Unsung Heroes

A family had to flee from Singapore just days before this former British colony fell to the invading Japanese Army in WWII.

Eleanor was born in Muar, a small provincial town on the west coast of British Malaya, seemingly safe from the horror of war that rages throughout Europe in 1940.

But her world and that of her family were about to descend into chaos as the fall of Singapore signalled the end of the British Empire and also any chance for a normal childhood.

Although too young to remember the detail, Eleanor grew up listening to the stories of her parents and their accounts of life before and after the Japanese occupation of Malaya and Singapore.

From this, she has woven a narrative of her rich family history and the war that engulfs them. Eleanor and members of her family escaped from Singapore, only to be captured at sea on the SS Mata Hari and interned - first in one of the notorious POW camps in Sumatra and then later, in Singapore's Changi Prison. Meanwhile, some of their menfolk are sent to the infamous Thailand-Burma Death railway to suffer untold misery at the hands of their Japanese captors. Amidst the brutality and horror, there were moments of kindness shown, even by the enemy.

This is the true story of a resilient family torn asunder by war and yet through love, faith and an indominatable human spirit, they refuse to abandon hope in their darkest hour.

Dettagli