Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Dad and WWII.

Dad told us that when he went to enlist in the Army, he was worried the Army may have height and weight minimums and he may not meet them. At the recruitment centre, a big bloke said to Dad “Don't worry”. He put his hands under Dad's arms and lifted him slightly - “Yep, you meet the height minimum.” Next Dad stood on the scales to be weighed. A big foot appeared on the scales next to Dad's feet - “Yep, you meet the weight minimum.” So Dad was accepted into the Army.

Dad started life as a southpaw, left hander. For writing, he was converted to right handedness, but preferred to shave with his left hand AND a cut throat razor. At camp, Dad would arrive at the shaving bench and set down his shaving ear. It was a long bench and blokes lined up each side of it. As he started shaving, he found it very entertaining to watch the bloke opposite. The bloke opposite would have his eyes fixed on the cut throat razor, in Dad's left hand. Often, as the shave progressed, the other bloke's eyes would widen and when they reached their limit, the other bloke would pick up his gear and move to the other end of the bench. Took a while for them to get used to Dad's shaving method.

They were on the way to another training site and came to a creek. Quite a depth of water in the creek, but not to worry, these were high clearance vehicles. Yep, the vehicles were high clearance, but not the radiator fans. The fans are made to move air however, when under water, the blades are not strong enough to move water. The blades folded forward, and when the blades folded, they carved up the radiators. A few trucks went through the creek before anyone realised there was a problem. A way was found to stop the same thing happening to the rest of the trucks. Those that got through had to tow the damaged trucks. They arrived at camp after a bit after dark, after a longer than expected day. It had been hot and dusty and when they found that the camp was on a creek bank and there was water in the creek – right – swim time. Joy! Splash about, get a mouth full of water and squirt it out to get the dust out of their mouths. It didn't taste too good so they didn't drink much of it. Next day they went to the creek again, but pulled up quick. It wasn't a flowing creek. It was just a large and very stagnant pool, complete with all the vegetation that grows in stagnant water. Plus cattle and animals footprints were around and in to the water. Remembering back to the what they did the night before, when they had that water in their mouths, made their stomachs do flip flops. Fortunately nobody got physically sick. There was no more swimming until the rains flushed the creek. Rain – mixed blessing – made the creek great to swim in: living in a tent became miserable.

Another company had been there and left the tents up. The boys found tin cans in each tent. No label, no idea what had been in them, no idea why they were there. But smell; they were foul. The boys had great delight in pitching the tins as far as they could. The night turned bitterly cold. Well it seemed that way to North Queenslanders. Their kidneys shifted into overdrive to fill their bladders. At some time in the night each bloke woke with the feeling he was about to burst. At first, nobody got far out of bed before slipping back and pulling up the blankets. Each bloke then had to decide - what was worse – getting out of bed in the cold or putting up with the feeling he was about to burst? As each bloke debated what to do, he came to realise what the tin cans were for. Next morning, the boys were out searching for the tin cans.

Before leaving Australia, the boys had to have shots to protect them against foreign diseases. Instead of turning the blokes into pincushions, they received only one needle. It was placed in the arm, then the syringes were screwed on to the needle, one after the other. Not something to look forward to. The Doc was small bloke, (probably rivalled Dad in height) with small hands. He was unable hold syringes in one hand. To watch him screw the syringes on, one after the other, and pump the syringes with two hands turned a lot of faces pale. Dad wondered how many blokes were ahead of him, so he looked under the arm of the bloke in front. At that moment, the bloke in front fainted, caught Dad's neck under his arm, and dragged Dad to the floor with him. The other bloke had to be hauled off Dad before he could get back on his feet.

In true Aussie tradition, the tallest bloke in the Company was nicknamed “Tiny”. Dad came in at the opposite end of the height scale. While wading through swamps in New Guinea, he would follow Tiny. Dad used Tiny as a depth gauge. When the water got above Tiny's belt, Dad had to find another way through the swamp. The water would be almost to Dad's nose.

Dad told us this story. One of their men was shot in a river and drifted away before he could be rescued. They wanted to retrieve the body so he could be given a decent burial. The local natives were asked if they could watch for the body. The witchdoctor heard of the request and came to help. He plucked a few hairs from his head and dropped them in a puddle. The motion of the hairs was studied intently then he told the Aussies where the body would be found, what day, even an approximate time. The body was found where indicated on the day and at the time stated. Dad wondered for the rest of his days – was it really magic or did the witchdoctor have a very good knowledge of the river and its eddies and swirls?. OK, they had found the body, but they were reluctant to shift it. It had been in water for a few days and recovery was not going to be pleasant. The search party went back to camp to report the find and to discuss what to do next. Someone remembered there was a bloke in the Company who was an undertaker's son. It was thought he may have had the most experience in this sort of thing, so the decision was made – the undertaker's son was sent to retrieve the body. Dad told the story at a number of reunions over the years but nobody could remember the incident. Finally at one reunion, a bloke spoke up “I remember the incident. I remember it very well. I was the undertaker's son.”

Some of the blokes had false teeth. The natives were very impressed (“blown away”, “gobsmacked” I think we would say today) to see the blokes take out their teeth and put them back in. One bloke had a glass eye. Can you imagine the reaction when he took out the glass eye, washed it, and put it back in?

