On the twenty-fourth of August the military interpretercame into the women’s camp, and ordered all the women togo to the chapel at 4 p.m., saying that Colonel Suga wouldaddress us. Colonel Suga had never before spoken to us onour own ground: we had always been ordered to stand in thesquare and await his convenience.
At four in the afternoon the sun hung hot and lethargic inthe Kuching s^. It glared in our pupils at eye level, andbored m the windows of the chapel where we sat. The heatwas stifling, the room was silent and breathless, we weretense to the point of agony, and Colonel Suga was an hourlate in coming.
George was with me, unusually quiet for him, feeling thetension. I prayed over and over. This was the last chance. Icouldn’t survive, if the prayer wasn’t answered this time —God, make it peace.
I looked about me at the women in the chapel. We hadstood a great deal. When the Japs cut our rations, wehad laughed. When they sent us to work in the fields we hadlaughed. When they cut oflF the water, and we carried itfrom wells, we had laughed. When we were hungry, ill,tired, we had laughed. But now, if this promise of peace wasone final joke —we could not laugh!
I looked about me and saw women who had performed im-possible physical tasks, and who looked it. Faces were strained,lined, agonizingly controlled. Hands were stained and bluntedand calloused; feet were bare, broken-toenailed, grimy, withsores and septic toes; clothes were worn, patched, faded, and
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scanty. There were only half a dozen out of the whole twohundred and forty-six who looked at all attractive and alive.Of the rest, some might regain attractiveness, but never youthagain. Captivity had taken too much.
At five o’clock Colonel Suga arrived, accompanied by twomilitary aides. As he entered the chapel, I shook with nervoustension, and my heart pounded as if with adrenalin, my handswere cold and damp. We rose to our feet and bowed. Itwas the last time we were ever to do so to Colonel Suga.
For the first time in our imprisonment, he spoke to us thatday in his own words, without a written address. In the pasthis speeches had been written for him by prisoners, some-times by myself, and at his dictation they had run to oratoryand self-praise. But this day he spoke slowly, with painfullysought-out words, and carefully controlled emotion, and therewas no false note. I know that the words he spoke were trulyterrible to him to speak. They were the death of his prideand probably his body, and they were the coming to lifeagain in us of these things.
Many times in the past I had watched Colonel Suga’sprison audience, and felt the hidden smiles, the latent sneers,the suppressed snickers sweep through them, inaudible andinvisible, but more insulting than a loud guffaw. I have seenSuga stop cold in his words when that wave of derision struckhim, and turn yellow and stiff, while he reached out mentallyfor some way in which to retaliate against the contempt of histwenty-five hundred captives. But he, the victor, had no wayto retahate; he could shoot them, or torture them, or bribethem — the sneer would be in their hearts, though they died,and he would know it.
This day, as one of the vanquished, for the first time incamp life he commanded public respect, even from those whohated him most. We knew that we were watching him die,and that he was doing it bravely.
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What he told us was this: Peace was here. The events lead-ing up to it, and the principal causes of Japanese surrender,were as follows: (i) The complete collapse of Germany inMay of this year, and her acceptance of the Potsdam peaceterms. (2) The use of the atomic bomb by the Allies inJapan, a bomb more destructive than any other, and onewhose use was against international law and humanity.(3) The declaration of war against Japan by Russia, on Au-gust 9. The Japanese Emperor could not bear to see themisery of his people, borne by the women and children athome who had suffered by the destructive forces of the atomicbomb. In order to save the Japanese nation from completedestruction, he had asked on August 15 for an armistice tothe fighting, and had agreed to the Potsdam Conferenceterms.
This would be good news to us prisoners, Suga said, butwe must not get excited, or lose our control, as danger wasnot over. We must obey orders and keep calm.
The Japanese Army was still undefeated. They still heldsuccessful positions in all the occupied countries, especiallyChina, for the Armed Forces had not lost the war. Theseforces had refused to surrender. But, as Japanese, they had toobey their Emperor, therefore they had renounced theirJapanese nationality, and repudiated their allegiance to theEmperor. They were determined to fight on to death, as vic-torious, brave, and imdefeated soldiers.
