Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Lest We Forget
Sons and daughters of Herberton.
In honour of some of the grandchildren of Dr Walter Stephen and Sarah Ann Smith, and children of Samuel Jackson Christopher and Ivy Dorothy Smith of Lillyvale, Herberton.
They all came home except A.I.F. Sister Lillian Winifred Smith who died 17 June 1945 from leukemia in Brisbane after serving in New Guinea. She is buried at Lutwyche Cemetery, Brisbane and remembered on the Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour Panel 96.
Samuel Douglas (Doc) Smith: A.I.F., Australian Army 1941 joined 2/2 Tank Attack Regiment R.A., and saw service in Egypt and later as a Commando in New Guinea. He disembarked in the Middle East 25 September 1941 and was deployed to Port Moresby, New Guinea on the 5 October 1942. He left Port Moresby on the Canberra on the 2 April 1944, arriving Sydney 9 April 1944 and embarked again at Brisbane on the 25 September 1944 for Bougainville arriving on the 3 October 1944 on the Lew Wallace returning to 5 June 1945. Doc Smith is buried in Herberton.
Noel Lionel Smith Warrant Officer Royal Australian Air Force, attended All Souls Anglican School Charters Towers before joining the R.A.A.F., on 9 September 1942 at 18 years of age. Initially an Aircraftman Class 11, he made Sergeant, Airman Pilot 21 November 1943, Flight Sergeant Airman Pilot 21 April 1944 and Warrant Officer Airman Pilot 21 April 1945. He was posted to Kittyhawk Squadron 450 Harassers operating in Egypt Western Desert and in Italy. Noel Smith is buried in Herberton.
Leslie Jackson Christopher Smith Leslie served in the R.A.A.F. and served in the Army of Occupation in Okinawa Japan. Leslie Smith is buried in Katoomba, N.S.W..
Sister Valerie Elizabeth Smith, Fellow of the Royal College of Nursing London; Fellow of the College of Nursing Australia1949, nursed at the Innisfail District Hospital and Cairns General Hospital before joining the Australian Imperial Force (A.I.F.), enlisting in the 13th Australian General Hospital (A.G.H.) of the 8th Division. She was called up on 25 April 1941 and posted to Malaya. For about four months she worked in the Army Hospital on the Exhibition Grounds, Brisbane and then at Kangaroo Point in the old Immigration Buildings under the Storey Bridge. These were the first Queensland Army Hospitals.
Lieutenant Sister Valerie Elizabeth Smith boarded the Hospital Ship ‘Wangaratta” and headed for Perth where they were posted to a new unit the 13th A.G.H., and destined for Singapore.
On arrival most of the nurses were taken to St Patricks School Katong for two weeks and then on to the Jahore Mental Hospital where they had been given two wards in which to work. In January 1942 they transferred back to St Patricks and on the morning of 12 February they were ordered to pack their kits for evacuation by their Matron. Their evacuation ship was the Rajah of Sarawak’s pleasure launch the Vyner Brooke.
Leaving Singapore, the Vyner Brooke, displaying the Red Cross insignias, was bombed in the Banka Strait on the 12 February 1942. Valerie survived three and half years imprisoned in Sumatra before being repatriated in Singapore and Perth. Her courage and initiative earned her a Mentioned in Dispatches medal.
Valerie made Bully, for her dear friend, Australian army nurse Betty Jeffrey of 2/10 Australian General Hospital, as a present for her birthday on 14 May 1945, while they were prisoners of war near Loebek Linggau in Sumatra. Bully resides in the War Museum in Canberra.
Valerie Elizabeth Smith went on to study psychology and nurse training to become a Tudor Sister. She was the first woman Superintendent and of an all male nursing staff at the Goodna Asylum for the Insane at Wacol, Ipswich, Queensland from where she retired in the 1970’s.
The R.S.L. Herberton sub-branch held a special dedication service in the School of Arts building in Herberton to mark the unveiling of a memorial plaque which honors Sister Valerie Smith following the Remembrance Day service 11 November 1995. Valerie Smith is buried in Herberton.
Valerie Elizabeth Smith attended the Holy Trinity Sunday School Herberton, Herberton Primary School where she obtained her Junior Certificate in 1927 and her secondary level education at St Mary’s Church of England Girls School in Herberton earning her Senior Public Certificate on the 21 January 1931. Her Junior Certificate in 1927 and Senior Public Certificate in 1931 were issued from the University of Queensland (att) (English, math A, modern history, ancient history, biology and geography (her best subject). The family had moved in Ellie Street Herberton, home of their grandfather DR Walter Stephen Smith when they started school.
Valerie Elizabeth Smith undertook her nurses training at the District Hospital Cairns (nursing certificates att.,) gaining her:
1934: Invalid Cookery
1935: General Nurse Cairns
1936: Maternity Ward certification Cairns
1937: Certificate of Registration for Midwifery Cairns
1939: Triple Certificate Nursing Cairns
1940: General Nurse Dirranbandi
1943: Lieutenant Valerie 23 March 1943
1947-1948: Florence Nightingale - Tudor Sister Diploma Fellow of the Royal College of Nursing, University of London. Florence Nightingale International Foundation – Nursing Education at the Royal College of Nursing London and gained the Tudor Sister Diploma of the London University subsequently studying in Belgium, Norway and Sweden from September.
1949: Fellow of the College of Nursing Australia
1950: Reference from Health and Home Affairs Australia Brisbane
1951: Certificate for Maternal and Child Welfare Brisbane and Nurse Masseuse registration
1954: Chosen to represent Australia at the W.H.O. meeting with Chiang Kai-shek President of Nationalist China, in a three week seminar in Taipei.
1955: Nurse Colorado General Hospital.
1956: University of Colorado Nursing and Chestnut Lodge.
1956: American Nurses Association – University of Colorado Medical Centre.
On 23 October 1945, the hospital ship Manunda arrived in Fremantle.
… It was lovely, it was Australia…I just started to howl…[Sylvia Muir]
Aboard were 24 Australian army nurses, who, in February 1942, had survived the sinking of the Vyner Brooke, before spending three and a half years in Japanese captivity on the island of Sumatra. Three and a half years earlier, on 14 February 1942, 12 of the 65 Australian Army nurses on board were drowned or killed in the water. The rest struggled ashore on Banka Island, some having been in the sea for more than 60 hours.
Sister Vivienne Bullwinkle was the only survivor of the massacre after Japanese soldiers captured 22 nurses, plus a civilian woman, ordered them into the sea and machine-gunned them. She was later reunited with her surviving colleagues and interned at Muntok on Banka Island for two weeks before the group was transferred by ship to Palembang in Sumatra.
Early in April 1945, they were moved to their final camp at Loebok Linggau in Sumatra, many of them severely ill with malaria, dysentery and beri-beri . We find we can eat most of the grass growing near the creek, also the young curling fronds of ferns. Curried fern with sweet potato is exactly like eating mushrooms! [Betty Jeffrey, White Coolie, Angus & Robertson, Sydney, 1954, p162].
After the Japanese surrender of 15 August 1945, the Australian war correspondent Hayden Lennard eventually located the nurses and they were flown to Singapore. At the Australian hospital at St Patrick’s College they were ‘fattened up’. On 4 October 1945, after enduring three years and seven months as prisoners of war, the 24 sisters sailed for Fremantle, Australia.
Sister Betty Jeffrey weighed just 30 kilograms and was suffering from tuberculosis when she was liberated.