British War Medal 1939-45 : Warrant Officer Class II F J A Fisher, 8 Division Australian Army Service Corps

British War Medal 1939-45. Impressed around edge with recipient's details.

NX38187 Warrant Officer Class II Frederick John Anderson Fisher was born in Edinburgh, Scotland on 5 November 1898. He served with the British Army Service Corps during the First World War on the Western Front. After the war he immigrated to Australia with his wife Elizabeth and their children. Before the Second World War Fisher worked for the Main Roads Department at Goulburn, NSW. He enlisted into the second AIF on 7 July 1941. Fisher was a member of 8 Division Mobile Laundry & Forward Decontamination Unit and served in Singapore. On 15 February 1942 Singapore fell to the Japanese. The unit’s commanding officer had earlier been wounded and taken to hospital, so the officer acting in charge of the unit was Lieutenant Kenneth King. He told his men to do what they could for themselves. About half the unit decided not to escape. However King and the rest of his men, including Fisher, decided to try and escape from Singapore by boat. Twenty three men escaped in a small launch and a small skiff, which was attached to the launch. There was a concern that other soldiers would sink the already overcrowded launch and skiff by trying to board, so they drifted out to sea a little before starting the engine away from the docks. After some engine trouble they left Singapore after midnight and made for the open sea and Sumatra. They had a fair amount of food, a little water and about 50 gallons of petrol that they had scrounged from the docks. Failing to find their way to the straits that would lead to Sumatra they anchored close to shore until dawn. The party became lost but eventually landed on an island called Sabu and obtained water, coconuts and a map from a Malay who spoke English, who also gave them directions. On the island of Morro the local chief presented them with a letter from a military officer advising any evaders from Singapore of the location of foodstuffs and other items on a nearby island, and gave general directions to reach Sumatra. After further travelling they came to another village and found a letter from a British major advising evaders to head upstream to Tembilahan in Sumatra and then on to Rengat. At Rengat they had to leave one of their men with a medical officer as he was too ill to continue. They travelled west by motor lorry, then by train, arriving at Padang on 27 February. At some point during his travels, Fisher broke a rib, which was treated by a doctor at Padang. On 2 March the old Dutch steamer SS De-Wiert took the group from Sumatra, which was being evacuated due to the Japanese advance, to Colombo, Ceylon (Sri Lanka). They arrived on 9 March and were sent to 2/12 Australian General Hospital outside the town. There they were issued with fresh towels and soap and had their first shower in weeks. They received pyjamas, singlets and socks from the Australian Comforts Fund and were billeted in a empty ward of the hospital. On Friday 13 March they left for Australia on board the ‘Stirling Castle’, arriving at Port Phillip Bay, Victoria, on 27 March. On 29 March 1942 news reached Fisher's wife and two daughters that he was not a prisoner and was in Australia on his way home. That day he caught a Red Cross train from Melbourne to Sydney. His wife and daughters met him at the Goulburn railway station the following morning and continued on with him to Central Station in Sydney. Fisher served in other army laundry units in Australia until his discharge on 5 April 1944.