Papers written by Hodgkin, Ernest P. (Doctor, b.1908 - d.1998) - Part 18

appearance of wielding a changkul. It is going to be most interesting to see how our experience 
of internment affects the attitude of the European to life in general and to the indigenous 

population. I shall be very surprised if, upcountry at least, we do not adopt a much more 

sympathetic and friendly attitude than we did before.

For the accommodation of these new arrivals a number of new huts have been built by 
our own labour. They are constructed from round timber and attaps, and being devoid of 

windows are dark and airless and are a great come-down in the world of those who have had 
to evacuate relatively palatial quarters in the wooden huts to allow extension of the women's 

camp. To add to the chaos the Nips have today ordered the evacuation of three huts at the other 

end of the camp, and there is no accommodation available for the unfortunates who are being 

thrown out. We are taking a number in this hut and Dr Molesworth is coming to live in our 

room. He is a very likeable individual and has common interests with myself and others in the 

room as he is a keen naturalist and an artist. Why the three huts have to be vacated has not yet 

been vouchsafed us; a barb-wire fence has been erected round them.

An addition to our mess will be an advantage. You cannot live in such close 

association with the same five persons for a year or more without sometimes getting on one 

another's nerves, and a congenial change of company should ease the strain. We all have our 

idiosyncrasies and some of these are easier to tolerate than others. Recently I have become 

very allergic to John; he is a bossy young man who must always be organizing others and in 

consequence has rather set the whole hut by the ears. To make matters worse he has recently 

been thrown out of his hospital job because the staff had to be reduced and has less scope for 

his activities, and in consequence he is even more restless than Eric, hardly ever reads a book 

and is forever fiddling about with bits of 'cookery'. Meal time conversations are not easy; Eric 

sets the ball rolling with 'It has been suggested ...' followed by some scheme of his own for a 

complete reorganization of our feeding arrangements, or some equally debatable point. He is 

immediately taken up by Alan who will point out that if we only feed twice a day we shall be 

very hungry for the rest of the time. Battle being joined John returns from food-serving and 

joins in with an 'I-I-I ...' (he has an impatience-stammer, being in such a hurry to get

something out that his words fall over one another). Eric continues with "I told Hughes (the 

Cook) that most people would prefer a small meal in the middle of the day.....' Whereupon 

Ernest interrupts with, 'What do you mean by most people? I wasn't aware that we had ever 

been consulted in the matter!' - and then relapses into silence having uncivilly wrecked that 

argument. Eric perhaps tries again in his best Wickham Steed manner (he is a grand lecturer 

but a trying conversationalist), 'You will be interested to know ...' followed by some highly 

coloured story of dubious authenticity. John probably will cap it with another, though neither 

in manner or words expecting one to believe the unreliable. He will then start upon some 

scheme for ordering the consumption of our palm oil - a matter which has long ago been settled 

satisfactorily to the mess in general and needs no further discussion.  Rupert may have 

interjected a devastating comment on some particularly questionable remark of Eric's and 

Stuart has maintained a poker-face throughout. The conversation is not by any means  always 

on such a low level and there are often discussions on medical and scientific subjects, but the 

parts taken by the disputants differ little; ex-cathedra statements by Eric, reasoned comment by 

Alan, something about everything by John, occasional comments from his personal experience 

by Rupert, occasional dogmatic statements by Ernest on subject he thinks he knows something 

about, and a rare statement of fact by Stuart.

