Good Night Jack

After a grandfather died, his family handed us a pile of letters, photographs and cards from a mysterious locked box. The items clearly related to Bob’s brother Jack, someone he could never bring himself to talk about.

We transcribed the letters, scanned them all and reproduced them chronologically.

Their contents allowed us to research and recreate Jack’s tragic tale:-

• How he yearned to hear from his home in Bolton, Lancashire, after being posted to China in 1936 for his five year stint.

• How he ended up in Singapore and how this ‘so-called’ war suddenly turned from phoney to very real when he was captured by the Japanese.

• An ordinary man with an extraordinary story concerning him and his mates Bob and Charlie, their captivity, the Death Railway and Hellfire ships.

• And how it ended under friendly fire by allies, being left to drown by the enemy.

Nothing was heard from Jack following captivity other than from a few pro-forma cards to his mother and father. This poignant silence had to be filled in by us.