Having worldly possessions stolen is enough to make anybody angry and disillusioned.
To lose a father and all the childhood memories that should have been, is devastating – a lifetime spent wondering what might have been is an unhappy burden to carry.
For 30 years the Australian Government would not release details of the horrors that took place at Sandakan and on the death marches that ended this World War 2 tragedy. They feared that it would be too much for families and friends of the soldiers imprisoned there.
All this time they yearned to know, kept in the dark and grieving.
Jan Welsh and daughter, Louise, have recently returned from Sabah, North Borneo, and the scene of some of the worst atrocities of the war against Japan.
Jan’s father, Lance Corporal Harold Arthur Downey, NX31046, known to her for four short years, was captured at the fall of Singapore, spent a year at Changi, was transferred to Sandakan and died on the seventh day of the death march, 44 miles from Sandakan. That he managed to get that far is hard to imagine.
“He would sit me on his chest so that I could turn the pages of his book as he read in bed,” Jan remembers. “I was sick with scarlet fever, and not allowed to visit him at Bathurst prior to his embarkation on the Queen Mary for Malaya in February, 1941.” When the Japanese surrendered on 15th August 1945, Jan and her mother waited for news and his return.
“I was sure he would bring me a pet monkey, and longed for him to take me swimming,” Jan recalls.
On a cold, wet and bleak afternoon on 27th October, 1945, Jan’s hopes were dashed when she answered a knock at the door. The postman handed her a telegram which read: “It is with deep regret that I have to inform you that NX31046 Lance Corporal Harold Arthur Downey died whilst prisoner of war on 8 Feb 1945 and desire to convey to you the profound sympathy of the Minister for the Army”. Louise knows him from stories only.
Jan’s first journey to gain an understanding of the events was in 1999. Lynette Silver, one of the tour guides and author of Sandakan, A Conspiracy of Silence, had organised a tour for relatives to follow the path of prisoners through Changi to the camp at Sandakan, where they were forced to build an airstrip, using primitive tools and their bare hands. That tour went on by bus along the approximate route of the death march.
On this trip, in August 2008, Lynette again assisted guides to take 19 people on a walk in the footsteps of those who suffered so much.
Some of the track has been replaced by formed roads and palm oil plantations but, over six days, walkers covered just over 100 kilometres along the section from Boto to Ranau, through jungle, river crossings and traversing steep, high mountains.
With temperatures in the high 30s, oppressive humidity, clutching vines and biting insects, well-fed and healthy tourists, fresh from a good night’s sleep, and carrying a small backpack for water and lunch, struggled to complete each section.
Points of significance were noted, with participants reading brief histories of those who died at the place where they fell or were shot.
It beggars belief that men near starvation, suffering malaria and beri-beri, bone-deep ulcers, without proper footwear or bare-footed, and carrying heavy loads of Japanese equipment, could endure
bashings from their guards and complete the 164 miles from Sandakan to Ranau.
Of the first group of 455, 70 died on the way. Only 183 from the less fit second group of 536 made it to Ranau, while the third group of 75 all perished in the first 50 miles.
Amazingly, some of those that made it to Ranau were detailed to carry 20 kilo bags of rice back along the track to Paginatan, 26 miles over rivers and high mountains.
A few managed the trip five times, taking three days to get there and two days to get back.
Most were beaten to death or shot when they fell from exhaustion.
Of the 2,434 imprisoned at Sandakan, 1787 Australians and 641 British, the only survivors were six Australians, who managed to escape.
Louise says the gruelling trek gave an insight to the horrors endured by her grandfather, but only those who experienced the ordeal could know the full extent of their suffering.
Lest we forget.