Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Walter Robert Neville (Bob) Mountford was born 10 November 1924 at Willowie, South Australia, fourth son of Sidney Herbert and Ellen Elizabeth (nee Morgan) Mountford. Sidney established a blacksmith shop at Willowie in January of 1923. 

Bob was single when he enlisted with the RAAF 17 February 1943, aged 18 years. At the time of his enlistment he listed his  occupation as a labourer.

Reporting for duty at No. 1 Recruit Depot, Shepparton, he was then shifted to Service Training Schools in Melbourne and Sydney for three months, where he undertook training as an Aircraft Fitter. In November of 1943 he was posted to Central Gunnery School at Cressy, Victoria, before being billeted to 2 Embarkation Depot at Bradfield Park, (now Lindfield) New South Wales.

Bob left Australia 14 February 1944 posted to No. 7 Transport and Movements Office, on Kiriwina, the largest of the Trobriand islands, in the Milne Bay province. He was based here for four months before being transferred to No 11 Repair and Salvage Unit (RSU), located at Nadzab, 33 miles inland from Lae in Papua New Guinea, on the 11th of June 1944. The unit was known as “Taylors Tigers” after Wing Commander C.R.Taylor, the Commanding Officer. Aircraft repaired included Vultee Vengeance, Curtis Kittyhawks, and Boomerang fighters (Australian designed and built) as well as Bristol Beaufort torpedo bombers.

Four months later, 21 October 1944, Bob was on the move again to Noemfoor, one of the Schoeton Islands in Papua Province, Western New Guinea, with the 22nd RSU and then back to the 11 RSU. He was based here until 22 April 1945.

It would be assumed that Bob was in the advance party that moved to Tarakan, as the main party of No. 11 RSU didn’t commence its move to Tarakan Island until early May. The airstrip at Tarakan was never completed satisfactorily, so most of the combat aircraft of the 1st Tactical Air Force were forced to remain in place at Morotai, well beyond effective operational time scales. This resulted in a constant movement of aircraft between Morotai and Tarakan with a consequent spasmodic aircraft maintenance workload for No. 11 R.S.U. to perform at Tarakan. Bob was based here until the 18 October 1945, when he returned to Australia, and No. 4 Personnel Dept – Adelaide.

Bob didn’t talk much about his service, although he did recount one event where they were sent in to construct a runway and he said it turned out to be a mozzie infested swamp! It could be reasonably assumed he did not hold the Americans in very high esteem for their planning prowess!

He also spoke highly of the indigenous people of New Guinea who worked with the Australian forces to repel the advancing Japanese war machine. They were a people who did not like the Japanese, who would shoot them in the feet so that they could not help the Australians.

Bob was discharged from the RAAF 12 November 1945. He initially obtained employment with Philmac, a pipe fitting company in Adelaide, before sharefarming with his brother Sidney John (Jack), in the Inman Valley, near Victor Harbor. Bob decided to get a job in Victor Harbor as there was insufficient work and income on the farm to sustain him as well as Jack and his family. It was here that he met his wife Joan Trewin-Sampson. Bob married Joan at Victor Harbor 27 March 1948. They went on to have six children.

As land was expensive near Victor Harbor (where Joan was from), Bob came to Western Australia, where his other brother Herbert Lloyd (Snow) lived. Bob used Snow's home as a base to ride his motor bike out to look at properties, initially in the Moora and Merredin area which possibly reminded him of Willowie where he grew up. He finally settled on some land at Donnybrook in 1951. The family moved over there February 1952. They built up a dairy and purchased two further properties, one adjoining and one opposite. On the death of Joan in 1994 Bob could not settle without her. Visiting his brother regularly back in SA, on one occasion he met Shirley Pearce, whose husband died in 1994. Bob and Shirley eventually married in her home garden 29 April 2006.

Bob died 22 January, 2009 aged 87 years at Glen Osmond, South Australia. His ashes were interred next to his wife Joan, at Donnybrook Cemetery, Western Australia.

Excerpt taken from book "Diggers From the Dust" (2018) Di Barrie & Andrew Barrie