Sketch by Jack Chalker

Jinsen

This story is not Public Domain. Permission must be obtained before any part of this story is copied or used.

The World War 2 Japanese Prison Diaries of

Alexander John James

Korea

Jinsen

Jinsen Korea

On our arrival at Jinsen we were greeted by the Camp Commandant, Major Okuda, with what was more a harangue than a speech.  Briefly he informed us that we rated lower than animals, and must expect to be treated as such!  Having often witnessed examples of the heartless cruelty with which Japanese treat living things, we were not exactly thrilled by this welcome.  Somewhat to our relief the position was clarified on the following morning when Colonel Noguchi, Superintendent of Chosen P.O.W. Camps, explained that as honourable prisoners of war, we would receive the same treatment as Japanese troops. 

There was a good deal of give and take, almost invariably in favour of our captors, but broadly speaking this forecast proved true.  We were not nearly so well fed (Red Cross supplies excepted), but our general discipline was usually easier, and punishments more lenient than those meted out to Japanese soldiers.  Living conditions were much the same for both.  It boiled down to the fact that we ranked lower than the Korean troops, who are themselves inferior to Jap troops, who lead a dog’s life!

Our quarters at Jinsen camp consisted of four wooden huts, two about sixty five feet by thirty five, and two more double the length, but subdivided into two sections.  A central pathway of bare earth ran longitudinally down each hut, on either side of which was a wooden floor raised about fourteen inches from the ground.  Upon this floor was laid straw matting known as ‘tatami’, and upon this we lived.  The windows gave ample light, but as a means of ventilation were superfluous, since the wind whistled through innumerable chinks and cracks in the walls.  As winter approached, as many as possible of these holes were laboriously covered with pasted paper, in an endeavour to render the rooms draught-proof.  The roofs leaked in several places, compelling many people to move their kit every time it rained.  The buildings were heated, when the Japanese thought it necessary, by large brick stoves, from which metal pipes drew off a proportion of the smoke.  London fogs had nothing on us when these chimneys would not draw!

Officers were segregated, but lived under exactly the same conditions as the men, except that the latter were slightly more crowded; we had about six feet by four per person to their six by three.  Fortunately the voyage from Singapore had taught us the art of living with all one’s worldly possessions within a few square feet.  In true oriental fashion we lived on the floor, sitting on two or three folded blankets.  Furniture was at first completely non-existent, and shelving almost so.  Later a table was issued to each squad or mess, on which to serve food, and after a few months we began to surreptitiously construct small tables and chairs for ourselves.

It was two years before any more shelving was put in.  

Jinsen PoW Campa

Jinsen PoW Campb

There were two cookhouses, one exclusively for rice, and the other for stew (of which more anon).  All food was cooked in large iron ‘coppers’ over fires of wood and coal-dust.  After the first day or two all cooking was done by our men under Japanese supervision. 

In two bath-houses water was heated in large cauldrons for our bi-weekly baths.  These were taken on the oriental ‘dip and sluice’ principal, a poor substitute for the European ‘sit and soak’ variety.  Each hut had a detached building for washing facilities and lavatories; concerning these it suffices to say that Japanese ideas of sanitation would have been considered archaic in England five hundred years ago!  We very soon realized why the Japs were so keen on inoculating us against dysentery and typhoid; it was a very necessary precaution. 

The only other building in our area that concerned us was the canteen.  As a central library and store for Y.M.C.A. sports gear it proved very useful, but as a canteen it was a failure.  The only foodstuffs that were ever sold, apart from special issues at Christmas, were two or three apples each a week from November to February, and during the first winter only, a handful of chestnuts a week.  For the remainder of the time there was an intermittent supply of cheap pencils, toothpowder, razor blades (two blades per shave), toilet paper etc.  Everything was strictly rationed, and became more and more difficult to get as time went on. 

