By Mario Xuereb
Aussie battler ... Despite the intolerable cruelty Jack Fitzgerald suffered at the hands of the Japanese as a POW in Burma, he has learned to forgive, but never forget.
LONG-TIME Maribyrnong resident Jack Fitzgerald cannot forget the heat, hardship and death of the Thai-Burma Railway.
He recalls how, from the age of 27, he spent more than three-and-ahalf years from 1941 toiling in the sodden jungles of Japanese-controlled Burma.
Practically dead to the world outside, he worked under a veil of fear and utter powerlessness.
Riddled with tropical diseases and starved to the weight of a schoolgirl, Mr Fitzgerald lived knowing death could, and chances would, strike at any second.
He has tried to forget, but like the thousands of Australian servicemen and women that came before and after him, memories of war remain etched on the brain.
But Mr Fitzgerald, believed to be the last remaining World War II prisoner-of-war in Maribyrnong, offers more than gruesome stories of war.
Along with the brutality of his captors, he recalls the camaraderie of Australian captives who never let a mate die alone.
He recalls the joy that swamped the jungle camp when news came of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
He laughs at his first requests after being transferred to a Rangoon hospital: a chicken sandwich, a sip of Fosteršs beer and a nursešs kiss on the cheek.
Last Saturday, friends and family at the Maribyrnong-Maidstone RSL gathered to celebrate Mr Fitzgeraldšs 90th birthday.
Alongside his only daughter Eryn, son-in-law Steven and granddaughters Leah and Sharn, the former POW reflected on a life that, in a flash, transformed him from humble salesman to soldier.
Mr Fitzgerald was working for Myers when he decided to join the army when war broke out.
"We all wanted to fight to help England," Mr Fitzgerald said. "We fought for God, king and country."
After a year of training at Puckapunyal he was shipped to the Middle East where Australian forces helped recapture Syria for the British.
On his voyage back, Mr Fitzgerald was sent to the Indonesian island of Java where Japanese forces had taken over. Despite the arrival of the Australians, Dutch colonial forces in Java capitulated after three weeks and he was taken prisoner.
Sent to Burma through Thailand and present-day Malaysia, he began work on a railroad that would claim more than 100,000 allied lives.
The prisoners worked through the night clearing jungle, building bridges and laying rails.
They worked through the rain and humidity, wearing nothing more than loincloths and their bodies stricken with malaria, beriberi, dysentery and cholera.
"We were beaten constantly, and in one weekend we lost 800 men to cholera," Mr Fitzgerald said. "We lived on morsels of rice, so in the end I weighed five stone."
Mr Fitzgerald freely admits it was the atomic bomb that saved him from death in the jungle. After the Japanese surrendered, the 31-yearold spent weeks recovering in hospital before returning to Australia.
Looking back, Mr Fitzgerald chooses to remember the friendships he forged while imprisoned.
"If therešs anything we can take out of our experiences, itšs that the Australians stuck together the whole way through."
Most significantly, the passing of time has revealed to Mr Fitzgerald the power of forgiveness. "I accept what lifešs given me, and Išm at the stage where nothing worries me. Išve learnt to forgive," Mr Fitzgerald said. "But we never forget the friends we lost."
Š Star Newspaper