Old Soldiers

Moments from History

In a small country town in the Australian state of Victoria is the Tatura World War 2 Wartime Camps Collection Museum. Originally the museum’s exhibition was divided into two themes, local history and the history of irrigation in the area which began in 1887. Three rooms were devoted to photographs and written material about these two vital historical aspects of the area. However, a few months after the museums opening, some visitors were asking strange questions. ‘’What have you got about us?’’ The perplexed staff asked, ‘Who are you and what’s your connection to Tatura?’ The visitors reply was to create quite a stir among the Historical Society members and has make their small museum in country Victoria quite well known both in Australia and overseas.

The visitors told the staff that they were German nationals interned in camps in the area during World War 2. This was one aspect of local history the society had not considered for inclusion, possibly because very little was known about it. They were to discover more about these camps and the people who were held in them. No one at the time could have predicted what fascinating stories were waiting to be uncovered. Not only were German internees housed in camps in the area but Italians and Japanese as well. To make the subject even more interesting, Italian, German and some Japanese prisoners of war were also sent to the camps which opened up an even bigger area of research. The museum contains photographs, memorabilia, artefacts made in the camps, intelligence reports, records, newspaper articles and books related to the history of the seven camps.

During WW2, over 15,000 civilians were interned in Australia, approximately one half of these were residents of Australia, the remainder being imprisoned overseas and transported here for internment. These men, women and children-mainly German, Italian and Japanese and a number of other nationalities were believed to be a security risk to the Allied War effort. The internees varied in ages from the elderly to mere babies, some were even born in the internment camps. In addition to the internees, there were incarcerated a further 7,000 enemy Prisoners of War.

There is a distinct difference between the two groups held in the camps during WW2 .Prisoners-of-War [POWs] were, as the name implies, enemy servicemen who had been captured in various theatres of war and transported to Australia for the duration of the war.

Internees were civilians who were living in Australia, or other Allied territories, and were deemed [rightly or wrongly] to be a security risk because of their nationality. . They were both housed in specially built camps in Victoria, New South Wales, South Australia and Western Australia. The greatest numbers of camps were located in the vicinity of Tatura. Approximately 150 German officers from the Luftwaffe, Afrika Korps, Kriegsmarine and Merchant Navy were housed in the nearby Dhurringile Mansion which today is a state prison. The most famous prisoners were the survivors of the German raider, ‘Kormoran’ that sank the Australian light cruiser, HMAS Sydney in the Indian Ocean off the Western Australian coast with the loss of the entire crew of 645 on the 19 November, 1941. The total destruction of the cruiser remains the largest maritime tragedy in the history of the nation and also the most mysterious as the ship disappeared without a trace.

Life in the camps varied depending on the nature of the particular camp. Family camps incorporated playing areas for children and the necessary school accommodation. Internees and POWs organised a wide range of activities to keep minds and bodies active including craft work, education, gardening, theatre, music, sport and one especially popular activity for the POW’s. Escaping!

Compared with the German, Italian and especially the Japanese POW camps, the Axis POW’s were on a holiday. The Australian Government took its Geneva Convention obligations very seriously. So much so that both German and Italian ex-prisoners were unanimous in their praise of the generally humane treatment they received from the military authorities. In the Victorian camps, there was a cordial understanding between the officers and men who guarded the prisoners and the officers and men who were the prisoners about what was expected as proper conduct. However, most trouble came from the Germans.

No matter how well they were treated, there was the sheer frustration of being a POW in a strange country almost on the other side of the world with no news from the Fatherland, their loved ones and being crowded together with differences of opinion on a great many issues especially between Austrian and German, Nazi and non-Nazi. The bars of their prison could have been made of gold but those bars still prevented their freedom. Escape plans began to hatch. The Germans learnt very early that if they escaped, they were not going to be lined up against a wall and shot. There was no Gestapo or Kempi Tai, but they also understood that because Australia is such a vast island nation, there was no where to escape to. Their only hope was to somehow get aboard a neutral ship. Escaping became a sort of therapy to relieve the tension of camp life although a few did entertain thoughts of actually trying to get home. Their attempts to escape were a constant problem for both military and civilian authorities.