After our arrival we were given a week in which to settle down and recover from the effects of the voyage.  Then began a course of Japanese drill, and simultaneously we had to start numbering in Japanese on the two daily roll-calls.  These drill parades, though not without their amusing incidents, were on the whole most unpleasant, particularly as the Japanese and Korean instructors developed a habit of face-slapping when they considered we were not trying.

It was at this time that the Commandant earned the nickname of ‘The Mad Major’.  Like most Japanese he was completely unpredictable.  One moment he would be laughing and joking, then suddenly his smile would fade and be replaced by an expression of hatred and fury.  As he was too short to strike most of us, he appeased his rage by throwing stones at us, and hitting us about the face and head with his sword; sometimes he came on parade equipped with a stout pole for this same purpose. 

This state of affairs lasted about a fortnight, and then ceased abruptly.  We heard through an interpreter that the M.M. had been reprimanded for making officers drill.  Next we were subjected to a positive orgy of saluting.  For a few weeks all prisoners had to salute all Japanese.  Then after repeated complaints, officers had only to salute Jap officers, and the men had to salute their equals in rank and superiors.  Actually the saluting of Japanese other ranks by our troops soon died a natural death, and defied several half-hearted attempts by the Japs to revive it.

As an alternative method of worrying us, the M.M. began Japanese lessons for officers.  These lessons, as such, were a complete failure, but were extremely amusing at times.  However, we were quite relieved when they too ceased after two or three weeks. 

About the middle of November working parties for the men started.  One or more officers accompanied each party to act as liaison between our troops and the civilians in charge of the job.   These expeditions provided a welcome change of scene, and enabled us to see something of the town and its inhabitants.  The men were engaged on unskilled manual labour of various types.  As a rule, they were not overworked, and were very soon on good terms with the Koreans; on some jobs the latter began a surreptitious traffic in foodstuffs, which cost them and the purchasers a beating-up if the transaction were detected by a sentry.  The guards were at first officious, but in most cases were soon tamed, and the men got to know just how far they could go with each.  There was little unpleasantness on the whole, and a man was seldom struck unless he deserved it, in any case the balance of undetected crime was very much in our favour.

Shortly before Christmas, to our great relief, the Mad Major was sent back to his unit in Manchuria, and was replaced by a Major Okasaki.  The new Commandant adopted the admirable policy of “live and let live”, and was at first rarely seen.  Later he appointed himself as odd-job man to the camp!  He would often be seen working with the two British camp carpenters, to whom he was more of a hindrance than a help.  They complained that he cramped their style in that they could not swear freely! (The Japs showed a remarkable aptitude for recognizing bad language, and such was their inferiority complex that they invariably took it for granted that it referred to themselves.) Major Okasaki excelled himself at times by cleaning out the drains round our huts with a shovel, prior to his own inspections!

Inspections in the Japanese army are even more a matter of eyewash than in ours.  All Jap personnel were reduced to a state of flat spin for two or three days before a major affair.  Their books were carefully falsified, and any article that officially did not exist was hidden in our lines.  When the bigwig arrived, he would spend sometimes half a day inspecting the Japanese lines, but was seldom more than an hour in ours.  These events, which were fairly frequent until we were no longer a novelty, had their compensations.  Usually there was a special ‘inspection’ stew, well above the everyday standard; this alone made worthwhile what little trouble we took to tidy the place up.  We always organized a sweepstake on the number of persons in the inspecting party. (The record was about 150)  Everything would be reduced to normal ‘scruff order’ before the last of the visitors had left our area. 

The Japanese were particularly sly about the annual Red Cross Inspections.  We were not officially informed of the visits until about half-an-hour before the interview, which took place between the R.C. representative and two British officers and one N.C.O. (all selected by the Japanese).  The first time we were caught napping, and had no report prepared.  The Japanese practice was to hustle the whole affair.  The interview was rushed through in about twenty minutes, then the representative was taken on a very hurried tour through the camp, and was not permitted to speak to anyone on the way.  The second year we were ready, having recognized the familiar pre-inspection symptoms, and managed to put across quite a lot.  As a result the senior officer was given a week’s solitary confinement, and the two spokesmen three days each, on some hastily concocted pretext.  On the third occasion the Japs insisted on editing our report before the interview!  Fortunately the Red Cross representative was a Swiss of strong character who refused to be hustled in any way; his sympathies were definitely in our favour, and he saw through most of the Japanese camouflage.  A week before the visit, twenty officers had been moved into an empty hut, and the others spread out – “The happy well-fed prisoners have ample living space”.  Two days after the inspection we were back again in our old crowded positions!

