Service number | VFX61330, F31029 |
---|---|
Ranks Held | Captain, Lieutenant, Lieutenant Colonel |
Birth Date | 18/12/1915 |
Birth Place | Australia: South Australia, Kapunda |
Death Date | 03/07/2000 |
Death Place | Australia: Western Australia, Perth |
Final Rank | Lieutenant Colonel |
Service | Australian Army |
Unit | 2/13 Australian General Hospital |
Places | |
Event | The Sinking of the Vyner Brooke |
Conflicts/Operations |
|
Lieutenant Colonel Vivian Bullwinkel
Vivian Bullwinkel, sole survivor of the 1942 Banka Island massacre, was born on 18 December 1915 at Kapunda, South Australia. She trained as a nurse and midwife at Broken Hill, New South Wales, and began her nursing career in Hamilton, Victoria, before moving to the Jessie McPherson Hospital in Melbourne in 1940.
In 1941, wanting to enlist, Bullwinkel volunteered as a nurse with the RAAF but was rejected for having flat feet. She was, however, able to join the Australian Army Nursing Service; assigned to the 2/13th Australian General Hospital (2/13th AGH), in September 1941 she sailed for Singapore. After a few weeks with the 2/10th AGH, Bullwinkel rejoined the 13th AGH in Johor Baharu.
Japanese troops invaded Malaya in December 1941 and began to advance southwards, winning a series of victories and, in late January 1942, forcing the 13th AGH to evacuate to Singapore. But the short-lived defence of the island ended in defeat, and, on 12 February, Bullwinkel and 65 other nurses boarded the SS Vyner Brooke to escape the island.
Two days later, the ship was sunk by Japanese aircraft. Bullwinkel, 21 other nurses and a large group of men, women, and children made it ashore at Radji Beach on Banka Island; they were joined the next day by about 100 British soldiers. The group elected to surrender to the Japanese, and while the civilian women and children left in search of someone to whom they might surrender, the nurses, soldiers, and wounded waited.
Some Japanese soldiers came and killed the men, then motioned the nurses to wade into the sea. They then machine-gunned the nurses from behind. Bullwinkel was struck by a bullet and pretended to be dead until the Japanese left. She hid with a wounded British private for 12 days before deciding once again to surrender. They were taken into captivity, but the private died soon after. Bullwinkel was reunited with survivors of the Vyner Brooke. She told them of the massacre, but none spoke of it again until after the war lest it put Bullwinkel, as witness to the massacre, in danger. Bullwinkel spent three and half years in captivity; she was one of just 24 of the 65 nurses who had been on the Vyner Brooke to survive the war.
Bullwinkel retired from the army in 1947 and became Director of Nursing at Melbourne's Fairfield Hospital. She devoted herself to the nursing profession and to honouring those killed on Banka Island, raising funds for a nurses' memorial and serving on numerous committees, including a period as a member of the Council of the Australian War Memorial, and later president of the Australian College of Nursing.
In the decades following the war, Bullwinkel received many honours and awards, including the Florence Nightingale Medal, an MBE and the AO. She married in 1977 and returned to Banka Island in 1992 to unveil a shrine to the nurses who had not survived the war. Vivian Bullwinkel died on 3 July 2000.
Rolls
-
Second World War POWs and Missing Persons:
- Unit
- 2/13 Australian General Hospital
- Conflict
- Second World War, 1939-1945
- Rank
- Lieutenant
-
Honours and Awards:
- Unit
- 2/13 Australian General Hospital
- Conflict
- Second World War, 1939-1945
- Rank
- Lieutenant
-
Honours and Awards (Recommendation):
- Conflict
- Second World War, 1939-1945
Timeline
Date of birth | 18/12/1915 | Kapunda, SA. |
---|---|---|
Date and unit at enlistment (ORs) | 08/08/1941 | Enlisted in the Australian Army Nursing Service, Australian Imperial Force. Bullwinkel was assigned to the 2/13th Australian General Hospital. |
Other | 09/1941 | Sailed for Singapore and soon joined the 2/13th Australian General Hospital in Johor Baharu, Malayasia. |
Other | 12/02/1942 | Bullwinkel and 65 other nurses boarded the SS Vyner Brooke to escape the Japanese invasion of Singapore. |
Date captured | 16/02/1942 | The SS Vyner Brooke was sunk by Japanese aircraft. Bullwinkel and many others made it to shore. Bullwinkel was the only female survivor of the massacre at Banka Island where 21 members of the Australian Army Nursing Service and other survivors of the sinking of the SS Vyner Brooke were murdered by the Japanese. She was later interned in Pelambang prisoner of war camp. |
Date released | 09/1945 | Released from captivity at Pelambang prisoner of war camp. |
Date of discharge | 30/09/1947 | Bullwinkel retired from the army and became Director of Nursing at Melbourne's Fairfield Hospital. |
Date of honour or award | 06/03/1947 | Royal Red Cross (2nd Class). |
Date of honour or award | 01/01/1973 | Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE). |
Date of honour or award | 26/01/1993 | Officer of the Order of Australia (AO). |
Date of death | 03/07/2000 | Perth, WA. |
Related information
Places
Related Objects
- Sister (Sr) Vivian Bullwinkel and her mother at a reception held at the 115th Australian General ...
- Matron Vivian Bullwinkel
- Sister Bullwinkel
- Bullwinkel, Vivian (Lieutenant Colonel, b.1915 - d.2000)
- Bullwinkel, Vivian (Lieutenant Colonel, b.1915 - d.2000)
- Souvenir of Western Australia
- AWM54 1010/4/24B - [War Crimes and Trials - Affidavits and Sworn Statements:] Statements by QX20748 Cpl S Bryant-Smith; VX39327 Pte G Bryceland; QX17889 WO1 RG Bryden; QX14893 Dvr HG E Buchanan; Pte WR Buchanan; 420132 F/L DWJ Buchanan; NX2588 Pte AJ Buck; NX26109 Pte RJ Buckland; VX55003 Pte PJ Buckland; NX31853 Pte WW Bucknell; 109313 F/O RP Bulock; NX58482 Lt JD Bull; VFX61330 Lt Sister V Bullwinkel
- Series 8 - Prisoner of war accounts
- Series 8 - Prisoner of war accounts
- Series 1 - Wartime diaries and papers, 1941-1946