大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by the CSV Action Desk at 大象传媒 Gloucestershire on behalf of Miss Sowls with his permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions

This is the story of my Mum and Dad, Sadie and Alf Sowls.

Alf was born in Stonehouse, Glos. on 5th January 1922, he had 2 older brothers, Harry and Sid. War broke out in 1939 when Alf was 17. He planned to join the Glorious Gloucesters after his brother Sid but was pronounced too young. Disappointed but not daunted he went to the RAF and was accepted. He was sent to RAF Odium to start his training and was later sent to Mac merry just outside Edinburgh to prepare for oversees missions. There he met his good friends John McCabe, Jimmy Hamilton and Doug Jolly and it was with them in Princes Street that they met three local girls. Alf paired off with Sadie and it was a partnership started early February 1941 that was to last a lifetime. Later in the year of 1941 he was put on embarkation leave so they decided to get married on 15th October 1941. Their honeymoon was a quick trip to Stonehouse to see his Dad, then three weeks after the wedding he was sent overseas.

On route to Australia he called in at Cape Town, Java and Sumatra but had the misfortune to be in Singapore when it fell to the Japanese Army and was taken prisoner. Sadie had worked for Crawford鈥檚 Biscuits in Leith but had to leave when she married, as was Crawfords policy. She came back to Stonehouse to live with her Father-in-Law but had to return to Leith when the War Office informed her Alf was missing presumed dead and they wanted to put her on Widow鈥檚 pension. This she fought against as she was and remained convinced Alf was alive. She got a job driving a crane, which transported molten metal. One day she was driving her crane when she was told to come down. One of her family had brought a postcard from Alf telling her he was o.k. but a prisoner with the Japanese in Singapore. It was 2陆 years since Alf had gone away and this was the first she had heard from him.
Alf meanwhile was in Changi Jail in Singapore working on the Singapore Aerodrome. He had been due to go up to the Burma Railway to work but had missed this as he was ill with dysentery at the time. He was released on August 15th 1945 some 3陆 years since he had been captured and one thing he did say was a lot of prisoners died the day they were released, they just couldn鈥檛 cope. Alf returned to Leith on 13th October 1945, 2 days before their 4th wedding anniversary. Sadie, a cousin Joss and a beloved Uncle Bob went to meet him, Uncle Bob at the gate, Joss the far end of the platform and Sadie in the middle. Sadie spotted Alf on the train, at least she thought she did but he had put on so much weight due to the steamed food they had been given on the boat home. In her own words she stood there saying 鈥楢ye it is him, no its not him 鈥榯ill he got off the train. After a family party they went for a long holiday with Jimmy Hamilton and his wife to a secluded farm in the Scottish borders then of course to Stonehouse to see his Dad and brothers. When they returned to Leith Alf trained as a bricklayer and I was born in 1947. In 1948 they decided to make their home permanently in Stonehouse and there they lived until their deaths, Alf in 1996 and Sadie in 2002. Alf didn鈥檛 talk too much about his war experiences and although he was very much against bombs he did say that if Hiroshima and Nagasaki hadn鈥檛 have been bombed he would not have survived as the prisoners of war were digging a mass grave in Singapore.
In later years, the 60鈥檚, the Cotswold Far East Prisoner of War Club was started and this gave Alf and Sadie many years of great pleasure with some new but very good friends. Alf was proud to have been a F.E.P.O.W.

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