Those Who Left and Those Who Stayed

Those Who Stayed

Letter to the Editor DURING 1941, Papua contained a num ber of elderly gentlemen who con tinually rushed into print to affirm that they could run the country capably on their own account, and that every young man of military age, irrespective of sentiment or social commitment, should be away at the war. Arguments were advanced by them to show that Papua had no need whatever of any young men in the conduct of its affairs.

But when the Rabaul disaster occur red, their war fervour evaporated. The first air raid produced all sorts of ill nesses and physical weaknesses in some of our warmongers, and the “superfluous men” of military age were not a little surprised to hear of this one and that one deserting a business or place of employment and finding a berth aboard a south-bound ship.

But nearly all the men who had failed to enlist for overseas service, and who were considered “superfluous” in Papua, proved not quite so spineless as the Papuan public had been told. The mooilisation that occurred was not a compulsory one, and if the enlistees had been as scared of war as our “Old Guard” had led the public to believe, there would have been a greater number dodge enlist ment than the two or three who did.

The opinion regarding superfluousness was not shared by the military authori ties, for Immediately following enlistment, the local enlistees were nearly all sent to outposts to discharge important military duties. The first six months of 1942 were anxious ones for those remaining in New Guinea and, though no one had any thing to feel over-confident about, every one wa£ prepared to do his utmost to hold on.

Now that the prospect is brighter, it is with no little amusement that one notices the return to Papua of some of the “Old Guard.” Men who, a year ago, were over age, or had sickness, ulcers, etc., and betook themselves to safer climes, now find that their age is no burden, and that their illnesses are cured, and they have now started to show up on their former stamping ground again. Some who escaped the mobilisation in Papua were likely to be caught in the conscrip-* tion south, and hurriedly returned to New Guinea. Few, if any, are in the front ranks with the fighting men.

The “PIM” was right in its October statement that those residents now in Papua were going through “undiluted hell”; but exclude from this the recent arrivals, who have just turned up now that things are looking brighter. It is suggested that the “PIM” can form a shrewd idea of the progress of hostilities in New Guinea, according to the presence or absence from south of these “Old Guard” members. One supposes that if things look black again the “over age” lads will find their burdens heavy, and sickness and gastric ulcers will reappear.

I am, etc.,

One Who Stayed.

Papua, 16/2 1943.

EDITORIAL NOTE: Our correspondent is permitted to express his views; but we think they are a little jaundiced.

From March until about August, 1942, the “PIM”^ office was being constantly visited by middle-aged men who had been com pulsorily evacuated from Papua and who were doing everything they could think of in order to get back again, in any sort

of wartime job. There may have been a few dodgers, as described by our cor respondent—but they were very few.

Mr. D. M. Hore Lacy, well-known New Guinea planter, writes anxiously from USA, to inquire concerning the fate of Letham Hamilton and B. A. Sweetapple, two planter comrades who were asso ciated with him in planting enterprises, and who were caught in the Jap inva sion. We informed him that Mr. Hamil ton is believed to have been made a prisoner of war after the Japs captured Rabaul. Mr. Sweetapple was drowned

when trying to cross a flooded river in New Britain, about February, 1942. Mr.

Hore Lacy is now in the service of the British Admiralty, and has been in “operations.” His ship was lost during the great landing in North Africa in November and, when he wrote, he was waiting for another ship, to which he had been allotted, and expected soon to be back in the grim, silent, supremely important Battle of the Atlantic.

The rainfall in Fiji in 1942 was 27.84 inches below normal. The total was 93.02 inches, compared with the average rain fall of 120.86 inches.