Author’s Notes and Acknowledgements
I have used the spelling Sungei Siput for the location of the 16th June murders that kicked off the Emergency, rather than the spelling used today - Sungai Siput. All contemporary accounts use the Sungei spelling, including the newspaper reports. This may cause confusion as there is another town spelt with the ‘e’ in the south of Malaysia in Malacca. I considered using the current Sungai spelling to avoid such confusion, but prefer to be historically accurate. This also goes for other spellings such as kampong or kampung – I have used what I believe would have been the common colonial British usage at the time, based on contemporary accounts.
Apart from significant historic figures, including the murdered planters, Chin Peng and named members of the go
