⇒ PDF Gratis The Forgotten Highlander My Incredible Story of Survival During the War in the Far East eBook Alistair Urquhart

The Forgotten Highlander My Incredible Story of Survival During the War in the Far East eBook Alistair Urquhart

Download As PDF : The Forgotten Highlander My Incredible Story of Survival During the War in the Far East eBook Alistair Urquhart

The Forgotten Highlander My Incredible Story of Survival During the War in the Far East eBook Alistair Urquhart

This is a book that is not taught in schools. It is certainly not used or read in Japanese schools.
The book tells of the experiences of a Scottish man during WWII. This man appears to be the unluckiest man of the war. Now it certainly could be argued that he at least lived through the war it is hard to say if it was worth it.
Alistair who is the author as well as the subject of the book tells his story of what happened to him in the war.
1. First he was sent to Singapore. The British "plan" to defend Singapore was laughable at best. The British so full of themselves and the arrogance gave little credibility to the Japanese and believed themselves to be so superior than the defense plan was a joke, and most of those in charge, were unfit to be in the military. This has been documented in hundreds of books. So Singapore falls, and any white man especially in a military uniform is rounded up or killed, doesn't matter if they are in the military, are a doctor performing surgery or a man on the street. The "lucky ones" are kept in or near Singapore in prison camps. The unlucky ones- of which the author in one- are loaded like cord wood in train cars and taken to the jungle. The Japanese have decided they need a rail route from the tip of Malaya to Bangkok, and while the British realized the human toll of such an endeavor would be crippling the Japanese now had thousands of slave laborers to make it happen. I won't go into the horrific details of what these men were subjected to, again it is documented here as well as in many other books and scholarly writings, but it is appalling.
After working to build the railroad for a long period of time he is then shipped over to work on the bridge over the river Kwai. The movie depiction of this little endeavor is as accurate as most things Hollywood does, which is to say pure fiction. Here like with the railroad the men are starved, beaten, tortured, and worked until they die. Except a few who like Alistair are near death and shipped off to a camp to "get better"
2. Now that the author is sent in the hold of a ship along with 1000's of other men to be slave labor for anything else the Japanese can dream up. These were known as hell shops and the beatings, torture, and starvation continue. The Japanese though never agreed with, much less adhered to any of the Geneva convention protocols so these ships that are filled with prisoners, are not marked with red crosses and therefore are targets of the U.S. And it's allies. The ship Alistair is on is targeted and sunk. He escapes and spends 5 days drifting in the South China Sea, until he is picked up by a Japanese fishing boat and brought to mainland Japan. Here he is, "made healthy" and sent to work at a prison camp which also supply's slave labor to a coal mine.
It is now 1945.
3. The prison camp is in Nagasaki. One overcast day in August as Alistair is outside he hears a huge explosion and is knocked off his feet by a warm wind. A week later the war is over, and Alistair is driven through what remains of part of Nagasaki and all of the radioactive dust, to a ship to begin his long journey home.
Why the Japanese have never been held accountable, never been forced to recognize and apologize, never been forced to pay for what they did to every country and it military personnel and especially its citizens is an appalling travesty. If you research these acts of barbarism and the blind ambition the Japanese military had for the region not to mention their wish to never surrender, it is impossible to argue that dropping two atomic bombs on them was wrong. The Japanese deserved what they got and got off extremely easy.

Alistair closes the book by detailing the appalling treatment he and so many others received by the British government upon their return home, and what his life was like going forward, especially the permanent damage done to his physical self, and his mental self.
Shockingly he has lived into his 90's.


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The Forgotten Highlander My Incredible Story of Survival During the War in the Far East eBook Alistair Urquhart Reviews

