This paper is a case study as to why nations perceive and present the same information differently and thus understand how cultural bias and the needs of a country affect national perceptions and memories. It uses the case study of Changi as the specific geographical location and a short time scale allows for in depth analysis. The Japanese have been deliberately neglected in this paper, despite also being a main actor at Changi, due to my limited Japanese language skills.
Contents
I will begin with a brief overview of some of the existing literature. I will then cover actual events which took place at Changi during the Second World War, so we have an established timeline to compare media coverage of Changi. We will then compare newspaper reporting from all three nations to understand the origins of the narratives within each nation before finally analysing and comparing modern media coverage to that which was contemporaneous. I will then conclude this presentation.
Existing Literature
Previous war memory research is mainly focused on the Holocaust, individual countries and how generational perceptions or memories present the past. They all fit into one of three categories: the transmission and evolution of memory (such as Halbawchs, Hirsch and Hunt), the relationship between national identity and national memory (such as Rothberg, Harper, Noakes and Melling) and the creation of commemoration sites (such as Muzaini and Yeoh, West and Blackburn), they do not consider the perceptions of these groups to compare why there are different national memories of an event.
Background
Fifty thousand Allied troops were captured at the fall of Singapore and held in Changi Barracks which became the POW headquarters in Singapore.[1]
For many POWs, Changi was just the transit stop on route to working parties around Malaya and further afield.[2] From the fifteen thousand Australian troops entering Changi in February 1942, only two-thousand-five-hundred remained by the middle of 1943 due to relocations for work parties.[3]
The daily food allocation for a prisoner in 1942 had fewer calories than international pre-war scientists had believed a man could survive on.[4] Trade with local people outside the camp allowed a thriving black market.[5] All commodities were sold including food and a prominent medical drug selling ring.[6]
Ailments suffered by POWs included nutritional deficiencies and skin diseases which never healed due to the tropical climate.[7] Diarrhoea and dysentery outbreaks occurred within a fortnight of arrival at Changi, but cases declined once fly-proof latrines had been built.[8] In March 1943 a Malaria outbreak was caused by men returning to Changi from work parties in Thailand.[9]
Whilst British and Australian POWs were held in Changi Barracks, Changi Gaol was used to intern civilians. The exact number of CIs interned Singapore will never be known as “records were often lost, destroyed or simply not kept”.[10]
As with the POWs in the barracks, in Changi gaol there was overcrowding: seven people would share a cell eight feet wide by twelve feet long and contained a toilet.[11] Some overcrowding was alleviated by converting functional areas, such as laundry rooms.[12]
Cells were never locked, and CIs would be accompanied by guards on trips including shopping for extra food and swimming to alleviate skin ailments.[13] Here too a black market flourished, often used by guards themselves to supplement their wages.[14]
There was a period where conditions for CIs significantly declined, known as the Double Tenth Incident.[15] The Japanese wrongly assumed that when six Japanese cargo ships and one Japanese oil tanker were destroyed off the coast of Singapore it had been the work of saboteurs within the gaol and Japanese military police, or Kempeitai, were brought in to investigate and control the camp.[16] Food rations decreased, physical punishments, increased and essentially “the whole camp was punished”.[17] Fifty four men and three women were taken to Outram Road Prison for questioning and torture, those that survived did not return for six months.[18]
Soon after the this ended all internees were moved to the former military barracks at Sime Road to make room for ten thousand military POWs returning from the Burma-Thailand Railway.[19]
For Singaporeans Changi had two significant involvements during the Japanese Occupation. First, locals would smuggle and/or trade food and medicines to POWs and CIs.[20] Second, Singaporean locals were involved in smuggling at local canteens considered a “hot bed for exchanging messages and necessities such as food, medication and even radio parts” to POWs who would pass through on their work parties.[21]
Changi also holds significance for Singaporeans as part of what was known by the Japanese as Dai Kensho (the great inspection) and to Chinese as Sook Ching (cleansing).[22] Over a fortnight, it is estimated fifty thousand people were executed along beaches, including Changi, to rid Singapore of anti-Japanese elements.[23] Victims were tied and loaded onto lorries and transported to remote sites, like Changi beach, to be massacred.[24] To dispose of the bodies mass graves were dug (sometimes by POWs) or the victims were shot along the shoreline to allow the sea to wash away the corpses.[25]
Contemporaneous
Newspaper articles from 1 February 1942 to 1 January 1946 which include reports of Changi will be analysed to see how these events were reported within each nation. This period was chosen to include reporting during the Japanese Occupation and during the liberation of Singapore. The articles were located within the three main national newspaper archives for each country: National Library of Australia’s Trove Archive, British Newspaper Archive, and the National Library of Singapore eNewspapers.
