Ballale Island

"Kill-All Order" of August 1, 1944
War Ministry, Tokyo

When the battle situation becomes urgent the POWs will be concentrated and confined in their location and kept under heavy guard until preparations for the final disposition will be made. Although the basic aim is to act under superior orders, individual disposition may be made in certain circumstances. Whether they are destroyed individually or in groups, and whether it is accomplished by means of mass bombing, poisonous smoke, poisons, drowning, or decapitation, dispose of them as the situation dictates. It is the aim not to allow the escape of a single one, to annihilate them all, and not to leave any traces.

Graves of the Ballale Island Massacre.

by NX.70429 Maj. Ewan Cameron Millikin B Sqn 2/4 Australian Armoured Regiment.
From information obtained in the RABAUL Area

BALLALE IS. is pear shaped with an area of approx. one square mile and approx 2000 yds East & West and 1900 yds North & South. An area approx 600yds square, where the white POWs and Chinese were quartered, was "Out of Bounds" to the majority of the Japanese and to all Koreans unless they were there on duty.

OSAKI Unit (18 Naval Construction Unit) during the period under review was approx. 800 strong and while on this island suffered fairly heavily from Allied bombing. In Sep '43 the Unit was moved to KAVIESO ( New Ireland) and built up to 1200 strong. At this period the commander LT. COMD. OSAKI returned to Japan. His further movements are unknown.

In all 324 Japanese Naval personnel and 2 Koreans of OSAKI Unit who had been on BALLALE IS. during the period under review were located in the RABAUL area. Of these 108 Japs, including all the Officers and Petty Officers also the 2 Koreans were interrogated

The Japanese all claimed to know very little about the white POWs and in my opinion must know a lot more than they are prepared to admit. Not one man interrogated would admit having come into actual contact with the POWs. In view of the wall of silence raised by these Japanese it would appear they have either been ordered not to say or admit to knowing anything or else they have decided upon this course by themselves.

On the other hand the 2 Koreans were prepared to tell all that they knew. Their evidence was mostly hearsay, being mainly overheard from groups of Japanese discussing these matters. I consider that the story told by these two men is, as far as it is possible to obtain, the true story of what happened.

A Japanese interpreter HIGAKI of No. 5 Compound RABAUL gave evidence about a party of 600 British Artillerymen from Singapore who left there by ship during Oct '42 arriving RABAUL 6 Nov '42. One man died on the voyage. The party staged at KOKOPO (RABAUL) for about one week. 82 men were left here as too weak to continue their journey. This party was later put under the care of HIGAKI as he could speak English. These men, apart from 3 reasonably fit men left as cook and medical orderlies, were suffering from beriberi, malaria and other sicknesses. On 18 March '43 the numbers were down to 48 - HIGAKI took over at this stage. On Japanese surrender 18 men survived. HIGAKI states that the men told him that after a stay of one week at KOKOPO the 517 fit men were put on a ship and departed for an unknown destination. He was unable, despite repeated inquiries, to find out anything about their fate.

This party of 517 appears to be the same one referred to in HQ First Aust. Army letter A27974 of 25 Jan '46 addressed to 23Bde, the differences being that the letter refers to a party of 512 leaving New Britain in Mar '43 by boat. HIGAKI is quite definite about the number 517 and the date approx. one week after 6 Nov '42.

There is no doubt that a large number of the POWs were killed by Allied bombing, mainly as a result of the Japanese refusing to let them take shelter in slit trenches or air raid shelters. From evidence given by the Koreans, also that taken in other areas, it seems certain that the remaining POWs round about June '43 were killed and buried. The reason for this is not clear, the evidence pointing to :-

(a) The POWs were of no further use due to being too weak for further work or else their task was finished.

(b) The Japanese feared an invasion by the Allies and did not wish the POWs to be discovered.

The method of killing is not clear, although evidence gathered in other areas is all to the point that at a certain time the POWs remaining were killed. In the absence of an eyewitness the best evidence will be a complete report on the exhumation of the bodies.

In view of the evidence gathered by me I am of the opinion that the only person who can be held responsible is the commander of the unit Lt Comd OZAKI.

Major E C Milliken NX.70429
10 March 1946

Following liberation of Ballale, 436 bodies were exhumed together with artefacts proving these men were the missing artillerymen who had sailed from Rabaul to an unknown destination. None of these could be personally identified and these bodies were eventually re-interred in individual graves at the Bomama War Cemetery in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea.

For more information on the Ballale Gunners see:- Stories - Rewarding Research

Alastair Patrick Steele was born on 25 Jan 1906 and died on 5 Mar 1943 in Solomon Islands at age 37.

General Notes: Major Alastair Patrick Steele, R.A.

Major Alastair Patrick Steele, R.A., has been posted by the War Office as “Missing, presumed drowned.”

Alastair was born in Swatow, China, and was educated at the Royal Academy, Inverness and Tollington School, Tetherdown, London. From the University College Reading he took the B.Sc. at London University. Thereafter, he graduated at the Dick Veterinary College, Edinburgh, securing the Diploma of State Veterinary Medicine with many distinctions. His final appointment at home was that of Veterinary Inspector to the Orkney and Shetland Islands, with his headquarters at Kirkwall. During that period he shared the command of one of the vital defences of Scapa Flow with Eric Linklater, the novelist.

Having achieved his majority, he was then appointed Instructor of Gunnery to the Eas­tern Command. He was ordered to Hong Kong in 1942, but, when that fortress fell, the transport was directed to Singapore, where he arrived, only to be captured by the Japanese when the Malay Peninsula was finally occupied by the enemy. At Changi prison camp he was put in charge of the anti-Mosquito Cam­paign.

From Singapore, he and 600 other prisoners were shipped to New Britain in the Pacific, he being second in command of the group. In New Britain he was put in charge of the working parties, and “handled the Japanese” with much skill, to the advantage of the men under him.

From there, he and the men who could travel were sent to the Solomon Islands, and then back to New Britain. The final move was in a ship bound for New Guinea, and of that voyage nothing is known, nor has any news been re­ceived since.

Two of his friends, a Captain and Instructor in Gunnery in ,the R.A. (who died later from malnutrition) and a medical Orderly, bore testimony to him as “the straightest man they had ever known, a great man and a fine Christian.”
He leaves a wife, formerly Miss Candlish, and two children, Alastair Kenneth and Eileen Fiona, now living in Dumfries.