At breakfast on 5 January 1942 we learned that the Japanese had landed on the west coast just north of Kuala Lumpur, and were once more threatening to cut off the troops defending the Perak border. That was why we had been moved out late the previous night, and it explained the congestion and troops at Batu Caves.

A telephone message from Head Office in Singapore instructed us to proceed to Seremban and then Johore. After refuelling we took up our convoy positions and were on our way again - this time thankfully in daylight. Seremban, then Gemas, where somebody had found us an empty bungalow for the night; then Segamat, and my first introduction to Johore.

We had been told to take our time, the general idea being that we needed a break. Boardman and I had let the others push on, and we tried to make this part of the trip rather more relaxed. Johore helped us in this; the roads were wide and well kept, and the villages clean and tidy. We stopped for tea and cakes, fresh pineapple slices, bananas and rambutans. Only once or twice did we see a military vehicle.

Then Boardman's car needed petrol, and we found that we had no coupons for petrol in Johore. Only the intervention of a Malay Policeman saved the situation, and the reluctant Chinese served us, against the regulations. We were back to law and order again.

We reached Johore Bahru at dusk, and the District Engineer was about to leave his office. We followed him to the Club.

The Japanese were just a few miles up the road; they were sailing along the west coast and landing almost where they pleased, to cut off our troops retreating down the peninsular; and in Johore Bahru Club, lounging against the bar, dressed in white shorts and shirts and tennis shoes, were PWD Engineers, just back from the tennis courts. Immaculate men and women lounged in rotan chairs. Surely they had heard about the War?

We were objects of interest in our soiled uniforms, our faces streaked and grimy, our clothes unstarched and our shoes dirty. Somebody offered us a drink, and the questions started. They knew of our activities up north, and of the commissioms we nine had been given. There seemed to be a bit of envy on this last point.

After a meal we were taken to the District Engineer's palatial house with its spacious grounds, neat lawns and flower beds, and I thought of my little bungalow on the hill in Kuala Kangsar, with its garden surely overgrown now, and its tomatoes and bringals ready for picking.

When we suggested that two camp beds in the lounge would be fine, one of the men offered us a bedroom with two twin beds, and a bathroom - with a 'long bath', as against the common shower. After the tubs and dippers of the past weeks I had a sudden desire to lie forever in a deep warm sudsy bath, and I became aware of my salty, sticky skin. A haze of tiredness came over me.

A nightcap was suggested, and gratefully accepted, and we slumped in the luxurious lounge, half listening to the wireless, the enemy up the road forgotten for a while, and for my part it was time to think of home, and of mundane things like finding a dhobi to wash my clothes, finding a bank to get some cash, getting the car washed and serviced - the everyday things in a sane world. Morgan woke me and ordered me to bed.

Next morning we awoke refreshed, later than usual, and drove over the Causeway into Singapore to report to the Director of Public Works. Chinese coolies were drilling into the granite of the Causeway ready for demolition charges and troops were guarding the approach.

Mr. Nunn, in the uniform of a Group Captain RAF, welcomed us warmly, and we reported on our work in the retreat. We received our orders, and were given a day or two for rest before returning to Johore Bahru.

Boardman had the address of a young couple from his home town, and we were put up there for the night. Next day we explored the town. Raffles Place showed signs of damage, and the big European stores were boarded up. Troops and civilians crowded the town, and we recognised some from up north, including Penang. As the sun was setting we made our way to meet another of Boardman's friends, and after arranging accommodation for us he took us to a Chinese restaurant.

Boardman's friend had been a Flight Lieutenant RAF in England, and when his term finished just before the war he had come to Singapore intending to set up in business. Instead, he had volunteered for service with the Malayan Volunteer Air Force, and he was a Flight Sergeant, with control of a ground crew who were busy assembling aircraft. He said that two hundred and eighty Hurricane fighters had arrived that week, but so far the men needed to assemble them had not arrived. The news was cheering for us because at that time the Japs were apparently unchallenged in the air.

Perhaps the men who were to assemble the Hurricanes failed to arrive, or there were no pilots for them. Two hundred and eighty fighters would no doubt have made a difference over Singapore.

On reporting next day to Johore, we found that the PWD pioneer group of nine - the 'Circus' - had been broken up. Its members were to be deployed to special jobs over the area. The reason was of course that we knew how to use the local labour force to supplement the military personnel. My job was to take charge of the whole road from Johore Bahru along the east coast to the edge of the district. First though there was work for me in town, working with an assistant engineer called Winston.

