A few days after the surrender we were given a packet of cigarettes from our own stores in Hong Kong and a Japanese band played the Jap national anthem and ‘God Save the King’ on the square. The guard and all prisoners able to walk were turned out and stood to attention.
Conditions were rapidly getting worse in the hospital hut. Most of the wounded and sick lay on the floor. Many were without covers. We were pestered by millions of flies during the day. I saw a lieutenant; I will not name him for the sake of his family, with half his back blown off, lie withering, moaning and dying, and his back black with flies. He died in torment. The place reeked with foul odors. One bedpan was available for over fifty patients. The sickly smell of gangrene was always present. Amputations were performed without anesthetic, just where the patient lay. More and more died.
Then at last came a Japanese doctor. He sniffed as he stood by the door and I believe he would have retired only that one of our doctors was performing an operation, the amputation of a mans leg without drugs. The Jap waddled across the hut and with legs apart stood watching. The doctor, who happened to be Portuguese, raised his head and looked at him. The Jap remarked, smirking superciliously, “Primitive. Primitive.”
Then he turned and walked from the hut. The Portuguese doctor’s face went first red then white. If a look could have killed the Jap would have dropped dead.
This hut was a pest house. It was freezing cold at night and this, while it brought fresh discomfort to the wounded, may have helped to hold down the epidemics of dysentery and diphtheria which later swept through the camp. Many had no blankets and awaited the death of a neighbor to have first claim on his possessions, some extra clothing, or if lucky a blanket. We saw no Red Cross supplies.
As soon as I could hobble around on a stick I decided to get out of this charnel house and move to another along with Bob Manchester and some other Canadians mostly Royal Rifles. C. S. N. Todd was in charge, he was killed in Japan several years later while working in a Yokohama shipyard. I was sorry to leave Scotty and thanked him, and his friend the orderly, for all they had done for me. How true it is that a friend in need is a friend indeed. Those noble souls who from their own innate decency and goodness of heart ministered to others like brothers, even though they were strangers. They redeem one’s faith in human nature and set an example that all should follow in order to make this world a better place to live in.
In my new quarters the atmosphere was a little better. Food was scarce but most of the unwounded were in fair physical shape when captured and had not yet begun to lose weight. The Japs left us much alone and in charge of the white camp officers, the senior being a Major of the Hong Kong Volunteers. They had the arranging of fatigues, burial parties, distribution of rations, etc. There was little discipline as we were a mixed lot.
