Unit diaries relating to service of Geoffrey W. Fennell - Wallet 2 - Part 4

The procession approached having first inspected the Camp Guards, who were all

dressed in Marching order. First came the Camp Adjutant, followed by

Genera Audo himself. He was really a fine figure of a man, well over 6 feet,

and broad in proporation. He had grey hair, rows of medals (including our own

of the Great War), spectacles, and a large moustache rather like Francis Joseph,

the old Austrian Emperor! Then came the Colonel Commandant , and an array of

Staff Officers, the tail being brought up by Warrant Officers. One looked rather
a nasty looking piece of work with gold cords hung at his shoulders and a
swaggering cavalry gait. All their uniforms were very smart but boots not so 

good. The parade passed off without comment, and we fell in again in our huts in

two ranks on one side of the table.  
The procession passed through and this time there was a large old boy wearing

General's badges at the back having a good look on his own.  He looked like a

grizzled old boar!  Then the Japanese Camp Staff were fallen in by the office,

and harangued by the gentleman with the gold cords, who appeared to be Chief of

Staff. He then gave them a sheet of paper to read, as if he was setting them

a problem. Groucher looked as if he wanted to run away, but Moonface was his

usual imperturbable self. The Commandant then arrived, let out a stream of

orders in Japanese and Air Raid and Anti Parachutists Drill followed. Roll Call

came next, and Groucher, the Orderly Officer, took so long that eventually they

told him to stop!   We then went out and saw the General depart. Groucher, with

much shouting and screaming, indicated that Roll Call would have to be done again,

and this time was successful.
The final event of the day was that all boots had to be checked, and in future had

to be put into the boot room tied together in pairs instead of in bundles by

messes. The day actually ended with a joke on Groucher. One of the officers had

a match box, in which he kept odds and ends. He was sitting at the table with 

the box by his side, when Groucher suddenly appeared. He pounced on the box and

let forth a stream of Nipponese, and was just going to hurry the officer to the

cells for being in illegal possession of matches when the contents of the box

was shown to him. He registered great disgust and contented himself by pinching

the new empty match box! “The tumult and the shouting have died, and "the

Captains and Kings” having departed, we returned to the normal level of routine -

and so did the Rations!
Vegetable Gardens
On March 9th, the long promised start was made on a camp vegetable garden to be

made by the officers. We were quite keen on it and felt that the work would

be of some value instead of the purely manual labour we had been doing at

present. Plug Ugly marched us out to the Labour Camp where we drew shovels and
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changkuls and then went on to a long strip of grass alongside a large dried up

lake in which the men were working at this time, making a “Japanese Garden".
We then divided up into Mess Squads, and the job was to move the grass on top so

as to get at the earth to be dug up and made into beds. This work went on for 

about 3 days, and we were shown by Jerry Mathews of the Signals how to do "Double
Digging". We formed up in lines across the plot and then stared by digging a
trench about a foot deep, after which you were ready to start. You then dug a
spade's depth and put the soil and grass, if any, into the trench; then dug
another spade-full down and put the soil on top. By this means the ground was
really dug up and we all thought of the sweet potatoes, tomatoes and onions
which we were told were going to be planted athough we hoped we should be free
before they came up! The men's work consisted of draining parts of the basin
which had been flooded, and also bringing earth in baskets, and building a 
mound in the middle, which was christened "Fujiyama"!
On March 12th there was a sudden hullabaloo during Morning Roll Call when the

Air Raid siren went. At first we wondered whether it was the real thing, as we

heard planes starting up on the aerodrome, but it turned out to be merely a

practice. Still it was cheering to us to know that the Japanese now considered

Air Raids a possibility in spite of telling us that all the Allied planes

had been destroyed long ago! Most nights were Black-out nights. The chief inconvenience
of these Air Raid practices was that it was part of the drill to

douse the cookhouse fires, and meals sometimes came up very late except on days

when we were on cold salad, which now consisted of white cabbage, ginger root,

beans, red pickled cabbage and yellow Chinese radish, which was really very good,

particularly if it coincided with a sugar issue.

About this time we got another issue of the Nippon Times about 6 weeks old, the

chief items being (1) Stalingrad completely cleared of Germans and the remainder

captured. (2) Russians landing at Novorisisk in the Black Sea. (3) Churchill

has conference at Tripoli with Alexander and Montgomery, and then went on to

Turkey with the Foreign Secretary, General Brooke, General Maitland Wilson, and

Navy and Air Force experts. (4) Japanese admit loss of air and manpower

superiority in the S. Pacific. (5) Large convoy left Gibraltar for the East.

In fact, very good reading!

After 3 or 4 days' work on the gardening patch, we were taken off it to put a

fence round the Nippon barracks and Cookhouse so it appeared that the Garden was

only a flash in the pan.
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Results of the Audo Inspection

In the middle of March a new system of Roll Call was started. Roll Calls at

7 am and 8 pm were abolished, and, instead, there was a roll call morning and

afternoon immediately after return from work. In addition to this, we were

liable to have a roll call at any time during the night and early morning.

At first the camp staff were very keen and chose hours like 23.30 and 04.15

but gradually they got tired of it and frequently we had one immediately after

Lights Out and no more. One great advantage of there being no Roll Call at

7 am was that it gave us extra time to get washed. At Roll Calls during the

night we were allowed to go back to bed as soon as our hut had been checked,

and early huts on the roster were frequently asleep again before the last one

had finished.

The general evidently asked questions about the Canteen, but unfortunately

Mr Seeto, the accounts officer, developed jaundice and so nothing could be

done until he recovered. However we were given some Bandmann Vitamin pills to

be going on with and also rice polishings, which were made up into a sort of

a mash, or else issued meat from the cookhouse. At present there were about

190 Beri-beri cases, and the number appeared to be on the increase. The

other chief item of note was that "Franky" was posted elsewhere and his

successor "Nicolas" appeared to be a much more human person. Franky's ideas

of PT for the sick will never be forgotten. (An Atrocity Form was filled in

against him) To talk of something rather more pleasant, there was an issue

of "Pineneedle Sauce" at a bottle a head. This was quite good and it tasted

like an inferior brand of Worcester Sauce; it went well with rice and put a

little life into the stew. It was also found that when mixed with tea, the

result was not unlike Bovril!

The Vegetable garden came to life again but we never went back to the first

patch. A bed was dug up alongside the fence by the office, and tomatoes,

cabbage, two types of beans, radishes and some flowering shrubs were put in.

"Nanny" Goat of the Signals was put in charge, and in due course the earth

brought forth fruit, the French beans particularly being good.

After this, the garden work was again consigned to oblivion as the Commandant

had decided that a large area of old garden on the far side of the exercise

ground was to be filled in and added to the exercise ground and the officers

were put onto this. As it would take years to do this, with baskets at the

Officers' trade union speed, a length of line was fetched up one Saturday

morning and laid down from the hillside to the new place, and about a dozen

trucks were brought up. The lines were very old and rusty, but were bolted

together by a long thin young gentleman with dark blue trousers but when it was

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