MAJOR EWAN LAWRIE CORLETTE NX350 2/2 Casualty Clearing Station Middle East – Java- Thailand

MAJOR EWAN LAWRIE CORLETTE NX350

Sydney born Ewan Corlette was working at Orange when he enlisted as a Captain AAMC (as a specialist he was then promoted to the rank of Major) and was allocated to the 2/2 Casualty Clearing Station (CCS) serving first in the Middle East. On 18 February 1942 an element of 2/2 CCS, along with 2/3 Machine Gun Battalion and 2/2 Pioneer Battalion, moved to the Netherlands East Indies and landing in Batavia, Java. This was to honour a British undertaking to assist the Dutch to resist the Japanese. The Dutch stopped fighting on 8 March and with all the Allied forces, Corlette became a POW of Japan on12 March 1942.

The 2/2 CCS  on arrival on Java, was under the command of Lt Col Norm Eadie who was then appointed Assistant Director Medical Services (ADMS) for the Java force known as “BlackForce”. As a consequence Major EE (Weary) Dunlop was made CO of the CCS and promoted to Lt Col (Temp). These CCS personnel became POWs and it seems that apart from Lt Col Eadie only 3 of their Medical Officers were in Java. They were:

Lt Col Dunlop and Majors Moon and Corlette. Major Jock Clarke, a dentist from 2/2 CCS, was also present and a 4th Australian Medical Officer, Captain McNamara from the 5th AGH, was attached.

Subsequently, a hospital facility was established and it is assumed that the CCS ceased to operate. The former CCS officers, plus RAF and RAMC personnel, who had also been captured, staffed the hospital.

We wish to acknowledge the above information is copied  from the late Peter Winstanley’s website:    https://www.pows-of-japan.net/articles/28.htm

At the Australian POW Memorial in Ballarat in 2018 and the 14th Anniversary Service the Guest Speaker was Andrew Corlette, son of Ewen Corlette, one of the Australian doctors captured in Java and sent to Burma-Thai Railway.  The following is the address by Andrew Corlette

At sea, 13 Oct 1945.  Medical officers of the Java Force, released prisoners of war (POWs) of the Japanese, aboard the British troopship MV Highland Brigade during their journey home to Australia.

Left to right: WX11120 Lieutenant Frederick George Smedley, 1 Java Ambulance Car Unit, Australian Medical Forces (AMF); VX14845 Lieutenant Colonel Norman Menzies Eadie, Assistant Director of Medical Services, Java Force, AMF; Lieutenant Colonel A C King, 1 Mobile Field Ambulance; NX350 Major Ewan Lawrie Corlette, 1 Allied General Hospital; Major J E R Clarke, 1 Allied General Hospital; Captain Theodore Godlee, 2/3rd Machine Gun Battalion.