Darwin

Darwin - Darwin is the capital of the Northern Territory (NT), one of the constituent parts (but not a ‘state’) of the federation of Australia . The NT is one of the least populated parts of the country so it doesn’t come as a big surprise that Darwin’s population is only around 140,000, and that is more than half of those living in the NT in total! The city (originally called Palmerston until 1911) is on the northern coast, i.e. in the most tropical part of Australia and as such is subjected to an annual wet season with heavy monsoon-like downpours and occasional cyclone storms. Some of these proved destructive, most recently in 1974 with Cyclone Tracy, which devastated large parts of the city and killed ca. 70 people. Darwin has a long military history, and in WWII it played a prominent role for Allied forces, with barracks, a naval harbour and several airfields. Being so far north it was expected that Darwin might come under attack by Japan after its raid on Pearl Harbor , so part of the civilian populace were evacuated. Then indeed, on 19 February 1942, the Japanese attacked and bombed Darwin in two massive waves involving 188 warplanes from four aircraft carriers that had taken up position in the sea between Darwin and Timor . The double raid caused massive devastation, sank eight ships in the harbour, destroyed 23 planes and killed at least 243 people (some figures given are much higher). This was the worst of the Japanese bombing of Darwin, though many dozen further air raids were flown across the region around Darwin (often referred to as “the Top End”) until by 1944 the fortunes in the war had turned against Japan. In the city today there are several memorials to the bombing, including plaques by the old Government House (which was destroyed in the air raids) as well as in the city’s main shopping mall and at Darwin’s cenotaph.