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Back Railroad of Death
Chapters (40)
  1. FOREWORD
  2. RAILROAD OF DEATH
  3. REFERENCE LIST:
  4. Railroad of Death
  5. PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION (1948)
  6. INTRODUCTION
  7. PART ONE: SINGAPORE
  8. CHAPTER 1
  9. CHAPTER 2
  10. CHAPTER 3
  11. CHAPTER 4
  12. CHAPTER 5
  13. PART TWO: RAILROAD OF DEATH
  14. CHAPTER 6
  15. CHAPTER 7
  16. CHAPTER 8
  17. CHAPTER 9
  18. CHAPTER 10
  19. CHAPTER 11
  20. CHAPTER 12
  21. CHAPTER 13
  22. PART THREE: BASE CAMPS AND LIBERATION
  23. CHAPTER 14
  24. CHAPTER 15
  25. CHAPTER 16
  26. CHAPTER 17
  27. CHAPTER 18
  28. CHAPTER 19
  29. CHAPTER 20
  30. APPENDIX ONE:
  31. APPENDIX TWO:
  32. APPENDIX THREE:
  33. APPENDIX FOUR:
  34. APPENDIX FIVE:
  35. APPENDIX SIX:
  36. APPENDIX SEVEN:
  37. APPENDIX EIGHT:
  38. APPENDIX NINE:
  39. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  40. And The Dawn Came Up Like Thunder

Consequently we were all on parade punctually to await the arrival of the Nips; and at about 9.30 they turned up in, on and all over a lorry. After numbering, and drawing our picks and changkuls, we marched out onto the course to receive our tasks, and so the road making began. The process was simple. You merely dug out a ditch on either side of a grass strip to act as malarial drains, and threw the earth out onto the centre. Later on stones and granite chips would be rolled in by steam-rollers and finally tarred. There was only one bridge to make across the reservoirs. And so the work started, and so it went on daily. The hours were 8.30-1 o’clock, and from 3-6 o’clock, or a bit later. The troops worked in shorts and hats, and the dull coolie work went forward under the perpetual sweating sun. Officers and N.C.Os. only supervised, but some N.C.Os., out of very boredom, worked alongside the men.

Now it was not necessary for officers to go out more than one in three days, and there were fatigue parties allowed in camp. Their function was to try and improve the camp. Here, our C.O., an electrical engineer, was the leading figure. He traced all our cables from the old camp to a nearby sub-power station, repaired the whole thing, and by bribing the Nips first with light in their guard room, we soon had electric light and fans functioning in most of our huts.

Next he turned his attention to the water supply, and then we had lavatories that flushed, and a bare minimum of cold showers sufficient for the whole camp soon followed. Scrounging went on, though bounds had been defined, and the camp became slowly more habitable.

At this time pay to the amount of 25c a day was the average; formerly worth about 7d or 8d, it now had the purchasing power of 4d or 5d: the officers and warrant officers all had 40c a day. This was just enough to encourage us to start a canteen, and so that brought us to the kampong. The kampong, a collection of wooden and atap (palm thatch) houses, numbered probably not more than 50 to 100 persons, mostly Malays, though a few Tamils lived with them.