Bert Collins is still soldiering on after close calls during war

WORLD War II veteran Bert Collins recounts his time as a soldier. Several times throughout his story the 101-year-old states “We were really lucky to be alive.”

World War II veteran Bert Collins, 101, at his Bankstown home. Picture: Ian Svegovic

AT 101, World War II veteran Bert Collins is lucky to be alive, not simply because of his age, but because he made it through the war.

“We were really lucky to be alive,” Mr Collins says multiple times as he recounts his service as an Australian soldier.

A Bankstown resident since September 1949, Mr Collins was a sergeant in Dutch New Guinea, fighting the Japanese as part of the 52nd Australian Composite Anti-Aircraft Regiment.

Mr Collins marched proudly at Sydney’s Anzac Day service last month.

Serving from 1942 to 1945, Mr Collins was mostly stationed at the Merauke airfield.

He said he and his mates had to battle against mosquitoes, crocodiles and very unpleasant conditions.

Bert Collins during his service in the 1940s.

“I went up to the major one day and asked him what we were doing there,’’ Mr Collins said.

‘‘He said ‘We are here to try to slow them (the Japanese) down to give Darwin a chance to build up their defences’.

“I said ‘How many have we got?’.

‘‘He said 6000.

‘‘I said ‘What are we up against?’.

‘‘He said ‘Bert, I don’t tell lies ... there’s 190,000 Japanese’.”

Mr Collins said he was forced to look death straight in the eye several times.

“One day when we were getting bombed ... I dived into my gun pit and all of a sudden I got a whack on my left shoulder blade,” he said. “I got a bit of spent shrapnel. I was lucky it was just that.”

During the New Guinea campaign, Australians fought alongside soldiers from the US, New Zealand, Britain and the Netherlands.

Mr Collins married his first wife Norma in 1944 while on leave.

Years after she died, he married his second wife Peggy in 1983.