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The Tanks: An Unofficial History of the Activities of the Third New Zealand Division Tank Squadron in the Pacific

I. Base Ordnance Depot

I. Base Ordnance Depot

The unit's first ordnance store was set up in the basement of the impressive new Government buildings in Suva, a striking edifice built in the style of similar modern buildings in India. The store covered an area of 2,400 square feet only, and was purely a temporary location for the depot. The first deliveries of supplies were made to the Reserve Battalion, which later became the 34th Battalion. Equipment was also isued to units arriving from New Zealand.

With Suva only a mile from Nasese camp, leave was natur-page 146ally spent seeing something of 'how the other half of the world lives,' and the cosmopolitan population of the city provided a continually changing kaleidoscope in 'technicolour.' Shops owned by Chinese and Hindus had strange foods in their windows; maize, apparently boiled hi sugar; confections looking something like doughnuts; brightly coloured tin toys, such as a miniature tower with a spiral staircase and parachute, imitating the life-sized apparatus used for practice by Russian parachute jumpers. Jewellery shops, whose owners steadily increased the prices of their wares as more troops landed, contained not only the exquisitely made filigree silver bangles and brooches that the Indian is noted for, but also silver salt and pepper pots hand-wrought in Java in the design of a lotus flower, diminutive elephant earrings carved in ivory, and alabaster models of the Taj Mahal. Many of the unit bought tortoise-shell watch-straps, inlaid with coconut palm and turtle designs in silver. In the middle of December the depot's original staff in Fiji left Nasese and moved into tents in the grounds in the Boys' Grammar School in Suva, near the open-air swimming baths, where the temperature of the water was often 90 degrees after a day in the hot sun. When ships laden with equipment began to arrive the original store, 40 by 60 feet, proved too small, and a larger depot was set up on the ground floor of the old Government buildings. The organisation grew steadily with the successive arrivals of the growing force in Fiji, and quantities of camp equipment were packed and sent to all parts of the island.

Army cooks were grappling unsuccessfully with taro and yam—native vegetables which can be starchy and sodden if not treated kindly. Later the New Zealand army took lessons from native cooks. Christmas and fresh vegetables, however, arrived together, and the white population organised sports, dances, and Christmas dinner parties to which some of the corps were invited. Army 'orders' of that time indicated that the spirit of the first Christmas overseas lasted well into January. In the first week they were full of Draconic pronouncements on such subjects as: 'Bad language,' 'Breakages in quarters,' and '… in that he did discharge a firework in a barrack-room. Five days CB.' Ordnance was well represented, with a member of the unit almost 'KO-ing' the provost marshal, who weighed 16 stone, and was six feet tall in his socks—a case of mistaken page 147identity during a moment of high blood pressure and poor visibility—and that worthy officer benevolently reducing the charge to read, '… in that he, having previously imbibed an alcoholic stimulant …' The loss of the prisoner's paybook containing £2, at the scene of the 'crime' (advertised in the same routine order) was not, however, attributed to the provost marshal.

In January, the living quarters of the base depot were again changed when the unit moved to Tamavua, a camp on the hills a mile and a half from Suva, and overlooking the harbour. It was while the unit was there that, on 20 February, a hurricane struck the island with such ferocity that it was recorded as the worst for the past 30 years. Every unit has, of course, its story to tell of the event. To ordnance, it meant that every officer and man had to turn out to tie down loose stores. By 10.30 am everything had been made as secure as possible and, with the gale increasing, it was possible to move about outside only by using a stable object as an anchorage. Light native buildings were swept away, roofs of European houses creaked and lifted, and sheets of iron and small trees passed overhead in gusts, like leaves. As the centre of the hurricane reached Suva, the unit returned from the depot to the camp at Tamavua for lunch, during the comparative calm. Due to the wreckage, the normal 15 minutes' journey took an hour and a half. There, too, buildings leaned at precarious angles. When the hurricane blew from the opposite direction in the afternoon, it completed its trail of destruction. Later, troops helped civilians to restore some kind of order to the appearance of the town.

During the remaining months of 1941 the spirit and quick comradeship of wartime grew in the unit along with its expansion into a full-sized depot. Lieutenant S. A. Knight and a flight of 'white leghorns' arrived in May from New Zealand. Near Samambula Indian village large new stores were erected, covering many acres. Lieutenant Knight assumed command, and in August the unit moved into new quarters which formed part of the new depot. In August, also, Lieutenant H. McK. Reid came from New Zealand to join the unit, together with other additions to the staff.

