WW2; in the firing line for the first time

Miss Emilie McKittrick. >>

Chosen by General Sir Thomas Blamey as the representative nurse to be painted by the official war artist. she served with the AIF in the Middle East

Hundreds of Australian Army nurses were serving in Malaya and Rabaul when the Japanese attacked in WW2.

Many were taken and made Prisoners of War. Some others were killed. Some got out in time.

The Australian forces under Major General H. Gordon Bennett arrived in Malaya in 1941. Their medical units were the 2/4th Casualty Clearing Station and the 2/10th and the 1/13th Australian General Hospitals. These were stationed respectively in Kluang, Malacca and on Singapore Island. Nursing staff then began to arrive in Malaya in February 1941. Life in peacetime Singapore was very easy. Nurses were made honorary members of the European clubs and could live very social lives if they wished. This languid lifestyle ended in December when Singapore came under air attack.

Nurse's winter weight red wool cape with Captain's rank insignia and straight 'AUSTRALIA' titles on each shoulder. Summary: This cape is associated with Captain P E Morey who served in the Australian Army Nursing Service with 2/1 Australian General Hospital between 1941 and 1946.

As the military situation deteriorated all three medical units were concentrated on Singapore Island, and the engineers blew up the causeway.

Major-General Gordon Bennett refused to order the evacuation of the nurses, on the grounds that such action would lower civilian morale. However, Colonel A. P. Derham, Assistant Director of Military Services, gave instructions that as many nurses as possible should be sent out with casualties being evacuated from Singapore.

As a result six nurses went out on the hospital ship Wah Sui. This had been an anchored convalescent ship, which was hurriedly refitted for the voyage and painted white with a red cross on the side. Japanese aircraft shadowed it, and indicated that it would be bombed if it did not keep going. Had this instruction been obeyed, the worn boilers would have burst. So the old ship anchored during the night and proceeded at full speed by day to Batavia. The nurses eventually reached Australia safely.

Escape from Singapore

By the time it was realised that Singapore would fall, it was too late to evacuate the sick and wounded and medical personnel with safety. The Japanese were concentrating their attack on the docks area and hospital ships could not approach without great risk.

Half the nurses from each hospital were ordered to leave. They were reluctant to go. In the words of Betty Jeffrey of the 2/10th AGH they did not want 'to walk out on those superb fellows'. But orders were orders. Nevertheless, while being driven to the dock through an air raid, the nurses constantly left their vehicle to tend the wounded.

Soon after leaving Singapore the overcrowded Empire Star was attacked from the air, and many of the wounded men lying on the deck were killed or wounded more severely. Sisters M. I. Anderson and V. A. Torney came up from the hold to tend them, and were subsequently awarded the George Medal and the MBE respectively for their courage. The ship eventually reached Batavia, carried out repairs, and went on to Australia.

The Vyner Brooke, which took off the last of the nurses, was not so lucky. It carried 300 people, mostly women and children.

The nurses slept on the decks. They had little to eat, no washing facilities, and very little hope.

Matron 0. D. Paschke had warned them that their chances were slim, and all who could not swim were allotted to lifeboats.

George Medal

MBE

VFX38812 Matron Olive Dorothy (Dot) Paschke RRC, Australian Army Nursing Service (AANS).

Matron Paschke was in charge of 2/10 Australian General Hospital (AGH) nurses and was evacuated from Singapore on the SS Vyner Brooke, which was sunk by the Japanese in the Bangka Strait.

She was on a raft, with several other Sisters and two small children, which was carried out to sea and disappeared on 1942-02-14.

Matron Paschke was awarded the Royal Red Cross in 1942 and was posthumously awarded the Florence Nightingale medal. (Her medals are held by the AWM) (Donor: J. Jones)

The Florence Nightingale Medal.

VFX38812 Matron Olive Dorothy Paschke enlisted 3 September 1940 in the Australian Army Nursing Service, serving in 2/10 Australian General Hospital in Singapore.

She was missing presumed drowned on 14 February 1942 after being evacuated from Singapore aboard the SS Vyner Brooke which was bombed and sunk by the Japanese while passing southward through Banka Strait.

