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00:01It's quite amazing that it still survived all these years.
00:05200 years on from Raffles' landing,
00:09archaeologists are reshaping what we know about Singapore.
00:14From uncovering evidence of ancient Singapura...
00:18It's been here for 700 years,
00:20and so whatever we find in here will be totally new discoveries.
00:24...to unearthing little-known stories of colonial Singapore.
00:29This is a very nice colonial period item.
00:32...and lingering mysteries of World War II.
00:36This was a scene of complete chaos, mayhem, you know, catastrophe.
00:43New artefacts, new theories, new possibilities.
00:47It does rewrite history, not only of Singapore,
00:50but of all of Southeast Asia.
00:53In this episode, a hunt for lost World War II relics.
01:02Oh, my gosh, that's one of the handles.
01:05Archaeologists are looking at the Battle of Singapore
01:08from a different point of view.
01:10The invasion happened, the occupation happened.
01:13What other layers can we add to the historical narrative?
01:16Searching for personal fragments of history missing from the war stories.
01:22These are conflicts that are happening in our own backyard.
01:26Who knows, it might have been this bullet that killed one of them.
01:29In the stuffy confines of the British Command headquarters,
01:47officers come to a decision.
01:49Singapore is lost.
01:59After a week of fighting, they surrender to the Japanese.
02:06It's one of the greatest military defeats in the history of the British Empire.
02:1277 years after the fall of Singapore, archaeologists want to find answers from the battlefields.
02:23The Second World War would have marked the start of the end of the British colony.
02:27Conflicts are the type of events that cause changes to people, to societies and to places.
02:33It actually was a starting point for a chain of events that led to Singapore independence.
02:42Archaeologist Aaron Kao is at a World War II museum at Bukit Chandu.
02:55This entire area was once a deadly battlefield,
02:58where the local Malay regiment held their ground against Japanese soldiers.
03:03The Malay regiment is the first indigenous fighting force raised by the British Army in Malaya.
03:09It was significant that we had an indigenous army raised to fight the Japanese.
03:22A platoon of 42 men, led by Lieutenant Art Nun, is tasked to defend the hill.
03:28They launch an all-out attack, defending a key route that would lead the Japanese to the British military hospital and main ammunition depots.
03:37They are severely outnumbered, but fight to the last man.
03:39They are severely outnumbered, but fight to the last man.
03:56The museum commemorates the men who died in the battle.
03:59But archaeologists want physical evidence to go along with it.
04:03Renovation work is scheduled to begin here soon.
04:04They are only given two weeks to excavate.
04:05Most of the time, development will change the landscape.
04:06And along with it, the loss of archaeological deposits.
04:07The loss of archaeological deposits.
04:08And the loss of archaeological deposits.
04:09And the loss of archaeological deposits.
04:10And the loss of archaeological deposits.
04:11The museum commemorates the men who died in the battle.
04:16But archaeologists want physical evidence to go along with it.
04:21Renovation work is scheduled to begin here soon.
04:25They are only given two weeks to excavate.
04:30Most of the time, development will change the landscape.
04:32And along with it, the loss of archaeological deposits.
04:36Once we lose these sites, there's no turning back.
04:39You know, the archaeological information will be lost forever.
04:42Most battle artefacts are made of metal.
04:49The most common artefacts that you can find at a battlefield site
04:52is definitely things like bullets and cartridges.
04:55Anything that is, you know, going to do with the clashing of two armies.
05:00To locate them, Aaron is using a specific tool.
05:04So when I sense an object, I have to double-check it.
05:07Let's say if I get a ping here, right?
05:09So I have to go across just to pinpoint a location like X marks the spot.
05:20This is the first time archaeologists are breaking ground at Bukit Chandu.
05:26But they aren't exactly hauling in the artefacts.
05:30Probably a nail, but it's highly corroded, really out of shape.
05:34Definitely not a cartridge.
05:39Ah, just a nail.
05:41OK, we'll move on to the next one.
05:47I think it's another nail.
