Project Synopsis

Cambridge University Library has been awarded a Wellcome Trust Research Resources Award to conserve, digitise and make freely available online the archives of two WWII civilian internment camps on Singapore - Changi and Sime Road.  These form part of the Royal Commonwealth Society's British Association of Malaysia and Singapore archives.  Our two-year grant commences in September 2015 and we plan to launch the records in Cambridge Digital Library in August 2017.

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Few survivors of Japanese internment spoke of their traumatic experience, so the records are of immense interest to the friends and families of those interned in the Far East, as well as to the academic community, and particularly to those studying the effects of malnutrition and tropical diseases.

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In our archives, the internees meticulously documented their captivity - their accommodation, work for the Japanese, their recreation, diet and health, and repatriation at the end of the war.  Nominal Rolls and the files of the Camp Commandant and Quartermaster are complemented by newspapers, written and circulated by the internees, diaries, letters, plays and memoirs

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More details: http://www.lib.cam.ac.uk/collections/departments/royal-commonwealth-society/projects-exhibitions/changi-project

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