06 Mar 1943, John Charter's wartime journal

I must here record that today is the wedding day of Eileen Bliss and Mr Frederick Hall. All day the occupants of the next room, Eileen, Mrs Glanville and Joan Armstrong, have been working away at their preparations for the wedding and the reception. The bridal party has just now left on its way to the ‘church’ i.e. the BCC office (transformed), some 50 yards distant! As Eileen and her father turned the corner I heard the skirl of bagpipes, so I presume Mr Hall is Scottish. Almost immediately afterwards, 3 large Japanese bombers zoomed overhead in arrowhead formation – a bridal salute? I fear me not. Now, for the next 15 minutes or so everything is quite quiet, and then, I doubt not, things in this section of the camp will brighten up considerably. I heard the words, “Bottle of Champagne,” mentioned! How they have come by that I cannot imagine. Well, all good luck to them.

In many ways I cannot help feeling sorry for couples who have been married in this camp and who have had to be content with all the inevitable makeshift arrangements here. I think of our own lovely wedding and thank God we were married when we were and had 10 months together in our own little home before being pitched into this maelstrom. However, from their point of view it will doubtless be just as happy a day! Now the skirl of the pipes again, they are returning – Mr and Mrs Hall, God bless them.

We had been having some fun during the previous few weeks on account of our over crowded room. Our room measures, 18’ x 15’ and next to it is the dining room of the flat (ours is the living room) measuring 12’ 6” x 15’.  A 9’ verandah runs the full length of these two rooms and of course makes a difference, as in dry weather people can sleep on it.

During the first four months of camp there were 12 of us billeted in this room – Jack and Vera Armstrong with Bridgette and John, Harold and Elsie Bidwell, Isa Watson, Tim and Marjorie Fortescue with baby Adrian, Yvonne and myself. In the room next door were five ladies – Mrs Glanville and Joan, Eileen Bliss, Constance Wood and Dinnie Dodwell; on the balcony (for the first week only) were Dr & Mrs Canaval, Mrs Stevens, Irene Hasler and Judy Graves. The Canavals erected the jib sail of a yacht, which they had brought with them, to protect them from the cold winds. When the Japanese guards etc., billeted at first in block 2, moved out after the first week or so, the verandah contingent managed to get a room for the 5 of them in block 2, where they got to work and organised the first baby clinic. Y and I had in the meantime slept in the hall with the Bidwells. The B’s had a 3’ 6” wide mattress and we had a couple of mintois which we just spread on the floor. Jack Armstrong slept on a camp bed in the small pantry. This was inconvenient for the other people in the flat because if they wished to use the hall lavatory at night they had to stumble over the Bidwells and us. Also it was most disturbing for us. Incidentally there was no electricity in those early days.

To be more correct, our party occupied the dining room to start with, but we changed with the 6 or 7 women in the living room, 2 of them finding accommodation in another flat. Then the Japs sent round an order that no halls or pantries must be used for sleeping purposes. So Harold erected the sail (bequeathed by the Canavals) in the corner of the verandah and he and Elsie slept outside. Isa slept outside on the verandah on a camp bed she had managed to bring into camp with her, and the Armstrongs, Fortescues and Charters slept in the room. There was just a gangway where Isa could put her bed when it rained. Really, when we were all in bed on a wet night we completely covered the floor! It was awful.

Some time in May (I expect I have noted the date earlier in this diary) the Kadoorie family – very wealthy Indian Jews – managed to get passages to Shanghai and the Armstrong family quickly moved into their room and just claimed squatters rights! (They have remained there ever since! 4 of them in a 5 person room in block 2!) The difference it made in this room! Now we were 8 instead of 12. All this time we had eaten our meals around the dining room table which we had placed in the hall – there simply wasn’t room for it in our room. The eight of us continued to eat our meals in the hall and we were joined by Mr Lammert who after much wandering had obtained, for his sleeping space, one of the small pantries on the top floor of this block. Mr Lammert is Elsie and Isa’s father. The other people in the flat did not really like us eating in the hall, but they admitted we were very crowded. We also kept our plates and cooking utensils in an ice chest in the small pantry.

Well, one day, sometime early in January, the billeting officer of these blocks, one Captain Taylor of the Mercantile Marine, brought us a note from the camp billeting committee requesting us to move all our goods and chattels from the pantry as it was to be converted into a living room for Mrs Bruce.

Now, Mrs Bruce, up till then , had shared an Amah’s room in this flat with Mrs Joffe and her baby, Elizabeth (the first baby born in camp) and they were finding it too much of a squash. These Amah’s rooms measure 6’ x 9’ 6” and are small for two adults and a baby, but the Fortescues had applied to the billeting committee months ago for such a room, as it is most difficult both for the parents and for the other people in a big room when there is a baby amongst them. It generally means that the parents have to give way to the baby for the sake of peace and quiet when really they should let him bellow at the top of his lungs without paying attention if he is being naughty. And it is certainly trying for other people to have to put up with all the domestic inconveniences attendant upon the upbringing of a baby, especially when it isn’t their own! (I can’t imagine how everyone survived this all in one room!)  Hence the desirability of giving parents with small children or babies a small room to themselves.

