The Ghosts of Roebuck Bay
Posted on: Mon 9 Oct 2017
In late February and early March 1942 a little pearling port in North Western Australia became the epicentre of the war in the South West Pacific. Not much was reported about it around Australia. Nearly three months after the attack, the Cairns Post newspaper reported:
- ‘Broome has been described as a ghost town… There is not one woman or child within 50 miles… The full story of the machine-gun and bomb attacks on Broome has not yet been told. It may never be told.’
Australian author, Ian W Shaw has laid all that out in the open for Australians and the rest of the world to examine and know. Ian takes Service Voices listeners on a fascinating journey through some aspects of his book ‘The Ghosts of Roebuck Bay’. It shows that not all of Australia’s war heroes were generals or front-line military personnel.
Interviewer Helen Meyer