I do not wish to labour unduly the question of food, but at the time it was of paramount importance to us.  The Japanese provided the bare minimum necessary to keep us going.  Most people were two or three stone (28 to 42 lbs.) below their normal weight.   Except for perhaps an hour after each meal, we were perpetually hungry, especially at night.  Our internal capacity became so shrunk, that any unusually large meal (e.g. Christmas) had disastrous results, though the amount eaten was probably less than a normal meal at home. 

There were three meals a day.  Breakfast and supper consisted of a bowl of boiled rice, and about a pint of what passed for vegetable soup.  The consistency of this soup, or stew as it was called, is indicated by the following incident. On one of his rare visits to the cookhouse, the Japanese messing officer raised the lid of a copper, disclosing a steaming brown liquid.”Tea?” he enquired. “No, stew” replied our cooks.  He peered again and sniffed, then smiled and said “You make joke, I think tea”. “Well the joke’s on us because it is stew!”  And it was.  Admittedly it was usually slightly better than that, but not much. At midday we had the same stew plus a small loaf (about six ounces) of soggy brown dough, which these people fondly imagined was bread. (“The lucky prisoners have European food”.)  Occasionally a small portion of fish, either boiled or fried, was produced in the middle of the afternoon, and on three memorable occasions we had fried steaks of whole meat!  In winter, when vegetables were too costly, their place in the stew was taken by seaweed!  And that is every bit as disagreeable as it sounds.

Food values and dietetics took on a new interest for us.  We received no dairy produce whatever, and the only protein foods were the fish, soya beans issued daily in one of the stews, and an occasional meat stew.  This latter meant that a few lucky individuals found in their stew a lump of meat perhaps as large as a walnut.  When it arrived in camp, the meat supply for over five hundred men did not fill a bucket, and when we were only a hundred strong, the butcher carried it into the cookhouse on the palm of his hand!

Later on, when the garden started, and we had built an oven and baked our own bread, things were somewhat better.  Every three months or so we would go to the Japs with a formal moan about food, sometimes with temporary success, more often with none.  “You must not be so materialistic, if you are hungry go to sleep and will forget your hunger.”  Like hell!

Our first Christmas at Jinsen was the best of the three spent there.  Discipline was rapidly relaxing, and there was less ill-feeling between captive and captor than before or since.  At our request and expense a certain amount of extra food was provided, far more than in subsequent years, in spite of decreasing numbers.  A church service was held in the morning, and in the evening we had our first concert.  One or two people had brought musical instruments, and the Y.M.C.A. has supplied more, so that whatever shortcomings our band may have had, there was no lack of volume.

That winter was a severe one, especially as most of us had spent some time in the tropics.  Before leaving Changi we had seized what warm clothing we could, but in most cases this was insufficient.  We were issued with Japanese blankets and greatcoats, and very sparingly with certain items of British Army clothing from the enormous stocks captured at Hong Kong and Singapore.  “One shirt is quite sufficient; you must give up your luxurious ways of living.”  We had not anticipated living in wooden shacks in a temperature that remained below freezing point for three months on end.  On the main working party, where the men were excavating the site of a dockyard, the bitter north-west wind froze one to the marrow; and the open sea was often covered with ice.

One of the most memorable days of our captivity was February 24th 1943.  For some three weeks previously there had been vague rumours of Red Cross Parcels, but the idea had been dismissed as groundless wishful thinking.  I was on the ‘docks’ party that day, and as we reentered the camp after work, the great news was shouted to us – “PARCELS UP!”

