Typhoon weather
(Club - Moring, 3 Van der Lelys, J.W. Fitz-Gerald, Ronnie Brooks, Marie O’Connor, Betty Hyde-Lay, Betty Drown, A. Hutton – Potts, Dorothy Keates)
((Barbara Anslow: Both Mrs Keates and her eldest daughter had the same Christian name - Dorothy. I should think the Dorothy Eric mentions is the daughter, teenager.))
It is still raining cats and dogs, but there is still more good news: Admiral Fraser of the Home Fleet is on his way to the Pacific with a battle squadron to join Chester Nimitz and the American fleets. We know that there are already five American fleets in the Pacific and this new British fleet together with Somerville’s fleet in the Indian Ocean brings the total up to seven. Seven fleets against the Japanese!! How I should hate to be a Japanese now.
Rained heavily all night.
Canteen buyer No.19.
Rained all day.
More Canteen gear came in.
Good evening meal tonight, good by Stanley standards that is.
Dreux captured. More gains in France & Russia. No news of Italy, Burma or Pacific.
According to C.S. the Japs expect anything to happen here at anytime. They have promised to send in a full month’s supply of rice among other things & emphasized the difficulty of getting supplies anyway. Roll on Xmas & relief as it is my guess that we shall be relieved by then.
With Steve pm.
Planes over about 1am.
Dry, overcast, squally pm.
Electricity off indefinitely (for perhaps 4 days) so got our wood boiler going.
Col. Takanada arrived for Camp inspection, but the General who should have come to carry it out didn’t come.
Water only on 6-8am & 4-6pm. Fire wood reduced by 20%. We are reduced to a stage [sic] of siege almost.
The whole Camp cooking to be reorganized. We get Congee at 10am a meal at 5pm & 4oz of dry rice.
American bombers and submarines are taking a heavy toll of Japanese shipping and generally this causes difficulties for Stanley Camp. But today they get a pleasant surprise: the shortage of coal in occupied Hong Kong means that the electricity supply has become so unreliable that the freezers at the Dairy Farm cold storage facility aren't working so the Japanese send in the pheasants. On the 23rd they'll get more of the same and on the 25th patridge will be served.
A most welcome addition to the boney fish that replaced meat in February.
NO ELECTRICITY
No bread
Pheasants from cold storage
Oh horrors! The electricity in town has failed and we are without ‘juice’ of any description. It went off early yesterday morning and has not come on since. The Japanese have said it will be off for 3 or 4 days whilst repairs are executed at the Power Station, but we have a feeling that it is off for good. I sincerely hope we are wrong in this more pessimistic view, but some acquaintance with Japanese methods and promises makes us very sceptical these days.
Overcast, showery, warmer.
Chinese paper came in. Our forces on the outskirts of Paris where the inhabitants are on communal feeding. US Anglo forces rapidly advancing up Rhone valley. St. Malo finished. Russians through Osowiec.
Veg & what is a tremendous surprise, pheasant. It seems they are getting rid of the Dairy Farm stuff before it goes rotten due to lack of power to run refrigerator plant. What a chance for Jap propaganda, “Internees fed on pheasant”.
With Steve pm.
(Camp rumour, “Japs asking for terms” “Canton about to be taken”)
Chicken Y42-55 per catty Veg cabbage Y12 ???? ((unclear))Y10.80
Leprosarium for TB cases
G???? ((unclear - "Garoupa" ?)) (red) Y36 (green) Y26.74
Overcast, heavy showers.
No food between 5pm & 10am. Hungry as hell.
Hot water at 2pm daily, once only. According to camp yarns we shall end up very soon on bare rice only and not so much of that.
Enjoyed our pheasant rissole, first meat for 8 months.
Chopped wood for water boiler.
With Steve pm & he is fed up to the back teeth.
Canteen prices increased & each person can spend 17-50.
Mary sent me up some boiled egg.
"In rooms at 9pm"
"Electricity may be on one in 10 days in month"
"Bow head when see sentries"
Hurray! The first fine day for weeks – and the water has come on again. Incidentally, there never need be a water shortage in Stanley during the wet season, for the upper Tytam Reservoir is always full and, being situated higher that this peninsula, by opening certain valves and closing others, the pumping system can be dispensed with and the supply can be affected by gravity flow. I hear that Woodward of the Water Works went up the hill to Nemuri and explained this; so perhaps that will ensure a constant supply of water. We sincerely hope so.
Overcast, occasional showers, wind SW & to N pm.
More veg & pheasant arrived.
Japs cover the raids on their main-land pretty well, only slight damage reported – 23 out of 80 of our planes brought down. Nothing outstanding re other fronts.
With Steve pm.
Internees must be in their rooms by 9.00pm now instead of 9.30pm.
Lorry arrived with rice at 9pm.
Paris is firing all its ammunition into the August night. Against a vast backdrop of water and stone, on both sides of a river awash with history, freedom's barricades are once again being erected. Once again justice must be redeemed with men's blood.
Albert Camus, novelist and philosopher, writing in the resistance newspaper Combat.
Classical concert (Esther Barton, Talbot, Drown, Goodbane, Heasman)
a.m. Hill conference about chatties
Issue oil, sugar, curry powder
"All produce of gardens for communal purposes" meal
Pheasant stew for p.m meal
Another blow is pending. When the military authorities took over, here, they obviously found that this camp had not been run in the same way as those of the POW camps at Argyle Street and Sham Shui Po, where communal undertakings had been developed to a far greater extent than they had here. At these camps all the gardens had been communal and they also established a piggery or piggeries, which apparently have been a great success. (We hear they are now able to kill a pig a week, though I don’t know how many of them there are to eat it.)
Dreamt that Germany had capitulated.
Fine day, low clouds wind N.
Chopped wood for boiler.
Oil & sugar issued.
Anglo, US line from St. Germain, W of Versailles down to Fontainbleu 21st. Germans have withdrawn their 15th Army from Calais area to support other parts of their line.
Chinese paper has even better news. US forces advanced S around Bordeaux. Jassy evacuated 21st. Vichy Gov’t moved to Belfort. French Communists retire in all parts against Germans. V.Adm.Decoux given Dictatorial powers in F.I.C.
Classical concert ((see 24th for details))
