After leave and reinforcement the battalion moved to Greta for training and then by train to Brisbane and embarked for New Guinea. The ship “Anhui” was being loaded but was behind time as the wharf labourers were refusing to load the stores unless they were paid at the rate of “time and a half”. The CO took charge and the men of 14 platoon loaded the ship when the wharfies walked off. (The wharfies had no case because the country was at war. The battle of Milne Bay had just finished, Darwin and Broome were being bombed, The Americans were in a bloody fight at Guadalcanal and the 21st Brigade with the 39th Battalion was desperately defending Port Moresby from the Japanese and the 2/1st were on their way to help.) The ship’s crew (all civilians) was in revolt, as they did not want to go into dangerous waters. The convoy called into Townsville where all the deckhands, cooks and stewards walked off leaving the CO with one alternative, man the ship themselves. Volunteers became stokers, cooks and seamen and managed to keep up to the required convoy speed and so the 2/1st Battalion took themselves to the war in the Pacific and to Kokoda. This is but one or two reference's of this kind of attitude and actions by Aussie wharfies in Australia during war time, another example is during the war in Viet Nam they at one point refused to load anything but cans of beer. More examples from WW1 and WW2 to Viet Nam wars to follow. Also During WW2 in Melbourne and Sydney they refused to load ammunition along with much else, to dangerous they said. This is why the RAN have for many years now had their own wharf's and cranes on their own docks etc for loading supplies and such things themselves. However if such a predicament as a large war happens will the Wharfie's be needed to load merchant shipping with ammo and other dangerous items; Probably so! Is it why many ex military chaps offered themselves to be trained and to work as full time wharf labourers during and after the great wharfie strikes of the 1990's? Traitors well I'll keep my opinion of these persons silent or else I might get too emotional.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/new...that-aunty-did-n/story-e6frg6z0-1111113559562 Heres some more on these so called persons during WW2 For thise outside Australia, Aunty = ABC (Australian Broadcasting Commision) (It is Aussie Govt Owned TV Stations.) Hal G.P. Colebatch: We heard nothing of how the unionists undermined the war effort during World War II, all the looting, the strikes and industrial ransom From: IF the ABC wanted to make a drama about the waterfront in Australia, one may wonder why it didn't look at a matter rather more dramatic and significant than that depicted in Bastard Boys, and one that has been suppressed with Orwellian thoroughness by the Australian history industry: the waterfront strikes that occurred throughout World War II, and at times when Australia's national survival appeared to be at stake. As Japanese forces attacked Milne Bay in 1942 and Australia and the US tried to rush reinforcements to the troops holding on there, Townsville watersiders refused to load heavy guns unless paid treble or, later, quadruple time. A small group of US soldiers, under a colonel who had trained Australia's first modern heavy artillery battery, eventually threw the watersiders off the wharf and loaded the guns themselves. By then the rest of the convoy had sailed. The guns reached Milne Bay too late. When advance elements of the 7th Infantry Brigade on the SS Tasman reached Milne Bay in 1942, proceeding straight into battle, they found watersiders at Townsville had broken into the radio vans and taken the accumulators from the radio sets. Other waterside strikes caused Milne Bay to be supplied with anti-aircraft gun barrels without mountings. The Tasman was the target, as it ferried troops to New Guinea, of not exceptional but repeated strikes during each voyage. Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar. End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar. In Adelaide in 1942, watersiders deliberately wrecked US aircraft engines by dropping them from cargo nets until American soldiers fired sub-machineguns. Sergeant E. D. Patton of the First Australian Corps of Signals recalled: "There were two incidents which occurred at Adelaide on our arrival from the Middle East in 1942 on the SS Jetersum. Our cargo consisted of 5000 tons of ammunition, 25-pounder field guns, 200 truck pens plus four Bofors 40mm anti-aircraft guns mounted on deck. The ammunition was covered by about 3000 tons of sand and 80 tons of gun cotton was below water level in the anchor-chain lockers. "As soon as we tied up at the wharf, the wharfies came on board asking various members of the crew and army what we had on board, especially under the sand. Well, no one would tell them but they soon found out about the ammo and demanded danger money. Not receiving (it), they went on strike. The army was called in to unload the ship. In the meantime some of the wharfies would not get off the ship, so the army removed them. "The ship berthed in front of ours was an American Liberty ship which was unloading Allison aero engines. When the cargo nets were lowered into the hold the engines in their flimsy crates were loaded, then the winch-driver would snatch the net up and swing it over the