4. Mates for their Short Life

WW2 – Mates for their Short Life

Saluting their Service - Grahame Old

NX43500 Pte Harold WEST NX43504 Pte George LEONARD

Source the AWM

Harold West and George Leonard were best mates who did everything together. Born six months apart, the pair enlisted together at Goodooga in north-western New South Wales in August 1941, were posted together to the 2/1st Battalion, and served together in the Middle East, Ceylon, and Papua New Guinea.

As young Indigenous boys growing up on the border between New South Wales and Queensland, they had been taught to hunt, track, and live off the land. As adults, they put their specialised skills to work as bushman trackers, station hands, ringbarkers and casual labourers. Harold, a proud Murrawarri man, was so good at his work that it was said he “could track a little black ant up a crowbar after six inches of rain”.

These skills, along with his ability to move quietly and invisibly through the bush for long periods of time, would prove indispensable during the Second World War when his battalion found itself desperately fighting to stop the Japanese advance on the Kokoda Trail in 1942.

The Kokoda Trail – Papua New Guinea

George Leonard was Killed in Action at Eora Creek, on the 23 October 1942, he was 31 years old. Deeply affected by the death of his mate Harold West commenced a personal war with the Japanese. Over the following days and nights, he sought revenge, putting his specialised skills to work to track the Japanese and even the score.

Leaving his unit behind, Harold would disappear for days at a time to hunt Japanese machine-gun posts. Armed with a bag of grenades, Harold stealthily moved behind the enemy’s lines, eliminating machine-gun posts and numerous other enemy positions. Waiting silently for hours alone in the jungle, he would inch carefully towards a party of Japanese soldiers and throw grenades before slinking back into the bush. He would then disappear into the jungle, evading capture, despite the enemy’s best efforts to find him. Upon returning to his unit, he would report that another Japanese machine-gun post had been taken out of action.

Sadly however, Harold died just a few weeks later. He had initially managed to avoid being wounded during his solo missions, but his luck changed when he accidentally broke his leg. He contracted scrub typhus while being treated in hospital in Port Moresby, and died on the 26 November 1942, he was 31 years old.

Two proud indigenous men lived their life together and died together. In his native language, Murrawarri means “to fall with a fighting club in one’s hand”, and he had done just that, defending his Country and his friend.

The Collie–Cardiff RSL proudly displays a portrait of Harold WEST as part of the recently completed Mural. Harold features as the Aboriginal Serviceman in the RSL emblem, representing all those indigenous servicemen and women who have served the country in all wars.

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