Kavieng was beautifully laid out with good roads made from coronus, which was decomposed coral and when put on roads and rolled down, it set like cement. The roads were lined with some beautiful flowering trees and casuarinas trees. There was a very good coronus road which ran along the east coast of New Ireland for over one hundred miles towards Namatansi. This road passed through all the villages on the coast and most villages had a house Kiap which was built by the natives for the use of Europeans travelling along the road.
My plantation which was approx 1,000 acres had approx 40,000 coconut trees. It was called Ulul-Nono and was 19 miles from Kavieng. About 1930 on one of my trips to Kavieng Bobby Melrose, who was District Officer, asked me to tender for some government owned water buffaloes which were roaming around Kavieng and becoming a menace to European residents, so I said I would give him 40pounds for all the water buffaloes and the two bullock wagons. Bobby said the offer was ridiculous, but when I told him I was not interested he said he would send the offer to Rabaul. To my surprise and Bobby’s the powers that be in Rabaul accepted my offer.
There was an old Scandinavian planter about 20 miles further down the road who had a few hundred head of Zebu cattle head his name was Charlie Ostrom and he had been on New Ireland for many years even when the natives were cannibals. He was a very powerful man and one time when I was on a visit to Kavieng there was a brawl at the Chinese Hotel and Charlie threw the piano over the veranda. I believe that in German times when Charlie came into Kavieng, he would have to lodge a deposit at the government office to pay for any damage he did.
I was importing short horn bulls from Queensland and building up a very good herd of cattle. By the time the Japanese arrived in Kavieng in 1942 my cattle herd numbered nearly 500 head and the water buffalo 70. This was all a great source of fresh food supply to invading forces.
Some time in 1938 a chap named Swindles asked me if I would be interested in buying his plantation “Lamernewai” for 10,000 dollars I was interested and clinched the deal right away I arranged my mate Blue Gow to manage it for me.
He was one of the first to leave Kavieng and join the 8th Division in Sydney was captured in Singapore and died a prisoner of war. Another chap from New Guinea Ossie Grey who worked for Burns Philp was also a POW said Blue was always in trouble with the Japanese he would not co-operate with them and they used to ill-treat him, however he died a few months before the armistice.
There was plenty of good feed at Lamernewai so I decided to send a lot of young calves over whenever possible. Everything was going nicely when the war came.
We were a very happy community in Kavieng and most of the population played golf every afternoon. The road down the coast was a great acquisition and we often went for drives in the cool of the evening. Fresh food was plentiful Sang Sang one of the local Chinese had a market garden and grew practically all the vegetables needed. There were about 500 goats and pigs on Ulul-Nono so we were never short of meat.
Margaret was thriving after her ordeal in the Rabaul eruption and Rene about to have another baby, It was due on Anzac Day (25th April 1940} Anzac Day had come and gone, but it was not until the 29th of April our little baby Jeannette May arrived.
It was about this time we noticed high flying planes over Kavieng at pretty regular intervals at the beginning it might be one a fortnight, then one a week, then more frequently. We presumed they were Japanese planes from their base at Truk Caroline Islands, which was only a couple of hundred miles north from Kavieng. A Mr Merrillees was the District Officer at this time and the Japanese planes were flying over more frequently. There were no planes in Kavieng and at this period none in Rabaul. We used to get news over the wireless and knew there were many enemy German Surface Raiders in the Pacific Ocean. The Police Master Jim Livingstone used to compile a weather report each morning and this I used to send it to Rabaul at 6am. It was approaching Christmas 1940 and everyone in Kavieng was preparing for the festive season. Extra food supplies had been bought and we were all looking forward to a Merry Christmas. A few days before Christmas I was just about to get out of bed about 5.30 am to go to the wireless station to despatch the weather report, when Phil Levy the manager of Burns Philp store who lived opposite my place called out asking if I was awake, I said I was just getting dressed and he came in and told me something was happening as a small pinnace had just pulled into the harbour.