20th May   We are still here! And despite a flood of rumour, there seem no reasonable 

grounds for thinking that our lot is likely to improve in the near future. Even in our newsless 

state we are now reasonably sure that Germany is out of the war, and in so far as that brings 

the end nearer we are justified in hoping we shall not be here so very much longer. But the 

many stories of an early release, and of peace with Japan, are of a kind with the many similar 

stories we have heard from time to time during the last three years. It is a continual source 

of surprise to me with what eagerness born of hope I listen to all such stories and search for a 

grain of hope in every least event of our monotonous lives. If I who have so many interests am 

affected that way, it  is scarcely to be wondered at that many with few interests in life so hang 

upon the least breath of 'news' that may give hope of early release. Everything we observe we

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explain in the roseate light of hope, seldom in the cold light of reason; for example there has 

been no raid here since Good Friday and for more than a month there has not even been a 

reconnaissance plane over; for a time this was held to be evidence that the war was really over 

or that an armistice had been signed; the more rational explanation that for the time at any rate, 

there was nothing of sufficient importance to bring our bombers some thousands of miles over 

enemy territory could not get a hearing.

The Red Cross parcels were eventually delivered to us on 23rd April; one to each old

internee and to five new internees. The General took photos in the orchard of happy 

family groups opening their parcels but that did not affect the generality of us. You may 

imagine the thrill of opening them after waiting more than three years, the excitement to a 
semi-starved, rice-fed internee of chocolate, tins of meat, cheese, butter, milk, and all sorts of other 

good things; then the even greater thrill of tasting such things again. Nothing was wasted, 

neither the mouldy chocolate nor the musty prunes and raisins. The rate of consumption has 

naturally varied greatly according to the tastes of individuals; some are even reputed to have got 

through the contents of a parcel in twenty-four hours, we in our mess are trying to spin ours 

out over three months (POW's in Europe are said to get a parcel every fortnight!). The 

impact of such unaccustomed food on the stomachs of those who have indulged not too wisely 

has often proved too much for them and they have revolted! It is hard to think that in all 

probability one could not tackle a decent meal without disastrous results. The rest of the food 

parcels are still in the hands of the Nips and there is no prospect of their early release.

The miscellaneous comforts  were also released, they were so few that they had to be 

drawn for: I won a tube of shaving cream, a few fortunates got shirts and trousers - articles 

almost beyond price in these days of shortage and inflation. Books, cobblers' outfits, 

cigarettes and the rest of the medical supplies have also been released. The library took a quite 

unconscionably long time to place the books in circulation, a quite unjustified piece of 

inefficiency under the circumstance. The selection is not a good one, but that is probably 

because only a very small proportion have reached us: besides a certain number of fiction and 

general non-fiction (including the collected plays of Shakespeare), there is a very mixed bag of 

instructional books: from the operation of farm gas engines to simple science problems for 

children, many are very elementary and a sore disappointment to instruction-hungry internees,

but for all that few are likely to lie idle on the library shelves for long.

There has been another batch of letters and cards (three from you) bringing our news 

up to August and September of last year. From yours I guess that you were considering going 

Home at a time that many others went; the photo also looks suspiciously like a passport photo, 

but it is a joy to have. I am glad you decided to stay where you are, I cannot see that there 

would have been anything to be gained for you and the babes by such a move and I can see a 

lot of disadvantages - not that I am in any position to judge of the advisability of such a move. 

I should think that G's own initiative combined with a good fund of reading matter would fully 

offset any minor defects in the schooling available in Perth. He is going to have a hard time if 

he is ever going to read, or read with me, all that I planned for him to read! At the 

moment I feel that I wouldn't mind what I did or where I worked so long as I was with you 

dear five. Unfortunately I still feel I have a responsibility to this country, and in any case I do 

not suppose that jobs will be so easily come by after this is over, particularly for those who 

have vegetated for three years. I sent you a wireless the other day, I wonder will it ever reach 

you! What is there that one can say in such messages that you want to know except that one is 

alive and well. I did my best to be informative; I wonder what you will make of my statement 

that I am making spectacle frames. Arthur and Jack also sent you messages so with luck one 

should get through.

Talking of vegetating, I have done something to keep my brain alive: little 

writing since we came to this camp except for my few attempts at verse, but quite a bit of 

serious reading of a somewhat discursive nature; literary, philosophic, biologic, and a wide 

range of general reading.  am now studying Logic! Not with any intention of becoming a 

dialectician - that is too foreign to my nature - but simply of trying to find out what it is all

47

about and perhaps improving my powers of reasoning. I am pleasantly surprised to find that 

logic is very much the type of thought in which one was trained by all scientific studies.

