06 Sep 1943, Diary of George Gerrard in Stanley Internment Camp Hong Kong

I omitted to mention we were all greatly shocked to hear of the death of Sir V.M.Grayburn in the prison here. He died of beri beri on the evening of the 21st August (Saturday) and the news was only released by the Japs. on the 23rd evening, that is 48 hours afterwards. There has been a great stink about it and our people have taken the matter up very strongly with the Jap. Authorities. No-one was informed of his sickness or death not even his wife in the camp. It looks suspicious and he must have had a tough rough time of it.

We had our block representative election last Monday and the present member Bob Young was defeated by John Barnett who is in the room next to us.

We had a typhoon over the weekend and it is only today that the wind has finally dropped tho' it is still pouring.

I handed in my 100 word postcard to you on Saturday and I hope you receive it O.K. There is such a lot I would like to have been able to tell you but we are so much tied and restricted in what we are able to say that anything out of the ordinary would mean the destruction of the card. The Japs. are funny and peculiar in their ways.

We had a very fine air raid on Thursday 2nd September and oh boy it was jolly good and we want a lot more such like. One bomb hit a gasoline tank at the Lai Chi Kok and the smoke and flames rose high in the sky for a long time . Many bombs were dropped in Hong Kong and Kowloon and it is said that all the docks got a pasting. Miskee let them have it we can start afresh some day.