They Got Away

Adventures of Territories' Residents Who Escaped the Japs

OTORIES of the resource, fortitude and courage of New Guinea and Papua residents :who escaped from the Japanese invaders have continued to reach Sydney during the past couple of months, as more and more Europeans came South from those Territories. All women—save a handful of nurses in Papua—and the majority of men over military age now have been evacuated.

Pieced together, here are the accounts of some of the people who got away to safety.

Chased By Jap Warship

INCIDENTS during a two months’ journey getting from Rabaul to Aus tralia including being pursued by a Japanese warship off New Britain and, later, being adrift in Torres Strait, were recounted by Captain E. C. Vider, of the NG Administration’s Marine De partment, when he finally reached a North Queensland port recently.

With other Rabaul men aboard, Cap tain Vider took a Government motor vessel out of Rabaul harbour 15 minutes before Japanese speedboats raced across the bay with advance units to occupy the town. Following the coast south, the party sighted two Jap planes, but dodged into the shadows of land. At dusk next day, an enemy warship (some of the party believed it was an aircraft-carrier) was sighted. They were chased but managed to sneak away during the night. Eventually they reached Port Moresby, Papua, where the boat was taken over by the authorities.

From Moresby, Captain Vider, accom panied by Messrs. E. Austin and L.

Weekes (Pt. Moresby), Mr. R. Staddley (Bulolo), and 20 Papuans, sailed for Thursday Island in a 27-tons ketch.

After only a day at sea, the engines broke down and they drifted for some days. One native, who had been ill, died. Finally, they made landfall at a point about 100 miles north-west of Moresby. A couple of days later they were able to get a tow to Daru, from whence they sailed without further mis hap to TI, arriving exactly a month after leaving Port Moresby.

800 Miles In Govt. Launch

ADVISED in mid-February by Port Moresby to “go while the going is good”, Mr. S. H. Chance, Resident Magistrate at Kikori, outpost in the Delta Division, freed the prisoners in his gaol, collected Mr. H. E. Shaw (of Port Romilly sawmill) and Mr. E. H. Adams (Papuan Medical Dept.) and made pre parations to leave for Australia in the Government launch “Alele”.

The three men (all over-age, and with service in the last war) sailed westward for Daru, headquarters of the Western Division. They met wretched seas and fierce north-west winds on the 22-miles journey across the mouth of Turama River and experienced similar conditions crossing the Ply estuary. From Daru they went west and south to Saibai Island and Banks Island, in Torres Strait, all the while against head-winds.

At Thursday Island, they picked up a deck-hand and a native pilot, who guided them down- through the Barrier Reef to Cairns, Nth. Queensland.

Apart from the adverse weather con ditions, said Mr. Chance, the 818-miles voyage was uneventful; though he added, facetiously, that they were a

trifle puzzled on the last stage of the trip when they passed Bird Island and found it covered with turtles, then Turtle Island carrying nothing but birds!

Mr Chance later went South to Lis more, in New South Wales, where he found his brother, Mr. W. H. Chance, well-known storekeeper of Milne Bay (Eastern Papua) awaiting him—he had got away to Thursday Is. in the Com monwealth Copra Co.’s “Gili Gili”, and then from TI in the coastal vessel, “Wandana”.

After Bombs, Dessert

ONE evacuee, now in Australia, was in Port Moresby when a Japanese fighter pilot, in a Mitsubishi Zero plane, was shot down by ack-ack fire. At first, the Jap airman was afraid his cap tors would torture him, but he calmed down in hospital; after a while he asked for peaches and cream—and got them!

Bomb Splinters As “Souvenirs”

DISPLAYING bomb splinters which he brought “just for souvenirs”, Mr, J.

Ward Nolan, SDA missionary at Orokolo, Papua, told how Jap bombs dropped less than 100 yards from where he was sheltering during a raid on Port Moresby.

He came to Australia from Moresby in a 40-ft. auxiliary ketch, which brought eight others' (including a native mission ary and his wife). As they were leav ing, Japanese planes circled above them, but no attack was made The voyage to. Cairns took 15 days—one of which was spent hove-to when the engine broke down. They were well provisioned; one member of the party, originally from New Guinea, had gathered a plentiful supply at Samarai —he said the BP store there had been thrown open and people were told to “help themselves”.

Mr. Nolan now has joined his wife at Wahroonga, Sydney; she came South from Papua ten months ago.

Jap Destroyer Blew Up Their

Boats

CRAMMED with adventure was the escape from Rabaul of Mr. Leo McMahon, engineer in the NG Public Works Dept. When the Jap “blitz” began, he and two other men, Carson and Earley, made for Kokopo in a Ford truck. Seeing small Jap boats with landing parties leaving their par ent ships along the coast, they decided to continue on to Warengoi River. Then, joined by a party from Put Put planta tion, they left in a pinnace and a schooner for Adler Bay (further south along the coast of Gazelle Peninsula), stealthily avoiding the patrolling Jap warships.

