The Dunoon and District Gazette

Throughout my many years in PNG and trips to other Pacific Island Nations I have at times found myself in the thick of things quite unknowingly.

Smoked corpse of Aseki.  

Dad operating the radio: My father is on the right in this photo taken in 1916. Note how huge the size of the radios were in those days.

During April this year there have been a series of old photos appearing in the “Looking Back” section of The Northern Star newspaper that were taken by my father Richard Betteridge in the 1920’s.

During the thirty years I spent in PNG I met many returned ex-servicemen and women who fought in New Guinea during the 2nd World War. Most of them were on a pilgrimage to visit the sites where they actually fought against the Japanese or where their mates fell during a fierce battle and all visited either one of the three main Commonwealth War Cemeteries based in Port Moresby, Lae and Rabaul.
There were times I helped Japanese survivors and the widows and children to visit a particular site or a memorial and on every occasion, no matter who it was or where they were from I heard some very poignant stories which always left me so saddened about the futility of wars.

Photographs taken by Charles in 1996, 2 years after the eruption of the Vulcan Volcano in September 1994.

Charles standing on the “road” between Rabaul & Kokopo. Note how high the volcanic ash is piled above him. The road itself is some 50ft below Charles covered in ash.

The pumice covered "Durour" at the former slipway near Karavia. The "Durour" was left stranded hundreds of meters inland from the new shoreline formed after the 1937 Vulcan eruption.

Charles standing on Rabul's ash strewn runway next to one of the third level airlines aircraft that didn't make it out. Tavurvur volcano smoking in the background.