05:49Just keep getting nails.
05:51This is tedious work, and it's not always fruitful.
05:55But the team believes it is crucial to understanding Singapore's micro-history.
05:59These sites are important to be documented because if we look at historical records,
06:05we don't get the perspective of the individual soldier in the field.
06:10Archaeology is able to zoom in on the human experience,
06:13the emotional aspect of the soldiers being in the battle.
06:16These are intangible aspects that are also crucial in telling the story.
06:20Arun is not the only archaeologist at Bukit Chandu.
06:27Other members of the team are spread out across the compound.
06:32This is actually a construction debris rather than a soldier's belonging.
06:38With a limited amount of time, no one can say for sure if they can find the war artefacts they are after.
06:50This is part and parcel of the process of archaeology.
06:54I mean, not always we find out the types of artefacts that we want to find,
06:58but it doesn't mean that we're not going to find battlefield artefacts in other areas.
07:04These misadventures here and there, I think it helps to let us, as archaeologists,
07:08appreciate what we are actually excavating.
07:14Bukit Chandu is not the only World War II location the archaeologists are investigating.
07:24Oh, yes.
07:30Two girls first.
07:41Oh, it's really humid in here.
07:46It's quite flooded, isn't it?
07:51Oh, it's more than a meter.
07:53It's quite deep.
07:54Yeah.
07:56Let's go up, let's get the waders and then we can try and wade through this.
08:04Archaeologist Lim Chan-Sien has been studying existing World War II structures.
08:10Together with volunteer Aung Ching Hui, they are at the largest war ruin in Singapore,
08:16the Johor Battery.
08:17We are at one of the biggest gun positions ever built during the Second World War in Singapore and throughout the British Empire.
08:25The British set out to build a strong defence for Singapore and installed military fortifications around the island,
08:32including five of these 15-inch guns that protected it from a sea invasion.
08:39This reinforced Singapore's reputation as an impregnable fortress.
08:45If I would go back in time and I was standing by it, I mean, you'll be in awe of these things.
08:50It's massive.
08:51It's huge, right?
08:52It's several hundred tons and it's like, you'll be impressed.
08:54Journalists came to witness the prowess of these guns, generating a lot of hype in the press.
09:01If any enemy ships got within 30 miles of Singapore, a good many would be blown out of the water.
09:19This long-range destruction would be done by big guns mounted at strategic points on the island.
09:29Each a self-contained unit with underground control rooms and ammunition stores.
09:48Shells nearly a ton in weight come up to the guns on automatic lifts.
09:54This would be done with a minimum of fuss.
10:13And maximum of efficiency.
10:18Singapore's defences are ready for anything, day and night.
10:24It's not flooded all the way inside.
10:36Yeah, okay.
10:39A lot of historians would look at it from a very macro perspective, a very big perspective.
10:43The invasion happened, the occupation happened.
10:46Archaeology can look into this little micro level of how life was like within that single site.
10:52It will be a challenge to navigate the flooded complex, but Chen Xian is raring to go.
10:58I'd like to find a little bit more about the site and perhaps I'll be able to interpret how the soldiers' lives were like in the past.
11:04I got my weightless on because we don't know how deep the thing is.
11:08So let's see, keep our fingers crossed.
11:10This is the first time Chen Xian has been given access to the underground complex.
11:22The complex is three stories deep.
11:36A maze of tunnels connects the gun to its ammunition stores.
11:52It was almost like having a jigsaw puzzle.
12:06You don't know how many pieces you're missing.
12:08You don't know how many pieces you have.
12:10So we're really trying to figure things out in the dark.
12:14Guided by old blueprints, they venture deeper.
12:22There's some writing on top.
12:25Men are forbidden to write in this ammunition hoist.
12:29So this is the lift.
12:31The hoist will bring out the ammunition.
12:33There's all sorts of things here.
12:35Oh my gosh, this is one of the handles.
12:37Oh, look at that.
12:39Still around.
12:40Yeah, yeah, yeah.