The days fill themselves without difficulty: chores, some six hours of spectacle 

making, a bit of reading, and feeding leave little out of a day that starts at 7.30 and finishes at 

9.30 when the lights go out, or soon after when one is glad to crawl into bed so as to conserve 

calories. The spectacle industry is flourishing: I have now made over one hundred new frames 

from old toothbrushes, they are sturdy and efficient, and with their bright colours help to cheer 

the life of the camp, they fill a vital need and they are one of the few things that are to be had 

free. I sometimes get a bit fed up with the daily grind but I couldn't change my job now if I

wanted and I find it difficult to get more interesting work. This week I have made an 

engagement ring for Miss Foss! She is engaged to Richard Sidney so I offered to oblige him 

with a ring. One of the girls gave me a tourmaline and this I have set in your old opal ring 

which I still had.  had to make a silver setting and soft solder it to the gold, neither of which is 

a very satisfactory arrangement, but it looks rather nice and should see them out of internment! 

The match causes me much amusement as you may well imagine. I wonder how it will work 

out, they are so different in many ways and one would imagine that they must be fairly set in 

their ways, but three years of internment may have been sufficient to shake them out of any 

incompatible habits. 

The food situation has not altered appreciably recently. Schweitzer, the 'Neutral 
Agent' seems to have ceased to exist and so we get few extras to the Nip diet. The bulk of the

Red Cross parcels is insufficient to augment it appreciably, adding only a little vital protein and 

some real flavouring. Most   people acquire red palm oil by various methods of purchase or 

barter and so manage to add a few vital calories. We gave a pound of butter and a pound of 

jam in exchange for four gallons of red palm oil and thought we did well by the exchange; we 

now take about 2oz each a day which is just about as much as we can cope with. The morning 

kunji is laced with a tablespoon of the oil; the midday 'hash' a watery mixture of green

vegetables with a little root and rice, carries a dessertspoonful, and we make up a spread of oil 

and gula malacca to put on bread or mix it with savoury rice in the evening. It is not the clear 

red fluid one bought in peace time, but a thick often solid grease with a fair admixture of ants, 

flies, and an assortment of less pleasant adulterants beside the mere dirt. One becomes 

acclimatized to the taste, except when the oil is rancid, and that takes some getting used to!

A drastic cut in the firewood (more than half) has necessitated alterations in kitchen

arrangements and we no longer feed from the hospital kitchen. We get less variety in the food 

but in some ways it is better: if the hash is thinner  the kunji is thicker than we used to get, and 

instead of a rather miserable wet bun every day we get a good solid lump about twice a week, 

all of which I appreciate because I get very tired of slush and like to chew on something 

relatively solid. One amazing dish the new kitchen produces is an evening 'pudding':  it is little 

more than a semi-solid kunji but has a suet-like capacity for sticking to the ribs. Rupert and 

Stuart find considerable difficulty in getting through their portions in spite of starvation, the rest 

of us watch them hungrily to see whether or not they will make it. Our manners are scarcely 

genteel, we almost scrape the enamel from our plates in our endeavours to capture the last 

calorie, and after a meal of bully beef or other such luxury, we lick our plates! Revolting, I 

know, but so would you if it were three and a half years since you had sat down to a civilized 

meal and were as hungry as we are. The high-light of evening meals was I think bacon and 

eggs, the bacon cold out of the tin and boiled eggs (at $9 each!). Surprisingly the bacon is very 

good that way and it is not a vitiated sense of taste that makes me say so. Food, food, food - it 

seems to fill our thoughts; may you never be in a position where food is such an all-important 

interest. I can assure you of the accuracy of the saying that hunger makes the best sauce: only 

a really hungry man could swallow some of the things we lick our lips over. 

29th June  Another birthday has come and gone and I don't seem to be any nearer 

release or to reunion with you my darling. I can't say that I feel any older, but I get daily more 

fed up with this futile existence. That I have benefited from this internment is beyond doubt; I 

have learnt much that I would never have had time to study in ordinary life; as a result of close 

contact with my fellows I think I have rubbed off some of my corners; I have made many new

48

friends; and above all I have had time to stop and think whither my life is leading. But it has 

been long enough now - far too long: there are books enough, and experts in abundance, to 

allow me to go on taking up fascinating new lines of study for years to come; I have no doubt  

plenty more corners to rub off; there are any number of people I have never spoken to; and 

immunity from the press and immediacy of ordinary life might enable me to widen my 

philosophy of life; but however fine a philosophy, however many friends, and however wide 

one's knowledge one cannot LIVE in a monastery. I have no desire whatsoever to become a 

monk. I often wonder, if on February 13th 1942 we had known that we were going to be

interned for three or four years, how many of us would have tried to get away? We say that we 

stayed because it was our duty to do so and because we had jobs to do, and we say that those 

who ran away were rotters and we despise them. All very true, and any decent man who had a job 

to do would have regretted desertion for the rest of his life; but we sometimes forget that we 

have other duties, more especially to our families; that for two or three days devotion to duty 

we have paid with three and a half years of futility, and that the only good we did by staying 

was to show - rather late - that the Englishman does not run away from his responsibilities. I 

think many more would have done their best to get out, justifiably too, and not only the many 

older men who should in any case have been sent off long before the end. This is not to 

include those older folk who considered themselves domiciled in the country; they did not 

anticipate internment.

Camp Notice dated July 1st: "Fish in the Drains".  "There are at the present time a number of 

fair-sized fish to be seen in the drains in the Camp and it has been decided to trap them on an 

organized basis. Dr Dugdale and Mr J. Johansen have been put in charge of the scheme and 

from today no fishing, 'gudding' or other attempt to catch the fish is permitted to internees. 

Any traps or 'Dams' that may be set must not be interfered with. Any fish caught will be Camp 

property and will be utilized as such." To such a pitch of madness are reduced that we must 

organize the collection of a few miserable catfish that feed in the sullage drains of the camp!
Recipe for a good rumour: take two announcements by the Nip authorities, preferably 

quite unrelated to one another; add imagination and speculation to taste; allow to simmer for a 

couple of hours and serve hot with a spice of rhetoric. Two days ago it was announced that 

there would be a medical inspection of all internees between the ages of 15 and 55, the reason 

given being that it was imperative that we increase the production of food. Yesterday a notice 

came round stating, what has long been obvious, that some internees had many more

belongings than others; this caused discomfort and inconvenience (sic) and in future no internee 

might possess more than one suitcase, one bed and bedding, and one chair. All trunks etc in 

excess of this must in future be stored centrally (There must be only a very small proportion of 

old internees that have more than this). The combination of these two pronouncements very 

soon gave birth to a variety of rumours. One of the more highly coloured rumours was that all 

the fit men were being sent to an internment camp that had been prepared for us in Johore, and 

where we would have to grow all our own food. I forget what was the alleged date of our 

departure. The women and all the other male interns were to be sent into Singapore, which was 

to be declared an open city. Not bad! Of course it is axiomatic that no reason given for an 

order made by the Nips can be believed. This is an unfortunate assumption and leads to much 

groundless speculation; that it is not altogether unsupported by past experience is unfortunately 

not altogether untrue. A recent case in point seems to be the tunneling that is being done in the 

hillside opposite this hut. The camp has had to provide the labour to dig the tunnel and we are 

told that it is for the safe protection of our stores. Everyone believes that this is just a polite 

fiction and that the tunnel is for an ammunition dump or for some other military purpose; all the 

evidence of our eyes points that way. The men digging the tunnel have been given much extra 

food to enable them to do the work, and to begin with this included oatmeal and Horlicks, both 

commodities which we thought had ceased to exist long ago. It is a mad world this, we are 

being starved in a world of seeming plenty (to judge by the new internees); we are paid at the 

rate of 40 cents a day and a month's earnings is not sufficient to buy an egg on the rare 

occasions when these luxuries are obtainable through the black market, which is the only 

source of them.

