At the outbreak of World War I, Col. Sir Samuel Augustus Pethebridge took command of the Australian North-West Pacific Expedition, raised to occupy German islands north of the equator. Before the expedition could sail, the British government decided to allow the North Pacific islands to be left in the hands of their Japanese occupiers. Pethebridge suggested that his unit, known as Tropical Force, might be used to relieve the expeditionary force led by Colonel W. Holmes which had captured German New Guinea in the first weeks of the war. This was accepted, and in January 1915, Pethebridge succeeded Holmes as administrator at Rabaul. In January 1917, he contracted malaria which forced his return to Australia, where he died a year later.

Lieutenant R.G. Bowen, RAN, served in New Guinea during World War I with No. 6 Company of the Naval Battalion of the Australian Naval & Military Expeditionary Force.

Father Gerard Bruns was born on the 17 August 1932. He arrived in the Solomon Islands in September 1960 and worked as a Marist priest on Makira, Solomon Islands. Fr. Bruns took a great interest in the people of Makira and has documented much about the Kahua language and the culture of east Makira in the Solomon Islands. In 2008, he moved to the Marist Brothers at Tenaru Secondary School outside of Honiara. Fr. Bruns moved again and now lives at Tanagai parish centre close to the sea shore which has been his home ever since.