Archived articles
Bringing Australian Soldiers Home
Anzac Day 2007.
It was hot and humid at the bottom of a hole on the side of a hill north of Bien Hoa in southern Vietnam and Tony Lowe, the archaeologist with an Australian Army recovery team, was carefully removing soil from the excavation when he began to uncover nylon cord at the bottom of the hole.
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Bringing Australian Soldiers Home6 February 2008
Missing WWI Soldiers Identified
The remains of two missing Australian WWI soldiers have been positively identified following extensive research collaboration between Australian and Belgium authorities. The Minister Assisting the Minister for Defence, Mr Bruce Billson, said the investigation started last year when five sets of unidentified remains, believed to be Australian missing war dead, were discovered near the small Belgian town of Westhoek.
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Missing WWI Soldiers Identified4 September 2007
Search Goes On For Australians MIA In Vietnam
Hanoi – 21 August 2007. Today the members of the Australian Government, Department of Defence, MIA forensic team met with officials of the Vietnamese Government in the continuing Australian Government programme to fully account for the remaining two soldiers and two airmen lost during the Vietnam War.
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Australians MIA in Vietnam4 September 2007
Do You Know These Australian WWII POWs?
The four photographs below are from the scrapbooks of Mrs Josephine Meder of Gräfendorf, former County of Gemünden am Main, now County Main-Spessart, in the northwestern corner of Bavaria, Germany. During WWII, this family was assigned a number of Australian POWs as farm labourers.
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Australian WWII POWs26 July 2007
AHU Recover Australian Diggers Remains
Mr Brian Manns, the Army History Unit's (AHU) Deputy Head has had the lead in the ongoing investigation work into the Australian soldiers killed in action in the Vietnam war, but whose bodies were not recovered.
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AHU Recover Australian Diggers Remains12 July 2007
History Sleuth
Hours of studying 90-year-old maps, war diaries and records in the Australian War Memorial may pay off for historian Ric Pelvin in his quest to identify the remains of five diggers uncovered in Belgium last year.
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History Sleuth5 April 2007
Handing Over An Arsenal
Soviet RPGs, Kalashnikovs and night vision sights are among a cache of weapons captured in Iraq and Afghanistan now housed in the Australian War Memorial.
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Handing Over An Arsenal8 March 2007
Lost And Found On The Western Front
Of the eight Australian soldiers believed to have been buried near the hamlet of Westhoek in Belgium but who were not later exhumed for reinterment, seven have been identified.
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Lost and Found On The Western Front8 March 2007
Contents
From the Head
SASR soldier brought home
Training for deployments
MINREPS
Conference Report 2008
The AHU publishing scheme
Exit interviews
Old Soldiers Meet Again
NEWS IN BRIEF
Reserves deploy to Timor
Deployment to the Solomons
MUSEUMS ROUNDUP
Mannequins multiplying at Bandiana
Intelligence Corps Museum takes shape
Hangar at Engineers Museum
Bio - David Cran AM
FEATURES
Korea, 58 Years On
The Missing of Fromelles
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AHU Newsletter 2008 
SASR Soldier Brought Home
From Despatches, December 2008 Recollections from former Vietnamese Peoples Army (VPA - or colloquially known as VC) officers and soldiers, thorough research and a concentrated effort between the Australian and Vietnamese governments resulted in the discovery of the remains of the last Australian soldier missing in action in Vietnam.
PTE David Fisher, 3 Squadron SASR, fell from a rope beneath a helicopter during a hot extraction in 1969 in Vietnam after his patrol had been in almost continuous contact with the opposing forces for two days.
Since November 2007 an Australian Government Investigation team, centred on Army History Unit (AHU) has spent countless hours poring over thousands of pages of documents and conducting interviews in a relentless search for the missing soldier.
