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The Time of Their PNG Lives
A Man of Kararau, Sepik River
Judy Cannon looks at Una Voce, a newsletter in the Library’s Collection

A Man of Kararau, Sepik River
From Collection of Photographs of Papua New Guinea, Nauru and Australian Trade Exhibition, c.1930s
gelatin silver; 1 of 29; 16 x 21 cm or smaller
Pictorial Collection P2216/1–29 Album 936

Because we live in a region where some countries have not yet fully established their own facilities, the National Library is an important source of information, books, publications, paintings and other items relating to our Pacific neighbours. Among such holdings, the Library holds a significant collection on Papua New Guinea, which in the year 2000 celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary of independence.

One outcome of the PNG experience—the Retired Officers’ Association of Papua New Guinea (ROAPNG)—has been keeping former residents in touch since the late 1950s with its quarterly newsletter, Una Voce. From a small beginning, the publication has developed into a journal of substance. For researchers, it is a classic example of how the regular collection of a serial publication can build into a historical resource. 

Early issues of the newsletter were primarily concerned with practical matters, like superannuation and financial aspects as expatriates met the challenge of an old life gone and a new one to settle into. Gradually, however, the publication’s task of campaigning on members’ behalf became less necessary, and Una Voce has been able to include more reflective articles, important because PNG documents Australia’s experience of governing a colony. At the same time, part of the newsletter’s joy is its reminiscence of funny and anxious moments, even if, one has to suspect, some are burnished for the telling and wrapped in a little nostalgia.

Una Voce has been produced in recent times by three editors: Freddie Kaad, earlier ROAPNG secretary and a former district commissioner at Madang; Doug Parrish, previous ROAPNG president, formerly with the PNG Department of Labour; and Marie Clifton-Bassett, PNG resident for 20 years. All volunteers, they have dedicated many hours to achieve publication every quarter.

In the Nukumanu Group—The District Officer Holds Court in the Rain c.1930s

In the Nukumanu Group—The District Officer Holds Court in the Rain c.1930s
From Collection of Photographs of Papua New Guinea, Nauru and Australian Trade Exhibition, c.1930s
gelatin siver; 1 of 29; 16 x 21 cm or smaller
Pictorial Collection P2216/1–29 Album 936

 

As the PNG experience faded into the past, interest could have flagged, but, on the contrary, the journal has gone from strength to strength. Amusing, and sometimes startling, stories leap out at you when perusing old copies of Una Voce, which is available in the National Library’s main reading room.

The issues reflect the attitudes of the people and the times. The June 2000 journal, for instance, includes an item from Bob Cole, a former assistant district officer. Apparently in the 1940s a senior delegation, led by the administrator, arrived on a fact-finding mission in Bougainville after a church official had informed the Australian media that people in the Buin area were starving. The party included the director of public health, the district medical officer, the director of agriculture, the commissioner of police, the assistant director of the department of district services and native affairs, two lecturers and the Bougainville district officer.

Fortunately, in fact, there was no starvation in evidence. However, the investigating party embarked upon the long trek to Buin. Cole wrote, ‘I was horrified to see these senior officers so ill equipped for bush work and was a little taken aback when the administrator moved in on my table, chair, bed-sleeve and tent-fly, which he used for the next three days to Buin.’ The administrator apparently was determined to address as many people as possible. When they approached a village, ‘he stopped, changed into his uniform and moved into the village. After the talk, and leaving the village, we stopped again whilst he changed into his khakis before proceeding.’

June Cox (June 1997 issue) wrote of a recent discovery of a bomb rack (a container for a bomb) in the family shed at Dungog, which brought back memories of PNG 40 years earlier, when Jackson’s Strip in Port Moresby attracted treasure hunters: ‘My son and his father spent some happy hours at Jackson’s, rabbiting around in the revetments and finding in wrecked equipment invaluable material for mending and making all kinds of things.’

When Jackson’s Strip closed, the two moved on to Tuaguba Hill, where American troops had discarded equipment. ‘It was fascinating booty but dangerous. We had to declare the place out of bounds when live bullets appeared … The last trophy from the old camp site was a tin hat, presented to me with enthusiasm for use as a hanging basket for ferns!’

Evening with Canoe Moored in Creek c.1920s

Frank Hurley (1885–1962)
Evening with Canoe Moored in Creek c.1920s
gelatin silver, sepia, 1 of 36; 12 x 16.5 cm or smaller
Pictorial Collection P590/1–36

 

‘The Snakepit’, a Port Moresby bar demolished in 1981, gets a mention in the March 1986 issue, when Des Large wistfully remembered its wide variety of beers and a piano-playing medico who, while sipping ‘a sample of the good stuff’, was asked by a patron what to do about prickly heat. The medico replied: ‘Have you got two quid on you?’ When the patron had put two pounds on the bar, the medico turned to him and said: ‘Scratch the bloody stuff the same as I do!’

Bert E. Weston (December 1991 issue) wrote of ‘inexplicable happenings’ which he became aware of during his time in PNG, and of a plantation manager living on one of the remote Ninigo Group islands, which was serviced every eight weeks by a steamer from Rabaul. There was no radio, so there was no news of the outside world, and when the steamer was late on one occasion, food and medical supplies, together with liquor and tobacco, were nearly exhausted.

Weston recalled: ‘Things were at a low ebb, when the boss boy came grinning to tell Jim (the manager) that the ship would arrive next day bringing a red-haired man to take over as manager, as Jim was needed back in the firm’s Rabaul office.’ At sunrise there was smoke on the horizon, and Jim went out by canoe to greet the skipper. ‘I have news for you, I am taking you back to Rabaul,’ the skipper told Jim—adding, as a red-haired man stepped forward, ‘here is your relief.’

The Heart of Papua, Looking from Dilava to Mt Davison c.1920s

Frank Hurley (1885–1962)
The Heart of Papua, Looking from Dilava to Mt Davison c.1920s
gelatin silver, sepia, 1 of 36; 12 x 16.5 cm or smaller
Pictorial Collection P590/1–36

 

Unease also occupied Adrian Geyle. He described (June 1998 issue) the crocodiles of Lake Murray, where a Qantas Catalina flying boat used to land once a fortnight in the 1950s, returning men to their villages after completing work contracts. ‘Our station canoes would collect these men and bring them ashore, under paddle-power,’ he wrote. Geyle always took his single-shot Lithgow rifle with him when going out to the buoy to help tie up the Catalina.

‘Crocs would surface a short distance from the stationary canoes and it was a bit of a worry (to me, if not the locals!), sitting there on the glassy surface eyed-off by these semi-submerged saurians. There were monsters among them which could overturn canoes.’ On one occasion, Geyle sighted a three-metre crocodile. He managed to shoot him through the ear with a .22 bullet and the crocodile was killed instantly.

Afterwards local people gleefully invited Geyle, as the VIP ‘big white hunter’, to a celebration dance. Out of politeness he had to sample a piece of his now stinking trophy. Pretending to chew, he surreptitiously slipped the croc morsel to his dog, Woe, and the poor dog subsequently broke out in white pustules.

Geyle wrote of Woe: ‘Brave little stalwart that he was, always nearby to protect his master, he rallied—but with somewhat of a jaundiced look in his eye.’

A book, Tales of Papua New Guinea—Insights, Experiences, Reminiscences, edited by Stuart Inder, has recently been published by the Retired Officers’ Association of Papua New Guinea Inc. It is a selection of stories, articles and anecdotes from past issues of Una Voce.

JUDY CANNON is a Brisbane-based freelance writer

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