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Lieutenant Colonel Allan Gordon Cameron | |
|---|---|
 Cameron as a major in October 1942 | |
| Born | May 16, 1909 Fitzroy, Victoria |
| Died | June 8, 1960 (aged 51) Phillip Island, Victoria |
| Service | Australian Army |
| Years of service | 1926–1931, 1939–1947 |
| Rank | Lieutenant Colonel |
| Unit | 46th Battalion 2nd/22nd Battalion Headquarters 30th Brigade |
| Commands | Maroubra Force 53rd Battalion 3rd Battalion 2/2nd Battalion |
| Battles / wars | |
| Awards | DSO & Bar Mention in despatches |
| Alma mater | Scotch College, Melbourne |
| Spouse(s) | Margaret Whatnough née Stewart |
| Other work | Ex-service organisation leader Farmer Local government councillor |
Lieutenant Colonel Allan Gordon Cameron DSO, JP (16 May 1909 – 8 June 1960) was an Australian Army infantry battalion commander during World War II who commanded units during several campaigns and major battles in the South West Pacific theatre against the Japanese.
Early life
editBorn on 16 May 1909 at Fitzroy, Victoria, Allan Gordon Cameron was the son of Lochiel Frederick Arthur Gordon Cameron, an Australian-born banker, and his British-born wife, Kate Inez Maud née Bagnall. Allan attended Scotch College, Melbourne, before joining the Commercial Bank of Australia as a bank clerk.[1][2] Around 1926, he joined the 46th Battalion, a part-time infantry unit of the Militia.[1] Promoted to corporal then sergeant in 1927, and company sergeant major the following year,[2] he was commissioned as a lieutenant on 15 October 1929,[1] but resigned from the Militia in 1931 because he had been transferred to a country area.[3] He married Margaret Whatnough Stewart at the Presbyterian church in South Yarra on 3 November 1934.[1] He rejoined the 46th Battalion, and was re-appointed as a lieutenant on 19 June 1939.[2]
World War II
editWorld War II broke out on 1 September 1939, and in October, Cameron completed the platoon commanders' course at Seymour,[4] and was temporarily promoted to captain on 10 May 1940.[5] On 1 July, Cameron volunteered for overseas service and transferred from the Militia to the Second Australian Imperial Force (2nd AIF) as a substantive captain.[1][5] On the same day that Cameron transferred to the 2nd AIF, the 2/22nd Battalion was raised as part of the 23rd Brigade of the 8th Division, and Cameron was posted to the 2/22nd, which was commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Howard Carr. The battalion was initially based at Victoria Barracks, Melbourne, but after ten days it was transferred to Trawool in central Victoria for training.[6] Cameron was appointed as the unit adjutant on 15 July.[7] On 24 September, the battalion left Trawool and marched the 235 km (146 mi) to Bonegilla near the New South Wales border, arriving on 4 October. This was followed by a period of additional training,[6] during which Cameron completed the company commanders' course,[4] and was hospitalised for a week with mumps. Cameron entrained for Sydney on 11 March 1941, and embarked on the SS Katoomba the following day, disembarking at Rabaul on the island of New Britain on 28 March.[7] Rabaul was the government hub for New Britain, located in the Bismarck Archipelago, which was part of the Territory of New Guinea, an Australian-mandated territory pursuant to a 1920 decision by the League of Nations.[8] The rest of the 2/22nd Battalion entrained embarked at Sydney on 17 April 1941.[6]
Rabaul
editOn 26 April 1941, the battalion arrived at Rabaul. Along with a unit of the New Guinea Volunteer Rifles, a coastal defence artillery battery, an anti-aircraft battery, and elements of the 2/10th Field Ambulance and 17th Anti-tank Battery, the 2/22nd became part of Lark Force, which was later reinforced by No. 24 Squadron, Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). Lark Force's mission included four tasks: protect two airfields, at Lakunai and Vunakanau; protect the Rabaul seaplane base at Simpson Harbour; and track any future Japanese movement towards Australia from the islands further north. The force numbered only 1,400, was poorly-equipped and unlikely to be able to resist a concerted Japanese attack in strength. The 2/22nd occupied the months until the Japanese opened the Pacific War with their attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December with constructing defences and training for tropical operations.[6]
