07 Jun 1944, John Charter's wartime journal

Rome has fallen! The news was received in camp with great jubilation. The Japanese paper makes a pathetic effort to explain the German withdrawal as an instance of the consideration displayed by Germany for Italy’s famous capitol and priceless buildings of antiquity showing up by contrast the barbaric vandalism of the Anglo-American armies. They fail to say why the Germans allowed these vandals to get so near Rome; nor did they mention the fact that America and Britain had declared they would not attack Rome if it were declared an open city. Anyway, it gives a good start to June.

To return to gardening, we ate our first vegetable from the garden on 31st Oct 1943, when we picked some of the bigger leaves of the Chinese cabbage we were growing (Pak Choi). At first we considered we were doing pretty well if we had vegetables twice a week from the garden; Later, in fact from about Nov onwards we have had something every day and often have cooked enough at the morning meal to carry over some for the evening meal as well as having tomatoes and or lettuce for supper and tea. In fact, although it has meant a lot of energy output, we have had a lot in return, and it has been a Godsend. Recently, since the rations have been so terribly bad, it has meant the difference between going hungry and feeling reasonably well filled.

We have grown a considerable variety of vegetables and they include; tomatoes, carrots, turnips, pak choi (Chinese cabbage), Tientsin cabbage, English cabbage, gai laan choi or Macao cabbage, lettuce, New Zealand spinach, beet spinach, onions (spring and shallots), garlic, French beans, Chinese green string beans and white string beans, brinjals, Ceylon spinach, peanuts or ground nuts, pumpkin, cucumbers, several kinds of sweet potatoes, chilies and mint.

Quite a number of people are growing maize, but having tried a few out of season we decided they were not worth our while. Sweet corn is a very greedy plant and takes a lot out of the soil. We are able to order seeds from town through the canteen and we tried to get sugar cane cuttings, but unfortunately without success.

Our garden is somewhat on the old feudal system - the plots are not together but scattered all over the garden! We started modestly with three beds and as we got going Cox let us have other beds until all available were taken. Then we indulged in the rather heavy work of breaking new ground and made several more new beds, one or two in rather poor soil but some in quite good brownish earth. Our ambition then led us further afield and we went to the slope just below the cemetery where we broke more ground for sweet potatoes. The site was on a steep hillside but this did not matter as we built furrows one below the other. We have also dug another pumpkin pit there. To do this bit of the garden we had to borrow tools which was rather a fag and watering would be difficult – hence our choice of the crop. Actually we had decided to plant more sweet potato cuttings and so it did not matter where we located our site. The soil there is not too good but should do better at the second crop. (I hope we shall not be here for that. That is what we say every time we plant anything!).

One day Y and I are going to measure the total area of our garden. I think its size will quite surprise us. Yvonne has really been marvellous in the amount of work she puts in – the heavy work too of watering and hoeing new ground. I try to do as much of the heavy digging as possible, but one hasn’t the strength to do much at a stretch and the dull work is less tedious when two of you are at it.

In the MQ gardens are situated the huge septic tanks for the gaol. Dr Macleod, the camp health officer, allows the tanks to be opened alternately about once every 6 weeks. The MQ gardens then have the doubtful priviledge of extracting the partly decomposed soilage for purposes of manure! It is a pretty niffy job and in its half decomposed state is not such very good manure, but it still has some quite good properties. In addition we collect what kitchen vegetable refuse we can and cut and dry grass which, when buried decomposes and forms useful humus. We also try and get hold of wood ash from time to time for potash, but it is difficult to come by as nearly all of it is reserved for Mrs Lanchester who makes lye for the community for the purpose of washing clothes. ‘Lup sup’ decomposes rapidly here, especially during the summer and so it can be buried directly in the beds.

We really have learnt a lot about gardening and mean to keep a really good garden when we ‘get out’. Whether we shall or whether we shall find as many more things to interest us that we let our gardening ideas fade into the back ground remains to be seen. It will be nice to cultivate flower gardens in peacetime; so far our efforts in horticulture have only got us as far as the cultivation of some nasturtiums – the struggle to grow food is too stern to permit an indulgence in the lighter and prettier side of gardening!

Our tomatoes and carrots were a great success and we mean to plant double the amount this autumn. Our tomatoes haven’t finished yet and may last till July. Our biggest fruit weighed 11 ½ oz, not bad! Though one or two people produced a few one pounders! At present we are eating quantities of these Chinese string beans. They are delicious fried in oil. They are really rather fun as they grow to 3’ in length and you really feel you have got something when you pick a dozen or twenty of those!

I measured one of ours the other day and it registered 27”. One could concoct some quite artistic dinner party dishes by plaiting or twining some of these beans into circlets and filling the centres with mashed potato and a cutlet on top of whatever you fancy.

We had great success with our New Zealand spinach. We had more than we could eat ourselves and after giving quite a lot away to friends we were able to swap quite a lot for tea, curry powder and salt. We found this type of spinach very astringent and it ‘hit’ the back of our throats if eaten plain boiled, but it was very good curried. One thing we have discovered here is that vegetables are much tastier fried than boiled. Why the population of England persists in eating boiled cabbage (when all the goodness of the salts is boiled out into the water and lost) when cabbage chopped up and fried is so infinitely nicer, I do not know. I cannot remember having tried fried cabbage before coming to Stanley! Even so we have only oil in which to do it; the thought of butter – yum – just makes my mouth water! It is true that the greater heat engendered in the frying process may destroy the vitamins more than would boiling, but there is nothing much in it, I think; boiling itself destroys most of the vitamins anyway, but frying preserves the salts.

Another scheme Yvonne and I have (it was her bright idea) is to fill an ex coffee tin with vegetables – beans, potatoes, onions, tomatoes etc., chopped up - pour some oil and salt over them and then take them to the bakery to be baked. We are each allowed to bake a cake once in six days, so instead of cakes we bake our vegetables, and done this way they are delicious too.