49

15th July  The 'medical inspection' the other day passed off without incident and we are

still in ignorance of it's purpose. About two thousand male internees marched solemnly past the

inspecting officers, each was asked his name and a character was written against it in the list,

and that was all for most of us. There was a Nip doctor present but I could not see that he took

any part in the proceedings. A few people were asked by the interpreter what was wrong with 

them if they had anything as obvious as an arm in a sling, and a few were asked if they had had

anything wrong with them. The interpreter (who lived in the States until his 'repatriation') 

asked one man, "Have you had any disease before?" and to the rejoinder, "Before what?" , he

replied, "Thank you, next man please"! By our own folks we were lined up and numbered off

on the road through the camp, in the full sun, but fortunately the Nips allowed us to make

ourselves comfortable under the trees in the orchard. I spent a very pleasant afternoon talking

to Dr Holmes whom I only regret I do not see more of as he is quite one of the most interesting

and intelligent persons I know; he can understand my pacifist views and he has not the usual

flag-wagging, bombastic, imperialistic ideas that seem to me to be altogether too prevalent. In

this backwater we cannot guess what plans are being made for the future of the world but I

cannot believe that it is to be based on an Anglo-Russo-American imperialism; if it is then I do 
not see how the peace is to be any more enduring than the last. I do not like our hosts, their

treatment of us has not been such as to inspire affection (I doubt if any prisoners ever enjoyed

their lot), but I get no pleasure from the though of their cities being ruthlessly bombed; it

seems to me that it can only result in a tradition of hatred that will take generations to disperse.

I have just read 'The Road to En-dor'. It would be a fascinating book at any time, but

it is especially apposite to our condition here. It is the story of life in a POW camp in Turkey in

the last war, and of how the author and a friend secured their release by practising

'spiritualism' and the simulation of insanity. They had a dreadful time while 'insane' and were

only exchanged a fortnight before the Armistice was signed with Turkey. But the interest of

the book to me is in the resemblance between the realities of life in their internment and ours, 

although there were far fewer of them than there are of us. As with us their chances of escape 

(by running away) were negligible and so they had to settle down to make the best of a bad job

for the duration, employing themselves as best they could with books, study, entertainments

and sport. His comments on the difficulty of living long with even the best of companions

struck a sympathetic cord, for at times even the good qualities of one's companions become

insupportable; helpfulness is interference, friendly interest is inquisitiveness, talkativeness is an

unbearable garrulousness, and a lack of interest becomes callousness. The lack of any real news

of the outside world and of the progress of the war, the lack of variety, and of any well

founded hope for an early termination of hostilities and release, were all the same with them as

they are with us. The credulity of many of the prisoners and their inability to observe

accurately and to reason logically are well brought out by the readiness with which they

accepted the genuineness of the spiritualistic sessions that were only a very successful fake.

That last makes one wonder whether one would not have been taken in oneself; though I don't

see how anyone quite as sceptical as I am could be taken in except so far as one is taken in

by a conjurer who is able to confuse one with a trick that one knows to be false. The treatment

of these prisoners by their hosts in many ways resembles our treatment here; the difficulty of

contacting the officer in charge of the camp, strafes for the misconduct of individuals, the

misappropriation of parcels, and in other respects

Yesterday we had ocular evidence of the nearer approach of the war to us. A type of

plane that we have not seen before spent half an hour going to a fro over our heads; it was

evidently flying at an immense height and travelling at a prodigious speed, twisting and turning

with a rapidity that at once proclaimed it different from the huge, four-engined planes that we

have come to expect. Even at such a great height we could see that it had a twin-fuselage and

was quite different from anything that any of us has seen before. Of course the know-alls were

able at once to supply details of its size, range and performance - matters on which we are

necessarily ignorant. As a herald of the approach of our forces it was cheering, but, placed as

we appear to be in the centre of an area that is to be 'defended to the last man', it is with mixed

feelings we contemplate the approach. We assure ourselves that we will be moved from

here before the fighting begins, but the only evidence for that belief - if evidence it can be called - 

is the construction of what we believe to be military works within the perimeter of the camp,

