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Lark Force honoured


Volume 50, No.4, March 22, 2007
 
NAVY TRIBUTE: ABHSO Adam Hillsley during the memorial ceremony at the restored monument.
 
The crew of HMAS Benalla has restored a monument to 160 men of Lark Force and honoured their memory on the 65th anniversary of their deaths.

While conducting survey operations in Henry Reid Bay, New Britain, in support of the PNG Government, HMAS Benalla (LCDR Richard Mortimer) visited the resting place of the 160 members of Lark Force who were executed on February 4 1942 after surrendering to a vastly superior Japanese invasion force.

Lark Force was a garrison of 1,396 men stationed at Rabaul of whom only 400 returned to Australia at the end of the war.

A monument to the massacred men was erected by the Army in May 1987. It had since become overgrown but, with the help of some of the local population, members of Benalla’s ship’s company were able to restore the monument to its former state.

A small ceremony, involving members of ship’s company and a PNG representative, was conducted to honour the men.

The ceremony ended with the piping of the still and the observance of a minute’s silence.