An exhibition to commemorate the end of the Second World war and the return of a number of local men who for years were prisoners of war of the Germans and Japanese takes place at Peterborough Museum on Saturday, November 15.

The Peterborough Military History Group is holding its annual exhibition at the Peterborough Museum and Art Gallery.

There will be many displays covering aspects of military history, plus displays of scale models. Part of the exhibition includes memorabilia and items used in the POW camps by the following men: Tommy Haskayne from Peterborough; James Goodwin from Whittlesey; William Taylor from Wisbech; Stan Randall, Hector Howes and Leslie Suttle from March.

Thomas Garland HASKAYNE

placeholder image — Thomas Garland Haskayne

Thomas was born in September 1910 in Ormskirk in Lancashire and came to Peterborough to take up a posting in the County Surveyors Department with the Soke County Council. When war was declared he joined the Royal Artillery Territorial Army, being directed to attend the Drill Hall in Lincoln Road on the 2nd September 1939.

He married a Peterborough girl, Kathleen Judd in January 1941. She at the time worked in the County Finance Department. Thomas's first posting was to Singapore where he was captured by the Japanese in February 1942.

For 18 months he was posted as missing before eventually being reported as being in a Japanese prisoner of war camp. An account he gave upon returning was that after about six months in captivity he travelled by cattle truck to a camp in Thailand.

On the journey they survived on one bowl of boiled rice a day. He was in the camp in Thailand until January 1943 when he and others were forced on a nine-day march into the jungle after which they ended up in what was called number 5 camp on the French lndo China border. The Japanese soldiers took most of the POW's valuables but he managed to hide his watch.

He was repatriated after the war by being flown from Bangkok to Rangoon and from there sailed to Liverpool on the "Empire Pride" where he was met by his wife and his mother.

He died on the 11th April 1997.

Another man, is Harold Hector HOWES from March. Born in Wakefield Harold spent most of his life in March. He served in the Cambridgeshire Regiment and was captured at Singapore in February 1942. He was held in captivity in Thailand and later at a camp called 7B-(UBE) Okinoyama, Hiroshima.

He died in 1995.

The display is a tribute to the men from the city who fought for their country, then ended up being ill-treated for years in prison camps but who finally came home to their loved ones.