70 YEARS ON
sundayterritorian.com.au
Darwin overshadowed
by massive Pearl attack
Darwin Military
Museum director
TOM LEWIS says
Pearl Harbor is often
compared to the
Darwin attack but
the similarities are
very few
East Point Museum director Tom Lewis commemorates the bombing of Darwin
York and caused the death of
more than 400 people. In August
1845
the
barque
Cataraqui was wrecked on
the west coast of King Island,
in Bass Strait, with the loss of
400 lives.
Some commentators suggest that Darwin was poorly
defended.
In fact, there were 18 antiaircraft guns based around
the town. One group of heavy
weapons alone — those based
on the Darwin Oval — fired
1050 rounds in the two raids
of 19 February.
The gun barrels were redhot at the cease-fire.
Rather than just a few defenders there were 10,500
troops in Darwin at the beginning of December 1941.
Darwin was full of defending
soldiers. It was home to
many warships, serviced by
hundreds of people ashore.
Jack Mullholland, who
was an AA gunner on February 19, 1942, says there were
about 7000 troops in Darwin
on the day of the first raid, as
well as 2000 civilians.
Added to the dedicated AA
weapons there were scores of
machineguns in use around
the town.
At least three Japanese aircraft were shot down on 19
February.
None of this is to say that
the Darwin strikes — there
was a second raid on the first
day — were insignificant.
They were significant.
The attacks were the first
on the Australian landmass,
and signalled a new and
sometimes desperate stage of
the war, which if Australians
had not stood alongside
Americans and prevailed in
New Guinea, may well have
seen invasion.
The writer Douglas Lockwood called his 1960s book,
the first published about the
raids, Australia’s Pearl
Harbor. It’s a good and deserved title.
Picture: JUSTIN SANSON
But the important differences should be emphasised,
not minimised, to do historical justice to both attacks.
Dr Tom Lewis OAM is the
author of 10 history books, and
has served as an officer in the
Royal Australian Navy for 19
years, seeing service in Baghdad, Iraq, and East Timor. He is
the Director of Darwin Military
Museum.
PUB:
ALTHOUGH both Pearl
Harbor and Darwin were
surprise initial raids on an
enemy of the Japanese Empire, the destruction caused
in each raid was disproportionate in the extreme.
Here’s a few comparisons.
Many say more bombs fell
on Darwin.
True enough but it is just
used to be sensationalist.
The tonnage of bombs
which fell on Pearl Harbor
was greater. The Japanese
were using smaller bombs in
the Darwin raid.
It’s a bit like saying the
Darwin assaults were more
significant than the Nagasaki raid because the attack
on Japan only used one
bomb.
Some say that more civilians were killed in the Australian raids. Untrue.
There were 2388 lives lost
in the Pearl Harbor raids
compared with about 251 killed in Darwin. It’s generally
held 68 civilians were killed
at Pearl; 25 were killed in
Darwin.
What about the ships
sunk? Ten ships were sunk
in Darwin, eight inside the
harbour. The largest warship
was a destroyer, the USS
Peary, with 89 of her crew killed. At Pearl all eight battleships of the US Pacific Fleet,
the most important capital
ships at the time, were sunk
or badly damaged.
The size difference between a destroyer and a
battleship is immense.
The comparison is similar
to that of a car set beside a
three-trailer truck.
The firepower is commensurately similar.
Three cruisers; again, big,
important ships, five destroyers, and seven other
ships were also sunk or
grounded.
Most ships were raised and
repaired, although for many
wrecks this took years.
The strike at Pearl was a
massive loss for American
aircraft too, and that raid
was far more destructive
than Darwin’s.
For example, 350 aircraft
were destroyed or damaged
whereas in the Australian
town around 30 were lost.
Some people say that the
Darwin raid led to the worst
death toll from any event in
Australia. Untrue. In the loss
of HMAS Sydney 645 men
were killed. In the sinking of
the Montevideo Maru, a ship
carrying PoWs off Rabaul in
July 1942, 1050 Australian
live were lost. In terms of natural disasters, Cyclone Mahina in 1899 struck Cape
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Above, bomb damage to a wharf in Darwin (NTAS, Ron Urquhart, NTRS 258, Item 14). Left top, severely damaged vessels
along Battleship Row after the Japanese attack on the US
naval base in Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, on the morning of
December 7, 1941, that led to the Americans entering World
War II. Left bottom, ships in flames in the aftermath of the
surprise Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
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Sunday Territorian Special Feature, Sunday, February 19, 2012 — 25