VJ Day 80th Anniversary

Victory over Japan Day Celebrations 1945

This footage is taken from a home movie shot by William Wright of Leicester during the VJ Day Celebrations in Leicester in 1945.

Victory over Japan Day (VJ Day) is the day on which Imperial Japan surrendered in World War II, in effect bringing the war to an end. It took place on 15th August 1945, and 2025 will be the 80th anniversary of this important event.

Footage provided by Media Archive for Central England (MACE).

Leicester and Leicestershire Soldiers in the Far East, 1941-45 

VJ80 Day, 15th August 2025, marked the 80th anniversary of Victory over Japan and the end of World War II. Many from Leicester and Leicestershire served in the Far East campaigns against Japan and its allies.

In 1941, Japan, Germany’s ally, invaded Malaya. The 1st Leicestershire Regiment defended the town of Jitra but were finally forced to retreat across hostile jungle. Many were killed or captured. On 15th February 1942, the British commander in Malaya surrendered to the Japanese. 195 men of the 1st Battalion had died in the fighting, 694 were captured and 76 were evacuated or escaped. 

Many Leicestershire prisoners of war were sent to build the Burma railway and 106 died either through sickness, starvation or execution. When the railway was finished, many prisoners stayed to maintain and repair the line. Others went back to camps in Singapore or Japan, travelling on so-called ‘hell ships’ to work in terrible conditions.

By May 1945 Japanese forces had been driven out of most of Burma. In August 1945, America dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. On 15th August the Emperor of Japan surrendered on what is now commemorated as Victory over Japan or VJ Day.

 

Soldiers’ Stories

There are many powerful stories of Leicester and Leicestershire soldiers from the Far East campaigns. Here is a small selection:

Captain Henry Charles Poulter, Royal Army Service Corps

Captain Poulter was sent to Changi camp in Singapore. He was the Officer in charge of supplies and would try to find extra food to keep people alive. He collapsed just days before Singapore was freed from the Japanese and died on the voyage back to Britain at the age of 37.

One Prisoner wrote: “To officers and men alike in the P.O.W. Camp he was one of those unmentioned, unrecognised men who was indeed a hero.”

Lance Bombardier Walter Winslow, 155th Field Regiment (Lanarkshire Yeomanry) Royal Artillery

Although he lived in Leicester, Walter joined the Lanarkshire Yeomanry. In August 1941 they fought with the 1st Battalion of Leicestershire Regiment at Jitra.

Walter was left behind in the retreat and no one ever heard from him again. The official date of his death is 12 December 1941, but his body was never found. He is listed on the Singapore Memorial along with many others. Walter was aged 22 when he went missing.

Albert James Barnes, 118th Field Regiment, Royal Artillery

As a prisoner of war, Albert worked as a driver for two Japanese Sergeant Majors who called him ‘Baby Soldier’ as he looked so young. When Albert was working on the Burma railway, the same two officers saw him and were shocked at his poor condition. The two sergeants stormed in, assaulted the guards and brought food for Albert and his friends.

Later, Albert was on the Kachidoki Maru ‘Hell Ship’ which was torpedoed by the US submarine Pampanito. He survived and helped rescue several men and a Japanese woman with her baby.

Albert died in Leicester in 2012, aged 91.

Remembering the sacrifice

When surviving prisoners of war from the Japanese camps came home, including 537 men from the Leicestershire Regiment, they were told not to tell anyone how badly they had been treated. People wanted to put the war behind them, and the country did not care to remember.

Former Prisoners of War formed their own self-help groups. As survivors died, their relatives formed Children of the Far East Prisoners of War groups (COFEPOW) to honour the soldiers’ memories and campaign for greater recognition of their experiences. To mark The sacrifices given by Leicester and Leicestershire residents in the Far East, a memorial stone has been laid in Victoria Park. It was funded by a local COFEPOW group.

The wording for the Far East Memorial

 

In Memory Of

The men and women of Leicester and Leicestershire
Who gave their lives fighting in the Far East,
Or who died as Far East prisoners of war.
We also remember those who returned from their
Terrible captivity and who continued to suffer.
‘At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them.’

