Invasion Rabaul

by Bruce Gamble

  Within minutes, D Company was cut off from the main road and its own parked vehicles. Travers had no communications with battalion headquarters or the other companies, and was therefore unaware that B Company had withdrawn from Three Ways. To ascertain what was happening, he sent a driver to contact Carr. The soldier never returned. Travers next sent out a squad, followed later by a whole platoon, all of which ran afoul of the enemy. “They were attacked from all quarters by Japs in the kunai grass and scrub,” stated Sergeant Desmond T. S. Ferguson in an official report. None doubled back to D Company.

  Two other platoons, led by Lieutenants John G. “Geoff Donaldson and boyish-looking Glenn Garrard, were also surrounded. The Japanese continued to close in, and by 1400, following more than two hours of enemy probes and skirmishes, Travers knew it was time to commence an organized withdrawal. He first sent Donaldson’s platoon to counterattack along the Kokopo Ridge Road and recapture a few trucks.

  Twenty-four-year-old Corporal Arthur B. Simpson, carrying one of the new Thompson submachine guns, distinguished himself by advancing toward the enemy in leaps and dashes “using all available cover,” and firing into clusters of surprised Japanese. The platoon successfully retrieved two trucks, which they drove back to Travers’ position through a hailstorm of small-arms fire and exploding mortar rounds. Miraculously, not a single Australian was lost. Donaldson claimed his men had killed fifty of the enemy, but actual Japanese losses were less than ten men.

  Travers’ company was still not out of danger. Two trucks were not nearly enough to carry everyone, so he ordered most of the company to withdraw southward on foot to the Glade Road. Shortly past 1500 they took off through the heavy kunai grass, vigorously pursued by enemy troops that closed to within a hundred yards. “The Japs were firing into the kunai from some hills to the left,” Sergeant Ferguson reported, “and although their bullets whipped uncomfortably close through the grass, no one was hit.”

  During the withdrawal, several men fired Lewis machine guns and Tommy guns to the rear while they moved through the tall grass, keeping the enemy at bay. They could see the Japanese waving signal flags to communicate with aircraft overhead, and numerous strafing attacks ensued. The Australians suffered no casualties during their rush through the grass, and after a heart-pounding hour of evasion they stumbled across the Glade Road. Instead of calling a halt, however, Travers kept them moving south until they entered a donga, a deep gully near the base of Mount Varzin. The Japanese gave up the pursuit, and the exhausted men of D Company collapsed on the ground.

  Similar actions occurred all across the plateau as groups of desperate Australians withdrew into the jungle. They had no provisions, no communications gear, and no training in the art of jungle survival. Most had either lost their weapons or deliberately dumped them during the withdrawal, keeping only what they wore: lightweight tropical uniforms and leather boots. Many also discarded their helmets, though a few wisely kept them.

  BY MID-AFTERNOON ON JANUARY 23, THE JAPANESE WERE NO LONGER encountering resistance. An unnamed 3rd Battalion officer observed “places on the road where the enemy had abandoned vehicles, where ammunition was scattered about, and where due to the pursuit attacks of our high-speed butai [there] were pitiful traces of the confused flight and defeat of the enemy.”

  The victors carefully recorded their spoils, though much of it was damaged: five airplanes, two fortress cannons, two antiaircraft guns, fifteen antitank guns, eleven mortars, twenty-seven machine guns, 548 rifles, twelve armored cars, and nearly two hundred light vehicles. Someone even took the trouble to count all of the captured bullets, tallying 11,334 rounds of .303-caliber ammunition.

  Taking such attention to detail into consideration, it is probable that the Japanese losses reported in various summaries are correct. For one thing, the dead had to be identified so that their families could properly honor their sacrifice. Some of the rituals were public and highly visible, such as periodic ceremonies to honor “fallen heroes” at the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo. If nothing else, they added another layer of legitimacy to the admitted losses at Rabaul. Sixteen men from the South Seas Detachment, all below the rank of warrant officer, were killed in action; and two officers and forty-six men were wounded. Among the naval forces, only one fighter pilot from the Kaga, Flying Petty Officer Second Class Isao Hiraishi, was lost on January 23.

