Opium poppies at Loveday Internment Camp

Depicts Opium poppies under cultivation at No. 14 Prisoner of War and Internees group at Loveday internmnet camp in South Australia. Crops were tended by the internees with much success. From the crop at this camp was extracted a large proportion of the morphine requirements of the Australian military forces. A chronology of events at the Loveday Group Camp records on 17 December 1945 the completion of picking 107 acres of opium poppy heads that were then packed into 301 wool bales. It was the largest harvest of opium poppies ever to be gathered in Australia. Loveday Internmnet Camp was located near Barmera on the Murray River. The camp accommodated German, Italian and Japanese internees from various states in Australia and internees and POWs from the Netherlands East Indies, the Pacific Islands, New Zealand, Britain and the Middle East. The camp comprised six compounds and the maximum number of internees (3,951) was reached in March 1942. Max Ragless was appointed official war artist in March 1945 and he was commissioned to record home-front activities, including mobilisation of primary and civil industries to war-related production.