The Untold Story of the Great Emu War: When Australia Took on Its Most Unlikely Enemy
- Daniel Holland
- 19 hours ago
- 8 min read
“We’re losing to the birds!”
That was the mood in Western Australia during one of history’s strangest military campaigns. It sounds like satire, but the Great Emu War was entirely real. In late 1932, the Australian government sent soldiers armed with Lewis machine guns to the Wheatbelt region to fight an enemy that no one could have imagined: thousands of large, flightless emus. The result was chaos, comedy, and complete defeat.
A fragile land and desperate farmers
To understand how this farce unfolded, we have to step back to the aftermath of the First World War. Thousands of discharged veterans were given plots of farmland through the Australian government’s Soldier Settlement Scheme. The idea was to reward service and develop agriculture, but most of the land offered in Western Australia was marginal at best. The soil was poor, rainfall was uncertain, and the economic crash of the Great Depression in 1929 made things worse.
By 1932, wheat prices had collapsed. The government had promised subsidies that never materialised. Many farmers faced ruin. The fields of the Wheatbelt, stretching around small towns like Chandler, Walgoolan, and Campion, became symbols of frustration. Just when it seemed things could not get worse, the emus arrived.
The arrival of the emus
Every year after breeding season, emus migrate from the arid inland toward the coast in search of food and water. In normal times, this was part of the natural rhythm of Australia. But the farmlands of 1932 were not normal.
The newly cleared fields, fresh crops, and man-made watering holes for livestock were irresistible to the birds. Around 20,000 emus descended on the Wheatbelt that year, trampling fences, devouring crops, and leaving gaping holes that allowed rabbits to flood in too.
For farmers already on the brink, this invasion was catastrophic. Local settlers reported that “the emus just kept coming” and that every attempt to scare them away only seemed to invite more. The farmers decided they needed help of a very different kind.
A call to arms
A group of ex-soldier farmers sent a deputation to Canberra to meet with the Minister of Defence, Sir George Pearce. Having fought in the Great War themselves, they knew exactly what could cut down an advancing enemy: the machine gun. They asked the government for military assistance to control the emus that were, quite literally, eating their livelihoods.
Sir George Pearce agreed. But he did so with several conditions. The operation would be carried out by military personnel rather than civilians. The Western Australian government would cover transport costs. The farmers would provide food, lodging, and payment for the ammunition. Pearce also reasoned that the mission could serve as target practice for troops and might even act as a public show of support for struggling farmers at a time when Western Australia was toying with the idea of secession from the Commonwealth.
In short, it was a small political gamble disguised as pest control. A cameraman from Fox Movietone News was even invited to document what was supposed to be a simple and effective military operation.
The soldiers prepare for battle
In October 1932, the operation was approved. Major G. P. W. Meredith of the Royal Australian Artillery’s 7th Heavy Battery was placed in command. His small team included Sergeant S. McMurray and Gunner J. O’Halloran. They were armed with two Lewis machine guns and 10,000 rounds of ammunition. The orders were to assist the farmers and, according to one newspaper, to collect one hundred emu skins so that their feathers could be used for military hats.
The “war” officially began in early November after a spell of rain had caused the birds to scatter. Once the skies cleared, the soldiers took up position near the farming settlement of Campion, ready to engage their peculiar enemy.
The first campaign: November 1932
The first encounter came on 2 November. About fifty emus were spotted in the distance. The soldiers set up their guns, but the birds were too far away. Local farmers tried to herd them into range, but the flock split into smaller groups and sprinted off in all directions. A few birds were killed, but most escaped.
Two days later, the soldiers set up an ambush near a dam where roughly 1,000 emus were expected to pass. They waited until the birds were in close range and opened fire. The gun jammed after just twelve birds were killed. The rest fled into the scrub.
Realising that static ambushes were failing, Meredith decided to pursue the birds. He ordered one of the machine guns to be mounted on the back of a truck. It seemed like a smart idea until the team discovered that the rough terrain made the ride so bumpy the gunner could barely fire a shot. Once again, the emus escaped unharmed.
After several days of fruitless effort, the soldiers were exhausted and humiliated. Meredith’s official report noted that his men suffered no casualties—except for their dignity.
The emus fight back
The longer the campaign went on, the more the soldiers began to suspect that they were up against a clever and coordinated opponent. Each flock appeared to have a leader, described by observers as “a big black-plumed bird standing six feet tall” who would warn the others of danger. The emus travelled in small groups, changed direction unpredictably, and could reach speeds of up to 30 miles per hour. Their thick feathers absorbed bullets, and even wounded birds seemed to keep running.
Ornithologist Dominic Serventy later wrote that “the machine-gunners’ dreams of point-blank fire into serried masses of emus were soon dissipated. The emu command had evidently ordered guerrilla tactics.”
By 8 November, less than a week after the first engagement, around 2,500 rounds had been fired. The total number of birds killed was somewhere between 200 and 500, depending on who was counting. Major Meredith ended the first campaign with his troops demoralised and the birds largely unscathed.
Public ridicule and political fallout
The story quickly made headlines. Newspapers were merciless. “Emus Defeat the Army,” shouted one. “Machine-Gunners Outwitted by Birds,” declared another. The press dubbed the fiasco The Great Emu War, and the name stuck.
