Fall / Winter 2002

Volume 5 No 2 Page 8

Fall 2004

HEITO POW MEMORIAL DEDICATED. . . AT LAST!

R.O.C. Military Honour Guard stands by the new Heito POW Memorial located outside the present gate of the former camp

Tuesday November 16, 2004 saw the culmination of more than five years of effort as the Heito POW Memorial was finally dedicated. For the past 3 ½ years the Society has been trying to obtain permission to erect a POW Memorial on the site of this important camp, but had always met with obstacles and delays. This year in October, permission was finally granted.
The 350 lb. memorial stone was transported to the site on the bus carrying this year’s POW guests on their visit to the southern camps. It was “planted” in the garden just outside the main gate of the current army camp with the help of the R.O.C. military.
More than fifty people were present for the ceremony and listened to addresses from Michael Hurst of the POW Society, the Vice Governor of Pingtung County, the local community chairman and the commander of the military base. All honoured the POWs for their sacrifice and promised to care for the memorial in perpetuity. Poems and readings were rendered by three of the former Heito POWs children, and wreaths were laid to honour the men who had suffered and died in this camp. A minute’s silence followed the playing of taps, and then reveille sounded to awaken everyone to a new day of remembrance for the Heito POWs.
We want to thank all those who have had a part in making the Heito POW Memorial possible, especially to Ms. Lisa Huang a local conservation authority manager in Pingtung County. She was a great help in finding the camp initially, and has been instrumental in contacting some of the former camp guards and setting up visits to the camp for POWs and their family members. She also enlisted the aid of local and government officials and the military to help get permission for the memorial to be placed outside the camp entrance. We could have not done it without her.

TPCMS Director Michael Hurst with Lisa Huang

To those who have contributed towards the cost of the memorial we say thank you as well. It is a fitting tribute to the men of Heito and just further helps to ensure that these men are “never forgotten”.

A Father Found . . .

A special story to come out of this year’s Remembrance Week event is that of Moira Webster and Lindsay and Stuart Edwards. All of them had a father who was a POW on Taiwan. Lindsay and Stuart Edwards’ father – Pte. George W. Edwards of the 18th Btn. Recon. Reg’t., came home after the war, but he was a very different man than when he left. Moira’s father – Gnr. Robert Glendinning of the 155th Field Reg’t. R.A., didn’t come home! These POW “children” came to Taiwan this year searching to know more about their fathers and their time as prisoners of the Japanese. They wanted to get to know and understand them more, and hopefully to be drawn closer to them.
Moira’s search for her father began several years ago, and after first making contact with the Taiwan POW Camps Society, she longed to come to see where her father had died and was first buried. At that time the camp he was in when he died had not even been found. Last year the site was confirmed and this year she was determined to come. Her father had been in Kinkaseki, Heito, Taihoku Camp 6 and Oka Camp – where he died, and this year Moira got to visit all of those camps. She was able to see the place where her father was first buried, and later a very meaningful service of remembrance was held at the site of the Oka Camp at which she read a tribute to her father.
Lindsay and Stuart’s father was in Taichu, Heito and Taihoku Camp 6, and they got to visit these sites during their time here and also take part in the various memorial services.
They all told us afterward how grateful they were for the opportunity to be able to come to Taiwan and learn more about their fathers. We are very glad they were able to come too!

Lindsay (l) and Stuart Edwards at the
Heito Memorial

Moira and cousin Malcolm Ross at the Oka Memorial service

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