By the next day we were all in a pitiful state, hungry, and blue with cold. We were then issued each with Chinese jacket and trousers (which turned out to be alive with lice) and given a bowl of soup to drink. We were then loaded on board another ship, the "Shinsei Maru", a cargo vessel of about 8,000 tons. We were forced down into the holds, fitted out similar to the "Lisbon Maru". The holds contained lorries and other military transport and stores. We were kept in the holds for four days, until our arrival at Moji in southern Japan, at the entrance to the Inland Sea.
As many of us POWs were suffering from dysentery and other sicknesses, the state of the military equipment in the hold can be left to the imagination, when we were finally released from the holds. Another example of the lack of any humanity by the Japanese was shown in the fact that, although many of our chaps had wounds or injuries, the Japanese refused to issue any bandages or medical supplies. About four died in our hold during the journey and taken out and thrown overboard.