in the war in Papua-enemy warships shelled Allied positions by night.

Jackson and Truscott, who knew the truth better than any one at Milne Bay, were foremost their praise of these men. When the battle was over and won, Truscott summed up this: "They were bombed and strafed. From 4 a.m. t~ 7 p.m. and often much later. they worked, drenched to the skin, even eating their meals in the rain. At night they got little sleep because of the shelling from the warships, but they carried on and kept our aircraft in the air. The cooks did a wonderful job too, serving hot meals while the rain teemed down, and never a grumble. We were all in it together, and the great job those chaps did will never be forgotten."

Jackson's tribute was just as eloquent. Seventy-five Squadron held their engineer officer, Flying-Officer W. Matson, as the "very best-bar none". Through his ingenuity and tireless work, Matson was able to maintain amazing serviceability. He and "his blokes" even changed the main planes of aircraft in all the mud and filth and rain without proper equipment or tools. To-day Matson is a Member of the Order of the British Empire, an honour that dates from this campaign. In the armament section too, Seventy-five had good reason for congratulation. 'these were I the
men who kept the guns firing, even when they were so worn that barrel measurements were more than o.6in. instead of the original calibre 0.51n. Warrant-Officer Charles Saward, the squadron's armament officer, was mentioned in dispatches for his splendid service.

Two other members of the ground staff of Seventy-five who were mentioned in dispatches were Messman C. Annear and Cook Watts.

"The ground staff did a magnificent job and to them the main credit is due," was Jackson's statement.

The first the Australian defenders knew of the naval bombardment was at 9-15 on the night of August 26, when a shell screamed over their heads and exploded harmlessly in the hills. That was an end of sleep and a new tax on already highly taxed nerves. Fortunately the Japanese marksmanship was bad and most of the attack was wasted. On seven nights the Japanese warships steamed into Milne Bay from a position some distance off the Trobriand Islands where almost perpetually bad weather with the visibility almost nil, gave them perfect cover in daylight. On the second night (August 29) the shells fell in the bay.

The next visit was on the night of September 2. They returned the following night. On their fifty visit (September 6) they found a target -the Allied merchant vessel, Anshun, which they sank at her moorings off Gill-Gill jetty under two salvoes of gunfire, in about twenty minutes. The next night they were back again and finally, on September 8, the warships made their final attack with something of a searchlight display.

The Japanese naval Commander, in very marked contrast to the behaviour of the Japanese army who have committed atrocities, distinguished himself by permitting an Australian hospital ship to pass out of the harbour unscathed with her lights ablaze according to the rules of international law.

On the night the Japanese began this naval bombardment, the crew of an R.A.A.F. crash boat promptly obeyed their orders to put to sea and try to reach Samarai if enemy naval forces should enter the harbour. The risks were great, but the crew headed the launch towards the harbour entrance. They might have "got away with it" had not one of the enemy ships' searchlights picked them up. From a range of little more than fifty yards a naval gun opened fire. The launch blew up and many died in that action.

One of the survivors, a leading aircraftman, severely wounded and only half conscious, drifted for eighteen hours. Soon after dawn he was seen and rescued by natives who, greatly daring, took him to their village inside enemy-held territory. Here he was tended and nursed back to strength by Maiogura, a mission-trained nurse who, when there was danger of his being discovered by the Japanese, hid him beneath an upturned canoe. Eventually the airman returned safely to his unit.

Some time after the battle had ended, R.A.A.F. men still at Milne Bay anticipated the official decoration of Maiogura by Major General Morris, Officer Commanding the Australian and New Guinea Administrative Unit, by arranging an unofficial ceremonial. Maiogura was asked to name any presents she particularly desired. She chose a bicycle, a ram cape, a pair of sun glasses, seven yards of red material for ramis (the customary skirt) and a carton of aspirins! With solemnity the presentation was 
made in the village square beside the still, and by this time peaceful, waters of Milne Bay. 

In the presence of these fearless, sea-going Papuans, many of whom lined the decks of their craft to watch the ceremony, the officer commanding the operations base commended Maiogura and presented her with the gifts in deep appreciation of her skill and courage. Maiogura, responding in precise English, said with deep conviction: "I give thanks to God that I was able in some small measure to assist my very good Australian friends."

The Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels had again proved their splendid worth.

