NSW. Paybook photograph, taken on enlistment, of NX26088 Sergeant Francis O'Brien, 2/3rd Motor ...

NSW. Paybook photograph, taken on enlistment, of NX26088 Sergeant Francis O'Brien, 2/3rd Motor Ambulance Convoy, Australian Army Service Corps. He was one of over 2000 Allied prisoners of war (POW) held in the Sandakan POW camp in north Borneo, having been transferred there from Singapore as a part of B Force. The 1494 POWs that made up B Force, were transported from Changi on 7 July 1942 on board the tramp ship Ubi Maru, arriving in Sandakan Harbour on 18 July 1942. Sergeant O'Brien, aged 34, died as a prisoner of the Japanese on 23 May 1945. He was the son of Thomas John and Cecelia O'Brien, and the husband of Gladys Mary O'Brien, of North Sydney, NSW. He is commemorated on the Labuan Memorial Panel 20. (Photograph copied from AWM232, items 4 and 5. Personal information from the Commonwealth War Graves Commission Database.)