Series number

AWM302

Series title

Records of 8th Field Ambulance, Vietnam

Contents date range

1965-1972

Extent

1 metre

Access conditions

Subject to the Archives Act 1983

Agency controlling

Department of Defence

Custodial agency

Australian War Memorial

Function and provenance

8th Field Ambulance commenced operations in South Vietnam in April 1967 eleven months after it had been raised at Puckapunyal, Victoria.  It replaced 2nd Field Ambulance which arrived in South Vietnam in May 1966 to support Australia’s increased military commitment to a Task Force level.

8th Field Ambulance continued to operate the 60 bed hospital at Vung Tau and a smaller forward section of 10 beds at Nui Dat which had been established by 2nd Field Ambulance.  Like its predecessor, the unit had to manage with reduced staff numbers and a shortage of medical officers within the Royal Australian Army Medical Corps (RAAMC).

In October 1967 the Australian government announced that the size of the force in Vietnam would be increased to include a third battalion.  To cope with this increase in troops it was also necessary to increase the level of medical services.  A plan which included the establishment of a new 100 bed hospital at Vung Tau and many new specialist services was approved in December 1967 along with a new scheme for using specialist medical practitioners for three month tours of duty in Vietnam.  The 1st Australian Field Hospital (1 Aust Fd Hosp) was raised in April 1968 to run the new field hospital complex and 8th Field Ambulance moved to the Task Force base at Nui Dat.

With the withdrawal of troops from the Task Force area from October 1971 8th Field Ambulance returned to Vung Tau and took over from 1 Aust Fd Hosp which returned to Australia in late November.  The unit continued to provided medical services to the remaining Australian troops in South Vietnam until it was also withdrawn on 29 February 1972.

The records of the 8th Field Ambulance were amongst the first major transfer of records relating to the Vietnam War from the Department of Defence to the Australian War Memorial which occurred between November 1981 and March 1982.  This consignment was accessioned as OW82/11.  They formed part of a large series which was designated as AWM100 in the mid 1980s when the Memorial adopted its new numbering system.

The registry cards which controlled this series of records were transferred in February 1982, accessioned as OW82/20 and later designated AWM104.

Since 1999 Official Records staff have removed subseries from AWM100, and registered each of them as a separate series of records.  The records of 8th Field Ambulance were added to the RecordSearch database in July 2002 and the series was redesignated AWM302.

Content

8th Field Ambulance created its files to document its activities, to record events and to enable efficient retrieval for future reference.  The files in this series cover the following categories: accidents and casualties, discipline, general correspondence, equipment and supplies, finance, movements, orders and instructions, personnel, reports, supplies and training.

System of arrangement and control

The system of arrangement and control is the original Department of the Army filing system, as used when the records were created.

Registered files

Registered items have a three-part item number conforming with the Department of the Army registry classification of correspondence catalogue.  The first number represents the primary topic of the item, the second and third numbers refine the topic further.

Non registered files

Non registered items (not having registered item numbers) were given imposed numbers by the Australian War Memorial (AWM), beginning at 1 and continuing serially.  They are single numbers, not two or three part numbers like the registered items.  They retain their original titles.  Where no title was found, the AWM has imposed one that best describes the item’s contents.  All imposed information is enclosed in square brackets.

Using the series

Each item in the series is recorded on the RecordSearch database which researchers can access via the Internet.  Further assistance in finding relevant information may be gained from related series of records (click on Series Links at the bottom of this page).

The original registry cards which control this series form part of series AWM104.  They can also be accessed in the Memorial’s Research Centre.

Sources

AWM administrative file, AWM302 Series dossier

James, W. B. 1994, ‘The medical story – Australian forces South Vietnam 1962-1972, Duty First, Vol 1, No 6, pp. 37-41

O’Keefe, Brendan and Smith, F. B. 1994, Medicine at war: medical aspects of Australia’s involvement in Southeast Asia 1950-1972, St Leonards, NSW, Allen and Unwin