N.B. museum marks 80th anniversary of Canadian POWs being liberated during WWII

Nearly 2000 Canadians were taken prisoner on Christmas day 1941... Including 200 from northern New Brunswick.

The New Brunswick Military History Museum is marking the 80th anniversary of Canadian POWs being liberated in Japan during the Second World War.

Nearly 2,000 Canadians were taken prisoner in the Battle of Hong Kong in December 1941, with about 200 men coming from northern New Brunswick.

Joseph “Joe” Charles Frenette of Glen Levit, near Campbellton, was a prisoner of war for three years and eight months.

Frenette’s daughter, Mona Thornton, and his son, Ed Frenette, recently donated their father’s entire collection of letters and journals from his time in captivity to the museum, located at 5th Canadian Division Support Base Gagetown.

There are nearly 100 letters in the collection, sent back and forth between Joseph, his wife Ruth, and daughter.

“They had very strict instructions on what my mom could write to him,” says Thornton. “She would only be allowed to write him 24 words.

“He was allowed to write back on occasion, but they had to be very careful what they said. They couldn’t describe exactly where they were or how conditions were.”

One of the letters, dated May 27, 1943, from Joseph says: “A few words to let you know that I am well. I surely hope that both you and baby are well also. It will soon be Mona’s birthday. How the time flies.”

David Hughes, the museum’s manager, said the letters help to provide more insight into that time.

“We’re getting these items, in many cases, in the nick of time,” says Hughes. “We’ve transcribed handwritten letters into typewritten form so they can be more easily accessed by people.”

The transcribed letters and journal entries will soon appear on the museum’s website and be part of an expanded exhibit on prisoners of war at the museum.

Andy Flanagan, author of “The Endless Battle: The Fall of Hong Kong and Canadians POWs in Imperial Japan,” delivered a presentation at the museum on Thursday. The book tells the story of his father, James Andrew “Ando” Flanagan of Jacquet River, and his time in captivity as a POW.

“Dad used to tell horrible stories and on Christmas Day it was horrible at home because that was the day he was captured,” says Flanagan. “He’d go through his archives and materials, he’d tell a story and he’d cry a bit. But then he’d say something funny and try to get us laughing a bit.

“He tried to lighten it with humour. He always talked about it. It was his revenge, telling what they actually did to him.”

A photo of James Andrew Flanagan at the end of this time in captivity shows him looking emancipated at only 68 pounds.

About 550 Canadians died in the Battle of Hong Kong, either in the initial attack or in captivity.

Those who survived faced starvation, disease, abuse, and forced labour until they were liberated in the wake of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945.

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