Thrale history

Search • Advanced Search • Search Families • Search Site

First Name:   Last Name:   ID:  

THE 15th AMENDED EDITION OF

The Valleys of the Shadow of Death

H ITHERTO the truth of the Sufferings of those Ex-Servicemen who were Prisoners of war in Japanese hands, has been largely hidden from our gaze, and their terrible ordeal is for most of us a matter for nebulous conjecture. Through the courtesy and co-operation of Charles Thrale we are able to exhibit the only pictorial record in the world of this 3½ years of Spiritual and Material laceration set to a story. We offer them, not as an amusement, but as a lesson which, gruesome though it is, must be learned if we are to remain educated. It must be a rare occurrence to be able to tell a story by a series of paintings, but this Catalogue allows you to follow the trail to hell in company with those thousands of our countrymen who were unfortunate enough to be caught up in the Japanese blitzkrieg. One of them willed that the story should not be brushed aside as something "finished with," and used his gift of incredible ingenuity to paint the story. While the survivors of this outrage live, this story never be out of print, for the injuries inflicted on mind and on body will remain until their "Call" comes. When you look at it, and think about these pictures, please remember they are not to be judged by the accepted standards of Art, but are to be judged with your mind occupied with the conditions under which they were painted. By that standard they become "Masters." Charles Thrale is a C. of E. English and a Portrait Painter. He joined the Army in 1940, and when he started painting these pictures was serving in the 1st Bn. Cambridgeshires, attached to Intelligence. He left England for the Far East in October 1941, and eventually landed at Singapore. After a very hectic two weeks the Island fell, and he was taken prisoner by the Japanese. The hell into which he and thousands of his comrades passed is depicted in these sketches, all of which were painted on the spot, and none of which have been touched up in any way since they were painted. Whoever sees these pictures and remains unmoved must be humanly callous. These pictures are not frightening so much as they are inspiring - they should be a stimulant to a world too apt to forget. They were painted under the most frightful conditions and improvised materials. Crushed leaves—crushed pencil lead—Indian Ink—Boiled Rags—Boiled Book Covers—Jungle Roots—Clay—and even his blood was used for tints. The paper used was any scrap that could be begged, bought or bartered, or even stolen from the Japs. It varies from wrapping paper to music score sheets. At times much-needed food was bartered for a scrap of paper—two dinners were given for a very coveted piece of Cartridge paper. These scraps afforded spiritual food the artist insists they kept him alive and sane. Sometimes he managed to borrow a box of schoolboy's paints—these were untold gold, and the flickering spark of life was fed with a paint brush manufactured from his own hair. Thin bamboo was used for handles, and the thin end was taken well up into the hairs this—thin end flexed and allowed the hairs to spring with it, otherwise human hair could not have been used. Surely, no one in the world before has produced pictures of such merit with such inadequate materials. Surely no one had greater incentive to paint. It is said by many of the men who have returned from this imprisonment that it was possible to forecast accurately he death of a seemingly fit man two weeks before it happened—losing all interest in living, meant losing life. There was very little in living, in that Dante's inferno. Charles Thrale had his abiding creative instinct, which kept him alive and continually creative. Those pictures have received much