The first reporting of Changi in Australia brought news that British forces had been interned at the “fortress” and confirmation that Australian forces had also been captured followed.[26] Information coming out of Singapore was severely limited due to ongoing war in the region and was biased due to Japanese censorship. Australian press had the primary aim of relaying basic information to the public and then ensuring citizens did not panic hearing this news.
In Britain, most reports that came out during 1942 also focused on the POWs that had been taken. The Daily Record reported an interview that Lieutenant-General Percival had conducted with the Japanese Newspaper Nichi Nichi and included such information as “We have enough food to eat and our daily needs are satisfied, but we should like a little more water”.[27] British Press focused on disseminating basic information about those in Singapore, but it was wise not to panic the population. Finally, with the war in the West also progressing, this loss would not have been focused on.
Singaporean press was directly controlled by the Japanese during the occupation. The first reports in 1942 about Changi reinforced the image of Japanese liberating Singapore from western enemies. Reports started to be produced about British mistreatment of the Japanese during their rule and the Battle for Singapore, including one alleging Japanese men had suffocated whilst being transported by the British due to lack of air from overcrowding and exposure to the sun.[28] Singaporean Press was aiming to rouse the local population into supporting the Japanese.
This trend of using Singaporean press to report British atrocities during the Battle for Singapore continued into 1943. The Syonan Shimbun had a headline “British Atrocity Revelations” which detailed how the British rounded up three hundred men on suspicion they were pro-Japanese and interned them in multiple prisons.[29] The article reported some of these men were kept forty to a cell only built to hold twelve and they were only released on the 13 February 1942, just before Singapore was surrendered.[30]
The Changi area featured within Singaporean press with details about the expansion of Changi market. One example is the article which reported over twenty stalls at the Changi market belonged to Malay stallholders and that more Malays were turning to the trade.[31] This praise encouraged more locals to become self-sufficient. Praising Malays was another way to divide the different cultures within the Singaporean population and to marginalise Chinese citizens who the Japanese believed were supportive of the British.
Australian press in 1943 saw more details of those being held at Changi emerge and that civilians were also held, such as the example on the screen. Again, this report is focused on stating necessary information whilst providing reassurance.
British press in 1943 also had not changed and newspapers featured multiple stories with names of those interned, particularly in local newspapers.[32] Some of these articles published details of captivity revealed to family members in mail received from internees. The Dundee Courier stated Mr Porter’s wife had received a postcard in which he stated he was “safe, fit and in good cheer”.[33] Again, British press is following the same pattern as the Australians.
In 1944, British press focused on reporting that “information received by the Colonial Office and British Red Cross indicates that civilian internees have been transferred from Changi Camp, Singapore Island to a camp in Sime Road, near Singapore”.[34] Once again, British Press is seen to be presenting facts but little else. One theory for this could be the British were more focused on the war in the West as this was closer to home and showed Britain in a more victorious light. It can also be explained by the fact that due to Japanese censorship, not much mail was coming out of Singapore and as the war became more intense between Japan and the US the Japanese were less willing to give any details to the Allies.
Australia’s press, however, managed to get more details due to some prisoners being transported from Changi managing to escape and return home. These details focussed on the Sook Ching massacre and Australian prisoners’ involvement with burying the bodies. According to these reports, Chinese were tied in groups of three along Changi beach and machine gunned, one afternoon one hundred and six Chinese people were buried.[35] Each mass grave usually held about one hundred people.[36] These shock stories allowed the Australian press to sell stories by unveiling the true horrors of what was happening at Changi whilst also allowing the public to stay calm. Whilst this was a horrifically barbaric act, the Japanese were targeting the Chinese.
There nothing of significance reported about Changi within Singaporean press during 1944. There are two plausible reasons for this, the first that the Japanese believed they finally had control and as such the POWs did not need to be presented in such a bad light. The second is similar to the reason the British press reported very little, that as the Japanese position in the war weakened the flow of information became more restricted. This ensured the Japanese kept power by keeping the population uninformed.
