VJ80-2025: Surviving Japanese POWs
Some years ago, THS volunteers used to meet at the Town Hall to index the Tewkesbury Register, a conservative newspaper, which was published between 1858 and 1967.
The following were photographs copied for research and available on the THS Woodard Database.
If these were members of your family, please contact us on presidentths@gmail.com and tell us more about them.
Signaller Joe Wilkins, formerly Employed by Matthews Butcher at the
Cross was missing until July 1942 then officially a POW and in May 1943 held in
Osaka
Sgt. Harry Williams, his wife Edith and young son with first news from January 1944
after he disappeared after Singapore.
When the card had been received by the Echo they had been married 70
years. They then lived in Bolton, Lancs.
Click Image to Expand
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When the First Atom Bomb Fell
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Two RAF POWS, Hedley Bonnes & Edward Ravenscroft of Queens Road, Priors Park, but from Birmingham. Both were flown to the Far East after the Battle of Britain.
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3d. After being overrun by the Japanese, they manged to escape until captured in March 1942 - then "3 years of hell" . [1961]
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3e. Unwelcomed passengers with Japanese soldiers. [1961]
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3f. Suffered dysentery until they arrived in Japan. [1961]
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3g. "a great deal of cruelty" and torture methods described - cheered by attacking Allied bombers. [1961]
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3h. In August 1945 they were unaware of the dropping of the Atom Bomb except they heard the explosion - and they heard the Emperor’s voice surrendering. [1961]
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In 1961 Ravenscroft was hailed as a new Tewkesbury industry – in Green Lane, Newtown
We would like to know more about this remarkable transformation from being a Japanese POW in 1945 to being a captain of industry – please contact presidentths@gmail.com
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