Sure enough at half past five we each received a British Red Cross Parcel.  It was our first sight of European food for over a year.  The excitement was terrific, and the hubbub did not die down until long after the official ‘lights out’ hour.  A few days later we were issued with cocoa, sugar, and bully beef, bulk supplies of which had arrived with the parcels.  Thereafter for five months we each received a parcel a month, and the bulk supplies lasted still longer.

As a result of the first visit of the Red Cross representative in December 1942, a number of books had been received from the Y.M.C.A.  These were on loan to the camp for two or three months, and were then replaced by a fresh batch, and so on.  Usually a few technical and school books were included with each lot.  Sometimes the books were brand new volumes from America, but for the most part they came from the shelves of various English-speaking clubs and schools in Japan.  In this sphere we were very well catered for, and were seldom in want of something to read.

The  Y.M.C.A. also sent various items of sports gear, including baseball equipment.  There was insufficient room for football, rugger etc.; but we found it possible to play a modified version of baseball, (having trained the guard to fetch balls that went over the fence), and in April 1943 our one and only season started.  It was a tremendous success.  Three or four of the men who had played at home, together with Anglo-Chinese R.A.M.C. orderlies from Shanghai – good fellows – taught the game to the rest of the camp.  In no time a league was formed of the twelve men’s and two officer’s messes.  Each team chose a name for itself, and wore clothing suitably inscribed.  Team mascots appeared, and when Number Three Mess “Millionaires” took the field for their first match, their mascot led the cheering in full evening dress, including white (Japanese cotton) gloves, cane, and (cardboard) top hat!  Bookies opened up business and went broke in rapid succession.  Half the fun of the game was the bantering by spectators.   The standard of play was not very high, but everybody took the game seriously, and enjoyed themselves hugely.  Unfortunately on some evenings the Jap orderly officer would forbid bantering and cheering, on the grounds that Koreans outside the camp thought we were having too enjoyable a time!  Knowing as they did that the Koreans were far more favourably disposed towards us than towards themselves, they might have thought up a better excuse for their own petty spite than that!

The game could not be revived the following summer for two reasons.  Firstly much valuable space on our exercise ground had been taken up for slit trenches, leaving insufficient room to play.  Secondly the cumulative effect of our meager diet – parcels having long since finished – left us with no surplus energy for undue exertion. 

One evening at the end of July 1943 occurred an event with far-reaching results.  Shortly after roll-call Lieutenant Moore and Sergeant Bosworth, under cover of the increasing darkness, left the camp via one of the more easily negotiable parts of the fence. (The spot was pointed out to every subsequent inspecting party.)  I acted as a unwitting accomplice to the escape, in that I happened to be talking to the sentry for the area concerned at the crucial moment.  He was a harmless Jap, just out of university, who spoke a little French.  It was the easiest thing in the world to fudge the two daily roll-calls, as there was no check on persons going say from number one but to numbers three or four, while the orderly officer was in number two hut.  (An oversight that was shortly to be rectified.)  However when the roll-call bugle wakened us at two o’clock in the following night, we knew that the game was up.  The Japanese doctor – a dipsomaniac with less medical knowledge than a non-dispensing chemist – was orderly officer, and trembling and stuttering with rage, he carried out an immediate check to discover any possible further disappearances. 

The next morning it was rumoured that Moore and Bosworth had been actually trying to get back into the camp when they were caught.  This was subsequently confirmed, the explanation being that Moore had been taken ill during this twenty four hours freedom. (“Our trustworthy patrols are invincible; you are fools to think it possible to slip through the net that surrounds you”.)

Working parties were cancelled for the day, and there was a complete search of our kit, and check on the amount of money, soap (for bribing civilians), and Red Cross food held by each person.  All unopened tins were punctured, and in future tins were either issued punctured, or had to be returned empty within a certain time.  A rule was brought into force forbidding any officer to have more than fifty yen in his possession at any time, and lesser amounts for N.C.O.’s and men.  Not unexpectedly there was also an immediate tightening up of discipline.