1945 Newspapers contained the most reports featuring Changi in all three nations, particularly in September and October, when the Japanese Occupation ended and released prisoners were sent home. In Australia, details about conditions within Changi camp began to emerge for example those imprisoned were “subsisting just above starvation level” and yet made to work a twelve-hour day to build Changi airfield.[37] These reports directly opposed earlier stories that Changi was more than adequate, and food was in great supply.
More reports of atrocities committed against the Chinese also emerged. Sergeant Blain, in the Morning Bulletin, stated the Japanese had killed Chinese women by decapitation for stealing and Australian POWs had to collect the heads and display them on sticks to serve as a warning.[38] These further details have the shock factor that so often accompanies newspaper stories.
Another theme that took over the coverage of Changi in 1945 was the spirit of the prisoners. The Telegraph stated that “the belief that the rest of the AIF would one day return and release us never wavered in the hearts of the men of the Eight Division”.[39] The Daily Mercury remarked on “the cleanliness, orderliness and self-discipline of prisoners, notably the Australians”.[40] Further examples of Australians defying the Japanese and “ingenuity of the Australian soldier under the most unfavourable conditions” including making items such as spring lid tobacco cases and razors from scratch, emerged.[41] This defiance and attitude gives the public a story meaning they can take pride in the actions of their men, even though they had been defeated and captured. This allows the country to feel patriotism and pride over something which could otherwise cause shame.
In a letter to the Sun the lack of coverage of civilians who had been interned was questioned.[42] This shows that Australian authorities and the press themselves were more focused on those that had been captured from the military. This may have been because military members had more experiences of brutality to report (having been sent to work on projects such as the Burma-Thai Railway, which civilians rarely served on).
Reports did emerge of the Double Tenth Incident which detailed how twelve people died due to a Kempeitai investigation to find spies in the gaol.[43] Plus, further claims of mistreatment emerged with the story men had lost up to five stone each during their internment.[44] It seems the press would report on the most shocking stories of internment rather than how it had been in daily life. There were multiple reports of the Double Tenth Incident but few featured stories from the rest of the interment of civilians.
British press in 1945 also had a focus on liberated prisoners and hardships they had endured. Sergeant Crockett stated he saw men forced to stand naked, outside, in the hot sun for up to five days as punishment for minor misdemeanours.[45] The Nottingham Evening Post contained information that “ex-prisoners were so thin that their ribs could be counted 20 yards away” and four or five people would usually share a cell which measured seven feet by twelve feet.[46] Again, this served a similar purpose as the Australian press. To give the British press the horror stories which the public seem to enjoy and give them something to be proud of. Their men may have been interned but they endured a lot and they should be proud of them for not only surviving but also regaining control of Singapore.
This is also seen with the story of how four hundred British women marched ten miles to Changi camp singing “There’ll always be an England” featuring in several publications including the Derby Daily Telegraph.[47] This reflects the rebellious behaviour of Australian POWs. This act once more gives the public a personal link to these stories through shared patriotism.
The Singaporean press in 1945 also focused on hardships that those interned had endured, describing those recently liberated as “moving skeletons” and documenting two hundred and twenty deaths had occurred at Changi and Sime Road camps.[48] At this point Singapore had been retaken by the British so the press switched bias from the Japanese back towards the British. As a result, the Singaporean press was more sympathetic towards British views after the liberation. In the same way as the Japanese had reported the behaviour of the British to justify their own actions, the British were reporting on Japanese crimes to justify and gain support for the upcoming war trials of the Japanese.
Finally, accounts of the Sook Ching massacre were also reported in Singaporean press. The Malaya Tribune featured an account of an escape from a massacre at Changi beach by Wong Peng Yin and The Straits Times reported Chinese bodies being buried after the Japanese murdered them and survivors being sheltered.[49] As the Chinese had been marginalised and persecuted under the Japanese these atrocities were finally being reported fully to the Singaporean public. First-hand accounts and the ability to speak about the ordeal provided a way to show the Japanese no longer had censorship powers and demonstrated support for the Chinese portion of the public.
