Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Life before the war

Thomas Parea Rowe was born on the 28th of April 1923 to Henry “Harry” Rowe and Annie Elena Nielsen in Geelong, Victoria. Sometime before 1928 the family moved to South Australia and resided in Semaphore (Ancestry Website). On the 19th of January 1928, his sister Tessie Dawn Rowe was born when Thomas was 3 years old. Thomas was very close to his sister as she was his only sibling (Henderson, S. 2023). Thomas was only 11 years old when on the 12th of July 1934 his sister Tessie Dawn Rowe went in for routine surgery to have her tonsils removed. Tragically she passed away at only 6 years of age, with the coroner’s report stating an allergic reaction to her anaesthetic (Ancestry Website). Thomas took the death of his sister hard as did his parents and her death may have had an impact on Thomas’s behaviour in his teens. At 12 years of age in 1935 he was fined by the police for trespassing (Ancestry Website) and in 1941 at 17 years old for attempting to break into a store, he was fined 1 pound and 10 shillings on this occasion (Ancestry Website).

By 1941 World War 2 had already been in motion for 2 years, having commenced on the 1st of September 1939 with Germany invading Poland. At 17 years of age Thomas had left school and was working as a driver’s assistant. By 1942 Australia was in a position of defence with the Japanese bombing Darwin on the 19th of February. All Australians were being called to get 100% behind the war efforts and those over 20 years of age to enlist in the army (Anzac Day Commemorative Committee). In 1942 Thomas was only turning 18 in April but desperately wanted to join his fellow Australians and fight in the war. He enlisted in Hindmarsh, South Australia and on his forms he purposely misspelt his last name to Roe and changed his birth date to 1921, in order to be 20 years old and old enough to enlist. Little did he know the horrors he’d face.

Life during and after the war

Thomas was taken on strength on the 13th of May 1942 and was attached to the 2/5th infantry battalion (National Australian Archives). However, Thomas would not be sent abroad straight away and spent the first two years of his service time in Australia. It can be assumed that Thomas was training at that time. It was not until November 1944 that Thomas would leave Australia to fight in the pacific.

On the 24th of November 1944 Thomas embarked to Aitape, New Guinea from Cairns, Australia on the MV Duntroon as part of the Aitape-Wewak campaign and arrived on the 29th of November. The role of the battalion was to relieve the United States at Aitape and to protect base facilities (Australian Bureau of Statistics).

 However, Australian Commanders opted to advance to the east of Aitape to destroy the remnants of the Japanese 18th Army (Australian War Memorial).  “The resulting operations were characterised by prolonged small-scale patrolling, often in particularly arduous conditions” (Australian War Memorial).

Sometime between the 23rd and the 25th of February 1945, Thomas was searching, what they thought was an abandoned village, checking for Japanese soldiers around Bauputa, when he opened the door to one of the village huts and was shot by a Japanese soldier laying on the ground (Henderson, S. and National Australian Archives). The bullet penetrated his left thigh and when it exited it entered his right thigh. One of Thomas’s fellow soldiers who was also searching the village alongside him ran to his aid and shot the soldier who shot Thomas. Thomas’s fellow soldier took the Japanese soldier’s wallet which contained a Japanese yen, which he gave to Thomas and Thomas kept his whole life (Henderson, S.).

Thomas was admitted to Australian General Hospital in New Guinea where he received treatment for his gunshot wounds. On his service and casualty forms, it notes on the 2nd of March, 1945 that his wounds were ‘uncomplicated’.  On the 13th of April he was transferred to the Convalescent Depot, which was where injured soldiers went to recover and rehabilitate. On the 29th of April, 1945 he embarked in Lae, New Guinea to return to Australia and disembarked in Townsville, QLD before returning to South Australia (National Australian Archives).

In late 1945 while stationed in SA, Thomas would meet a young woman named Marjorie McQuillan while off duty and the two started dating. On the 17th of January 1946 Thomas Rowe was discharged from the army after serving for 3 years and seven months. Shortly after this Thomas and Marjorie married and in October that year, welcomed their first Child Jean, Thomas and Marjorie would go on to have 4 more children, Joan in 1948, Patricia in 1952, Rosemary in 1957, and Sonya in 1968. After the war Thomas became a skin classer where he sorted wool, leather and hide into different classes for manufacturing (McManus, R.). 