Initially, the local population were apprehensive when the first escapes took place but over a period of time they became more relaxed when they realised the Germans were not going to murder them in their beds. Many recaptured POW’s told of locals giving them the Australian ‘’fair go’ or sporting chance. Examples such as being given food and directions and told they have 8 hours start before they had to be reported to the authorities. They were even sometimes given work on farms. One episode, on 11 January 1945, that caused enormous concern for both military and civilian authorities was the mass escape of 17 officers and 3 batmen who tunnelled under the camps barbed wire at Dhurringile. The leader of this escape was Fregattenkapitan Theodore Detmers from the Kormoran. All were recaptured within a week.

The most famous attempted escape by POW’s in Australia was in the neighbouring state of New South Wales. On 5 August 1944, a total of 1,100 Japanese prisoners broke out of their prison camp located near the small rural town of Cowra. The escapers stabbed or bludgeoned four unfortunate guards to death and wounded four others. The Japanese actively sought death. They wanted to be killed. Only their death would wipe away the shame of being captured, the disgrace to their families, to the Emperor and to Japan. Many were coerced into this escape by the more fanatical of the prisoners. The escape sent shock waves throughout the local communities and caused tremendous concern throughout Victoria and it temporarily stifled any escape attempts by the Germans.

The military authorities killed 183 Japanese while trying to prevent the escape, 36 committed suicide or were killed by fellow prisoners and 12 by unknown causes. The remainder who were not granted their glorious atonement by death were eventually returned to prison.

Once the war was over, the camps were dismantled so that little physical evidence remains today. Most prisoners were returned home but one of the enduring legacies of that sad period in history is that many POWs’ and internees returned to settle in Australia.

Some never left. Two war cemeteries were established in the area. The official German War Cemetery adjoins Tatura Cemetery and the Italian Ossario and War Cemetery are at the nearby town of Murchison. German and Italian POWs and internees who died in various parts of Australia during both world wars are buried at Tatura and Murchison respectively. A commemoration service is held at each cemetery every November.

Donations of photographs, personal papers and memorabilia are always arriving from Australian and overseas sources especially from the relatives of those who spent time in one of the 7 camps. The influx of material and the museums international reputation continues to grow. A tribute to the dedication of people who are interested in keeping history alive and well.

REFERENCES

Historical Records--Tatura & District Historical Society Inc. Tatura, 3616, Victoria, Australia.

PHOTOGRAPHS

Courtesy; Tatura& District Historical Society.

Ken Wright. [C] 2005.

My father had been on Gallipoli in WW1 when he was sixteen, but when the World War 2 started, I was an apprentice motor mechanic. As soon as I finished my apprenticeship, I enlisted in the Royal Australian Ordinance Corps in the city of Melbourne on the 14 November 1941 and became Army recruit Private Tommy Thwaites. After a vigorous basic training, we were shipped from Melbourne to Sydney by train.

It was a warm morning in Sydney when I boarded the ship, Aquitania with 5000 other Army recruits. I’ll remember January 10, 1942 for the rest of my life. I was excited but a bit anxious as we got closer to departure, because we didn’t even know the destination. We were off to fight for our country, that’s all we knew! We sailed at midday and we called in at the Western Australian port of Fremantle where we picked up the 2/4 Machine Gun Battalion. By now we knew we were going to Singapore. The Army issue of underwear was standard cool climate gear including long johns and this became more useless the closer we got to the tropics. The result was that these surplus items were dumped over the back of the boat and formed a chain of direction markers to the boat. Well, the Army wasn’t trained in naval security. We sailed on into the tropics to Sunda Straits on the west end of Java, and because the Japs controlled the air, we had to change into much smaller boats to go on to Singapore.

