Backcreek, full marks.
Neil Brian Davis, combat cameraman 1934 - 1985.
In Bangkok on Monday 9 September 1985 yet another military coup d'tat, relatively bloodless affairs in Thailand, ironically delivered Neil Davis to his appointment with a visceral, brutal death. As Davis, Bill Latch (journalist), Gary Burns (cameraman) and his Thai sound recorder Daeng Kariah tried to take cover from tank canon and machine gun fire behind a telephone junction box outside an army radio station on Phitsanuloke Rd, BK, as tanks and Thai rebel soldiers layed siege to the Government building.
His death was spectacular yet futile. Davis filmed the action as ordinance rained over their heads, the shells and rounds crashing into gates and the building, the ground shuddered beneath them as shrapnel screamed demented howls of death. The machine guns hammered out Davis'and Latch's last hasty orison.
Neil Davis' death certificate read: Laceration of the heart, lungs, spleen, kidney and blood vessels in the stomach causing excessive blood loss. Burns heard Neil's last words, "Oh...shit". As Gary Burns tried to drag Neil away from the gunfire, his side frightfully opened, his organs and blood spilled out onto the hot pavement, he had been virtually split in two by shrapnel.
Davis lived large and lead a tremendous life but died an inglorious death. But he had certainly lived up to his motto and lived his philosophy,'....One crowded hour of glorious life Is worth an age without a name'. Mordaunt, T. (1765-1763).
The Peacekeeper.