12:42It's amazing that after 85 years or so this structure is still in place.
12:47Ah.
12:48I didn't really know you.
12:49I didn't really know you.
12:50I didn't really know you.
12:51I didn't really know you.
12:52Yeah.
12:53I'm optimistic, so you really hope that maybe you left something I can see.
12:57But it's flooded.
12:58I can't really see anything on the ground.
13:00And also by just having a look at it, you realise that a lot of things have been stripped away.
13:05The flooded tunnels make it difficult for them to go any further.
13:10So they plan on exploring another ruin nearby.
13:13So the air fear is over there, and that's us right here.
13:21Abandoned World War II structures can still be found in this vicinity, hidden from public view.
13:28So I think over here, where Chang Nhi Ho is, we might have something right there.
13:34It might be great to look around this entire area.
13:37And I suspect there's still a lot of things buried just beneath our feet.
13:42But of course there's still a lot of things buried in the degrees.
13:46Across Singapore, archaeologists are investigating the remnants of World War II.
13:53Archaeologist Lim Chern-xian is interested in remaining World War II structures.
14:00OK, this is... There we are.
14:03It's only facing the sea.
14:05Following an old map, Chen Xian and volunteer
14:10Ng Ching Hui have found an abandoned structure, hidden within a golf course.
14:15I think archaeology in Singapore, it's real fun in the sense that it's not so much as
14:19archaeologists discovering new things, but it's really about us rediscovering things
14:24that we have forgotten.
14:25Up here?
14:26Yep.
14:27OK.
14:28This is a good sign.
14:35Blue is good.
14:39Chen Xian believes this is an old World War II structure.
14:44So, archaeology does not limit itself to just that you need to dig for something.
14:48There's also a lot of above-ground archaeology.
14:51It's also about a survey of looking at how a site was used in the past.
14:59So, is there any scientific reason to paint it blue?
15:02If it's this observation pose and you're looking out towards the sea, right, and the sky,
15:07the sea is blue, the sky is blue, so you need something to match with the sky,
15:11so at least your eyes get accustomed to it.
15:14Most of the structure has been stripped away,
15:17so they can't be sure what it was used for.
15:21It's quite small, smaller than I anticipated.
15:24I was hoping to find at least some pedestals and things where they mount the rangefinder,
15:29telescope, but they don't have it here.
15:32So, there are no marks.
15:34Oh, there's something that's been removed here.
15:37Aha, there we go.
15:40Table on machine.
15:41Yep, the mount is there.
15:43Very nice square.
15:44There we go.
15:45So, the plotting table is here.
15:47It's quite exciting in the sense that there's still all these little hidden gems around in Singapore.
15:51Chen Xian thinks these mounts would have supported equipment that were used to look out for enemy ships,
15:56making this a possible World War II observation post.
16:01If we are here, let's say, in 1942, right, on E for the Battle of Singapore,
16:05there won't be any vegetation in front of us.
16:08You can see up for kilometres out into the sea.
16:11And if we're using this table here to plot,
16:14those information will be relayed back to the gun batteries to fire onto the target.
16:18But the Japanese don't invade from the sea.
16:35Instead, they come overland through Malaya.
16:38Two of the naval guns are turned around to attack the invading troops on land.
16:47Their shells make enormous holes in the ground, but do little real damage.
17:06The impregnable fortress failed to live up to its name.
17:12The British became a victim of its own propaganda.
17:15But unfortunately, due to various reasons, maybe also inadequate equipment,
17:21it didn't happen as what they had planned.
17:23They were just outplayed.
17:24When the Japanese landed on the island, the Battle of Singapore lasted just seven days.
17:36Amateur archaeologist Martin Fryer has a personal connection to the Asia-Pacific War.
17:41His relatives fought in a battle near MacRitchie Reservoir.
17:47Martin lives in Australia, but visits Singapore often in search of a link to his family's past.