After about a month of exhaustive investigations, into which fresh people were dragged from time to time, and after the subsequent trial, the results were formally announced to us.  Joe Moore was sentenced to eight years imprisonment, Sergeant Bosworth six years, an officer who assisted in planning the escape got three years, and five others who had lent money two years each!  In a British P.O.W.  camp the maximum sentence is twenty eight days detention!  An even greater shock than the severity of this punishment came eight months later, when we heard of Moore’s death at Keijo gaol, the circumstances of which stank to say the least. 

This was the tragic climax of what was generally considered to be an exceptionally foolhardy escapade.  Everyone ‘in the know’ had tried in vain to dissuade them from going.  Their goal had been the Russian border, some six hundred miles away.  Both were over six feet in height, and therefore particularly conspicuous amongst Asiatics. Neither could speak Japanese or Korean.  Both were undernourished, and Moore was particularly unfit.  Their food stocks were necessarily absurdly small.  In fact as someone aptly put it at the time, it was a case of ‘more guts than brains’. 

In all we had six or eight searches at Jinsen, and on every occasion it was a little more than a farce.  To carry out an effective search, at least three factors are essential: - a well organized plan of action, scrupulous attention to detail, and infinite patience.  Fortunately for us the Japanese showed a complete lack of all three.   We always managed to get notice – though sometimes only a few minutes – of a ‘surprise’ search; and it took only a very short time to distribute such things as money, soap, cigarettes, and tins of food so that nobody had too much of any commodity.  Every room had its secret chache where contraband was permanently kept.  The Japs displayed an infinite capacity for overlooking the obvious; consequently anything placed on the central fireplace, or in the middle of the floor was usually safe; though I had a shock on one occasion to see the Commandant pick up from the fireplace my water bottle containing a prismatic compass and a hundred yen!  Luckily his suspicions were not aroused.  Another time, shortly after all home-made furniture had been confiscated and destroyed, and further construction strictly forbidden, a Japanese sergeant, in order to look on a certain shelf, stood on my easy chair, (patent applied for, all materials including four new shovel handles smuggled in from working parties).  Usually this invaluable article was hidden above the ceiling during inspections, but this one was a bit too sudden. 

Another red-letter day in our lives was September 8th 1943, quite as memorable as our first parcel day.  In the late afternoon a Japanese officer brought across to the canteen a mysterious cardboard box, and before disclosing its contents, he sent for all squad leaders.  Not two minutes after they had assembled, the news flashed from end to end of the camp – “MAIL UP!”.

It was nineteen months since the capitulation of Singapore, and this was our first news from home.  We were wild with joy and excitement, and the fact that the letters were all more than eight months old in no way reduced the pleasure they gave.  From this time on, mail arrived at irregular intervals varying from one to four months.

Our outward mail was limited to four letters and a postcard in 1943, four letters and two postcards in 1944, and for the following year the ration was four letters and four postcards.  Latterly all letters were limited to two hundred words, and cards to fifty words.  Honesty compels me to add that while the mail we received gave us untold pleasure, that which we wrote did not.  In fact it was extremely difficult to think up something fresh and cheerful to say each time; not only was our existence singularly changeless, but almost everything that might have been of interest to those at home was barred by the Japanese censors.

The summer climate at Jinsen was excellent.  During June, July, and August the temperature varied from 75F to 100F, only a few days being uncomfortably hot.  We worked on the garden, shirtless and hatless throughout. Flies and mosquitoes were very trying, especially in the former which bred in millions everywhere as a result of the aforementioned Japanese sanitation. 