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| Brian Manns and WO2 Stan Albert with Vietnamese workers sieving for human remains |
The team compiled information on every detail relating to PTE Fisher's actions the day he went missing. It determined the precise route flown by the extraction helicopter and the exact gear and equipment he was carrying, which was all American issue with the exception of an Australian water bladder and SLR.
The team leader, Mr Brian Manns said the AHU investigator canvassed support within the Vietnamese veteran community in Australia and within the former VPA veteran community in Vietnam. Stories were published in community newspapers in Australia and leaflets were distributed in Vietnam which even included pictures of an SLR.
"With four different Australian Vietnamese families coming forward we were able to locate a number of former VC burial sites," the team investigator Maj Thurgar said.
"One of them had told me he and one other soldier buried who they thought was an American soldier." The informant thought the soldier was an American because of the military fatigues, but when shown photographs of different weapons he immediately recognised an SLR similar to the one carried by PTE Fisher.
Interviews in Vietnam with high ranking members of specific VPA units verified the information given by the informant in Australia. The team determined a possible location where a soldier could be buried in a shell hole made by US heavy artillery.
Despite an extensive search carried out by the Australians in 1969, PTE Fisher was not found. The team investigator said the area where the soldier's remains were found was not searched because of the deployment of harassment and interdiction fire by US heavy artillery onto a suspected VC main supply route in the area and had ordered all the Australian forces to clear the area.
The investigation switched from a search to a recovery operation. This involved 17 Vietnamese labourers, two Vietnamese People's Army engineers who operated metal detectors, members of the Vietnamese Government Central Missing in Action (MIA) team, a Provincial MIA team and members of the Public Security Branch who protected the site.
In addition to the team leader and team investigator, other Australian personnel included archaeologist Tony Lowe, forensic anthropologist Squadron Leader Dr Denise Donlon and Army History Unit member WO2 Stan Albert.
Schonstedt and Minelab metal detectors were used by the VPA engineers during the recovery operation, which located among other items, an identity disc. Fragments of a water bladder, the type issued to Australian SASR soldiers, was also found at the site. On completion of the recovery operation a formal Australian forensic identification was conducted. This was followed in Hanoi by an independent Vietnamese forensic examination which was chaired by Professor Toan from the Vietnamese Forensic Institute. Identification of the remains was assigned to David Fisher.
The Vietnamese officials and workers on the recovery site were convinced it was PTE Fisher when the remains were first discovered.
"They held a small Buddhist ceremony where they blessed the ground and blessed the spirit of David Fisher to return safely to his loved ones," the team investigator said.
"It was a very sombre moment, everyone was incredibly respectful. The remains were treated with great dignity. The Vietnamese workers were absolutely excellent."
The repatriation of PTE Fisher took place with a ramp ceremony in Hanoi on October 9 and a ramp ceremony for the arrival home on 10 October 2008 at RAAF Richmond.
"His family has been grieving ever since 1969 and they never gave up hope. When you are close to the family you see their hurt all the time," MAJ Thurgar said. "I think the final chapter has come now that David has returned home."
Jack Thurgar
(Originally published in Army News)
Reserves deploy to Timor
From Despatches, December 2008 Two reserve members of AHU deployed to East Timor for a two week field tour recently to conduct oral history interviews and escort a war artist and documentary film maker. CAPT Brett Campbell, a member of AHU's Oral History Cell, and WO2 Steve Crawford, Museum Manager at DINTC, deployed as part of an AHU Field Team to Operation Astute. With them were the Australian War Memorial's accredited painter, Jon Cattapan, and filmmaker Robert Nugent.
During their deployment the party travelled to Gleno, Maliana, and Balibo on the western side of East Timor and then via Dilli to Baucau and Viqueque on the eastern side. Apart from their escort duties, Brett and Steve conducted 26 oral history interviews and briefed a number of commanders on the importance of operational record keeping for historical purposes.
The AHU members enjoyed the opportunity to travel around East Timor and meet the officers and soldiers currently serving with the International Stabilisation Force (ISF).