Day, Francis (Frank) Russell James (Private, b.1916 - d.1976)

Accession Number PR03884
Collection type Private Record
Record type Collection
Measurement 5 wallets: 8 cm.
Object type Diary, Poem, Document, Card
Maker Day, Francis (Frank) Russell James
Place made Malaya
Date made 1941-1946
Access Open
Conflict Second World War, 1939-1945
Copying Provisions Copyright restrictions apply. Only personal, non-commercial, research and study use permitted. Permission of copyright holder required for any commercial use and/or reproduction.
Description

Collection relating to the Second World War Service of VX39518 Private Francis Russell James Day, 1st Field Bakery, Singapore, 1941-1946. The collection consists of a diary, an illustrated autograph book, a collection of poems and a number of other documents. Private Day was a baker by trade and became interned at Changi following the fall of Singapore in February 1942.

The diary is in two volumes. The first covers the period January 1941 to September 1943 and has been stored in a hand-made and decorated cloth pouch. Entries begin at Private Day's enlistment and cover topics such as baking bread and seeing films in Singapore, the fall of Singapore, and daily life during his internment. An entry from 9 February 1942 reads "the Japs are shelling very heavy & dive bombing us ... we wait expecting the worst, I really don't think we will get out of it alive". Day describes being wounded by shrapnel, hospitalised and losing his leg to gangrene on 19 February 1942. The second volume of the diary covers the period of September 1943 to September 1945, an includes further detail on daily life while interned, mostly concerning food and rations, news of the war, entertainment, and Day's work in the camp library. Entries at the end briefly document Private Day's journey home to Australia by sea after the close of the war.

The collection also includes a sizeable amount of poems (around fifty), handwritten on small loose sheets, on the subject of war and its futility, love and romance, missing home, and the experience of being a prisoner of war. The autograph book has a cloth cover that has been embroidered with the Australian Commonwealth Military Forces rising sun insignia. Inside it is full of poems, drawings, artworks, jokes and well-wishes. Other documents in the collection are two soldier's pay books, a demobilisation procedure book, a record of service book, a document advising of a grant of war pensions payable to a trustee (dated 1946), and a Christmas card (1st Field Bakery, Malaya 1941) addressed to 'Mumma and Dadda', and signed 'your son-in-law Frank'.