Military Diaries

Dirty Eddie’s War is the true account of the wartime experiences of Harry Andrew March, Jr., captured by way of diary entries addressed to his beloved wife, Elsa. Nicknamed “Dirty Eddie” by his comrades, he served as a member of four squadrons operating in the South Pacific, frequently under difficult and perilous conditions.

The diary and letters I wrote when I experienced the coup d'état that ousted Salvador Allende in Chile on Tuesday morning, 11 September 1973. This coup was carefully planned by the Chilean elite with the help of the CIA, and included propaganda, economic sabotage, torture, total press censorship, assassination, and a radical free market revolution leading to a gross gap between rich and poor.

After being captured in Singapore and transported to the infamous Burma railway, Colonel Owtram was appointed the British Camp Commandant at Chungkai, one of the largest POW camps. Many ex-prisoners testified to the mental and physical courage that he showed protecting POWs from the worst excesses of their captors. Of course his account does not admit to this, but what is clear is that in addition to the deprivation and hardship suffered by all POWs, the author bore heavy responsibility for those under his charge and the daily trauma of dealing with the unpredictable Japanese.