Authors Note:

The following scenario is presented as a sample from my forthcoming book on wargaming the Kokoda campaign of 1942. The book examines how the campaign can be represented on the tabletop without reducing it to a simple jungle firefight. Kokoda was a campaign of terrain, exhaustion, supply, fear, command friction, and small unit endurance. Any game that ignores those elements misses much of what made the fighting so difficult.

This sample, based on the fighting around Templeton’s Crossing, shows the approach taken throughout the book. The aim is not merely to provide orders of battle and victory conditions, but to help players recreate the pressure of the Kokoda Track itself. Visibility is short, movement is punishing, units become separated, and both sides must fight against the ground as much as against the enemy. In that sense, the scenario is intended as both a game and a design study in how to make historical conditions shape player decisions.

The Battle of Templeton’s Crossing, 1942

The fighting around Templeton’s Crossing during the Kokoda campaign represented one of the defining moments of the struggle for the Owen Stanley Range in 1942. It was not a single battle in the conventional sense but a series of brutal engagements fought in mountainous jungle terrain where exhaustion, terrain, rain, isolation, and logistics shaped events as much as direct combat. The battle demonstrated the changing character of the Kokoda campaign. Earlier fighting had largely involved delaying actions by understrength Australian militia formations attempting to slow the Japanese advance toward Port Moresby. By the time combat reached Templeton’s Crossing, however, Australian forces increasingly combined battle experience with reinforcements from the Second Australian Imperial Force. The fighting also exposed growing Japanese logistical difficulties and demonstrated the cumulative effects of attrition within the jungle environment itself.

Templeton’s Crossing lay deep within the Eora Creek valley system north of Myola. The crossing itself marked one of the critical points along the Kokoda Track where movement became compressed by steep ridges, narrow approaches, thick jungle growth, and the creek itself. The terrain was physically punishing. Movement off the track rapidly became disorganised and dangerous while observation remained limited to extremely short distances. Combat therefore occurred suddenly and at close range. The battlefield imposed severe restrictions on command and control. Platoons and sections frequently became isolated from one another while officers often fought with only fragmentary knowledge of surrounding positions. Under such conditions the battle became one of endurance, initiative, and small unit cohesion rather than manoeuvre in any conventional operational sense.

The crossing itself had already acquired symbolic significance within the campaign. It was named after Captain Sam Templeton of the 39th Battalion, who had disappeared during the early fighting near Kokoda in July 1942. Templeton had commanded B Company during the desperate initial defence against the Japanese advance and was widely respected by his men. Lieutenant Bert Kienzle of the Australian New Guinea Administrative Unit later named the crossing in his honour while assisting in the establishment of supply routes through the mountains. Thus, by September 1942, Templeton’s Crossing already carried emotional and institutional weight within the Australian Army.

The first major fighting around Templeton’s Crossing occurred during the Australian withdrawal southward after the Battle of Isurava. The Japanese South Seas Detachment under Major General Tomitaro Horii continued to press aggressively toward Port Moresby following the fall of Kokoda and the subsequent Australian retreat. Australian commanders sought to impose successive delaying actions intended to slow Japanese momentum while buying time for reinforcements to move into position farther south. Brigadier Arnold Potts and the exhausted formations of Maroubra Force therefore attempted to use the terrain around Eora Creek and Templeton’s Crossing to impose delay and disruption upon the advancing Japanese columns.

The battlefield itself heavily favoured defence. The track descended sharply into the Eora Creek valley before climbing again through steep jungle covered ridges. Any force moving through the area became channelled into narrow approaches vulnerable to ambush and defensive fire. The Japanese advance increasingly encountered resistance from concealed Australian positions positioned to exploit terrain rather than hold continuous linear fronts. This was not European style positional warfare. Instead the battle fragmented into isolated firefights, patrol clashes, ambushes, and short violent assaults fought within dense vegetation and difficult terrain.