This morning the Emperor had sent out three princes tothree important military positions, to attempt to persuade thegenerals to follow his orders. He, Suga, hoped and prayedthat they would be successful, and the end come soon. Ifthe peace terms were made reasonable for Japan, perhaps theprinces would be able to persuade the Army to cease fighting.
Kuching, he said, was now the military headquarters inBorneo. The military forces had taken up their positions in
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the highlands, from whence they would resist the Allieswhen they came in to Kuching, and there might be fighting.He, Colonel Suga, was prepared to obey the Emperor. Oursafety was his concern. But he had received no orders of anysort from anyone, and no official information. Kuching wasat present unable to communicate by wireless with the out-side. He would do what he could for our safety, but theJapanese officers and young men were hotheaded and fa-natical, and they had the weapons. Therefore, although peacewas in sight, we must not get excited, we must keep calm, donothing to aimoy, and obey orders. We must be patient, andkeep up our morals.
He then read aloud the pamphlet dropped by the Allies onthe twentieth, which I had concealed on my person andwhich probably he had on his, when we had met that after-noon. When he read the sentence, “At last the Allies havedefeated completely the Japanese, and the Japanese Emperor,on behalf of the Japanese Nation, has accepted unconditionalsurrender,” I semembered the times in the past when Sugahad told us that Japan would win the war, if she had to fightfor ten years longer. I felt that in that sentence the ultimatedegree of humiliation for him was reached.
This was Suga’s last message to us in captivity.
Suga left in his car, the same car from which he had somany times in the past distributed small packets of biscuitsand sweets to the clamoring children, when he was the victorand had the spoils. George looked after him and said, “Didhe feel bad. Mum, because he lost the war?”
After leaving us, Suga went to the men’s camps and madesimilar announcements. It was obvious that he desired toavoid mass meetings, or demonstrations.
A Douglas C-47 flew very low over camp. A door openedin the center and two blond airmen leaned far out, wavingand shouting and laughing at us. We had crowded to the
entrance of the camp when we heard the plane flying low,and now we waved wildly back, jumping and cheering, notknowing what was happening, but sure that it was good.
The C-47 circled camp and returned, swooping evenlower as she neared us. The center door opened again, themen were leaning out waving, and suddenly, to our delight,out of the door came a long torpedo-shaped object. It shotdownward; then, just before reaching the ground, a para-chute unfurled above it, and the torpedo settled softly to thegroimd, between the entrance gates of our camp. The thirty-four kids fell upon it. On the six-foot torpedo was printed theword BREAD.
People have asked me since if we raced for this first bun-dle of food, and tore it open, and fought over it. Such an ac-tion would have horrified us. We might have felt like it, butwe could not have done it. Mean tricks we had learned incaptivity, but an equal division of rations had become sacred.
In any case, half-starved though we were, that first para-chute meant so much more to us than food that we were noteven tempted. Even more than our bodies, our hearts hadstarved — for contact with our own people, for a touch of thefriendly hand. The word on that parachute spelled bread,but it meant, YOU AR
E NOT FORGOTTEN. The greatest satisfac-tion we could get from its contents was ours already.
Twenty-five parachutes descended that day. At first theJapanese held us back; but by the time the planes had left,we had raced forward and started salvaging the parachutesthemselves, which we saw would be priceless for shirts andpants. Some of those first parachutes — made speedily into pants— were walking around on children and mothers withintwenty-four hours.
In addition to bread we received that day boxes containingtinned tongue, ham, rabbit, milk, butter, chocolate, biscuits,sugar, custard powder, soap, toilet paper. Red Cross medicalsupplies, and a little clothing.
During all of this people continued to go mad. Georgeleaped into the air like a puppy, women jumped and wavedand screamed, tears flowed, noses were blown, hearts pounded,laughter and cheers poured out. All but myself; I went verysilent, in a cold sweat, with an asinine smile, and no words formy feelings. I could only nod my head, Yes, Yes, in agree-ment with everyone that this was the greatest moment ofour war.