  According to the Australian nominal rolls, fifty-seven men were killed in action, of which forty-one belonged to the 2/22nd Battalion. Among the attached units of Lark Force, the antiaircraft gunners suffered the heaviest losses with seven killed.

  Few specific details exist about individual casualties. Bandsman Jack Stebbings, for example, was simply listed as “killed while riding.” Assigned as a dispatch rider, he was delivering messages at the time of his death, but whether he was the victim of a marauding Zero or Japanese soldiers was not recorded. Overall, the number killed in actual combat at Vulcan or Raluana Point is thought to be relatively low, which indicates that numerous casualties occurred on the roads. No matter how they were killed, the dead remained where they fell.

  The number of Australians wounded that day has never been accurately determined. Some who could walk were able to escape into the jungle with the assistance of other troops. Graham Parsons, bleeding badly from bullet wounds in his chest and neck, had plenty of help as he made his way toward the north coast of New Britain. Those who were immobilized, however, had almost no chance of getting away—the terrain was simply too rugged. Most of the sick and wounded were therefore captured, sometimes along with a medical orderly or friend who volunteered to stay with them. Fifteen of the former bandsmen serving as stretcher bearers were taken prisoner in that fashion, including the only American-born member of Lark Force, Private Jim Thurst.

  Inevitably, some of the captured Australians regretted their decision to stay rather than evade. None were prepared for the ruthless behavior of their captors, who deeply loathed Caucasians but abhorred the concept of surrender even more. Those emotions, combined with the Japanese soldiers’ belief in their own superiority, made them capable of horrific brutalities.

  There is no question that the Japanese acted savagely on January 23. Tolai natives witnessed an incident in which “some retreating Australians were killed in a fight and their heads were cut with axes, bellies sliced open, and limbs removed with bayonets.” Although no other statements have surfaced to corroborate this particular incident, independent confirmation is unnecessary. Over the next several weeks, members of Lark Force would witness more than enough atrocities to give the account plenty of credibility.

  THE JAPANESE WERE QUICK TO PUBLICIZE THEIR VICTORY, BEGINNING WITH an official statement from Imperial General Headquarters on the afternoon of January 24: “The Imperial Army and the Imperial Navy in cooperative fashion eliminated the enemy’s resistance and successfully landed in Rabaul, New Britain Island, in the east of New Guinea before dawn on 23 January. They are steadily extending their gains.”

  Despite the fact that several hundred Australians had escaped into the jungle, General Horii was certain his troops would hunt them down. So far the invasion had been conducted with almost surgical precision, and victory was guaranteed.

  To honor their glorious campaign, the men of the South Seas Detachment composed an emotion-filled victory song titled “Nankai Dayori” (“Tidings from the South Seas”)

  First to cross the Equator,

  Our unit of vigorous youth from Shikoku.

  Far from home, in the South Seas,

  The Rising Sun flag fluttering brightly

  Over Rabaul, New Britain.

  Like a maiden’s breast,

  Rising kindly over the gulf,

  The fiery volcano beckons.

  The pure hearts of young brave men

  Think of the smoke in their homeland.

  Push on into the jungle,

  Bananas, papayas, and coconut milk,

  Enjoy the taste of bounteous nature;

  Nostal
gic we would push on

  To our mothers in our villages.

  After a passing squall,

  A rainbow on Branch Gulf,

  When at last all the enemy bombs

  Are heard receding in the distant sky,

  Beautiful smokescreen blooms with the rainbow.

  Just below the Equator

  We are under the Southern Cross.

  The warrior’s blood runs hot

  As the Rising Sun flag advances.

  Ahead the enemy pleads for his life under a white flag.

  A brisk divine breeze blowing

  Towards Australia at the limit of the south.

  The ultimate place to reach.