From March till the end of November, gardening was the chief relaxation for some of the officers.  Inside the camp, we cultivated about half an acre of very gravelly soil.  This occupied four permanent workers.  The outside garden, which did not come into use until 1944, lay some three hundred yards from the camp, and comprised about an acre and a half of fairly good ground.  Here there were five or six regular workers, and ten or twelve more who came when they felt like it.  Our normal routine was to work all morning, and return to camp in time for cold bath before lunch.  The Japanese made repeated efforts to make us work in the afternoon, but only met success when we felt inclined, which was not very often.  Our big lever was that gardening was a voluntary effort on the part of the officers, and the slightest suggestion of a direct order put us on strike at once.  When the direct order was put in the form of a respectful request from the Commandant – and not until – we usually complied.  (This state of affairs was frankly disbelieved by prisoners from camps in Japan where such action would have been ruthlessly punished.)

The garden was a great benefit in many ways.  Although the produce did not supplement our rations, but replaced them, we gained considerably, as we saw to it that nothing inedible went into the cookhouse; also the weighing of vegetables was left to us, and seldom checked!  The exercise, fresh air, and sunshine obtained were invaluable, and the temporary change of scenery was welcome.  We were accompanied by three sentries, two Koreans and a Jap, (the Japanese never trusted their Korean troops alone with us), and these were usually quite innocuous.  Occasionally a sentry new to the job, and possibly unaware of our rank, would try to make us fall in and number before leaving camp, and on arrival at the garden would order us to get on with the work.  A combination of our ridicule and emphatic disobedience, and their own inferiority complex would very soon change their ideas; anyway they never tried it on twice.

Our time in camp was passed in a variety of ways.  As previously stated, there was usually plenty to read, and a great deal of time was spent by everybody in reading.  A tremendous amount of bridge was played, with post-mortems lasting far into the night; chess and Mahjong were also popular.  Classes were officially forbidden – they came under the heading of ‘group conduct’ – but we pleased ourselves about that, apart from keeping them as small as possible, and French, German, shorthand, and book-keeping and accounting were taught.  There were several books on history, geography, economics, science, mathematics etc., which were used by individuals.  Most officers made an effort to study at least one subject from time to time.

Until the second front in Europe started (6.6.44), copies of the ‘The Nippon Times” usually six to eight weeks old, were issued to us in batches about once a fortnight.  This paper gave us a vague idea of happenings beyond our fence, gleaned from between the lines of childish propaganda, but our local news sources gave us a more accurate and up-to-date version of the war situation.

In the autumn of 1944, knitting which had hitherto been the propensity of two or three, suddenly became the rage.  Wool came from old socks, balaclavas, and other oddments, and needles were easily enough made from bamboo.  Socks and roll collars for army jerseys were the most popular items, and many pairs of gloves were made.  Two of us even produced pullovers. 

One officer had a gramophone and a few records, which like the other musical instruments, could only be played on Sundays and official holidays.  Unfortunately dearth of needles made this a very rare luxury.  After we had left Jinsen, we were infuriated to learn that shortly after the first Red Cross visit, a Y.M.C.A. gramophone with plenty of records and needles had been sent for our use.  We had seen or heard nothing of it.  At the Keijo camp a gramophone that had lain idle in the office for two years, was suddenly produced just before the 1944 Red Cross visit.  It was this sort of thing that fostered in us a violent hatred for the Japanese.  Similarly but more understandably, a radio sent to Keijo never left the Japanese office.

We never seemed to run short of something to talk about, although most topics were flogged pretty hard.  There were endless discussions on the war situation, how soon we should be free, which way we should go home, etc.  In addition many officers were evolving post-war plans which were discussed with one another.  Arguments, often vehement but seldom acrimonious, started on the slightest provocation and sometimes lasted for days.  As appears to be the rule amongst Englishmen abroad, a number of persons claimed an intimate and precise knowledge of London, and a random enquiry lobbed in their midst would keep them happily bickering for hours.  Also we had the usual sprinkling of know-alls and experts who posed as authorities on any conceivable subject.  A ‘Pocket Oxford’ dictionary acted as dumb referee to many controversies; unfortunately its decision was not always accepted as final.  Whitakers Almanack for 1935, and the 1941 editions of Pears Encyclopedia and the Daily Mail Year Book were in constant use. 

