Tom Uren speaks here of his mate, Bill Halliday, on the Burma-Thailand railway, and how mateship changed them both.
Transcript
In the sick bay, when he was back in the camp, I would go over to see him. And in the early days when I'd go over to see him and take him something, if I could scrounge something to take to him, he was never really grateful, there was no mateship.
He was always kind of whingeing. But, as the time went on, his hope grew in him and he used to look forward to seeing me and I used to look forward to seeing him.
And I'll never forget, he was so skinny that you could see his backbone through his stomach, lying on that bed. And he had this awful leg. And the stench of the ulcer wards - it's like death itself. ...
But the thing about Bill Halliday, was that even though he was a whinger and a whiner in those early days, in the end, you know, he used to look forward to seeing me and I would look forward - but his eyes, they shone - beautiful eyes. I can just see them.
They shone like beacons in the night. Just, it was so beautiful - you couldn't help but love the guy for it.
Read more about illness and death on the Burma-Thailand railway.