Out of the Depths of Hell

As John McEwan, a young Gunner in the 155th (Lanarkshire Yeomanry) Royal Artillery Regiment sailed down the Clyde in early 1941, he and his colleagues could never have imagined the horrors that lay ahead.

When John and his Regiment landed in Malaya, they were all hugely confident. This evaporated in utter disbelief as the British were totally out-manoeuvered by the Japanese advance culminating in the capture of Singapore. However there was hard fighting, more than generally credited, and John McEwan found himself in the thick of it.

In the event, the author was one of the few to survive the horrors of prolonged captivity and mistreatment. This is his extraordinary story, told with humility and pride, which he dedicates both to those who slaved, suffered and died in brutal conditions of the Kinkasaki copper mine.