New Guinea

    "Crawling on hands and knees up razor backed ridges in drenching tropical rain with the ever present prospect of being ambushed by the Japanese..."

In March 1942 - with most of its men now prisoners of war of the Japanese on Java - the remainder of the 2/3rd Machine Gun Battalion returned to Adelaide from the Middle East. They had been fortunate enough not to have been on the Orcades, the only ship from the returning fleet that was re-directed to Java.

    After being reinforced, the Battalion trained in Cowra, NSW, and later in Queensland, ending up in Wondecla near Cairns. In July 1943, the Battalion's 'B' Company was sent as part of a larger force to Merauke in Dutch New Guinea (now Irian Jaya) to prevent Japanese landings in northern Queensland. In December 1944, the Battalion's five companies landed at Aitape to take part in the final campaign against the Japanese Army, headquartered 154 km east at Wewak.

    In New Guinea, troops had to fight against an often invisible enemy, engaging in nerve-racking and deadly games of hide-and-seek in dense jungle. They also had to battle mud, floods and steep mountain terrain, as well as malaria, ringworm, dysentery and other tropical diseases. Many remember the lack of food and water, and the long marches through the slippery mud.

      "Most times you couldn't use your tent, you sat in a hole in the ground and tried to sleep with mud, water, maggots...You were working hard by day, then at night you couldn't sleep. Mosquitoes were terrible. We used to try and wrap ourselves in our one blanket, which would be wringing wet, but our feet would stick out the bottom and we had no socks. The mosquitoes would bite your feet until they were red raw."

      (Mick Considine, 2/3rd New Guinea veteran)

    As the Battalion made its way from Aitape to Wewak, some of the troops encountered a massive flood on the Danmap River in January 1945. The river level rose almost 5 metres in two hours, a "huge wall of water" that completely submerged vast areas of the surrounding jungle.

    The Battalion went on capture strategic Japanese positions at Arohemi and Muguluwela, forcing the Japanese back to Wewak. The 2/3rd suffered many casualties, who were often some distance from medical help and had to be carried out on litters over mountain ranges to the coast.

    In May 1945, 'C' Company took part in the Dove Bay landing east of Wewak, around which Australian troops fought an exhausting campaign. It was terminated by the official surrender of Japan following the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and by the USA in August 1945.


Battalion Formation and Training | Middle East | Java | POWS
POW School | Burma-Thai Railway | Weary Dunlop | New Guinea
War's End