William Ashworth

William Ashworth was a P.O.W. (prisoner of war) and he was posted to Japan. He was one of 700 fit me to build the Death Railway. Before he was picked to build Death Railway, he worked on the docks at a different concentration camp. He, and many others, ponged(stole) small things that could fit into their pockets, from the crates like food, medicine etc.

They got little food (usually a cup of rice, half a pint of tea with no sugar or milk or a weak stew).

Luckily, he survived and came back home but he was very thin because they didn’t feed them well.

To help my class I bought some artefacts and showed them in a class presentation. We used them as primary sources of evidence so that we are able to better understand how World War 2 changed lives.