Australian troops during this phase consisted primarily of battalions from the 21st Brigade including the 2/14th, 2/16th, and 2/27th Battalions together with remnants of the 39th Battalion. These formations had already endured severe fighting at Isurava and were physically weakened by hunger, disease, and constant movement. Supply remained one of the central operational problems throughout the campaign. Every round of ammunition, ration, medical supply, or mortar bomb had to be carried by Papuan carriers or Australian troops across mountain tracks frequently reduced to mud by heavy rain. Men fought while exhausted and underfed. Many soldiers suffered malaria, dysentery, tropical ulcers, and exposure.

Japanese forces experienced similar difficulties despite their continued tactical aggression. Early Japanese successes along the track had depended upon rapid movement, infiltration tactics, and aggressive offensive doctrine. However, by the time fighting reached Templeton’s Crossing, Japanese logistics were increasingly strained. Supply lines stretched back toward Buna and Gona while Allied air attacks and terrain imposed mounting burdens upon Japanese transport capacity. Food shortages became severe. Japanese troops increasingly relied upon captured Australian supplies or reduced rations. Operational momentum therefore became difficult to sustain despite continued tactical pressure.

The fighting itself around Templeton’s Crossing during late August and early September developed into a series of delaying actions. Australian troops used the terrain effectively to inflict casualties and slow the Japanese advance while withdrawing before encirclement. The dense jungle and steep ridges prevented large scale manoeuvre. Instead platoons established concealed positions overlooking likely approaches and engaged the advancing Japanese at extremely short range. Bren guns, rifles, grenades, and mortars dominated the fighting. Visibility often extended no more than several metres. Soldiers described hearing enemy movement before seeing opponents. Combat therefore became psychologically exhausting as much as physically dangerous.

The Japanese repeatedly attempted flanking movements through the jungle to bypass Australian blocking positions. These tactics had proven effective earlier in the campaign and remained a hallmark of Japanese infantry doctrine. However, terrain around Templeton’s Crossing imposed significant difficulties even upon experienced jungle troops. Movement through the steep valleys and thick vegetation proved exhausting while coordination between advancing units became difficult. Australian patrols and defensive fire frequently disrupted Japanese attempts to achieve decisive encirclement. The result was not a clean breakthrough but a grinding advance imposed through cumulative pressure and attrition.

One of the defining characteristics of the battle was the role of terrain as an active operational force rather than a passive backdrop. The Eora Creek valley compressed movement and fractured cohesion. Men slipped from tracks into ravines. Weapons malfunctioned from mud and rain. Evacuation of wounded soldiers became agonisingly slow. Commanders struggled to maintain communication with forward companies. Runners frequently became lost or killed while moving between positions. Wireless communication remained unreliable within the mountains. In many cases platoon and company commanders exercised initiative with limited guidance from higher headquarters.

Australian resistance at Templeton’s Crossing nevertheless succeeded in imposing delay upon the Japanese timetable. Every defensive stand forced the Japanese to deploy, probe, attack, and reorganise before continuing southward. This delay proved strategically important because it allowed additional Australian forces to establish defensive positions farther south near Efogi, Ioribaiwa, and eventually Imita Ridge. The battle therefore formed part of a broader operational strategy designed to trade ground for time while progressively weakening Japanese offensive capacity.

The psychological dimension of the fighting also deserves attention. By September 1942 many Australian troops had already endured weeks of continuous combat and withdrawal. The strain of repeated retreats weighed heavily upon morale. Nevertheless, the fighting at Templeton’s Crossing demonstrated increasing tactical confidence among Australian formations. Combat experience sharpened jungle fighting skills while leadership within battalions adapted to the realities of close terrain warfare. Junior officers and non commissioned officers became especially important because small unit initiative often determined local outcomes. The battle therefore contributed to the broader transformation of Australian forces during the Kokoda campaign from inexperienced formations reacting to Japanese initiative into increasingly capable jungle fighting troops.