He said he did not know who was on board or where it came from. While we were discussing the situation a Police Boy handed me a note from Merrilees, the District Officer asking me to report to him immediately. I went straight to his house just as day was breaking. As I walked up the steps of his house I noticed 3 or 4 fellows in gum boots and heavy beards and at once thought they were Germans. Merrilees heard me arrive and called me into his office. As I walked in, he introduced me to the Chief Officer of the “Rangitane”. I did not take much notice of the introduction, but I did notice the escort Officer clicked his heels and saluted, which only confirmed my first suspicion that they were Germans. However my suspicions were wrong. Merrilees and the Chief Officer asked me how soon I could get in touch with Rabaul and I said I would be in touch at 6 am Merrilees and the Officer had already drafted a message to the Administration saying there were over 500 men, women and children at Emirau Island, about 60 miles north of Kavieng needing food and medical supplies and immediate assistance. I sent the message to Rabaul and told the receiving operator I would wait a reply. After waiting until nearly 8 am the reply came back wanting to know if Kavieng had started their Christmas festivities too early. I told Rabaul “This was serious” and at last they seemed to realise the seriousness of the situation. We then sat down to await instructions from Rabaul.
In the meantime Merrilees had organised all the small ships around Kavieng and loaded them with all our Christmas stores and any spare clothing we had and despatched them to Emirau Island.
In the meantime the Burns Philp ship “MONTORO” and the E & A ship “NELLORE” had been diverted to Kavieng to pick up these survivors and take them to Australia. All these people were survivors of the Rangitane and 5 other ships, which the German Raiders Orion and Komet had sunk off the island of Nauru while waiting to load phosphate.
The Chief Officer of the Rangitane told me they had been well treated. Only that they were overcrowded and whenever there was danger they were battened down, which was their worst experience. He said the Captain of the Raider gave them a small pinnace at Emirau and told them to go to Kavieng where there was a wireless station and they could radio for help. When the Chief Officer and Merrilees handed me the radio to send to Rabaul for assistance I asked was it OK to send in plain language and the Chief Officer said that the Germans had told him they had all our codes and they would be listening for Kavieng radio so that when the German ship heard the message being sent to Rabaul they would know assistance would be on the way and the survivors safe.
However it was 24 hours after the message for assistance was sent that the Administrator from Rabaul, General McNicoll arrived by seaplane with dozens and dozens of hard-boiled eggs. I believe Merrilees told him that the ex-prisoners needed opening medicine more than hard-boiled eggs.
The story of these German Raiders is very interesting and shows how open and vulnerable Australia was to attack at his period in time.
Disguised as a Japanese freighter, the Orion (Captain Weyer in Command) left Germany for the Tasman and South Pacific to look for enemy ships and lay mines. On the way from Germany to New Zealand he sank the British freighter Atlantic. While in New Zealand waters they laid 228 mines in the Hauraki Gulf, 60 miles from Auckland. It was one of these mines which sank the Niagara with a large quantity of gold on board. The Orion captured the Norwegian steamer Tropic Star and sank the French Steamer Notua off Noumea, New Caledonia. On August 20 1940 the Orion sank the British ship Turakina.
The Turakina had one gun and put up a good fight but was finally sunk by torpedoes, 26 survivors were picked up, but 36 had been killed. The Orions next victim was the Norwegian steamer Ringwood. After this sinking Orion joined another Raider the Komet (Captain Eyssen). On November 28 the Komet sank the Rangitane, 17,000 ton liner, off the coast of Northern New Zealand. The Rangitane was bound for England with a large number of passengers and Australian Air Force personnel on their way to Canada for training (Empire Air Training Scheme). The Komet set the Rangitane ablaze with gunfire and torpedoes. The 303 passengers and crew (including 36 women) were transferred to her prison quarters. A few days later the Komet and Orion caught 5 ships off Nauru Island waiting to load phosphate all these ships were sunk. The marksmanship of the Germans must have been terrific, survivors told me that the German’s first shell always blew the wireless cabin to pieces and that is why none of these ships ever sent a distress signal. By this time the two raiders and the supply ship Kulmerland had 495 prisoners on board between them. They decided they would have to do something about the prisoners which prompted Captain Eysson who had been to Emirau Island (pre WW1 when the Bismarck Archipelago was German Territory} to land the prisoners there. Emirau Island was a plantation planted up by a German named Wilde, but at this time was owned by W.R. Carpenter& Co and managed by Charles Cook.
This is Cook’s own story as it appeared in the Sunday Sun dated 21st. September 1940.