Boardman left for Kulai, and Winston put me up in his quarters. He seemed to be totally devoid of information about the situation in the north, and was optimistic about the future. Considering the size of the Malay Peninsular - it is only as big as England, less than 450 miles from north to south and about 200 miles west to east at its widest point - the presence of the Japanese already halfway down the country did not seem to me to inspire optimism. Winston told me that the place was packed with Australian troops, and that their Commander-in-Chief, Gordon Bennett, had expressed confidence that they would hold the enemy when the Japs reached the Johore border. Armed with this reassurance, I wrote home to tell my family that we were going to make a stand, packed as we were in the southern tip of the country.

It is a pity that my letters were not saved for me to read today; or perhaps it is as well - few of us in later life relish being reminded of the folly or ignorance of our youth.

Only a couple of days later, whilst out on an inspection with Winston, I saw my first air battle over Malaya. Jap aircraft had come for Singapore, and had been met over the Straits of Johore. It was a great fight. Anti-aircraft kept the planes high, and RAF fighters engaged them from above. Silvery shapes wound and twisted in the tropical sky, and power dives were rattled with gunfire and the burst of shells. We saw one plane come down. After about ten minutes the Japs made off.

So perhaps things really were not so bad after all. There had been an orderly withdrawal from the north, with thorough salvaging of resources; the Australians were getting ready; at last we had air cover. A bit late perhaps, because we'd almost run out of land, but in Johore we could at last make a stand.

On Tuesday morning we went along the Kulai road to see if there was any problem after heavy rains the previous night. Many Malayan bridges in those days were of timber construction, built with twelve inch square hardwood columns driven into the ground. As we approached the Lee Pineapple factory we saw that the swollen river had inundated the lowlying land on each side. The road for a quarter of a mile or so was under a few inches of water, and we went on to Kulai thinking that the flood would perhaps subside before we returned.

On our return we found the road blocked with vehicles. We were half an hour reaching the pineapple factory, and in the hour or so that we had been away the river had risen about three feet. Kampong houses on the low-lying ground were flooded to eaves level, and the road ahead was flooded for half a mile. A bridge spanning the swollen river was out of sight save for its wooden parapet. Chinese women with their children were crying out from the flood, hens were squatting in bushes, and banana trees were toppling. Soldiers manning a gun-nest at one end of the bridge had salvaged their gun to higher ground and had started rescue operations. They had rigged a long rope from the bridge parapet rail to a tree, and a soldier swam between the rope and the stranded Chinese, supporting them until he reached the rope, then pulling them to safety. After a short rest he was off again, collecting old and young and pulling them to dry land. The method was repeated on the other bank, and soon a few young Chinese got into the act and relieved the soldiers.

We organised a gang of coolies to form an avenue along the carriageway edge to show the drivers where the going was safe. The larger vehicles could proceed unaided, but smaller vehicles had to be towed or pushed. The main hazard was a strong cross-current which tended to float them off the road. One Australian Red Cross vehicle was swept off the road and finished halfway down the bank at a dangerous angle. We carried the sick and wounded to safety and pulled the ambulance back on to the road.

The flood began to subside by noon, but it was three o'clock before all vehicles could proceed with safety. Every vehicle was in trouble at one time or another, and one had to be left to be salvaged later from the bank. Some of the kampong Chinese had drowned.

Winston left me at the site to finalise relief work, and then I needed a lift into town. Three lorries had stopped by the roadside clear of the flood, and I walked up to them to beg a lift. A young Indian - perhaps eighteen years old - was working under the bonnet of the front vehicle, with a middle-aged helper. They were tired, dishevelled and dirty.

When I asked what was the trouble, they told me the engine was overheating. It was a Chevrolet, and so I was able to draw on personal experience to help them. We examined the plugs, and they were badly coked and burnt back. A penknife to scrape the points clean, then a tap with a spanner to reset the gaps, and all was well.

The older man agreed to give me a lift in his car, which was parked some distance ahead of the small convoy. As we walked to the car I asked him how far they had come that day.

They had come from Muar, some miles north on the west coast, and the youths were pupils of the elderly Asiatic schoolmaster. They were all in the Medical Auxiliary Service, a voluntary organisation trained by the Medical Service, and they had been under intense pressure during the air raids. Casualties had been heavy, and the First Aid Posts severely taxed. Finally they had to collect and bury the dead. They had never done such a thing before, but they had picked up the dead, piled them into their three lorries, driven to an open space, then dug communal graves and disposed of their grim cargoes.

The schoolmaster was not sure of their next move, but the boys had volunteered to evacuate their lorries filled with medical equipment to Singapore and await further orders there. They had left their homes without prospect of ever returning.

The heavy rains created serious problems at other points in the limited highway network. Next day the State Engineer took me to Ulu Tiram at the beginning of the 14th mile up the East Road to Kota Tinggi and Mersing on the east coast. The swollen river had scoured behind the abutments of a concrete bridge and below its foundations, causing it to break its back. There was a sixty feet gap in the road. An alternative route through a rubber estate had a weak timber bridge over the same river. Australian troops were on the east coast at Mersing.

My job was to strengthen the timber bridge on the estate road and to design and construct a replacement bridge on the main road. Labour and materials had to be found locally.

After taking a few rough measurements I returned to the office and enquired about supplies. I found that I would have to run around in my car, finding what I could, and then design a structure using what I had found.

It was an interesting sortie. Five miles up the West Road I found a few short ends of rolled steel joist, at the PWD store were some small timbers, and two miles up the Kota Tinggi road there were two long RSJs. The Timber Controller told me about two sawmills at Kota Tinggi with large stocks of heavy timber.

That night a strange bridge was designed from my notes and from first principles.

Next morning, by arrangement with Customs at the Causeway, I arranged for the requisitioning of a six-wheeler timber waggon, and by eleven on the third day all the materials were on site. A young Portuguese lad called Jo Cavallo from Malacca was looaned to me by the District Engineer.

Over the next few days the Estate road bridge was strengthened and the new main road bridge was in place, using coolies and Chinese carpenters. The method of payment was simple; I had a wad of dollar bills, and the men were paid at the end of each day. Three ringgit for an eleven hour day, with half an hour lunch break. Five ringgit bonus to any man who brought in another carpenter.

Jap aircraft went over daily, but the work went on. I acted as errand boy when nails or ironwork or cash ran out, and vouchers were signed for the timber. On the third day traffic was crossing the new bridge, and the Estate bridge was two feet wider.

We were working on parapets and kerbs and railings on the morning of the fourth day when a young Artillery Captain stopped and asked the way to Lee Sawmills. He looked distressed when I told him it was some way up the road, and he explained that he had disembarked only two days previously. He had to go into action that night, and he needed planks to get his guns over the wide ditches. I gave him what I had to spare, and he went off to find a lorry. When he returned I asked him how things were up north, and he told me to listen for news about Batu Pahat, where he was to go into action. Batu Pahat was on the west coast just a few miles northwest of Johore Bahru.

At the end of that day Horsley came by in his car. We were so glad to see each other that one would have thought we hadn't met for years. The pace and constant change of our activities, plus the hazards of our retreat from Perak, made a chance meeting with a friend something of special value. We exchanged news, and I found that our original nine had all been re-gazetted, and all the other PWD engineers now had commissions. I had to collect extra pips, together with a weapon and more kit. Horsley was engaged in confiscation of boats up river in conjunction with the Navy.

The bridge was finished a few days later, though it had in fact been in use from the third day, and every day the traffic increased. Australians were heading northeast to the Mersing front, and there was a steady flow of vehicles in both directions. Cattle were being moved south, and evacuees streamed down the road, using whatever means of transoport was available.

The young Chinese in the village held a procession and demonstration, their banners demanding weapons so that they could fight the Japanese. Too late.

On 28 January 1942 we were told that a withdrawal was to be made across the Causeway. We dumped broken stone along the road for use to fill bomb craters. We made a last issue of rice to the coolie lines. Troops occupied the police station and shops in the town. The Malay Police force had been disbanded by that time. Arrangements were made to salvage or 'deny' plant left behind, and I handed over a small amount of gelignite from a PWD quarry to engineers who were preparing my new bridge for demolition.

On 29 January a go-down containing forty thousand bags of rice and forty thousand 40lb. tins of sugar was opened and the villagers were told to take what they could. I tried to help, but after half an hour or so, with the stacks barely touched by the scrambling Chinese and Tamils, I had to give up. Next day the lot was to go up in smoke. Too late - again.

Early on 30 January Jo Cavallo and I met a few RNZAF engineers at our depot, and we loaded some lorries with tools and fittings, assisted by a few faithful Tamil coolies. Two hours later we started in convoy for the Causeway and Singapore. My car led, Jo Cavallo following in Winston's car.

Japanese bombers appeared as we set off. They were bombing the road to the Causeway. Anti-aircraft guns engaged them, and we had to take cover. After half an hour I restarted the convoy. Apart from a scatter of poles and fallen cables, earth and debris, and one motor cycle dispatch rider laid out by the side of the road, the damage was slight. The bomb craters were four or five feet in diameter near the bridge which carried the road into town.

We drove slowly through the guards to the Causeway and along the granite strip onto the Island of Singapore.