Valentines day.............not as happy for some.

[Surpmil]

Not even the Red Cross parcels that were sent were provided, and then only sporadically and at the end. Worth remembering that the official Japanese plan was to kill all PoW's before surrender and in some places this was carried out.

Meanwhile the interned Japanese Canadians were enjoying care packages of special foods from the Imperial Government, with the exception of a small group who refused them on the grounds that they were Canadians and had no need of charity from an enemy government! From some camps polite greetings were exchanged with various Japanese government officials and on the whole the attitude seems consistent with that of interned enemy aliens. Along with celebrating the emperor's and Hitler's birthday, Japanese Navy Day, Pearl Harbour Day, etc., etc. Very pally with German PoW's too in some places where the camps were nearby. These are not allegations by the way, but all straight from their own accounts of which I have copies. There is much more that could be added I assure you.

[Peter Laidler]

Back to Singapore.... I often wondered whether there were any soldiers captured there who had a reasonable life. After all, there must have been cooks, mess orderlies etc etc.

While I was in Oz and NZ we had a fair few FEPOW's who worked in the camps and one of the boilermen, an ex RNZE (Royal Engineers) was working as a supervisory engineer with the Water Board when Singapore fell. For the next few weeks they remained in situ, under Jap control of course but working on their own, repairing the damaged water infrastructure. He and the other RE's and RAE's made out that they were really civilians and were expecting an easier life as civilian internees after they'd finished their tasks. Alas, the Brit overall boss of the Water Board dobbed them all in after a couple of weeks so it was off to Changi

[CINDERS]

From my library another fearsome struggle with no quarter given by either side pretty brutal reading of the USMC's struggle against a ruthless enemy........

[Gil Boyd]

Peter,
Called into the Changi Museum on our way back from the Plaman Mapu battlesite in Borneo in 2015 with The Parachute Regiment veterans on the 50th Anniversary of the battle.
As we were formally visiting the two graves of the two lads killed during the battle we also went to the museum.

Highly recommended if you go back out there, it holds no punches as to what occurred on the island under Japanese occupation and especially at Changi Jail.

It probably scratches the surface and doesn't really show the true hardships and the unecessary loss of life and how they all died, but it is a befitting memorial by the people of Singapore. Those who served there will know the two photographs, the first Raffles Hotel out of bounds to mere mortals
Lest We Forget

[CINDERS]

Some years ago a vet was taken back there and the secret radio they had built was still in its hiding spot as he located it I think it was on 60 minutes maybe 10-12 years ago.