World War II Research

Consolidation of personal notes and research into World War II / Battle of Singapore

Visits

Visit to Changi Museum

• Changi Tree - area named after exceptionally huge tree in area, probably Sindora Wallichia / Sepetir which grew 50m tall, blown up by british army 1942 to prevent its usage as geographical marker
• front of museum lined with military crests of companies, poppy flower garlands, Australia India Msia NZ Pakistan SG UK
• Japanese soldiers were allowed two weeks to do whatever they liked after capture of Singapore, but after which they faced severe restriction for behaviour (impunity during war)
• 3 star men, 2 star men, blue star for europeans indicating they were supposed to be under curfew, story about eurasian mother out with children to watch movie when a chinese civilian called her out for breaking curfew hours and she and the children were terrified (although it wasn't one of the authorities who caught her) and ran home
• "Asia is for Asians" propaganda slogan used by japanese
• "Once I was given a puppy to eat, but I couldn't eat it. I was so hungry but still I could not eat it." - Jack "Crackers" Kyros Australian POW
• POW - Lunch was 50g cooked rice (source: oral history report of Dutch POW Victor Lois Bloen)
• Learning to make soap, wine, tapioca crackers, cakes (no flour), oil for lamps using coconut, condensed milk, shoe polish, frying pans, tyres, welding set bottles ropes paper
• Remembrance ceremony held at Krangi War Cemetery in April and Nov
• Plan of typical cell in so called "Asiatic style"
• Secret POW postcards with allied intel info sent using postcards glued together with rice starch (source: prof malcolm H murfett)
• shortwave radio hidden inside water tank, windup devices in matchbox for morse code
• Alexandra Hospital Massacre, Sook Ching, Double Tenth Incident, Selarang Incident (no escape paper. "So we signed. What did we sign? we all signed fictitious names. The japs never knew. I signed "winston churchill. Some put down mickey mouse, charlie chaplin" (source: charles Lyon British POW)
• New resettlement sept 1943 endau 12000 catholic chinese and several hundred eurasian catholics --> new syonan in endau johore (mainly catholic, some christian)
• Bahau in negri sembilan "fuji-go"
• "F Force" --> sent to death railway between thailand and burma. 7500 strong end of 1942.
• H E Mackenzie Illustrated London News Oct 27. 1942. A Japanese Internment hell in Singapore. Changi Criminal Jail.

Books

SPEEDREAD!!!

Legacies of World War II in South and East Asia

Edited by David Koh Wee Hock, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies

Review of Literature

• http://www.naa.gov.au/about-us/grants/margaret-george/twomey-paper.aspx

Notes

• Keep Mum posters from IWM (replicated within the Battlebox)
  • http://www.wisegeek.com/what-are-the-origins-of-the-phrase-keeping-mum.htm - Mmmmmm. Mummeries. Mummer. The term was also borrowed by members of the acting community, who started to put on “mummeries,” or silent plays, at around the same time. In a mummery, people would wear masks to conceal their identities, and portray a scene which was often laden with political and social commentary.
  • http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/9732 - image: a three-quarter length depiction of an attractive woman, reclining on a chair and looking directly out of the poster. She is surrounded by three entranced officers, representing the Army, Navy and RAF. text: Keep mum she's not so dumb! CARELESS TALK COSTS LIVES Printed for H.M. Stationery Office by Greycaine Ltd., Watford and London.