The individual and collective deeds performed in the Battle for Milne Bay include many that must take their place among the most inspiring of all war records. Many concern the magnificent work of R.A.A.F. ground staff. One of the most noted of the Hudson bomber pilots, Wing Commander (then Flight-Lieutenant) Colquhoun, since awarded the Distinguished Flying, Cross and the Air Force Cross for his great service, both in combat and in training, tells how, after one of his gunners had been wounded while strafing, the six members of the ground staff who serviced his aircraft almost fought among themselves to be allowed to take the wounded man's place. 

His regular crew comprised: Sergeant Richard Arnold (observer), Sergeant Eric Long (wireless operator air gunner), and Sergeant Keith Dreverman (gunner). Long was wounded, and after he had been taken to hospital, Sergeant Carrera, fitter armourer, took his place on the next strike. To make honours even among the keenest contestants, the captain took L.A.C. Horner and Sergeant Dakin in turn on the following operations and thereafter while the battle lasted these three took turns as acting gunner. One day the captain was astounded to find after take-off that instead of four, the Hudson had a crew of six. The three acting gunners had all come along!

These three men with Sergeant Sellers, Corporal Fuller and L.A.C. Hawks, maintained, refuelled, rearmed, and bombed up the Hudsons without relief. All bombs and petrol drums had to be "man-handled" in mud and slush, the dumps, more often than not, standing in six or more inches of water. When the removal of aircraft to a rear base was decided on the night of August 28, there was the same sharp difference of opinion among Colquhoun's ground staff as to who should go, for there was room for only one. This time the argument was in reverse. Each one felt it was imperative that he should remain behind, and finally they settled it by agreeing quite happily that they should all stay. This was the spirit which won the battle of Milne Bay.

As it happened, the enemy advance was checked by the A.I.F. and Militia, and all the aircraft returned to Milne Bay the next day. On this day, Colquhoun sighted the enemy' naval squadron once more. He went in to strike, selecting a destroyer and diving on it through a curtain of ack-ack fire. The aim was true and the Hudson came out safely, leaving the destroyer vitally damaged by bombs which exploded just under her stern. Later the destroyer was reported "believed sunk".

The deadly strafing of the Kittyhawks coupled with splendid work of the 25 pounders, was meanwhile helping to shatter the Japs in body and spirit. Papuan carriers. who stuck their ground bravely believing in the strength of the Australians, gave graphic descriptions of the Kittyhawks strafing.

Enemy snipers were at work with their usual cunning, and the great areas of coconut plantation at Milne Bay gave them opportunities that might have been extremely costly for the Australian ground troops had not the fighter pilots raked the palm tops with their fire. Climbing the palms, the snipers would slash out the centre and settle down, well concealed from the ground but still able to see it. And there the pilots of Seventy-five and Seventy-six slew them. The natives, grinning delightedly, told the rest of the story: "Japan man, he fall down from tree many, many times."

With the enemy held on the ground, the air attack went on as furiously as ever. Word came from Army headquarters that a Japanese light mountain gun, on a spur commanding the communicating road to the front line, was giving trouble. Truscott and Flying-Officer Ian Crossing took off. Soon afterwards they were back at base, the gun silenced for ever.

Later there was an unusual unofficial ceremony when the Australian troops who gained the spur from which the gun had been firing dragged it down and "presented" it to Truscott. It was just another expression of appreciation by the troops for what the Kittyhawks were doing. Men of the U.S. ack-ack batteries which gave splendid service in aerodrome and ground defence, joined enthusiastically in this praise of the men of the R.A.A.F. 

Perhaps the most impressive unofficial proof of this was the presentation of some new pyjamas and underwear to Truscott by Corporal Jake Lindsay of Atlanta, Georgia. A letter sent with this personal and, in this setting, most unusual gift, said: "This is only a part of what we think of your squadrons. You deserve more praise than you will ever get. Thank you for the wonderful work you have done at Milne Bay. The American Ack-Ack think you are wonderful."

On August 28, the Japanese troops reached the seaward end of what was then known as No. 3 strip, now named Turnbull aerodrome in memory of Squadron-Leader Turnbull. The partly constructed runway was little more than two miles from the runway from which the R.A.A.F. was operating. Truscott was leading a flight of four Kittyhawks in a ground strafing attack when about fifty Japanese troops appeared on the half-formed strip. The Kittyhawks dived on them. They threw themselves flat on the ground and there they died. Truscott and his flight flayed them with gunfire, and there were fifty fewer "Sons of Heaven" for the ground troops to kill or drive back into the sea.

