Unofficial Prisoners of War Medal : Private J T Marsden, 2/20 Battalion

Unofficial Prisoners of War medal. This medal is silver in colour and hangs from a red, green, black and white ribbon. The vertical stripes of red and green on the ribbon flank two thin white stripes which surround a thicker black stripe containing a representation of barbed wire vertically down the centre in white cotton. The green represents the fields of home, the white the fences of the compounds. The face of the medal has the words 'INTERNATIONAL PRISONERS OF WAR' embossed around the circumference. In the centre is a representation of the globe which symbolises the global parameters of the conflict. Superimposed on this is a bird which has been trapped by a length of barbed wire symbolising the loss of freedom. The reverse has the words 'INTREPID AGAINST ALL ADVERSITY' embossed around the circumference and a representation of the sharp points on a length of barbed wire which serve to divide the reverse of the medal into four quadrants.

This medal was purchased by John Talbot Marsden, or his family, in the 1990s. This medal was proposed by the National Ex Prisoner of War Association (Great Britain) and applies to anyone whose country was allied with Britain at the time of their capture, regardless of whether the United Kingdom was involved in the conflict. Private (Pte) John Talbot Marsden of Mount George, New South Wales, a bush worker by trade, enlisted in the AIF on 20 June 1940 and embarked from Sydney on 3 February 1941. He arrived in Singapore with 2/20 Battalion on 18 February 1941. When Singapore fell to the Japanese on 15 February 1942 Marsden was officially listed as 'Missing/Prisoner of War' . He spent the next three and a half years in the Japanese prison camp at Changi and was released on 5 September 1945. He embarked from Singapore aboard Hospital Ship Oranje on 15 September that year and arrived in Sydney on 28 September. That same day he had his left leg, badly wounded by shrapnel, amputated at the thigh. Marsden was discharged on medical grounds on 26 November 1946.