This year has been one of the busiest yet for me and the Taiwan POW Camps Memorial Society. As further progress has been made, more opportunities have opened up for learning and sharing the work we are trying to do to remember the POWs.
One such opportunity presented itself in March with an invitation by Keiko Holmes to join a group of FEPOWs she was taking to Japan. Keiko is a Japanese lady who has committed her life to trying to bring reconciliation and peace between former POWs and their oppressors.
I met Keiko and the group from UK in Tokyo on March 22 and the following two weeks are ones I will never forget. There were POWs and family members representing various areas of the Pacific War, and two former Kinkaseki POWs - George Reynolds and Harold Brant, were among the group.
Perhaps the biggest highlight for me was the trip to the former POW camp at Omine. More than 200 Taiwan POWs were sent to Japan in the closing months of the war to work in the coal mines, and many of the Kinkaseki men with whom we have been in contact were in the group who worked there.
The people of Omine made us feel very welcome and a lovely civic reception was held for us. Following this we went out to old camp site for a very meaningful memorial service. Harold - who had been a POW in the camp, laid a wreath along with two of his former camp guards. It was a very emotional time for all.
At a dinner which followed, one of the former guards got up and apologised for the way he had treated the prisoners and then sang the song “It’s A Long Way To Tipperary” - which he had learned by listening to the POWs sing it on their way to work in the mine each day. There certainly was some reconciliation that day!

Old enemies now sing together in friendship!

The next day we went from Omine to Hiroshima where we took a tour of the Peace Memorial and Park. It was sobering to see the horrible destruction wrought by the atomic bomb, but once again we were reminded that if it had not been dropped, many more hundreds of thousands - including the POWs, would have died.
Back in Tokyo we attended a memorial service at the Hodogaya War Cemetery. The FEPOWs laid a wreath at the Cross of Remembrance and following the service we all spent time looking around. George and Harold and I laid some poppy crosses on the graves of former Taiwan POWs, and I also visited the Canadian and Australian sections to lay poppy crosses there. Once again the POWs will not be forgotten!

With John Emmett (l) and Ken Davis in Canada

I made a trip to Canada in April and May, and while there I had the opportunity to meet with two former Kinkaseki POWs - John Emmett, who is an old friend, and also Ken Davis, who we just discovered last year. We spent a lovely day together and had Chinese food!
While in Canada I noticed some ads for some very reasonable airfares to the UK so I decided to take the opportunity and go and visit our UK rep and my good friends Maurice and Barbara Rooney.

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FEPOW friends at Wymondham, Norfolk, UK