'Thailand - POW Railway. Punishment with 4 gall container 3/4 full of water or stones', 1943 (c)

Watercolour with some pen and ink, by Gunner Jack B Chalker, Royal Artillery.

Chalker later recalled observing such a torture on arrival in Ban Pong Camp in October 1942. 'The tin container was filled with stones or water, when the neck was straightened the jagged edge of the tin lacerated the chest…he was in great distress.'

Jack Chalker was anticipating taking up his scholarship with the Royal College of Art when his call-up papers arrived in 1939. He was captured during the fall of Singapore in 1942 and was first held at Changi before being sent to work on the Burma Railway. This painting shows a punishment for serious offences that was used more often against Chinese and Thai prisoners.