When the matter reached the Australian Parliament, politicians could not resist making jokes. Senator James Dunn mockingly called George Pearce “the Minister for the Emu War,” and Prime Minister Joseph Lyons was asked whether medals would be awarded to the soldiers—or perhaps to the emus.
Facing national embarrassment, Pearce ordered the withdrawal of the troops on 8 November. The first battle of the Great Emu War was over, and the emus had won.
The second campaign: December 1932
The farmers’ relief was short-lived. The emus kept coming. With temperatures soaring and drought taking hold, thousands of birds continued to invade the farms. James Mitchell, the Premier of Western Australia, pressed for renewed military support. Bowing to pressure, Pearce approved a second campaign in mid-November.
Once again, Major Meredith led the operation. The first two days went well, with about forty birds shot, but after that progress slowed. By early December, the soldiers were killing roughly one hundred emus per week. When the campaign ended on 10 December, Meredith’s final report claimed 986 confirmed kills with 9,860 rounds of ammunition. He estimated that a further 2,500 birds had died from their wounds.
That meant roughly ten bullets were fired for every confirmed kill. Even this figure is now believed to have been exaggerated. Historian Greg Beyer later wrote that Meredith’s numbers were “highly disputed and likely inflated.”
Lessons learned and reluctant victory
Despite the ridicule, some farmers insisted the second operation had been worth it. An article in the Coolgardie Miner three years later declared that, “although the use of machine guns had been criticised in many quarters, the method proved effective and saved what remained of the wheat.” Others, however, were not so sure.
Meredith, who had begun the mission full of military pride, developed a strange admiration for his adversaries. He told reporters, “If we had a military division with the bullet-carrying capacity of these birds, it would face any army in the world. They can face machine guns with the invulnerability of tanks. They are like Zulus whom even dum-dum bullets could not stop.”
It was an odd tribute to an enemy that had no idea it was fighting a war.
The aftermath and ongoing emu battles
Although the official campaign ended in December 1932, the farmers’ troubles continued. They petitioned the government for military assistance again in 1934, 1943, and 1948, but were refused each time. Instead, the government expanded its bounty system, paying a small reward for each emu killed. Between late 1934 and early 1935, more than 57,000 bounties were claimed in just six months, proving that localised control worked better than military intervention.
At the same time, exclusion fencing became increasingly popular. These long wire barriers helped keep emus, rabbits, and dingoes out of farmland and proved a far more efficient solution than machine guns.
By December 1932, the story of the Emu War had spread overseas. In Britain, conservationists protested what they described as “the extermination of the rare emu.” The reality, of course, was quite the opposite. The emu population remained strong, and the so-called war had barely dented their numbers.
Australian ornithologists Dominic Serventy and Hubert Whittell later described the Emu War as “an attempt at the mass destruction of the birds,” though they noted that the effort had been largely symbolic. The birds had survived, the farmers had moved on, and the government had learned that not every problem could be solved with a gun.
A curious legacy
The Great Emu War became one of Australia’s most enduring jokes. It revealed something about human arrogance and nature’s stubborn resilience. What began as an attempt to defend wheat crops ended up as a national embarrassment, immortalised in headlines, history books, and now, internet memes.
Today, the emu is a protected species and one of the two animals featured on Australia’s national coat of arms, alongside the kangaroo. It’s a delicious irony: the bird once targeted as a pest now stands as a symbol of national pride.
And the story didn’t quite end in 1932. In November 1950, the issue of emus returned to Parliament when MP Hugh Leslie requested that the Army Minister release .303 rifle ammunition for farmers struggling with bird infestations. The minister agreed, authorising the release of half a million rounds. Even then, nearly twenty years after the Great Emu War, the ghosts of the battle still lingered.
What the Great Emu War teaches us
It’s tempting to laugh at the absurdity of the Great Emu War, but it also holds a serious lesson. It shows how easily humans can underestimate the natural world. The soldiers thought they could control the land with discipline and firepower, yet the emus thrived because they understood it better than anyone.
In the end, the birds did not win because of strategy or strength, but because they were perfectly adapted to their environment. Australia had tried to conquer its own wilderness and lost.
A war without victors, but a story for the ages
The Great Emu War of 1932 remains one of the most unusual and endearing events in history. It speaks of frustration, humour, and humility in the face of nature. Whether viewed as farce or fable, it reminds us that sometimes the best stories in history are the ones that refuse to take themselves too seriously.
Or, as Major Meredith might have put it, “the emus fought gallantly and won.”
Sources
Australian War Memorial Archives, “The Emu War of 1932.”
The Sydney Morning Herald, November–December 1932.
Royal Australian Artillery Historical Society, “Major G.P.W. Meredith and the Great Emu War.”
McQuilton, John. “Rural Unrest and the Emu War.” Australian Historical Studies, Vol. 31, No. 115 (2000).
ABC News, “When Australia Went to War with Emus—and Lost.” https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-11-10/the-great-emu-war/11678936
National Library of Australia, Trove newspaper archives.
Long, Gavin. The Australian Army 1901–2001. Allen & Unwin, 2002.
Serventy, Dominic and Whittell, Hubert. Birds of Western Australia. Paterson Brokensha, 1948.
