Item 04: Memoirs of a Colonial Boy by Robert Joseph Stewart, ca. 1971 - Page 459
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[Page 459]
(14)
training was intensified, and some of our younger officers, and many of the sappers, immediately volunteered for service with the second Australian Imperial Force, now being raised for service overseas. Compulsory service had not been reintroduced since it was suspended in 1930, during the depression, as an economy measure, and replaced by a purely voluntary system with much more attractive uniforms and conditions. As Australia's war preparations got into their full stride, more members of the Militia were called up for full-time duty at the military establishments and training centres.
Towards the end of April 1940, the three field companies and the field-park company of our Second Division Enigneers began a three-month training camp at Glenfield; a tented camp with hutted messing and cooking accommodation, about twenty five miles south-west of Sydney. Winter set in early, a very dry and cold one, so the viruses had plenty of dust on which to ride around. Consequently, respiratory infection was very common in the camps, particularly chronic sore throats, known as Puckapunyal throats, this being an allusion to a similar bad epidemic at the big Victorian military camp of that name. We all slept very cold in tents without flies, and the only provision for our morning ablutions was a number of cold showers. I had a chronic cold for most of this camp period.
Three weeks before this three months of constant training was due to terminate, two other officers and I were called up for full-time duty in the Engineer Services Branch, Eastern Command, Victoria Barracks, Paddington, for an indefinite period. The Shell Company approved (they really didn't have much choice) and confirmed that they would pay the difference between my military emoluments and theirs: at the beginning, my army pay and allowances amounted to slightly more than I was receiving from Shell. This move pleased Madge very much, and she thought that I should take the opportunity offered of serving full time for duration of the war, rather than attempting to hurry back to