Ballalae: A story of history and tragedy
by Chris Leonard, February 2025
Japanese Heavy Bomber on the Kahili airstrip, south coast of Bougainville, myself and David Kuhuga, a Bougainvillean friend from Sirovai village.
I first heard the name Ballalae when my boss at the time asked if I would undertake a business trip to one of our clients in the Western Province of the Solomon Islands. I was working on Bougainville Island in the North Solomons Province of PNG and the client was Allardyce Lumber, a logging company on Shortland Island. Of course I jumped at the chance.
Ballalae is an island not far off the south coast of Bougainville with an airstrip that serviced the many islands in that part of the world. Over the years, I would make several flights into Ballalae, either on business or by passing through to Honiara, the capital of the Solomon Islands.
The Ballalae airstrip is approximately 1.75 km long and runs from one end of the island to the other. It hadn’t dawned on me initially that this was once a World War II bomber strip. The size should have said it all as it dwarfed our tiny plane. It seemed as though you could land a Jumbo jet there.
Ballalae has been spelt several ways—Ballalae, Ballale, Ballalai, Balalai and Ballalei, but they all sound like BAL-A-LAI. The renowned author, James A Mitchener, whilst in the US Navy during WWII, was based for a time at the nearby Treasury Islands. I have long surmised that the mysterious island, Bali Hai, in his book, ‘Tales of the South Pacific,’ was derived from the name Ballalai.
Ballalae has never been home to permanent villages. Basically, it was used as a transit point for tribal groups when passing from one area to another. There was some talk that it was a superstitious place where, in the past, the victors of tribal fighting held cannibalistic feasts to celebrate their conquest.
In 1901, Sam Atkinson purchased the island to establish a coconut/copra plantation. He passed away from cancer in Sydney in 1931 and his wife, Edith, continued to run the plantation for many years[1]. Edith Atkinson was the second daughter of John and Melinda McDonald, who first sailed into the Shortlands in the 1860s[2]. She was well respected by the Shortland people and only left the island just before the Japanese invasion of the Solomons.
The 18th Construction Battalion of the Imperial Japanese Navy landed on Ballalae on 3rd November 1942. Initially, they started with 370 personnel with the aim of constructing a major forward airbase[3]. At its height, up to 95 aircraft were stationed there. The Japanese code name for Ballalae was ‘RXZ’, and they would call it an ‘unsinkable aircraft carrier’[4].
On 16th November 1942, a contingent of British artillery soldiers were about to set sail from Rabaul. These men, 600 in total, had been captured with the fall of Singapore and on 18th October 1942, were put on the Masta Maru, destination Rabaul. When they finally reached Rabaul, with death and disease already taking a toll, only 517 made that final journey to Ballalae. I estimate they reached the island around 18th November 1942. The men were under the command of Lt Col. J. Bassett.
The prisoners were immediately put to work constructing a crushed coral runway and multiple plane parking/revetment areas. They were treated appallingly by the Japanese with many dying from disease, overwork and poor nutrition. But that was not to be the worst of it. The men were kept in an enclosed compound when they were not working and at night. The tide of the war was turning after the American landings at Guadalcanal and with the Japanese now on the defensive, Ballalae was to come under more and more aerial attacks. The prisoners were not allowed to construct any air raid shelters or dig slit trenches. Consequentially, many hundreds would be killed by Allied planes; the Americans were unaware that POWs were there.
Sometime around late March 1943, no one can be sure of the exact date, the surviving POWs, numbering less than 100, were taken to one end of the island and executed, likely bayoneted and/or shot. There were no survivors.
Since there were no eyewitnesses other than the Japanese participants, we don’t know to this day exactly what happened to these men. At the end of the war, Australian forces based at nearby Torokina on Bougainville decided to investigate native reports of the demise of the servicemen. They eventually exhumed 436 remains from a mass grave. Some personal belongings that were retrieved indicated that these were, in fact, the British servicemen from Singapore. No dog tags or identity discs were found, which would identify an individual. Clearly, at some point, they had been deliberately taken by the Japanese.
Initially, the bodies were removed and interred at a cemetery at Torokina. Later, they would be moved again to individual plots at the Bomana War Cemetery outside Port Moresby, on mainland Papua New Guinea. Each has a headstone that reads, ‘Known only unto God.’