When the Colletts (they live on the other side of the island) saw the steamer going past they waved cheerfully to it, we don’t often see ships passing Emirau that was at 4.15 pm December 19th 1940. The steamer passed our plantation about half an hour later and our native boys gave their usual cry of sail-o big fella ship too much. I called my No1 boss boy and told him to send some of the boys along the beach to keep watch on the ship. At the same time I sent a runner round to Colletts. Collett had a saw mill on the other side of the island. With our wives and his small daughter we are the only people on Emirau. Usually there is a missionary on Mussau Island 18 miles away, but the Atkins had gone away on leave. Collett who was looking after the Mission station for them had sent the mission launch over to Mussau three hours before to pick up food for the natives it was dusk by then. One of my scouts came back and told me the Germans were putting off a boat. My wife and I decided to go bush and hide I knew the Germans would not stay long. I packed a few things we might need and lined up my 62 boys. I told them there might be fighting and I wanted them to protect the missus and hide her till the Germans had gone. Four of the boys stepped forward and said they would fight until the missus was safe. I gave one of them my rifle and kept the revolver for myself, the rest had spears I intended if we ran into any German party to hold them off until the boss boy could get them to a secret cave we knew. We marched off ready for anything, but we did not meet any Germans and reached the Colletts place.
The District Officer rewarded these boys for loyalty later. Collett and I were talking the affair over and had decided to hide the women when a runner came with the news that the ship had gone to sea again. We thought everything was over and went back to our homes.
At 6.45am the next morning an exhausted runner came in with the news that three German ships were anchored on the far side of Emira (this is the name we all always knew it by not Emirau) and were landing in force.
I put my wife in the lorry and raced for the Colletts. Somehow we missed each other. They were coming to meet us by another road, I swung back to pick them up, but before I reached the turnoff my boys signalled there were Germans in front of us. We were cut off. We stopped the lorry and waited. Round the corner swung 11 Germans marching in military formation, all heavily armed. Two Officers stepped forward and offered us their hands. One of them said
“We are taking possession of this Island in the name of the Reich.” They asked me if I had any food, I told them I had enough for two or three months, but apparently they knew I had cattle on the island. They simply ordered me to run the cattle into pens, as they wanted to slaughter some for fresh meat. The Officers told me that their ships were going to land 500 prisoners on Emira. They would not let my wife go back to the house, but asked me to drive them to their ships. Halfway I stopped to roll a cigarette; one of the marines had his revolver drawn all the time. They must have thought I was leading them into an ambush.
The three ships were anchored off my wharf and I drove between two files of German Marines. My wife and I sat under a tree waiting for the prisoners to be put ashore and two Officers came up. One was a doctor, the other (I learned later) was a Gestapo man, and he began questioning me. “He asked me where the mission launch was I told him the Atkins had taken it into Rabaul when they went on leave and that it was still there. He then asked me when the trade schooner was due, I said she had arrived the week before; actually she was overdue and should have arrived that morning.
Collett rode up on his bicycle. He had heard of our capture and had ridden over to find out just what was happening.
At noon the Germans landed the first of the prisoners, women and wounded. They sheltered in a small bungalow we had built for an overseer. The Germans had commandeered the lorry and when it arrived back I took some of the women, picked up Mrs Collett and drove them home. A German escort rode with us. Then they divided into two work parties, one went looking for a radio transmitter they feared we might have, the others killed five of my working bullocks. The lorry could only carry two of them back to the ships and they left the rest with us, we cut them up and made stew for the prisoners, cooking the meat in 40 gallon drums.
My wife and Mrs Collett with the help of some women prisoners made tea and scones; I drove the lorry back to the ship and met the German Commander on the wharf.
He was a well built man of middle age and wore two iron crosses. The Captain of the Raider (named (Manio Maru Japanese}was on the wharf and asked Captain Millar Master of one of the victim sunk ships what he would do for a living. He had signed an agreement not to go to sea again in an armed ship. Captain Miller Looked at the German for a moment and said “Well Captain I’ll be straight with you. Just as soon as I can get another ship I will be back at sea.”
The German Captain knew the island well, before the last war he had helped the original German settler to mark out the station; he was on the island when natives killed two German settlers. The raiders left Emira at 1am on Sunday. We had 175 head of cattle on the island and there was no shortage of meat for the 500 prisoners, the Kanakas stripped their gardens to provide vegetables {the government fed them later until they were producing again). The women slept on the floor of our bungalow, we put the wounded in the guest bungalow, the men split up into ships companies, some made bush houses, others camped in the copra sheds and kilns, we gave the wounded our private stores and everything from the refrigerator. We got natives to help the women prisoners with the cooking.
