Changi Chapel Revisited

Discussion in 'REME/RAOC' started by borneo72, Aug 19, 2013.

  1. borneo72

    borneo72 Junior Member

    The following article is extracted from the RAOC Gazette Summer 2013 edition, and written by Major E.W. Campbell TD of the Newcastle Branch, RAOC Association:

    "Every year I visit the Changi Chapel and museum to pay respects and lay a Remembrance Cross to members of the Corps who died in captivity as prisoners of the Japanese.
    On Tuesday 02 April 2013 when I arrived at the museum with my wife and sister-in-law, I was informed that there was a new manager and a meeting was arranged. A surprise, the manager was former RAOC SSgt Hugh (Max) McMenamin who served in HQ 3 BOD and in Borneo during the confrontation in 1963. He is a Singapore permanent resident.
    In the courtyard of the Museum is the Chapel, it is a symbolic replica of the primitive religious place built by the prisoners of war and civilian internees during imprisonment.
    With Max we paid our respects as I laid the Remembrance Cross on the altar in front of the Changi Cross. This Cross was made in March 1942 by a British prisoner of war, SSgt Harry Stogden RAOC. Without suitable material or tools, he painstakingly crafted it from scraps of brass and a used 4.5 inch Howitzer (Artillery) shell.
    The cross was designed by the reverend Eric W B Cordingley for St Georges Church, which he set up in an abandoned mosque in the India Lines of Changi Prisoner of war camp. The engraving of the Regimental cap badges was added by Cpl Tim Hemmings, using an engraving tool made from an umbrella stem. The cross is inscribed with Harry Stogden's rank and name including unit 18 Division and the RAOC badge.
    The reverend Cordingley took the cross from him to the Thailand-Burma Railway and also into Changi Gaol itself, setting up new churches wherever he went. At the end of the war he took the cross to UK.
    Meanwhile Harry Stogden was sent to Japan to work in the coal mines at Fukuoka.The harsh conditions took their toll on his health and, suffering from Beri-Beri he died on-board the American Hospital ship USS Haven, shortly after the end of the war. His body was transferred to the British aircraft carrier HMS Speaker, and was buried at sea with full military honours just off Nagasaki. Tragically, Harry's wife had also died in 1942, leaving their three young children to be brought up by relatives.
     
  2. borneo72

    borneo72 Junior Member

    Harry's Children knew little of their father's wartime experiences, and it was only in 1997 that Bernard Stogden, Harry's son, learned of the cross from an article in the Japanese Labour Camp Survivors Association's Fulcrum magazine.. By that time, the Reverend Cordingley's daughter had returned the cross to Singapore where in 1992; it was put on display in the chapel at the old Changi Prison Museum site.
    When the current museum opened in 2001, Bernard Stogden and his family attended the ceremony, he personally placed his father's cross in its present position.
    There were 50,000 prisoners of war and 3,500 civilian internees that included women and children accommodated in Changi's buildings and environs, the Museum gives a vivid account of the horrific conditions and brutality suffered by all prisoners, and what was life behind bars. The museum tells the story of the three-and-half years occupation of Singapore and the atrocities committed by the Japanese on the civilian population. I appreciated the information provided by the Museum and the kindness of Max McMenamin. Information on the Changi Museum can be found at www.changimuseum.sg"

    I would like to thank Major Campbell for submitting this article, and hope that former ex-RAOC personnel who are not in possession of the gazette, enjoy.
    Dave
     
    Buteman, 4jonboy and dbf like this.
  3. RemeDesertRat

    RemeDesertRat Very Senior Member

    Extremely interesting, thanks for posting.
     

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