17:55This is a photograph of my grandfather, Private Walter White, who was in the area of MacRitchie during the hostilities, along with his first cousin, Sergeant William Bill White of Sea Company, who were instrumental in the defence of this hill.
18:11My mother never knew her father. She said that your grandfather was a prisoner of the Japanese and they starved him to death. That was all that she really knew.
18:22And so I wanted to learn as much as I possibly could to understand what he experienced and what happened to him.
18:30The MacRitchie Reservoir Park is today a popular spot for nature lovers.
18:37But it was once a strategic position for British forces.
18:41An important water source for almost one million troops and refugees at that time.
18:46MacRitchie Reservoir was actually the last water supply to Singapore City, so it was totally critical that British forces held this position.
18:53If you cut the water supply to a city, it's going to fall to its knees within days.
19:04This hill is where British and Japanese soldiers fought and died.
19:13One of Martin's starting points is the diary of his relative, Sergeant William White, who describes the fighting at MacRitchie.
19:20The hand grenades come over thicker now. How it missed me, God only knows.
19:35God only knows.
19:46They come, bullets flying. Grenades exploding. Machine guns rattling chaos.
19:55We're battling chaos.
19:57Come on!
20:22Our casualties are heavy.
20:25They are on top of us now.
20:31It is us, or them.
20:49Martin hopes to find artifacts that can add to the account.
20:53Well, archaeology tells the story.
20:56It's the footprint in the ground.
20:58It just tells you the bigger perspective on the whole story.
21:04People think I'm mad.
21:05People think, well, why do you go out to Singapore and dig around in the dirt?
21:09Well, it's because I'm driven and I love it.
21:11And I love learning more and I love finding the evidence in the ground
21:15and supporting the events that actually took place.
21:17And I use this pointer probe to actually get in the hole
21:22and actually identify where the object is,
21:26which is picking up the strongest signal right here.
21:30And hopefully we'll pull up something interesting.
21:34So straight away, there is something down here.
21:39And lo and behold, it's a comb.
21:49Metal detecting is something where you have to be very patient
21:52because you're not going to find something every time you go out.
22:05Here it is.
22:07Another broken key.
22:08Doesn't appear to be a wartime key.
22:10Problem that I have on this hill is that the public come and picnic.
22:15We do find a lot of 21st century rubbish that's just been dumped.
22:20It just gets in the way and makes the job so much harder.
22:23Hopefully, when we get into the dense jungle areas,
22:26that's where it'll be more interesting
22:28because people haven't been in there so frequently
22:30and whatever we might find is likely to be World War II.
22:33Hmm, that's interesting.
22:43On appearance, this resembles a coin
22:46and the inscriptions that we can see so far
22:48is it appears definitely to be a King George period Indian coin.
22:52So this coin could have been dropped during the fighting.
22:55It's only got the possibilities of being owned
22:58by one of the soldiers on the hill.
23:00But Martin wants to find battle remains,
23:03solid evidence that will tie this hill to the events he's read about.
23:07What I do on Hill 105, I find extremely challenging
23:12and I love to be challenged.
23:19Then what Martin has been looking for turns up.
23:23You absolute little beauty.
23:30That is a round.
23:31It appears to be a Japanese round.
23:34I can only imagine that these boys are on this hill
23:55That is a round.
23:57It appears to be a Japanese round.
24:00I can only imagine that these boys who were on this hill,
24:04because they were boys, these boys would have been terrified.
24:06They were up against the formidable Japanese Imperial Guards
24:11who were ruthless, they were highly trained.
24:14I mean, this is quite emotional because so many boys on this hill were killed.
24:20Who knows, it might have been this bullet that killed one of them.
24:25These finds, buried over time and forgotten,
24:30provide Martin with the physical evidence he is looking for.
24:35Without those finds, we would only have just the accounts
24:40that the guys wrote in their diaries.
24:43It's a story that needs to be told,
24:45and I think that the relatives of the men who fought out here,
24:49they want to know what happened to their loved ones.
24:52Finding the artefacts on the hill pieces everything together,
24:55like a jigsaw.
