Some Came Home: Pacific War Veterans Tell Their Stories of Survival from the Hell Ships

The POWs thought it could not get any worse when they were ‘liberated’ from their hell ships when allied submarines sank their floating prisons. But they found themselves facing death in another unforgiving environment – the ocean.

This DVD provides firsthand eyewitness accounts from nine survivors over two fascinating hours. Not only did they survive, they kept their sanity and sense of humour.

1. American Air Force Sergeant Cletis Overton recalls the Bataan Death March and surviving the sinking of the hell ship Shinyo Maru, and how his religious faith got him through.
2. Gordon Highlander Alistair Urquhart visits the USS Pampanito sixty-four years later to the day that she torpedoed his prison ship Kachidoki Maru.
3. Australian Navy survivor Lloyd Monroe sank three times – on the Perth, the Rakuyo Maru and the Warrnambool.
4. Ray Cornford survived the Burma Railway and the sinking of the Rakuyo Maru to be rescued by the USS Pampanito.
5. Australian Navy electrician Fred Lasslett rovides an insight into life on board HMAS Perth, surviving its sinking, facing a firing squad, befriending the managing director of the coal mine in Japan where he was a POW, and lots more.
6. Dr Rowley Richards provides intimate details of Australian mateship and caring when men passed away on the infamous Burma Railway. Dr Richards recalls the sinking of the Rakuyo maru, imprisonment in Japan and the differing attitudes of Australians towards ex-POWs.
7. Royal Scot Dennis Morley was taken prisoner in Hong Kong and survived the sinking of the Lisbon Maru. He talks about how having the right mental attitude is crucial to survival. Dennis talks about the attitude of his government towards returning POWs and how he gained closure after the war by visiting the place in Japan where he was imprisoned as a POW.
8. Doug Lush, an Australian officer taken prisoner when Singapore fell and transported to Japan, explains the tribulations of being made responsible for fellow POWs in a large camp in Japan. He provides a personal opinion of the Japanese character, and a comparison between Australian soldiers from World War One and members of the present-day armed forces.
9. Japanese merchant seaman Yoshiaki Yamaji explains the events following the sinking of the Montevideo Maru and his escape following the massacre of many of the Japanese survivors after their lifeboat made landfall in the Philippines.

Running time: 2 hours, 45 minutes