Exactly three years ago today we arrived in this camp! Three dead years in our lives! And all this time we have firmly believed we would be free in the next 6 months. Well, it is a mercy that, in the beginning we could not forsee this endless internment. I am sure that if we could have forseen it, many more people would have tried to escape. On the other hand, I think the camp would have been organised on a long term policy instead of our short term, month by month policy and, in consequence, we should have been much better off in the long run.
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Cloud, E wind, not quite so cold.
Ground rice.
Cotton to Mary & she gave me egg & pork.
A/r 3.40pm. 16 planes heavy stuff dropped. All clear 4.30pm.
On holiday this week.
Margery Fortescue, Victor Cross (6), Stewart Valentine (13), Peter Hall (10) and Kenny Macleod (8) have chickenpox, they're not in hospital.
Clifton says he's dying of hunger - maybe appendicitis, perhaps gall-bladder; they're not sure about operation.
Newspaper says the Japs are eager to meet the enemy in Manila. Parcels rumour afloat again.
Many happy Returns Rae darling. I’ll be with you both soon.
Cloudy, warmer, brightened up during forenoon.
Ground rice.
A few sips of Chinese wine with Steve proves how careful of “booze” I must be when it is procurable.
Lorry with wood & veg 5.30pm.
Chinese paper has it that Russians have 180 divs in the field & that the offensive they have started will not end until they reach Berlin. Battle for Manila commenced. Allied Offensive opened N.sec, W. front.
Apologetics class in morning. No raids. Rumour that parcels are in town and will come in with next consignment of rice.
Misty, NE wind.
Ground rice.
Chow at Steves pm pkt cigs.
27 workers cigs Dec.
Weather cleared up 4pm. NW wind.
Germans in retreat on Russian Front. All other news seems good.
“Slug” in. Japs wanted Camp reps. to sign statement re the bombing of Bung.”C”.
Plane over 10.15pm.
Our room's turn to sweep the passage.
Water-carrying day; spent a long time at water hydrant, then went down to well. ((strangely, now I can't remember where that well was!)). There's a pump now. Met Concannon there, he carried water up for me. Got most of my washing done, and hair.
Newspaper supposedly suppressed. Rumours of Canton being surrounded.
Clifton still on fluid diet (at hospital).
Lovely stew - carroty and oniony - for tiffin.
The Japanese Red Cross sends the International Committee of the Red Cross a telegram which gives us an idea of the set up in the camp medical facilities in early 1945:
Tweed Bay Hospital containing about seventy patients in six wards attended by ample medical staff and qualified nurses. Latter accommodated top floor hospital...TB Sanatorium in excellent location and presently accommodat(es) ten male and three female patients....
(spelling and punctuation normalised)
Cloudy. NW wind. Warmer.
Ground rice.
Some chow at Steves.
Took door down for Rita.
Nickel [Nicol?] saw me re work .
Lorry with nothing.
Yesterday’s papers destroyed.
Annie insisted on my going home with her after Mass, and I had coffee with sugar!! ((Annie was Dutch; her parents and brother & sisters also in camp; somehow her family had access to food from outside sources, and were always very generous. Many of the non-British internees had been brought to Stanley some time after the British, so had had more time to prepare for internment.))
Visited Doreen (Leonard), am going to teach her shorthand.
Cloudy, colder. NE wind.
In workshop.
5,000 killed & wounded in raid on Wanchai last Sunday.
Taiwan raided 21st & 22nd. Advances made on Luzon to Tarlac area.
Lousy chow today. Hungry as the devil. Come on Yanks, get us out of this damned hole.
Chopped wood for Rita.
Rec.4.25Y worker’s pay for Dec.
Rice going into go-down.
Paper with-held again.
Formosa raided by 3,000 planes yesterday?
Journalist Eric MacNider writes in his diary that a woman has been brought before the camp tribunal for requesting a double-decker wooden bed, which she then chopped up to use for firewood.
Source:
Christina Twomey, Australia's Forgotten Prisoners, 2007, 72
Outdoor a.m. roll call
No ration lorry - only greens
Low cloud, cold NE wind.
Outside roll-call 8.30am.
Workshop.
Steve for coffee, gave me 2 pkts cigs & Y100.
Rice flour ½ lb Y25. Noodles - Y10.30 ¼ lb & Sugar 9.45 ¼ lb.
Fixed chatty for Mrs W.
20 to town rice loading.
“Shell” House, Dockyards & part of Wanchai damaged. Kowloon go-downs, five ships sunk.
Danzig captured. Hitler & Himmler at the front. German generals have been given a free hand. Japan raided 23rd.
Some internees arrested for liquor selling, and one found - so rumour says - in Stanley Village at 1am.
Requiem Mass for air raid victims.
Rumour that Russians are 90 miles from Berlin.
Eggs selling at 38 yen each.
Drizzly, NE wind.
Guards picked up Scott, Ward & Channing for trading but it seems to be purely local. ((There are several possibilities for each of these names, so I'm not sure which three he is referring to.))
Went to Prep. school clearing clogged pipes. Had a meal there too. Like ours but more of it.
Yesterdays paper not worth reading.
Russians breaking thro’ Posen area are now 30 mls inside Germany according to latest notes from North.
Air raid alarm at tiffin-time, but heard no noise.
My voice gave out at choir today – hopeless.
Hardly any rations - just beans and greens for both meals.
While I worked in afternoon, gramophone recital in office. ((Sunday))
Planted N.Z. spinach - given by Mr. A. R. Cox.
There is a service at 9.45 a.m. to mark the third anniversary of the united Protestant celebrations (see Chronology, January 25, 1942).
Frank Short, Chairman Stanley Ministers and Clergy, has previously advertised the service by circulating 'A Message to all Christians in Stanley.' part of which reads: