Gunner Kerr

KERR, YOUR NUMBER IS UP

It’s blistering hot at the front gate of Holsworthy Army Base in the western Sydney summer of 1972.

The only shade is a narrow sentry box that has a lean to the left.

The entire security detachment, a bored, resentful 20-year-old conscript, is less interested in who wants entry to a military base, than just getting out of the sun.

To that end, he’s removed his right boot so that he can stand sort-of upright in the shade of that tilted box.

Gunner Kerr has been rewarded with guard duty for disobeying one of the long list of trifling offences invented by the Australian Army to ensure a ready supply of sentries for its military installations.

And he in turn has repaid this kindness by logging the incoming drivers as ‘M. Mouse’ or ‘F. Castro’ or “S. Milligan.’ Such is the tedium of military life and a slow Saturday.  

Yes, it was a different time. The Vietnam War was over for Australia, although the military hadn’t quite grasped that reality, and was still stuffing 20-year-olds into Army uniforms under the National Service program. So it was for Gunner Kerr, number 6710352.

On arrival at Puckapunyal Army Base, we were equipped with a pile of khaki greens. Between marching and learning to salute, we were dispensed dubious advice on how not to get gonorrhoea.

A Kiwi named Dusty Berkenhagen had the happy duty of turning us raw soldiers into the feared killing machines the Army was trying to convince us we could be.

Sergeant Berkenhagen was first-rate, wielding weapons and words with the same alacrity. Don’t do whatever: we were going to get our arms ripped off, be beaten to death with the wet end. That kind of stuff.

For my part, I‘d determined none of this was to be taken seriously. By mid-72, Australian soldiers were coming back from Vietnam, not going. It was the luck of a birthdate, but I was training for something that would not happen.

On day one, we’d been given military-issue postcards with instructions to write to our parents saying all was well. Yes, really.

“Dear Mummy and Daddy,” I gushed. “Thank you for sending me to this lovely holiday camp. The other boys and I … “

Having gotten away with this minor mutiny, I further chanced my luck during a power failure a fortnight later.

It was 10 pm when we were forced onto the parade ground for some specious reason. Most of the guys were in jamas or towels having just left the showers.

I went a step further, having already tossed Army issue pjs for an electric blue, knee-length nightshirt. Because of the blackout, I also carried a candle. Out I went onto the parade ground.

My Wee Willie Winkie outfit brought the entire parade to a knee-buckling collapse. Yes, I copped a good yelling, but hell, it was worth it.

The truth is, at the tail-end of National Service – we were the second-last intake under the scheme – the Army was hard pressed to find us anything to do.

But off we went to corps training, anyhow. I’d asked for Intelligence and so was given a posting in Artillery; that’s the Army way.

In Artillery you fire large guns, in our case a 105 mm howitzer that lobbed shells about 12 kilometres. Rather than stuffing 15 kilogram shells into the gun breech, I got the cushier job of figuring how wind would affect accuracy. I gained the qualification of ‘First Class Layer’ and our rank changed from Private to Gunner.

I’d figured on a survival trajectory of my own: An election was due on December 2, 1972, and Labor’s Whitlam was likely become Prime Minister. He’d promised to end National Service and we’d all go home. I just had to stay in one piece for a few more weeks.

My smart mouth would see me do a lot of sentry duty, whitewash rocks and keep the nation’s enemies at bay using scribbles on a clipboard.

It’s been fifty hot Holsworthy summers since then, and the Australian Army has not once queried that curious list of visitors in that log.

As for my hard-won Artillery qualification – First Class Layer – it has failed entirely to impress any member of the opposite sex at any time.

It’s time, I think, we call it a draw.

In memory of Gunner David Hoyle, a braver soldier and a better man than I will ever be. (22/3/2023)