THE JAPANESE SUBMARINE 1-25 lying just off Cape Wickham lighthouse at the northern end of King Island in Bass Strait had launched the Yokosuka E14Y float plane approximately two hours before dawn on Thursday 26 February 1942. Using the Cape Otway and Point Lonsdale lighthouses as navigational aids, Warrant Flying Officer Nobuo Fujito and Petty Officer Shoji Okuda flew their reconnaissance mission over Laverton RAAF Base, Melbourne and the docks, then down Port Phillip Bay, past Cape Schanck lighthouse and back to the waiting submarine.

Fujito had previously flown over Sydney and would go on to carry out reconnaissance missions over Hobart, Wellington, Auckland and Suva. Later the same year, in September, he would attempt to set fire to the Siskiyou national forest in Oregon, USA, with two 100-kilogram thermite incendiary bombs. His historic flights might have come to an abrupt end in the skies over Melbourne if Victoria’s first radar station had been operational.

In 1942 Britain upgraded its coastal radar system and as Australia did not possess radar at the time, a number of these superseded British units were shipped here. The unit known as 13 Radar combined an Australian receiver with an English transmitter and was one of the first radar installations on the Australian mainland and the first in Victoria. The site chosen for it was Cape Otway, Victoria’s most western promontory and a key navigational point on the sea lanes in and out of Bass Strait. German U-boats were known to prowl these lanes and in November 1940 an American ship, City of Rayville, had been sunk by a mine off Cape Otway .

Built among the sand dunes and tea-tree on top of the cliffs, the unit's blockhouse (known as a "doover") had concrete walls 35 centimetres thick. It was divided into three rooms to house the wireless telegraphy operator, the radar itself and its operator. This blockhouse also served as an air raid shelter. Power was supplied by two Ford V8 engines with direct drive to a 240-volt generator housed in an underground concrete bunker. Close to the blockhouse were two huts to house commissioned and non-commissioned personnel, a mess hall and shower and latrine facilities. Water from a spring was supplied by a small windmill. 13 Radar became operational on 27 June 1942 and, together with 14 Radar at Wilsons Promontory, was able to detect the movements of shipping and aircraft entering and leaving Bass Strait between Tasmania and the mainland. Other radar stations in Victoria were 15 at Metung and 16 on Gabo Island.

Leading Aircraftsman Eric Mittag, writing in1944, describes the operation of the radar unit.

The radar operator would manually sweep (by a small wheel attached to the gearing) the antenna 360 degrees looking for blips above the "lathoole" ray oscilloscope trace line on his screen. If an aircraft or ship was detected, he would focus the antenna and pass range and bearing to a second radar operator. These co-ordinates were then plotted on a grid and passed on to the wireless-telegraphy operator for transmission to headquarters in Melbourne.

Postings to 13 Radar were usually seen as a rest assignment. Because the station was an early link in Australia’s new radar program, it was an ideal place for new personnel to learn the operating techniques of the system. During winter, the station would shut down when gale-force winds reached Force 6 or more. The antenna needed constant cleaning on account of the flying spray from the sea below the Cape Otway cliffs.

In the mess hall, a billiard table on loan from the local hotel "for the duration" and books provided the basic entertainment, but during the warmer months there was the opportunity for more challenging activities such as cliff-climbing, swimming and fishing. Outside the mess hall a vegetable patch took shape. The most sought-after recreation was the chance to go into the nearby township of Apollo Bay to a local dance, a movie and of course the hotel.

Naturally the personnel couldn’t have everything their way. There were inspections, machinegun, rifle and grenade practice with competition shoots and more inspections to keep everyone on their toes. Many enjoyed hunting, if one could call shooting rabbits with a .303 rifle hunting (nor would there be much left of the unfortunate rabbit for the cook's stew-pot).

Had Warrant Flying Officer Fujito and Petty Officer Okuda made their reconnaissance flight four months later, 13 Radar would almost certainly have spotted them and alerted HQ of their presence, with the float plane possibly being shot down by aircraft from the RAAF base at Laverton or anti-aircraft guns at Williamstown. As it was, their presence passed unnoticed. Not so that of Korvettenkapitan Heinrich Timm, who was to stir up some real action two years later.

