("Meijima sending telegram to Tokyo concerning I.R.C. parcels: definitely have not arrived in town.")
Betty Twydale & Marie O'Connor
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I have spent most of the week in bed and in the lavatory with continuous diarrhoea, terrific pains in the tummy and my haemorrhoids lousy. However I am feeling much better now and on my feet again. I had to have the Block doctor Dr Rhys Jones and he fixed me up all right. I am to see Dr Yaroosky on Tuesday and in the meantime I am having thiamine injections from Mrs Godfrey who has been giving me them here everyday while I was seedy.
WHITSUNDAY
Short / Sewell
Patty Mace / Jenner
Humid & overcast.
Ground rice.
Whit Sunday.
No news or rumours.
With Steve pm.
Supposed to be some good news in Camp.
Rained pm.
Operation on Dr. Dean Smith's arm. (Prof. Digby, Drs. Kirk, Newton, Alderton (i.), Uttley (p.) )
Issue of 1 tin corned mutton for four.
Showery & hot.
Ground rice & chopped wood.
4oz tinned mutton issued.
With Steve pm.
News in Jap paper very heartening re Italian Campaign. 20mls from Rome.
Muggy.
Ground rice.
Choir practice, polishing up the old stuff again.
Steve to music practice pm so I didn’t go see him for once.
Rep. Comm. to suggest children over 5 & under 15 to be included in American rep. if it takes place before our own.
Very fed up.
Cant. No 96.
Muggy, rained most of day.
Ground rice for congy & bread.
With Steve pm.
No news.
250 Portuguese to come in to godown?
Oil issue.
Beach reopened (pm's only)
8 a.m. parade roll call.
Prof. G.T. Byrne M.Sc., F.H.C. ((sp?)), J.P., Prof. of Chemistry HKU (59) died suddenly at I.Q.
(Day 887 of captivity). The beginning of a new month thank God. Time passes wearily along. One day is so exactly like another that it is extremely difficult to fix the dates of events in one’s memory. I suppose I may read this diary one day and it will bring back many things I have already forgotten about. Incredible it is to think we have been in this place for over 2 years 4 months now! If we are still here, (as I fear we shall be) by July 8th of this year, I shall by that day, have spent just half my sojourn in Hong Kong in this camp.
G. F. Byrne died while rice-grinding.
The June 1944 issue of Dover Grammar School for Boys' alumni magazine mentions internee Eric Pudney:
News of Eric Pudney has been received through repatriated internees from Stanley Camp, Hong Kong. He is taking a very active part in the life of the camp amongst other things keeping the accounts and organising and taking part in entertainments. He is also said to be an expert in camp cookery.
See: http://www.dovergrammar.co.uk/archives/pharosians/1944june.html
George Byrne, Professor of Chemistry at Hong Kong University, suffers a fatal heart attack while grinding rice flour for the cake for his sixtieth birthday. He never believed he would survive internment.
His wife Ethel is also in Stanley, and in early 1945 she will later have to bear the second blow of learning of the death of her son Brian, a former arts student at Hong Kong University, in action in Burma.
Sources:
Source:
Heavy rain all day, must be a record the amount we have had.
Re-commenced baking.
¼ lb Wong Tong ((brown sugar)) issued.
Choir practice 5.15-6pm.
Saw Steve pm.
No news. Lousy start of a new month.
Alban Mts. mentioned. Inuxio [Inuvio? Invx10?] slopes.
Search warrants "order" bulletin (6 rules)
Rained all day.
Ground rice for bread.
Added a little to my “letter” to Marj.
With Steve pm.
No news.
Wonderful feats by Japs in Burma make our efforts at war useless ha! ha! Biak Is. N.W. New Guinea occupied by us 27th May.
Cloudy, showery, improved later.
4Pkts cigs.
Awful tiffin.
Choir practice 5-6pm.
Steve to Concert in Social Hall. Saw M till he came back.
Paper makes it obvious that all Allied efforts are useless. Germans lynched one of our airmen. We seem to be stuck about 20mls S. of Rome.
Letter rec. by C. Thompson ((Perhaps C R W Thomson ?)) tells us Shanghai rec. Canadian parcels in April.
Blackout.
TRINITY
Short / Martin / Drown
Mrs. Macleod & Mrs. Andrew-Lavine ((sp?)) taken up hill for late going home after 8 p.m.
B.O.