70 years ago: Hong Kong's wartime diaries

On Monday (20thAugust) at about 10.30 a.m., 110 husbands from Sham Shui Po arrived, to visit their wives, and amongst them was Kenneth Watson, Isa’s husband. All except wives and relatives were asked to keep away from the entrance where the husbands would arrive by bus. Yvonne witnessed the scene of reunions from afar and even so was quite overcome. It was a grand day and I really began to feel the war was over and to realise a bit what that meant for many people.

Isa brought Kenneth along to room 11 for lunch and tongues wagged hard the whole time. He was looking very fit and brown though he, like everyone, had shed a good many pounds. On the whole the POWs in the officers’ camp were all pretty well.

We decided that on the whole they had better rations than we did but that our surroundings and locality were pleasanter and healthier than theirs. They lived in big wooden huts with 50 men per hut, (one room) so they had even less privacy than we did. It was amusing to compare notes. We found that we used the same kind of tins for collecting our food and cooking in – 5 lb tins, coffee and Cow and Gate milk tins; they had the same ramps and suspicions about rations – the cooks were always distrusted! Actually, our last lot of cooks under Owen Evans have been absolutely exemplary and above the slightest whisper of suspicion; I don’t know about the other blocks.

The officers were first at North Point Camp, they were then moved to Argyle Street Camp and finally, about 9 months ago, were moved to the main camp at Sham Shui Po but were separated from the men and NCO’s by barbed wire. After most of the POWs had been shipped to Japan there were about 500 officers and 1000 troops left. I did not realise there were so few left.

There is a Major Boon, who, with some 5 or 6 stooges, have been arrested and is now awaiting Court Martial on some very serious charges of dealing with the enemy. The Japanese put him in charge of the men’s camp at Sham Shui Po and he perpetrated the most awful crimes – disclosing the existence of wireless and so on, which led to the execution of some of our men. It is a terrible business. He was put in a hut and given a revolver but evidently could not bring himself to use it. His arrest, of course, took place after the cessation of hostilities. (He was in fact acquitted in 1946 of all crimes.) They have also taken Blumenthal into custody and locked him up. I don’t know on what charges but I presume it was on instruction from Gimson or, Pennefeather-Evans and is probably because of his dealings with the Japanese in this camp. Well, many people thought that friend Blumenthal was storing up trouble for himself. There are a good many others here who will be brought to account too, though on minor charges.

The hospital conditions at Sham Shui Po were terribly bad. There was no hospital accommodation within the camp at first and on one or two occasions the doctors had to take a patient to a hut in the Indian Camp, which the Japs allowed them to use for operations, perform the operation and then bring them straight back to his own hut on the stretcher! One operation for a duodenal ulcer had to be performed with razor blades – in fact some amazingly successful operations were carried out with razor blades. And they were pathetically short of drugs. Many lives were lost because insufficient serum was supplied during the diphtheria epidemic. In this respect, little Watanabe has proved himself a true humanitarian and a real Christian, for on many occasions he brought in, quite unofficially and at his own risk, drugs and medical supplies which were most urgently needed. Yvonne Ho corroborated this and said he did the same for Bowen Road Hospital too. She said she used to urge him to be careful (she called him “Uncle John”) but he used to say;  “Yvonne, I do not mind what happens to me; I must do what I think is my duty”.
 
He is a frail looking little man and the chaps in Sham Shui Po and Bowen Road said they often saw him struggling along with large rattan baskets so full of supplies that he could hardly walk. He had seen his eldest son in a transport as it passed through HK on its way to a S. Pacific destination and Yvonne Ho said he had told her that the rest of his family was in ill fated Hiroshima which was one of the towns practically wiped out by the atomic bombs. He told her, with tears streaming down his face, that he did not expect to see any of his family again. But he keeps on with his relief work doing to the best of his ability, what he considers his duty.

He came into camp with one of our supply lorries this morning and I was glad to see John Sterricker (the BCC Sec.) greet him and shake hands with him.

((Sir Selwyn Selwyn-Clarke dedicated his book ‘Footprints’ to Kiyoshi Watanabe. The dedication reads, ‘This book is dedicated to The Reverand Kiyoshi Watanabe, formerly Officer Interpreter, Imperial Japanese Army, who helped to save the lives of many prisoners of war and British and Allied civilian men, women and children interned in Hong Kong during the Japanese occupation, 1941 -1945, at the risk of losing his own. His wife and daughter were killed during the Allied (atomic) bombing of Hiroshima on 6th August 1945.))

Yvonne mentioned four other Japs who could be called reasonable men – I forget their names, Maejima was one and he apparently is devoted to Dr Selwyn-Clark and does his best to help him. Maejima had tried all the Jap doctors in town who had failed to diagnose his complaint, so in the end he went to Selwyn-Clarke who diagnosed (correctly) TB immediately and prescribed treatment which has, apparently, been successful. But the rest of the Japanese have earned nothing but dislike and hatred.

The troops at Sham Shui Po evidently had a very bad time indeed, especially at the beginning. Their pay, compared with that of the officers’ was quite negligible and they were unable to supplement their rations from the canteen. Dystentry and malaria was very bad and their hospital conditions were terrible.

Mr Corra had an awful time: the Japs discovered that he is Austrian by birth and they sent for him and told him they wanted him to broadcast to Austria – propaganda. This he refused to do and they gave him a bad time. They questioned him non-stop for 14 hours, keeping him with powerful lights shining in his face. They had him up five times altogether, trying to force him to broadcast, but he resolutely refused. The last time they said; “You’re wife and daughter are at Stanley Camp are they not? If you do not do as we wish it may mean they are taken away from that camp”.

