East Surrey Boy Bandsman then Japanese FEPOW (4 of 5)

After K.L. we moved down to Changi, on Singapore Island, where I met a lot of my mates that had survived so far.

The food here was much better than before, and it was a very large camp, so they had well established and thriving cookhouses, so they could also get more types of greenery, and sometimes we had a small piece of meat in our rice. Don't ask me what it was, but we ate everything they gave us. Some of the prisoners who were cooks, (or said they were cooks), were put in charge of the prisoners' cookhouses.

At Changi I was put on a wood chopping party that had to go out into the forests (under guard of course) and saw down (with crosscut saws), huge trees, cut off the big branches, trim off all the small ones with axes, then saw the trunk up into logs to be delivered to all the camp cookhouses to be used as fuel. We used to load up the wood onto old chassis of lorries, and then pull them by the use of ropes tied to the frames, to the various camps.

It was hard work, but I didn't mind because the Japs didn't bother us too much, and also, we got more food, in other words, more rice.

Suddenly we were told we were all going to be formed into new working parties, and going north, where we would have better food and conditions.

We were taken to Singapore Railway Station and loaded into cattle trucks, with severe overcrowding. These trucks became so very hot during the day with the tropical sun beating down, then very cold at night. Toilet facilities were nil, for other than passing water, your comrades held your hands while you put your backside outside, and you did your thing, hoping and praying that your pals held tight onto your hands.

We were on the train for three days until we reached our destination, which was a place called Non Pladuk in Thailand just south of Bangkok. There we were told that we were to build a railway, the notorious Death Railway from Bampon in Thailand to Moulmein in Burma, a distance of about 400 kin which included the Bridge on the River Kwai. It is said that for every railway sleeper laid on the railway, a prisoner-of-war died.

I worked in many camps on the railway, finishing at a camp called Brenkasi, but was sent back to Non Pladuk on a sick party because of a bout of dysentery. During my 3 1/2 years as a P.O.W. I contracted: dysentery, malaria, pellagra, dengue fever and beriberi. Besides the diseases I had, there were others, jaundice, blackwater fever, scabies, ringworm and worst of all, tropical ulcers.

If you were out on a working party, and you got scratched with any of the jungle growth, especially bamboo, there was the chance of it turning into an ulcer. These tropical ulcers were terrible; some were open wounds stretching from the knee right down the calf of the leg, with the bone visible, and full of puss. I had one occasion to go into a hospital ulcer ward, to see one of my pals, and the smell of rotting flesh nearly made me sick. Some of the ulcers got so bad that amputation was the only answer.

We had to build the huts we lived in, they were made of bamboo and attap (a kind of large jungle leaf). The huts were about 120 ft long with P.O.W.'s sleeping each side on split lengths of bamboo; about 6 ft long, lashed together with a type of raffia, then raised about 2 ft off the ground. We had a bed space of about 2ft by 6ft on either side of a passage running the length of the hut, about 4ft wide, and open at each end.

The latrines were at one end, which consisted of several trenches about 7ft deep, 2ft wide and 14ft long, with foot rests made of bamboo over the trench. You then squatted (native fashion) making sure you didn't fall in this cesspit, that after a while, became a mass of writhing maggots. There was no privacy and if you were not in the front trench you were faced with the rear ends of those in front, plus the menace of flies. But it is quite amazing how one can adapt to even the most shocking conditions in the battle for survival.

Then in May 1943 cholera struck some of the camps in the north. As it is principally water-borne, its spread during the monsoon was inevitable, everything had to be boiled.

The Japanese were also frightened of cholera and ordered that the bodies of those who had died should be burnt, and evening processions to the funeral pyres became common occurrences.

I remember one of the jobs we had to do on the railway was to cut a cutting going through large rocky areas. Because of the lack of automatic hammers, two men in a team used a steel spike to hammer a one-metre hole in the rock down which dynamite for blasting would be put.

One would hold the spike, and the other man would hit the spike with a seven-pound hammer and with the aid of water poured into the hole, drill the rock. This was called "hammer and tap".

I can assure you this is hard work if you are very fit, but with our not4oo-good rations, we were losing weight, and with the illnesses many kept getting, this was indeed strenuous labour.

As soon as all the holes were completed, the dynamite would be placed in them by the Japanese engineers, and then we had to take cover. As soon as the charges had been fired, we then had to clear all the rocks away, before drilling more holes, to the continual chant of "speedo, speedo", from the Japs. We worked, naked from the waist up, in the tropical sun, and also when the monsoon rains came. It could then rain for a few days without stopping, but work went on in the heavy mud, when you couldn't tell if it was rain, or sweat, running off you.

Now that I was off the dreaded railway, and back at Non Pladuk, things became a little more bearable after I had got over my attack of dysentery, and had come out of hospital.

Now Non Pladuk P. O.W. camp was situated near the main railway line to Bangkok, and also lay amid the marshalling yards, workshops and supply sheds of the railway depot. It was therefore inevitable that if the allied plans struck heavily at the depot, the prisoners would be in danger. I used to lay at night, listening to the allied planes going overhead, as it was now about August 1944 and the Japs were losing the war badly all over the East.

On the evening of 6th September 1944,1 was listening as usual to the planes, when I realised they were much lower than usual. Suddenly I heard the rush and whistle of bombs and I realised we were in the centre of an air raid by our own planes. When the raid had finished we found that ninety-eight prisoners had been killed, and three hundred or more injured, many who were to die later of their wounds. The dead were wrapped in rice sacks and laid together on the parade square, where we saw them as we went off to work in the morning. When we returned to camp at night they were still there, having been in the sun all day. For some reason the Japs didn't allow us to bury them until after work the next evening, so they had been laying, exposed to the tropical sun for two days, and the stench was terrible.

