Hi all, I am a new member to this group and hoping somebody may be able to help me find any information about those held as a POW in camp 4 Thailand. My grandad was held there from April 1942 until his release at the end of the war. I have located the attached questionnaire but it doesn’t give much information Hugh King Signalman Service number 2578158 Any information would be very helpful. thanks
Welcome to the Forum. It would appear that your grandad was attached to 137 Field Regt RA and captured in Malaya on 9 Jan 42. He was held in a camp at Kuala Lumpar and moved to the Thai-Burma Railway on 14 Oct 42. Unfortunately his Japanese Index Card has little information. You should contact the very helpful Thai-Burma Railway Centre who should have details of his camps. TBRC Online: THE THAILAND-BURMA RAILWAY CENTRE Tim
Casualty list reports him as 'Missing Malaya' 7/1/42, he was subsiquently reported as POW. Afraid that my knowledge of POWs is poor so I will leave others to interpret the following 3 items:
The first extract is a change of camps. The second extract is from the Royal Signals Roll maintained by the clandestine POW organisation known as the Bureau of Record and Enquiry (BRE) in Changi and shows he was attached to 135 Field Regt RA and was sent Overland (OVL) from Kuala Lumpar (LPR) on 14 Oct 42 to the Thai-Burma Railway. The last extract is from the master list of POWs and shows dates of capture and liberation and that he was liberated from one of the camps in Thailand (TH). The date of liberation may not be exact as sometimes a general date was used. Tim
Thank you both Tim and Tony. I have sent an email to the Thailand-Burma Railway Centre as recommended. Thanks again for your help.
Hi Tony, if I may ask: where did you find those lists? I have my granddad's index cards (showing he was in several camps/branches, most of which in Thailand), but I have not been able to find him on any list. I thought his service number was 19494, as that is written on his index cards, but when I search for a POW with that number, I find an Australian POW (my granddad was Dutch).
I should probably do so somehwere else, because I believe camp No. 4 isn't one of the camps he was in. But the cards are in Japanese, so I'm not entirely certain
