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by Ernie Badham
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PAGE 4 Once in the town, numbers of residents would line the streets to watch us an the Javanese would stare insolently as we walked past, with an occasional stone thrown into the marchers. However in the case of the Dutch women it was an entirely different reaction. They would always be there with bread and bananas to throw to us. These actions on the part of the women were mostly ignored by our guards but on some occasions would attempt to stop the procedure. I can still remember one particular incident that occurred on one intersection when a Dutch woman there some bread to us and immediately a guard got off his bicycle, picked it up and threw it at her. The pedal caught her face, tearing her cheek open and the force threw her to the ground. At the next intersection though, there she was again, a blood-soaked towel held to her face and still throwing food at us!! This was typical of the Dutch women. Loyal and determined to help us where and when the opportunity arose. We Aussies used to say, that if the women had borne arms on Java instead of the men, the island would have held out for many weeks or months and allowed the allies more time to prepare for the Japanese advance. So life went on for approximately five months in this camp with only one episode to mar a rather dull and monotonous existence. It appears some Dutchmen were managing to scale the wire surrounding the camp and during the night spending an occasional few hours with their wives and family who no doubt lived nearby. We had heard rumours of this practice but passed it off with a shrug and hoped that if it was happening they would not get caught. However it did happen and in this instance, three men were caught. They were immediately put in an area surrounded by wire in the middle of the camp. This was where those that caused any kind of trouble to the Japanese were usually placed for a limited time depending on the severity of the misdemeanor. It was an open area with no cover or amenities of any kind apart form a bucket for toilet purposes. Food and water was provide once a day. These three Dutchmen were installed in this area for approximately one week, when early one morning the whole camp was awakened and told to hasten on parade. Unknown to us a platform had been erected in the parade ground during the night and now we were assembled surrounding the raised area. No sooner than we were on parade and counted off (the Japs counted us regularly and always appeared obsessed with keeping count of our numbers) when these three men were led out of the enclosure and brought up on to the platform. The camp Commandant was there, also another Japanese officer, plus another soldier we identified as a Sergeant-Major. As soon as the Dutchmen were on the dais, the Sergeant-Major ordered them to strip to the waist, then proceeded to tie their hands behind their backs. The Commandant then read out the charge, which was mandatory in all cases of escape. This sentence was to be carried out despite the fact, as we learned later, that the men were caught re-entering the camp after their visit home. The men were made to kneel and in turn were beheaded by the officer who had been standing beside the Commandant. These three men were upright to the time of kneeling and appeared resigned to their fate. Only one man, the last to be executed, spoke, and just before kneeling put one hand in the air and called "Long Live Queen Wilhelmina"! They were not blind folded and each had to watch his predecessor executed. Fortunately I was in a rear rank and once the men were on their knees, only saw the raised sword as it descended. Those in the nearer ranks were horrified and sickened by the display as we were so unused to this barbaric practice. After the execution we were dismissed and by the time the ground was cleared, the Japanese had removed the bodies and dismembered heads and had them taken to pre-dug graves in a remote part of the camp.
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