THEY’RE our wartime secrets on home soil.

Today Australians are taking a moment to commemorate the bravery of our armed forces overseas, but what many of us don’t know is that during World War I and II, Australia housed thousands of “enemy aliens” in camps and compounds across the country under the National Security Act of 1939.

Australian authorities established “internment camps” to prevent its citizens from assisting the Axis powers (Germany, Japan and Italy) and to accommodate POWs transferred Down Under during the war. They also were believed to placate public opinion.

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At the peak of the invasion threat in 1942, more than 12,000 people were housed in these compounds.

Although there were a number of escapes, most POWs were recaptured as they had nowhere to go. Many recaptured POWs also told of experiencing the Australian “fair go” as they were given food and directions.

More than 50 compounds were in use during World War II, and in a bid to remember the history behind our own backyard, we’ve highlighted a few across each state.

Lest we forget.

WARNING: Some images contain graphic content.

CLICK ON YOUR STATE BELOW

• NEW SOUTH WALES

• QUEENSLAND

• SOUTH AUSTRALIA

• TASMANIA

• VICTORIA

• WESTERN AUSTRALIA

NEW SOUTH WALES

More than 300km west of Sydney lies a farming district by the name of Cowra. At first glance it looks like any other ordinary, quiet, country town, but in fact, it is responsible for the bloodiest — and largest — prison escapes in British and Australian War history.

It began operating in June, 1941, specially built to house POWs brought to Australia from overseas.

No. 12 POW Compound, one of the largest in the country, housed 4,000 military personnel and civilians detainees from the Axis powers. Koreans, Chinese and Indonesians were also held here.

It was divided into four areas, each surrounded by barbed wire fences. Prisoners first lived in huts, but eventually included its own store, kitchen, mess huts, showers, shops and vegetable gardens.

On August 5, 1944, a mob of at least 1,104 Japanese POWs staged a mass breakout, attempting to break through the barbed wire fences of the compound with the aid of blankets. Armed with knives, baseball bats, studded clubs with nails and hooks, and garotting cords, they set most of the buildings in the Japanese compound on fire.

359 POWs escaped, while four Australian soldiers and more than 250 Japanese soldiers were killed. Some committed suicide, others were killed by machine guns, while those left standing were captured and sent back to camp within 10 days. It is commonly referred to as the Cowra breakout.

After the drama of the breakout, most of the Japanese POWs were transferred from Cowra to another POW camp in Hay, NSW, where the prisoners were held in high security.

No. 12 Camp stayed in operation until January 1947, when the last Japanese and Italian prisoners were repatriated.

Cowra commemorates its history with a Japanese war cemetery, and a Japanese garden was later built. To this day, visitors can take a walking trail throughout the camp ruins and the local council is working on renovating upgrading hat is left of the site.

News_Image_File: SEPTEMBER 16, 1943: A group of Indonesian internees and their children, at the No. 12 POW Compound. Picture: Lewecki

News_Image_File: FEBRUARY 4, 1944: The compounds of the 12th Australian POW Camp at Cowra. The Group Headquarter buildings in the foreground. Photographer: Geoffrey McInnes

News_Image_File: FEBRUARY 4, 1944: Group headquarter buildings at Cowra.

News_Image_File: Headlines from The Sunday Telegraph at the time, reporting on the Cowra breakout. News_Image_File: This painting by a Japanese POW shows the main Garrison entrance gate to the Hay POW camps. Picture: Hay Gaol Museum

News_Image_File: A view of the Cowra compound. Picture: Cowra Visitor Information Centre

News_Image_File: Picture: Cowra Visitor Information Centre

News_Image_File: Picture: Cowra Visitor Information Centre

News_Image_File: Picture: Cowra Visitor Information Centre

News_Image_File: AUGUST 5, 1944: The burial of Australian soldiers killed during the Cowra breakout. Picture: H.G. Cartree

QUEENSLAND

German, Japanese and Italian prisoners of war were transferred to Queensland following capture overseas. Of all the Australian states, it had the highest percentage of its ethnic population interned during World War II. 43 per cent were held in camps.

The first train load of internees left Queensland for camps in central Victoria in February 1942, but there were six camps already set up within the state.

In particular, Queensland internees were housed at the Enoggera Military Base; commonly referred to as the Gaythorne internment and prisoner of war camp.

Enoggera was located next to an existing army camp in what is now suburban Brisbane. It began operations during World War I in 1914, housing nearly 140 internees including the crew of a civilian German ship that had docked in Brisbane after the outbreak of war. For the first five months, internees were able to leave the camp during the day to ensure employment.

