During World War II, 106 Australian medical officers were taken prisoner of war by the Japanese, along with 22,000 Australian troops and many thousands more British and Dutch. Over three and a half years, they accompanied work parties of Allied prisoners sent to camps all over southeast Asia and Japan, living in a variety of harsh and dangerous conditions. Despite the doctors’ efforts, one in three Australian POWs died in captivity. Of those who survived, most attributed this not to inner strength or to luck, but to the care of their medical personnel. Yet apart from the attention recently accorded to Sir Edward “Weary” Dunlop, who was only one of these doctors, the experiences and work of all Australian POW medical officers in World War II has been largely overlooked. / Medical officers were crucial for the survival of Australian prisoners, both physically and psychologically. Doctors attempted to keep men of all nationalities alive with little medication, tools or diagnostic equipment, and battled a variety or medical conditions, starvation and systematic physical brutality from their captors. As survival became more difficult, the increased status and responsibilities of the doctors had significant ramifications for the military chain of command and for the burdens on the doctors themselves. / This thesis explores many aspects of Australian POW doctors’ experience of captivity: the complexities of practising modern medicine without any of its tools; the development of unique strategies to combat a wide variety of environmental limitations and life-threatening medical conditions; the unique relationship between medical personnel and their captors; the relationships between Australian POW medical officers and combatant officers and a comparison with relationships in the British military in captivity; the daily dilemmas faced by doctors trying to reconcile their professional ethics with their military obligations, and how they coped with these responsibilities. Doctors’ continuing roles in the postwar lives of ex-POWs, and the influence captivity had on their own lives and careers after the war are also analysed. / While examination of the influence of medical officers on other prisoners’ lives is important, studying their experience as a group in their own right is equally valuable. In this thesis, both these areas are investigated to bring a variety of perspectives to understanding the complexity and importance of Australian POW doctors’ captivity experience.

Les intendants militaires constituent une catégorie particulière d’officiers qui s’occupent des besoins de la vie courante du soldat. Ils sont crées en 1815 et remplacent les commissaires des guerres et les inspecteurs aux revues. Leur étude comprend deux parties. La première est destinée à présenter leurs caractéristiques sociales et militaires générales et leur place dans les débats sur l’administration militaire et la communauté militaire. Elle comprend les domaines suivants : - l’origine géographique, - l’âge et le grade au mariage, - la profession des pères et des beaux-pères, - la composition et le montant des dots, - les dossiers de demande d’autorisation de mariage, - les demandes de bourses pour les écoles militaires, - la place de la vie privée dans les appréciations données par leurs supérieurs. - l’origine du recrutement (saint-cyriens, polytechniciens, soldats), - les causes des fins de carrières - les grands évènements de la carrière (entrée dans le corps de contrôle de l’administration, interruptions de service, mutations), - la remise en question de l’intendance militaire au cours des débats sur l’administration militaire après la défaite de1870, et notamment sa place vis-à-vis du commandement, - la place des officiers d’administration et des médecins militaires, - l’image des intendants parmi les autres officiers. La seconde partie expose les déroulements des carrières, elle comporte les points suivants : - les résultats de la scolarité dans les écoles militaires et leur influence sur les appréciations données par leurs supérieurs et l’avancement ; - les carrières dans l’arme d’origine (l’influence des appréciations, des félicitations et des punitions), - les conditions du passage dans l’intendance (le concours, la formation administrative), - les carrières dans l’intendance (l’influence de la carrière dans l’arme d’origine, les rôles de l’origine et des appréciations dans l’accès aux différents grades, les projections de carrières à partir du premier grade). / The intendants establish an officers’s particular body who deal with the support of the common life of the soldier. They are create in 1815 and replace captains of the wars and inspectors in reviews. Their study includes two parts. The first one intended to present their general social and military characteristics. It includes the following domains : - the geographical origine, - the age and the rank in the marriage, - the profession of the fathers and the fathers in law, - the composition and the amount of dowries, - files of wedding authorization request, - applications for a scholarship for military academies, - place of the private life in the appreciations given by their supériors, - the origin of the recruitment (graduests of St. Cyr, graduests of Polytechnique prestige engineering school, soldiers), - the causes of ends of carreer, - big events of the career (entered the body of control of the administration, interruptions of service, tranfers). - the questioning of the military estate management after the defeat of 1870, in particular its place face to face of the command ; - the place of the officers of administration et of the military medical officers, - the image of the bursars among the others officers. The second parts explains the progesses of careers, il contains the following domains : - the results of the schooling in military academies and their influence in the appreciations given by their superiors, and of the promotion ; - the careers in the element of the army of origin (influence of the appreciations, the congratulations and the punishments) ; - the conditions of the passage in the estate management (the competition, the administrative training), - the careers in the estate management (the influence of the career in the weapon origin, the roles of the origin and of the appreciations in the access of the various ranks, the progressions of the careers according to the passage in the second rank).