side and let it drop on the concrete wharf; as a result the engines were damaged. "The Americans told them to stop dropping the engines, (but) the wharfies took no notice whatsoever. As a consequence the Americans armed themselves with Thompson sub-machineguns and fired a number of short bursts up in the air. That quietened them for about half an hour, so some of the crew produced some plastic stun grenades and dropped them down into the hold. That put a stopper on their shenanigans." On the Brisbane wharves Australian watersiders also deliberately wrecked US P-38 fighter planes. According to another eye-witness, Ian L. O'Donnell: "They simply hooked the lifting crane on to the planes and, without unbolting the planes from the decks, would signal the hoisting engineer to lift, which effectively tore the planes to pieces." On the same wharves, in August 1942, watersiders smashed the vehicles of an army battalion being rushed to New Guinea by dropping them from winches after soldiers with drawn bayonets had stopped them stealing food from the stores they were loading. When No317 radar station was being set up at Green Island near New Britain, it was found that all the valves for the radar sets had been stolen by wharf labourers at Townsville. Without the valves the station was unable to go on air as scheduled, and a violent electrical tropical storm caught a force of two-seater American Vultee Vengeance dive bombers flying back from a raid on the Japanese base at Rabaul. The storm upset the aircrafts' compasses and, even though they were in radio contact, they became lost. Without radar the station could not guide them home and they flew on until they ran out of fuel and crashed, as those listening on the ground heard. Two of the aircraft were found. Sixteen others were lost and the 32 men in them perished. James Ahearn, an RAAF serviceman at Green Island, wrote: "Had No317 been on air it was possible the doomed aircraft could have been guided back to base. The grief was compounded by the fact that had it not been for the greed and corruption on the Australian waterfront, such lives would not have been needlessly lost." RAAF sergeant H. T. Tolhurst, who had opened the box marked "Radio valves - handle with care" and found it empty, said: "We believed that had we been on air it was possible that we could have guided those doomed aircraft back ... All of the personnel keenly felt the loss of those ... young lives. Our feelings were not helped by the scorn of the US Air Force personnel who became aware of the reasons ... and who tainted us with the contempt they held." In September 1942, at South Brisbane, watersiders refused to work after midnight unless paid time-and-a-half when the 2/1Battalion, AIF 6th Division, was being rushed to New Guinea to defend Port Moresby. Jack Prichett, a sergeant with the 2/2 Battalion, AIF 6th Division, recalled: "As orders were to sail at 0300 hours with or without stores our (commanding officer) took charge and 14 platoon loaded the stores and we sailed late. It was essential that we got to Port Moresby to prevent the Japs capturing it." These are a small sample of accounts that I have collected dealing with literally hundreds of incidents of wartime strikes and pilfering on the wharves from 1939 to 1945, as well as outright sabotage. During the course of World War II, virtually every major Australian warship, including at different times our entire force of cruisers, was targeted by strikes, go-slows or sabotage. Too bad the ABC is not interested. The story would make a great drama. Hal G.P. Colebatch is writing a book on wartime strikes and sabotage, Australia's Secret War
WOW Cobber - you have done it again - what a great story. - What mongrel bastards those wharfie's who were involved. - As Spidge said, I too wonder if they were communists
There was a quite significant amount of Aussie's working on wharf's who were members or very sympathetic towards communism and especially Russian Communism. I imagine that being in Australia in the 1930's and 1940's they would not have any 'real' understanding of communism and it's dirty deadly underbelly Many wharfies Australia wide, eventually went on a protracted "Go Slow" especially of Troop Ships, supply transports as well as much else military type cargo's untill the Germans invaded Russian territory after which many again worked as close to normal that these people could. However as the examples in the above posts in this thread show they kept doing their dirty un Australian business to Australian and Allied troops and stealing vital equipment and the" very important food" in the Australian LOC and other areas(Not all wharf workers but a large % of wharfie's And wide spread stealing of items from the water front here in Melbourne which has been happening for a very long time that there is a serious black market for the items nicked. I Will find some more reports on the thread subject and post soon.
I was a Custom Preventive Officer in the late 1960's. It was a shame to see the damage that was done to new cars onbooad ships as the Wharfies stole the sparkplugs , tools and jacks. If the cars were locked they used their hooks to force open the boots and bonnets. Whenever we searched a ship you would find hiding spots where they stashed their stolen items until they got the chanch to take them of the ship.