On September third. Colonel Suga gave a “farewell party.”Invitations to attend were delivered to Allied representativesof the prison camps.
Some refused to go. For the first time in prison life we werein a position to say No. As communication was now allowedbetween camps, Harry sent word to me not to accept. Butjournalistic instinct urged me on; I had a feeling that partywould be unique. I had seen the mud and blood, and now Iwas going to see flowers strewn at the victor’s feet. So I sentword to Harry by Dorie that I was going, wouldn’t he gotoo? He would.
We arrived at the top ofiice at 6 p.m. Here we foundColonel Suga resplendent in Japanese uniform with the sameAllied World War I military decorations on his chest thatHarry has. His former prisoners, now his guests, wore the newuniforms with which the Japanese had supplied them afterthe armistice, and the civilian prisoners wore their coming-out clothes, hoarded throughout imprisonment for the timeof release.
There were about sixty persons at the table, including allthe Japanese ofScers of the camp. Victims and torturers min-gled nervously. Lieutenant Kubu, the chief inquisitor of thecamps, sat across from me. He was a drug addict, and par-ticularly cruel when his supply ran out: he would get it onFridays, and on Friday night one could ask him for anythingand get it, but Monday to Friday he was bad.
This night he asked me who my favorite English author
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was. Every time we met, which was on all camp searches,Kubu always asked me this question, both of us being, hetold me, literary.” I replied with a different author eachtime, but he always gave me the same answer: “Kipling isthe favorite author of the English people.” Kipling, withhis TVhite Mans glorification, was not the favorite authorof the Japanese people. Tonight I told him that Dickens wasmy favorite author, and he rallied me with “What? NotKipling?”
Dr. Yamamoto sat next to me, and was as usual very polite.We talked little, and he ate scarcely anything. The atmospherewas too tense for any jokes.
Miss Asaka sat between two civihans from Harry’s com-pound; the attempt to force fraternity by interminglingfriend and foe was obvious. Her train-announcer’s voice pene-trated the strained laughter of the others, but nothing couldpenetrate the dead silences which frequently occurred.
We were seated at a long U-shaped table in the top office,which had been built for Colonel Suga a year before by thePOWs. When it was near completion, the workers had col-lected the bedbug which abounded in the POW camp, andestablished them in the cracks of wood in the new offices.I was reminded of this story tonight by a young Australianofficer near me, who muttered a sinister question in my di-rection: “Do you itch yet?”
Lieutenant Nekata sat at the center of the U-shaped tablenear Suga. He spent his time jumping up and down pouringdrinks for prisoners of higher rank. Suga himself was sur-rounded by Australian officers, as a tribute to the AustralianKberators who were now on their way to us.
The meal consisted of soup, beef, pork, fried rice withmeat, vegetables, bananas, jelly, hot water in cups, and ciga-rettes, followed by local “whiskey” made from pineapplejuice. As the whiskey was passed around. Colonel Suga com-mented, “This whiskey wiQ be very strong for you, because
you are unaccustomed. It is for a toast.” So we waited todrink it for the toast.
When we finished eating Suga arose to speak. His handswere shaking, and he cleared his throat constandy, and mis-pronounced his words. I had never heard his English so bad.His words were:
“Peace has come. The Japanese have surrendered. That isgood news for you, but not good for us.” (Here a nervouslaugh, not echoed by anyone else.) “I am very sorry so manyprisoners have died. This seems to some of you to be due tosome neglect.” (Here followed a completely unintelligibleflow of words for several minutes.) “I am very sorry for therelatives of the dead people. I also am a relative of deadpeople. I thank the representatives of your camp for workand assistance in running these camps. I hope there are nohard feelings or thoughts of revenge with you. I hope some-time we can be friends. Let us drink now to better feelings inthe future. Cheerio.”
We drank. With the unpremeditated, involuntary motionsof people hypnotized, the glasses were raised and lowered,and the whiskey slipped down our throats. I felt then that nocomment could ever be made on this party which couldequal the party.