British and Australian press appears to have had similar motives throughout the Japanese Occupation and immediately after the liberation of Singapore. In 1942 and 1943 the primary aim was to reassure the public about those taken POW, whilst still relaying the facts. In 1944, British press still followed this pattern; however, the Australians manged to gain a ‘scoop’ obtaining information from men who had managed to escape and began to disseminate some of the true horrors that were occurring at Changi. There still was not a huge cause for concern amongst the public as the brutality had been targeted against the Chinese and Australians were merely being tasked with cleaning up the aftermath (as being reported at the time). In contrast, Singaporean press in 1942 and 1943 was used to attempt to turn the Singaporean population against the British justifying the Japanese occupation and internment of Allied forces. As the war turned against the Japanese so too did the flow of information from them regarding the Allies. This retained the illusion of stability, supremacy, and power over the Westerners and prevented any ideas of revolt. In 1945 all press, now every nation was under Allied control, had bias towards the Allies. The main purpose was to show the horrors the men had survived and to portray internees as heroic and patriotic. Thus, what would have been an embarrassing defeat was instead portrayed as a jubilant victory and heroic story of survival. In Singapore this went further as it aimed to unite the population’s support for war trials and influence their opinion into the Japanese guilt. It also portrayed the Japanese occupation as far worse than the British rule to quell any revolts at the British regaining command. Finally, Singaporean coverage of the Sook Ching massacre aimed to reintegrate the Chinese and stop them from feeling persecuted, by bringing legitimacy to their claims of atrocities carried out against them.
Modern
Now that historical perceptions have been analysed we can assess modern-day perceptions and compare them.
Online media has become one of the main ways the public receives news. To get a true picture of modern public perceptions of Changi during the Second World War it is necessary to also look at online news articles. This project has limited online news articles to one organisation per country. Media organisations with both an online and television presence considered the ‘national’ channel of each country was picked. For Australia this was ABC and in Britain this was the BBC. In Singapore, MediaCorp is the most government influenced organisation however this in a conglomerate of individually branded channels and stations. To make a fair and direct comparison between this and the other nations, the brand Channel NewsAsia was selected as this is the most news focused.
The timeframe used for archive searches was 1 January 2000 to the date which searches were conducted on during 2017 (exact access dates are in the footnotes). This broad time frame allows for several political changes in leadership (excluding Singapore where the PAP have been in power since independence) thus attempting to limit any political bias found in the news articles surveyed.
One event reported on in all three nations was the Singaporean government’s decision to demolish parts of Changi Gaol in 2003 for renovation and expansion to make it more suitable for modern day usage. Ultimately this one incident serves as a microcosm for the rest of this section. The main perceptions of Australia and Britain are strongly exhibited within the articles reporting on the demolition. Australia reported that this announcement had caused anger amongst the public who felt the building should be preserved in memory of those that had suffered there, although a minority disagreed feeling the prison was nothing more than “old buildings”.[50] The national feeling was so strong the Australian government even lobbied Singapore for its preservation, though this was ultimately unsuccessful.[51] This shows how strongly the national connection to Changi was felt. Trying to interfere in another nation’s internal affairs demonstrates the Australians were trying to execute a claim over the memories, history, and sentiment of the building rather than the land it was on. This shows Changi is a site of national importance to Australians even though it lies overseas.
In Britain there were also calls for the prison to be preserved however, reports of this focussed on the Australian campaigns as they were more vocal in their lobbying than the British were.[52] This shows that whilst Britain disagreed with the demolishing of Changi prison they did not view it as having the same level of importance. The fact that British press focused mostly on Australian lobbying, and not lobbying themselves, suggests that the British, whilst sympathetic to the Australians, felt that it was less their fight and more of an issue for Australia. This is probably because the Fall of Singapore and internment was the biggest event for Australians during the Second World War whereas in Britain more focus was spent within the European theatre of war. The Second World War in Europe was also considered more of a victory for the British, where they pushed back and quashed the Axis forces. Changi therefore became a place where there were fewer soldiers and those that were there had ultimately surrendered and lost. This was a part of history which was less favourable to the British.
In Singapore most of the reporting focused on trying to understand why Australia was “making such a fuss about it” and there was some resentment felt as to why Australia felt they could throw “their weight around and ask a small country to preserve something few Singaporeans really care about?”.[53] There was a minority who felt that the prison was a place where relatives of those who had been prisoner could “pay their respects and feel a connection to those who have gone”, especially for those that were buried in unmarked graves or at sea, and that it even served as a connection to their past for Singaporeans.[54] The general consensus of the population, and the Singaporean government seemed to be best summed up by Joy Frances in her opinion piece for TODAY: “Why should dead, or almost dead, ex-prisoners take precedence over living, currently incarcerated ones?”.[55] Singapore’s focus has always been on moving forward and replacing old with new to modernise and keep buildings practical. The need for modernisation, practicality and living quality for Singaporeans massively outweighs any form of sentiment for the past. Additionally, Singapore feels this is not particularly relevant to their history as it mainly affected Australian and British nationals. It is therefore not advantageous to Singapore to save the building to please other nationalities’ citizens at the cost of providing substandard facilities to its own.