The Japanese meanwhile faced growing operational dilemmas. Although tactically aggressive, they increasingly struggled to sustain offensive operations across the mountains. Casualties mounted steadily while disease and malnutrition weakened units. The deeper the Japanese advanced toward Port Moresby the longer and more fragile their supply lines became. Japanese assumptions regarding rapid victory began to erode. Strategic reverses elsewhere in the Pacific, especially around Guadalcanal and Milne Bay, further altered the broader operational context.

The second major phase of fighting around Templeton’s Crossing occurred during the Australian counter offensive in October 1942. By this stage the strategic situation had changed significantly. Japanese forces had abandoned their advance toward Port Moresby and begun withdrawing northward. Australian forces under Lieutenant General Edmund Herring and Major General Arthur Allen now pursued the retreating Japanese back across the Owen Stanley Range.

This second battle around Templeton’s Crossing proved particularly costly. Japanese troops established strong defensive positions north of the crossing within terrain ideally suited for defence. The Japanese had become highly skilled at constructing concealed bunkers integrated into jungle and ridge systems. Australian troops advancing north encountered interlocking fields of fire, hidden machine gun positions, and carefully prepared defensive localities. The steep terrain again restricted manoeuvre and forced frontal attacks through narrow approaches.

Australian commanders increasingly attempted to use flanking patrols to outmanoeuvre Japanese defensive positions. Yet movement through the jungle remained extraordinarily difficult. Patrols often lost direction while carrying supplies across steep ridges. Rain, mud, and exhaustion slowed operations. Nevertheless, Australian numerical superiority and improving logistics gradually imposed pressure upon the withdrawing Japanese forces.

The October fighting exposed tensions within Australian command structures regarding the pace of the advance. Senior commanders including General Douglas MacArthur and Lieutenant General Thomas Blamey criticised Australian formations for perceived slowness. Yet such criticism frequently underestimated the realities of jungle warfare within the Owen Stanley environment. Every advance required movement through terrain where tracks barely existed, supply depended upon human carriers, and every ridge potentially concealed prepared Japanese positions. The battlefield fundamentally resisted operational tempo. Templeton’s Crossing illustrated this reality clearly.

Combat during the counter offensive remained intimate and brutal. Japanese defensive doctrine emphasised concealed positions and determined resistance. Australian infantry therefore frequently closed with enemy bunkers at grenade range. Patrol actions, ambushes, sniper fire, and close assaults characterised the fighting. Casualties continued to mount on both sides despite the broader Japanese withdrawal.

Eventually Australian forces forced the Japanese out of the Templeton’s Crossing area and continued advancing north toward Kokoda. The battle nevertheless revealed the enormous physical and psychological cost imposed by the campaign. Even successful advances occurred slowly and under severe strain. Terrain and logistics continued to dominate operations. The campaign remained one of attrition rather than rapid manoeuvre.

The significance of Templeton’s Crossing within Australian military history rests partly in how clearly it demonstrated the relationship between terrain, logistics, endurance, and small unit cohesion. The battle was not defined by sweeping manoeuvres or dramatic breakthroughs. Instead it represented the cumulative grinding character of jungle warfare in New Guinea. Men fought under conditions where exhaustion and isolation shaped outcomes as heavily as tactical doctrine.

The battle also contributed significantly to the development of Australian jungle warfare experience. Earlier assumptions derived from Middle Eastern campaigns proved of limited value within the Owen Stanley environment. At Templeton’s Crossing Australian forces increasingly adapted to jungle conditions through patrol based operations, decentralised leadership, and flexible defensive tactics. The campaign therefore became a learning process fought under extreme pressure.

Templeton’s Crossing further occupies an important place within Australian memory of Kokoda because it symbolises both sacrifice and endurance. The crossing itself commemorated Captain Sam Templeton while the surrounding battlefield became associated with some of the harshest fighting of the campaign. The area represented the physical reality of Kokoda more accurately than many later commemorative narratives. Combat there involved hunger, mud, confusion, disease, fear, exhaustion, and fragmented violence within terrain largely indifferent to human effort.