Early one morning, while still half asleep, thinking about other things, Dad was walking on a track near camp. He felt slight pressure on his leg and heard a click. Hell! Grenade booby trap! He ran as he had never run before. Seconds later the grenade went off, but Dad was long gone. He was still doing a fair rate of knots when he ran past the OC's tent. Eventually he got the adrenaline rush under control, slowed down and started back past the OC's tent. A voice came from the tent “Ashworth, don't do that again.”

Dad “Sorry Sir, I'll be more careful when near the booby traps in future.”

OC “That's not what I'm talking about. Don't run past my tent like that. You create too much dust. Don't do it again.”

This incident showed up a weakness in the booby trap system. Grenades take several seconds to go off after being triggered - time for the person who triggered it to run away (fortunate for Dad on the occasion above). A new system was needed. The solution arrived – packages of explosive, fuse and a device to light the fuse when the wire was tripped. They were already assembled and just had to be set up in place. Dad thought the fuses were too long. The enemy would still have time to get away. Before setting each device, he shortened the fuse. He was cautious but not overly concerned about his safety. Before touching each fuse, he checked the area for shelter in case a spark ignited the fuse. He'd be right if he moved fast. After setting all the traps, he went back to camp and advised someone up the chain of command that he had shortened the fuses. That's when he was advised the traps were made with instantaneous fuse. He hadn't seen that stuff before. That's why the fuse looked different. As for having time to get away in case of an accident, well, forget it. Instantaneous fuse is instantaneous.

Dad had some experience with dynamite during the war. He remembers the first time he handled it. He didn't know it contained nitroglycerine. He didn't know that nitroglycerine could be absorbed through the skin. He didn't know that nitroglycerine dilated blood vessels and could cause horrific headaches. He went to the Doc convinced something terrible was happening. The doc asked a few questions then laughed and said “You have a headache. That's good. It proves you have a brain in your head.” Much later in life, narrowed blood vessels in his heart made it necessary for Dad to once again become acquainted with nitro and nitro headaches.

One day, Dad went to the waterhole to get fresh water. A burst of machine gun fire cracked past, just over his head. He raced back to camp and a group of men came back to investigate. They found the Japs had set up a gun on a tripod. They had aimed it with the average Aussie bloke's height in mind then locked the tripod, and placed foliage in front of the gun. The gun was not visible to the Aussies and the target was not visible to the Japs, but the gun was locked on target, they thought. Luckily for Dad, he was shorter than average. He lived to tell the tale. Several years after Dad's death (aged 88), a large man, 6ft 6in (2 metres in today's talk) told me the same story, but it was different. In this version, Dad told him he had mates with him and Dad arrived back in camp with his mates' brains spattered on his clothes. He went back out with mates to get even, and they did. This man, who had also been to war somewhere, said that if he had closed his eyes, he would have thought the story was being told by a person far larger, taller and uglier than him. Such was the power of THIS version of Dad's story. Apparently the version our family heard had been “sanitised”. I wonder how many other stories we never heard because they could not be sanitised.

Dad was a happy bloke. He could laugh and joke with the best of us, but he never showed sorrow or grief. “Sounds like a person who has been to war and seen too much” said a bloke who had been to Vietnam and had seen how some of his mates suffered from the experience. Dad's wife died unexpectedly. His face became very neutral and he became very quiet for a number of days. Years later, gun laws made it impractical if not impossible for him to keep his old 303 Army rifle. Handing it in for destruction was NOT an option. I suggested having it rendered safe and giving it to the RSL. That met with a very definite NO. I got the impression the rifle was not to be harmed. They had been through the war together. It had been like a faithful companion. He found a gun dealer who would take it in exchange for the certificate that proved he had handed it in. He didn't receive any payment for it. He just wanted the rifle to be safe as possible. He did the best he could for it. Dad had given up his drivers licence, so I drove him home. His face looked very neutral and he was very quiet on the way home. What had they been through together?

At the end of the war, Dad's company went to Nauru Island to send the Japs on the island home. As they approach the island, they kept the ship's guns aimed at the island in case the Japs decided to fight on. When they got to shore, they found the Japs' guns were at least twice the size of theirs. They would have been in trouble if the Japs had fought. As it turned out, the Japs were glad to see the Aussies. The Jap diet for the past several months had consisted mainly of pumpkin. They were sick of it and additional rations from the Aussies were very welcome.

The Japs on Nauru made an alcoholic brew out of coconut milk. Dad put a drop on his tongue. It burnt all the way down his throat. Dad had found a motorbike and had thoughts of inspecting the island, but travel was limited by a shortage of fuel. He got an idea – would the bike run on the home brew? Yep. It did. Ran well. He got to see the island.

Len had a very wide range of interests – machinery, motors (electric, petrol, diesel), boats, cars, everything. The war gave him the opportunity to collect all sorts of things that he thought could be useful during the war and for back home because he had the ability to repair or make just about anything. When he was about to ship home from Rabaul Papua New Guinea, he found he had so many souvenirs and could not stand up after gathering the load. He gave away items until he could walk. To get aboard the ship in the harbour they had to climb up the side of the boat on rope landing nets. The Americans on the ship had sturdy lads on deck to help our fellows over the rail. One fastened on to Len and hauled him on to the deck. He said "Buddy, for a small guy, you carry a lot of ballast".

Long live Aussie ingenuity, the Aussie yarn and Aussie sense of humour. Oh! And let's not forget Aussie mateship. - Jim Ashworth

Jim Ashworth (Len's son)

P.O. Box 87

Home Hill, Qld. 4806

(07) 47821177