While they camped at Adler Bay, a Jap destroyer steamed into the cove and blew up their two boats. The refugees dispersed into the bush.

Later, Mr. McMahon, Mr. W. L. Mac- Gowan (Public Works Dept.), and Mr.

G. Slater banded together and continued their journey southwards, on foot. After a time the incredibly rough country began to tell on MacGowan and he became too ill to proceed further; he decided to rest while the others made for Tol plantation to seek food.

Arriving at Tol, McMahon and Slater found it had been bombed, machine gunned and looted, but they caught a pig, which they cooked. MacGowan came in later, having been found and assisted by a couple of police boys.

Joined by a Mr. Duncan, they got across to Karlai mission station where they obtained another pinnace. Shortly afterwards they came upon Dr. Norm.

Fisher (Govt. Geologist), Mr. George

Greathead (Patrol Officer) and Mr.

Clem. Knight.

It appeared that Greathead and a com panion had left Rabaul when the inva sion began; rcrossed the Baining Range (6,000 ft.) together; and then separated.

Eventually, he linked up with Dr.

Fisher and others and for a couple of days and nights they made their way cautiously down the coast. Informed by natives that a party of Europeans was only just ahead in a boat, they set off in a canoe, but in the hurry to overtake this boat the canoe was swamped and they were lucky to get ashore on a small island, having lost everything but their lives. It was there that McMahon found them.

Across The Open Sea

THE whole party, by this time num bering nine, proceeded to Palmal mal plantation, after obtaining a second pinnace found hidden near a native village. A refill of petrol at Palmalmal apd they sneaked off again, making for Lindenhafen. First an air craft-carrier was sighted; then a cruiser, flashing signals, bore down 'on them.

Both times the men held their breath as McMahon swung the pinnace hard in shore to elude the Japs.

Their objective was the mainland of New Guinea, but when natives told them the Japanese had landed in Huon Gulf,

they decided to make a break across the open sea for Port Moresby, in Papua. To get sufficient petrol for this voyage, they had an anxious time searching for the “plant” at the back of an abandoned plantation while a Jap warship was lying off-shore, in front.

For a couple of days they, were tossed about in the open water —adrift at times, when the temperamental pinnace engine got up to her tricks. Eventually they reached Sim Sim Island in the Lusancay Group, then on to Kiuaua (Trobriands), Dobu (D’Entrecasteau Islands), and, finally, Samarai. An RAAF Catalina fly ing-boat took them to Moresby; then, after a few days’ rest, they came South to an Australian port.

Through New Guinea Wilds

A PARTY of 32 Wau and Salamaua residents, who reached Australia in mid-March, made a long, hazardous trek through a section of the seldom penetrated country in the centre of New Guinea, near Mt. Lawson and the head waters of the Lakekamu River.

Using rough maps and relying on a surveyor’s knowledge of that part of the Territory, they were able to escape the Japs by crossing from New Guinea to Papua and then going down the Lake kamu by canoes to the coast. The final stage of their journey to Port Moresby was along 60 miles of beaches. They

estimated that in their seven weeks’ trip they covered over 250 miles, during the whole time living on rice and native foodstuffs.

Leader of the party was Mr. J. H. King and all the evacuees acknowledged that his bushcraft was a big factor in their reaching Moresby intact. Among others who arrived in the party were three BP employees, Messrs. A. L. Chapman, R. J.

Brown, and C. R. Ryan.

“Pushed, Bombed, And Towed”

MR. E. W. Harrison, of Dobu Passage, Eastern Papua, with some com panions, arrived in Cairns (Queens land) in March in a small vessel. “We are still alive and kicking,” he said. “We were pushed out of .Samarai; bombed out of Port Moresby; towed 450 miles southwards from Cape York; and here we are in exile.”

One Down First Round

ONE of a group, Mr. W. A. Haydon, a refrigerating engineer of Wau, TNG,

said that an “ack-ack” gun was being assembled when a Japanese four-engined reconnaissance bomber flew over the town, in February. The gun was made ready for action in record time ind the first round fired by its crew scored a hit.

Trailing smoke, the bomb6r crashed into the sea some miles away.

Back To Earth

A SMALL fortune in gold was lost in crossing a flooded river by 30 Wau and Edie Creek miners who arrived m Port Moresby at the end of March after a three weeks’ walk from Morobe goldfield.

Packets containing* 124 ounces of gold were dropped in deep, muddy water, and although hours were spent diving they were not recovered. Another packet of gold worth more than £2,000 was brought through safely.

The miners nonchalantly declared that their trek by jungle and mountain tracks, and voyages by raft down flooded, yellow rivers was “practically unevent ful”. The only casualty v on the long journey through the difficult country was one Chinese, who died of illness.