By then Corra was so exhausted that this final threat practically finished him and he was half demented for the next three days. He was sent back to camp and a day or so later, while wandering about the camp he fell over some obstacle and cut his leg badly. The doctors seized the opportunity and put him in hospital and when the Japs sent for him again they said he could not leave camp as he had fallen and broken his leg. Strangely enough, after that the Japs never worried him again and Poldie and Christine knew nothing about it at all until he visited them on Monday and told them about it!

These POW civilians had some grim stories of atrocities to tell. Mr Goodban, the peacetime headmaster of the Diocesan Boys School had been an eye witness of the execution of a man named Prater (Praater). I don’t know his offence, but his feet were tied together and he was killed by savage dogs that the Japs let loose on him for their amusement. Chinese refugees and homeless people (street sleepers) were treated in this way. The Japanese patrols would take their savage police dogs with them and set them onto these defenceless and often starving people. Anyone trying to assist the victims would be fired at or suffer a similar fate. There really has been a ghastly reign of terror here about which, I for one, treated it as ficticious. I realise now there was little fiction about them and the facts are far worse than we ever dreamed possible.

On Tuesday 21st, Y and I went down to the MQ gardens where a number of sampan people had landed from their boats and climbed over the barbed wire. We had taken with us a pot full of boiled rice which we wanted to try and exchange for fish. We had great fun trying out our very scanty amount of Cantonese. Anyway, we managed to get three little fish in exchange and, I think, both parties were highly satisfied. The man indicated that they wanted clothes and in the stress of the moment I said; “You come back here yesterday”! The man never so much as smiled or raised an eyebrow, so I thought I had made myself quite clear until Y pointed out my mistake.

To our great delight, Bunny Browne ((John‘s best man)) turned up in the afternoon with the rest of the Sham Shui Po party. The P0W on Tuesday were supposed to be those who had relatives in camp but Bunny, who during his internment had improved the shining hour by learning Japanese, had been sent over as official Jap interpreter. The Sham Shui Po men always have a Jap officer in charge of them! It is a ridiculous situation! Bunny was in fine form and looking most fit. He has shed a lot of weight (from over 200 lbs to 142 lbs) and though he will put a good deal back again (he has already gained 10 lbs), I really think he looks better now than before the war. These Sham Shui Po men, of course, have unearthed their best (in many cases their only) shorts, shirts, shoes and stockings to wear to Stanley. It was amusing to see how many of them took the first opportunity to divest themselves of everything except their shorts and walk about like the rest of the men in Stanley. They have been even more scantily attired in their camp where there have been men only, the only garment being a fandouche (loin cloth).

Another amusing – in fact quite touching – sight was to see them talking to and lifting up small children – the dear little brats that have been one of the plagues of Stanley! The Sham Shui Po men had a tremendous welcome from the Chinese in town: they cheered them all the way as their bus drove through the town. Fancy the Chinese being so demonstrative, especially to the ‘foreign devils’. It shows what hell they have been through for them to be glad to see the Europeans coming back again, for, fundamentally, China is very antipathetic to Western men.

One POW who wanted to get away from the milling crowds, went for a walk by himself towards Customs Pass (beyond Kai Tak up the Clearwater Bay Road). He must have been the first European that the Chinese villagers had seen for some years, for as he approached they came running out, all smiles, and they thrust upon him their scanty food supplies, eggs, bananas, stinking salt fish etc. and he said that soon both he and they were talking and laughing with tears streaming down their faces.

On Thursday, (23rd August) I happened to be standing in the road to the gaol with a number of other people, when the prison gates were opened and out came a bus full of Chinese imprisoned by the Japanese. We all raised a spontaneous cheer and waved to them and their thin emaciated faces lit up as they cheered and waved back to us.

Charles Tresidder came over from Sham Shui Po and spent the afternoon with us. It is great fun renewing old acqaintances. Sidney Burt had come out on the first day, when we met him at the hospital, where Olive was recovering from a slight attack of dysentery. He is so proud of his skinny little son (the first time he had met him). There are quite a number of camp born babies who have only just seen their proud fathers. Christopher took to Sidney like a duck to water (if that similie can be used), much to Olive’s relief.

On Thursday we had issued to us some Chase and Sanbourn coffee (7 people per 1 lb tin), 1/3   of a tin each of evaporated milk, some sugar (a good dollop each!) and a little oil. Yvonne Ho had, in the meantime sent us a tin of marmalade, so on the following morning we ate our congee with sugar and cream, followed by toast and marmalade and coffee! It was heavenly. Gimson has told Zindel to buy up food in town and send it in as quickly as possible, and these things are now beginning to arrive. In addition the Japs have opened up godowns packed full of food and prices in town have tumbled down in an extraordinary way. The Japs have sent us in packets of cigarettes – 10 per person – 5 boxes of matches each, more toilet paper, a pencil each, and the other day they sent in more than 1 lb of fresh meat per person. Fortunately we now have electricity again and refrigerators are available.

The kitchen issued raw steaks to those who wanted to do their own cooking (hot plates are in action again thank goodness!) and we fried our steaks with onions from our own garden. It is wonderful to taste more or less civilised meals again. I must say that I ate a good deal of meat and Yvonne did quite well too and we both survived with no ill effects. But this larger quantity of meat proved too much for a lot of people and many of them were violently ill and had upset tummies.

It is as well, perhaps, that we have had no butter issues yet, for we are already eating richer food than we are used to, and much fat, I am told, would really upset us – do something to our livers. We did have a spoonful of some kind of margarine a day or two ago, but even to us it seemed rather poor stuff. We have been so excited at meeting friends that, really, food has become quite an unimportant consideration. What, a few days ago would have been an outstanding camp event (say the extra issue of meat) is now enjoyed thoroughly but not raved over. We are beginning to get back our sense of proportion.

These days have been most exhausting and I feel whacked out at night; but even so I take ages to get to sleep.