Arthur Moon
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Major Arthur Moon (17 May 1902 – 28 October 1973) was an Australian army doctor who saved the lives of dozens of Far East prisoners of war as the Thailand-Burma Railway was being constructed during World War II.


Early life

Moon was born on 17 May 1902 at East Maitland, New South Wales. By his early twenties he had embarked on a medical career as a gynecologist and obstetrician.


Military service

Moon enlisted in the Second Australian Imperial Force in 1940. Initially, he was a member of 2/4 Field Ambulance, which was in the Middle East and deployed into Syria. There he transferred to the 2/2 Casualty Clearing Station (CCS). In February 1942, Moon along with Colonel Ernest "Weary" Dunlop sailed from Suez and landed in Java to honour a British undertaking to assist the Dutch in the defence of Java. However, on 6 March the Dutch capitulated and the Australians, known as “Black” Force, became prisoners of war. A General Hospital was established at with 23 officers including Arthur Moon as a Medical Officer. In January 1943 a party of around 900 POWs, known as “Dunlop” Force was assembled to move to Thailand under the command of "Weary" Dunlop. The force arrived at Banpong in Thailand on 24 January and was trucked to Tarsau. From Tarsau the Force moved on foot approx 25 km to their first work area at Konyu where they arrived with 875 POWs. Moon moved to Hintok Mountain Camp early April and was then sent to
Tamarkan Tamarkan (also: ''Tha Makhan'') was a Japanese prisoner of war work camp during World War II. The camp was initially used for the construction of the bridge over the Khwae Yai or Mae Klong River and not the River Kwai. The camp was located about ...
to take up the post of Senior Medical Officer. He took up the post on 1 May 1943 where he took charge of a camp that was not a proper hospital as it remained essentially unchanged from when the bamboo huts served as the quarters for POW workers that preceded them.Records of Daily life at Tamarkan, 15 May 1943, State Library of New South Wales, MLMSS 4234 Here Moon worked under a British Territorial Officer Lt Col
Philip Toosey Brigadier Sir Philip John Denton Toosey (12 August 1904 – 22 December 1975) was, as a Lieutenant Colonel, the senior Allied officer in the Japanese prisoner-of-war camp at Tha Maa Kham (known as Tamarkan) in Thailand during World War II. Th ...
who was well-ordered and disciplined which helped with hygiene and the organisation of Moon's medical staff, mainly made up of enlisted soldiers. On 3 May the first party of sick men arrived by barge at Tamarkan and after this, about 100 a day came. Many were delivered at night and left in the rice fields where parties had to be sent out to find them. Moon was also at Chungkai and Tamuang at various times.


Record of conditions and atrocities

Moon is credited with causing one of the most comprehensive records of wartime Far East
POW A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is held captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold prisoners of war ...
camp conditions and atrocities to come into being. He enlisted four prisoners with artistic skill,
Ashley George Old Ashley George Old (born 1913, d. 2001) was an artist best known for documenting the lives of prisoners of war forced to construct the Thailand-Burma Railway. During World War II he was stationed in Singapore, and when it fell to the Japanese in F ...
,
Jack Bridger Chalker Jack Bridger Chalker (10 October 1918 – 15 November 2014), was a British artist and teacher best known for his work recording the lives of the prisoners of war building the Burma Railway during World War II. Biography Chalker was born in Lon ...
,
Philip Meninsky Philip Meninsky (born 1919 in Fulham, England, died in 2007) was the son of Bernard Meninsky. Despite an early passion for art, at his father's wish, he initially trained as an accountant, before being called up for National Service. After a firs ...
and Keith Neighbour, to create paintings of the camps, prisoners and injuries. The artists undertook this work in circumstances of extreme difficulty and danger. Many of these paintings were buried in the ground at Moon's final camp, then recovered after the war and archived by the
State Library of Victoria State Library Victoria (SLV) is the state library of Victoria, Australia. Located in Melbourne, it was established in 1854 as the Melbourne Public Library, making it Australia's oldest public library and one of the first free libraries in the ...
. In 1995 an exhibition of the works was held under the title 'The Major Arthur Moon Collection'. The collection catalogue cover shows a painting of a beckoning hand titled 'Bomb wound (air attack)' by Old and is compared in the narrative to Picasso's Guernica as a truly extraordinary image of war. The
Australian War Memorial The Australian War Memorial is Australia's national memorial to the members of its armed forces and supporting organisations who have died or participated in wars involving the Commonwealth of Australia and some conflicts involving pe ...
holds photographs of Moon operating in the camps.Major Arthur Moon operating in the hospital hut at Tamaung, Thailand, in 1943. Arthur Moon Papers, Letters, and Medical Reports, including the diagrams and maps of burial sites of soldiers at the Tamarkan POW camp are held by
The State Library of New South Wales ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the ...

MLMSS 4234


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Moon, Arthur World War II prisoners of war held by Japan Japanese prisoner of war and internment camps Japanese war crimes South-East Asian theatre of World War II Australian prisoners of war 1902 births 1973 deaths People from New South Wales Burma Railway prisoners