TRAINING AN ARMY

Evening Post, Volume CXXXI, Issue 41, 18 February 1941, Page 5

TRAINING AN ARMY

DARING AUSTRALIANS

THE ABYSSINIAN REVOLT

IDENTITY CLAIM

(By Trans-Tasman Air Mail, from "The Post's" Representative.)

SYDNEY, February 8,

Residents of Sydney and Newcastle declare that they know the identity of the five unnamed Australians, who, a cable recently reported, are engaged on a hazardous mission training the new Abyssinian regular army preparing to lead the revolt against that country's Italian conquerors.

Basing their belief on letters which they had received and from "other information,"' friends say that the five men are Lieutenant Brown, of Hay (New South Wales), Sergeant Ron Wood, of Sydney, Sergeant Ted Body, of Trangie (New South Wales), Sergeant Ken Burks, of Newcastle (New South Wales), and Sergeant Bill Howell, of Longreach (Queensland). Descriptions of the five men, published in a cable which said that the party of Australians promised to provide this war's- counterpart to the exploits of Lawrence of Arabia, fitted perfectly the men they knew, it was declared.

"We have had letters that leave little' doubt," said Miss Peggy Lamb, • the fiancee of Sergeant Wood. "Ron, Ted Body, and Bill Howell. have been companions since boyhood, and they went together to school. They have often spoken about. one another, and the cabled descriptions tally exactly. Ron, for instance, was a rubber planter in Papua, as the cable says, and Ted Body was a grazier at Trangie. We all know that Bill Howell was a station overseer at Longreach. They often spoke of Ken Burke, of Newcastle, as a very fine chap." Wood's mother said she also was certain. . "Apart from other things, I had a letter just recently that said they were going 'out into the blue.' They have been friends for. yeatft? and have always been together/ A military officer in Sydney, who knows Sergeant Burke well, said, "the description in the cable fitted ■ him like a glove. I don't know anybody that that description would fit •better than' Ken Burke. He is very well known in Rugby Union circles in Newcastle and Sydney. He first played at St. Joseph's College, and later he played representative Rugby Union for New South Wales. He took part in trials for the New South Wales team for abroad in 1927. Later he played in trials for the Australian team. He is in his thirties, and is . just the type for a mission such as this. . *

Sergeant Burkes mother said she was sure that the man referred to was her son. He had told her in a letter some time ago that he and four other Australians' had been transferred to an English command. In one letter he had suggested that he had "some difficult -work to d 0.",, Jocularly, he added^;thatJciis A circu,msta < nces. had" improved, because "I have a black boy to clean my boots and prepare my food." Burke left Australia in January last year with the first contingent. .