ERNEST GLOVER

Ernest was born in 1906 at Hemsworth. His father was a coal miner and when Ernest was six he died after being badly injured in a mining accident. Ernest followed his father into the mines when he left Southmoor Road School at the age of fourteen and he worked at South Kirkby Colliery. Following a shot blasting accident in 1936, Ernest decided to join the army. He joined the Royal Engineers, giving a false date of birth as he was too old to enlist.

After his training he was posted to Malaya in 1937 and he joined the garrison of the island fortress of Singapore. When the Japanese attacked Malaya in December 1941 the British were quickly defeated. Singapore was captured and Ernest joined other British prisoners of war in Changi prison.

Later Ernest was transferred to Hakodate prison camp on Japan’s northernmost island, Hokkaido. There the prisoners were forced to work ten and a half hours a day on starvation rations. Sacks of rice were deliberately left out by the guards to tempt and to torment the prisoners. Ernest snatched a handful of rice from a sack and was then beaten by the guards with their rifle butts, kicked and left to die in the snow. After the war the commander of the camp was tried and hanged for his treatment of prisoners such as Ernest.

Ernest died on 3 January 1944, but news of his death did not reach his mother until December 1945, four months after Japan had surrendered. In the meantime she received two postcards saying the Ernest was well and that he hoped to be home soon. As a result, she had her house redecorated and rarely left home, expecting her son to return at any moment.