Obituary of Lt. Col. Pembshaw
Extract from The Scheyvillian No 1. 2024
Alan David Heynes Pembshaw (with input from William Monfries, RAAEC, Virpi Hatukangas and Tony White, 3/70).
Alan was born in Adelaide on 1 March 1950 to William and Averil (Dover) Pembshaw, a brother to Stephen and John. He completed his secondary education at Enfield High School in Adelaide’s northern suburbs. Prior to entering the Army on 28 January 1971 at 2 RTB, Puckapunyal, as National Serviceman 4722156, Alan was a Secondary Teacher with the Education Department of South Australia. Alan applied for, and was accepted for, officer training and commenced at the Officer Training Unit at Scheyville, NSW, on 12 February. Along with Cadets Jim Reade, John Tucker and L. V. Shore he was allocated to 4 Section, 2 Platoon. Their ‘Father’ was originally Sergeant Payne, but later was Corporal Wayne Jackson. In his Senior Term Alan remained in 4 Section where his ‘Son’ was Cadet B. Stebnicki. Alan graduated with his class on 15 July 1971. He was allocated to the Artillery Corps and undertook a “Young Officer’s Course” at the School of Artillery in Manly, NSW. On completion, Alan was then posted to 16 Light Anti-Aircraft Regiment at Woodside in his home state of South Australia. He completed his National Service on 26 January 1973.
Having enjoyed Army life, Alan took a Short Service Commission in the Royal Australian Army Educational Corps and was appointed Lieutenant on 1 February 1975. He was posted to PNG in May as an Instructor in the Education Wing at the Goldie River Recruit Training Depot. Two years after Independence, there were only about 13 Australian Officers left at Goldie. There were three Australians in the Education Wing and three PNG officers and senior NCOs. In December 1976, Alan moved to Headquarters PNGDF at Murray Barracks. He coordinated the writing of the Defence Force Certificate of Education (DFCE) Level Four courses, which allowed soldiers entry to the University of PNG or Lae Institute of Technology. The package was completed and accepted by the Education Department in November 1977, for which Alan was awarded a Commander PNGDF’s Commendation. This was a good start to his RAAEC career. Alan studied Indonesian language over the next few years. This included long-term schooling at the Language School at Point Cook, and immersion training in-country.
In January 1982, Alan was posted to 4 Training Group in Adelaide to instruct on Subject Three promotion courses. In those days, all-corps qualification for Sergeant and Warrant Officer Class 2 included five or six weeks schooling in literacy, numeracy and current affairs. After this, Alan was the District Education Officer at Headquarters Fourth Military District (SA), before promotion to Major in 1984 and posting to Headquarters Training 43 Command in Sydney. Alan then had a number of postings in Sydney, Army Headquarters and the Royal Military College. In the Queen’s Birthday Honours List in 1987, Alan was awarded the Defence Force Service Medal. Alan was selected to attend Staff College in Indonesia during 1988 and 1989. During the course, Alan became good friends with a lecturer named Lieutenant Colonel Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. Bambang, as Alan called him, went on to become President of Indonesia from 2004 to 2014. Alan fondly regarded his time at Indonesian Staff College, and the relationships he formed there, as highlights of his career.
As a Lieutenant Colonel, Alan was the District Education Officer in Headquarters, Third Military District, (Vic) and was then appointed Commanding Officer of the Defence International Training Centre in 1992. Alan loved his time at DITC, being responsible for cultural awareness and Australian familiarisation training for students from regional defence forces before they undertook specialist training in Australia. Alan retired from full-time service after his command of DITC, to become the Director of the English Language Services Division, of IDP Australia, in 1994. During this time, he met Virpi Hatukangas, a Finnish teacher, at a conference in London. Alan did further Reserve work, including some full-time service, until finally retiring from the Army for good on 4 December 2000. Alan and Virpi married, and Alan worked in the financial world, becoming a licensed Australian Financial Service Authorised Representative. Alan was also the Operations Officer, State Emergency Services, in the Blue Mountains from 2002 to 2005. In 2006 Alan and Virpi moved to Finland. Alan returned to the education world and became an English Language Trainer and later a Management Consultant. Fitted in around his work for 18 years Alan and Virpi took every chance that they had to travel throughout France. Alan and Virpi were both keen photographers and loved experiencing and recording every aspect of French city and rural life, including the French reverence for good food and drink (right). Alan kept up his Bahasa Indonesia skills by holidaying in Bali every two years.
