The Australian War Memorial Collection. Test site
Depicts a group of sappers preparing to construct a boom across the Jaba River to arrest the force of logs coming downstream that could damage the piers of the bridge. Mt Bagana, an active volcano nicknamed "Smokey Joe" by the lads, is seen steaming in the background. Sapper Pinchen is the artist in the foreground and the nude in the mid-ground is Sapper David Ramsay Waller (SX38044). This river mouth is a well known point on Empress Augusta Bay, as it was here for many months that the US troops had their perimeter, prior to the Australians taking over. In the trees to the right the Americans had 15 heavy machine guns whilst the Japanese held the bank in the foreground, their forward position being back 100 yards or so from the logs in this painting. The bridge had been open for less than a fornight when this painting was commenced. Previously there had been a ferry service. The sappers in the foreground are 'jetting out' holes for posts. The trees on the right, casuarinas, grow all round the bay and give at times, as in a scene such as this, a surprisingly untropical atmosphere. On the extreme left are the lower of the shoulders of Mount Balbi.
MOTUPENA POINT, BOUGAINVILLE ISLAND, 1945-01-26. SAPPERS OF THE 23RD COMPANY, WORKING ON THE CONSTRUCTION OF A PERMANENT TIMBER PILE BRIDGE ACROSS THE JABA RIVER. THE PONTOON FERRY WHICH IS TO BE REPL
A scene of a bridge, trees and tanks. The tank in the right foreground is transparent, enabling the viewer to see the drivers.
In the foreground there are three men seated, one is crouched on his haunches as they take a tea break amongst the activity of cutting of logs from surrounding trees used in the construction of the th
Men working on the bridge construction, with trees and background hills. At one point on the Burma-Thailand Railway a substantial bridge had to be built where the Mae Khlong and Khwae Noi rivers met.
Soldiers are walking on a suspension bridge over the Fall River at Milne Bay in New Guinea. Two Australian soldiers are at work shovelling in the foreground.
This painting depicts the site of the battle of Messines on the Western Front. It is a snowy, war-torn landscape with soldiers and bare trees in the midground, and a river in the foreground.
