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Most probably it was the firm of Burns, Philp & Co., whose overseas trading interests were mainly run from its Sydney office, which provided the weightiest but not the only spur to the Bank's first move into Papua. The initiative certainly came from Sydney, where the Bank already kept the accounts of a number of storekeepers, traders, and planters. At the beginning of 1910, T. H. Ivey, now chief inspector, wrote to William McRae, the former manager at Suva, who had been appointed manager at Townsville and assistant inspector of northern branches in 1908. The general manager wished him to visit Port Moresby and Samarai and report on prospects for branches. Head office had been approached by a plantation company, and the names of several individuals and companies with interests in Papua and the neighbouring islands were mentioned. Ivey concluded: "Burns, Philp & Co. Ltd. are anxious for us to open at Port Moresby, and from conversations with Colonel Burns I gathered that they do a very considerable private banking business at the Port which is increasing to such an extent that they are forcibly reminded that they are not bankers. This Coy. will of course do a large business with us should we open in Papua."
In March the board received a letter and telegram from McRae which confidently recommended opening a branch at Port Moresby as soon as possible. A final decision was left to Russell French's discretion, but the answer was plain, for a telegram on 22 March told McRae to prepare for opening and to suggest a possible manager. The manager appointed was P. H. Pickering, McRae's accountant at Townsville, and as second officer he had T. L. Sefton, who resigned the following year from the Bank and became a highly respected planter in Papua. The branch at Port Moresby was opened on 10 May 1910 and was quickly followed on 15 June by a branch at Samarai, a small island off the eastern tip of New Guinea and a trading centre for the neighbouring groups of islands.
"Bank of New South Wales, A History: Volume II:
1894 - 1970"
Papuan business depended largely on copra and rubber, and neither commodity produced much profitable activity as their prices were un-satisfactory and unstable. Nevertheless the Bank spread its coverage to the mandated territory of New Guinea by opening branches at Rabaul in June 1926 and Kavieng in July 1927, both heavily dependent on copra, but the former a useful port of call for shipping services from Australia to the East. A watch was kept on the development of the goldfield at Bulolo and a gold agency for it was conducted at Salamaua at least briefly in 1926; a branch was opened at the latter place in 1929 to serve the area.
"Bank of New South Wales, A History: Volume II:
1894 - 1970"
The Japanese attacks on Pearl Harbour and Singapore gave the signal that the emergency had reached Australia. On 11 December 1941 the chief inspector advised inspectors to use their discretion to set in motion the second and third steps 0f the plan for safeguarding basic records 0f potentially vulnerable branches and instructed managers to evolve their own scheme for protecting staff pending decisions by the authorities. Within a few days those branches regarded as vulnerable---mainly coastal branches and particularly those in North Queensland, Western Australia, and Island branches-were instructed to apply the second step and send regular returns of their business and individual accounts to custodian branches. Such plans worked smoothly and allowed certain flexibility in the remoter branches. In Fiji, for example, the manager made his arrangements for a final emergency or evacuation on the basis of joining, with the Bank of New Zealand, in the Government's scheme to move inland from the coast. The rapid progress of the Japanese to New Guinea and the military service and training which all the male staff of the Island branches were called on to perform on a part-time basis threw some of the routine procedures out of gear, and the local staff were left substantially to their own initiative---in which they were not wanting---in protecting the Bank's records and cash. By the time that the final step of dispersing records on a daily basis was called for in February 1942, the branches in Papua and New Guinea had been evacuated and the bulk of essential records and cash had found devious ways to the mainland.
The Japanese invasion of New Guinea began the critical period for the mainland of Australia. For months the danger of attempted invasion seemed imminent, and in all States the Bank prepared for the dispersal of its operations away from the coast. Detailed schemes were worked out with defence and civil authorities for the movement from Townsville and North Queensland branches and from Brisbane. At one stage the possibility of moving out of Perth had to be given serious attention. Elsewhere the danger was less imminent, but plans had to be ready. Branches were kept on the alert with frequent reminders of the need to maintain all precautions for the safety of staff and protection of the Bank and its records until June 1942, when the worst dangers appeared to have faded. Not until April 1943 was any relaxation of the emergency procedures approved, and then only to a limited extent. A final cancellation of the emergency plan, with minor exceptions, came a year later, in March 1944.
The Bank's outlying branches in the Islands and at Darwin and Broome were in the front line and accordingly suffered. The Story of the Island branches and of Darwin wrote a new experience into the Bank's history of the courage and initiative of the staff and their devotion to their responsibility for the Bank. The ordeal began with the first of a series of air raids on Rabaul on 4 January 1942 which reached a crescendo on 20 January. The following day the branch was able to open for only about an hour because of the calls of defence duties, and as invasion was expected the following day preceded by bombing, the available staff under the manager, A. W. Clarke, spent the night packing the most essential records in two tin boxes, buried them in a slit trench, and then returned to their units. On 22 January air raids concentrated on defence installations, but in the afternoon an invasion fleet was reported, and the defence volunteers were ordered to get out. The manager with R. W. Skillen, the accountant, succeeded in digging out the boxes and got away in a small coastal ship with the records and £5,299 in notes. After calling at Samarai, where the branch had been evacuated the day before, the vessel eventually reached Townsville on 30 January. Of the remaining staff of the branch some escaped on foot and by small boats after fighting in defence of the town and reached either Port Moresby or Cairns after hazardous and strenuous journeys; two tragically were never heard of again.
