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The Cruiser HMS Exeter and Able Seaman Gwynne Hodge
Anniversary of VJ Day
Anniversary of VJ Day
'Its over! Peace at Last!
'Its over! Peace at Last!
Gwynne Hodge was a good Welsh international gymnast, the longest serving table tennis league player in Swansea and a Welsh weightlifting champion.
He was a prisoner of the Japanese since his ship, HMS Exeter, was sunk on 1st March 1942. In August 1945 he was at the Macassor death camp when he heard of the end of the war. 'There was much speculation as the rumour spread that the war was over. We waited apprehensively as the Dutch Commandant climbed on to the platform and began to speak in Dutch. We listened without comprehending, but as he spoke we began to sense his meaning, confirmed for us by a Dutchman in the ranks who muttered, ''The war is over, The war is over.'' Pandemonium broke loose; tears, shouts, screams, kissing and hand-shaking'.
Gwynne described being in Perth for about six weeks after the war had ended, arriving on HMS Maidstone at Fremantle, the port near Perth, on September 30, 1945, to a rousing welcome from the Western Australian public.
He was amongst 440 officers and ratings of the Royal Navy who had been prisoners of war at Macassar (Celebes) and had been members of crews of the Exeter, Encounter, Electro, Stronghold, Jupiter, Anking and Francol, all of which were lost in action in the Java Sea early in 1942.
He had only been in Perth a few days and was queuing for his pay at a barracks, when he collapsed. He spent the next few weeks in Hollywood Hospital, but Gwynne said 'almost the only time anyone was in bed was at visiting time, as we went over the fence into town, if we were able to do so.'
When they left on the HMS Maidstone, each of them carried an Australian Red Cross hospitality parcel containing some foods they had not seen for the past three and half years.
aman To all those who fought a daily battel to survive
The full story,
Recollections of a Japanese Prisoner of War by Gwynne Hodge
and ... after the Battle of the River Plate I served on HMS Exeter by Christopher Gwynne Hodge
VE DAY & VJ DAY 1945
Victory in Europe Day, generally known as VE Day or V-E Day, was the public holiday celebrated on 8 May 1945, to mark the end of the Second World War in Europe.
Victory over Japan Day, VJ Day or V-J Day, is a name chosen for the day on which Japan surrendered, in effect ending the Second World War, and subsequent anniversaries of that event.
August 15 is the official VJ Day for the UK, while the official U.S. commemoration is September 2.
August 15th, 2015
It is probably the last time that the generation who fought that conflict – in foreign combat and on the Home Front – will be able to assemble in numbers, a final chance for succeeding generations to offer thanks for their labour and sacrifice and the part they played in the triump
Acknowledgment
Text previously published inMUMBLES Memories of the Second World War 1939-1945by Kate Elliott, Carol Powell and John PowellPage updated
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