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and the knowledge that civilians are being encouraged to leave Singapore. None of us can

view with equanimity the possibility of fighting here, fighting that would be far more severe

this time one imagines.

29th July   The behaviour of some of the new internees has led to restraints and

disciplinary measures that we have not known before. Two escapes have resulted in 
reimposition of morning and evening roll calls, which, though no worse than an inconvenience,

are an annoyance with which we have successfully dispensed until now (except for a short

period some months ago). The first escape was a lad (Eurasian I think) who had run up

gambling debts in the camp which he was unable to pay. He left a note for his 'Hut

Representative' saying that he was going because he was tired of the camp and the shortage

of food here! The second man to go was a young Jew, and it is not clear whether he had gone

out for a jaunt and to get a square meal intending to return or whether it was a genuine escape.

The trouble is that there is nothing to prevent anyone leaving the camp except a trumpery affair

of barbed wire or of planks, together with a guard of Sikh sentries too sparse to be any

deterrent. The real preventive of escape is, as it always had been, the thousands of miles of

hostile territory that lie between us and freedom. Even at Changi there were people who

thought it worth while to climb the wall for the freedom of a night - they did it once too often

 and got caught - and here there is nothing to prevent that sort of thing except the fear of being

caught. With any who have any community sense there has always been the fear that if they

were to escape the whole community would suffer. Following these two escapes the

inhabitants of the two huts where they had lived were first put on half-rations for twenty-four

hours and then dispersed to other huts in camp. The latter necessitated a general re-shuffle

of living accommodation and consequent ill feeling when people had to uproot themselves from

their accustomed niches and re-establish themselves with their soap-box furniture, their bits of

attap and canvas, and their square yard of onion and lettuce beds. We nearly found ourselves

on half-rations in this area when a hospital patient was found escaping; fortunately the Nips

were dissuaded from penalizing us when it was explained to them that he was mad.

Trouble arose in the women's camp recently when the Nips discovered that tapioca

had been stolen from the camp garden. The women's rations were cut to rice only until, after a

day or so, the culprits were apprehended; what happened to them I do not know. The culprits

were again new internees, and their male relatives are likely to get us into trouble this side for

the same offence.

The new internees are not the only offenders against the community, far from it, but

they are the most flagrant, partly I suppose being what they are they have less social sense than

the old internees most of whom come from a different section of society and partly because

they have not been interned so long and it has not yet occurred to them that the camp is a

community to whom they have a loyalty.

I suppose it is very good for all to have to subordinate our individual interests to

those of the community, but after three and a half years of it one begins to long to regain one's

individuality, to be able to do what one likes when one likes without having to think always,

how will my neighbour be affected? How will they react? In the camp as a whole it is fairly

straightforward: you either do your share of the work or you shirk, you obey the regulations

or you disobey them at the risk of getting you fellows into trouble as well as yourself, you

show as much consideration for the comfort of others as your nature leads you to and as your

fellows demands. Living as we do in this hut in separate rooms each with its own small group,

we have perforce to pool our resources and to subordinate our individual wishes to those of our

fellows much more than is generally done. This has its advantages; for instance, we are able to

make our tinned food go much further, but against this there is the necessity that one must do

what one's room-mates (or the more insistent of them) want the whole time, and after a time

that becomes a strain - at any rate it does to me. If the mess decides that one tin of bacon is

enough among seven, you must accept it even if you are yourself feeling that that is only

enough to whet your appetite for more; if they decide to keep half their rice from tea for supper

or to dress up some bit of salad or other extra in a special way, you must be one with them or

be a nuisance, and if some want to chatter or rattle dice when you want to read you must submit

51  

with a good grace. The material advantages clearly outweigh the disadvantages but there are

many occasions when I feel I would gladly change places with a Robinson Crusoe. I can

readily submit to the necessary restrictions imposed on us by our internment, but I am afraid I 

am no good at cheerfully subordinating myself to the whims of those with whom I am

constantly in contact.