We were eventually allowed to take them to be buried in a mass grave, consisting of a large and deep hole, just outside the camp. Now being a large hole, the bodies had to be lowered down and laid on the bottom, then the next lot had to be also lowered, but then laid on top of those already there, and so on, until the hole was full.

Having been left for two days the bodies had rotted in the fierce tropical sun, so as they were lowered, arms and legs etc. fell out of the rice sacks, so as you can imagine, it wasn't a pretty sight. Fancy having to be buried like that after losing your life being bombed by your own planes.

Now I don't intend to dwell any more on P.O.W. experiences, just to say that some were quite humorous (you needed a sense of humour), but most of the time things were horrific, but I would like to relate one more experience.

I wrote this, and it was printed in our F.E.P.O.W. magazine, which has for its motto, "To keep going the spirit that kept us going". It is the story of another pal of mine, Joe Holland, who attempted to escape.

Joe and I were in a camp in Thailand, I cannot remember the name of the camp, but it was situated near a river. Our work at this time was transporting Japanese goods, food, medical supplies, arms etc, from off lorries onto small bogies, (trucks that ran on a narrow gauge railway). These trucks we then pushed through the jungle, down to the river, where we off-loaded them onto barges.

When we left our camp for work in the early hours of the morning, we used to be marched out of the camp by the Jap guards, then were allowed to make our own way, using the jungle paths, to our place of work. Then, on completion of the days work, we would do it in reverse, make our own way, then march into camp where we would be counted and then dismissed.

One day, to my surprise, Joe suddenly said that he intended to try and escape. Apparently, he had made contact with some Chinese boatmen on the river who had agreed to help him. I tried to dissuade him, because I thought it would be useless for him to try and get to the coast. He would have to travel north and there were miles and miles of dense jungle between him and freedom, and besides, he wasn't in the best of health. Also, although these Chinese had agreed to help him, the natives in the area just could not be trusted. But he had made up his mind, and intended to go in two days time.

Two days went by, we all set off as usual and worked all day. At the end of the day, as we set off through the jungle towards the road, Joe and I managed to segregate ourselves from the rest of the working party and we were on our own. We arrived at an s-bend in the path, where we were out of sight of everybody.

Joe suddenly stopped and said, "This is where I am leaving". We shook hands, I wished him the best of luck, he dived into the jungle and I proceeded on my way to the road. On reaching the road, I joined the rest of the party, and off we went back to camp. It was strange that, at this point, no one noticed Joe was missing.

As we approached the camp I thought to myself, "this is where the trouble starts". We all formed up and the Jap started counting. When he got to the end he started muttering to himself, shouted to us to line up properly, slapped us about, and then proceeded to count us again. Then it dawned on him (thick headed idiot), that there was one of us missing - all hell was let loose - and in the end, I had to admit that my friend Joe was the one missing. The guard dismissed the party, but I had to stay behind.

I told them, through an interpreter, that Joe had just got over a very bad attack of dysentery, so perhaps he had gone into the jungle to relieve himself, and had collapsed. This was the story I had thought up on our way back to camp. This appeared to satisfy them but six of the party, myself included, had to return, with a Jap guard, to our place of work to try and find Joe. So there was I, walking around, shouting "Joe, Joe", knowing, and hoping, that by this time he was miles away up river. After a while we all went back to camp, and life carried on as usual.

About three weeks later, I was on another working party clearing the jungle to make an airstrip, when the news came that Joe had been captured and was back in camp. As we got near the camp, I could see him standing outside the Jap guardroom. As we passed we all gave him the thumbs-up sign, but I was shocked at his appearance. He looked just like the "Wild Man of Borneo". He was very thin, which was to be expected, his hair was long and matted, and he had a huge beard. But it was his eyes - they had a wild, haunted look as he just stood there looking straight ahead.

I do not remember how long he stood there, but I do know that as every Jap guard came on duty, they all beat him until he dropped to the ground. Then they threw water over him until he came round, then he had to stand on his feet again. Eventually he was put into a small attap hut.
Now, two strange things happened, the first was —

The Japs would not allow the senior officer in the camp to visit Joe, yet, when I asked, they let me visit him in his little hut. When I got into the hut, Joe suggested we talked quietly in case the interpreter was outside hoping to hear something.

Joe told me that, on leaving me, had had contacted the Chinese who had a boat ready and they proceeded to go quickly up river, so as I was shouting for Joe, he was already miles away. During his stay up-country, he had joined some Chinese guerrillas and, with them, had made a number of successful raids on Japanese camps by the railway. After a stay with the guerrillas, he decided to move on but, on trying to jump a train, he was spotted by a Jap guard, recaptured and brought back to camp. Joe asked me to pass this information on to the senior officer who was a Major Poole.

The second strange thing was —

After a while, they took Joe away from the camp, and we all thought that was the end - he had had it - but, suddenly one day, he was brought back to the camp and released amongst us all. He told us that he had been on a court martial and, after a lot of shouting and arguing, he was put on a truck and returned to our camp.

How very lucky he was! We all put his luck down to the fact that, as this was 1944, perhaps the Japs were having a bad time in the war and were trying to make amends - you know, "What nice fellows we are and how we have abided by the Geneva Convention". I did enquire about Joe on one of my visits to our annual get-togethers at the Festival Hall, I was told he was still alive and well, after a very brave, but foolhardy attempt to escape.

After I had been at Non Pladuk a short time, I was moved to a place called Ubon, which is in the south-east corner of Thailand. There we were once more put to work clearing the jungle to make an airstrip. That was my last camp as on August 15th 1945, we found we were free, after they dropped the atom bombs.

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