Douglas Hassall shares how he narrowly escaped a death sentence after spending three and a half years as one of Japan’s prisoners of war during World War 2. Douglas accepted early on that escaping would be foolish as any escapees were executed; the camp being located in Vietnam also left the nearest allies 1100 miles away.  The Japanese employed beatings and other instantaneous punishments, something alien to a British soldier like Douglas, their neglectful medical care equally as shocking to him. Despite his horrible treatment Douglas highlights how incredibly lucky he was as the other camps had prisoners sleeping outside with no access to clean water. The few lenient guards allowed them to hold concerts and church services however over time the Japanese replaced them with cruel guards who murdered the prisoners’ pets.    Douglas got his first hint of freedom after a British interpreter secretly told him that allies were closing in, both of them unaware that Japan’s prisoners of war were all destined to die. Prison labour had halted and transportation of prisoners to the execution site had begun when the second atomic bomb fell forcing Japan to free everyone at the very last second.  Unfortunately Douglas’ release was bittersweet due to the plane transporting one of his friends back to England crashing killing everyone on board.   

Bob Sullivan joined the Royal Engineers in 1942 and soon volunteered for the special services as a paratrooper where he was assigned to number 3 parachute squadron Royal Engineers. Bob dropped into Normandy on June 5^th 1944, his squadron destroyed bridges along the river Dives to secure the allied left flank and then retreated to Breville to reinforce 9^th battalion who had taken a gun battery. Bob details life on the front line for an engineer in Normandy, this involved; building fortifications and gun batteries, going on patrol to detect mines, and laying Somerville tracks – whilst also repelling the German counterattack from the trenches. In December 1944, Bob was re-deployed to the Ardennes to identify and lift mines. Innovative glass and carbon fibre mines, combined with the freezing temperatures made this a torturous experience for Bob and his squadron. He left the Ardennes in February and shortly afterwards his squadron was disbanded, Bob transferred to number 1 troop and was sent to the Rhine in March. Upon landing he suffered a severe mortar wound to his leg, thus ending his military involvement in Europe. After a 5 month recovery period back home Bob “returned to the airborne” and was deployed in Palestine for a year. Bob delivers a uniquely extensive recollection of his experience in WW2, but more than anything the former paratrooper wants to highlight the memorable friendships he made during his service.

John volunteered for the RAF just before the start of WW2, but failed the vision test and instead joined the Army. He was assigned to the armoured corps and soon after he volunteered for Special Operations Executive. At the time parachuting was not mentioned and John thinks that if it had been he would not have volunteered! During training he specialised in Signals and learned unarmed combat and parachuting, which he was not too keen on. He was scheduled to parachute into France before D-Day but the mission was aborted at the last minute. Instead they dropped after D-Day, from a Short Stirling bomber. Due to a storm the pilot could not find the drop zone but they parachuted anyway. Three days later they met their French resistance contacts near Dijon. Here they received knowledge of a German troop train passing through. John contacted HQ and the information was passed to the RAF who bombed it. During this time he could see German radio detector vans trying to find their precise location. Later he and the Resistance attacked troops guarding Marshall Petain, the Vichy collaborator, as he tried to get to Switzerland. During this time the British stayed in uniform to avoid execution if captured by the enemy. On his return to Britain he was sent to jungle training school and then parachuted into Burma and during this period he was shelled by ‘friendly fire’. His unit fought the Japanese and they eventually met up with the British 14^th Army.