These men had been our torturers and executioners, theyhad starved us, and left us to die from disease. But this waswar, the object of which was to kill; this was legitimatemurder and destraction. If there had been poison in the soupand arsenic in the drinks tonight, I could have sympathized.But to sit here as guests, with our stomachs full and smirks onour faces, and wish each other well, was perversion of everyinstinct.
Old Lady
Despite starvation and abuse, the soldiers had one thingthat we did not have to keep up their morale —they hadauthentic news of the outside world.
Throughout their imprisonment a homemade radio wasconcealed — and functioned — in the British soldiers’ camp.On this wireless the first news of peace was heard, on thenight of August 14.
In the Australian POWs’ camp in Sandakan the Japanesehad discovered a similar secret radio set in 1943, the radiofrom which we had received smuggled news reports whenwe were on Berhala Island. This discovery had made theJapanese suspicious of the existence of one in the Kuchingcamp, and they searched constantly to try to uncover it.Memory in this camp of the execution of a number ofAustralian POWs as a result of the discovery of their radiomade our soldiers more wary in hiding their own.
The radio was never referred to in camp by name, butspoken of as Granny, Mrs. Harrison, the Ice Cream, the OldLady, and several less polite terms. Knowing that the livesof its inventors and protectors were forfeit to its discovery,as well as the welfare of the whole camp, a security serviceof men was formed to guard the Old Lady. These kept guardon the Japanese guards, with more eflSciency than the guardskept guard on them. Night and day a signal system of songs,
whistles, and bird noises kept the Old Lady vigilant to theapproach of danger in the shape of guards, officers, andKempi-Tai.
At first the soldiers’ camp had electric lights, and whilethis lasted the radio was run by electricity. Later when theelectricity was discontinued, the radio ceased to function fora four-months period, during which time the men were busyat work making a hand-power generator. It took them onlyone month to make the generator itself, but it had taken themthree to make the tools with which to make the generator.
This hand-power generator was run by a flywheel, whichwas disguised as a barrel top. The wheel was turned by oneman, and had to revolve at the rate of three thousand revolu-tions per minute in order to generate sufficient power for theradio. The man who turned the flywheel was given extra foodand care in camp, and developed huge muscles in one armand side from turning it. After sixty seconds of turning, thesweat poured from him like water, and he could turn for onlya few minutes at a time.
With the exception of the four mon
ths’ silence during theconstruction of the generator, the radio never ceased to func-tion throughout the entire life of the Kuching prison camps.Only a dozen or so soldiers in camp were trusted with theknowledge of how, or where, the Old Lady was hidden, orwere given at first hand the news that she brought — becauseof the necessity for secrecy, and the great risks attached toher possible discovery.
But rumors which they knew were based on fact reachedall of the men, and these cheered and interested them. FuUyas important as the news itself was the fact that the camp knewthat in spite of everything the Nipponese could do, despitethreatening, searching, watching, and listening, the Old Ladystill thwarted discovery, remained ahve and well, and wasfunctioning regularly. This heartening defiance of the enemygave them courage to live and the will to endure, when noth-
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ing else might have done so. When peace finally came, theOld Lady’s welfare was considered to have been such a vitalfactor in keeping up camp morale that some of the youngmen who were responsible for her birth and preservation werelater awarded military decorations for their accomplishment.
The manner of the Old Lady’s concealment varied throughthe years. At first the wireless set was buried in the ground,and dug up every night for use; but this was hard on theOld Lady’s guts, and also on those of her caretakers. In timea recess was made in the walls of the kitchen, and here she wasincarcerated behind a false wall, which had nightly to beopened up and then replaced after use. In the end a table witha false-bottomed top was constructed, and she was hiddenthere, behind a drawer. Here she lived contentedly until theend of the war. On this very table the Japanese officers wouldfrequently sit, drumming nervously with feet and hands, whiledirecting the search of the guards in the kitchen, for theOld Lady’s hiding place. Frequently during the Old Lady’sclandestine life she was so near to detection that her protectorsmust have lost some of their longevity, even if escaping im-mediate execution. But the Old Lady never choked a valve.True to feminine instinct, she was at her best when sur-rounded by anxious males.
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