Modern interpretations of Kokoda sometimes risk simplifying the campaign into a straightforward national story of heroic resistance. While courage undoubtedly characterised the fighting, Templeton’s Crossing demonstrates the complexity of the campaign more fully. Australian success emerged not from singular moments of heroism alone but from endurance, adaptation, logistics, and the cumulative wearing down of Japanese offensive capacity. Likewise Japanese defeat resulted not merely from battlefield losses but from strategic overextension and logistical collapse across impossible terrain.

The battle therefore stands as one of the central engagements of the Kokoda campaign because it revealed the essential character of the wider struggle. Terrain imposed constraint upon both armies. Supply determined operational possibility. Small unit leadership became decisive. Combat dissolved into fragmented local engagements fought under extreme environmental pressure. Templeton’s Crossing thus remains one of the clearest examples of jungle warfare in the South West Pacific during 1942.

Footnotes

1. Dudley McCarthy, South West Pacific Area — First Year (Canberra: Australian War Memorial, 1959), 216–240.
2. Karl James, The Track: A Historical Desktop Study of the Kokoda Track (Canberra: Australian War Memorial, 2009), 32–47.
3. Nicholas Anderson, To Kokoda (Newport: Big Sky Publishing, 2014), 72–192.
4. Peter Brune, A Bastard of a Place (Sydney: Allen and Unwin, 2004), 180–240.
5. Gordon Maitland, The Second World War and its Australian Army Battle Honours (East Roseville: Kangaroo Press, 1999), 142.
6. Samuel Milner, Victory in Papua (Washington DC: Center of Military History, 1957), 85–130.
7. David Horner, High Command: Australia and Allied Strategy 1939–1945 (Canberra: Australian War Memorial, 1982), 250–275.
8. Peter FitzSimons, Kokoda (Sydney: Hachette, 2004), 310–360.
9. Australian War Memorial, “Battle of Templeton’s Crossing,” accessed May 24, 2026.

Templeton’s Crossing, 1942

A Kokoda Track Scenario

This scenario is designed for platoon level World War II rules with an emphasis on exhaustion, restricted visibility, jungle movement, and fragmented command. It is particularly suited to systems that model morale, cohesion, or command friction rather than simple attritional firefights. The scenario recreates the fighting around Eora Creek and Templeton’s Crossing during the Japanese advance south along the Kokoda Track in September 1942.

The battle should feel compressed, uncertain, and physically exhausting. Visibility is short. Movement is difficult. Units become separated easily. Firefights erupt suddenly at close range. The battlefield itself is the greatest enemy.

Historical Background

Following the fighting at Isurava, Australian forces withdrew southward through the Owen Stanley Range attempting to delay the Japanese advance toward Port Moresby. Around Templeton’s Crossing the track descended sharply into the Eora Creek valley before climbing again through steep jungle ridges. Australian troops established a series of blocking positions designed to slow the advancing Japanese while preserving enough combat strength to continue withdrawing south.

Japanese forces attempted repeated frontal probes and jungle flanking movements to dislodge the Australian defenders. The result was a series of brutal small unit engagements fought in thick jungle under terrible physical conditions.

Table Size

6′ x 4′ recommended.

Terrain Layout

The table should feel narrow and claustrophobic rather than open.

Map produced with the assistance of ChatGPT.

• Dense jungle covering at least 70 percent of the table
• One steep ridgeline running diagonally across the table
• Eora Creek crossing near the centre
• Narrow jungle track running north to south
• Muddy slopes and ravines
• Fallen logs and broken ground
• Bamboo thickets or tangled scrub
• At least two elevated firing positions overlooking the track

Terrain Effects

Thesed may differ from one rule set to another so treat these as suggestions only:

Dense Jungle

• Visibility limited to 6″
• Units moving through jungle count all movement as difficult
• No unit may move at double speed in jungle

Steep Slopes

• Half movement uphill
• No heavy weapons may redeploy uphill faster than normal movement
• Units retreating downhill test for disorder

Eora Creek

• Counts as difficult terrain
• Units crossing lose any charge or movement bonus
• Heavy rain may increase movement penalties

Forces

The scenario works best with reinforced platoon sized forces.