Overall, the Singaporean government did concede a little and ultimately “the Changi Prison entrance, gate, wall and turrets were gazetted by [NHB] as the Republic’s 72nd National Monument”.[56] This allowed the Singaporean government to preserve some diplomatic relations with Australia (and pacify the few lobbyists at home) whilst also achieving its first goal of improving the prison’s infrastructure. This allowed Singapore to preserve what is ultimately a tourist attraction, to allow those on a pilgrimage to pay their respects.
Tourism and exhibitions surrounding the Second World War at Changi were further mentioned in the press with the Light after Dark tour operated by Duck Tours for the sixtieth anniversary of the end of the second World War.[57] Humphreys remarked that “during the tour, he was “[astonished] to watch [his] guide recount the basic facts of the Sook Ching massacre for the benefit of several young Singaporeans (and their parents) in the group”.[58]
These commemorative events, as well as providing a draw for pilgrimages from other nations also provide a way for the Singaporean government to educate the public. It also allows for reinforcement of the message that Singapore needs to retain its ‘resilience’ and ‘unity’ so it is never dependent, and subsequently let down, by another nation again. This fortifies the need for Singapore to keep moving forward economically and infrastructurally so that it is a strong nation both within Asia and the rest of the World. It also justifies National Service, so the small nation can defend itself in the future.
Whilst reporting on Changi gate becoming a national monument, NHB stated it was “in remembrance of Singapore’s wartime experience and also [served] as a “grim reminder” of when Singapore was surrendered to the Japanese during World War II”.[59] Singaporean press also focused on the significance of the Changi POW camp, referring to it as “the main POW camp in Southeast Asia” putting the idea across that Changi was a form of epicentre for Japanese activities, and therefore atrocities.[60] This reinforces the idea that Singapore needs to be a truly independent nation so that the horrors of history cannot repeat themselves.
This theme also regularly emerged within British press; the fact that the Fall of Singapore had been the “biggest disaster in British history” and it was this that had led to the internment of POWs and civilians at Changi.[61] Again it can be seen that this is closely related to the victorious underdog mentality.
This theme of British disaster featured heavily within Australian press, two articles, for example, quote Winston Churchill as saying Singapore was “the worst disaster and capitulation in British history”.[62] In contrast to the British press, however, this allows the Australians to portray internment and the capture of Singapore as solely Britain’s fault. This centralising of POW stories within Australia’s Second World War history shows this really is considered the core event of the war for Australians. The POW with his fighting spirit shows that Australians want to portray themselves much like the British Bulldog who comes from unfavourable conditions to be victorious. The POW stories perfectly summarise this as they have become part of the public memory where citizens can show their nationalistic pride in these icons who portray the Australian stereotype.
Despite being one milder camps, the consensus of Australian national memory of Changi is that it represents the harsh conditions faced, and overcome, by Australian POWs and the heart of Australia’s Second World War history. It is for this reason that a common theme in both the Australian and British press, as Christina Twomey wrote, is the relation of the experiences of those interned in Changi as part of the overarching story line of the horrors experienced by those sent to work on the Burma-Thai Railway. Peek follows this pattern twice in her article on the seventieth anniversary of the Fall of Singapore stating one soldier “due to his weakened physical state, … avoided being sent to work on the Thai/Burma railway on the pretext he was being sent to a camp for medical treatment”.[63] This once again can be seen to portray the British soldier as coming turning a weakened position into a victory.
Australian press also merges the Burma-Thai railway with most accounts following the structure of Aaron Hall’s and Shae Johnson’s report: “his [Bevan Warland-Browne] unit was captured amid the shambles of the Malayan collapse and they were imprisoned in Changi before being sent to work on the [Burma-Thai] railway”.[64] Providing this pattern within the narratives of POW experiences works to standardise the Australian POW experience. This makes these tales become a national story rather than an individual experience, allowing the Australian public to feel connected and familiar with the narrative even if they did not directly experience it. Those accounts that do not fall into the established pattern of interned at Changi sent to the Burma-Thai Railway where they then experienced brutality on an unimaginable scale, are less reported to the point that they are almost forgotten by the nation because they do not fit within the established narrative.