So when we heard that we, already overcrowded (this type of room is officially scheduled to hold 6), had to move our things to make room for Mrs Bruce who was moving out of one of these rooms, we proceeded to protest. We moved out our things but at the same time wrote a letter of protest to the billeting committee. We pointed out that (a) we had been in possession of the pantry originally until ordered out by the Japanese authorities, and that this order had never been officially countermanded;(b) the committee had long ago agreed we were overcrowded but had done nothing about relieving our congestion, though, as we had discovered by enquiring, we had applied long before Mrs Bruce. (Our idea was for Isa Watson to sleep in the pantry as there really wasn’t room for her in the room in wet weather. The Bidwell’s had had to move in when the wet weather came). (c) The Fortescue’s would be only too glad to move into an identical Amah’s room (3 of them) from which Mrs Bruce was moving. We sent this letter to the billeting committee and gave Mrs Bruce a copy. Incidentally, we told Mrs Bruce we had nothing against her personally and that it was just a matter of policy and fair play, and I am glad to say we are still good friends.

The committee turned down our appeal so Tim worded another appeal – which was well written and much to the point – and we sent it to the Camp Tribunal. This Tribunal is the final court of appeal in all matters affecting camp life and is composed of three men: Pennefather-Evans (Chief of Police), M. Blake (a solicitor) ((probably D H Blake)) and someone else. Tim was summoned to appear for us and Capt. Taylor appeared for Mrs Bruce. In the end our appeal was upheld as the tribunal considered that the billeting committee should have made a definite ruling concerning pantries and given former occupiers a chance of resuming their occupation. They decided that the Amah’s rooms were too small for 3 but that Mrs Bruce should be found accommodation elsewhere. Mrs Bruce appealed against the decision and the tribunal decided that she should remain for the time being and that our block committee should decide whether or not pantries were to be used as permanent living quarters. In the meantime the Fortescue’s were put down on the list for an early move into one of the six kitchens in block 3. The sinks and the unused boilers in the kitchens were being moved out (the sinks into the small adjoining pantries). This suited us all – including Mrs Bruce who, incidentally has remained undisturbed – and on about February 10th the Fortescue’s moved house.

The remaining 5 of us moved all the furniture out of the room on to the balcony and set about having a magnificent spring clean. We scrubbed the floor (normally a polished floor), washed the windows, brushed the walls and ceiling, not to mention the picture rail. Then for one marvellous week there were only 5 of us in this room and as it was fine weather and Harold elected to move his camp bed onto the balcony, there were only 4 of us sleeping in this room. We had room to move the dining table into our room, thus propitiating the other members of the flat. However, this idyllic state of affairs (for Stanley) was short lived. First the 6 members in the end room asked us if we would change rooms with them as they were 6 in a 5 person room and we were 5 in a 6 person room. It seemed rather mean not to, but we had been so terribly overcrowded for a whole year that we felt we deserved a little relief. Also it meant we should lose the use of the balcony, so we said we regretted we did not wish to move, but one of them could come in here.  However, they said they did not wish to break up their mess, so that was that. Then the Norwegians came in and we had to have another person. (In passing I might note that I have been requested by the Blocks Committee, to draw a typical floor plan of all these ‘Married Quarters’ blocks, for reference purposes and billeting, and that in doing so I measured the end room in question and found it was 18’ 6” x 15’ whereas ours is 18’ 3” x 15’! It had always been taken for granted that ours, being the living room, was the larger. It would really have been funny if we had exchanged and Mrs Graves and Co had found they had no more than before for their things!)

When Eileen Bliss was married it left a vacancy in the next room. Apparently Mrs Glanville suggested to the billeting committee that Isa should move from our room to theirs and that her brother (Mrs G’s) and his wife should then make up the 6 in our room! At all events, Mr and Mrs Humphreys arrived on our doorstep next morning complete with an order from the billeting committee stating that Isa was to move out and them in. We said very firmly, “Very sorry, nothing doing”. Why should Isa be separated from her sister when she had been here one year? We made a counter suggestion that the odd person next door moved in here and Mr and Mrs Humphreys join their sister and neice next door – knowing that for family reasons this idea would not work!

The next day Mr and Mrs Sutherton–Russ arrived with the same story and again we were polite but firm and during the afternoon yet another couple appeared. Harold and I more or less took it in turns to be in the room in case of emergency. Then Harold went to see Roberts of the billeting committee who explained there were 4 married couples to be moved from the Dutch Block for whom accommodation had to be found without separating married couples – hence the idea of moving Isa. However, Roberts agreed it was their policy to unite members of families rather than separate them and agreed to send only one person. Then we tried frantically to think of some single congenial person. We tried several but found they were already fixed up. In the end we asked Mr Lammert if he would like to come and join us. We had felt that, being an oldish man, he would prefer to remain by himself in his pantry. However, he seemed quite to welcome the idea of a change and so, on Saturday 19th, Mr Lammert moved in here. So now we are finally settled.

When he vacated his pantry, Jack Robinson moved into it and Jean screened off the kitchen next to it. This solved several problems for it meant that these two, hitherto living in two different flats in this block, were at last together; Jean had been in Mrs Greaves’ room so their numbers were reduced to the requisite 5 and they were happy. Jack Howell moved into Jack Robinson’s old place in the bachelor room in the flat above; he had been in a four person room with Mr and Mrs Whitley and Harlow ((probably C M Harloe)). As Harlow ate his meals and spent every day with two friends of his in block 3 and slept in the hall in any case, he was given the ‘linen cupboard’ in which to keep his things and moved out of his room. This meant that Mr and Mrs Sutherton–Russ could be moved into the room with the Whitleys. This happened again and again all over the camp and I know for certain that to re-billet the 55 British from the Dutch block more than 200 people had to change about.