r/AusPrimeMinisters

John Curtin had been Prime Minister since the fall of the Fadden Government in October 1941, and it was under Curtin that Labor achieved one of its most comprehensive landslide election victories in the 1943 federal election. Having also entered the top job a mere two months before Australia went to war with the Empire of Japan, Curtin had presided over the entirety of Australia’s involvement in the Pacific War, which to this day remains the period in which Australia was at its greatest peril from a possible invasion.

But the stress of leading Australia’s war effort took a fatal toll on Curtin’s health, which was far from robust especially given his prior history of heavy alcoholism as well as his fondness for cigarette smoking. Like his US counterpart Franklin D. Roosevelt, Curtin’s heart began to fail as the war progressed. At the beginning of November 1944, this led to a major heart attack in Melbourne within days of arriving from Perth via train, during which Curtin was suspected of also having a heart attack then as he was already severely ill by his arrival. But Curtin was back at work by January 1945, now going up against the brand-new Liberal Party of Australia in Parliament rather than the United Australia Party, and though he managed to quit smoking entirely in the aftermath of these heart attacks, it was too late to reverse the now-steady decline, and the damage to his heart health was already irreversible. When Roosevelt himself passed away in office on 12 April, Curtin realised that he would soon suffer the same fate - but chose to remain in office until the very end, even as his health entered a state of terminal decline from end-stage heart failure. As he said to a friend around this time, “You know, I was stricken with the complaint that killed Joe Lyons. I’ll never be strong again”.

By the end of April 1945, Curtin’s health had declined to the point where he was confined to The Lodge; his world confined largely to the walls surrounding him. Curtin’s duties in office were largely relegated to figures like Treasurer Ben Chifley, his deputy leader and Army Minister Frank Forde, and his Attorney-General and External Affairs Minister Dr H.V. Evatt. As Curtin took a step back and was even largely restricted with what he could be informed about, the world underwent historic shifts that would help shape the modern world as we know it. Italian dictator Benito Mussolini was captured and executed before being publicly displayed in Milan on 28 April; followed two days later by the suicide of German Führer Adolf Hitler in his Führerbunker after having dragged Europe and much of the world into a state of apocalyptic destruction. When Nazi Germany, now under Karl Dönitz, finally surrendered to the Allies on 8 May, it was left to Chifley to make the formal announcement of victory in Europe, while serving as acting PM while Curtin was incapacitated and with Forde and Evatt being away in San Francisco playing a key role in helping establish the United Nations. But Curtin was determined to hold on, and to not even contemplate the thought of resignation until victory was finally achieved in the Pacific - even going so far as to put his name forward as the nominee for his Division of Fremantle for the 1946 federal election.

By the end of June, it was clear to those close to him that Curtin was not long for the world, and his trusted parliamentary colleagues - though largely keeping their mouths shut - began to visit Curtin at The Lodge with the expectation that it would be their last meeting. When Australian forces launched their last offensive of the war with the Battle of Balikpapan in Borneo on 1 July, Curtin’s terminal decline ensured that he would not be burdened with additional stress that his failing heart could not handle. Forde finally arrived back from the United States on 2 July, and he immediately made his way to The Lodge with Chifley. Both were left utterly shocked to see Curtin in his terminal condition, and Chifley was himself so overcome with emotion that he had to leave within minutes, with his face described as “the iron grey of a man who had suffered a shock” - he would later declare that Curtin’s final months were “the worst six months of my life”. By 4 July, Curtin entered his final decline, which Curtin himself recognised by stating that “I’m not worth two bob” and that he was “too tired” to go on. Members of the Labor caucus were finally informed to imminently expect the worst. The following day, as dawn broke at approximately 4AM, Curtin passed away, having seen off the Nazis in Europe but falling short of his desire to preside over victory over Imperial Japan.

Frank Forde, the long-standing deputy leader to Curtin as well as to James Scullin going back to 1932, immediately became the Acting Prime Minister - following the precedent set by Sir Earle Page subsequent to the death of Joseph Lyons. Later the same day Forde sombrely made the official announcement to the House of Representatives that: “It is my melancholy duty formally to inform honorable members of the tragic death of the Prime Minister… The Captain has been stricken in sight of the shore”. The following day, with Curtin’s body now lying in state in King’s Hall in Parliament House, Forde was formally sworn-in as Prime Minister by Governor-General Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester, with the understanding that he would resign if he were not elected Labor leader in the inevitable leadership contest that followed.