For the loved ones and families of these men, not having a clear picture of what happened to them must have caused much distress. The truth is that they suffered horrifically at the hands of the Japanese and at the end of the war, although an enquiry was held, no one was held accountable.
To put things into the broader picture, Ballalae was militarily useful as an airfield for less than a year from when it was first constructed. Consider other notable events around this time.
The Americans had long broken the Japanese codes, and a big break came when they found out that Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, the architect of the attack on Pearl Harbor, was to visit Ballalae on 18th April 1943. He planned a tour of forward bases in the Solomons and Southern Bougainville as a morale booster.
Yamamoto’s exact time of arrival and route were discovered, so the Americans, with a flight of P-38 fighters fitted with long-range fuel tanks, were waiting at a prearranged location off the southwestern coast of Bougainville, near Moila Point. Keeping to his timetable exactly, Yamamoto’s plane was shot out of the sky, sending it crashing into the jungles of Bougainville near Buin. All on board were killed
With the campaigns in the Solomons nearing an end, plans were in place for the invasion of Bougainville. To ensure the invasion's success, airfields on Ballalae and Bougainville had to be neutralized so the Americans had superiority in the air. From early October 1943, airstrikes were stepped up massively. Most of Ballalae’s planes were caught on the ground and frag bombed.
The landings at Torokina took place on 1st November 1943, so Ballalae had effectively been neutralized and bypassed. By the end of WWII, Ballalae was forgotten and for the next 25 years it was virtually left as a time capsule.
Ballalae was still privately owned, but by the late 1960s, people were coming to see and lust after the huge array of aircraft that littered the island. When the Atkinson family heard what was happening, they donated the airstrip to the Solomon Island government and gave the balance of the land to the Shortland Island people[5]. If this was meant to keep outsiders away, unfortunately it didn’t achieve its objective. In the early 1970s the airstrip was repaired and made fully operational so as to provide air services into the Shortlands region
After arriving in PNG in 1972, I worked for Morgan Equipment, an American company, which was one of the primary contractors supplying mining equipment to the newly opened Bougainville Copper mine. When I first flew from Aropa airstrip to Ballalae in a small aircraft, I was to meet with Max Martin, manager of Allardyce Lumber, to discuss the supply of various spare parts for their logging operation.
Max arranged for someone to meet me from the plane who took me by boat to the main island of the Shortlands group. I overnighted with Max and over a beer or two he told me of the massive amount of plane wrecks on Ballalae. No planes were visible because, as happens in the tropics, the jungle had long begun to reclaim the island and hide what was beneath. All that could be seen was the airstrip itself. I made sure that when I left the next day I allowed myself a couple of hours to do a little exploring before my flight.
Entering the bush at right angles to the runway and walking directly in, I soon came across my first aircraft. In front of me was a G4M1 ‘Betty’ bomber in somewhat remarkable condition. Walking further and bush bashing parallel to the runway, I came upon plane after plane after plane. In complete silence, with no one else around, it was an incredible experience. The planes had been there for roughly 30 years since the war. I was hooked. The Pacific War history fascinated me, and there it was right before my eyes. I had to learn more about this place. Being a budding Pacific War historian and sleuth, I had to come back. An hour or two didn’t cut it.
The next day at work I went to see my friend and work colleague, Ray Leddick. We shared many similar interests: wreck diving, shell collecting, exploring; we were ‘true partners in crime’. We had already undertaken a few trips in my 13-foot tinny to the south coast of Bougainville to dive on a Japanese destroyer, the Hatsuyuki. Surely Ballalae couldn’t be that much further, could it?
After some weeks of planning, we set off from Kieta around three in the morning, motoring out of the harbour in darkness. As was typical, many lights dotted the sea around us; local fishers in canoes and banana boats were catching fish to feed their families or to sell at the market. It was always a beautiful and reassuring sight.
We followed the inside reef down the east coast of Bougainville. Few words were exchanged while we soaked up the experience. To our right were palm-lined shores with hills rising to the mountain ranges that formed the spine of Bougainville. To our left we could see waves in the open ocean crashing onto the outer reef as we motored on, riding a gentle swell in the cool morning air.
We had no maps, compass, or sophisticated navigation gear; we just pointed the boat in the general direction and went. Our necessities were food, water and loads of fuel. Boy, I must have had a lot of faith in my (our) abilities, the boat and its engine. We were in heaven and on a big adventure.
