In August 1946, a 12-year-old boy made international headlines and captured the hearts of Australians after arriving in Darwin, barely alive, as a stowaway in the undercarriage of an aeroplane.

Indonesian orphan Bas Wie had crept into the wheel compartment of a Dutch DC-3 as it sat on the tarmac at Kupang airport, where he worked for food in the kitchens.

He was discovered in the wheel carriage, unconscious and severely injured, when the plane landed at Darwin airport three hours later.

Curator Michelle Hughes with a letter to the Immigration Department asking for permission to adopt Bas Wie. ( 666 ABC Canberra: Louise Maher )

The National Archives of Australia has hundreds of documents relating to Bas Wie's extraordinary feat and his subsequent life in the Northern Territory.

Curator Michelle Hughes said they include an account of just how awful his journey from Indonesia would have been.

"He was burnt by the exhaust, he had a laceration on his shoulder blade right to the bone and he also suffered from freezing cold blasts from the propellers," Ms Hughes said.

"So he was actually really lucky to have survived."

Mr Wie stowed away on a plane to Australia because he had lived through the Japanese occupation of Timor during World War II and remembered the kindness of Australian soldiers who had offered him bully beef and sweets.

However under the White Australia policy of the time the boy dubbed "The Kupang Kid" was an undesirable visitor and in line to be deported.

Overwhelming majority of community supported Bas Wie

The archive's documents include hundreds of newspaper clippings, letters from the public offering to adopt or shelter Mr Wie as well as official communication between then NT administrator Arthur (Mick) Driver and the federal immigration minister Arthur Calwell.

Mr Driver employed Mr Wie on his personal staff, sent him to school and applied for him to be exempted from the Immigration Restriction Act.

Ms Hughes said some correspondents called on the federal government to uphold the policy against Asian immigration.

"People who thought that it was dangerous to allow him to stay because it was creating this precedent of circumventing the White Australia policy and that we would be essentially inundated with undesirable migrants if we allowed Bas Wie to stay," she said.

But Ms Hughes said the overwhelming majority of the community supported his right to remain in Australia, not just because he was a stowaway with a tragic background but because of the "sheer audacity" of his journey and how well he fitted into the Darwin community.

"We have reports from his teachers that show that he was getting on socially as well as academically," Ms Hughes said.

"[Mr Calwell] gave this case special consideration because of Bas Wie's circumstances as an orphan and as a minor.

"It was thought that it was best to allow him to stay in Australia and to be educated so that he would have a better chance at life."

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Before Mr Driver left the Northern Territory, he found Mr Wie a job at Izods Motors and arranged for him to be adopted by a local family.

In 1958, 12 years after his arrival, "The Kupang Kid" was naturalised and went on to marry and raise a family.

Ms Hughes said the National Archives files tell the story of the "contrasting attitudes" of the then official government policy against Asian people and the way in which the general public welcomed this young Indonesian orphan.

"It just really speaks to the fact that the Australian community embraced him," Ms Hughes said.

"The immediate Australian community really found a place in their hearts for this boy who'd been through lots of tragedy."