In early January 1942, the Japanese began bombing Rabaul, with their air attacks increasing in intensity as the month progressed. By 22 January, No. 24 Squadron had suffered badly, and its three remaining airworthy aircraft were withdrawn, leaving Rabaul without air cover.[6] At this point, Cameron was second-in-command of C Company, 2/22nd Battalion, which was responsible for the protection of Vunakanau Airfield,[1] but with the departure of the RAAF, both the airfields were made unusable by Lark Force, and it redeployed away from Rabaul to the western beaches of nearby Blanche Bay to await the expected Japanese landing. There was little time to prepare, as 5,000 Japanese began landing from 01:00 on 23 January. Suffering from poor communications and severely outnumbered, Lark Force's defence had effectively been overwhelmed by 09:00, and its commander, Colonel John Scanlan, ordered his troops to withdraw from the beaches on the basis of "every man for himself". With no withdrawal plans prepared, Lark Force fell back in disarray and completely lost cohesion as a formation.[6]
The members of Lark Force dispersed south and west, and Cameron, along with others, retreated west, during which he maintained contact with four separate groups. In mid-February he was able to get a report about the fighting at Rabaul through to Headquarters New Guinea Force in Port Moresby, in the Territory of Papua, another Australian mandated territory. He also sought orders regarding what the survivors should do. Advised that he could escape if undertaking guerilla warfare against the Japanese was not feasible, he and twelve soldiers acquired a pinnace and sailed it to Salamaua on the north coast of the New Guinea mainland, where they arrived on 3 March. When the Japanese landed on 8 March, Cameron and his team got to work making the airfield unusable, set fire to the fuel dump, and shot one Japanese soldier then left for Port Moresby,[1] where Cameron arrived on 27 March.[5] Only around 400 members of Lark Force managed to return to Australian-held territory, of whom about 300 were from the 2/2nd Battalion. The rest were captured by the Japanese and held as prisoners of war. Of these, about 160 were killed in the Tol Plantation massacre, and most of the remainder died when the transport Montevideo Maru was sunk in error by the submarine USS Sturgeon on 1 July.[1]
Kokoda Trail campaign
editCameron was temporarily promoted to major on 8 May 1942,[7] and on the same day was seconded to the 30th Brigade, a Militia formation, as the brigade major (chief of staff).[1][3]
Later life
editFootnotes
edit- ^ a b c d e f g h i Sweeting 1993.
- ^ a b c National Archives 2020, p. 1.
- ^ a b National Archives 2020, p. 18.
- ^ a b National Archives 2020, p. 12.
- ^ a b c National Archives 2020, p. 11.
- ^ a b c d e f Australian War Memorial 2017.
- ^ a b c National Archives 2020, p. 16.
- ^ Official Year Book 1966, p. 1119.
References
edit- "2/2nd Battalion". Second World War, 1939–1945 Units. Australian War Memorial. Archived from the original on 2 May 2014. Retrieved 23 June 2014.
- "2/22nd Battalion". Second World War, 1939–1945 Units. Australian War Memorial. Retrieved 9 July 2017.
- Brune, Peter (2004). A Bastard of a Place: The Australians in Papua. Crows Nest, New South Wales: Allen & Unwin. ISBN 978-1-74114-403-1.
- Long, Gavin (1963). The Final Campaigns. Australia in the War of 1939–1945, Series 1, Army. Vol. VII (1st online ed.). Canberra: Australian War Memorial. OCLC 464094764.
- McCarthy, Dudley (1959). South–West Pacific Area – First Year: Kokoda to Wau. Australia in the War of 1939–1945, Series 1, Army. Vol. V (1st online ed.). Canberra: Australian War Memorial. OCLC 908207506.
- "NAA: B883, VX44906". National Archives of Australia. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
- Official Year Book of the Commonwealth of Australia No. 52, 1966. Canberra, Australian Capital Territory: Australian Bureau of Statistics. 1966. GGKEY:8H5DA2QGNN2.
- Sweeting, Margaret (1993). "Cameron, Allan Gordon (1909–1960)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. Vol. Volume 13. Melbourne, Victoria: Melbourne University Press. ISBN 0-522-84717-X.
{{cite encyclopedia}}:|volume=has extra text (help)CS1 maint: ref duplicates default (link) - Wigmore, Lionel (1957). The Japanese Thrust. Australia in the War of 1939–1945, Series 1, Army. Vol. IV (1st online ed.). Canberra: Australian War Memorial. OCLC 464084033.