Our tolerance towards one another seemed to increase with time rather than the reverse.  We learned to suffer in silence, and behaviour which would have earned immediate rebuke in normal times, was allowed to continue for days or weeks before somebody had a quiet word with the offender.  I suppose each of us realized that one’s particular idiosyncrasies must be just as annoying to others as theirs were to oneself.  During the whole time of our imprisonment I only once witnessed a blow struck in anger, and there were I believe not more than ten or twelve such cases amongst the men.   Admittedly, home truths interspersed with the usual abusive epithets were sometimes exchanged, but such ill feeling did not as a rule last for long.  If one disliked or even hated an individual, the fact was best kept to oneself, and that person avoided as much as possible; if it happened to be one’s next door neighbor, who lived about two feet away for twenty four hours a day, then that was just too bad. 

At the end of November 1944, long after we had given up all hope of such a thing, a large batch of American Red Cross Parcels arrived from Vladivostok.  Apart from a single American parcel in February 1944, we had received nothing from the Red Cross – no fault of theirs – since the first lot of parcels.  This fresh consignment gave us gastronomically a new lease of life.  The Commandant announced that the reason for so great a quantity – there were over two thousand seven hundred parcels – was that more prisoners were expected to arrive shortly from the ‘Southern Regions’.  This confirmed rumours we had heard of a party of Americans being on the way from the Philippines.

By this time there were only forty six officers and fifty four other ranks at Jinsen, parties having left a various times for Mukden, Kobe, Konan (further north in Korea), and Kyushu (the southern island of the Japanese group).  We occupied only a quarter of the available space in camp, yet the Japanese staff was practically the same in number as there had been for five hundred of us. 

From then on there were constant rumours of the expected party, and explanations for the delay in their arrival.  One rumour said that the party had been bombed and machine-gunned by American aircraft while in a Formosan port.  Half way through January the carpenters were suddenly ordered to prepare two of the empty huts for immediate occupation.  Still nobody came.

Our peace of mind (if any) received a nasty jolt on January 25th, when our private intelligence system informed us that all officers were to be moved to Keijo in two or three days!  At once surreptitious preparations for this upheaval began.  We had accumulated a surprising quantity of junk during our two and a half year’s stay, most of which was now jettisoned.  The famous Jacobean chair with shovel-handled legs, that had served me so well and escaped many inspections, had to be cremated, as none of the other ranks cared to risk a beating-up for being caught with it.

We did not forget to feign astonishment when on the morning of the 28th we were officially told that we were to move to Keijo on the following day.  Our kit was packed, searched with the customary inefficiency, and loaded on a railway truck that night.

At eight o’clock in the morning of the 29th we marched out of Jinsen camp for the last time, and entrained at a nearby siding.  An hour and a half later the camp disappeared from our view, as we were borne away numbed with cold, cooped up in a draughty unheated cattle truck!

Goto

[Alex John James] [Introduction] [To Singapore] [Singapore Under Siege] [Into Captivity] [Singapore to Korea] [Korea] [Life of PoW at Chosen] [Jinsen] [Keijo] [Freedom] [Alex Summery] [Appendix - Notes] [Appendix - Rolls] [Appendix - Speeches]

 

Sharing information with others is rewarding in itself, the pieces from the jigsaw begin to fit together and a picture begins to appear. Improve your knowledge and help make the Fepow Story an everlasting memorial to their memory.

Any material  to add to the Fepow Story please send to:

Ron.Taylor@fepow-community.org.uk

and their story will live on.

 

[Alex John James] [Introduction] [To Singapore] [Singapore Under Siege] [Into Captivity] [Singapore to Korea] [Korea] [Freedom] [Alex Summery] [Appendix - Notes] [Appendix - Rolls] [Appendix - Speeches]

 

Ron.Taylor@far-eastern-heroes.org.uk

 

Design by Ron Taylor

© Copyright RJT Internet Services 2003