Peace grows in Cowra's garden

The Japanese war cemetery in Cowra. Picture / Jim Eagles

The tranquil town of Cowra, on the banks of the Lachlan River in New South Wales, is living proof that beautiful things can grow from the least likely seeds.

Most people visit Cowra to see its glorious Japanese garden and investigate its role as a centre for world peace. But the garden and the culture of peace had their origins in one of the bloodiest incidents in Australian history.

The best place to hear the story is the Cowra Visitors' Centre where they have trained the hologram character of a charming young woman to explain what happened.

The story she tells goes back to World War II when the hills behind Cowra were the site of a prisoner-of-war camp holding German, Italian, Japanese, Formosan, Javanese and Korean prisoners.

Today, the site is a peaceful, grassy meadow, marked by a few old concrete slabs, some ancient water tanks, a series of plaques recording its history and memorials to those who worked and died there.

But on 5 August 1944 it was a scene of appalling carnage when 1200 Japanese prisoners, ashamed of having been captured and spurred on by fanatics, staged a suicidal breakout attempt, charging the barbed wire and machine guns with nothing more than knives, baseball bats and blankets.

Only a few made it outside, all of whom were later recaptured, but by the time it was over, 231 Japanese and four Australians were dead.

Newspapers of the time show that Australia was stunned by the uprising. The camp was restructured, and the bodies of prisoners and guards buried adjacent to one another in plots alongside the Cowra Cemetery.

Things might have ended there had it not been for the town's returned servicemen who took on the job of maintaining the graves of their mates who had died during the war.

After a time, some of the veterans looked over the fence, where the Japanese graves were covered with grass and weeds, and decided, as a gesture of respect to their former foes, they would look after them as well.

News of this gesture spread - particularly by relatives who came to see where their loved ones were buried - and in 1964 the Japanese Government asked if all its warriors buried on Australian soil could be interred in this town which had shown them such honour.

Visit Cowra's graveyard now and you will find a small plot for Australian war dead and a large Japanese War Cemetery - the only official Japanese War Cemetery in the world, apparently - with 552 graves and a small shrine, which, when I visited, had offerings of flowers, incense and a couple of bottles of something.

Almost inevitably this led to links developing between Cowra and Japan. In the 1970s Cowra High School started a programme of exchange visits with Japanese Schools. Youth Forums were held to discuss how to build peace and cultural exchanges were organised.

Japanese dignitaries made regular visits and a former Japanese ambassador, Atsushi Hatakenaka, described the town as "the spiritual home of Australia-Japanese relations".

But the biggest step was taken when locals, with considerable financial help from Japan, decided to build a Japanese garden.

Designed by Japanese landscape architect Ken Nakajuma, it was completed in 1979. It is a peaceful place to visit, with tranquil ponds and chuckling streams, flowers and delicate shades of green, meandering pathways and majestic rocks, sunny viewing points and a cool open-air tea house.

The garden is also home to a wonderful collection of bonsai plants, a gallery of Japanese art, and a museum of Japanese culture. It is the centre for events such as the town's annual Cherry Blossom festival.

Cowra has promoted itself as a centre for world peace. It holds an annual Festival of International Understanding and a Peace Poetry Competition, and the Cowra Rotary Club has written into its constitution that the town is a Peace City.

In recognition of those efforts, when Australia was presented with a World Peace Bell in 1992 - a replica of the one in the foyer of the United Nations headquarters - it was erected in Cowra.

Visit Cowra and you can ring the bell, as the secretary-general of the UN does at the start of every session, to symbolically send out a call for an end to the bloodshed of war and the start of an era of peace.

Case notes

Getting there

Cowra is Is about two hours' drive from Canberra and four from Sydney.

Accommodation

A good place to stay is the historic Clarendon Farmstay, run by former Wallaby captain John Thornett and his wife Viv, at Broula, near Cowra. Contact them by email or (0061) 2 6342 9333.

Food and wine

Cowra has long been the centre of a rich farming area and is now also producing increasingly fine wines. The best place to try the wines is the wonderful Quarry Restaurant and Cellars in Cowra. Another great place to eat is the Red Carp restaurant in the Japanese garden.

Other attractions

The Cowra Rose Garden has more than 1000 bushes and 130 varieties of rose.

Wyangala Waters State Park offers fishing and water sports.

The Age of Fishes Museum has fossil fish dating back 360 million years.

The Darby Falls Observatory is said to be the best place in Australia for stargazing.

Further information 

Cowra Visitors Centre is at (0061) 2 6342 4333. For information on visiting New South Wales phone 0800 100 006.

* Jim Eagles visited Cowra as guest of Tourism New South Wales and Air New Zealand.