General News
8 August, 2026
Veteran's Voice: Ambon Island tragedy
Oliver James Ballinger was born on January 20, 1919, to Walter James and Margaret Francis Ballinger of Horsham.
Oliver James Ballinger was born on January 20, 1919, to Walter James and Margaret Francis Ballinger of Horsham.
Ballinger, a farm labourer, enlisted in the 2/21st Infantry Battalion on July 9, 1940, where he was taken on strength at the Recruit Reception Depot (RRD) at Caulfield.
The RRD, located at the historic Caulfield racecourse, was the primary assembly point and processing facility where newly enlisted AIF personnel received initial training, uniforms, and medical evaluations before being deployed to their assigned units.
Ballinger broke out of camp and received two days of CB (confined to barracks) as punishment on December 6, 1940.
He was also punished for appearing on parade with a dirty bayonet with three extra days of duty.
The 2/21st Infantry Battalion was formed in Victoria as part of the 23rd Brigade of the 8th Division at Trawool, near Seymour, in August 1940.
Men who volunteered to join the AIF at various depots in the Melbourne suburbs, country towns, and in particular Shepparton, were transferred to Trawool to eventually become known as the 2/21st Infantry Battalion AIF.
The Battalion camped on the Shepparton side of the Goulburn River, and, due to the large number of men volunteering for active duty in the Middle East, there was an acute shortage of equipment for training.
Through a programme of frequent route marches, hill climbing exercises, and digging slit trenches, the battalion became very fit.
The Southern Command ordered that all 8th Division units be transferred to a new camp at Bonegilla, near Albury.
The 2/21st and the 2/22nd Infantry Battalions left Trawool camp on September 23, 1940, to march with overnight bivouacs 146 miles over 11 days.
The men’s full-scale training began, and clothing and equipment slowly improved, although a lack of equipment delayed the process.
Other units passed through the camp on their way to active duty, making the men restless.
On March 23, 1941, the whole battalion left Bonegilla camp to begin the long journey across the centre of Australia to Darwin.
Camp was made at Winnellie, NT, where they trained until December 9, 1941.
Ballinger was marched into the 7th Military District, an administrative area of the Australian Army covering the Northern Territory, on April 12, 1941.
He was promoted as a signaller on June 2, 1941.
Ballinger and his unit were ordered to prepare to embark overseas to Ambon Island, the capital and largest island of Indonesia’s Maluku Province, arriving on December 17, 1941.
Ballinger was one of the 1131 Australian soldiers in ‘Gull Force’ as part of the 2/21st Infantry Battalion, whose objective was to defend Ambon Island and hinder the Japanese advance.
On the night of January 30, 1942, Japanese forces landed at Ambon, supported by heavy air and sea bombardments, quickly overwhelming the defenders at Laha, who surrendered on February 3.
The 300 Australian troops, as well as a group of RAAF men who surrendered, were executed by their Japanese captors and buried in one of four mass graves.
After the surrender and execution of the main part of Gull Force, the remaining troops were imprisoned in their former barracks on Ambon.
In October 1942, 263 Australians POWs were sent to the island of Hainan, off the coast of China, where more than a quarter of them died.
The remaining 528 Australian POWs stayed at Ambon, where only a minority of them survived.
Investigations after the war determined it was impossible to positively identify many of the remains found at Laha, and these ‘war dead’ were declared ‘Missing and for Official Purposes Presumed to be dead.’
The remains that were found were exhumed and reinterred in the Ambon Cemetery.
Ballinger was listed as missing on February 3, 1942, in Ambon, and is believed to have been one of the 300 captured soldiers who were executed by Japanese personnel.
He was 23 years of age, and his name is commemorated on the Ambon Memorial.