A detailed diary kept by Mayor J. F. Burton during the WWll bombing of the Northern Territory capital by the Japanese has been found by Little Darwin in an interesting new secondhand shop in Ingham , North Queensland. It was accompanied by a badly silverfished and torn , illustrated map which forms the endpapers in Douglas Lockwood's Australia's Pearl Harbour but includes a photo of the MV Neptuna , loaded with depth charges and other explosives, which blew up in a massive, deafening fireball , and another view of the Darwin Post Office where staff were killed .
The badly silverfished cover note [above] to the diary , written in 1981, states Burton was one of the few who remained behind to attend to air raid and other duties , one of the last public servants to leave after the town had been taken over by the military .
Details from the first attack on February 19, 1942 to June 16 are covered in the above diary extract; there is even mention of a violent earth tremor . It seems these documents may have been part of a display , a large penned in note saying the diary assisted the commission handling claims for war damages. The proprietor of the interesting shop said she had obtained the items from Cairns
 |
Present day memorial to bombing in Darwin .
|
NOTE: Burton's diary is included in the appendices to Lockwood's book The Front Door - Darwin,1869 -1969.