Two days after attending Curtin’s state funeral in Perth on 8 July, both Forde and Chifley announced their intention to contest the Labor leadership in the ballot now scheduled for 12 July; this was followed the next day by the announcement of prominent South Australian minister Norman Makin that he too would contest the leadership. H.V. Evatt, who was only now making his slow journey back from San Francisco, was furious that the ballot should go forward before he even returned, and insisted on having his supporters nominate him for the ballot even if he could not personally campaign for himself. While Forde was highly respected among his colleagues and was viewed as an exemplary deputy, he was viewed as lacking the necessary gravitas and leadership qualities to be the permanent Prime Minister. Shortly before the ballot, Forde was informed by Les Haylen quite frankly, in what can be described as a mercy kill, that he didn’t have the numbers and stood no chance of defeating Chifley in a ballot. Forde’s face was later reported by Haylen to have “went deathly white, and the veins on his neck stood out in an effort to suppress his emotions….” before simply stating “I must say a little prayer for Ben. It’s not an easy job”.

Chifley initially hadn’t wanted to even run for the leadership, being so grief-stricken that he publicly wept the only time in his life when he lined past Curtin’s casket in King’s Hall. But it was made obvious to everyone, not least to Chifley, that he easily had the numbers to win a ballot if he decided to run. Chifley had to be talked into running by his supporters, though not without challenge - when told by Fred Daly that he was “the man to lead the Labor Party”, Chifley despairingly responded “Do you want me to join the bloody suicide squad?!”. It ultimately took the persuading of that tragic elder statesman James Scullin to forcibly convince him to stand for the good of the Party, and that it was in fact Curtin’s dying wish that Chifley succeed him. But by the eve of the ballot, Chifley was committed to putting his hand up despite still doubting he had the right qualities to be Prime Minister. But as Chifley put it that night, “all I’m certain about is that Frank Forde hasn’t”.

When the contest came on 12 July, it only took one ballot for the results to be decided. The absent Evatt, nominated by his most loyal supporters in caucus, in the end mustered just two votes. Makin did a little better, but at seven votes failed to crack the double digits. Prime Minister Forde received 16 votes, whereas Chifley won an absolute majority with a dominant 45 votes. The ever-stoic Forde was re-elected unopposed to once again continue as deputy leader, after which Forde led the congratulations and reaffirmed his loyalty to Chifley in what had been described as a “magnificent” speech. Chifley was sworn in as Prime Minister the following day, a mere eight days after Forde succeeded Curtin; to this day Forde remains by far the shortest-serving Prime Minister in Australian history. Chifley, surprisingly enough, decided to retain his post as Treasurer at the same time, and to date he is the last PM to insist on holding both the top job and the Treasury at the same time long-term. Meanwhile, Chifley also made history by appointing Arthur Calwell as Australia’s first-ever dedicated Minister for Immigration.

But of course, the war continued on as Australians were still fighting and dying while clearing up Japanese forces in places like Borneo. Within days of Chifley’s swearing-in, the “Trinity” atomic bomb test took place in New Mexico, and the Potsdam Conference commenced - spearheaded by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, US President Harry S. Truman, and British Prime Ministers Winston Churchill and (after the UK’s own historic election at this time) Clement Attlee. With it came an unequivocal demand that Japan surrender unconditionally, or otherwise face “prompt and utter destruction”. The Japanese High Command, still hoping for more favourable terms via diplomatic means through the then-neutral Soviets, chose to drag its heels. Then, on 9 August, young POW and future Labor figure Tom Uren was working in a slave labor camp at Omuta, not far from Nagasaki, when he chillingly saw, as he would later describe, that “the sky was crimson. We didn’t see the mushroom cloud, but we saw the complete discolouration of the sky” - a vivid discolouration that he would for the rest of his life never forget nor see again. On that day, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki, as well as Hiroshima three days prior, wiping out both cities and many thousands of lives in the blink of an eye. If that wasn’t enough in this most apocalyptic turn of events for the Japanese High Command, the Soviets declared war and invaded Japanese-held Manchuria.

And so it was, on 15 August, that Ben Chifley broadcast the triumphant announcement to a war-weary Australia, and the announcement that John Curtin was denied the opportunity to deliver: “Fellow citizens, the war is over. The Japanese Government has accepted the terms of surrender imposed by the Allied Nations and hostilities will now cease…. at this moment let us offer thanks to God.” Two days later, the Chifley Government passed the Australian National Airways Bill, which set up the Australian National Airways Commission with the (ultimately unsuccessful) attempt to nationalise domestic air transport and (successfully) establish the publicly-owned Trans-Australia Airways. The post-war reconstruction and flurry of landmark peacetime reforms by the Chifley Government had well and truly begun, and it would, over the rest of the 1940s, help reshape Australia and win the peace.