POWs and families mark 70th anniversary of Cowra breakout

Updated

A surviving Japanese prisoner of war (POW) who took part in the infamous Cowra breakout during World War II has returned to New South Wales to mark its 70th anniversary.

Sorry, this video has expired Video: Cowra acknowledges the breakout anniversary (ABC News)

The Cowra site was made up of four POW camps covering more than 30 hectares and holding more than 4,000 prisoners - mainly Japanese, Italian, German Indonesian and Korean.

On August 5, 1944, more than 1,100 Japanese POWs tried to escape from the camp.

A total of 359 made it out and 231 of them were killed in the following days.

Today Japanese and Australian survivors and descendants gathered in Cowra for a memorial service.

Teruo Murakami, a surviving Japanese POW from the Cowra breakout, travelled to NSW with his translator, historian Mami Yamada.

Peter Ward did not know his father was a guard at Cowra until they watched a movie based on the event.

"He said it wasn't accurate, I said, 'How would you know?' And he said 'I was there'."

Among the guests was the Japanese ambassador to Australia, Yoshitaka Akimoto.

Mr Akimoto read a message from Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, passing on his condolences to the families of the hundreds of men who lost their lives.

"We will never let the horrors of last century's history repeat themselves," he read.

Author Thomas Keneally, who recently penned a novel giving a fictional account of life for POWs in Australia, was also in the crowd.

He said many Japanese soldiers felt they had no choice.

"Their only self-exoneration was to charge the wire," Mr Kenealy said.

A deadly manhunt

Armed with knives, baseball bats, and clubs, the prisoners surprised the guards in the early hours of the morning.

A total of 359 POWs escaped in what was the largest prisoner breakout of the war.

During the ensuing manhunt, 231 Japanese POWs were killed along with four Australian soldiers.

At 2am, a ceremonial event was held at the site of the POW camp, and later in the morning wreaths were laid there.

A wreath was also laid at the memorial site for Lieutenant Harry Doncaster, one of the four Australians who died during the breakout, and ceremonies were held at the Australian and Japanese War Cemeteries.

Japanese told 'they can never return alive': POW

Mr Murakami told The World Today the soldiers had no choice but to try and escape.

"The army, they had been told all the time that they never can return alive," he said.

"There were many groups, small groups called Han, each Han had a leader, called Hancho."

Ms Yamada said most Japanese people did not know about the Cowra breakout.

"In Japan, maybe more than 95 per cent of people do not know even the name of this event," she said.

"I have been trying in the last 21 years to let the Japanese people know that it was happening like this."

Topics: world-war-2, history, prisons-and-punishment, cowra-2794, nsw, australia

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