Australian Forces:

Elements from the 2/14th Battalion, 2/16th Battalion, or remnants of the 39th Battalion.

Suggested Force:

• 1 understrength platoon HQ
• 3 rifle sections
• 1 Bren gun team
• Optional exhausted reinforcement section arriving later

Australian Special Rules

Again treat these as suggestions only as most rules have their own special rules for different nationalities.

Experienced but Exhausted

Australian infantry may re roll one failed morale or cohesion test per turn.

Jungle Veterans

Australian units ignore the first movement penalty caused by jungle each activation.

Ammunition Shortages

Japanese Forces

Elements of the South Seas Detachment.

Suggested Force:

• 1 platoon HQ
• 4 rifle squads
• 1 light machine gun squad
• 1 grenade discharger team
• Optional flanking patrol

Japanese Special Rules

Aggressive Infiltration

One Japanese squad may begin hidden off the main track and enter from a jungle flank.

Offensive Doctrine

Japanese infantry gain bonuses in close combat or assaults.

Supply Exhaustion

After Turn 6 all Japanese units suffer penalties to morale recovery or command rolls.

Deployment

Australians Deploy first.

• At least half the Australian force must begin hidden.
• No Australian unit may deploy within 12″ of the northern table edge.
• One section may begin in reserve.

Japanese enter from the northern table edge along the track.

• No more than half the force may begin on table.
• Remaining forces arrive over subsequent turns.

Scenario Length

10 turns recommended.

Optional sudden tropical storm rule may shorten visibility during the final turns.

Objectives

Japanese Objectives

Major Victory

• Break through the Australian line and exit at least 50 percent of combat units off the southern table edge.

Minor Victory

• Control the crossing and force Australian withdrawal.

Australian Objectives

Major Victory

• Delay the Japanese advance while preserving at least half the force.

Minor Victory

• Prevent Japanese breakthrough before Turn 10.

Hidden Movement

This scenario works best with hidden deployment.

If the rules you are using do not cater for hidden movement here are some possible methods:

• Dummy markers
• Written deployment
• Blinds system
• Hidden movement map

The Japanese player should never be entirely certain where Australian positions are located until firing begins.

Random Events

At the beginning of each turn after Turn 2 roll 1D6.

Command and Control

Communication in the jungle was extremely difficult.

Optional rules:

• Officers beyond 12″ may not issue direct orders
• Radio communication unreliable
• Units separated by jungle may activate independently
• Lost contact may cause delayed reinforcements

Casualty Evacuation

Australian players may attempt to evacuate wounded troops.

Each wounded figure successfully removed from the southern edge grants additional victory points.

This encourages historically appropriate withdrawal pressure rather than suicidal last stands.

Atmosphere and Tone

This should not feel like a conventional battlefield encounter.

The scenario should feel wet, exhausting, uncertain, fragmented, and claustrophobic.

Firefights should erupt suddenly at very close range. Players should struggle to maintain cohesion and awareness. The battlefield itself should create pressure upon decision making.

Templeton’s Crossing was not a battle of sweeping manoeuvre. It was a grinding contest of endurance fought in terrain that resisted movement, visibility, communication, and control.

Suggested Rules to use

• Chain of Command
• Bolt Action with heavy scenario modification
• Crossfire
• Combat Patrol
• Disposable Heroes
• Conflict Under Constraint adaptations
• Homebrew platoon systems emphasising morale and cohesion

Designer’s Notes

Templeton’s Crossing demonstrates how terrain and exhaustion shaped jungle warfare in New Guinea. The battlefield compressed movement into narrow tracks while dense jungle fragmented command and visibility. The scenario works best when players resist treating the battle as a straightforward firefight and instead focus on pressure, uncertainty, and the gradual erosion of cohesion.

The Australian player should feel constant pressure to delay without becoming trapped. The Japanese player should feel compelled to maintain momentum despite mounting disruption and uncertainty.

Feedback would be appreciated.