35 Facts About Lorenzo Gamboa

Lorenzo Abrogar Gamboa was a Filipino-American man who was excluded from Australia under the White Australia policy, despite having an Australian wife and children.

Lorenzo Gamboa's treatment sparked an international incident with the Philippines.

Lorenzo Gamboa married an Australian woman, Joyce Cain, and fathered two children, both born while he was serving overseas.

Lorenzo Gamboa was discharged from the US Army in 1945 and joined his family in Australia, but was refused permission to settle permanently and forced to leave the country.

Lorenzo Gamboa became a naturalised US citizen in 1946 and rejoined the army.

Lorenzo Gamboa applied to re-enter Australia in 1948, but was refused even a visitor's visa.

Lorenzo Gamboa was born on 11 November 1918 in Mangaldan, Pangasinan.

Lorenzo Gamboa left school at the age of 16 to work in a coal mine, while studying electrical engineering at night school.

Lorenzo Gamboa was a talented boxer, and in 1940 won a boxing competition that had a scholarship to National University as its prize.

Lorenzo Gamboa did not meet the educational requirements for the scholarship, and so began attending night classes to complete his secondary education.

In late 1941, Lorenzo Gamboa enlisted in the United States Army.

Lorenzo Gamboa was immediately caught up in the Battle of the Philippines, narrowly escaping a Japanese bombing raid before being hospitalised with a hernia a few weeks later.

Lorenzo Gamboa was sent to Australia via Celebes, arriving in Darwin on 13 January 1942.

Lorenzo Gamboa was moved on to Melbourne and housed in a military camp at Royal Park, while working as a guard at the Port of Melbourne.

Lorenzo Gamboa was posted to Port Moresby, New Guinea, a few months later, and served as an orderly for General Douglas MacArthur.

Lorenzo Gamboa was then attached to MacArthur's headquarters in Brisbane.

Lorenzo Gamboa visited his mother in March 1945, who did not recognise him; he had been listed as missing in action and was presumed dead.

Lorenzo Gamboa arrived in Yokohama in August 1945, to take part in the occupation of Japan.

In March 1942, Lorenzo Gamboa was taking a train back to his barracks when he met Joyce Cain, a 16-year-old Australian girl who worked at a biscuit factory.

Lorenzo Gamboa invited him back to her parents' home in Brunswick West, at the time a common gesture of goodwill towards soldiers.

Lorenzo Gamboa's continued presence was discovered by the Department of Immigration in early 1946, after he attempted to collect a ration book, and he was given three months to leave the country.

Lorenzo Gamboa left for the United States in June 1946, travelling alongside Australian war brides joining their non-white American husbands.

Lorenzo Gamboa subsequently re-enlisted in the US Army and was posted back to Japan, joining General MacArthur's headquarters in Tokyo.

Lorenzo Gamboa applied to re-enter Australia in October 1948, hoping to return to his family after his discharge in August 1949.

Lorenzo Gamboa's preference was for permanent residence, but he applied for a tourist visa as a back-up; he assumed that as a US citizen he would not face the same difficulties as before.

In early 1949, Lorenzo Gamboa encountered Australian Associated Press journalist Denis Warner while waiting in an army post office in Tokyo.

Lorenzo Gamboa believed that allowing compassionate exceptions to the White Australia policy would lead to a slippery slope in which thousands of other non-white immigrants would be allowed entry.

Lorenzo Gamboa accused Calwell of adopting a "pig-headed and inhuman stand".

Two days after the election, in December 1949, he cabled Joyce Lorenzo Gamboa and told her that her husband would be allowed to settle in Australia; an official announcement was made in February 1950.

However, the relationship between the two countries was severely damaged when the Australian government's treatment of Lorenzo Gamboa was made public.

However, the Lorenzo Gamboa case remained a problem for bilateral relations for a number of decades.

In 1957, Ambassador Mick Shann sent a communique to the Department of External Affairs recording his dismay at the number of times the Lorenzo Gamboa case had been raised with him, and emphasised the need to counteract the impressions given.

Lorenzo Gamboa visited the Philippines in 1971 for the first time in 20 years, along with his wife, daughter, and son-in-law.

In June 1973, Immigration Minister Al Grassby announced that he would allow Lorenzo Gamboa to become an Australian citizen.

Lorenzo Gamboa rejected the offer, as it would have required him to renounce his US citizenship, and said that government officials had approached him to take up citizenship on a number of previous occasions.