10582; Private; Sydney Lawrence BURNS; 23rd Battalion 2NZEF

Like the majority of men who returned home after the end of the Second World

War, Sydney1 did not talk much about his experiences, especially of the period when he

was a prisoner-of-war (POW). Over time, however, he did loosen up to share a few

memories but by the time the listener was aware what he was talking about, he had

finished and no amount of cajoling would make him repeat what he had just said. So,

family members had to be both patient and alert in order to ‘capture’ any such

reminiscences should they reappear. And reappear they did, like his skill at two-up, the

number of times he was fined for breaches of military discipline and also the total time

he was confined to barracks – all with a chuckle in his voice and a smile on his face.

There were other memories but for the want of a biographer, such pearls of

wisdom are not ours to share. On the other hand, Sydney was a keen writer and many of

the letters that he wrote while a POW to Pomsie and Dina (Joyce and Diana) and his

two elder sisters Dorothy and Lil, are now held at the National Library in Wellington.

He also kept a diary, carefully recording daily events probably to break the monotony of

capture and probably (this is pure guesswork) to write his memoirs at some future point.

This was a dangerous pursuit but he persevered and was hugely disappointed

when on the eve of being freed, the diary disappeared. His suspicions as to the loss

were not assuaged, even when it was suggested that perhaps the diary, which started life

as a roll of toilet paper ended up serving that purpose. For once, his voice lost its

characteristic chuckle. Returning to the task at hand, this account is based on

information gathered from the following sources:

Fragments of memories that Joyce and Diana can recall;

Copies of his military records;

The Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War 1939 – 1945, 23

Battalion by Angus Ross. Finally;

His note to Joyce and Diana to advise that he had been captured.

1Name written in full in preference to Syd or Sid variants.

Sydney enlisted on 11 January 1939 and marched into Burnham Military Camp

eleven days later to start military training. As he was not only born but also still resided

in South Canterbury, it was preordained that he would be a member of 23rd Battalion (23

Bn) a brand new unit especially created as part of the New Zealand Division, (Second

New Zealand Expeditionary Force), i.e. NZ Div (2NZEF). While 23 Bn was not

affiliated to any unit that served in the previous war and therefore had no tradition to

compare with or against, the unit quietly set about establishing its own imprint on the

military history of the nation. When hostilities ended, 23 Bn had achieved that objective

to be as highly regarded as any other unit of NZ Div, the accolade they enjoyed the most

being the nickname “The White Hori’s”, a comparison with the 28 th Maori Battalion a

unit they were yet to meet but which they ended up fighting alongside on many

occasions. Sydney would not have been aware of any of this for the first 3 months

would have been the busy ones of drawing gear, medical checks, responding to

commands without question, and the hundred and one things needed to become an

effective soldier.

Training would have been a challenge for the country was no more ready for this

war as it was for its quite recent predecessor. Instructors at officer and non-

commissioned officer (NCO) level would have needed to be at their ingenious and

inventive best to keep the minds and energies of these new recruits focussed on the

business of learning about and preparing for war. There were a few times where

Sydney’s mind wandered from the task(s) at hand as his disciplinary record shows with

the first entry dated 4 March 1940 where he was fined 10 shillings (a lot of money in

those days) and forfeited two days pay. The actual misdemeanour is not recorded but

probably fell into the conduct to the prejudice of good order and military discipline

category where the list is seemingly endless and includes such issues as refusing to obey

a lawful command from a superior officer (a list that starts at lance-corporal rank). All

part of the conversion process to change civilians into soldiers.

23 Bn embarked on the Andes on 1 May 1940 and sailed to link up with other

ships in Cook Strait the following morning before crossing the Tasman as a convoy

(under navy escort) to be joined off the Australian coast by ships carrying Australian

troops. Sydney remembered the Andes with great fondness and, no wonder as this

description from the official history states: Since no structural alterations had been

made to their luxury liner, the men were well pleased with conditions aboard the Andes.

