Hitchin soldier’s family discovers his lost WW2 novel

The family of a World War Two soldier has discovered a novel he wrote based on his experiences fighting in the Burma campaign.

John Harkness, known as Jack, was a rose grower in Hitchin, but he had previously served with the army from 1939 to 1946.

His family believes Mr Harkness wrote the book in the 1960s and tried to get it published in the 70s, but it was forgotten for 60 years.

“We shall never know how much is fiction,” said his daughter Elizabeth Pearson, who described The Singer and Her Soldier as “basically a romance” with “vivid descriptions of jungle warfare”.

The book centres around a young singer called Sheila who is sent to Burma with her band to entertain troops. After a plane crash, she meets a group of soldiers and romance blossoms with one of them.

“She has many adventures and they fall in love and hope for a happy ending. But it’s a war story, and there isn’t a happy ending,” Ms Pearson said.

“The soldier character is very much based on my dad – his family runs a plant nursery. There’s so much of his character in there and his values and his sense of duty.

“It does contain all sorts of accurate information about jungle warfare. It’s quite brutal and quite wonderful.”

Mr Harkness died in 1994 and Ms Pearson, who lives near Cambridge, said her brother Philip stumbled across the manuscript while sorting through old boxes.

“I prevented Philip from taking it to the skip. This stuff had not been looked at for 50 or 60 years. None of us remembered seeing it before,” she told the BBC.

“The book includes things dad experienced but never spoke about.

“Regrettably, neither [my brothers] Robert, Philip or I got to discuss it with dad during his lifetime, and he spoke little of his experiences in Burma.”

Ms Pearson decided to publish a few copies of the novel to share with family and friends.

“It’s been a voyage of discovery. I’m so happy to have saved it from oblivion, as dad’s wonderful work would have been missed,” she said.