This was the first of the odysseys from the Island branches. The branch at Lae had been opened only for two months when the town was raided by the Japanese on 21 January, and the Administrator ordered the cessation of business and evacuation of all civilians from the town. The manager, K. Diamond (his second officer, F. O. Monk, was on duty with the New Guinea Volunteer Rifles) was obliged to bury essential records and cash when the civilians decided that the only way out was to walk to the hinterland and take advantage of any opportunity to hitch-hike. Setting out on 26 January in a party, Diamond reached Wau after a strenuous journey on 4 February. There he met A. N. Marlay, the Salamaua manager, who had been obliged to close his branch on 22 January and find his way out with the New Guinea Volunteer Rifles, who were evacuating civilians. The latter had no chance of taking anything out, and had locked records, cash, and bullion in the strongroom. Marlay was able to return to Salamaua and get out some of his records, and with the help of the military authorities and the R.A.A.F. who blew open the strongroom, the bullion was recovered and flown out by flying boat. He returned to Wau before rejoining his unit. Diamond was still there, a sick man, but managed to get out Salamaua records and to make arrangements with a number of the Bank's local customers about the conduct of their accounts before he was directed to leave by plane for Cairns. He got out shortly before Wau was bombed, but greatly regretted his failure to return to Lae to recover the Bank's records and cash.
The branch at Wau was ordered to close on 22 January. The manager, A. J. Byrne, forthwith packed notes and essential records but was forced to leave much behind. He was able to get permission to fly out a reduced weight of records on 24 January, but at Port Moresby he was ordered back to Wau to rejoin his unit. The branch building, other than the strongroom, was destroyed by bombs in the raid on 1 March, and the remaining silver in it was subsequently recovered. Samarai at the eastern tip of New Guinea had more warning of events when two flying boats with almost a hundred people arrived from Rabaul on 23 January. On the following day a meeting of the local community with advice from the Administration decided to evacuate and to close down all business. It was a Saturday and the Bank's branch closed at noon, balanced it books, and mailed out its emergency records and returns. When the decision to evacuate was taken, the manager, C. W. Tonner, and his second officer packed the necessary books, papers, and cash, and while doing so from 9 p.m. until 2 a.m. on Sunday cashed cheques and issued drafts to late arrivals. They left at 5 a.m. on 25 January by ship for Port Moresby, having locked everything else away. Tonner then proceeded to Townsville with his own records and some of those which had been saved from Wau. The remaining branch was at Port Moresby, which had played, with Townsville, a vital role during the period of intermittent communications. That town was bombed on 3 February .The manager, C. M. Cox, was instructed by the Queensland inspector, R. F. Malfroy, the following day to close the branch and evacuate all essential material. The branch closed at the end of business on 5 February.
Thus most of the cash and bullion and essential books were brought out. With the aid of the emergency returns sent to the custodian branch, Charters Towers, it was possible to set up a small group in Brisbane to reconstruct the business of the branches in less than a month from the first closure. For all their ordeals the staff, too, had come out well. The younger fit members were called up for full-time military duties, and apart from two officers at Rabaul all were accounted for and gave distinguished service-not without tragic loss-in subsequent operations in the New Guinea theatre. It was an anxious time for the Queensland inspector, too, in the disturbed state of communications, but he received keen support from the Townsville manager, R. F. Pickering, whose personal relations with the Air Force authorities in particular ensured friendly co-operation and assistance from the R.A.A.F. in rescue operations. In the emergency in New Guinea the distinction between civilian and services became blurred in the effort to salvage the maximum while there was still time.
The work of reconstituting the Island branches in Brisbane had no sooner started than the first attack on the mainland of Australia woke the whole country to the imminent danger. Darwin was bombed on 19 February 1942 with dramatic effect on Australian consciousness. At the Bank's branch the wail of the sirens put the staff's drill in locking away cash and records and getting to shelter to practical test. Little damage was done to the business centre, however, other than shattered windows. After a day of indecision the authorities called the bank managers together at 9.30 that evening and ordered them to leave Darwin with their records by midnight. A truck was placed at the disposal of the four banks and the taxation and audit offices, and 90 minutes were left to pack in a blackout. An order under national security regulations to close the banks as from the following day was signed by the manager of the Commonwealth Bank. The branch manager, R. C. Harding, was allowed to accompany the records and cash, but the remaining three officers were under military orders to stay, though assured of evacuation within 48 hours. By truck and train Harding drove over 900 miles to Alice Springs, where he boarded an evacuee train with the records and arrived at Adelaide on 1 March. The following morning Darwin branch was re-opened in Adelaide office. Four months later the branch premises at Darwin were reduced to a shell in a further raid which buckled the strongroom door. In October, R. C. Harding got permission to return to recover records and documents left behind by the banks. He eventually got out by train in a cattle truck with ten cases of documents, the start of a long and varied journey to Adelaide.
Elsewhere the tension was high for several months. Preparations were made in Queensland for the hire of motor trucks to evacuate records from coastal and tableland branches in the north in case of need, and joint arrangements were made for a special train to be available at short notice at Townsville and Rockhampton. Fortunately such measures never had to be put in motion, though business in Queensland was carried on in discomfort, in an atmosphere of crisis, and amid interruptions and disturbance inevitable in circumstances of large-scale military movement. Similar planning for evacuation was also required in Western Australia. Only one branch, Broome, was closed when the Army persuaded everyone including the police to leave the town; the Bank made an ordered withdrawal at the end of March 1942. The New Zealand division was called on to make similar plans for an emergency to those undertaken in Australia. Addison was allowed discretion to take his own precautions, but was sent all the instructions issued by the chief inspector to Australian divisions as a guide. The danger to New Zealand, however, was never regarded as so urgent as in Northern Australia and the Islands.
"Bank of New South Wales, A History: Volume II:
1894 - 1970"
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updated 14th July 2013