Timm and his crew of the German U-boat 862 had been looking for shipping to sink in the sea lanes near Cape Jaffa, some 250 kilometres south-east of Adelaide, the capital city of South Australia.. On the morning of 9 December 1944, high seas, rain squalls and wind prevented the submarine's sonar detection from picking up the approach of the Greek freighter Ilissos until the ship was too close for U862 to manoeuvre into a submerged attack position. Timm decided to surface and attack the freighter from astern. It was a tactical mistake. The freighter was still out of range of his flak gun and the submarine's gunfire was answered by the rear deck gun on the freighter. The U-boat had to crash dive to avoid being hit.

The Ilissos’s call for help started the largest submarine hunt ever carried out in Australian waters. 13 Radar went on a 24-hour alert, since it was expected the U-boat would move east to attack shipping in Bass Strait. But U-862 managed to slip away to do her real damage elsewhere. She sailed down the west coast of Tasmania, past Hobart and on towards New Zealand, sinking two American liberty ships on the way.

The Cape Otway radar station continued operations until June 1946, when the unit was disbanded after four years of important but uneventful coastal surveillance. The concrete blockhouse and generator bunker still stand as a reminder of a war that now seems so long ago and perhaps hard to imagine for the holidaymakers and other visitors who come to visit the Cape Otway lighthouse and radar site.

REFERENCES

Battle Surface. David Jenkins, Random House.

U-Boat Far From Home. David Stevens, Allen & Unwin.

13 Radar. Personal recollections. Morrie Fenton.

History has shown a record of the inevitability of human conflict with war as an instrument of politics, religion, geography, power games or ethnic cleansing by one race against another. Only those who have experienced war can truly appreciate the futility and horror of it all.

How man can create so much beauty in the world and yet destroy life itself.

Warfare has always plagued humanity and for the foreseeable future will continue

to do so. Yet, in the midst of all the death and destruction and hatred, there are rare

glimpses of kindness, compassion and a genuine desire to help a fellow human

even though officially, from the Allied perspective, he or she is the enemy.

By the first week in May 1915, the Anzac’s [Australian and New Zealand Army

Corps] position at Gallipoli on Second Ridge was quite well established but to

Turkish commanders this was considered the most vulnerable point to attack. On 18

May, around 3 am, 42,000 Turkish soldiers began an early morning attack at

Johnston’s Jolly and German Officers Ridge. By mid-morning approximately 3,000

Turks were dead and 7,000 wounded. The Anzacs lost 160 killed and 468 wounded.

In volume two page 161 of his excellent series of books, The Story of Anzacs, the

famous Australian war correspondent, Charles Bean wrote; the dead and wounded

A truce was arranged between 7.00 and 4.30 on May 24 so both sides could bury their

dead and recover any wounded. One Australian soldier described it as a day of hard,

smelly nauseating work. He also wrote what a strange experience it was mixing with

the enemy, exchanging smiles and cigarettes when the day before they had been

tearing each other to pieces. One Turkish captain said to an Australian captain, ‘At

weep’ As the truce was coming to an end, some Australians called out, ‘Goodbye old chap. Good luck!’ to which a few Turks replied, ‘Smiling may you go and smiling come again’! The opposing forces had discovered a bond, respect for each other previously unknown amidst the horrific casualties and wasted lives that are the carnage of war.

On the killing fields of the Western Front in France in an expression of common humanity, the Christmas truce of 1914 was an example of how, two armies locked in mortal combat could for a time, forget the fighting and enjoy the sharing of human emotion unfettered by national politics. Soldiers on both sides laid down their arms on

Christmas day and met in No Mans Land to exchange cigarettes, food, badges, play

football, sing Christmas carols and wish each other a ‘Merry Christmas’. It has been

written that they even borrowed each others tools to make their life in the trenches a

little more comfortable. The truce was a spontaneous event. No prior discussions, no

orders, just a desire to be and act normally for a while. The killing resumed again after

the truce, but it did illustrate the underlying humanity enemies could show each other

in times of war.