Although Thomas survived the war it left its mark on him, both physically and mentally. During his time in the tropics of new Guinea he contracted malaria which would flare up every once in a while, for the rest of his life. Thomas would on occasion sleepwalk and dream that he was still fighting in the war, with his daughter Rosemary recalling a time she woke up to hear him punching the wardrobe in the middle of the night. Thomas had a very strict rule in the house that nothing was allowed into the house that was made in Japan. Thomas was also a heavy drinker and would often go to the pub with friends who served with him in the war (Corrigan, J.). It can be assumed that Thomas’s drinking was at very least partially caused by his time in the war and the trauma of losing mates. Thomas also loved to getaway and fish with his mates and his father who was a keen fisherman. Thomas rarely spoke about the war but had recalled stories of the Japanese soldiers jumping out of trees and attacking them and watching his mates die. His daughter Joan recalls that he would say “One minute your mates are there and the next they are dead with bullets” (David, J.).

Thomas was to go through another family tragedy in 1952 when on the 28th of October his father Henry ‘Harry’ Thomas Rowe drowned at 50 years of age while out fishing with a mate off Birkenhead, SA (Ancestry Website and Trove).  

Sometime before 1980 Thomas developed bowl cancer but unfortunately didn’t go to a doctor until it was too late for treatment. Thomas Parea Rowe passed away on the 15th of June 1981 at the age 58 years old (Ruggiero, R.). 

References - Websites

Ancestry Website – Thomas Parea Rowe

https://www.ancestry.com.au/search/?name=Thomas+Parea_Rowe&birth=1924_geelong-victoria-australia_95550&death=1981_adelaide-south+australia-australia_92210&child=Jean_Corrigan&child2=Joan_Davis&child3=Patricia+Anne_Rowe&child4=Rosemary+Pretoria_Rowe&child5=Sonya_Henderson&father=Henry+Harry+Thomas_Rowe&gender=m&mother=Annie+Elena_Nielsen&priority=australian&searchType=t&sibling=Tessie+Dawn_Rowe+&spouse=Marjorie+Pretoria+Annie_Rowe&treePerson=30210413_12250189502

Ancestry Website – Reports to the Police Coroner, 1842 – 1961 for Tessie Dawn Rowe

https://www.ancestry.com.au/imageviewer/collections/62316/images/62316_b1111295-00480?pId=9410

Ancestry Website – Reports to the Coroner, 1842 – 1961 for Harry Thomas Rowe

https://www.ancestry.com.au/imageviewer/collections/62316/images/62316_b1111334-00445?pId=18928

Ancestry Website – South Australian Police Gazettes 1862 to 1947 (1935)

https://www.ancestry.com.au/imageviewer/collections/60970/images/44401_b219865-00473?pId=281045

Ancestry Website – South Australian Police Gazettes 1862 to 1947 (1941)

https://www.ancestry.com.au/imageviewer/collections/60970/images/44401_b219871-00116?pId=51892

Anzac Day Commemoration Committee

https://anzacday.org.au/ww2-1942-an-overview-of-the-battle-for-australia

Australian Bureau of Statistics

https://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/[email protected]/featurearticlesbytitle/6174449DF6ACC670CA2569DE0020331A?OpenDocument

Australian War Memorial “Anzac Spirit”

https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/encyclopedia/anzac/spirit

Australian War Memorial, 2/5 Australian Infantry Battalion

https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/U56048

Department of Veteran Affairs – Anzac Portal

https://anzacportal.dva.gov.au/wars-and-missions/ww1/personnel/anzac-legend

Department of Veteran Affairs - World War 2 Service

https://nominal-rolls.dva.gov.au/veteran?id=681716&c=WW2#R

National Archives of Australia Records Search – Thomas Roe Service Records

https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=6393281

Oxford Languages

https://languages.oup.com/google-dictionary-en/

References - Interviews

David, Joan – Interview with Joan David, daughter, Sunday April 2nd, 2023

Henderson, Sonya – Interview with Sonya Henderson, daughter, on Sunday, April 2nd 2023

Ruggiero, Rachel – Interview with Rachel Ruggiero, granddaughter, on Friday April 29th 2023

McManus, Rosemary – Interview with Rosemary McManus, daughter, Thursday, April 20th, 2023.

References – Text Messages

Corrigan, Jean – Text message with Jean Corrigan, daughter, Thursday May 18th, 2023.