The ABC Radio National series Australians Under Nippon series demonstrates the horrific conditions experienced by POWs with its detailing of the programmes, and their synopses, on the main webpage for the series. The language used instils and reinforces the idea that POWs experienced significant hardships and brutality during their internment. Words such as “sardonic”, “grim”, “brutality and bleakness”, “slave labour gangs” and “wretched” all work to give the impression of sadistic Japanese soldiers operating hellish internment camps. These words are then juxtaposed with words to describe Australians, for example “Australian vernacular” and “extraordinary courage” to place POWs in a heroic light, using their ‘Aussie spirit’ to survive despite the environment working against them.
Conclude
Overall, when these modern reports of the experiences of those interned at Changi are directly compared to reports from the time we can see that whilst perceptions and memories portrayed have their roots in the reports from 1945, some themes have been almost forgotten.
The press amongst all the nations remains biased towards the Allies. There has been no mention of any of the British atrocities that were reported in the Japanese Occupied Singapore newspapers. Changi’s involvement in the Sook Ching massacre has been significantly marginalised within modern media. Despite their soldiers having to help with the burials in the aftermath of the massacres, the Sook Ching massacre goes against the narrative portrayed that Australians and British experienced the most unimaginable and brutal conditions. If another group, in the same area had worse experiences, this undermines the victorious underdog and fighting spirit images that each nation wishes to present and memorialise. Singapore also reduces the significance of the Sook Ching massacre, focusing instead on hardships experienced by all ethnicities. This has the same effect, to unite the nation, as the other major theme within Singaporean press, that they were let down by other countries during the war. For this reason, the Singaporean public needs to work towards the future to have economic, infrastructure and defence power they can defend themselves and avoid the hardships bestowed upon them by the Japanese. Changi is used as the main symbol for this as it is where their ruling power, and supposed protectors ended up locked away.
Finally, the themes of turning the embarrassing defeat and atrocious conditions experienced by the POWs into a jubilant victory where the Japanese were defeated, and the men survived against the odds portrayed in 1945 can be clearly seen in the press today. The actions of heroic and patriotic POWs are clearly represented as the victorious British underdog and the Australian spirit and humour stereotypes within national perceptions.
[1] A. J. Sweeting, ‘Changi, Bicycle Camp, and Other Main Centres’, in Australia in the War of 1939-1945. Series 1 – Army; Volume IV – The Japanese Thrust, ed. by Lionel Wigmore, 1st edn (Canberra: AWM, 1957), pp. 510–40 (p. 511) <https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/awm-media/collection/RCDIG1070115/document/5519444.PDF>; Matchit, ‘Recently Found Diary of a POW in Singapore – George Brown’, BBC WW2 People’s War, 2005 <http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/stories/19/a3609119.shtml> [accessed 9 August 2017]; R. H. Whitecross, Slaves of the Son of Heaven, 4th edn (London: Corgi Books, 1971), p. 11.
[2] AWM, ‘Changi’, Australian War Memorial <https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/encyclopedia/pow/changi> [accessed 3 September 2017].
[3] AWM, ‘Changi’.
[4] Russell Braddon, The Naked Island, 11th edn (Victoria: Penguin, 1993), p. 234.
[5] Sweeting, p. 517; Whitecross, p. 27.
[6] Braddon, p. 154.
[7] Braddon, p. 234.
[8] Sweeting, p. 528.
[9] Sweeting, p. 528.
[10] AWM, ‘Prisoners of the Japanese: Civilian Internees, Pacific and South-East Asia’, Australian War Memorial <https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/encyclopedia/pow/ww2/civilian_internees> [accessed 3 September 2017].
[11] Heritage Plus, ‘Olga Henderson Interviewed by Jane Hewitt’, 2009; George L. Peet, Within Changi’s Walls: A Record of Civilian Internment (Singapore: Marshall Cavendish Editions, 2011), p. 25.
[12] Heritage Plus; Peet, p. 25.
[13] Heritage Plus; Peet, p. 25; Mary Thomas, In the Shadow of the Rising Sun (Singapore: Marshall Cavendish Editions, 2009), p. 129; Changi Museum Archives, ‘PR (PER) / 0008: “A Diary of Internment in Singapore 1942-1945 by Gladys Tompkins – Reproduction Copy Bound”’ (Singapore), p. 1.
[14] Peet, p. 75.