A Japanese career diplomat Chiune Sugihara had been raised in the strict Japanese

code of ethics by a turn-of-the century samurai family. He was interested in foreign

ideas, travel, philosophy, language and religion. His deep interest in religion was such

that he converted to Christianity when he was 19. In 1935 he married Yukiki Kikuchi

and together they were posted to a diplomatic posting in Helsinki in Finland. Just six

months prior to the start of WW2 in Europe, Chiune Sugihara was sent to the city of

Kaunas in Lithuania to operate a one man Japanese consulate. Apart from normal

consular duties, he was to report on the looming Soviet and German war plans.

On 1 September 1939, German forces, without a formal declaration of war, invaded

Poland and in a spectacular demonstration of fire and movement utilizing the latest

weapons and in co-ordination with their air force, overran an allocated portion of

Poland by October 5. In conformity with the Nazi-Soviet Pact signed on August 23,

Soviet forces invaded the remaining Polish territory two weeks later ending any hope

the Poles had of a last ditch stand or that the Soviet Union might come to their aid.

Polish Jews were trapped between the two invaders and approximately 15,000 fled

into neighbouring Lithuania which was still independent. Although Russia was a

partner in the pact it was also wary of Germany’s military ambitions and made mutual

defence pacts with Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania.

In Kaunas, a chance meeting with an 11 year old Jewish boy resulted in Sugihara

being invited to the boys’ family Hanukkah celebrations. It is here that he first learnt

of Nazi atrocities in Poland mainly against the Jewish people. In the first few months

of 1940, the German military machine overran France, Belgium, Denmark, Holland

and Norway while Soviet forces occupied Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania in June and

ordered all foreign consulates to close. As news of the Nazi atrocities and the

imminent invasion of Lithuania spread, Jews began to seek any means of escape.

The English philosopher, Edmund Burke, once wrote, ‘All that is necessary for the

triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing’. Unfortunately, many of the world’s

embassies and consulates in Nazi and later Soviet held territories did nothing to help

the thousands of refugees from persecution by their conquerors but there were

exceptions. As Hitler’s iron grip tightened around Eastern Europe Jewish refugees

desperate to escape Lithuania found a Dutch consul who, with permission from his

superiors, was willing to stamp their passports with a visa to the Dutch colonial

Caribbean island of Curacao which didn’t require a formal entry visa. To get there

they had obtain an exit visa from the Soviet authorities. Fortunately, a sympathetic

Soviet consul agreed to sign the visas but only on the condition the refugees leave

Lithuania through Russia and exit on to Curacao via Japan.

Chiune Sugihara and his wife Yukiko awoke on the morning of 27 July 1940, to the

sounds of hundreds of Jewish refugees clamouring to see the Japanese consulate and

pleading for a Japanese entry visa. Sugihara wanted to help and requested three times

for authorisation from his foreign ministry to issue the visas. All his requests were

denied. Sugihara was now placed in the most difficult position of his life. Being

Japanese, Sugihara struggled with his religious beliefs, his families’ samurai code of

honour and his countries tradition of strict obedience. Also, as a career diplomat, he

could not disobey his superiors. If he did, he would lose his job, be disgraced, bring

shame on his family and suffer great financial hardship as he would never again hold

a government job. Sugihara also feared he and his families’ lives could be in danger

should they disobey orders. While he agonised over a decision, the crowds outside the

consulate grew larger and more desperate.

He had made his decision. From 31 July to 28 August, Chiune and Yukiko worked hour after hour, day after day writing an average of 300 visas each

day. He told anxious applicants that as long as there was a single person left, he would

help them. In September, the Soviet authorities finally forced the closure of the

consulate and Sugihara was reassigned to Berlin then to Prague where he wrote more

unauthorised visas. He served as Japanese Consul-General in several other occupied

European embassies until the war ended in 1945.The Sugiharas last posting was

Romania where they were arrested by Soviet authorities and imprisoned in an

internment camp for over a year before being allowed to return to Japan and an

uncertain future under the American occupation. On his return, he was dismissed from his job citing the downsizing of the diplomatic corps. As so often happens to people who take a stand against injustice, his life and those of his family were now thrown into turmoil. When asked the obvious question why he did what he did, he would reply, ‘They were human beings and needed help. ‘I may have to disobey my government, but if I don’t I would be disobeying God.’

