Informal outdoor portrait of, left to right: VX38444 Gunner (Gnr) Aubrey Alfred Emmett; VX38445 ...

Informal outdoor portrait of, left to right: VX38444 Gunner (Gnr) Aubrey Alfred Emmett; VX38445 Gnr Lancelot Leslie Gilbert; and VX38433 Gnr Frank Norman Emmett, all of 4 Anti Tank Regiment, and of Ouyen, Vic. Aubrey and Frank Emmett were brothers, and first cousins to Lancelot Gilbert. Frank and Lancelot enlisted on 29 July 1940 and Aubrey on 13 August 1940. Gnr Aubrey Emmett was promoted to Lance Bombardier (L Bdr) in June 1941. On 9 February 1942 Gnr Gilbert was killed in action in Malaya, aged 22. L Bdr Aubrey Emmett and Gnr Frank Emmett were taken prisoner of war (POW) of the Japanese. They went firstly to Changi gaol, then to Burma. Whilst being held at a camp at Tavoy, Burma, L Bdr Aubrey Emmett escaped with 7 other prisoners, all members of 4 Anti Tank Regiment. They were recaptured by the Japanese and executed on 6 June 1942. L Bdr Emmett was aged 23. One of the other seven men executed was VX57043 Gnr Alan William Glover, a friend of the Emmetts who had also lived in Ouyen. Gnr Frank Emmett worked on the Burma Thailand Railway and was later transported to Japan in a work party. At the end of the war he was liberated from a camp in Nakama, Japan. He died in 1953 as a result of his injuries and experiences as a POW.