A raft containing Matron Paschke, a number of nursing sisters and two children was lost at sea. She was awarded the Royal Red Cross (First Class) on 7 October 1941.

On 12 May 1951 she was posthumously awarded the Florence Nightingale Medal for services to nursing by the International Committee of the Red Cross in Geneva.

The ship progressed slowly. During the day it hid among islands, and each night made a dash for the open sea. In Banka Strait it was discovered by Japanese aircraft and received several direct hits. The order was given to abandon ship, but most of the lifeboats had been holed by aircraft fire. Those which did get away held mostly the elderly and the wounded.

The Nurses Memorial is situated near the spot where survivors of the sinking of s.s.Vyner Brooke came ashore and where 21 Australian Army nurses were massacred on 16 February 1942. The Memorial incorporates stone from the: 'Women's Camp' which the Australian Army nurses occupied for a time as prisoners of war. A bronze plaque records the names of all 65 nurses who were aboard the s.s.Vyner Brooke. Of those 65 only 24 survived and returned to Australia after being in prisoner of war camps for nearly 4 years, the most famous of which was Sister Vivian Bullwinkel.

The nurses, two of whom had been wounded during the air attack, saw that civilians were off before they took to the water. The order was given: 'Take off your shoes and jump.' Those who obeyed, and survived, were to go shoeless for many years.

Tangong, Singapore, 1942-01-20. Sisters of the Australian Army Nursing Service (AANS), 2/4th Casualty Clearing Station, 8th Division, AIF. Left to right, back row: e. Millie Dorsch (Vic), drowned 1942-02-14; b. Peggy Willmot (WA), shot Banka island beach 1942-02-15; Wilhelmina r. Raymont (SA), died Banka island 1945-02; Elaine Balfour-Ogilvy, shot Banka island beach 1942-02-15; Peggy Farmaner, shot Banka island beach 1942-02-15. Front row: Dora s. Gardam (Tas), died Banka island 1945-04; Irene M. Drummond, later Matron of 2/13th Australian General Hospital, shot on Banka island beach 1942-02-15 and Elaine M. Hannah who survived. Four of these nurses were among the twenty-one army nurses massacred by the Japanese on Banka Island after the SS Vyner Brooke sank off Sumatra. The photographer VX38986 Warrant Officer J. D. Emmett became a prisoner of war after the surrender at Singapore and buried the film for nine months. It was then handed to a private Abbott who developed it in the X-ray room at the Changi Hospital. After the war Warrant Officer Emmett recovered the film and had it printed.

As the Vyner Brooke was sinking it threatened a lifeboat, so three nurses jumped overboard and swam for shore. One of them, Sister Wilton, was not seen again, while Sister Oram was hit by a raft but managed to swim to another raft, where she was joined by a civilian woman. The two spent the night trying to row to the shore. At dawn they found themselves surrounded by Japanese in motor boats. The Japanese did not attempt to help them, but they managed to reach Muntok under their own power. There they became the first prisoners taken by the Japanese in Sumatra.

Atrocity on the Beach

<< Sister Vivian Bullwinkle, sole survivor of the infamous Radji Beach (Banka Island) massacre by Japanese soldiers. The nurses were marched into the sea and then machine gunned.

A ½ section of a plaque erected by the Hurstville City Council outside the Hurstville Council Civic Centre McMahon St Hurstville in 2001. Photo Alan Kitchen.

Tarakan, Borneo 1945-10-09. 110 Casualty Clearing Station. Interior views of wards. Through Ward 1 passed the majority of serious surgical cases during the early days of the Tarakan campaign. Lieutenant Derrick VC and many other Australians died in this ward, but many critically wounded men were saved. This unit saved a higher percentage of abdominal wound cases than any other Australian casualty clearance cases or Australian general hospital. QFX43184 Sister A. Wooley (Qld) attending to SX17065 Sergeant P. M. Brock. Sister Wooley was one of only seven Australian sisters on Tarakan. (photographer Lt W. N. Prior) >>>>>>>>

New Guinea, 1943. A operation in progress in a makeshift hospital. The patient is a Private Weakly of the 39th Battalion. He was wounded at Amboga River.