WWII POW Allan Charles Herd Camp Fukuoka 17 Biography

Born 1917 in Grafton, NSW, Australia
Joined Australian Army on 20 May 1940 at Homebush, NSW (a suburb of Sydney, NSW), Number NX25438
Posted to the 2/6th Field Company, Royal Australian Army Engineers, attached to the 7th Division, 2nd AIF
Embarked from Sydney for the Middle East on the original "Queen Mary" and changed ships in Bombay to the Dutch liner "SS Slamat"
and arrived in Egypt
Transferred with 7th Division to Palestine where the division took part in the successful Palastine-Lebanon-Syria campaign
against the Vichy French.
2/6 Field Company attached to the British army during the defeat of Italian forces in the Sahara Desert prior to the arrival of Rommel
and the German Afrika Korp.
7th Division was withdrawn for return to Australia for defense against the Japanese
"SS Orcades" was separated from it's convoy after stern debate between the Australian Government and Winston Churchill, who want
to send the 7th Division to Malaya and the Australian Govt refused.
"SS Orcades" was carrying around 3,000 Australian troops, mostly support, and landed in Batavia, Java, without their weapons,
which were with the rest of the convoy, which proceeded home to Australia. Parts of "Black Force" were, therefore, poorly armed
and short of ammunition.
2/6 Field Company was attached to "Black Force" commanded by Brigadier Arthur S Blackburn, V.C., commanding officer of the
2/3rd Machine Gun Battalion- "Black Force" comprising of Dutch, Australian, British & American troops and under the overall command
of the Dutch Army.
The Dutch surrendered to the Japanese and the remaining British, Australian & American troops were also ordered to surrender
The 2/6 field Company (and Allan) were rounded up as prisoners of war and incarcerated in an old Dutch military base later known
as "Bicycle Camp" in February 1942.
Note: The 2/6 Field Company did continue to fight through many battles with the 7th Division throughout the remainder of WW II.
Subsequently transferred to Changi, Malaya and finally to the Burma end of the brutal Burma-Thailand Railway work gangs
Allan survived the railway and was again sent through several camps in southeast Asia to the docks in Singapore.
From Singapore to Japan, on the "hell ship" Teia Maru" (ex Aramis), Allan was part of the third group to arrive at Fukuoka #17
Omuta, Kyushu. The group was a mix of Australian, British, and Dutch POWs who arrived on 18 June 1944.
They would be forced into slave labor in the coal mines.
Allan survived the coal mines (somehow) until the wars end when the prisoners were rescued by the American army and
transferred to and American hospital ship "USS Haven". Allan was eventually repatriated to Australia, where he spent some time
in the hospital before release and demobilization.
Allan's Camp 17 prisoner number was 1444 ~ in Japanese "Sen Yon Harku Yon Ju Yon"
Allan married after the war and produced three children (one of whom is deceased). Both he and his wife are still alive.
Allan is 92 and his wife is 89 - tho neither are in the best of health. (as of April 2011)