Rabaul's Missing

Civilians

Strange Stories in Circulation

Rabaul, Apr. 22

rE same despicable Australian official dom which has refused to order any inquiry to ascertain why some 300 New Guinea civilians were lost in the Jap invasion of Rabaul, is now making a mystery of some 24 new graves in this area of New Guinea.

Until some official statement is made to the contrary, the belief will be held here that these are the graves of 24 per sons who had been officially described as lost on the Jap prison-ship “Montevideo Maru.”

About the time that Mrs. Gladys Baker died, a new grave was noticed in Rabaul cemetery, beside that of the late Mr. Alan Campbell. It was assumed to be that of Mrs. Baker. But now it is known that it is not —it is the grave of Mr. Thompson, who was accountant for Messrs. W. R.

Carpenter & Co. in Rabaul, and who was thought to have been lost on the prison ship.

It appears that the Matupi natives re cently opened a large grave in their area, and there found the bodies of 24 Euro peans. One was positively identified as that of Mr. Thompson—it bore his wristlet watch, among other things—and it was buried in Rabaul.

The other 23 were taken to Bitapaka, and interred along with the bodies of Australian soldiers —which are being gathered from various places, and concen trated in this cemetery.

There is much public curiosity regarding the 23—both because of the place where they were found, and because they are generally in civilian dress. But, if they are civilians, why are they being buried in the soldiers’ cemetery? information here recently leads IN some of us to believe that there were 16 or 18 men instead of 8 or 9 with Albert Evenson and Bill Kom, when they were murdered in Rabaul by the Japs about the end of 1944. It will be remem bered that they were keeping records of the shot-down American and Australian airmen who were passing through Rabaul to Jap prison-camps, and the Japs found those records. The European civilians were all taken away somewhere and never seen again.

We are wondering whether these 23 unidentified bodies may not include those of Evensen’s party.

There is another interesting story current here. A high officer of the Aus tralian Army, here in connection with the war crimes trials, has stated privately that, soon after the Japs occupied Rabaul, a Jap cruiser off the South Coast of New Britain picked up one or more small craft, carrying 81 Europeans, and signalled the Jap commander in Rabaul for instruc tions.

The reply of the victory-drunk Japs was that they did not want any more prisoners in Rabaul.

So a plank was rigged over the stern of the cruiser, and the Europeans—all of them—were forced to walk along it, and fall into the sea, and thus were drowned. The story was told to the Army officer by a Jap member of the cruiser’s crew, who was in Rabaul as a war crimes witness. That would account for another 81 of our missing people.

According to the report here, high Aus tralian officialdom, which always tries to decide what is good for us, has decided to suppress this story. MS.