The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (NX34912) Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Esmond Robertson, 2/20th Australian Infantry Battalion, Scond 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 Richard Cruise, the story for this day was on (NX34912) Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Esmond Robertson, 2/20th Australian Infantry Battalion, Second World War.

NX34912 Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Esmond Robertson, 2/20th Australian Infantry Battalion
Died of illness 31 March 1943
Story delivered 28 July 2018

Today we remember and pay tribute to Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Esmond Robertson.

Andrew Robertson was born on 24 June 1906 in North East Ham in the eastern county of Essex, England, the eldest son of Andrew and Jessie Robertson.

The family immigrated to Australia, and by the 1930s Andrew was working as an accountant in Sydney. On 4 March 1933 he married Christina Lindsay in the North Shore suburb of Willoughby.

When Australia’s involvement in the Second World War was announced on 3 September 1939, Robertson was a major in the 18th Battalion, with 15 years of commissioned service to his name and a deep commitment to the army. At the age of 33, with a wife and two small children, he enlisted in the Second Australian Imperial Force as soon as he could.

On 1 July 1940 he was seconded to the 2/20th Battalion, which opened its headquarters a fortnight later at Walgrove Camp, west of Sydney.

After training at Wallgrove, Ingleburn, and Bathurst, the battalion embarked for Singapore as part of the 22nd Brigade of the 8th Australian Division.

Robertson suffered from some ill health before leaving Australia, but was well enough to embark on the converted luxury liner Queen Mary on 3 February 1941.

The end of 1941 saw Japanese forces spreading throughout south-east Asia. Two British warships were sunk by a Japanese air attack off Malaya, and the government of Thailand formally allied itself with Japan. Hong Kong was invaded in early December, and surrendered later that month. In January it would invade Burma and the Dutch East Indies, and capture Manila and Kuala Lumpur.

The 2/20th Battalion stood to arms in December 1941, but another month would pass before its men were in action. In early January Robertson’s C Company was detached to form half of a special force that attempted to delay the Japanese approach to Endau, a town further north along the coast. After clashing with the enemy, the company rejoined the 2/20th in January. The battalion then withdrew from Mersing and arrived on Singapore to take up a position on the island’s west coast.

The battalion was widely dispersed along its front, however, and when Japanese forces launched their invasion on the night of 8 February it was readily infiltrated. Despite the confusion, most of the 2/20th was able to withdraw in reasonably good order, but soon looked to be overwhelmed. In parties of varying sizes, its troops fought in a desperate retreat towards Singapore City that ended with surrender on the night of 15 February.

Imprisoned in the sprawling Changi prisoner-of-war camp, Major Robertson was promoted to lieutenant colonel and given command of the 2/20th Battalion.

As the war drew on the prisoners at Changi were allocated to external work parties. The first were dispatched around Singapore and southern Malaya, but members of the 2/20th later found themselves bound for the camps along the Burma–Thailand Railway and in Borneo, Japan, French Indochina, Java, Sumatra, and Malaya.

Lieutenant Colonel Robertson became responsible for C Force, a group including 563 Australians that left for Japan on the 28th of November 1942 aboard the so-called “hellship” Kamakura Maru.

Conditions aboard the ship were appalling. Locked in the holds with little food, water, or sanitation, more than 2,000 prisoners were crammed together, and some perished en route. Sickness, disease, over-crowding, and the dangers posed by allied submarines heightened the stress and anxiety endured on the voyage.

Arriving in Japan in early December, C Force was split, with about 250 men sent to Kobe Kawasaki camp, while Robertson and his group of about 300 were sent to Naoetsu, a small industrial town halfway up the west coast of the island of Honshu.

The camp had just been opened in the salt warehouse of the Shin-etsu Chemical Company. Robertson’s group was the first to be put to work.

A greater percentage of men died at Naoetsu than in any other prisoner-of-war camp in Japan. The horrific conditions there claimed the lives of 60 members of the 2/20th Battalion through disease, starvation, and the brutality of the guards. After the war, more of Naoetsu’s guards were tried and executed for than from any other prisoner of war camp in Japan.

The first man to die at Naoetsu was Andrew Robertson, affectionately known as “Ribbie”. He collapsed on the evening of 26 March 1943, and two days later was put into isolation into a storeroom, with rumours circulating that he was suffering from meningitis. He died on 31 March. The next day his covered body was taken to the crematorium by motorcycle and sidecar. His ashes were returned to the camp, and the Japanese placed black crepe around the camp.

Robertson was posthumously Mentioned in Despatches, and Jack Mudi, another prisoner at the camp, wrote a poem about him. In the absence of writing implements, he committed the poem to memory:
Old friend, farewell. Here, in a foreign land,
Your friends, who through the battle came,
Now bow their heads, and softly speak your name.
And wish you peace among God’s chosen band.
Our hearts are full of tears as here we stand,
And grieve that even your fierce-burning flame
Could not withstand a failing mortal flame,
So wasted with the work our captors planned.

And yet, our faith in justice triumphs still.
Our blood still tingles with consuming pride,
To know that no such race can quench at will
The spirit of our land for which you died.
Serenely proud, we say, “While e’er our land
Breeds sons like these, inviolate shall she stand.”
Andrew Robertson was 37 years old.
His name is listed on the Roll of Honour on my left, among almost 40,000 Australians who died while serving in the Second World War.

This is but one of the many stories of service and sacrifice told here at the Australian War Memorial. We now remember Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Esmond Robertson, who gave his life for us, for our freedoms, and in the hope of a better world.

Duncan Beard
Editor, Military History Section