Posted on 05/04/2022 1:56:08 PM PDT by CheshireTheCat
On lonely scrubland at the Aru Islands port of Dobo on this date in 1943, the Japanese military beheaded kidnapped Australian Rev. Leonard Kentish.
Nobody knew his fate at the time — his wife spent years tring to discover it — but the so-called “Kentish Affair” was one of the true oddities of the Pacific War: a civilian of no particular import to the war effort who was snatched from Australian territorial waters.
On January 22, 1943, the civilian Kentish, chief of Northern Territory Methodist missions to the aboriginal peoples, had hitched a ride on the HMAS Patricia Cam, a wooden tuna trawler that had been requisitioned as a wartime naval transport. The Patricia Cam wasn’t running any blockades — she was strictly for local cargo runs, in this instance shuttling among Elcho Island and the Wessel Islands just off Arnhem Land.
She had no radar capacity, and no inkling at all of her fate that afternoon when the Aichi E13A floatplane dove out of the sky and skimmed above the Patricia Cam, within 100 feet of the mast — dropping a bomb amidships that ripped open the trawler’s belly and sent her to the bottom.
While survivors scrabbled in the Arafura Sea for “overboard drums, planks, boxes — anything that would float” the raider circled for another pass, splintering with a second bomb an emergency canoe that men were crowding into, then strafing the waves with machine gun fire. Finally, the victorious seaplane set down in the waves.
And then mysteriously, the pilot gestured Rev. Kentish into the vacant seat of his plane, and took off. Kentish was the only prisoner taken, and his countrymen never again laid eyes on him....
(Excerpt) Read more at executedtoday.com ...
Makes you wonder how many Russians will be executed for warcrimes committed in Ukraine.
He was in Japanese custody 13 days.
To complete the story for those who do not wish to visit the web site:
The whereabouts of Rev Kenting between being picked up by the IJN Aichi E13A (only service listed as using is IJN) floatplane and him arriving at the Japanese camp at Dobo on the Aru Islands on 13 April 1943 were unknown. After physical punishment and minimal food, on the orders of 1st Lt. Sagejima Maugan, he was taken to a scrub grave some 200 yards inland and beheaded.
After an intelligence officer read Kenting’s wife’s published letter in Argus (a newspaper?), the matter was referred to Gen Douglas MacArthur’s Tokyo HQ for research [unknown time period but clearly post VJ Day]. From that inquiry, Rev Kenting’s remains were disinterred and reburied at the Australian War Cemetery on Palau Ambon in Ambon along with other Japanese murdered/died Internees. Ambon is an Indonesian Island close to Dobo.
“The consequence of this inquiry was a 1948 war crimes case against Lt. Sagejima Maugan, who was hanged in Hong Kong on August 23, 1948 for conducting Rev. Kentish’s execution.” He was one of 920 executed for war crimes in the post-war period.
For context as to what was happening at this time in the PTO, the Japanese Army (IJA) and Navy (IJN) withdrew from the defeat at Guadalcanal early February of 1943. This was a 6 month battle that the Allies initiated, invaded and defeated the Japanese military after a near supreme 6 months effort by the Japanese to resist. Thus, afterwards the IJA refocused efforts on the east end of New Guinea to take the Australian holding of Port Moresby. In March of 1943, the Battle of the Bismarck Sea had the Allies decisively turn back a Japanese land attack force of 6,900 troops on 8 transports. Only 2,700 returned after all transports were lost and 4 of the eight escorting destroyers! 1943 was the year that Japan started losing its land possessions in the Pacific as well as much of their Navy & aircraft.
On the 2nd day of the Battle of the Bismark Sea the allies returned the favor of the Japs strafing survivors in the open water. On the first day, 22 Jap ships were sunk. On the second day Aussie Beaufighters, under orders, strafed lifeboats and killed an estimated 800 men.
The justification for it was if they made it shore in New Guinea they would rejoin the fight and kill allied troops there.
Didn’t parse the title right, thought Kentish was executed for kidnapping an Australian...
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