Evening star., 1942-08-09
Continued From First Page. }


prison is like. What kind Of treat
ment I received. What 1 got to
eat. Every detail OF life inside the
prison camp that / can remember.
I suppose that the best way to
tell this is to start with the surren-
der of our forces to the Japanese at
Hong Kong. Then it can be seen
exactly how the Japanese act
toward the people they have con-
quered. do not think 1t makes
any difference whether the people
they have conquered are British,
Canadians, Eurasians or Americans.
They do not have a little gauge by
which they measure their amount
of hatred. 1t is all the same with
them. So think the treatment I
received would be the same as that
given to an American boy from Iowa
or New York or anywhere. And it
would not make much difference
either If you were colonel or
private. The Japanese are great
Jewelers..
Wanted to Hold Out.
The day Of the surrender, I was
getting ready to sit down for Christ
mas dinner at the military garrison
at Aberdeen, which is on Hong
Kong Island and was about five
miles to the south of the British
headquarters in Victoria barracks.
There we're about 1900 of us sta
toned there in a large reinforced
concrete building. There were In
dians, Middlesex, Canadians. Men
who ranged in age from is to over
10. There we're volunteers, armed
regular army and naval men. Any
one who could handle a gun.
The Japs had been shelling us
from every angle for days but 80 per
cent of the shells had been duds
and they had been using 3-inch
shells which made a lot of noise
but hadn't been able to do more
than nick and splinter the concrete
walls. So we kept on thinking we
could hold out. That was what we
wanted to do. We wanted to hold
out. We were like Old Man Rodg-
ers, the American stockbroker
Old Man Rodgers keeps coming
into my head. He was 73 and the
last time saw him he was going
into the front lines with an old
hunting rifle slung over his shoul-
der.
There were the Jap shells ham,
mering at the walls, but we were
thinking about what the cook had
managed for Christmas dinner when
they told us that it was all over.
A commander in the Royal Navy
came into the mess hall and made
the announcement. His voice was
fiat and dry.
Told to Surrender Arms.
B He said it was all over and that
we had surrendered to the Jap
anese. He said we were to throw all
our rifles and automatic and
grenades in a big pile in the center
of the mess hall and then wait to
see what happened.
When he said that, the 1900 men
made sort of low, rumbling noise.
1t was the kind of noise you hear
in crowd when something happens
that the people don't like. But the
men were soldiers. They were under
orders.
Then the commander said:
There will be no foolishness.
Every man must lay down his weap-
ons. No one will attempt to make
his way out into the Japanese
So we all moved forward and put
our guns in q big pile. Some of the
men threw theirs down. but most
just let them slide from their hands
as though they were too tired to hold
them any longer.
Then we stood around and waited.
We did not want to eat or think
about 1t very much. For two and a
half hours after that the japanese
kept on shelling the building,
Waited for Jap Captors.
went to window and looked
out. 1t was cold and clear. I
could see the blue sky and the
white puffs of smoke that were the
Jap artillery positions. I thought
how good it must be to see just
one plane fly over and drop some
thing on them.
Then it was dusk and after a
while the shelling stopped and we
stood there in small groups in the
darkness. That was the way 1t was
all night. We waited for the Japs
to come and get us.
Some of the men laid down in
their hunks or on the floor and
tried to 60 to sleep or they kept
lighting cigarettes and talking in
low voices. Every once in a while
when match flared you could
see the reflection on the heap of
steel in the middle of the room
But there was nothing you could do
| about it.
The next morning we had orders
to march out The Japs had ma
chine guns trained on us and their
faces were blank. The morning was
clear and cold and the Japanese
flag was flying over the Govern
ment House. think it was only
then-when I saw that f1ag-that
I actually believed that all this was
happening. I had seen the British
jack flying over that building fol
81 years.
No one spoke. We shufiled slow.
ly along the roads and streets. W.
did not know where we were 60.
ing or what was going to happer
to us. From time to time we woule
see the bodies of the dead. The,
were tortured dead.
Use Small Rifles.
Because they average only abou
five feet, five or five feet six inche
in height, the japanese Use a small
or pllp and a no1ler hovoref tho