His decision had bought tremendous hardship and pain to him and his family but had

saved the lives of thousands of refugees who may well have perished in concentration

camps such as Dachau, Buchenwald, Treblinka and Auschwitz. When the Germans

finally occupied Lithuania this was to be the fate of so many who were unable to

escape in time.

It is difficult to understand how brutality and mass murder can be perpetrated by a

nation against another or by human beings against other fellow human beings. Yet

given the right emotional, political and psychological circumstances, anyone could

commit an act against an enemy that could be classified as a war crime or an atrocity.

No one military force in the world today or for that matter, down through the ages,

could claim to be completely atrocity free. Whilst not seen as an atrocity, one side for

Example can deliberately commit an act of aggression against their own with the

rationalisation that it is for the greater good or a necessary act to cause the enemy to

lose more in the exchange.

One good example of this was the fact that Allied HQ knew that some ships leaving

from the Axis held North African ports were being used to transport POW’s to camps

in Italy. Allied submarine commanders were under orders to sink all Axis shipping. The loss of an enemy ship was considered worth the risk of POW’s being onboard. Perhaps the orders may not have been written as such but it meant the same thing.

The Italian cargo ship, Sebastiano Venier [originally Jason] left the Axis port of Benghazi on 8 May 1942 with approximately 2,000 Australian, British, New Zealand and South African POW’s onboard. British intelligence at Bletchley Park intercepted and decrypted the Italian ships planned route but there was no mention of any POW’s aboard. Some time in the mid-afternoon the following day, the Sebastiano Venier was torpedoed by a British submarine. A lookout had spotted the submarines periscope before the attack and raised the alarm. The captain and most of the crew abandoned ship before any torpedoes were launched leaving the POW’s locked in the ships holds. Of the three torpedoes launched, only the third struck the ship and 300 POW’s died in the holocaust that followed. Fortunately the ship remained afloat and a storm prevented further attack by the submarine. In the pandemonium that followed, a German merchant marine officer or engineer took over the running of the ship, arranged treatment for the wounded, and in the middle of the storm, used his skill to run the ship safely aground on a reef just off the Greek coast. According to some survivors’ reports, this man was everywhere, encouraging the medics, the wounded, and helping with the eventual rescue and transfer to land of the survivors. He was possibly the sole reason 1,500 POW’s were still alive. What happened to him and who he was is unknown. He has disappeared from history and so too has the unknown Italian steward aboard the ship who did his best to give food, drink and comfort to the wounded. Both the German and the Italian showed the enemy had a heart.

A naval tradition that existed well before the Geneva Convention [22 August 1864] was that once the engagement was over, the shipwrecked survivors should be rescued. This was before submarine warfare had begun and the very nature of this weapon was limited space, and the necessity to remain undetected. It was approximately 8 pm on 12 September 1942 when two torpedos from U-Boat 156 struck the armed Cunard liner, Laconia in the South Atlantic. Amongst the 3,000 people onboard were 1,800 Italian POW’s, their Polish guards and British soldiers with their wives and children. Once Lieutenant Commander Hartenstein, the U-Boat Commander, realised he had not torpedoed a ship full of British soldiers but a mixture of British soldiers, their wives and children, Axis POW’s and British civilians, he decided to undertake a rescue operation and had already rescued 90 before he sent a signal off to his Commander –in-Chief, Vice Admiral Donitz informing him of his action.. The decision to begin the rescue meant risking his submarine and crew as the enemy had already been notified of the U-Boats presence by the Laconia’s S.O.S. distress calls. In fact, Hartenstein even transmitted an open radio message himself. ‘If any ship will assist the shipwrecked Laconia crew, I will not attack her provided I am not attacked by ship or aircraft.’ The Vice Admirals reaction to the news the U-156 had already begun rescue operations was to order an additional three U-Boats and one Italian submarine to the area and through diplomatic channels requested the Vichy French to send their warships to assist in the rescue.

