NEW EPISODE! LISTEN AT APPLE PODCASTS, AUDIBLE AND SPOTIFY. (OR CLICK THE LINK BELOW)
Cunderdin is a town in Western Australia’s wheatbelt, about 150km East of Perth. It has been inhabited for thousands of years, but the first European visitor was Charles Cooke Hunt, who explored the area in 1864. The name is thought to derive from a Noongar word meaning either ‘place of the bandicoot’ or ‘place of flowers’.
It’s a nice little town, there’s about 600 people that live there, there’s an AG College, a golf course and an airstrip. A once strategic airstrip that used to carry US and Australian bombers during World War 2.
Construction started on the airfield in 1940 and it was operational by 1941. Cunderdin was home to the ‘No. 9 Elementary Flying Training School’. Part of the Empire Air Training Scheme (EATS) which was designed to produce Commonwealt pilots for eventual transfer to the British RAF. No.9 EFTS was one of 12 throughout Australia and the only one in WA. Pilot candidates would move from about 12 weeks initial training at Pearce Air force base near Perth and then onto Tiger Moth biplanes at Cunderdin. In some cases they would then join ‘No. 4 Service Flying Training School’ in Geraldton for advanced twin engine training on the Avro Anson.
The RAAF assembled a number of Curtiss P-40 Kittyhawk fighters at Cunderdin in March 1942, these were allocated to No.77 Squadron (Their motto: “Swift to Destroy”) to provide air defence for Perth. Like most RAAF installations there was a significant female contribution, from the Women’s Australian Auxiliary Air Force or WAAAF.
Between March and June 1942, two Liberator heavy bombers of the US Army Air Forces, 28th Bombardment Squadron of the19th Bombardment Group were based at Cunderdin and carried out long-range ocean patrols in the defence of Western Australia. In March 1944, a Japanese fleet broke out into the Indian ocean and it was thought Fremantle and Perth would be its target. Plans were made for Cunderdin Airfield to be the temporary base for Darwin based Liberators of the USAAF’s 380th Bombardment Group. In anticipation of the raid and the rush of reinforcements coming into WA, bombs, ordnance and supplies were stockpiled in Cunderdin.
The RAAF No.25 City of Perth Squadron was based at Cunderdin from early 1945, also flying B-24 Liberators. Almost immediately the squadron started flying search missions over the Indian Ocean looking for survivors of the American Liberty ship ‘Peter Sylvester’ which had been torpedoed South West of Fremantle by a German U-Boat. ‘Peter Sylvester’ had been carrying war supplies including a load of mules bound for Colombo when it was struck 1400km West of Cape Leeuwin. It was on one of these search missions, that Liberator A72-124 crashed on take-off at Cunderdin on the 14th of February, killing five crew.
As the direct threat to WA diminished and the Japanese were being pushed back, No. 25 Squadron began to stage some of its bombers out of Truscott on the Anjo Peninsula in far North WA. This was an ideal location for bombing missions against Japanese targets in Java and Borneo. Over the next five months, they also flew missions from the ‘invisible airbase’ Corunna Downs and Potshot near Exmouth. From there they flew sorties against Japanese targets across South East Asia and diverted attention away from allied landings in Borneo. Their last strike against the Dutch East Indies was just 10 days before the Japanese surrender.
Cunderdin-based Liberators made a formation flight over Perth as part of the Victory in the Pacific celebrations on 16 August 1945 and in the immediate post-war months evacuated Australian Prisoners of War from Borneo. The Squadron remained at Cunderdin until about July 46 when it was disbanded.
You can learn more about the German Monsoon Group U-boats in Australian waters by downloading Episode 9 and the Japanese Indian Ocean Raid of 1944 Episode 14 at Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Audible.
