OUR HEROES – THEIR STORIES

NX81910 Robert Clarke Gawne could never forget October 11, 1943, the day an horrific mortar accident in the Surinam Valley of New Guinea killed three of his mates and almost killed him. He was so close to death in the aid station after the explosion that three different chaplains gave him The Last Rites.

Gawne never got over the accident, nor other horror experiences fighting in the jungles of New Guinea and Borneo during World War II. He blamed himself for the death of his three mates.

Back home at war’s end he suffered nightmares for the rest of his life. His son, Mark, said: “My father never got over what happened or what he saw.”

The Surinam Valley incident occurred during one of the battalion’s worst days of the war when 8 and 9 Platoons of A Company were caught in an ambush. At the height of the battle Gawne’s mortar crew was called on to bomb Japanese positions.

There was a blinding explosion when Gawne’s No 2, Private Alan “Speed’ Eklund inserted the first bomb in the barrel of the two-inch mortar. The blast destroyed the mortar, blew off Eklund’s hand and mortally wounded him on the body. The blast also killed two soldiers who were carrying spare bombs. Gawne survived but was critically injured.

Queenslander, Corporal Eric Pearson, who witnessed the terrible event, wrote in a letter to The Footsoldiers author, William Crooks, 25 years after the war: “I heard an explosion and turned to see Bob Gawne with blood all over his face and “Speed” Eklund ( his No 2) crawling back down the track, dying as he crawled.”

Eklund’s failure to move his hand away quickly enough after inserting the bomb was given as a possible reason for it exploding in the barrel. However, a more likely cause, as discovered later, was that, unknown to Gawne or Eklund, the firing pin may have been moved out of position due to a “freak” fault in the design of wooden crates in which the mortars were packed for air-dropping by biscuit bombers to troops in the field.

After a series of “mystery” fatal explosions involving other mortar crews, Army investigators found some of the mortars being air-dropped weren’t being packed tightly enough to prevent the firing pins inside the mortars being jolted out of place and damaged by the impact of the wooden crates hitting the ground.

The investigators found that the movement of the firing pins made bombs liable to explode inside the barrel.

Tragically, mortar crews were never told about the investigation or warned of the potential problem involving mortars air-dropped in the field. Mortar crews had no way of knowing firing pins could have been jolted out of line. The only way they could have known was to dismantle the mortars and inspect them, but had no reason to do so. Although the Army kept the investigation secret, word eventually leaked out.

Among those to find out was Bobby Gawne’s best mate, and former 2/33rd Battalion Association President Ian “Snowy” King.

King witnessed the Surinam Valley mortar explosion and rushed to help Gawne and his men. He told Mark Gawne decades after the war ended that the Army had identified the cause of the “mystery” explosions and had buried a large number of mortars with the defective firing pins.

King said the Army never admitted to burying the mortars and never revealed the result of the investigations to those who mattered most, the mortar crew members who had survived explosions, including Bobby Gawne, and who were left believing they were to blame.

Mark Gawne said: “The survivors of these mortar incidents had to live with the guilt of being wrongly accused of misusing firing pins. My father blamed himself and carried the guilt of killing three of his mates for the rest of his life.”

Bill Crooks was highly critical of Army secrecy surrounding such wartime accidents. Bobby Gawne blamed himself because he was mainly responsible for supervising the safe operation of the mortar.

His job was to set up the mortar’s base plate and then raise the firing pin into position using a lever on the outside of the barrel. In normal operation the weight of the bomb being dropped into the barrel and onto the firing pin, would impact the primer inside the bomb causing it to fire.

If misaligned the firing pin could detonate the bomb inside the barrel. Investigators discovered the failure could be intermittent. One bomb could be fired successfully but the next could explode. The explosion and seeing mates killed wasn’t the only reason for Bobby’s nightmares. Other visions that haunted him for the rest of his life included seeing the result of atrocities the Japanese inflicted on women and girls in the native villages.

“Dad struggled with what he saw,” Mark said. Mark remembers his father going for long walks in the early hours of the morning to avoid having nightmares. The walks were so frequent he became a familiar figure to garbage and sanitary men, the only other people out so early in the deserted streets of Coff Harbour, on the NSW North Coast where he lived.

Mark recalls having to sometimes hold his father down in bed to stop him thrashing around during nightmares and injuring his mother, Kitty, who was sleeping alongside Bobby. Mark said: “The nightmares were why my father would never talk about the war.” There are still many things Mark doesn’t know about what his father did.

One reason was that after the war Bobby’s mother, Lorne, burnt his and his brother Phillip’s wartime records, letters, photos and cards saying they were family business and nothing to do with the public. Bobby’s records held at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra don’t help throw much light on his service.

Mark was intrigued, and a bit shocked, when he saw his father’s handwritten field notes for the first time at the Australian War Memorial. He was startled to see black lines striking out most of the written entries on each page. This was in the mid 1980s.

A research assistant said so much had been censored and struck out because the Army didn’t want the information disclosed even though it was nearly 50 years after the end of Word War II. The black lines in the field notes indicated that Bobby had often taken part in secret commando patrols that he was never allowed to talk about.

“Snowy” King remembered occasions in New Gunea when Bobby was ordered to report to A Company H.Q. . King and others assumed that Bobby, always a larrikin, was in trouble again. He often disappeared for days on end, always turning up with a made-up yarn about where he’d been. The fact that Bobby nearly became the fourth victim of the mortar explosion, and that three different chaplains had given him last rites after the accident, is recorded in the Memorial archives. The start of Bobby’s Army career was somewhat bizarre. He was born in the Sydney suburb of Turramurra, but lived in northern beachside suburbs during his teenage years.

