This lovely close-up is of a POW camp at Pyok Tong North Korea. The not so lovely part is that over
2000 UN prisoners are buried behind the camp.
Many UK prisoners from the Imjim
battles ended up in that camp. Most of the Glosters were marched for 6
weeks to that place, then the officers and NCOs were separated from the
men in case they influenced them.
Comment in email from Ron Cashman who rounded up this photo for our Aussie Album, and about all our other materials as well:
"Went to the funeral of an old 3RAR bod today, he had a damn good roll-up.
Tom Hollis was there, he had been in the same section as the deceased
fellow at the time of his capture. (Tom's)
Anyway we were talking about the POW affair and I told him of the photo I
have just sent you. Bugger me if it isn't the notorious 'camp 5' that he
finished up in, and where so many lads died. You will see that it is on a
body of water, which I assumed was the Yalu river. Tom told me that it was
actually a 'back-water' from a dam on the river, further along from the
camp. He also told me the basket ball court was for the Chinese, though I
expect it may well have been used for their propaganda photos later. I had
one from the Chinese showing the POWs having a 'jolly' game and in nice
clean uniforms."
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