The Forgotten Highlander - Alistair Urquhart [37]
But Freddie was irrepressible and became well known around the camp and well liked by all the men. He had such vitality and could bring energy to any situation. Nobody had a bad word to say about him; he reminded them of life before the camp, of a better world that existed beyond the wire in a different time and place.
Most nights the boys and I went up the grassy hill that dominated Changi to chew the fat. Boredom was a huge problem, not just for the boys but for me too. Invariably it led to depression and we did all we could to fight it. I managed to snaffle a deck of playing cards, which helped pass the time. We played endless games of whist and rummy, while snap seemed to be the boys’ favourite. We chatted about the possibilities of what could happen to us. I would say to them, ‘Look, you’re just young boys. The Nips won’t do anything to you.’ I think the older boys believed me but Freddie would look at me sceptically and keep his concerns to himself.
After enjoying the spectacular sunset we would talk for hours under the moonlight. The Brinds had never been to Scotland and I would tell them all about life in Britain. Freddie would sidle up and grill me about my life. He wanted to know everything, personal, professional and otherwise. He was eager to learn about life and was especially nosy about girls, and Hazel Watson in particular.
One evening hundreds of men milled about our normal spot up the hill. There was to be a concert, a break from the grinding monotony of camp life. As a music lover I was thrilled. The boys were excited too. Somehow, goodness knows how, a piano had been dragged all the way up the hill. It was a brilliant moonlit night and as the musicians arranged themselves total and respectful silence descended on the huge crowd. Had it not been for the sound of the crickets and the tropical breeze, we could have been in the Albert Hall. Then a solo violinist, a professional with the London Philharmonic called Denis East, stepped forward and the plaintive notes of Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto reverberated around the hillside. It was the first music we had heard for months. I sat entranced, and the boys, strangers to classical music, were agog – spellbound by Mendelssohn’s magic. For a few minutes the beauty of the music lifted us out of the camp and reminded us of the greatness of the European civilisation that the Japanese militarists despised. Some men wept. When East finished several stunned seconds passed before rapturous applause and cheering broke out. It was so beautiful.
Eventually the Japanese guards present got bored and left. When they had gone an altar was set up and an interdenominational church service held. It proved a welcome morale booster. Even people like me, not especially religious, found it comforting. It was to be my one and only church service during three and a half years of captivity but it struck a real chord and made me think seriously about Christianity for the first time. When the padre finished his sermon on our mount in Changi prison, thousands of miles from home, hundreds of voices joined in a moving rendition of ‘The Old Rugged Cross’.
The first verse seemed so appropriate to all of us caught up in the fall of Singapore:
On a hill far away stood an old rugged cross,
The emblem of suffering and shame;
And I love that old cross where the dearest and best
For a world of lost sinners was slain.
The Brinds were both devout Roman Catholics. Freddie never talked about his beliefs but the brothers were always missing on Sunday mornings and were friendly with the Roman Catholic padre. The Japanese did not allow church activities yet there were obviously secret masses going on – at considerable risk to all involved. I never enquired because I did not want the boys to think I was spying on them. Freddie always wore a crucifix on a silver chain, which he kept tucked under his shirt. If the guards had discovered it, they would have taken it from him and given him a beating.
During this bleak period when the days dragged on for