The women posted up a notice outside the kitchen door – “Breakfast, if any 8am, Dinner if any Noon, Tea if any 5 o’clock.” Afternoon Teas Wentworth Hotel Special to order in Sydney.”
On Monday, Collett sent a canoe across to Mussau to get the launch. (The Germans had made us promise not to send for help for 24 hrs). At 3 o’clock that afternoon three ship’s officer prisoners set out in the launch for help, a government schooner came out on Christmas Eve and took the women back to Kavieng. That night we had the only midnight Mass ever celebrated on Emira, Father Kelly, who was a passenger on the Rangitane wore robes made by Polish women from red and white calico in the native store. The male prisoners stayed two more days on Emira. They spent their time hunting wild pigs and fishing.
The women some of whom were short of clothing, one girl came ashore in just a man’s dress suit (the Germans had commandeered her clothes) they were worried by the rats on Emira, a ship arrived and picked the women up, Emira sank back into its peace again, but it will never be the same peace for me again.
Well that’s the story as to what happened on Emirau Island as told by Charles Cook.
The fleet of small ships which were sent from Kavieng were now returning loaded with prisoners from Emira and within a couple of days they were all comfortably aboard Nellore and the Montoro en route to Australia. Our Christmas was spoilt but we all thought we had done some good and did not regret the short rations we had to contend with until the next ship arrived.
According to Eric Feldt’s book “The Coastwatchers” page 23, this was the first report from a coast watching station in the Pacific War. He quotes the District Officer as the coast watcher but I Ted Bishton was the wireless operator who sent the message.
Extract from Bill Hughes Purser Tulagi
World War 11 exposed Australia’s vulnerability particularly the years 1939/40/41. The words in this treatise by Ted Bishton are exceptional also extracts from Merchantmen At War by RB Hughes Purser MV Tulagi Burns Philp
The charts and information available to the Germans of the area (Bismark Archipelago prior WW1) was exceptionally good. It was for this reason Emirau Island was chosen. Down below in the holds of these Raiders some 700 were kept. Apart from the matter of feeding them many had suffered wounds or injuries at the time their ships were attacked, the Raiders with their own food and medical supplies becoming acute, hence the reason to land some of them on Emirau.
After taking control of the Island and its inhabitants their food supplies were taken over, what cattle was on the Island was killed and taken aboard the ships. The small craft they used to travel around in and go across to Kavieng were put out of action. Each day a small float plane took off from one of the Raiders on a reconnaissance mission (the one we saw?) Finally with most of the prisoners landed they raised anchor and sailed away. Some 500 were landed the rest kept on board to be used as hostages in the event of being intercepted by British or Australian Forces. It was learned later the three ships headed for the Japanese Island of Lemontrek in the Carolines, one of their supply bases long before the Japanese entered the war. There the prisoners who had been kept were transferred to the Raider Ermland, taken back to Bordeaux, France and from there to a POW camp in Germany. Another source, is on the following trip of the Tulagi to Rabaul I was requested to keep one cabin available for some passengers we were to take south. They turned out to be Mr and Mrs Bill Cook from the WR Carpenter Copra Plantation on Emirau. It was during the voyage south that I was told the full story of what transpired at Emirau Island and Kavieng.
Burns Philp’s involvment.
The history of Burns Philp & Co. Shipping is a success story belonging entirely to Australia prior to the war, competing in the South Pacific against British and German companies. The BP & Co. Ltd. Branches, plantations, BP (South Sea Co) Inter Island shipping Services. The fleet of small ships was established in March 1920. The cessation of services inter Island due to Japanese occupation, the destruction of records leaves an irreplaceable gap in the history of Australia’s Merchant Navy WW2.
The evacuation of Women and children and in particular those landed on Emirau Island ahead of the known atrocities of Japanese occupying forces is a missing chapter in our history. I was involved with the BP mainline vessels mentioned in the Ted Bishton Diaries. Macdhui, Montoro, Tulagi, These and the small ships rank as heroic as Dunkirk or otherwise, particularly post Pearl Harbor.
From Malaya Singapore, Dutch East Indies, Papua, New Guinea and the Solomons. also Darwin and North Australia The only ship recorded Kavieng Emirau Island evacuation is E&A’s Nellore.
Ron Steve Wylie.