At 11-15am on May 16 a lookout on U-156 spotted an American Liberator aircraft approaching. A four meter square Red Cross flag was already spread over the U-156 deck and all attempts to contact the aircraft failed. It must have been obvious what was happening in the water below, a submarine’s deck covered with people and crowded lifeboats in tow. The aircraft departed but half and later either the same aircraft or another Liberator returned and carried out five bombing attacks on the submarine with complete disregard for the people in the life boats or on the submarines deck. Although the U-156 was slightly damaged many survivors were killed in the bomb blasts. Not only did this callous attack cause the death of many innocent people but it was to have tragic implications for shipwrecked survivors for the remainder of the war.

Why did the Liberator pilot attack? Was it on his own initiative or was he ordered to. Under the circumstances, the U-Boat commander would have been quite justified in taking evasive action as soon as the aircraft was first observed and slipping away leaving the survivors to their fate but he chose to remain even after he was attacked five times. It was only then, forced by military necessity, did he order the cutting loose of the four full lifeboats he was towing and discharge the 55 English and 55 Italians who were already onboard.

After the rescue was completed, and based on the Liberators attack and other factors such as U-Boat losses to aircraft in general, Vice Admiral Donitz issued what became known as the, ‘Laconia’ order. In it, submarine commanders were expressly forbidden to rescue survivors from torpedoed ships. . It was motivated by the endeavour to preclude any calculation on the part of the U-Boat commander as to the danger of air attack whenever an individual should feel tempted to undertake rescue work. What may have started out as an attempt to save Axis POW’s by Lieutenant Commander Hartenstein was also indirectly, to condemn hundreds more survivors to certain death because of the implications of Donitz’s Laconia order.

On the other side of the globe during the early Japanese conquests of WW2, the fall of Singapore and the fate of Allied POW’s has been well documented but very little is known about the fate of thousands of Chinese purged from Singaporean society and executed en-mass during the early months of the occupation.. Mamouru Shinozaki, a young Japanese Senior Special Foreign Affairs Officer attached to Japanese Defence HQ Singapore, managed at considerable risk to get printed between 20,000 and 30,000 special cards each personally signed by him, which allowed the bearer to go about his or her daily life unhindered by the military. Those cards saved the lives of thousands of Chinese.

Amongst all the horrors of war, we can, even if briefly, find experiences which demonstrate the spiritually and morally good in the human psyche. It might only be the act of giving a sip of water to the thirsty, but the act itself is enough. The Japanese diplomat, Chiune Sugihara, once said when recalling his fateful decision in Lithuania in 1940, ‘In life, do what’s right and leave it alone’.

Anzac to Amiens. Bean, C.E.W. Australian War Memorial Publication.1961.

Chiune Sugihara. The Sugihara Story. www eagleman.com/ sugihara/story

Sugihara Timeline. WGBH Educational Foundation 2005.

Sebastiano Venier. Edge, Spence. No Honour No Glory. William Collins, Auckland, New Zealand, 1983.

U-Boat Rescue. Peillard, Leonce. Coronet.1975.

Chinese Massacre. Ward, Ian. The Killer They Called God. Media Masters, Singapore.2004.

[C] Ken Wright. 2006.

Additional information re Chiune Sugihara for inclusion if necessary.

Sugihara’s career as a diplomat was finished forcing him to start his life over again. For approximately a year he was unemployed but eventually managed to gain part time employment as an interpreter and translator then spent 16 years working in Moscow as the manager of a Japanese export company.

He never spoke of his deeds nor did he have any idea if the visas he and Yukiko issued did in fact, save any of those who begged their help in 1940-1. It was not until 1969 that he was to learn that he had saved thousands from certain death. One of the refugees had finally tracked him down. Once it was known that he had been found, he was recommended to the Yad Vashem [Holocaust Memorial] committee in Israel for recognition and hundreds of survivors testified on his behalf.

In 1985, Chiune Sugihara was finally recognised by the Yad Vashem Martyrs Remembrance Authority in Jerusalem as ‘Righteous Among Nations’. The honour was accepted by his wife and son as he was too ill to travel. A park has also been named after him. Sugihara died in 1986 aged 86.

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