These images tell the story of my father, Bernard Charles Hanreck (Charlie).
The 1st image is the Telegram sent by the RA to tell my paternal Grandmother, Kate Hanreck that her youngest son Charlie had been taken prisoner in Java. These documents were never lost , but passed down through our family.
More than two years passed , before she received a message from him, still a POW, smuggled by friendly natives to the British Authorities:
The third image is a note to support Charlie from a captured Officer colleague that Charlie had been forced under duress, to sign an oath swearing complete obedience to the Imperial Japanese Army.
Charlie was born in 1911 in East Ham ( now part of Newham ) . He was a painter & Decorator , doing lots of exhibition and commercial work in London and Essex . His real love was sport , He played amateur football for Leytonstone and Dagenham . He was also a ” News of the World ” amateur snooker champion . He was conscripted in 1941 into the Royal Artillery , trained to drive a lorry pulling a Bofor ant-aircraft gun and to be part of the gun crew . In spring 1942 , his company set sail from Glasgow heading for the war in the desert of North Africa . Meanwhile on another continent , Japan invaded Malaya and Singapore fell .
Charlie’s Group were diverted to Asia and he found himself on Timor with Dutch and Australian Forces . The Japanese attacked and Charlie and his comrades were forced to fight a retreating guerilla war with little food and ammunition against appalling odds . This fighting group became known as Sparrow Force . Eventually they were forced to surrender , and be taken prisoners of war ( FEPOWs – Far Eastern Prisoners of War ) . They were taken to Changi Jail in Singapore on the notorious hell-ships . The conditions were brutal and starvation ensued. Prisoners were selected and taken away to work on the Burma Railway or in Japanese mines.
Charlie was terribly ill with tropical ulcers and was left behind to rot by his Japanese captors . Being separated from his comrades was one of the most terrifying ordeals he ever faced . (They had all built up an unbreakable bond of comradeship through their ordeals such that the RA contingent were officially allowed to wear the famous Australian slouch hat as a mark of their friendship.) However , Charlie did not rot ! He managed to stay alive eating such delights as snake , monkey and goodness knows what else ?
In August 1945 , the Americans dropped two atomic bombs on Japan , who surrendered unconditionally . The FEPOWs were now free but in very poor health . It took months to return to blighty, many ex FEPOWs witnessing further atomic weapons trials on their way home . Charlie survived . He was one of the lucky ones . He seldom spoke about the war but it undoubtedly stayed with him the rest of his life . He met and married Glenys , a Welsh lass and had three children . He never held a grudge against the Japanese Nation ( but he was not best pleased when Emperor Hirohito of Japan was invited to the Investiture of the then Prince Charles ! )
