Australia’s First Military

Prisoners of War

This 20-years’ old photograph, which has been kindly loaned to us by Mr A.

E. Cridland, R.M., of the Papuan public service, has great historical value. It shows the first military prisoners of war actually taken by Australia in 1914.

"When war broke out Captain Detzner, of the German New Guinea administra tion, was engaged in exploratory work near the border of New Guinea and Papua, around the headwaters of the Lakekamu River (which runs northwards from the gulf of Papua). The Papuan A.R.M. in that district, Captain C. R.

Muskett, heard that Captain Detzner was on the Papuan side of the border, and he got a police party together, made a long march inland, and eventually came out on a mountainside above the German officers camp. He stopped there, and very sport ingly sent a note ahead to Captain Detz ner, advising that he was coming along, that this was Papuan territory, and that war had been declared a few days before between Britain and Germany.

The watching Captain Muskett saw tre mendous activity break out in the Ger mans’ camp. Natives scuttled around, tents came down, and in no time Captain Detzner was headed northwards to com mence those years of wandering, ana avoidance of capture, which afterwards made him famous.

Captain Muskett, a little later, marched to the site of the German camp, and there, to his surprise, he found three German native military police, who had been left behind to complete the packing of the camp gear. The Papuan officer took charge of them as prisoners of war, and eventually sent them in to Port Moresby A few months later, when Australia was in charge of New Guinea, they were sent home.

The photograph was taken by Mr. Crid land just after the prisoners arrived in Port Moresby. The man in the back ground, guarding them, is the famous Sergeant-Major Simoi, of the Papuan Armed Constabulary. He died recently.

Dr. D. Murray Young, who has been Government Medical Officer at Tarawa, Gilbert and Ellice Islands, for 10 years, sailed for London from Sydney by the Orama on August 18.