On this voyage 76 officers and 1323 other ranks were carried. With the exception of

214 men for whom hammocks were supplied, all soldiers found themselves in cabins

with private bathrooms. Swimming baths, excellent dining rooms, wide deck space for

training and recreation, wet and dry canteens where beer and spirits sold for

approximately half the usual New Zealand prices, and friendly sailors – all these made

for happy voyaging and good morale.2

The convoy stopped briefly at Fremantle, Perth, long enough for one soldier (not

Sydney) to miss the departure. It was on to Capetown, South Africa with a rumour

circulating that instead of heading to Egypt, the destination point of the first echelon of

New Zealand troops, the second echelon was instead to sail directly to Britain. This

would have been heady news making the 26 to 31 May stop-over even more tantalising,

spurring Aussie and Kiwi soldiers to intermingle, fraternise and/or fight. Perhaps it was

here that Sydney became proficient at two-up, however, in the final analysis the

Capetown chief of police was moved to say: “We have loved having both you and the

Australians, but pray God, you never both come back together again”.3 The convoy

sailed on to Freetown, Sierra Leone where they were now well and truly in the tropics

and energy levels were drooping to the stage that physical training (PT) was suspended.

Nor were troops allowed to disembark during this stop, in case they caught malaria.

Then it was on to Gourock, the Firth of Clyde for disembarkation on 16 June. A journey

of 17,000 miles of ocean had been safely completed and while they would have fond

memories of the Andes, Sydney and his friends would have been relieved to be on terra

firma once again.

It was back to formal training with a vengeance and becoming part of the

network of land defences in the event that the air phase of the Battle of Britain failed

and the country was invaded from the sea. As history shows the air battle was won and

so by the end of that year, troops were as ready as they could be and were restless for

battle. An extract from the official history sums up precisely the gains from this period:

The period the 23rd spent in Britain was of great importance in its moulding. The 2 The Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War 1939 – 1945, 23 Battalion by Angus Ross. P. 103 Ibid. p. 12

sharing of so many experiences-travel on ship and train, visits to the same places,

training under the same stirring conditions before the Battle of Britain and literally

under the air-war, living together alternately in bivouacs and mansions-gave the men a

common background and a fuller understanding of one another. Since they constituted

the only South Island battalion to serve in England, they developed a spirit of

exclusiveness, which was partly pride in the 23rd and its record and partly the result of

being nicknamed ‘Cook’s Tourists’ and ‘the Glamour Boys’ by those units that had

gone straight to Egypt.4 Now it was forward to the serious stuff of walking the talk and

Sydney would have been as nervous and as excited as every other soldier in his unit.

One way of summarising the Battle of Greece from a New Zealand perspective

would be to say; arrived Piraeus Harbour (the port of Athens and the chief port of

Greece) on 27 March and departed on 25 April 1941, nothing to report. The official

history opens its Campaigning in Greece chapter thus: When the 23rd arrived at

Katerini, the stage was practically set and the curtain was about to rise on a modern

Greek tragedy. 5 It then describes exactly why this description was so apt.

The main reason was that the Germans had allocated 20 divisions to the task of

subduing Greece and the allied forces (the main elements being an Australian division,

NZ Div and a British Armoured brigade) as well as various Greek units totalling no

more than 3 divisions, were clearly out-numbered from the very start. Sydney and his

comrades would not have known this as they set out to confront whatever and whoever

lay ahead. Off they would have marched (images of the Grand Old Duke of York and

his 10,000 men come to mind) until they contacted German forces, turned about and

under constant and heavy pressure, fought their way back to Piraeus. Whereas

disembarkation was orderly, loading of ships this time was frantically quick and it

would have been a frustrated, bitterly angry, desperately tired and wounded (mainly in

spirit) group of men that eventually sailed to the next destination. The fact that it was