If it is sometimes said that in the first year of the war New Zealand, along with other Pacific countries,' dozed comfortably page 148in a lull of false security,' the sending of a force to Fiji 13 months before Pearl Harbour indicated foresight and an early mistrust of Japan that were at least well founded. In the 12 months that followed Japan's sudden attacks in December 1941 Japanese aspirations in the South Pacific became a potential threat, during months when the very shores of New Zealand were prepared to give battle. In the British publication, 'Transatlantic,' Gilbert Cant has stated that, in the Pacific,' from the end of 1941 until well into 1943 the Japanese could deploy more ships, aeroplanes and troops, wherever they chose, than could the United States and its allies.' Enemy submarines in the South Pacific in 1942 were grim proof of Japanese power and, with a very real sense of responsibility to the troops in Fiji, ordnance men toiled and sweated long hours in Suva's humidity, manhandling thousands of tons of heavy equipment and ammunition in and out of the stores, in order to speed available supplies, which were not over-plentiful, to units. The unit had also its own training programme to maintain as part of the genera! defence scheme planned against possible invasion.

When everyone else in the depot felt exhausted with the heat, Warrant-Officer Leighton was blithely beside his electric fan attending to a constant stream of administration and accounting matters with his 'off-sider,' Sergeant W. A. Pascoe. The foreman of stores was Sergeant M. W. Dobbs, but 'Dobbie' had a bad time in the tropics with sickness. The problems of the various stores were handled by several sound and hardworking non-commissioned officers, who had mastered their jobs. These men were Sergeant 'Stan' Daken (A group), Sergeant Jim Roughan, who was later mentioned in despatches (C group), and Warrant-Officer George Adamson (E group). Almost every merchant and store in the island must have been known to Lance-Corporal Beal. who looked after local purchases, assisted by Private Les. Calder. At Namaka, on the western side of the island, Staff-Sergeant Bert Buckley operated an important sub-depot for the unit. A never-ending stream of trucks from all over the island arrived each day at Samambula to collect supplies, and convoys were loaded at the various ramps by ordnance storemen, who discarded their sweat-stained shirts in the uneven struggle against the heat.

In the huts at Samambula siesta hour was almost a play in page 149one act of life in Fiji. Above their beds, men hung their mementoes of many expeditions, shopping and otherwise. Here, on a nail in the wall, hung a complete turtle shell. Across the way were several gaily coloured native grass skirts. Vivid red and white cotton sulus, ideal for sleeping in, and native mats to combat the corrugations of slatted beds, were common 'stage properties.' An iron, an immense heater, a radio and other amenities were bought by pooling resources. A score of nudes leapt from their raid-day siesta when the ice-box was unlocked, and, like 'arcadians' round the well, they drew fresh life from Puhman Singh's rainbow coloured soft drinks. The play continues:

Enter an Indian boy selling bagged peanuts.

Boy: 'Thrippence a bag, sah.'

Mick Duncan: 'Scram! We didn't come over here to be robbed.'

Exit boy.

Other characters were Carl Crocker, keen philatelist and would-be commando, who planned to storm the post office at Tulagi some day, so as to be the first to secure a rare set of Solomon Islands stamps (little knowing then that one day the division was to visit that very place); 'Scoop' Huon, who always had a new 'story,' and actually kept a 'rumour book'; and; Kyle Caldwell with an ear glued to the radio, listening to grand opera by a superb orchestra, and the rest of the hut shouting, 'Switch that row off and give us some music.'

As elaborate manoeuvres and other advanced preparations developed in Fiji in answer to increased Japanese activity in the South Pacific, base ordnance worked longer hours to maintain the supply of materials, equipment, and clothing. It was soon found that, with the rising tension of work, the need for recreation increased. At Albert Park, in Suva, and on visits to other units, a base ordnance team, played cricket. The fanaticism of Carl Crocker for the game usually ensured that the depot had a good team. Soccer was also played, and despite the heat some members of the unit joined rugby teams, and practically all hands spent their well-earned off-duty hours enjoying the warm waters off Suva Point.