Australian Death march POWs remembered

Kyt · Jun 1, 2008

Death march POWs remembered - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Australian prisoners of war who died in the Sandakan death march during World War II have been remembered in a ceremony in Canberra.

In 1942 and 1943 Japanese forces imprisoned 1,650 Australians at the camp at Sandakan in Borneo.

From there they were forced to march 250 kilometres to Ranau through the jungles of what was then British North Borneo (now part of Malaysia).

Weakened by war and malnourishment, only six soldiers survived.

About 25 people gathered at the Australian War Memorial (AWM) in Canberra this morning to mark 63 years since the last marches.

Maureen Deveraux, whose brother John died in the march, says she is grateful for the people who continue to carry on remembrance services.

"They suffered horrendously for the freedom of this country,and thank goodness they're not going to be forgotten now," she said.

Gwen Jackson's brother Leonard also died in the march.

"I think it's extremely important to have these memorials kept up. People must never forget the suffering that went on during the war," she said.
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Antipodean Andy · Jun 1, 2008

Must get to Sandakan one of these days.

Kyt · Apr 17, 2009

Reaching out for help to flee Borneo's death marches | theage.com.au

AT THE edge of the jungle, amid palm fronds, creepers and grey trunks of towering mengaris trees, 13-year-old Domima Akoi saw pale hands beckoning her.

Domima had crept out at dawn to feed her family's pigs in the tiny village of Paginatan, in Borneo's mountainous north.

It was the 1940s, and the early hours of morning were the only time that the occupying Japanese troops were distracted with their daily assembly, and her father felt it was safe for a girl to venture out alone.

A stone skidded across the ground and landed near Domina's feet, and she realised the waving hands were those of escaped Australian or British prisoners of war, begging for food.

"They were saying hello and then one of them made a gesture of hunger or thirst," Mrs Akoi, now in her late 70s, says through a translator. "I put the food that was for the pigs on a tree trunk and ran home to tell my father."

The men had escaped from one of the notorious Sandakan "death marches" — forced marches through 260 kilometres of jungle from a prisoner-of-war camp in Sandakan to Ranau, in what is now the Malaysian state of Sabah. With the war turning against them, the Japanese decided to move their malnourished captives — clad only in ragged loincloths and weakened by disease — to the west coast to work as labourers. The death toll was staggering.

Between 1943 and 1945, about 1780 Australian and 640 British prisoners, and more than 3600 Indonesian civilian slave labourers, died at the Sandakan camp, on one of three "death marches" or when they got to Ranau.

Of these 2420 Allied prisoners of war, only six Australian escapees survived what is now widely regarded as the single worst atrocity suffered by Australians in the Second World War.

Mrs Akoi is among a handful of Borneo locals still alive who helped the prisoners of war when they escaped from the marches. She and her father, Ahmad, risked their lives helping the five men she found hiding in the forest, leaving them sacks of rice, tapioca and fruit.

"I felt sorry for them and wanted to feed them and take care of them," she said. "I had no sympathy for the Japanese, who treated us cruelly."

For six days she left them food, but on the seventh day it lay uneaten. The men had disappeared to an unknown fate, leaving six gold wedding rings in a small tin for their helpers.

Mrs Akoi still lives in the village where she was born. Sitting on the veranda of her house, a broody hen in a cardboard box at her feet and a bag of home-grown rice stacked behind her, the diminutive grandmother recalls how she gave five of the gold rings to relatives and kept the sixth for herself, often wondering about the fate of its owner.

Her niece, Annie Rangga, explains that Mrs Akoi has left Borneo only once — to visit Australia as a guest of the Government in 2007 to commemorate the notorious death marches.

Her countryman, Saumin Kaingal, was 17 when he helped three escaped Australian soldiers, Keith Botterill, Bill Moxham and Nelson Short, after hearing one of them cough while he was fishing.

His family eventually led the three men to the safety of an Australian commando unit. He too has visited Australia and been thanked by the Government.

Next Saturday, Anzac Day, as in the past two years, the pair will attend a ceremony at a war memorial in the nearby town of Kundasang, on the flanks of the jagged-topped Mount Kinabalu.

Thai-born businessman and caretaker Sevee Charuruks visited the memorial with an Australian friend six years ago and was mortified to find it in disrepair, a dead dog floating in the water of a fountain and human waste smeared on walls.

Mr Charuruks poured his retirement money into its restoration and has planted gardens with roses, eucalypts, orchids and even leeks (for the Welsh), to represent the countries of dead soldiers.

He now walks proudly through the dappled light, pointing out the names of Australian servicemen that are etched in gold lettering on the walls.

"After looking at their pictures for so long, I feel like I almost know them," Mr Charuruks says.
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spidge · Apr 17, 2009

A good story Kyt!

liverpool annie · Apr 17, 2009

I believe one of my POW's died there .... still trying to find out about him !

Thanks for posting Kyt

Antipodean Andy · Apr 19, 2009

Read that story in the paper on the weekend (I tend to buy more papers around ANZAC Day for that reason). I'll scan the article as it includes a lovely photo of Domima Akoi.

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