Hospitals and Home

Amputation/DIL

Port Moresby

I was put on a plane to fly over the Hump to Port Moresby. It was a DC3 and they carried 21 stretcher cases. They had them hanging off the wall. This is where luck played a big part: I was last on to the plane and I was put on the floor of the plane.

When we got to Port Moresby I was first off the plane. They were sending casualties to two hospitals, the 2/5th and the 2/9th. The 2/5th was about 2 miles from the airport, and the 2/9th about 17 miles. I went to the 2/5th.

The 2/5th and 2/9th before I Arrived

Approximately 4 or 5 days before my transfer to the 2/5th, a company of the 2/33rd battalion were waiting to be transferred to the north of the island. They were loaded in trucks at night and parked in an holding area to await embarkation on planes early next morning. The army, in its wisdom, had the holding area in line with the airstrip runway. During the night or early morning, an American Liberator B24, a four-engine bomber, fully loaded with gas and bombs, took of from the airstrip and blew up over the loaded trucks, killing a great number and wounding with fire and exploding ammunition virtually the rest. The strain this accident put on the two hospitals can only be imagined.

To further complicate matters this was just after the hospital ship Centaur had been sunk by Jap torpedo, and the army would not put the Mununda back on the seas. Its next trip was my return on Boxing Day. This meant that, except for a very few of the less serious cases who were sent back by plane, there were no evacuations of the serious cases from New Guinea to Australia for over three months or more.

2/5th AGH - Port Moresby

This was a major hospital, and had been in the Middle East, Greece, Crete and back to the Middle East. In Port Moresby it had 1800 beds, and was headed by a full Colonel, Belisario, who was a Dermatologist. I don't remember meeting him, as I was in a major surgical ward, and the main two doctors who looked after me were Colonel Angus Murray (who was O/C surgical and one of Sydney's leading Gynaecologists) and Major John Gibson. The ward I was in was open on all sides, with fly-wire to keep out the bugs. The floor was concrete, and the beds were proper hospital beds. As I only left the ward on my way to or from the theatre I have no idea of the layout. The medical wards were something I knew existed, but had no idea what they looked like, or where they were located. Col. Belisario was not particularly liked by the patients who had dermatitis as they thought they should be sent back to a cooler climate for treatment. The Colonel, because of his speciality, kept them in Moresby. By the time I left, the hospital had over 2100 patients and, in the medical wards, some were sleeping on stretchers under beds. All this was caused by the lack of hospital ships and the fact that a Doug could only carry 21 people and took several hours to reach Townsville. Also they were needed to supply the troops in the north.

Apart from the doctors and patients, there were trained nursing sisters. The matron was a major, there were a few captains and the rest lieutenants. These were assisted by wardsmen and AMWAs who included a few officers and the rest NCOs and other ranks. Before the women arrived, the nursing was done by a team of dedicated men, who assisted in operations and general nursing.

I arrived in the 2/5th and, after I had been there for about an hour (or less), I wanted to go to the toilet. To get on to the pan I had to be lifted up, I couldn't get myself up. I was lifted up on to the pan and started haemorrhaging furiously.

I woke up the next morning, having had a number of blood transfusions. That afternoon, I think, Major Gibson said, "We are going to have to operate again tonight and we are going to try and save your leg but we might have to amputate it. What do you think?"

I said, "What's got to be, got to be". The rest of it is a bit of a blur. I can only remember certain things that were told to me ...

Amputation

I got my leg removed that night, that was on the 14 or 15 September. [Actually it was in the evening of 16 September, according to the medical records. JRH.] I had a lot of transfusions. Whatever they did it wouldn't hold and it kept haemorrhaging. I had something like 30 liters of blood. The gory details are in the medical record.

They finally tied the iliac artery, which runs down the middle of your navel, off, and that was done by Lieutenant-Colonel Murray. So I certainly had good surgeons. I don't remember much else of the period around the amputation.

The Nightmare

I remember I used to have a recurring dream at night. I would have to go up a river and, if I made it to the top of the river, I was going to be all right. I never came down the river. I only had to go up and that was recurring on a lot of occasions.

There is a funny story, of course. I was reading Pygmalion and, in the middle of Pygmalion, I had a haemorrhage. I was carted off to the theatre again and given a couple of blood transfusions. When I came back the first thing I asked for was my book and I started reading Pygmalion again. John Gibson came in and said, "What are you doing?"

I said, "I'm reading Pygmalion".

