australia october 1932
as gandhi began his hunger strike and
hitler circled the chancellorship of
germany george pierce australia's
minister for defense was faced with two
questions that would define his career
one could a group of farmers from
western australia get their hands on
some machine guns and two could they
shoot them at some emus now normally
these weren't questions a defense
minister would entertain but this
defense minister at that moment in time
answered them with a quick and
enthusiastic yes he would be the first
man in history to lead his country in a
war against the emu
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thanks so much to morningbrew for
helping bring this history to life
real quick up top once again please
welcome our esteemed guest writer for
this series from the super fun history
podcast something true duncan fife
thanks for bringing the birds duncan
strange as it might sound until 1932
nobody ever really thought to fire a
machine gun at an emu i know shocking in
australia the big bird even shares pride
of place with the kangaroo on the
nation's coat of arms but the farmers of
western australia's wheat belt soon came
to see that heraldry as an insult for it
celebrated a loud rabble-rousing pest
that stomped their wheat scared their
sheep and burst open holes and fences
that let rabbits rush in to do even more
damage though in fairness what the emu
saw was simply wide open spaces that
were supplied with fresh water and
plenty of wheat a.k.a the ideal
migratory destination for the enormous
avian but let's take a step back for a
minute and look at how these farms grew
to be an emu's paradise after the first
world war australia made its returning
servicemen a deal see it was sitting on
24 million acres of land and it wanted
to sell or lease that land to the
returning soldiers setting them up as
farmers one catch though that land was
awful the scheme was designed in part to
get somebody anybody really to settle in
and harvest the most desolate parts of a
very large country unfortunately there
was actually one more deeply disturbing
catch of approximately 800 aboriginal
men who served in the war only three had
applications approved under the
settlement scheme in fact some of the
land was even taken from aboriginal
reserves so if you were an aboriginal
soldier you actually had a better chance
of losing land than gaining it and you
know that's just something to keep in
mind for later if you find yourself
having a particular sympathy for men
getting humiliated by birds just think
back to this but anyway as we were
saying the land wasn't very good for
western agriculture in particular the
small towns of campion and wagolan 200
miles from perth were the toughest
farmland in the country there every
stalk of wheat that could be grown had
to be grown and not just for the
farmer's own sake because wheat was a
major australian export it was a tough
existence and then in 1929 came the
great depression unemployment
skyrocketed and the government offered
the wheat farmers a bailout by
guaranteeing them a decent price on
their crops but then they went back on
their word once the depression worsened
so the wheat farmers were losing their
shirts and despite multiple promises
from multiple governments assistance
never came in fact they were so mad that
they decided one day in 1932 that
australia would simply have no wheat at
all that year yeah they'd rather throw
it all away then prop up a government
that treated them so poorly a standoff
was coming and it would have happened
except for one thing actually more like
twenty thousand things emus
twenty thousand rowdy emus had just
mated and were ready to rumble hooting
and hollering they surged west in a
feathery tidal wave right for the wheat
fields of campion now if you happen to
have never had the displeasure of an emu
storming your wheat fields here is what
the farmers saw the average emu stands
six feet tall and stands for nothing
nothing of course but emu survival they
stay on the move in packs scouring the
land for resources like a marauding band
of pirates completely indifferent to the
rule of law and that's what makes them
such a dangerous foe you know that and
that they run incredibly fast 30 miles
an hour to be precise they're
lightweight tough and muscular and are
equipped with six inch razor sharp claws
on their toes meaning they're deadly in
a scrape and poorly suited for most ball
sports they thought the wheat fields
were a wonderful prize plenty to eat and
what they didn't take they'd get to
trample underfoot or poop on a natural
enemy for the farmer and indeed emus had
terrified the wheat fields for years and
by 1923 farmers had successfully lobbied
to have the emu designated as vermin
with the government subsidizing bounties
for any hunter bringing home an emu head
but they had never seen emus in numbers
like this before twenty thousand that
was a national emergency and the bounty
hunters had not signed up to take down
that many birds okay fences couldn't
keep them out and while the farmers got
off a few shots with their rifles they
assuredly weren't going to be able to
fend off this foul force with such
insignificant firepower but being
ex-soldiers they knew where to get some
more one of the most effective weapons
of the first world war was the lewis gun
a light machine gun that shot 550 rounds
a minute with an effective range of 880
yards it was one of the greatest
machines of modern warfare a potent
symbol of man's increasing power of
destruction and just the thing to put
down a flock of birds ah
but to get their hands on these guns a
coalition of champion wheat farmers made
a direct appeal to the minister of
defense george pearce who was also
importantly an elected senator for the
state of western australia pierce like
anyone whose career depended on the
voters of western australia was very
preoccupied with thoughts and fears of
secession although the federal
government of australia was only 30
years old the state of western australia
had for some time been agitating to
leave believing that the state its
people and their interests would be
better served by self-governance so the
depression had dealt the state massive
economic damage and this unhappiness
fueled an organized succession movement
that was fast building toward a
referendum on independence and that was
something pierce was actively
campaigning against also pierce was well
aware that the government had failed to
give any meaningful financial aid to the
wheat farmers of western australia after
putting them there in the first place
but with this overture from the emu
distressed farmers he saw that what he
could offer and what might earn him just
as much political goodwill as money was
a really big gun to shoot some emus and
save a union and if nothing else
remember this because it's an important
lesson in the workings of democracy if
there are enough votes in it the
government will let you kill any bird
you want now pierce had no way of
knowing if it would be effective to turn
weapons of war on a rampaging hoard of
emus i mean it had never been tried
before and a machine gun is not the
emu's natural predator after all but
given the opportunity pierce was eager
to provide a show of force a dramatic
and undeniable demonstration of his
party's friendship with the good
hard-working constituents of western
australia although he wasn't gonna pay
for it so here's the deal pierce struck
the farmers could have the benefit of
two machine guns but those guns could
only be used by soldiers from the royal
australian artillery the state
government would have to pay for the
transport of those guns and the farmers
had to arrange for the soldiers
accommodation and food meaning it was an
official military operation at a price
but one the farmers were willing to pay
the emus by contrast unfortunately
weren't able to earn or really
understand the concept of money which
did put them at a significant
disadvantage in the brewing conflict
pearce sent the farmers of campion two
lewis guns with ten thousand rounds of
ammunition and those guns were under the
command of major gwenet meredith who was
supported by two other soldiers mcmurray
and o'halleran plus usually a
cinematographer and you know that pierce
thought to insist on a cameraman does
reveal how much he considered the
mission to be a political opportunity
because i mean think about it what
economically depressed farmer in western
australia would ever vote to secede
after seeing wonderful footage of a
soldier murking an emu with a machine
gun right that's political gold right
there meredith and his men set out for
the front lines in campion confident of
success so confident in fact that they
left with an order from their comrades
in the army's mountain infantry units to
collect 100 emu skins to make stylish
feathered hats for the officers and come
on why would they not be confident why
wouldn't they be able to come home with
nice new hats the australian army had
helped win a world war so really what
were a few thousand birds the wheat
farmers george pierce meredith and his
men they all assumed that the emus would
be easy pickings but on the day they
arrived in emu occupied campion massive
guns in tow they had no idea of the
painful lesson they were about to learn
that when you assume you were made in
ass by an emu of course you can see why
this version of the seg never really
caught on because generally saying so
require diagrams but you get the idea
stuff's gonna get real next episode i
cannot wait for you all to see it
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