The Soldier's Details

Syd Osborne enlisted AIF 10 Aug 1940 later joining 2/4th MGB’s ‘D’ Company No. 14 Platoon with Commanding Officer Lt Tom Tompkins.  Other 2/4th ‘boys’ in this platoon included Percy Westlake also a former Fairbridge Boy.  There were 21 former Fairbridge Farm School boys in 2/4th.

Osborne was wounded in action at Ulu Pandan. Admitted to 2/13th Australian General Hospital on 16.2.1942 with shrapnel wounds to his back, shoulder and left buttock. Discharged to unit on 7.3.1942.

There were many 2/4th KIA or wounded or KIA at Ulu Pandan.

As a POW at Singapore Syd was selected with a Work Party to sail to Sandakan, North Borneo with ‘B’ Force Borneo. Bob Chipperfield was the only other Fairbridgian to be sent to North Borneo.  In total there were about 71 ‘boys’ from 2/4th who sailed to Sandakan and perished.

Please go to story of ‘B’ and ‘E’ Forces, Borneo.

And please read further and see detailed map Sandakan-Ranau March

List of Relics found after the war

Osborne was  a Kingsley Fairbridge Farm Schoolboy arriving in Australia on 11/2/1924 aged about 5 years. Osborne was housed at Jenner Cottage.   It appears there may have been an older brother John Thomas Osborne, who arrived on same ship, he was 10 years old.  Unfortunately this details cannot be confirmed.

As was the policy, once you were 14 years of age, Fairbridge schoolchildren were sent to work in rural Western Australia – sometimes in remote locations, with accomodation for boys ranging from tin-sheds with no running water, sleeping in the loft above the shed housing horses/cows to farmers who offered a ‘home/family.’  The latter being quite rare!

During 1935 and 1936 Osborne was working at ‘Woolgorong’ Station, Mullewa.

Sydney Albert Osborne married in 1937 to Irene Daphne Randall.  Irene was a Fairbridge girl, arriving in WA November 1929 and housed in Wolfe cottage. At 14 Irene would have been sent to work as a domestic in rural WA.

The couple resided at Morrison Road, Swanview with Syd working as a truck driver.  When the ‘Aquitania’ sailed for Singapore 16 January 1942 Syd left behind his wife and 2 young sons, Ross and Brian.   Brian was not then 12 months old.

Sydney Osborne had extraordinary strength of mind to remain alive in the horrendous and unimaginable circumstances existing at Sandakan until 21 June 1945 when he died of malaria (according to Japanese records).

The first and second Sandakan – Ranau marches had left by the end of May 1945.   The remaining sick and incapacitated POWs were, without any earlier warning, ordered out of their huts (their homes since arriving Borneo).  Some were carried out – assisted by those POWs leaving with No. 2 March – others crawled to lay in the open dressed in a few rags, the fortunate with ground sheets, within the wired area without shelter.  The Japanese then proceeded to burn every hut (and all records).      We believe Syd was one of the last few 2/4th POWs remaining alive.  He was 6’4″ and well built.

We today, can not begin to imagine how Syd and his mates kept going day after day. They had been starved since end of December when the Japanese ceased issuing food rations and forbidden locals trading with the POWs. They existed on their own stockpile of rice, which had dwindled. What did they have that kept them going?

After the war Syd’s body was recovered and identified with relic’s in a grave near Sandakan No. 2 Camp and reburied at Labuan War Cemetery. His Japanese death certificate records indicate he died of Malaria.

Following the end of the war, Irene Osborne remarried.

Brian remembers thereafter he and his brother were forbidden to talk about their father.   Photos and any memorabilia disappeared – it was as if their father Sydney Albert Osborne never existed.

A delightfully smiling and happy Syd Osborne – this photo was for his WA Pay Book

Brian Osborne attended the recent Fall of Singapore Service held on Sunday 11th February 2024.  He pointed out that it was 100 years to the day that his father Syd arrived at Fremantle aged 4 and a half  years and was sent to Fairbridge Farm in Pinjarra. Syd Osborne WX7634 enlisted in August 1940 and died of malaria at Sandakan Camp in June 1945 aged 25 years.