DROITWICH came together last weekend to mark the 80th anniversary of VJ Day (Victory in Japan).
A service of remembrance was led by Reverand Laura Handy, of The Saltway Team Ministry, in Victoria Square on Saturday morning (August 16). VJ Day is August 15.
Members of the community gathered to pay their respects as dignitaries laid wreaths at the town’s war memorial.
While VE Day (Victory in Europe) marked the end of the war in Europe in May 1945, many thousands of Armed Forces personnel were still engaged in fighting in the Far East.
VJ Day marks the day Japan surrendered, on August 15, 1945, bringing the Second World War to a final close.
Nigel Huddleston MP said the occasion was ‘particularly poignant’ because the service was attended by 100-year-old Burma Star veteran Eric Davis. Mr Huddleston said on social media: “What an incredible man he is.”
Another veteran, 82-year-old Vince Williams, who served in Borneo as an RAF helicopter crewman responsible for transporting British Marines and Gherka’s into and out of the jungle battlefields, was also present.
Thousands of British soldiers were held as Prisoners of War (POWs) in Japan.
The Japanese captors treated the prisoners with disdain and subjected them to harsh treatment, including forced labour, starvation and physical abuse.
Around 30,000 British POWs perished in captivity and the death rate was much higher than those captured and held in Europe.
Because VJ Day happened months after VE Day, those fighting in the Far East were known as the ‘forgotten army’.
