Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Sapper William Anderson was the son of Michael Joseph Anderson and Elizabeth (nee Kemp) and was born in Charters Towers, Queensland. Spr Anderson was a Salesman, he enlisted in June 1940 and served with the 2/11th Field Company. In December 1941 2/11th Field Company was sent to Ambon as part of “Gull Force” and Spr Anderson was reported missing on 2 February 1942, taken prisoner of war at Laha.

Gull Force was formed with the following attachments joining the 2/21st Battalion: C Troop 18th Anti-tank battery, 3 sections of the Field Coy, 1 section of the Australian Army Service Corps, 2/12th Field Ambulance Detachment, 23rd Special Dental Unit, and 104 Light Aid Detachment.

Gull Force was sent to Ambon to defend the strategic island's harbour and air strip. In January 1942 an overwhelmingly larger Japanese force of approximately 20,000 men landed on the Island. Some members of Gull Force were sent to defend the air strip at Laha on the western side of the bay and after a series of short but fierce battles, fighting on Ambon Island ceased on 2 February 1942. During this conflict, 47 men were killed in action, 11 escaped, 5 managed to join the rest of the force on the other side of the Island, and 229 were massacred after surrendering.

During the conflict on the other side of the Island, 7 members of Gull Force were killed in action, 804 became Prisoners of War. Of that number 267 were subsequently taken to the Chinese Island of Hainan, where 86 died as prisoners.

Investigations after the war determined it was impossible to positively identify many of the remains found at Laha and these ‘war dead’ were declared “became missing and for Official Purposes Presumed to be Dead, 20 February 1942”. The remains which were found were reinterred in the Ambon War Cemetery.