大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War Site by Three Counties Action, on behalf of Patricia Bienkowski, and has been added to the site with her permission. The author fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.

My father always wanted to return to the Far-East to honour his brother who died a prisoner of the Japanese and all of his fallen comrades. This he was unable to do and died when I was only 19 years of age. I never forgot his wish and at the age of 48 went on the trip of a lifetime in memory of my Father.

George Colin Cox (Dad) was sent out with the 5th Battalion, Beds and Herts regiment along with other regiments in 1941 on the ship westpoint, eventually to defend Singapore from invasion by the Japanese. The troops only had their arms and ammunition. There were so many Japanese troops with more arms and air power that our troops were overpowered and had to surrender in February 1942.

To the Japanese to surrender was worse than death so all prisoners were looked on as cowards. Their treatment of Allied Prisoners was inhumane, partly by the way that most of them thought. All prisoners who were captured in Singapore were marched to Changi being beaten as they went and from there were distributed to different parts of Thailand and Burma to start work on the infamous 鈥淩ailway of Death鈥�. They were beaten, starved and diseased through their 3 and a half years of hell, with only a cupful or two of rice a day to get them through. My father was at camps at Changi, Kanchanaburi, Chungkai, Wampo and Tarso. My Uncle Richard Charles Cox (his brother) was with Dad some of the time but got split up when the Japanese needed more men at other camps where too many other prisoners had died. After some months the men were forced to work day and night as the Japanese wanted the railway desperately to dispatch their troops arms and ammunition into Burma. The prisoners suffered with malaria, tropical ulcers (many arms and legs had to be removed without anaesthetic as ulcers ate right through the bone) and there was no proper medication. Most suffered from Beri Beri, also Cholera was rife due to the poor sanitary conditions. My father at one stage was put in a small bamboo cage for days with food and water out of reach. He had scars from cuts with bamboo sticks all over his back and a scar right to the bone on his leg due to a tropical ulcer.

The prisoners were forced to watch others being tortured and beheadings. For maybe trying to steal some food or trying to escape.

Luckily my Father got through his 3 and a half years of hell and he told me that they all had to bury or burn their comrades when they died.

My Uncle died a prisoner on the ship Rakuyo Maru which was carrying wounded men. As the Japanese defied the Geneva Convention they did not fly Red Cross flags. My Uncle鈥檚 ship was bombed by an American submarine in September 鈥�42.

I was never to meet my uncle but was the first to lay flowers at his memorial at Kranji cemetery Singapore. My Father would have been proud.

I will never forget what these men went through and our Far-East Prisoner of War Memorial and Educational Centre at Alrewas, Staffordshire will carry on their memory for all time.

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