By Karen Bong
KUCHING, Sept 11: More than 80 years after her father was captured by Japanese forces on New Year’s Day 1942 and spent more than three years in captivity, Anne Read returned to Kuching to remember his ordeal at the Batu Lintang Prisoner of War (POW) Camp, a chapter of his life he rarely spoke about but carefully recorded in a secret wartime diary.
Read, daughter of British civilian internee Arthur Hugh Peters Humphrey, was among those attending a wreath-laying ceremony at the Sarawak World War II Liberation Monument at Pending Jetty this morning to commemorate the 81st anniversary of Sarawak’s liberation.
For Read, the commemoration was a deeply personal moment to remember her father, who died in 2001, as well as the thousands of men, women and children who endured captivity, deprivation and suffering during the Japanese occupation.
the Sarawak World War II Liberation Monument at Pending Jetty on Sept 11, 2026.
Her father was captured on Labuan Island on Jan 1, 1942, while serving as the British Resident there. He was subsequently held at Brunei Jail and Jesselton before arriving at the Batu Lintang Camp in late August 1942, where he remained until its liberation in September 1945.
During his captivity, Humphreysecretly kept a diary, a dangerous undertaking under the circumstances.
He managed to get the diary out after liberation and later transcribed it during his retirement. A copy of the manuscript is now held at the Imperial War Museum, with the typed document running to about 240 pages.
For Read, the diary is more than a historical record. It provides a rare glimpse into what her father experienced but largely chose not to speak about after the war.
“He couldn’t say too much about what he experienced because he was already taking a huge risk writing the diary in the first place.
“But it is full of a tremendous amount of information and records, because he was a record keeper, being a civil servant really,” she told reporters after the ceremony which was attended by Kuching South City Council (MBKS) Mayor Dato Wee Hong Seng, Deputy Mayor Dato Zaiedi Suhaili, retired Lieutenant General Datuk Stephen Mundaw, retired Leftenant Colonel Dunging Serit, and Sarawak Tourism Federation (STF) president Audrey Wan Ullok.
Among the most sobering passages were his observations of the condition of prisoners of war and the hard labour they were forced to undertake despite their deteriorating health.
“At one point I remember him saying in his diaries that the POWs are fit for either the hospital or the grave, yet they are forced to provide working parties out of the camp and to do hard labour,” Read said.
Yet the diary was not solely a record of suffering. It also contained glimpses of humour and small moments that helped prisoners endure their ordeal.
Read said her father rarely spoke about the war after returning home, apart from occasionally sharing amusing memories.
She believed his silence was perhaps a way of coping with what he and many other survivors had endured.
“They were told when they went back to England not to talk about it all and everything. And maybe the only way was to put a lid on it and not have to revisit or think about everything too much,” she said.
Despite spending almost four years in captivity, Humphrey survived the war, although he was in poor health when he was liberated and was subsequently taken to hospital in Labuan.
Read said he was fortunate to survive when many others did not.
His diary and letters home also captured the moment of liberation, when Australian troops arrived at Batu Lintang.
“They were all like skeletons,” she recalled. “He writes in his diaries describing where these huge Australians on their motorbikes came and liberated us.”
But liberation also brought painful news.
Humphrey learned that some of his friends and former colleagues in Labuan had died during the war, tempering the joy he felt at finally being free.
Read said her father’s letters home reflected the sadness he felt upon learning what had happened to people he knew.
After the war, Humphrey resumed his career in Kuala Lumpur, where Read was born with her two sisters. He returned to Labuan in 1986 but, to her knowledge, never returned to Kuching.
“I think it would have probably been too painful, the memories, really,” she said.
Now, decades after his death, his daughter has returned in his place.
Read first visited Kuching 11 years ago with her younger sister and husband, John. This year’s visit, however, carried an added significance as Sept 10 marked the anniversary of her father’s death.
Humphrey died in 2001, shortly after his 90th birthday.
“He died the day before liberation,” she said.
Yesterday, she visited Batu Lintang Memorial Square and laid a wreath there, marking both the anniversary of her father’s death and what she described as the final day of captivity for those still imprisoned in the camp before liberation the following day.
Read said she felt it was almost fate that brought her back to Kuching for the 81st anniversary.
She had been planning a trip to Singapore, which was postponed earlier this year, and eventually realised the timing would allow her to attend the commemoration.
“I said we have to come to Kuching to be here for such an important date, not only for the camp but for all the people of Kuching, the liberation, the horrors, the deprivation and everything suffered by everybody, men, women, children, babies.
“And to remember those that died and those that lived and they have the memories of what they had gone through as well,” she said.
The Japanese surrender formally ended the occupation of Sarawak on Sept 11, 1945, when Australian Brigadier-General Sir Thomas Eastick, commander of the Kuching Force, accepted the surrender of Japanese Major General Hiyoe Yamamura aboard HMAS Kapunda at Pending Jetty at 2.45pm.
The following day, Australian troops of the 9th Division entered the Batu Lintang Camp and liberated the prisoners and internees.
For Read, however, the significance of that day extends far beyond a date in history.
Through her father’s diary, the experience of a generation who endured captivity has been preserved, offering a personal account of suffering, survival, loss and ultimately, liberation.
And 81 years after the end of the Japanese occupation, his daughter returned to Kuching to remember him, while paying tribute to those who survived and those who never made it home. — DayakDaily
