Fall of Singapore

15 February 1942: the morning conference in the Battlebox

At a morning command conference in the Battlebox at Fort Canning on 15 February 1942, Lieutenant-General Arthur Percival and his senior officers concluded that they could not mount a viable counterattack to recover the reservoirs, and decided to seek surrender.

Japanese forces had taken the reservoirs and pumping stations; Singapore's water supply was close to failure, and fuel and heavy-ammunition stocks were running low.

Percival's surrender party approached Japanese lines carrying both a white flag and the Union Jack.

6:10 p.m. in a factory boardroom

The party reached Lieutenant-General Tomoyuki Yamashita's headquarters at the Ford Motor Factory in Bukit Timah at approximately 5 p.m. Percival surrendered British-led forces unconditionally in the factory boardroom at approximately 6:10 p.m.

Some secondary accounts give the signing as 6:20 p.m.; the National Archives of Singapore timeline gives 6:10.

The surrender took effect at 8:30 p.m., when fighting ceased and the guns fell silent.

Prisoners, and a new name

Approximately 80,000 British, Indian, Australian and local troops became prisoners, joining roughly 50,000 Allied personnel captured earlier in the Malayan campaign — the two figures behind the commonly quoted total of more than 130,000. More than 15,000 of them were Australian.

The following day Japan staged a victory parade and renamed Singapore Syonan-to, beginning military occupation.