*** World War II-- Japanese conquest of Singapore evacuation








Japanese Conquest of Singapore: Evacuation (January-February 1942)


Figure 1.--Here British children are evacuating Singapore probanly during early-Februry 1942. Unfortuntely we do not have the press caption. We do not know the name of the ship that they were boarding or if they made it safely through to Australia.

For 2 years Singapore wtched the War unfolding in far away Europe. The Japanese threat escalated as they moved into French Indo-China, especially after the fall of France. The Britisjh in Singapore with the Blitz rahing hardly saw safty in Britain. And the authorities in Singapore did not plan an evacuation to Australia. Rather they went out of their way to assure the population by issuing optimistic pronouncements about Singapore as a bastion of the British Empire--the Gibraltar of the East. Singapore newspapers were heavily censored for any expression of the dnger faced from Japan. Journalists' reports abrpad were also censored. Singapore officials even sent optimistic reports to the British War Cabinet (late-1941). Some individual families evacuated/ Some fathers sent their wices and children hime, but because of the censored press, not very many. Incredibly, official evacuations did not beginuntil well after Pearl Harbor (late-January). Theu continued almost until the Japanese entered the city. Some of the evacuation boats were torpepded by the Japnese. RAAF squadrons had been evacuated before the Japanese invaded the island and the remaining RAN warships were ordered to leave. Naval vessels attempted to protect the merchant vessels carrying civilians from Japanese submarines. Australian Army nurses evacuated on the Empire Star (February 11). They reached Australia safely. The last 65 nurses were ordered aboard the Vyner Brooke which which sailed (February 12). Only 24 of these nurses survived to return to Australia in 1945 after the War. Singapore citizens continued to evacuate the city in the final days. In the finl days they not only faced Japnese submarines, but strafing attcks by Japanese aircraft.







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Created: 3:38 AM 9/26/2014
Last updated: 3:38 AM 9/26/2014