Patrick McAnulty was a stoker aboard the cruiser HMS Exeter when it was sunk in the Java Sea on March 1, 1942. After being picked up by a Japanese warship, he spent time in a camp on Celebes island before being shipped to Japan. After a spell in a shipyard in Nagasaki, he was transferred to Fukuoka Camp 26 in June 1945 and worked at the Yoshikuma Coal Mine.