Alan contracted cancer about a year ago and succumbed to the disease in Finland on 28 January 2024. He is remembered by his many Army friends as a ‘bon vivant’ with an unfailingly positive attitude, a zest for life, a preference for humility rather than boastfulness, and a strong commitment to seeing the best in others. Alan leaves behind Virpi and two adult children from his marriage to Anne: Nicholas and Carolyn. Anne is now married to Tony White (3/70).
Graham Thomson also had an email conversation with Alan Pembshaw in which Alan included details of his PNG history, part of which is as follows:
“The Army was very good for me. After graduation from Scheyville, I was allotted to Artillery and spent the remainder of my 2 years of National Service at the anti-aircraft regiment in Woodside, SA. I then ‘got out’ and went back to Uni for a year, then went to Marden High as a Maths teacher in 1974. I became quite disillusioned by that year, the lack of support from senior staff and lack of discipline amongst students – it was so disappointing after being part of a very strong unit at the regiment with good leadership and a really well-trained unit. So, I decided to come back into the Army, but into Education Corps, as the training side was still a focus for me.My first posting was up to Goldie River as a LT in the Education Section. This was about 6 months before PNG’s Independence, so part of the job was handing over to the new local education officers (all new graduates). At that stage in mid-1975 there were only about 15 officers/NCOs at Goldie and about 1200-1500 PNGDF. The other EdOs were CAPT Allan Cleary (Trg Development Officer)(now living in Canberra), LT Ken Bremner and MAJ Barry Paterson (he was head of the section till end 1975 then moved to Murray Barracks as Director PNG Education – resigned in about 1978 and became an Anglican minister. Bremner and Cleary returned to Australia end 1975 and mid 1976 respectively. I think Ken was a Nasho and discharged soon after. Cleary stayed in until mid 1990s and left Army as a major. CAPT Alan Berry replaced Cleary as TDO and he left PNG at the end of 1977, at the same time as me. I was in PNG from April 1975-December 1977 – the last year I spent most of my time between Murray Barracks and Goldie River as I had the project to introduce a Defence Force Certificate of Education Level 4 which was recognized by the University and Institute of Technology as equivalent to Year 12 and allowed soldiers to get into tertiary education and be commissioned. My boss then was Barry Paterson.
I ended up staying in the Army until end 1994 with a mixture of Corps jobs and non-corps positions usually in the training area. Because I was a ‘real, officer as opposed to a professional who had been given a commission, I had opportunities to get a wider job selection and often earlier promotion. I ended up as a LTCOL and CO of the Defence International Training Centre (for English upgrading and development for foreign students from SE Asia and also cross-cultural training for Australians prior to deployment overseas).
I then resigned and became a director of IDP Education running their English Language Services division for 2 years – almost burnt me out as I was travelling overseas for about 40 weeks a year. I resigned from the job in late 1996 and was going to take a few months off, but an Army mate asked me to do an Army Reserve job for a few weeks to evaluate training needs in the Commercial Support Program – this supposedly 6 weeks job became 6 months, followed by Education Corps asking me to spend 1997 as head of Education and Training for NSW.
In mid 1998, I was asked to become a financial adviser to military clients of a financial services company, became a partner in early 2000, then resigned end 2005 so that we could move to Europe – my wife, Virpi, is Finnish, so we have been here in Oulu near the top of the Baltic since then. I worked casually as an English teacher and also as a leadership and management consultant until last year, but now pretty well retired and spending my time on travel and photography. “
