The Australian who helped rescue JFK in WWII

I can’t resist listening to that grumbling old left wing curmudgeon, Phillip Adams on Late Night Live on Radio National, even if I find my frustration palpably growing throughout the hour of his nightly broadcast. However last week, I was enthralled by a conversation he had with Brett Mason, author of  Saving Lieutenant Kennedy The heroic story of the Australian who helped rescue JFK

Lieutenant John F. Kennedy and Crew of PT-109

But first a little background

On a moonless night in August 1943, a US torpedo boat commanded by Lt John F Kennedy, on patrol in Solomon Islands, was rammed by a Japanese destroyer. Left clinging to wreckage within sight of Japanese encampments, the eleven surviving members of Kennedy’s crew eventually struggled ashore on a small uninhabited island. Missing, presumed dead, behind enemy lines, with no food or water, and with several injured, the future looked bleak for the shipwrecked Americans. Fortunately, Australian ‘coast watcher’ Lt Reg Evans witnessed the immediate aftermath of the collision from his nearby jungle hideaway. Working under the searching eye of the Japanese military, over the next five days Evans and two Solomon Islander scouts — Eroni Kumana and Biuku Gasa — located Kennedy and his crew and ensured their rescue.

This story of wartime bravery and survival helped create JFK’s legend and paved his way to the White House. It also shone a spotlight on Australia and America’s shared wartime experience. In Saving Lieutenant Kennedy, Brett Mason, author of Wizards of Oz, sets the heroic rescue and its colourful aftermath against the background of the Pacific war and the birth of the Australia–US alliance, which remains as vital today as when Kennedy and Evans first shook hands.

Click the image below to listen to the full interview

JFK skipper of the PT 109 (Denver post / Getty )