In the last days of 1943 a brave young Australian soldier lost his life trying to save wounded comrades in the mountains of Papua New Guinea.
Shaggy Ridge, one of the grimmest battles in that theatre of war, was fought over the most hellish of terrain.
The ridge, a six-kilometre razorback dotted by several rocky outcrops, was so narrow men could only move in single file.
During months of fierce fighting, Australian troops inched forward under fierce artillery fire from the well-entrenched Japanese.
They gradually captured the strategic high points — the Green Pinnacle, The Pimple, Green Sniper’s Pimple, and McCaughey’s Knoll.
The last was named in honour of Lieutenant Samuel Michael McCaughey, known as Michael, a jackaroo from Jerilderie in southern New South Wales.
A costly act
On December 29 his gallant action cost him his life.
The ridge was an easy target for the Japanese who were trying to stop the Australian advance.
They rained shells on the forest canopy, trying to crush the soldiers sheltering in foxholes below with shrapnel and debris.
War historian and author Phillip Bradley recorded firsthand accounts from veterans of that campaign.
“So McCaughey had his men try to cut down the trees, but they couldn’t get them all down. Then in the afternoon another shelling started and two men were badly wounded,” Mr Bradley said.
As the shelling continued, McCaughey called for stretcher bearers.
With none available and disregarding his own safety, the young platoon commander ran forward.
“So he bravely ran out and got to the wounded guy, Wally Offer, and was treating him when another shell came over … and basically McCaughey took the full blast,” he said.
Michael McCaughey died soon after and was buried on the knoll that took his name.
It was the second tragedy to befall his family that year.
Michael’s cousin, David Macpherson, also 22, was a sergeant and air-gunner in the Royal Australian Air Force.
In early February, while attached to the Dutch East Indies Air Force, he boarded a plane at Batchelor Airfield, south of Darwin, for a long-distance bombing mission over the island of Dobo in modern-day Indonesia.
The Mitchell bomber was loaded with bombs and fuel, the official report said it was overloaded, and as it took off the engine failed.
It crashed in a fireball killing all nine on board, including David.
A family of benefactors
Before the war Michael McCaughey and David Macpherson had been jackaroos with ambitions of becoming managers of family properties.
The McCaughey clan played a prominent and influential role in developing Australia’s pastoral and irrigation industries.
Michael McCaughey was the sole male heir in line to inherit Old Coree, a 10,000-hectare station at Jerilderie in southern New South Wales.
Two years after their deaths, in 1945, Michael’s father Sam McCaughey and their Uncle Roy gifted the property to the nation for advancing agricultural research.
Today, the property is about 2,000 hectares and leased by SunRice Australia.
Its research and development program there involves scientists breeding more productive and sustainable varieties of rice.
The lease income helps fund the McCaughey Memorial Trust that awards bursaries to emerging young agricultural scientists.
The two young men it commemorates lie with thousands of others in far off war cemeteries — Michael at Lae, Papua New Guinea, and David at Adelaide River in the Northern Territory.
Trust chairman Michael Gregory, named after his fallen uncle, often has cause to reflect.
“Every Anzac Day you think ‘what if? What if they’d survived?’ But it’s an old story Australia-wide. I mean, so many young rural Australians were killed in both wars, many wars. And ‘what if?'” Mr Gregory said.
“It’s a little thing that we can do to keep their memories going. Their portraits are on the wall here and they watch over many a board meeting.”
The research work at the McCaughey Memorial Institute benefits many countries.
Agricultural scientist Aina Davis from the Markham Valley in Papua New Guinea first visited Old Coree 10 years ago to learn more about rice growing.
She now teaches farmers how to grow rice in her home country, work that is helping prevent rural malnutrition.
An extraordinary coincidence
In the grand dining room at Old Coree homestead a watercolour by Australian war artist Douglas Pratt depicts Shaggy Ridge and the Finisterre Range in north-eastern PNG.
Ms Davis is very familiar with the imposing razorback ridge, including McCaughey’s Knoll, that dominates the skyline.
In an extraordinary coincidence she sees it almost daily with her work in the fertile valleys below.
The war exacted a terrible toll on her country.
The older generation told her stories of wartime hunger and how the men hid in caves to avoid being enslaved as labourers by the Japanese.
As Ms Davis stands before the posthumously painted portraits of Michael McCaughey and David Macpherson, her voice quavers and eyes mist with emotion.
“Australia and PNG will always be close because of all the history we came through together, Australians were up there with PNG to fight,” she said.
“They are the heroes.”
Stories from farms and country towns across Australia, delivered each Friday.
