Like so many other young men, David Thomas was excited about joining the military ranks and heading off to experience the adventure of World War 2.
But near the end of his service, the stoic young private found himself in Hiroshima after the first nuclear bomb was dropped on Japan, killing up to 146,000 people.
After that, the now 100-year-old had a very different view of war.
Sitting in his armchair at his Mosgiel home yesterday, the still very stoic centenarian said he could not believe the level of destruction his eyes had shown him.
"It was in absolute ruins and all the trees had all the growth on them burnt off.
"The only thing that didn’t appear to be affected by the bomb were the concrete buildings — otherwise there was no village at all.
"When you stop to think what it must have been like for the people, as a human being, it was worse than bloody awful.
"You just saw what devastation can happen with one bomb."
At the time, he and his fellow soldiers said little about it.
"You weren’t paid to think."
But since then people had hoped the nuclear bomb would never be used again, he said.
"What they had then, and what they’ve got now, are two different things.
"That [Hiroshima] bomb made a wee bang. The next one will be a bloody monster."
Ironically, halfway through the journey the war was declared over.
The ship continued on to Egypt, where he served six months before being sent to Italy.
It was while he was in Italy that he was enlisted in the Japanese Occupation Force (J Force) and was sent to help repatriate Koreans in Japan back to Korea.
While the devastation he witnessed in Hiroshima was traumatising, it was the Japanese people he was working with who stopped him from being haunted by the experience, he said.
"You could leave your boots in the middle of the road and they would still be there a week later.
"The Japanese people — they’re honest, they were civil and I haven’t got a bad word to say against any of them. Not one."
