On 26 August 1939 Fred Woodhead set sail from Southampton to Hong Kong on the Viceroy of India together with a number of other "Crown Agents" who were members of the Hong Kong Police. After the fall of Hong Kong in December 1941 he was imprisoned in Sham Shui Po POW Camp. He was on the Lisbon Maru on 1 October 1942 when it was torpedoed and sunk by US submarine Grouper. Fred survived and was then transferred to Osaka Camp #1, where he remained for the duration of the war. He returned to the UK after his release and married his finacee, Miss Jeannie Smith, 3 weeks lat <Read more ...>
John Hubert Bottomley (Jack) was born in Baildon, West Yorkshire in 1899, the oldest of four children of Fred Bottomley and Elizabeth Tyson. As a young man Jack served in World War I and was gassed as well as receiving serious shrapnel wounds in Flanders. He was awarded the Victory Medal and the British War Medal.
After the Great War he studied engineering at Bradford Technical College (now Bradford University). He passed the Oxbridge exams but the family could not afford to send him to Oxford or Cambridge. <Read more ...>
Andrew Salmon first came to Hong Kong in 1937 as a junior member (trumpeter) of the Royal Artillery. He fought the Japanese and was taken prisoner at Stanley in December 1941. He was in Shamshuipo camp and then was sent to Japan on the ill-fated ‘Lisbon Maru’.<Read more ...>