  The dawn of a new world,

  Not quickly but faintly

  *Webster’s ethnic wisecrack was more accurate than he knew. Japanese soldiers went into battle with “emergency rations” for five days, including 1/2 pound of hard candy, a package of hard tack, and a small sack of polished rice. Additionally, the landing orders of the South Seas Detachment required every soldier to carry a two-day supply of Field Ration B, which included more than a pound of rice.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  YOU WILL ONLY DIE

  “Each day we felt ourselves growing weaker…”

  —Captain David Selby, Antiaircraft Battery

  After Colonel Scanlan and his party left Tomavatur, Bill Harry was one of the few men left at the headquarters site. His decision to stay behind proved wise. Captain McLeod and Lieutenant Figgis showed up an hour or so later expecting to find the colonel still in charge; and shortly thereafter Major Mollard and ten more men arrived in an army truck and a civilian taxi. All were curious about Scanlan’s whereabouts. Harry’s answer was simple: The colonel and his staff had walked off, and he didn’t know where they were.

  As the senior officer on the scene, Mollard took charge of the group. He decided to conduct a recon to the rim of the caldera, and placed Harry on point as they moved along a narrow track that brought them to Blanche Bay just west of Kokopo. The view of enemy activity was astonishing. “Great quantities of Japanese shipping were in the harbor and minesweepers were methodically sweeping the area,” remembered Harry. “Large numbers of enemy troops were ashore with trucks and armored fighting vehicles, and consolidation of the area they had so recently gained was well under way.”

  The party returned to Tomavatur at dusk. From the hilltop they could see the glare of headlights as Japanese vehicles moved onto Vunakanau airdrome. Obviously, the plateau was in enemy hands. To avoid capture, Mollard and his party would have to find a way off the island.

  The most logical escape route from Tomavatur was south toward the coast. A network of roads led as far as the Warangoi River, from which point the Australians would have to walk or take boats to Wide Bay. There, rumor had it, the evaders might be picked up by the RAAF. The total distance to Wide Bay was more than seventy miles, and the Australians would be hunted every step of the way by Japanese planes and roving infantry patrols.

  An alternative escape route was southwest to Malabunga Mission. From there, native footpaths led to Lemingi, a Roman Catholic mission high in the Baining Mountains. More trails branched out from Lemingi to Open Bay on New Britain’s north coast or Wide Bay to the south.

  Aside from Bill Harry, who had hiked among the mountains with the Reverend John Poole, few people in Lark Force knew enough about the territory to make an informed decision. For John Mollard, however, the choice was obvious: his primary goal was to find Hugh Mackenzie and the precious two-way radio, reported to be somewhere near Malabunga Mission.

  Just as darkness began to settle over the hilltop, privates Webster, Kelleher, and Searle stumbled in, exhausted after escaping from the Japanese ambush on the Kokopo Ridge Road. They shared their story, then everyone boarded the two vehicles for the trip to Malabunga Mission. Starting up the Glade Road toward Vunakanau, they moved slowly past the airdrome under the cover of a heavy downpour. They encountered no Japanese patrols on that miserable night, but the road became so slick that the taxi skidded into a ditch just beyond Malabunga Junction. The whole group crowded aboard the truck, and the driver turned on headlights for a wild dash over the last few miles of road.

  Arriving at Malabunga Mission, Mollard’s party found the compound deserted except for two men holed up in an abandoned native hospital. Tom Connop, one of the oldest privates in the 2/22nd, had suffered a badly broken leg earlier in the day. One of Major Palmer’s field ambulances had picked him up, but the bumpy ride had been excruciating. When the “meat wagon” reached the mission hospital, Connop was offloaded and doped with morphine to make him as comfortable as possible. There was no hope of moving him through the jungle, so Private Albert “Pop” Thomas, a London-born dental assistant, volunteered to remain at his side.

  Mollard’s party drove on for another mile and spent the night in a leaky native hut, then rose at dawn and continued on their journey. Soon the truck came to a fork in the road. To the right, a rough track led uphill to Kalas, the Methodist mission run by Reverend Poole. The main road, such as it was, continued a short distance to its terminus at the village of Rabata, situated on the upper reaches of the Warangoi River.

