Matthias Ulungura

Matthias Ulungura (1921–1980) (in some sources also referred to as Matthias Ullungura or Matthias Ngapiatulawai) was an Indigenous Australian from the Tiwi Islands, who in 1942 became the first Australian to take a Japanese prisoner of war on Australian soil. In Ulungura's words:

Ulungura took his prisoner to the RAAF guards stationed at the Bathurst Island aerodrome, where he was transferred into their custody. Toyoshima initially used the alias of Tadao Minami and claimed he had been washed ashore in an attempt to prevent his captors from locating his downed plane, but after questioning police saw through his story and located the wreckage. The wreckage was transferred to Darwin, and Toyoshima was taken to a prisoner of war camp, where he died in 1944 during the Cowra breakout.

Although Ulungura could not be enlisted because of his race (Australian military policy at the time forbade Indigenous Australians from enlisting), Corporal Moore, one of the two guards permanently stationed on Bathurst Island, took Ulungura on as his personal bodyguard and assistant.

Despite Ulungura's role as the first Australian to take a Japanese prisoner of war in Australia, he remains relatively unknown. Indigenous leader Mick Dodson has remarked that "the fact that an Aboriginal man took the first Japanese prisoner of war on Australian soil was hardly known in Australia."

A life-sized bronze statue of Matthias Ulungura was erected on Bathurst Island in 2016.