{"product_id":"at-the-emperors-pleasure-surviving-wartime-captivity-in-the-far-east-9781036109219","title":"At the Emperor's Pleasure: Surviving Wartime Captivity in the Far East","description":"\u003ci\u003eAt the Emperors Pleasure\u003c\/i\u003e follows the young couple Christopher and Topsy Man through the savage battle for Hong Kong and the years of enforced separation, she interned in Stanley Camp, Hong Kong, he as a prisoner of war and forced labourer in Kobe, Japan.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe book is not about Christopher and Topsy Man alone but also of friends and colleagues close to them forced to endure the cruel torture and execution by the Kempeitai.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAmongst those close to them some of Topsy's friends and colleagues were raped and murdered, one was imprisoned within shouting distance of her husband being tortured then executed by the Kempeitai, while another died when their camp was mistakenly bombed by the Allies. Topsy was herself the reluctant witness to ritual executions.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eChristopher lost brother officers and many of the Cockney soldiers under his command in the battle for Hong Kong. Others drowned in the East China Sea, victims of a barbaric but little-known mass war crime, the sinking of the Lisbon Maru. Still others survived the sinking only to succumb to the harsh regime of the POW camp in Japan. Perhaps most tragic of all, four of Christopher's men came through the battle, the Lisbon Maru sinking and cruel imprisonment only to die when the aircraft carrying them to freedom crashed into the sea during a typhoon.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLike many of their generation who suffered at the hands of the Japanese during the second world war, Christopher and Topsy Man rarely spoke of their experience, and when they did, they were guarded in what they chose to share of it, even with those closest to them in their post-war lives.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWith privileged access to personal letters, diaries and records from the wartime years, from memories exchanged with Christopher's and Topsy's contemporaries and from knowledge shared by other historians, the author has written a compelling and moving account of the young couple's lives being torn apart by world events in late 1941.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBinding Type:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Pen \u0026amp; Sword Military\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 03\/31\/2025\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781036109219\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 282","brand":"Richard Graham","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45150653743285,"sku":"9781036109219","price":42.46,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0473\/0804\/6492\/files\/img_745c9d9f-7b7f-4ca1-98f1-9cfd463ec3c4.jpg?v=1741104769","url":"https:\/\/pastforward.org\/products\/at-the-emperors-pleasure-surviving-wartime-captivity-in-the-far-east-9781036109219","provider":"Past Forward","version":"1.0","type":"link"}