I was a member of the Cadets at both schools and it was in my last year in Ulverstone that I won the award for being the Most Efficient Cadet. My name should still be on the honour board, the second one down. My prize was a .22 automatic rifle, which, apart from being my first military honour, was very useful for rabbits.
But despite the family history and my own penchant for soldiering, the idea of a military career was never pushed down my throat. My father encouraged education in general, and he realised I had an aptitude for building work. So, if my father didn't try to push me towards the Army, he definitely encouraged me in engineering.
It was only as a result of being in Cadets that I found out I was naturally good at that stuff. Then the local Regular Army Warrant Officer said that he'd like me to look at a film on Duntroon, the Royal Military College which was in Canberra. I was so impressed I applied to go there, went through the selection board and was told that I'd passed, subject to my matriculation exam results.
I studied flat out for my exams and, realising I only needed to pass three subjects out of the four, I concentrated on the easiest three (for me) and got them. A few weeks before my 17th birthday, I left Tasmania for the Royal Military College, Duntroon, in Canberra, to begin my life in the Army.
It was only much later that I discovered how pleased and proud Dad was that I had chosen a career in the Engineers. But he had made a point of not pushing me toward a military career because he wanted me to have as many choices as possible. He was the fairest man I have ever known.
Four years at Duntroon – learning to be a soldier as well as an engineer – was the equivalent of the first two years at university. Six of us passed our exams to go on to get engineering degrees at university and I remember thinking how much easier it was at Sydney University.
For a start, the discipline was comparatively nonexistent, and there were women. But the biggest thrill for me was realising that I wasn't a dummy. I had always been in a class with three really bright guys, who would leave the rest of us struggling in their wake. When we got to university I realised that, yes, they were a lot smarter than me, but I was a lot smarter than many of the other students too.
My self-esteem increased quite a bit as a result of passing my exams and realising that ultimately these other three, Rayner, Fisher and Gordon, were really bright. In fact, John Gordon was the top student at the University of New South Wales and Gary Rayner won the University Medal at Sydney.
I met my first wife Bev at the graduation ceremony at Duntroon, when she was there with another bloke. We met again at another party after that, and we started going out about six months later.
Bev was my first girlfriend. We didn't have much to do with girls while we were at Duntroon, and to be honest I didn't know much about them. We got engaged when I was at university and got married in January 1963, a month after I got my final results from Sydney Uni.
P/B
The official Royal Australian Engineers hat badge.
Then I went to the School of Military Engineering for a sixmonth course and got my first posting into 17 Construction Squadron. By the end of that year we were in Papua New Guinea and I – a bright eyed young lieutenant – was literally up to my neck in it.
17 Construction's base was at Wewak and the squadron was there to build a road to Lumi. I was a lieutenant in charge of 10 Troop, a unit of about 40 men. Everyone else was sent forward into the jungle, but we stayed back at base.
The troop's main task was to maintain the road, but they also had a major project at Wom Point Bridge. A point of interest is that this is where Lt-Gen Hatazo Adachi of the Japanese Army surrendered in the Second World War by handing over his sword to Maj-Gen H Robertson of the 6th Australian Division – I have a photo of the obelisk erected to commemorate this.
Indonesian incursions into East Timor and western New Guinea were raising fears that Jakarta might not be satisfied with what is now Irian Jaya, and try to take the whole of the island. It was decided to extend the airport at Wewak, making it a major air base from which to fight off any invasion that might ensue.
It was fundamentally a civil engineering job. We had the men and the equipment but we lacked a basic necessity: huge amounts of gravel. However, it just so happened that Wom Point – a virtual mountain of the stuff was only a short way offshore. My task was to pull down the old bridge, which had fallen into disrepair, build a new one across to the point and make a road through the swamp so that trucks could take the gravel to the airport.
The whole operation meant living on the beach and working in swamp often up to our waists. It was tough, difficult and demanding. But it was fantastic, just to be working as an engineer. It was here that the Engineers of the Strategic Reserve – 21 Construction Regiment came to do their 14 day camp and complete the building of the bridge.
Later on I had to take some of the troop to Vanimo, near the northern border with Irian Jaya, to build a 300 tonne shipping wharf. It was great.
Now, I would be the first to admit that's not as exciting as men in balaclavas abseiling from helicopters and crashing through windows. It's not as glamorous as jumping out of aeroplanes with a parachute and landing behind enemy lines. But in peacetime, the SAS spend a lot of time and expend a lot of energy chasing their own shadows. And there are no enemy lines for paratroopers to land behind – just a theoretical front in a hypothetical battle.
Even though this was essentially peacetime, what my men and I were doing, was real. Firing blanks is a bit like playing soldiers, but a bridge is still a bridge. That's one of the things that makes sappers special.
Another is that they may be a little bit smarter than your average footsloggers. There are many reasons why young men volunteer to join the armed forces. It could be the opportunity to travel, the appeal of comradeship or perhaps a simple lack of options; the army being preferable to the dole. In my case, I came from a family with a long military tradition. The Army was a serious career option and, in fact, was the only thing I wanted to do. But for a young man who's never going to rise above buck private, it's a shortterm solution with few longterm benefits.
Unless he's a sapper.
Anyone who joined the Engineers did so knowing they were going to learn a trade or perfect a skill they already possessed. They could have been carpenters, plumbers, truck drivers or electricians. It didn't matter – they would all have something that would stand them in good stead when they left the forces. There isn't much demand for tank drivers and artillery gunners in civvy street. So maybe that spark of ambition, that practical streak, is another vital element in the sapper's makeup.
Whatever the reason, I was glad to be able to command them in peace time, and, when it came, seized the chance to lead them to war.
1
CALL TO ARMS
I was barely 25 years old when Australia's involvement in Vietnam became a probability rather than a possibility. It was late in 1964 when the Prime Minister, Sir Robert Menzies, announced that military conscription was to be introduced. For those who had chosen to join the armed forces, it meant that it could not be long before we were marching on foreign soil. You cannot fight a war with raw recruits. It takes several months, not weeks, to make soldiers out of undisciplined and often unwilling conscripts. So they knew that when the call came, those already in uniform would be the first to go.
As early as February
