Island Life Magazine Ltd December 2010/January 2011 | Page 43

interview

Island Life - December 2010

their bombs. I always remember being with

“All my kit was still on the back of my

a mate called Vic Smith, and he and I were

motorbike, but when I went to get it the bike

on deck. We manned a gun in the bows of

had gone. So all I had was what I stood up

the ship, and down came the dive bombers.

in. We had to march 17 miles back to Changi

I thought ‘this is going to be the end of our

where we were kept prisoners. It wasn’t too

war’ and it was a real baptism of fire. Our

bad for six months, because we hardly saw

ship caught two bombs, but the Empress of

any Japanese. They recruited Indian sheiks to

Asia took a lot of bombs, caught fire and

oversee us, and they even tried to make us

rolled over. It was horrible to watch.

bow to them when they passed by, but the

“I was frightened because you think the
plane is going to hit you, never mind the

Japanese wouldn’t allow that.
“We did a lot of work in the docks until

bomb. But we survived. Then I was called and

October, and then we were moved to

told I was going off the ship at Singapore –

Thailand by rail. We were in metal box

Ginger Burke and I. We slept in an air raid

trucks, 32 to a truck and just enough room

shelter, and I still had my motorcycle - a

to sit down. It was red hot in the day and

350cc Matchless.

bitterly cold at night. The train stopped once

“Then the Japanese Army got on to

a day to get off and go to the toilet and get

Singapore island, and that was it for us –

rations of a can of rice to eat. It took four or

surrender, capture call it what you like –but

five days to get there.”

we were finished! We didn’t see one English

Jim and his fellow prisoners of war marched

plane all the way down to Malaya. We felt

another 24 miles to Kanchanaburi in a day

very isolated; we were hiding under the

and a night, carrying all their equipment.

trees, but the Jap planes were overhead, and

They stayed there a few days, before

if you moved or fired a shot you knew that

marching through the jungle Tamarkan.

would be it.”
February 15, 1942 is a date etched in Jim’s

“By the time I got there I had no boots.
They had worn out. We sweated so much the

mind. He says: “We were told to cease fire

kit went rotten, boots wore out, and they

at 2.0pm on that day. But we were still being

wouldn’t give us any more. In Tamarkan we

raided with mortar bombs, so it was a case

were told to start clearing the jungle because

of staying in the trench we had dug and

we were going to build two bridges – one

keeping our heads down until the 2.0pm

wooden and one concrete and steel.

deadline arrived.
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“I had nothing on my feet, and all I had to
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