The sleepy settlement on the north-east coast of Australia had certainly undergone a dramatic metamorphosis. Of all the coastal townships in this northern region of Queensland, Townsville was considered the most picturesque – locals and tourists seemed to be in agreement upon this. The other coastal towns of course boasted the same tropical splendour: lush palms, banyans and pandanus trees, the heady scent of frangipani, vivid aqua-blue ocean and white sandy beaches. But none could claim a Castle Hill and a Magnetic Island.

Townsville was not only a picture-postcard-perfect image of the tropics, Townsville had a drama all its own. Towering above the settlement and dominating the landscape from every perspective was the 950-foot-high red-rock edifice of Castle Hill, a very spiritual place known to the local Indigenous community as Cootharinga. And lying barely five miles off the coast was Magnetic Island, aptly named, for in the changing light of day it did appear to beckon, luring people with the promise of paradise. All in all, Townsville was an ideal holiday setting, offering an easy lifestyle for the locals and a magical hideaway for visitors.

Not anymore, not these days. The tourists no longer visited, and the locals now lived in a garrison town. The peace had been well and truly shattered, the people of Townsville rudely awakened to the fact that they were right in the firing line. And they were frightened.

The seemingly instant arrival of thousands of troops, together with the endless shipments of heavy equipment and the barrage of military vehicles that clogged the streets, was immensely disruptive to everyday life. Over time, the military would requisition properties: hotels would be commandeered as officers’ quarters; pupils evacuated and schools taken over for conversion to hospitals; many cinemas, halls and even some private residences of those prepared to move south would be used for military purposes. Allied army camps were currently springing up in the Botanical Gardens and parks and in Armstrong’s Paddock; tent cities appearing out of nowhere. And of course there were the Yanks. The US airmen and support staff were to be stationed at airfields to be built strategically across the north for American bombers on their runs to New Guinea.

These airfields, and other military infrastructures, were to be constructed by work units consisting of black American troops commanded by white officers, which provided a further element of fascination for the people of Townsville. Few had ever before encountered an American Negro, and certainly none had witnessed the numbers that now flocked through town.