TOUGH "AUSSIES"

Marlborough Express, Volume LXXVI, Issue 252, 26 October 1942, Page 4

TOUGH "AUSSIES"

SCOTSMAN'S TRIBUTE. " GAMER THAN BLACK WATCH." SYDNEY, Oct. 12. Private J. H. Stevenson, himself a Scot, thinks that the Australians in New Guinea were "gamer than the famous Black Watch. " Now lying in a military hospital, he said : "Where eise in the world would you find men who could crawl, injured and maimed, on their damaged limbs or bellies for fourteen days through mud, slush and rain, and refuse to be helped on the way?" Stevenson got a hulet through both legs in the Owen Stanley fighting and has one brokei^ leg plastered up and auto- • graphed with 400 signatures. "In my opinion one Australian is as good as two Japs, eveii at the Japs' own game, " he said. "But the Japs were always "Up to new tricks. They infiltrated our ranks unseen, disguised as trees and vines, learned our nicknames, moved back to their positions and called us over. One of our chaps fell for the gag, and the next thing the place where his voice came from was peppered with machine-gun fire. The Japs would keep us awake at night by throwing over crackers, rubbing bamboo sticks together to resemble machine-gun fire, and firing shots in the air. But yan can scare Togo's boys with anything that makes a noise. We used to hear them squealing with fear as our hand grenades went over." Stevenson said the Jap troops used in the Owen Stanley Range were taller and more rugged than those used at Milne Bay and other piaces. "The Jap troops we saw varied in height from 5ft. 8in. to 5ft. llin. They wore green uniforms, studded with little pockets, into which they stuffed twigs and lea-ves to complete their camouflage," he said. Private R. E. Meadows, of Kalgoorlie, whose left arm was fractured in a dash through Japanese machinegun fire, said he had seen many aets of valour in the Jap push towards Moresby. " When the Japs cut us cff from our brigade, a chap named Maidment received a machine-gun burst in the chest, " Meadows stated. "He got fighting mad, and, althoukh badly wounded, jurnped up and rau at the Japs, ffirowing hand grenades. j The officer of the platoon hurriedly j rallied his men, and following Maid- j fent, they wiped out the Japs. I , heard afterwards that Maidment was _ recommended for the V.C. "