Leicester’s Chinese Community on VJ Day 1945

Early on the morning of 15^th August 1945, after a week of expectation following the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, BBC Radio finally broadcast the news that Japan had unconditionally surrendered. After nearly six years of fighting, the global Second World War was finally over.

As the morning progressed 10,000 Leicester people gathered in Leicester’s Town Hall Square to give thanks for “Victory Over Japan”, just as they had done three months previously on VE Day. Elsewhere a wave of public celebrations swept across the entire city, with street parties, bonfires and fireworks, and music and dancing in every neighbourhood.  

The news was particularly welcomed by Leicester’s small Chinese community. The Republic of China had been fighting against Japan since the invasion of Manchuria in 1931, and across China since the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937. After the attack on Pearl Harbour in 1941, China formally became one of the “Big Four” joining the United Kingdom, the United States, and the Soviet Union in leading over 50 Allied Nations against the Axis. This came at a terrible cost, for between 1931 and 1945 China suffered somewhere between 15 and 22 million casualties.

The Chinese presence in Leicester dated from at least the First World War (1914-1918), during which a small number of Chinese nationals are known to have set up laundry businesses in Westcotes, Highfields, and Spinney Hills. These Chinese settlers had strong family connections with longer established Chinese communities in London, Liverpool, Sheffield and Leeds. Despite much prejudice a number of these Chinese nationals rented or bought property, married local people, and raised families.

When war with Germany broke out in 1939, several young Anglo-Chinese men born in Leicester were conscripted to serve in the British armed forces. In common with most families across Britain the following years were undoubtedly full of the constant fear that they may never see their loved ones again.  

As hope grew in early August that Japan would soon surrender, however, people from all communities started to prepare for life returning to normal. The Leicester Mercury of 14^th August 1945 reported:

 

LEICESTER CHINESE HAVE CELEBRATION PLANS

THE small Chinese colony in Leicester is planning its own VJ Day celebrations to mark the day which will mean the surrender of the country with which China has at war for over eight years.

Chinese laundries and restaurants in Leicester (numbering about twenty) are expected to take a full week’s holiday when victory over Japan is announced.

Religious services will be held to commemorate the day, and the Chinese are planning to light bonfires and have fireworks.

At Sam’s Chinese Laundry in Highfield-street Leicester, a “Leicester Mercury” reporter was told that altogether there were about 30 or 40 Chinese in Leicester. Several of them have sons in Services - some fighting against Japanese in the Far East

 

The next day, VJ Day 15^th August 1945, the Leicester Evening Mail carried a photograph on its front page of a Leicester Chinese family toasting victory over the Japanese. The paper reported:

 

City’s Chinese Celebrate.

VJ Day Celebrations by a Chinese family - but in an essentially English style - began early this morning at a hand laundry in Narborough-Road Leicester, when Mr Joe Den hung outside his shop a huge Chinese flag that he had not expected to use for many months, and opened several bottles of wine carefully stored for the occasion.

“This is our real V Day. We are all very happy,” Mr Den a native of China, who has still many relatives there, told the Evening Mail.

“In China on a day like this we would have let off as many fireworks as we could have laid hands on, but today we are all into the town to celebrate with the rest of Leicester. This is a treble celebration for us though. Our daughter Yvonne is 19 today, and our son Carl arrived home two nights ago after 3½ years abroad with the Army".

A party for the Chinese community in Leicester was held this afternoon in High-field-Street.

 

Mr Den’s authentic Republic of China flag, red with a white sun on one corner, seems to have been a rarity.

Whilst the City Council had managed to borrow a Chinese flag to hang on the Town Hall alongside flags of all the Allies, Chinese flags were generally in very short supply. Most therefore “made do and mended”, included a Mrs M. Warner of the Women’s Institute who sewed one out of oddments of fabric, including a piece of an old felt hat, and hung this outside her house in College Avenue.

War Memorials - 80th Anniversary Walking Trail

Explore Leicester's War Memorials with this short walking trail that takes you around memorials and Heritage Panels that are related to the First and Second World Wars.

Time: Around 30 minutes

VE Day 80 Leicester War Memorial Walking Trail