Charles Samuel HILL

Charles Samuel HILL Update Details

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HILL, Charles Samuel

Service Numbers:	VX63829, VX63829/V11934
Enlisted:	17 March 1941, 2/10 Ordnance Field Park Australian Army Ordinance Corps
Last Rank:	Private
Last Unit:	Australian Army Ordnance Corps
Born:	Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 13 August 1908
Home Town:	Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria
Schooling:	Not yet discovered
Occupation:	Clerk
Died:	Illness whilst a Prisoner of the Japanese, Borneo, 2 June 1945, aged 36 years
Cemetery:	Labuan War Cemetery Labuan Memorial, Labuan, Malaysia
Memorials:	Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour, Ballarat Australian Ex-Prisoners of War Memorial

World War 2 Service

3 Sep 1939:	Involvement Private, VX63829
17 Mar 1941:	Enlisted Australian Army (Post WW2), Private, VX63829/V11934, Australian Army Ordnance Corps, 2/10 Ordnance Field Park Australian Army Ordinance Corps
17 Mar 1941:	Enlisted Australian Military Forces (Army WW2), Private, VX63829

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Biography contributed by Chris Buckley

Charles was the youngest of six children of Frank Hill (born 1864 in Surrey in England) and Elizabeth Alice Stewart (born 1866 at Inglewood in Victoria) Frank - a House Painter - and Elizabeth married in 1885 in Melbourne, Victoria and raised their family there.

Charles was working as a Clerk in Melbourne when he enlisted in March 1941. He served as a Private (Service No:VX63829/V11934) with 2 Ordinance Filed Coy, and was captured by the Japanese in Singapore. He was part of B Force, transferred to Sandakan PoW Camp in North Borneo. He was transported from Changi on board the tramp ship Obi Maru. Japanese Lieutenant Susumi Hoshijima was in charge of the PoW Camp, and charged with constructing an airfield. In April 1943 Lieutenant Susumi told the PoWs 'You will work until your bones rot under the tropical sun of Borneo. You will work for the Emperor. If any of you escape, I will pick out three or four and shoot them. The war will last for one hundred years'. Charles died on 2 June 1945 at Sandakan PoW Camp. Older brother Frank (Private, Service No:V505515) served in New Guines in WWII, and Brother-in-Law John (Jack) Harold Marshall (Service No:1561/1781) served in WWI.

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