It was traditional for his father, Frederick and mother, Lorne, to read out the family mail at the dinner table after the evening meal.

In those pre-war days men wanting to join the armed forces had to first join the Militia, and then await transfer to the Army , Navy or Air Force on passing medical examinations.

In 1936 Frederick and Lorne were shocked to receive notification in the mail that their son, R.C..Gawne, had been accepted for Army training. He was only 14. Bobby had applied to join the Milita without telling anyone and had put up his age. Frederick and Lorne called on a family and tennis friend, Roden Cutler, later Sir Roden Cutler VC Governor of NSW, to write to the recruiting office and explain the mistake.

Two years later they were shocked to receive another letter to say R.C. Gawne had again been accepted to join the Militia.

Bobby was only 16. He had again applied and put up his age. This time Frederick and Lorne relented and allowed him to join, despite a public outcry about the Army agreeing to enlist under age boys. He was 19 when he finally transferred in 1942 from the Militia to the A.I.F. and the 2/33rd Battalion.

His first training was at the Lowanna Specialised Jungle Training Camp 20kms west of Coffs Harbour, where he first met his good mate “Snowy” King. To get to local dances they had to hitch rides on supply trucks, often having to sit on the canvas roofs of the fully laden trucks for the return trip to camp. At one of the dances he met a trainee nurse, Kathleen Lenore Reid, known as “Kitty”. Their love affair and marriage lasted more than 70 years. The had four children, Dennice, Robert, Mark and Lynne.

While training at Lowanna Bobby was often fined for going AWL to see Kitty. His young brother, Phillip, joined the Army in June 1944 and served with the 2/3rd Australian Infantry Battalion.

Some of Bobby’s training was at Dubbo where he became a member of what became known as the Elite Platoon, comprising soldiers with outstanding potential.

He later trained at Tenterfield, Canungra and the Atherton Tablelands in preparation for serving in New Guinea and Borneo.

After the war he often took his family to visit places where he trained.

Bobby’s Gawne ancestors migrated from England as free settlers. The patriarch, Walter Gawne, established a timber yard and building company W. Gawne and Bro., at Newton, in Sydney.

One of the company’s most prestigious contracts was to construct the original wooden Sydney Cricket Ground score boards now at North Sydney Oval. Walter’s youngest son, Frederick , Bobby’s father, married Lorne Lindsay Loader. They initially lived at Turramurra, where Bobby and his younger brother, Philip, were born.

But were advised to move closer to the coast and the sea air for the sake of Bobby’s health after he contracted meningitis as a child.

Bobby and Phillip attended Sydney Boys High School. Their ferry trips across the harbour gave them daily glimpses of the Sydney Harbour Bridge under construction. Both represented the school in all sports, including cricket and football.

While at Sydney Boys High School Bobby passed the entry examination to officer training school. This offer was declined. Bobby became a champion swimmer, despite making headlines in the Many Daily newspaper as a 15-year-old after being saved from drowning in a huge surf. The following year, as a 16-year-old, he won the open surf championship race at the Manly Surf Carnival, earning him the nickname of “Junior” because of is looks and age.

After being discharged from the Army in June, 1946, Bobby worked briefly as a trainee journalist in Sydney, but then became a trainee diesel mechanic with the Forestry Commission in Coffs Harbour. The job suited his love of the outdoors, often demonstrated by hugging big trees. With the commission he worked in the bush for weeks on end, living with timber workers and repairing diesel pumps and motors.

He then began working for a Coffs Harbour engineering firm designing and building diesel motors for the timber mills throughout Australia and Asia.

After 15 years Bobby started his own business, Coffs Harbour Diesel Service, sharing a shed with son-in-law, David Lewis. Kitty ran the front office. The business was so successful it attracted clients from all over Australia.

Eventually selling it allowed he and Kitty to indulge their love of travelling. Bobby’s other passions were watching and playing sport, surfing, photography, drawing, making superb models of boats and planes and going bush.

He played rugby league for local ex-service club teams. He was over 60 when he played in his last social game. He also played touch football and cricket.

Bobby helped with the newly formed 3rd Coffs Harbour St Johns scout troop, an Anglican church group.

He had an extraordinary talent at making model boats and planes. He would spend days meticulously cutting, sanding and shaping various parts until they fitted perfectly. They were all working models fitted with engines. His models have been displayed in museums up and down the NSW coast. The highlight of his modelling was an invitation by NASA to make a jet fighter for a series of photoshoots . He not only made the jet fighter but also worked out the dimensions for a wind tunnel needed for the photoshoot.

NASA sent him a glowing letter of thanks and two limited framed prints which still hang proudly in Mark’s home.

His photography highlighted his love of nature. Accompanied by his full time model, Kitty, he was always going on excursions to photograph insects, bees, flowers, rivers, water holes, birds, animals or anything else that caught his eye. He was always drawing and giving away beautifully crafted sketches of children.

After the war Bobby sought help from an Army psychiatrist for his nightmares but the sessions did more harm than good.

A psychologist who encouraged him to talk about his problems proved far more helpful. A sore point for Bobby was medal-wearing. Mark said: “I attended quite a few Anzac days and saw all the other men wearing their medals, but not dad. When asked why he never wore his medals he said didn’t have them because the Army wanted him to pay for them. Bobby refused saying that after all he’d been through he wasn’t happy about having to pay for them. Mark finally purchased a full set and mini set of medals. He said: “We gave him the medals as a family, not the Army.”

Footnote:
In late retirement Bobby enjoyed the simple things in life such as a seafood barbecue with a chilled beer and watching his favourite rugby league team, the Manly Sea Eagles.