Recording Roy's Military Service

The information in this section is factual and is drawn from a number of sources including my own recollections of conversations with my father, his own written recollections, his army service records and family memorabilia.

In the six years of my researching the Thai-Burma Railway, I have read many personal accounts of the atrocities committed by the Japanese Imperial Army and of the immense suffering of their captives. I have also received help and information from a number of sources and I have endeavored to acknowledge this whenever possible. New information is still being uncovered but many official reports of events which took place on the railway have never been published and lie in archives around the world.

Dad didn't talk much about his time as a prisoner of war in the Far East. When I was a child the stories he did tell me and my brother didn't really have much of an impact on us. It was only when I was much older that I began to realise the true brutality he and his and his comrades suffered. When I was older I did ask him many more questions but it was difficult to dwell on the subject since I knew it was hard for him to relive such a horrific experience. Even so I now regret that I did not ask him more for it is only through such first hand accounts that present and future generations can learn the truth.

With some encouragement, during the final years of his life he began to recall and document some of his harrowing experiences as a prisoner of war. Even though it was then over sixty years ago he was able to recall some events in vivid detail. I made a promise to him then, that I would somehow share this information and as others have done before me, help make the story of the Far East PoW's an enduring memorial and to honour all those who suffered at the hands of the Japanese Imperial Army.

Where there is any uncertainty about dates or places, I have tried to make this clear. My research is still uncovering a lot of information about his time on the Death Railway which sadly was unknown to me at the time of his death.

Although his wartime journey and some of his experiences as a captive are documented here, there are still events from his time as a prisoner of war which will never be known.

Sadly a lot of his memories too painful to recall died with him.

His story begins here . . . .