  Getting down from the truck, “Tusker” McLeod, Peter Figgis, and Bill Harry hiked uphill toward Kalas to see if any friendly troops had gone in that direction. Soon they found an abandoned staff car, identified as Lieutenant Colonel Carr’s, an encouraging sign that Mackenzie and the all-important radio were up ahead. But only a few paces up the trail they found the radio itself—smashed to pieces.

  Disheartened, the three men continued to Kalas. At the large, well-maintained compound, they were met by what Harry described as “a concerned group of missionaries, all neatly attired in white and awaiting the arrival of the Japanese.” John Poole and two other Methodist ministers, along with two businessmen from Rabaul, had decided to give themselves up. They shared a cup of tea with the soldiers, then explained what had recently happened. Mackenzie and Carr had indeed passed through Kalas, where they tried to hire native porters to help carry the radio. But none could be found, as most of the Tolai had disappeared into the jungle when the invasion started. With great reluctance, Mackenzie had destroyed the radio rather than let it fall into enemy hands.

  The missionaries, afraid to be caught harboring Australian soldiers, were anxious to see the three men off. Bill Harry urged John Poole to join them, but the other two ministers interjected. The reverends Laurie McArthur, head of the Methodist missions on New Britain, and Laurie Linggood, who ran another mission station on the coast, explained why they were surrendering: four Australian women from the ministry had gone to Vunapope with the hospital staff two days earlier, and they were now prisoners. The pastors were determined to accept the same fate.

  McLeod, Figgis, and Harry bid them all good luck and walked southward. The next day they caught up with Carr and Mackenzie in the village of Riat, swelling the total group to twenty-one individuals. In addition to Mackenzie and his naval signalers, the party included William B. “Bruce” Ball, the commissioner of police on New Britain, and two riflemen from the NGVR.

  Mollard’s group had not yet reached the village, which was fortunate. The men gathered at Riat had already run out of army rations and were subsisting on whatever they could barter from local villagers. Within two days of the invasion, the specter of starvation was already looming large.

  Many soldiers were surprised to discover that the jungle, for all its lush vegetation, would not feed them. It was actually “a desert” in the words of Lieutenant Commander Feldt, who had spent twenty years among the islands. “At its best,” he wrote, “the food the jungle can supply is only enough to sustain life, and under a prolonged diet of jungle food, mental and physical vigor decline until there is no ability left to do more than barely support life itself.”

  When their provisions ran low, evading soldiers turned to native-grown vegetables such as kau-kau, a close relative of the sweet potat
o, and taro, a broadleaf plant resembling a lily. The tubers were loaded with starch but lacked calories, and taro had to be cooked to a sticky paste in order to eliminate poisonous calcium oxalate. Other commonly grown foods included coconuts, papaya, sugar cane, and cassava roots, which yielded tapioca. There was very little meat available on the island, and although some villagers had pigs and fowl, they were not considered a regular part of the native diet.

  McLeod, Figgis, and Harry could see that Carr and the others at Riat were in no hurry to move on. The general state of lethargy was made worse by heavy rains which had fallen for several days, and the combination of sodden conditions and lack of food was brutal on morale. Deciding to move on, the three newcomers hiked to Rabata on January 27 to look for John Mollard. The village was empty, but Mollard’s vehicle was parked among a jumble of abandoned trucks, some of which still held plenty of canned rations. McLeod returned to Riat and obtained some help to transfer the food back to Carr and his dispirited group.

  Figgis and Harry remained near the Warangoi River for a few days before returning to Riat on the 29th. However, despite the additional rations, there had been no improvement in morale among Carr’s party. “The only plan,” noted Harry, “was to eventually trek across the Baining Mountains to the south coast.” No one had a timetable, and some of the men believed there was nothing to gain even if they crossed the rugged mountains. In their dejected condition, they believed it was better to simply wait for the Japanese to come. A few actually talked of returning to Rabaul under a white flag.

  This was exactly what Major General Horii wanted. On the afternoon of the invasion, he had taken pains to dictate a warning to the retreating Australians. Printed on leaflets, the persuasive message was airdropped with remarkable efficiency and reached hundreds of Australians. Few, however, took the warning seriously: