A Texan Cowboy: F.Ficklin (An OR with the “Lost Battalion”). An American POW.
Over 900 American Servicemen became POW’s in Java under the Japanese. They were processed through Changi to become slave labourers on: Thai – Burma Railway; mines in Japan; or slave labourers around Singapore.
Frank W. Ficklin (Fick) (1922 – 2011) was a Staff Sgt 2nd. Battalion, 131st Texas Field Artillery also known as the “Lost Battalion.” This comprised of 534 men. After the fall of Java Ficklin’s 3.5 years as a prisoner included: POW in Bicycle Camp, Batavia, 1942; Changi Prison Camp, Singapore, 1942; building the Thai – Burma Death Railway, 1942-44; Kanchanaburi, Thailand, 1944; Changi Jail,1944; until liberation Sept 1945.
Source: https://oralhistory.unt.edu/people/ficklin-frank-w-b-1922
Before the war, Texas, the ‘lone star state’ was sparsely populated; there were more people living in New York City at the time than in the entire state of Texas. Most Texans lived on farms or ranches or in small towns. Texas on the brink of war was mainly agrarian in both employment and attitude.
With Fricklin’s broad Southern accent, Des probably drew on his movie exposure of ‘westerns’ to paint this image of ‘Ficklin’.
This would have been done to bring some humour to the dismal situation they were in as POW’s would have given Fricklin & his fellow countrymen something to smile about.
It remains a mystery as to why Joe Keenan had this & other paintings by Des of Americans, (see ‘Babe Ruth’, ‘Bert Buller’ on this site), but it is likely that they were well liked by others, so Des simply painted the caricatures again for their buddies. These American POWs were with Joe Keenan on the Thai Burma Death Railway & likely formed strong bonds with each other to survive the brutality, starvation, disease & slave labour in the jungles they were forced to work long hours in building a railway with the most basic of tools
Images published with the kind permission of Joe Keenan’s family.