Rescued POWs broadcast to Australia

Surrounded by released POWs, ABC war correspondent Talbot Duckmanton holds the microphone while NX56669 Sgt Blain, 2/12th Field Coy, RAE, with Sgt Frank Martin and S/Sgt Joe James, sends a message to Australia from Morotai. This was the first time that POWs had broadcast after being rescued. The first convoy of POWs left Singapore and others from Ambon arrived at Morotai and were immediately placed in the 2/9th AGH and 2/5th AGH for medical attention. Two Red Cross representatives (left-right) Miss G Kilgour and Miss B Fleming. Tony Rafty (1915- ) enlisted with the Commonwealth Military Forces in December 1941, and was transferred to the Australian Infantry Forces six months later. In early 1943 he was invalided from the Northern Territory and his drawings, done while a hospital patient in Darwin, were seen by the Director General of Medical Services. Rafty was brought to the attention of Lieutenant Colonel Treloar, and a few months later he was transferred to the Military History Section in Melbourne. After joining the Section, Rafty was employed mainly in connection with the production of the Services Annuals the original drawings he produced for these illustrations are held in the Australian War Memorial's collection. Rafty returned to part-time employment with The Sun and was sent to Singapore and Borneo as a war artist correspondent, covering the post-war surrender period. In September 1945 he witnessed the surrender of the Japanese in Singapore and recorded the release of Australian POWs from Japanese prison camps, such as Kuching in Borneo.