Islington tribune - News: Grandson to read extracts from war veteran’s diary on Remembrance Day

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Islington Tribune - by PETER GRUNER
Published: 9 November 2007

Grandson to read extracts from war veteran’s diary on Remembrance Day

A 12-year-old Archway schoolboy will read from his late grandfather’s moving war diary at a special Remembrance Day event set to be attended by old soldiers on Sunday afternoon at Royal Northern Memorial in Manor Gardens, off the Holloway Road.
Galileo West, who is the son of Islington’s Labour opposition leader Councillor Catherine West, and her husband Colin, will recite a piece from his grandfather Jim Sutherland’s writings about life in a Japanese prisoner of war camp in Singapore.
Jim, who was in the Australian army, died in 2003 aged 86.
His son Colin said: “My dad was an ambulance driver who wrote his diary in exercise books concealed in his bedding.
“He was imprisoned for four pretty harrowing years.
“He mentions punishments in the camp and people being beaten.
“But there’s a wonderful excerpt when the prisoners finally see Allied planes go over the camp in February 1942 and realise that the Japanese have lost the war.”
The event, which includes a laying of the Wreath, starts at 2pm.
Islington’s Mayor Barbara Smith will lead Islington’s interfaith service and parade on the day.
In addition to those who died in the conflicts, it is estimated that more than 1,000 Islington civilians were killed during the Blitz bombing campaign between September 1940 and May 1941 which left 43,000 civilians dead across the city as a whole.
Cllr Smith said: “On Remembrance Sunday we remember not only the fallen of the First and Second World Wars but also those who lost their life in more recent conflicts.”
Residents are invited to join the service at Islington Green from 10.40am.
A two-minute silence will be observed at 11am.
The service will be accompanied by a brass quintet from the Guildhall School of Music.
This will be followed by a Service of Remembrance at Spa Green War Memorial, EC1 at 11.30am.
Veterans of the Royal British Legion and HM Armed Forces will attend the occasion.

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