[15] Heng Wong, ‘Double Tenth Incident’, National Library Board, Singapore: Singapore Infopedia, 2005 <http://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/infopedia/articles/SIP_111_2005-01-06.html> [accessed 26 March 2016].
[16] Philip Towle, ‘The Japanese Army and Prisoners of War’, in Japanese Prisoners of War, ed. by Philip Towle, Margaret Kosuge, and Yoichi Kibata (London/New York: Routledge, 2000), pp. 1–16 (p. 14); Wong.
[17] Peet, p. 90; Mary Thomas, p. 15; Changi Museum Archives, ‘PR (PER) / 0008: “A Diary of Internment in Singapore 1942-1945 by Gladys Tompkins – Reproduction Copy Bound”’, p. 5; Changi Museum Archives, ‘PR (PER) / 0031: “A Typewritten Record Evidence from Arrested Internees on Raid in Changi Camp on 10th October 1943”’ (Singapore), p. 1; Changi Museum Archives, ‘PR (PER) / 0265: , “Hugo Curtoy”s Account of His Internment in Singapore as Printed in the Reyrolle Review’’, p. 8.
[18] Changi Museum Archives, ‘PR (PER) / 0008: “A Diary of Internment in Singapore 1942-1945 by Gladys Tompkins – Reproduction Copy Bound”’, p. 5; Changi Museum Archives, ‘PR (PER) / 0031: “A Typewritten Record Evidence from Arrested Internees on Raid in Changi Camp on 10th October 1943”’, p. 1.
[19] A Mason, ‘A Short History Of Civilian Internment Camps In The Far East’, IWM <http://www.iwm.org.uk/history/a-short-history-of-civilian-internment-camps-in-the-far-east> [accessed 3 September 2017]; Henry Probert, The History of Changi, First (Singapore: Changi University Press, 2006), p. 40.
[20] Geok Boi Lee, The Syonan Years: Singapore Under Japanese Rule 1942-1945, First (Singapore: National Archives of Singapore & Epigram PTE LTD, 2005), p. 134.
[21] Joshua Lee, ‘Becoming Syonan-to: The Brutality of the Japanese Occupation from 1942 to 1945’, Mothership, 2017 <http://mothership.sg/2017/02/becoming-syonan-to-the-brutality-of-the-japanese-occupation-from-1942-to-1945/> [accessed 1 January 2017].
[22] Joshua Lee.
[23] Joshua Lee; Roots, ‘World War II’, National Heritage Board, 2017 <https://roots.sg/learn/stories/world-war-ii/story> [accessed 18 August 2017].
[24] Geok Boi Lee, p. 111.
[25] Geok Boi Lee, p. 114; Joshua Lee.
[26] ‘British Troops Interned in Changi Fortress: Singapore Prisoners’, Canberra Times (Canberra, 18 November 1942), p. 5; ‘Help for Australian Prisoners’, South Eastern Times (Millicent, 27 February 1942), p. 2.
[27] ‘Singapore Prisoners Want More Water’, Daily Record (Glasgow, 21 February 1942), p. 8 <https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/BL/0000728/19420221/112/0008?browse=False>.
[28] ‘British Maltreatment of the Japanese’, Syonan Shimbun (Singapore, 15 December 19642), p. 1.
[29] ‘A VICTIM’, ‘“Fifth Column”: British Atrocity Revelations’, Syonan Shimbun (Singapore, 23 February 1942), p. 2.
[30] ‘A VICTIM’.
[31] ‘More Malais Entering Into Business, Trade’, Syonan Shimbun (Singapore, 16 September 1943), p. 2.
[32] ‘In Changi Camp’, Aberdeen Press and Journal (Singapore, 4 June 1943), p. 4 <https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/BL/0000578/19430528/051/0004?browse=False>; ‘No Title’, Aberdeen Press and Journal (Aberdeen, 8 July 1943), p. 4.
[33] ‘Held By the Japs’, Dundee Courier (Dundee, 12 July 1943), p. 2 <https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/BL/0000564/19430712/014/0002?browse=False>.
[34] ‘Singapore Change’, Daily Record (Glasgow, 30 September 1944), p. 8 <https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/BL/0000728/19440930/110/0008?browse=False>.
[35] ‘Japanese Prison Camp Horrors: Men Starved and Bashed’, Argus (Melbourne, 18 November 1944), p. 10.
[36] ‘Gruesome Job for Australians: Burying Murdered Chinese’, Age (Melbourne, 18 November 1944), p. 3.
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RFHG 