2/7th Australian Advanced Workshop

Open air workshop - Lae, New Guinea 1944 Image from AWM film F07167

Brief History

This unit had many names having been raised initially as the 2/1st Army Field Workshop in November 1939 at Melbourne Showground. Included were three Recovery Sections and a number of LADs. While 1 Recovery Section and several LADs travelled withthe first convoy to the Middle East, the main workshop and the other two Recovery Sections relocated to Puckapunyal before travelling on the Third Convoy - diverted to England when Italy entered the war, closing the Red Sea route. In the UK they moved to Tidworth in Wiltshire, re-organised as the Austral Force Division Ordnance Workshop. Work undertaken was primarily on British unit vehicles.

In October 1940 the unit was renamed 2/1st Army Field Workshop before it left for the Middle East, arriving at Helean in Egypt during November. In December they moved to Deir Suneid and in January 1941 to Tobruk. In March 1941, reinforcements from Australia allowed the unit to build a second Recovery Section while they were busy supporting the forces defending Tobruk. In July they were withdrawn to Palestine with the main workshop located at Khassa. It was here that the 3rd Recovery Section was formed in October 1941. When the 9th Australian Infantry Division took over responsibility for garrisoning Syria, the main workshop moved to Tripoli, with the recovery sections at Aleppo, Rayah, and Lattaquie. Responding to the rapid German advance on Egypt, the 9th Division was sent to the Western Desert, and during the July/August battles the workshop moved forward as part of the Reserve Group west of Alexandria. In October they moved further forward for the El Alamein offensive before withdrawing to Palestine in December to prepare for their return to Australia in January 1943.

Following leave the unit assembled in Queensland at Harristown near Toowoomba. In May 1943 they were reorganized to form the 2/7th Australian Advanced Workshop along with the 2/118th, 2/122nd and 2/123rd Brigade Workshops. In June they moved to Tolga, north of Atherton on the Atherton Tablelands in North Queensland where they made preparations for a move to New Guinea. In October 1943 they moved to Buna as a temporary base until they relocated to Lae in February 1944. Despite plans to move the unit back to Australia in 1945, the majority of the unit was still in Lae at the conclusion of the war.

Unit Personnel

• Thomas Geoffrey Eliot 30 Oct 1941 - 4 Oct 1945

Notes

Content has come from The Unit Guide - Volume 5 - The Australian Army 1939-1945, pages 5.545 & 5.546 - Graham R McKenzie-Smith - Big Sky Publishing - 2018