The 49th Battalion was an infantry unit of the Australian Army. Raised as part of the Australian Imperial Force during the First World War, the battalion fought along the Western Front between mid-1916 and late 1918, before being disbanded in early 1919. In 1921, it was re-formed as a part-time unit based in the state of Queensland. Throughout the 1930s, the battalion was merged a couple of times as a result of manpower shortages, but in early 1940, as Australia mobilised for the Second World War, the 49th was expanded and the following year deployed to New Guinea to undertake garrison duty. Following Japan's entry into the war, the 49th was committed to the fighting in the early stages of the New Guinea campaign, taking part in the Battle of Sanananda in December 1942, where it took many