24:57Take a GPS spot.
25:01But these finds won't be leaving the site.
25:05In view of trying to keep this as an authentic Second World War site,
25:09we bury the artefact back in the ground
25:11so that it's intact with its history.
25:17McRitchie Reservoir to me is more than just researching the battle site.
25:21Today, there's people running around and canoeing and kayaking
25:26with not an idea what happened here.
25:31There's remnants of the battle all around them,
25:33still out there on the hill under their feet,
25:35but they would never know, they'd never realise.
25:37It's close to the end of the Bukit Chandu dig.
25:52The team have covered most of the compound,
25:58but have yet to recover any World War II artefacts.
26:03Time is running out,
26:06and archaeologist Aaron Kau has to devise a new plan.
26:10My strategy is to have several units being excavated concurrently
26:15so we can cover more areas.
26:21Aaron and colleague Michael Ung
26:23have opened a fresh unit in the compound.
26:26Doing fieldwork is all about patience.
26:28You don't heat gold all the time.
26:31I'll keep an open mind,
26:32because we know that battle was fought on this hill,
26:34but exactly where those exchanges were,
26:38we're not certain.
26:39Let's take a look, somewhere here.
26:51Mike, I think we have a projectile.
26:54Oh, nice.
26:56Looks like an Arisaka.
26:59Okay, okay.
27:03Another one?
27:09Here, it's another projectile.
27:13Oh.
27:14After digging for two weeks,
27:16they have unearthed two Japanese bullet projectiles.
27:21This is the part that actually kills or destroys,
27:25the part that actually leaves the barrel of a rifle,
27:27of a Japanese soldier.
27:29You can just imagine these objects flying around in 1942.
27:34It must have been very chaotic.
27:36It must be an air of fear in this place.
27:38It makes my hair stand, actually.
27:44Okay, I think let's back them up first.
27:46Okay.
27:51These artefacts help tie the historical accounts
27:54to the battle at Bukit Chandu.
28:00In Singapore's context,
28:01we are developing very fast,
28:03and sometimes we fall short of documenting
28:06minute details in our lives.
28:09I think with archaeology,
28:11it helps us not to forget what happened here,
28:13what the soldiers have gone through,
28:15what were they experiencing.
28:16We are constantly providing different perspectives
28:19to what happened in the past.
28:20Two months before the Battle of Singapore,
28:33Britain had sent a naval fleet
28:35to prevent Japanese troops from landing in Malaya
28:39and advancing south towards Singapore.
28:41One of the ships was the HMS Repulse.
28:54But the British were surprised
28:56by a squadron of more than 80 Japanese planes.
28:59these torpedo bombers were coming in so close,
29:14you could see the pilots.
29:16She hit us right in the midships.
29:29She hit us right in the midships.
29:37They were coming in one after the other.
29:40We were led to believe
29:50that it was going to be a piece of cake,
29:52that the Japanese were second-rate.
30:06But we were so mistaken.
30:08I always loved the sea.
30:15And it was my one ambition to join the Navy.
30:19It was my first ship.
30:20And it was really home.
30:26And within minutes,
30:29she'd gone.
30:38Maritime archaeologist, Dr Michael Flecker,
30:43has been surveying shipwrecks in Southeast Asia
30:46for 25 years.
30:51He still has many unanswered questions
30:53about the sinking of HMS Repulse.
30:55There had never been a ship sunk by aircraft fire,
30:59exclusively aircraft torpedoes or bombs, or both, before.
31:05And it didn't take that much longer after those thinkings
31:08for Singapore to actually be taken by the Japanese.
31:11What we'd like to achieve as a maritime archaeologist
31:16is to go and get tangible evidence of that battle.
31:19Hey, Mike, how are you?
31:30Mike Flecker, good to meet you.
31:31We've been waiting for you.
31:32Let's have a look at those plants.
31:33Remarkably, the HMS Repulse sank in just 11 minutes,
31:38killing 500 sailors on board.
