The University of Oxford has released a collection of previously unseen letters and diaries from the Second World War to mark the 80th anniversary of VJ Day. The Watson Collection, part of the Their Finest Hour project, documents the experiences of Frank Watson, a Royal Air Force serviceman captured by Japanese forces in 1942, and his wife May.
Frank Watson’s journey began with the fall of Singapore and continued through his time in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp, where he faced forced labor, physical abuse, and starvation. During this period, May wrote almost daily letters to her husband from Orpington, uncertain if he was still alive. While victory in Europe was celebrated at home, Frank remained in captivity until several months later.
The archive contains over 2,600 scanned items. These include diary entries, official documents, handwritten memoirs, photographs, mementos from captivity, and May’s unsent letters.
Dr Matthew Kidd prepared the materials for publication. He said: "The Watson Collection offers an unusually complete picture of wartime life, both overseas and at home. It is incredibly rich, honest, moving, and full of material that will be of interest to anyone interested in the human side of the war."
Andrew Watson, son of Frank and May Watson, funded the digitization project and made it accessible to the public via the Their Finest Hour Online Archive. The collection is available online as of today.