Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

From the website 230battalion.org.au

Changi Prison and A Force on the Burma Railway

Private

PRIVATE ERNEST JOHN MCGRATH

“Dedicated by his family—from the hands that waved him goodbye to the hearts that still hold him close; from those who waited anxiously at home to those who remember today—in everlasting gratitude for his courage, sacrifice, and the freedom he secured, your bravery binds our family across generations.”

Ernest John McGrath (1917–1944)

Ernest John McGrath was born on 5 December 1917 (in New South Wales) to Ernest Andrew McGrath and his wife Sarah .  His father, Ernest Andrew, worked as a butcher, and young Ernest was raised in the Lismore region.  During the 1930s he entered the meat industry: early records note him working as a sausage casing cleaner and later as a meat worker in Wallangarra (on the NSW–Queensland border).  This was a time of economic hardship in rural Australia – as the Great Depression gave way to recovery and the outbreak of global war – but McGrath’s family kept their roots in northern New South Wales and southern Queensland.  In the last pre‐war electoral rolls he is listed as a Wallangarra meat worker and an associate of the local butchering trade (reflecting the family business).

In mid‐1941, with World War II expanding into the Pacific, Ernest McGrath enlisted in the Australian Army.  He joined the Second Australian Imperial Force on 8 July 1941 at Toowoomba, Queensland (Army number QX18378), giving his locality as Wallangarra .  He was allotted to the 2/26th Battalion, 8th Division – a Queensland/New South Wales unit – and trained with its 27th Brigade at Grovely and Redbank Camps before embarkation.  The 2/26th Battalion sailed for Singapore in late July 1941, arriving in the British colony on 15 August  .  Here the battalion joined other elements of the 8th Division to reinforce Malaya against the threat from Japan.

The Malayan Campaign began in earnest in December 1941.  McGrath’s battalion fought in the jungle withdrawals through southern Malaya during January 1942.  On 28–30 January 1942 the 2/26th helped cover the Allied retreat to Johor; on 30 January it entered Johore Bahru and crossed the causeway into Singapore Island .  When the Japanese assault on Singapore began on 8 February 1942, the 27th Brigade (including 2/26th) defended the northern sector of the island’s perimeter.  Fierce fighting and heavy Japanese artillery and air attacks ensued.  Within days the defenders were overwhelmed.  On 15 February 1942 Lieutenant-General Arthur Percival surrendered Singapore to the Japanese.  McGrath, like nearly every man in the 8th Division, became a prisoner of war that day .  In all, his unit spent “the next three-and-a-half years as prisoners of war” under Japanese control .

After capture, McGrath was interned with thousands of other Allied soldiers at Changi and other camps.  The Japanese began using POWs for forced labour in Singapore and beyond.  Many prisoners of the 2/26th were sent first to build airfields and work parties in Malaysia and then to the notorious Burma–Thailand Railway (“Death Railway”).  Historical studies note that the worst period in a POW’s life was often these transports and labour assignments .  Private McGrath was placed on what Australian POWs called an Allied “A-Force” work party in May 1942, which was bound for Burma’s jungle railway.  Conditions in the camps were brutal: overcrowding, disease and malnutrition claimed thousands of lives.  McGrath managed to survive these years of captivity in Southeast Asia.  (Contemporary accounts stress that POWs endured severe hardship — the Japanese “hellships” were grossly overcrowded and sailed without adequate food or water  — yet McGrath lived through this ordeal.)

By late 1944 the Japanese began moving surviving POWs from the railway back to Japan for medical treatment or further labour.  McGrath was one of the men loaded onto the Rakuyō Maru, a Japanese transport ship, in Singapore.  On the night of 12 September 1944 the convoy carrying these POWs was attacked by U.S. submarines in the South China Sea.  The USS Sealion II fired torpedoes that struck the Rakuyō Maru.  Contemporary records describe how Rakuyō Maru sank with over 1,300 Allied prisoners aboard .  (Its passengers were “all survivors of the Burma–Thailand Railway” who had only recently returned to Singapore .)  McGrath was lost when the ship went down; of the Australians on Rakuyō Maru, over a thousand died.  He “drowned 12/9/1944 when Rakuyō Maru was sunk” by enemy action .  American submarines rescued only about 150 POWs from the water after several days; the rest, including Private McGrath, perished at sea .

Ernest McGrath was 26 years old at the time of his death and had no grave; he is officially commemorated as “died at sea (Rakuyō Maru)” .  His name is inscribed on the Australian War Memorial in Canberra (panel 53 of the Commemorative Area)  and also on the Labuan War Cemetery memorial in Malaysia (Panel 15) for those lost with no known grave.  In his home district, he is remembered on local war memorials – for example in Wallangarra and Lismore – and in newspaper “In Memoriam” notices placed by his family.  A 1948 family notice in The Border Post (Tenterfield) reads: “In memory of our brother QX18378 Pte E. J. McGrath, who lost his life at sea … 14th September 1944.  Always remembered.” (This notice was inserted by his sisters Bess and Dot of Wallangarra.)

McGrath’s story reflects the experience of the Australian 8th Division soldiers in the Far East: fighting a losing defence in Malaya and Singapore, suffering years of brutal captivity, and in his case dying tragically on one of the infamous “hellships”  .  Today he is honored with the many thousands of service personnel on the AWM Roll of Honour as one of those who “gave their tomorrow for our today,” and as one of the sons of Lismore/Wallangarra who paid the ultimate sacrifice in World War II  .

Sources: Official war records and memorial databases, including the Australian War Memorial Roll of Honour   and Virtual War Memorial Australia , and contemporary accounts of the Malayan campaign and the Rakuyō Maru sinking  . These provide the basis for McGrath’s military service dates, unit, POW experience, and death date. The POW Memorial Ballarat database notes his death on Rakuyō Maru . The family notice in The Border Post (Tenterfield) and Anzac Day commemorations in Wallangarra preserve local remembrance of McGrath’s life and sacrifice.

Maps of Ernest McGrath’s Service Journey

Burma–Thailand Railway
Illustrates the route of the “Death Railway” where McGrath endured forced labour from 1942–44. 

Malayan Campaign & Singapore Invasion (Dec 1941–Feb 1942)
Shows Japanese advance down the Malay Peninsula and the sea-borne landings that cut off the 8th Division’s retreat into Singapore. 

Changi Prison Camp Layout, Singapore
Details the various compounds—such as Roberts, Selarang, and Changi Gaol—where Allied POWs, including McGrath, were interned before being sent to work parties. 

Singapore Island (1942–43)
Highlights the northern defensive perimeter around Bukit Timah and the Causeway area where McGrath’s 27th Brigade held out before surrender. 

These images show the Rakuyō Maru itself before her final voyage (top row) and the desperate rescue of POWs by U.S. submarines USS Sealion and others after she went down (bottom row).