ANZAC Day would have escaped them and the final word in the unit’s official war

diary sums up this phase appropriately by saying: In Greece, we lived amongst the gods

at Olympos, held the Pass at Thermopylae and ran for Marathon.6

4 Ibid. p.195 Ibid. p.276 Ibid. p.54

The NZ Div landed on the island of Crete that same afternoon (25 April) and

was to leave, once again under pressure from the Germans, a month later. This time,

however, there were significant differences as the Battle for Crete began with the

defenders giving a very fine account of their fighting abilities. An invasion was

expected and an invasion (by airborne not seaborne forces) did eventuate. There are

many stirring accounts of this battle available elsewhere and is recommended reading

for those with an interest in military history. What is worth mentioning here are two

facts: fact one; the Germans were not to employ airborne tactics again throughout the

war and, fact two; the New Zealanders showed that they could fight.

The official history says: In the 23rd, those men who had lasted out till 31 May had

every reason to be proud of their stamina and courage. To the end, they had remained

a fighting unit and provided rearguard after rearguard. “The officers and men fought a

great action against hopeless odds. They did everything that was required of them and

more – no matter what odds were against them…continually bombed and machine-

gunned from the air, at no time were there complaints or any suggestion of down-

heartedness and never a thought of surrender.”7. Where was Sydney at this time? An

earlier extract stated: The battalion casualties in Crete were not known at the time but

were later officially listed as 56 killed or died of wounds, 187 wounded and 114

prisoner of war, of whom 58 had been wounded – a total of 299 casualties.8. Sydney

was soon to be confirmed as missing in action.

According to his military records, Sydney was listed as missing on 2 June to be

then posted as a POW the same day. Only those who have experienced the chaos and

confusion of the closing stages of the Crete campaign, know precisely what traumas

have to be faced and the fears an unknown, troubled and turbulent future would

generate. We imagine that he would have been quite fearful as, along with his

comrades, they were marched away by his captors. The sudden change from soldier to

prisoner could hardly be expressed in this terse message that he was allowed to write: 9

7 Ibid. p.968 Ibid. p.939 Held in National Library, Molesworth Street, Wellington.

The rest of Sydney’s war could be summarised as:

Incarcerated in Stalag VIIIB, Germany as POW 5047 till 8 April 42;

then shifted to

Stalag 344 until 12 January 1944; then back to

Stalag VIIIB, before he was released and Joyce advised he was safe in

United Kingdom on 4 June 1945.

After his release from Stalag prison (the manner and date are not known) Sydney

was to spend a brief period of time in a US Army General Hospital where he was treated

for cuts to three fingers of his right hand. This stay within a US military establishment

clears up a mystery that the photo below caused familiar with the equipment issued to

British Forces:

Where and how did Sydney get hold of American (inner) helmet and it can be safely

assumed that he borrowed one during his stay in the US Army military hospital.

Sydney left Britain on 31 August 1945 and arrived in New Zealand on 30

September. He was declared medically unfit and was discharged on those grounds on

11 January 1946. To be discharged on medical grounds is perfectly understandable,

given the length of time Sydney spent as a POW. Diana/Dina recalls “hiding” behind a

settee on Sydney’s return to Timaru, wondering who this huge man was and where he

came from, not surprising for at age 7, she was meeting her father for the first time.

A summary of the key dates of Sydney’s career in the Army, are collated below.

Attested/enlisted into the NZ Army; 11 January 1940:

Marched in to camp to begin training; 22 January 1940:

Embarkation, day of departure from NZ; 01 May 1940:

Disembarkation, arrived in England; 23 June 1940:

Arrived and disembarked Greece; 27 March 1941:

Embarked and left Greece: 25 April 1941:

Arrived Crete in the afternoon of; 25 April 1941:

Posted as missing in action; 02 June 1941:

Posted as prisoner of war (POW); 02 June 1941:

Reported to be safe and in Britain; 04 June 1945:

Left England; 31 August 1945:

Arrived New Zealand; 30 September 1945:

Discharged from the NZ Army; 11 January 1946.