31:40It's still a mystery
31:41why the massive ship sank so quickly.
31:43Dr Flecker hopes to find all the torpedo hits
31:45that sank the ship,
31:46something no one has been able to do yet.
31:49There was a survey done in 2007,
31:51so they went down, they confirmed one hit midships
31:53on starboard, which is here.
31:55The ones that have not been visually confirmed
31:57are these two port-side hits,
31:59one here and one here.
32:01One here and one here,
32:03and one here.
32:04One here and one here.
32:07We've done many bypasses with the scooters,
32:11and we never saw these.
32:13Maybe the wrecks tilt a little bit more over time,
32:15and that would be completely new information,
32:17so it's good to find that if we can.
32:28If they can find the two remaining torpedo hits,
32:31they might come closer to understanding
32:33how the disaster unfolded.
32:36HMS Repulse sank while en route to Quantan, Malaysia.
32:42The wreck lies some 90 kilometers off Tiamen Island,
32:4656 meters deep in the sea.
32:48The team must first pinpoint the location.
32:52All right, guys, we should be coming up on it now.
32:56Okay, I'll get the fish finder hooked up.
32:58And ready.
33:00Just gotta put in the fish finder.
33:02Just sends a little chirp down to the bottom,
33:04which bounces off, and it picks it back up,
33:06and it'll give us our distance to the bottom.
33:09And then as we come over the wreck,
33:10we'll get the depth change as it picks up the actual depth of the wreck
33:12instead of the depth of the cement.
33:14It's coming up.
33:16Okay, slope, slope, slope.
33:18Some degree down there.
33:20Okay, we've got fish coming up.
33:22That's always a good sign.
33:24And there comes the wreckage.
33:26Wreck located, the team must now secure a line for their descent.
33:30I mean, we're talking about a 200-meter-long wreck.
33:34That's massive.
33:35So what we do is we just drop the anchor,
33:37and then as we go down, we will just meet the wreck.
33:40Stop, we're in.
33:41Okay, we're good.
33:43We're hooked.
33:47Set.
33:50My father was fighting in World War II,
33:52so it's very close to home.
33:54To go and look at the repulse will be a very intense experience.
33:58I think it's time.
34:03Let's have a nice one.
34:04Yeah, that's a good one.
34:05Yeah.
34:12I love diving,
34:13and now this is the ultimate of diving with a purpose.
34:28The huge number of men that were lost on board,
34:35so to actually see the tangible evidence of their demise,
34:39you're reliving what was happening 80 years ago.
34:41This was a scene of complete chaos, mayhem, catastrophe.
34:46HMS repulse is over 240 meters long and weighs over 32,000 tons.
34:57Dr. Flecker and the team have only 25 minutes of air
35:00to find the two unconfirmed torpedo holes.
35:05With a vessel of this size, it is actually very easy to get lost.
35:08I've also dived on quite a few World War II vessels,
35:12and they're not anywhere near as overwhelming as it is to dive on the repulse.
35:17So we are on the bottom, and we're looking for a torpedo hole,
35:35but we're seeing these long, ripped-up holes in the vessel
35:39with metal going in and metal going out,
35:41and these are not things we expect to see.
35:45This destruction doesn't look like it's been caused by torpedoes.
35:49A torpedo would have done a lot of internal damage as well,
35:52whereas these holes were just seeing the sheet damaged on the outside.
35:55The interior is not necessarily affected.
36:00We got to the area they should be, but that area was missing.
36:11The part of the ship that would have had those torpedo holes is now gone.
36:18It's been ripped apart.
36:19It seems that the dive has surfaced more questions than answers.
36:41Our aim was to look for the torpedo damage on the port side.
36:46We got down there, but we didn't see any specific torpedo damage.
36:50These huge piles of tangled, twisted steel, and it's just mayhem.
36:55The whole bottom is mayhem.
36:57The ancient
37:13maritime archaeologist Dr Michael Flecker is investigating the sinking of a British battleship, the HMS Repulse,
37:19an event that precipitated the fall of Singapore.
