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Killed in Action
Royal Army Medical Corps
197 Field Ambulance
History
by Ray Watson
Excerpts from ‘Mr Sam’ Far Eastern Heroes
Compiled by Ron Taylor
Liberation
15th August 1945 - 1st January 1947
Time was drawing near to the end of the hostilities. And one day, as I was working in the timberyard, a Japanese soldier gesticulated to me in a way that led me to understand that Britain had won the war. He laid his rifle down in front of me. I knew in my heart that the Atom Bomb had been exploded on Japan. We were all agog to listen to our wireless at that ‘certain time of day’.
Our Commanding Officer, Colonel Collins told the Japanese Commanding Officer to keep his weapons until our soldiers arrived, and to still run the camp. He explained that he was afraid of what the soldiers, on either side, would do to each other, and so we were reprieved from the dread of going into the jungle to be executed. This state of limbo continued until Lord Mountbatten landed on the island.
Mountbatten was a very matter-of-fact man with his words. He said; ‘You have been Prisoners-of-War for three and a half years, so don’t get bloody mad at us for not getting you off this island in three or four days. Give us time and we’ll get you all back home again.’
After all that time, we were quite content to just sit back and admit that we could manage better as free men than we could as captives. The elation we felt at being free was something to experience.
The sick were soon flown out from the island, but death still found the sick. After three and a half years of hell as a Japanese PoW, surviving Liberation on hope, they did not make it home.
God Bless Them !!!
Liberation Deaths
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