The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (NX50524) Lieutenant Daniel Galton, 2/20th Battalion, Second World War

The Last Post Ceremony is presented in the Commemorative area of the Australian War Memorial each day. The ceremony commemorates more than 102,000 Australians who have given their lives in war and other operations and whose names are recorded on the Roll of Honour. At each ceremony the story behind one of the names on the Roll of Honour is told. Hosted by Charis May, the story for this day was on (NX50524) Lieutenant Daniel Galton, 2/20th Battalion, Second World War.

NX50524 Lieutenant Daniel Galton, 2/20th Battalion
DOD 12 July 1945
Photograph: 02467.581

Today we remember and pay tribute to Lieutenant Daniel Galton.

Daniel Galton was born on 17 January 1905, one of six children of Grace and Harry Galton of Charters Towers, Queensland. Daniel’s father was associated with the mining industry, in particular copper and gold mines. He died in November 1927 of blackwater fever, contracted on a visit to mines in New Guinea. In 1938 the family suffered another loss when Daniel’s older brother George, a fireman on the railways, was killed in a train accident at Moselle.

Daniel went into journalism after completing school, and worked for the North Queensland Newspaper Company at Charters Towers and then at Townsville. He later moved to Lismore in New South Wales, where he was employed on the staff of the Lismore Northern Star and ran the ill-fated Lismore Sporting Guide. Galton was a keen sportsman, and a member of the Northern Star’s hockey and cricket teams.

Daniel Galton enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force in June 1940, following the failure of a company he ran with James McCaughey. He underwent an extended period of training in Australia, initially with the 6th Battalion, and then with the 2/20th Battalion. In 1941 he was sent overseas for service in Malaya. In February 1942 Galton was promoted to lieutenant. One week later, Singapore fell and he was made a prisoner of war of the Japanese.

At some time during the fighting around Singapore, Galton was wounded when a bullet passed through his leg. He later lost a thumb and two fingers to a grenade. Nevertheless, when his friend Private Forbes last saw him in Changi Prison, he said he was in good shape.

In July 1942 Galton left Changi in a group of 1500 Australians known as “B Force”, bound for Borneo and the prisoner of war camp at Sandakan. Initially treated well, the prisoners experienced increasing hardship as the war went badly for Japan. By early 1945 they were gaunt and starving.

Under increasing pressure from the Allies, the Japanese decided to send a large group of Australian and British prisoners to Ranau, roughly 260 kilometres to the west of Sandakan. Most died on the way, but Lieutenant Galton was one of 313 men to arrive in the camp. Most of these men, having survived horrific conditions on the march, could not survive further hardship in the camp. On 12 July 1945 Lieutenant Daniel Galton died of malaria, which had been made much worse by the extremely frail state of his body. Only six men survived the march to, and internment at, Ranau.

The name of Lieutenant Daniel Galton is listed on the Roll of Honour on my left, along with some 40,000 Australians who died during the Second World War, many of them his mates on the Sandakan Death March. His photograph is displayed today beside the Pool of Reflection.

This is but one of the many stories of service and sacrifice told here at the Australian War Memorial. We now remember Lieutenant Daniel Galton, and all those Australians who gave their lives in the service of our nation.

Meleah Hampton