37:23it's time to review the footage from the dive when you're diving on air as soon as you get
37:32under a certain amount of pressure it starts to have an effect almost like drinking alcohol
37:37so you'll think you're doing fine but when you get back to the surface you think well did i do
37:41that or didn't i do that and some things are not that clear and some things are almost beyond belief
37:47but footage captured on dr flecker's camera leaves no room for doubt this is a gopro camera i had on
37:57the back of my tank and here we're finding a dozen or so all along one side in a quite confined area
38:03so they're clearly not torpedo holes there's definitely signs that there's been salvage down
38:09there they've been using explosives on the outside of the hull
38:17the hms repulse has fallen victim to shipwreck theft scavengers are after a type of steel
38:26that's worth a fortune on the open market sold and used in scientific and medical equipment
38:33super thick armor plating had been bent all over the place like tissue paper when they're ripped up
38:41we've lost the respect for all those people that have sacrificed themselves fighting during the war
38:47it's a hopeless situation and it's been allowed to happen
38:58and we swam along this edge that was all gone all the way across there was just disappeared if i was
39:05going by what we'd seen on that dive there's more than 50 gone even five percent appalling
39:17the fact that we went down there to look specifically at what happened during world war ii and instead
39:23of we're now looking at what happened one or two years ago so for me the archaeological work is impossible
39:28the evidence has disappeared it will never reappear it's gone
39:46archaeologist aaron cow is analyzing the artifacts the team has unearthed
39:50the projectiles founded bukit chandu join a larger collection built up over a decade when an artifact is
40:00removed from the ground there's always an urgency to perform conservation by cleaning these artifacts we
40:07are also able to identify what these are the team has amassed hundreds of world war ii artifacts to date
40:16most look corroded or misshapen but every piece is an important link to the past
40:23this artifact is interesting um if you look at this part that rod that goes across these two features
40:30here the safety pin on this grenade was actually not pulled so it was blasted into pieces even before
40:35it was used this i mean this just simply tells us how ferocious the battle was i mean the poor fellow who
40:42this grenade belongs to was probably torn to bits besides a haul of firearm ammunition the team has
40:49also unearthed personal artifacts from the soldiers this particular item over here will be a drinking
40:56water bottle so these are the personal implements of a british soldier this one is interesting because
41:02this is the army issued standard uh shaver if we wind back the clock something mundane but because of
41:11what it has gone through and how it was deposited in the ground and where it was deposited in the ground
41:17it gives us a new meaning
41:18the british surrender in world war ii was a defining chapter of colonial singapore
41:34more than a hundred thousand soldiers were killed wounded and captured
41:41making it the largest surrender in british history
41:48the objects left behind during the heat of the battles remind us of the reality of war seven decades on
42:04i can understand that people feel detached from the second world war so because singapore was a colony
42:10there was very little nationalistic feelings i think archaeology can emphasize on the fact that these
42:16conflicts important periods of our history these are happening in our own backyard
42:23the second world war is a crux for the political awakening of this island after the post-war period
42:29we can realize that no we should be self-governed we can't depend on other people someone who's
42:3510 000 kilometers away to think on our behalf we need to rule our own our own communities
42:42beyond world war ii remnants there are still spaces left untouched waiting to be explored
42:51as we excavate is almost like opening a portal into the past
42:58although archaeology is still new in singapore quite significant discoveries have been made
43:03i believe there's still a lot more to discover to give us new perspectives new answers
43:12new stories to be unearthed retold and rewritten
43:23at the end of the previous in we are amazing
43:25also known as the
43:31we have been seeing a lot of webinars and being able to gather to the past
43:32that we will never forget that the history of the past one is
43:34we can see us all in our lives
43:35and see you in the past three and a few months
43:37the history of the past two months
43:39in the past three months
43:42the history of our history
43:43is that the history of the past two months
43:46is an incredibly important and the history of the past two months
43:48was amazing
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