Australian prisoners of the Japanese were captured at many locations across South East Asia and the South West Pacific.
Nearly 15 000 were captured in Singapore; over 2700 on Java and the remainder in smaller groups on Ambon, Timor and New Britain. In addition some 300 men who survived the sinking of the HMAS Perth in the Battle of Java Sea in late February 1942 were taken prisoner. So too were women of the Australian Army Nursing Service who were sunk near Sumatra while trying to escape from Singapore in February 1942