The camp was closed in 1915 but was re established in 1940 during the outbreak of World War II and enlarged to accommodate 1800 people in five separate compounds. Children, the elderly and families were housed here, consisting of primarily German, Austrian, Italian and Japanese immigrants.

Those who escaped imprisonment were forced to carry police permits to travel outside their residential district and their mail was regularly intercepted.

News_Image_File: 1915: A view of what the camp looked like almost 100 years ago in Brisbane. Picture: Australian War Memorial

News_Image_File: 1916: Officers pictured in the Officer’s Quarters at the military concentration camp on the outskirts of Brisbane. Picture: H.G. Cartree

News_Image_File: 1915: A gymnasium in use at Enogerra Army camp complex. Picture: Australian War Memorial

SOUTH AUSTRALIA

South Australia consisted of one main internment camp at Loveday, near Barmera on the River Murray. Opened in 1941, it was supported by centres at Bordertown, Clare, Lameroo, Maitland, Mount Gambier, Mount Pleasant, Morgan, Murray Bridge, Naracoorte, Tumby Bay, Willunga and Woodside from 1943—45 and a transit camp at Sandy Creek near Adelaide from 1944—46.

The Loveday Internment Group accommodated German, Italian and Japanese internees from various states of Australia, and international internees and POWs from the Netherlands, East Indies, the Pacific Islands, New Zealand, Britain and the Middle East. It consisted of six compounds and accommodation for personnel of the 25/33 Garrison Battalion who kept guard.

During its peak, the camp held over 5000 internees who produced goods and cultivated crops for the Australian war effort.

Some Italians were deployed to work as farmhands, while other Italian and Japanese internees were separated and even paid to harvest wood at Katarapko, Woolenook and Moorook West. 300 Italian internees were employed as railway workers at Cook on the Trans — Australia line.

One POW and 134 internees died at Loveday, while another two POWs were killed during an escape attempt while en route to Loveday.

Cause of death varied from illness and fragility brought on by old age, suicide, and at least one homicide.

Loveday Internment Camp closed in December 1946.

News_Image_File: MARCH 11, 1943: Inside the Officers’ Mess at Loveday Internment Group. Note the Australian flag on the wall and in background, a large Rising Sun insignia over the bar. Picture: Australian War Memorial

News_Image_File: MARCH 15, 1943: A Salvation Army hut at the No. 14 Prisoner-of-War and Internment Camp, Loveday Group, on the banks of the Murray River. Picture: Australian War Memorial

News_Image_File: JANUARY 27, 1944: Perimeter wiring at a corner of Moorook Camp, one of the Loveday Internment Camp Group in the Barmera area. Picture: Keith Hedley Cullen

News_Image_File: MAY 13, 1943: Japanese internees leave the train which brought them from Hay, NSW, on their way to the Loveday Internment Camp Group. Picture: Australian War Memorial News_Image_File: Hay, as it looks today. This is where the prisoners were picked up before embarking on their trip to Loveday Internment Camp.

News_Image_File: APRIL, 1944: Japanese internees using a “Holland” celery planter to plant seedlings at No. 9 Camp Nursery and Loveday. Picture: SGT H.K. Cullen

TASMANIA — BRIGHTON

Brighton has a long military history. Troops going to the Boer War and World War I trained in paddocks near the Jordan River and in World War II, it was the last Australian state to receive prisoners of war.

Previously used as Hobart’s first aerodrome, the Apple Isle’s first and only camp was established at Section 1 of the Brighton Army Barracks, adjacent to the State Highway, in October 1944 until May, 1946. It held approximately 300 captured Italian POWs in three compounds, A, B and C; consisting of one officer and seventy-five other ranks.

During the post war years Section 1 was developed for Defence housing and training, but parts were converted into migrant accommodation like that of Bonegilla in Victoria and Northam in WA and by 1949, the Barracks housed hundreds of immigrants from Poland, Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Yugoslavia,\ and the Baltic counties.

News_Image_File: APRIL 23, 1943: Troops in a mess hut at the general depot. Picture: Australian War Memorial

News_Image_File: APRIL 23, 1943: These newly-arrived recruits are being addressed by Sergeant W T Knott. Picture: Australian War Memorial

News_Image_File: APRIL 28, 1943: Inside one of the wards of 80 Australian Camp hospital in Brighton. Private L.M. Ferrar is on the left, while Private E.C. Carter is sitting on the bed. Picture: Australian War Memorial

News_Image_File: APRIL 23, 1943: A general view of the Brighton Army Barracks as it looked back then. Picture: Australian War Memorial

Sadly, the heritage-listed army barracks were destroyed by fire in September last year. According to The Mercury, some of the barracks were sold and transported off the site after it was sold to Sydney housing developer Simon Toumas in 2010.