This is the second book I have read about this very brutal episode in WWII. It beggars the mind to read of the level of suffering inflicted on the surviving members of the British Army in Singaphore after the fall to the invading Japanese Army. That anyone survived is a testament to human grit and our capacity to defy inhuman treatment. It reads like an apocalypse story of alien invasion. The only thing missing is humans being served as food.
After being moved to Japan to continue working as slave labor, the author experiences a near miss as Nagasaki is bombed with an atomic weapon. His further adventures on the road back to England are further enlightening. This man deserves your attention to his book.
Good book autobiographical written describes in detail the horrendous living conditions of prisoners in that area with PTSD memories that basically followed him the rest of his life but being one of the quiet Gordon Highlanders who grew up rough and with less tumble than many he left his schoolwork occupation and answered the call of the War as a conscript typical British soldier rather daily going old boy where "they jolly well put me",. Writing style begins like old memories told around a veterans pin then moved to horrendous descriptions of Japanese work camps and how he just managed to survive while over a hun Dr ed thousand others by the tens of thousands of in smaller groups who disappeared into South East Asian forests and mountains,swamps and deserts and were lost forever_,none returning to say it it was war of diseases that killed them. All these years later herein his 90's and despite being still active in his daily life he is still eaten up by the return home where everyone except the British on his return were generous and kind...him they ignored and tricked out of a disability pension he says..what's missing is any other person's input..but then it IS an autobiography....decent but remember 80 year old writers Forget some and embellish detaills..some of this comes from an angry kind that won't lose its anger ..ever.
Alistair Urquhart is to be very highly commended for this historic description of mans inhumanity to man ! This true story is highly descriptive however, I very much doubt that any of us could ever truly understand what these Prisoners of War had to go through some 70+ years ago. I also got a feeling that the author's style of writing was in a modern style and somewhat closer to this present age than the time under examination. This comment is purely made under my perception that the author's style of writing is more akin to the current years than that of the 1940's, which for me, I found very readable.
Often, two witnesses at an event present confusing accounts of the same event. There were a small handful in this book that seemed to conflict with other accounts of what was happening just before the August 9 detonation over Nagasaki, as viewed from the prison camps (including the author's recollection of British fighter planes diving low just before the detonation). Then, events described by this author crossed directly over to another book (John Baxter's "Missing, Believed Killed") - in fact, later describing the Allied food package that splashed Baxter with tomato sauce. Both authors turn out to have been at the same camp, one describing an event unique to the other. So, this book is genuinely, historically enlightening. All the better, because the author was actually a very talented writer. In fact, I would highly recommend both books mentioned here.
This is a book that is not taught in schools. It is certainly not used or read in Japanese schools.
The book tells of the experiences of a Scottish man during WWII. This man appears to be the unluckiest man of the war. Now it certainly could be argued that he at least lived through the war it is hard to say if it was worth it.
Alistair who is the author as well as the subject of the book tells his story of what happened to him in the war.
1. First he was sent to Singapore. The British "plan" to defend Singapore was laughable at best. The British so full of themselves and the arrogance gave little credibility to the Japanese and believed themselves to be so superior than the defense plan was a joke, and most of those in charge, were unfit to be in the military. This has been documented in hundreds of books. So Singapore falls, and any white man especially in a military uniform is rounded up or killed, doesn't matter if they are in the military, are a doctor performing surgery or a man on the street. The "lucky ones" are kept in or near Singapore in prison camps. The unlucky ones- of which the author in one- are loaded like cord wood in train cars and taken to the jungle. The Japanese have decided they need a rail route from the tip of Malaya to Bangkok, and while the British realized the human toll of such an endeavor would be crippling the Japanese now had thousands of slave laborers to make it happen. I won't go into the horrific details of what these men were subjected to, again it is documented here as well as in many other books and scholarly writings, but it is appalling.
After working to build the railroad for a long period of time he is then shipped over to work on the bridge over the river Kwai. The movie depiction of this little endeavor is as accurate as most things Hollywood does, which is to say pure fiction. Here like with the railroad the men are starved, beaten, tortured, and worked until they die. Except a few who like Alistair are near death and shipped off to a camp to "get better"
2. Now that the author is sent in the hold of a ship along with 1000's of other men to be slave labor for anything else the Japanese can dream up. These were known as hell shops and the beatings, torture, and starvation continue. The Japanese though never agreed with, much less adhered to any of the Geneva convention protocols so these ships that are filled with prisoners, are not marked with red crosses and therefore are targets of the U.S. And it's allies. The ship Alistair is on is targeted and sunk. He escapes and spends 5 days drifting in the South China Sea, until he is picked up by a Japanese fishing boat and brought to mainland Japan. Here he is, "made healthy" and sent to work at a prison camp which also supply's slave labor to a coal mine.
It is now 1945.
3. The prison camp is in Nagasaki. One overcast day in August as Alistair is outside he hears a huge explosion and is knocked off his feet by a warm wind. A week later the war is over, and Alistair is driven through what remains of part of Nagasaki and all of the radioactive dust, to a ship to begin his long journey home.
Why the Japanese have never been held accountable, never been forced to recognize and apologize, never been forced to pay for what they did to every country and it military personnel and especially its citizens is an appalling travesty. If you research these acts of barbarism and the blind ambition the Japanese military had for the region not to mention their wish to never surrender, it is impossible to argue that dropping two atomic bombs on them was wrong. The Japanese deserved what they got and got off extremely easy.

Alistair closes the book by detailing the appalling treatment he and so many others received by the British government upon their return home, and what his life was like going forward, especially the permanent damage done to his physical self, and his mental self.
Shockingly he has lived into his 90's.