What could go wrong?
Now as I look at maps, I feel we covered around 80 km each way. No small distance, but at the time, we didn’t give it a second thought. One thing that we did discuss at length was crossing the international border from PNG to the Solomons. Although we didn’t expect customs or police at Ballalae, we agreed on a story if confronted. We were employees of Allardyce Lumber and had just come over for the day. I felt sure that Max would vouch for us. As it turned out, for this and all subsequent trips that we did, we were never challenged.
Ray and I were so fortunate to explore this open-air museum so many times that I wished that I kept a log of the trips. My only other regret was not having a sophisticated camera to take hundreds of photos capturing what we saw and did. As an aside, Ballalae is known for Scrub typhus which we were not aware of at the time. On one trip, Ray broke out in welts all over his body. It was a very uncomfortable ordeal for him. Luckily, I did not get the same affliction although we had been together the whole day.
A lot of time has passed since those days and, today I believe the vast majority of the aircraft have been removed from the island by fair means or foul. The planes are probably spread out across the world, in parts or restored for static display.
My only souvenir from Ballalae was a single prop blade from an A6M Zero fighter. Someone had removed the complete propeller from the aircraft and dismantled it to all its component pieces. Every day, I look at that blade with its dings and dents from bullets and bombs. The blade brings back so many memories of our adventures. It also conjures up the history of that time and place, and the terrible tragedy that spoke of the cruelty toward the British POWs.
Suggested background reading and references
Australian War Memorial https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C75175
COFEPOW Remember – The Children, (Families and Friends) of the Far East Prisoners of War. Rabaul Excerpts from 'Hostages to Freedom' By Peter Stone. Available online at https://www.cofepow.org.uk/armed-forces-stories-list/rabaul
Darby, 1979. Pacific Aircraft Wrecks…And Where to Find Them, /Kookaburra Technical Publications, Melbourne.
Kosmidis, P. Balalae island, a tragic story of loss during WW2. Available online at https://www.ww2wrecks.com/portfolio/balalae-island-a-tragic-story-of-loss-during-ww2/
Pacific Islands Monthly Magazine Section NORWEGIAN SEA CAPTAIN PLAYED BIG PART IN DEVELOPING THE SOLOMONS (1 February 1964). (1964-02-01). In Pacific Islands Monthly: PIM. 35 (2), 79. Available online at
https://trove.nla.gov.au/work/234132172?keyword=sam%20atkinson%20solomon%20islands
Pacific Wrecks Inc. Broken Wings of Ballale The Tragic Salvage History of the Last Undisturbed World War II Airfield. Available online at https://pacificwrecks.com/airfield/solomons/ballale/salvage.html
Pacific Wrecks Inc. Ballale Airfield (Ballalae, Ballalai) Western Province Solomon Islands. Available online at https://pacificwrecks.com/airfield/solomons/ballale/index.html
http://www.solomonencyclopaedia.net/biogs/E000566b.htm
Copyright: © Solomon Islands Historical Encyclopaedia, 1893-1978, 2020
Stone, P. 1994. Hostages To Freedom - The Fall of Rabaul, Oceans Enterprises, Yarram, Victoria.
Taylor, R. Roll of Honour, Britain at War, Gunners 600 Party History, site management - email Ron.Taylor@fepow-community.org.uk. Available online at https://www.roll-of-honour.org.uk/atrocities/600_Gunners_Party/html/history.htm
The National WWII Museum New Orleans, Operation Vengeance: The Killing of Isoroku Yamamoto, available online at
https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/operation-vengeance-killing-isoroku-yamamoto
Footnotes:
[1] https://pacificwrecks.com/location/solomons_ballale.html
[2] Chaning-Pearce, J. Recollections of my family’s early years in the British Solomon Islands, Una Voce Vol 4, 2009 p8p. 60-563
[3] https://pacificwrecks.com/airfield/solomons/ballale/index.html#:~:text=On%20November%203%2C%201942%20the,to%20Ballale%20Island%20as%20laborers.
[4] https://www.ww2wrecks.com/portfolio/balalae-island-a-tragic-story-of-loss-during-ww2/
[5] https://pacificwrecks.com/airfield/solomons/ballale/salvage.html