News_Rich_Media: The former army barracks at Brighton destroyed by fire, seven fire trucks attended the blaze, which wiped out the heritage-listed building.

VICTORIA

There were at least eight camps in the state during World War II which held between 4000 to 8000 people. Most were located in the Goulburn Valley because food was plentiful and there was a good supply of water.

Four of the camps were for enemy servicemen who had been captured from around the world and then transported to Australia. These camps were at Dhurringile Mansion, Camp 13 near Murchison, Camp 6 near Graytown and Camp 5 near Myrtleford.

The other four camps built near Tatura were for civilians considered a security risk because of their nationality.

The 65-room Dhurringile mansion was used as a POW camp for German officers. One of the most successful escapes from the camp happened in 1945 when 17 officers and three batmen tunnelled 14 feet down from a large crockery room, and under a perimeter fence.

The mansion was later used by the Presbyterian Church as a training camp for orphans before the Victorian Government turned it into a minimum security prison.

The first purpose-built internment camp for World War II was located about 167 kilometres north of Melbourne at Tatura. It consisted of four camps, two at Tatura and two at Rushworth, a couple of kilometres away. The lands where the camps are situated has since been sold and is now in private hands, however, the German War Cemetery was built next to the Tatura cemetery a few years after the war ended. It was the first war cemetery to be established in Australia.

The camps at Tatura were opened in 1940 and held German and Italian internees. Conditions were tough, the mess halls were the only heated rooms in Camp 1 and only one section of Camp 2 had hot showers.

But internees were able to develop tennis courts, workshops, a newspaper, flower and vegetable gardens and start small businesses such as haircutting and tailoring.

News_Image_File: Internees were sometimes allowed to visit the graves of family members at Tatura cemetery. Picture: Australian War Memorial.

News_Image_File: Dhurringile mansion after it was taken over by the military for use as a Prisoner of War camp in 1943. Picture: Australian War Memorial. News_Image_File: Geoff Carol, an overseer at Dhurringile Prison in 1989, peers down the tunnel dug by German prisoners in World War II. Picture: Ross Duncan.

News_Image_File: Internees at Tatura engaged in making fenders for landing barges. Picture: Australian War Memorial

News_Image_File: View of Tatura compounds taken from one of guard towers. Picture: Australian War Memorial.

A Kosher kitchen was established for Jewish internees and one hut was also converted to a Jewish synagogue.

Camp 3 at Rushworth was used exclusively for family groups and hot water was available in all the washrooms. It also featured a camp school taught by German teachers.

However, internees at Camp 4 lived in corrugated iron huts, which were very hot in summer and freezing in winter as the windows had no glass. This camp was used initially for Europeans who had been living in Australia at the outbreak of the war. They included Germans Italians, Hungarians, Finns and Romanians. Once Japan entered the war, they had to make way for Japanese internees as well as some Chinese from Formosa, now known as Taiwan.

WESTERN AUSTRALIA

Camps were mostly located in the northern and central wheatbelt areas and in the southwest of the state. The main camp was located at Marrinup, about 60 kilometres southeast of Perth. Other camps were based at Rottnest Island, Harvey, Fremantle Prison, Northam and Woodmans Point. There was a shortage of farm labourers in the state so many POWs were put to work, performing tasks such as potato digging, flax harvesting and firewood gathering. They were not forced to work but were paid in tokens that they could exchange for items like chocolate and cigarettes.

The No. 16 camp at Marrinup housed up to 1200 POWs from Germany and Italy. Many of the first German prisoners were sailors from the HSK Kormoran, which sank during a battle with the second HMAS Sydney off the coast of Western Australia in 1941.

Civilians were sent to Rottnest Island, which was used as a prison, tourist destination and an internment camp in both World War I and II. It was home to mostly Slavs during the first World War who lived in stone houses and tents. There was not much food, poor sanitation and internees were required to do their own cooking. Italian internees were housed on the island during the second conflict.

News_Image_File: The POWs at Marrinup were put to work due to a shortage of labourers in Western Australia. Picture: Australian War Memorial

News_Image_File: Internees had no chance of escaping from Rottnest Island. Supplied by Australian War Memorial

News_Image_File: Rottnest Island has returned to being a tourist destination.