-
Source: Reuters -
Related
The family of two Australian diggers lost in Papua New Guinea during World War II have finally laid their loved ones to rest.
In a small ceremony at Bomana War Cemetery, just outside the capital Port Moresby, Lieutenant Tim Logan and Lance-Sergeant Jim Wheeler were buried with full military honours on Tuesday.
As the coffins were lowered into newly dug graves, Australian soldiers fired three shots to honour the supreme sacrifice the fallen men had made.
For Fred Logan, from Bribie Island in Queensland, said it was a particularly moving day - he'd never met his father.
"It's a great relief, it is extremely emotional day," he said.
"I said hello to my father for the first time. Today, I said goodbye.
"The overwhelming grief I carried throughout my life has now past in the knowledge that we've done all we can for him," he said.
Logan said his father was with the 2/12 Australian Infantry Battalion and was killed on PNG's northeast coast near Buna on January 1, 1943.
"Tim's last phrase before he was killed, he wasn't thinking of himself: 'For Christ sake get your bloody head down'.
"The unfortunate part is that a sniper shot him through the neck and he was killed instantly," he said.
Wheeler, a forward observer with the 2/1 Field Regiment, Royal Australian Artillery, was killed on PNG's northeast coast near Sanananda on December 1, 1942.
Wheeler's family, also at Tuesday's ceremony, acknowledged that it was 67 years to the day that he had died.
The Australian army forensic team could not identify two other sets of remains. They were buried with a headstone marked "Known unto God".
Brian Manns, manager of the Australian army's unrecovered war casualties unit, said there were more than 700 Australians classified as `missing in action' from World War II in PNG.
"In my experience families are grateful and relieved that finally there is an end to a particular chapter that's always had a question mark over it," he said.
Around 3,000 Australians are buried at Bomana.
