An amazing story of the escape from Singapore, under the most harrowing conditions of Major Maurice Ashkanasy, a Jew; who was deputy assistant adjutant general of the Australian Imperial forces in Malaya, was reported today by the correspondent of the Evening Standard.
Ashkanasy, leading a party of forty soldiers from the British Brigade, left Singapore harbor in a lifeboat on Sunday, February 15, the day the city fell to the Japanese. With Ashkanasy, who in civilian life is a prominent Melbourne lawyer, at the tiller the men rowed all afternoon in a boat so crammed that the tiller could not be moved without the men first shifting their positions. Carried toward rocks by a heavy current the boat lost its rudder and sprung a leak.
Pumping and bailing the fugitives finally reached a small island where they paused for a short rest before continuing. The next morning after rowing all night they saw land to the westward. By noon they had reached a small native village where they were able to hire a launch to take them to the mainland of Sumatra. From there they were taken to Java by a British warship. All during their voyage there were Japanese aircraft overhead but they were not attacked.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