The week that followed was one of extreme tension, but the anxiety was lessening the enemy was being driven back; because of counter attacks on his bases in which he was losing aircraft on the ground as well as in the air, his air attacks were virtually impotent and the movement of his naval units, still lurking in the weather-shrouded waters round the D'Entrecasteaux and Trobriand Islands, presaged, though the defenders of Milne Bay were not aware of it, an effort to save his task force from disaster. Instead of adding the eastern extremity of New Guinea to the menacingly long list of territorial gains in the name of the "Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere" the Japanese were at last to know the bitter taste of outright defeat on land, Just as they had learned the meaning of defeat at sea when their naval forces were broken in the crucial battle of the Coral Sea three months earlier.

Late on August 29 an enemy cruiser and nine destroyers were reported at Normanby Island, steaming south. Again Hudsons and Kittyhawks: carrying bombs, with an escort of Kittyhawks as fighter cover, set out to attack. Again the weather saved the enemy. It was so thick the attacking aircraft failed to find the naval force before darkness came.

On the next day again barge sightings were reported, and on that day and the four days following, Seventy-five and Seventy-six squadrons kept up their onslaught on barges, dumps and troop concentrations, giving the enemy no respite and earning great praise from the ground troops who, now considerably heartened by their own and the squadrons) successes, were pressing the enemy hard.

On September 6 detached flights of Beaufighters and Beaufort torpedo-bombers arrived, and on September 7 a co-ordinated attack was made on the enemy's naval forces. As the aircraft circled the one serviceable aerodrome, forming up for the attack, troops on the ground cheered them with joy in their hearts. The Beauforts, led by their commanding officer, Wing-Commander Balmer, had three Beaufighters to sweep in with them and strafe in beam attacks while two formations of Kittyhawks-eight under Truscott and ten under Jackson-had been detailed, one to strafe and draw the fire from the enemy ships, and one to give top cover. Once again the weather protected the enemy, but the attack did not fail completely, though luck was against the attackers. One destroyer was hit, and though it was not observed to sink, its loss was later proved by reconnaissance and the strafing aircraft acquitted themselves with daring thoroughness.

That night the enemy ships succeeded in getting in to a point close to their original landing place, and on September 8 the Battle for Milne Bay was virtually over. The remnants of the defeated task force had withdrawn overnight, leaving, large numbers of their original strength dead, wounded, or
straggling in the sodden where Australian patrols "mopped them up".

On that day, September 8, Tokyo Radio announced the Japanese evacuation of Milne Bay.

A true picture of the Battle for Milne Bay must bring into perspective the magnificent work not only of the R.A.A.F., but of the A.I.F., the Australian Militia, the Australian and American anti-aircraft batteries, the American engineers slaving to construct aerodromes, the men who sailed the merchant ships and small craft, and those who flew the transport aircraft that supplied the forces. But this is essentially an air story and, because it bore the burden of the air war in this particular campaign, essentially a story of the Royal Australian Air Force.

That most vital and inspiring story of how the men of the Australian land forces finally drove the enemy into the sea will be told in the war history of the Australian Army. It is enough to say here that the R.A.A.F. pays deep and lasting tribute to its sister service, the Army, for the magnificent spirit and valour with which the land action at Milne, Bay was fought. The Army has paid tribute to the men of the R.A.A.F. who fought with them. The General Officer Commanding New Guinea Force (Lieutenant-General S. L. Rowell) and the General Officer Commanding Milne Force (Major-General Cyril, Clowes) personally and officially expressed, deep appreciation of the courageous way in, which the R.A.A.F. fighter and general reconnaissance squadrons operated against the, enemy. This tribute was paid with equal warmth by the Commanding General, Allied; Air Forces in the South-west Pacific, Lieutenant-General (then Major-General) George C. Kenney.

The men who had fought and won this. battle had done much more than achieve a famous victory. They had created a common and lasting bond of comradeship, trust and admiration between Australian land and air forces.

Hudson Scores Direct Hit on Jap Seaplane Tender by B3/59

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