He said, "Not bloody likely, you've got the thing upside down".

George Amsberg

The other thing I vividly remember from that time is George Amsberg, who was the head naval officer in Port Moresby. (He was a barrister and, after the war, became a judge. As a barrister he defended the lower end of society and had little regard for judges, with whom he had many arguments whilst in court. One of his more famous "cases" was with a judge with whom he had an altercation, to which the judge said, "If you carry on like that Mr Amsberg I will have you for contempt of court". George answered, "I have nothing but contempt of this court".) At the time, he was a lieutenant in the navy, and he was the ranking naval officer in Port Moresby. By this time Port Moresby had been by-passed. Lae had fallen, everything had been moved up to Lae, so a lieutenant was ranking.

The Amsbergs and the Hermans had been great friends. It had been my grandfather, Jack (Jacob), who was instrumental in getting George into Fort Street High. He was a wonderful friend and he used to come in twice or three times a week to see me.

George I remember clearly (unlike other visitors), as he was my only contact with reality. We talked of many things. On one occasion he came in to see me and I had mosquito repellent on my face as I was the only patient in the hospital who didn't sleep under a net. I had refused as it gave me claustrophobia and it didn't matter as I wasn't going to make it through the night. He saw the moisture on my face and took a towel and wiped it off, and I said, "You bloody fool that is my mosquito repellent".

He and I talked about many things. As I started to improve, he brought up such subjects as how I was going to be able to have sex with one leg, as he thought I may have trouble in getting on. His solution was simple (for a naval officer) and that was to use a set of "sheer legs" (a three legged lifting device). Fortunately I never have had to use such a device.

George kept my mother, father and family sane by writing and telling them everything that was going on. Well, not everything that was going on because it wasn't very good news.

In retrospect George was wonderful to and for me and my family, as the army was not forthcoming with any information on my condition.

The other reason that George liked to see me was the fact that the hospital had many unattached females who just loved the uniform of an Australian naval officer, with the added attraction of a "wet mess" in a land where the only alcohol was used to rub into the skin. George, although married to Agnes, was not averse to "a bit on the side".

D.I.L.

I was on the DIL, the Dangerously Ill List. I got wounded in late August. The iliac artery was tied on 6 October. I was on the DIL in September and October and into November ... over ten weeks. I was having bouts of malaria all through that period. In the army, if you got malaria, they'd test your blood. If they found parasites, they would give you quinine. Quinine was so short they wouldn't give it to you unless you proved positive. So, John Gibson tested me three times in 24 hours and I came up negative. He said, "This is no good. I'm going to give you 10ccs of quinine intravenously". He did and since then I never have had malaria.

Visitors - Padres

During my stay in 2/5 hospital, I was constantly visited by padres of all colours and creeds. The Jewish one for the whole of New Guinea at that time was Rabbi Rueben Zacs who was physically small, and totally unsupported by the community or the services. He came from Perth and had to organise everything himself without any support from the military. I don't know if it was true, but I have heard that on his return home he went a bit "troppo".

I got on well with all the denominations. One used to come in and play crib with me. With me lying flat on my back, he had to do the scoring for both of us. I only had trouble with one and I don't remember which denomination he was but, after he tried to convert me and I told him what I thought of him, I didn't see him again. My language was choice.

Other Visitors

I had lots of other visitors, most of whom I don't remember, but have been reminded by them later on. The most constant was George Amsberg, as I noted above.

Other visitors included Allen Wright and Cecil Luber who, as president of the Temple, managed a tour of New Guinea but mainly to see me and report to Mum and Dad. Another was Alice Jackson, the editor of The Australian Women's Weekly, who wrote the story about me and others ("The luckiest man in New Guinea", AWW, 4 December 1943). There was also a concert party with Gladys Moncrieff, who sang at the foot of my bed.

There were others but, as I have said, my memory is very vague of the sequence of events during that time.

The ward I was in was a surgical ward and there were plenty of cases as bad as I was but, because I survived through the surgical attention I received, I was a bit of as pet. When I came back to 103AGH (Baulkham Hills), all of a sudden I was just one of the boys.

Specific comments about Harold's memoirs can be sent to Harold Herman.

Harold's War was written and is maintained by Jack R. Herman as a part of the history section of his website.

Published by
Jack R Herman
Sydney, March 2007

All material © Copyright: Jack R Herman and Harold Herman.
Email: hhermie@iprimus.com.au

Last updated: 23 March 2007