30th July   From what I wrote yesterday you will probably conclude that I am very sick

of internment, and there you will be right, and also that I am not fitting in too well with my

fellows. There I think you will be wrong, I am only taking the opportunity of letting off steam

to you (even if you should never read it), and I am quite certain that most others react in very

much the same way even if perhaps they do not think about it in quite the same way.

While on the subject of individuals and the community there is another thing that has

struck me forcibly and that is the attitude that people take to doing their share of the work in the

camp. In Changi it didn't matter much if individuals shirked because there was not enough

work to go round, but here it is very different. The Nips expect every fit man to work. That in

itself is no reason for working, if it were work from which they were to derive the benefit no

one could be blamed for shirking, but most of the work is in our own interests, chiefly the

production of food for our own consumption, and anyone who shirks is depriving his fellows

of food or shifting the work onto the shoulder of others who are willing to work. Most

people of cause pull their weight but there are plenty who have no shame in doing as little as

they can get away with - in fact they seem to take pride in it. It is an attitude that I am

completely unable to understand. Of course I myself should be miserable if I hadn't plenty to

keep me occupied but that is another matter. I have also taken good care to find interesting and

congenial employment; a fair reward I think for always have done a job of work.

The spectacle industry has so increased that I now have John Softly working with me;

he and I were hospital carpenters in Changi. Up to now we have been very busy because I ran

out of fret saw blades and we had to devise some other means of cutting the toothbrushes to

make the spectacle frames. We toyed with various ideas such as circular saws and making

blades from watch springs until I hit on the seemingly obvious method of using a knife. The

difficulty was that we had to operate the knife (a razor blade) accurately at steam heat.

Eventually we evolved a machine that would perform this function with the high degree of

accuracy that is necessary. It is really rather an achievement considering the difficulties that we

had to overcome and the primitive material with which we had to work. The score of

toothbrush frames is now 160.

There has been a further issue of letters and cards. I have two from you, one from

Graham and one from Tricia, all dated September, October and November of last year; there is

also one from home dated December. It is marvellous to get the letters and to know you are all

well, but I long for some real news of you all. There were photos as well; one of you not very

flattering but nevertheless you, it has caused unfavourable comment because of the enormous

plate of food that you are nursing. Another shows the tribe perched on a cart behind some

strange beast the progeny of a horse and a giraffe. I wish I had given you some lessons in

photography, there might then have been less horse's neck and more children, less leg and

more Mary, and in the third less fog and more Graham. Don't think me ungrateful, I am

thrilled to the wick with them and have shown them proudly to all my friends. The horse we

could do with here, it would be a very welcome addition to our diet. For my birthday party I

was given curried catfish caught in one of the camp drains - what could I not do with a horse!

11th August    Eggs are now $18 each on the 'grey market', and gula malacca is $2.60 an

ounce! This is a mad, incomprehensible world! The war may be over for all we know, in fact

if we were not by now so habituated to unfounded rumours we could not but believe it to be at

an end. We know from the Nip's own propaganda that they have been offered peace terms and

have refused them with contumely (or so they say), and that they say that they will fight on to

the last man - a statement that nobody credits. Yet today men out on fatigue were told by an

Asiatic that Japan had surrendered: those were the words, in English. And yesterday one of 

the Nip military (a junior who is in charge of the construction of one of the tunnels) told an

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internee that the war in East Asia was finished; he spoke in Nipponese but the lad to whom he

spoke understands that language, and he checked his translation with one of the interpreters

(also an internee). Now one can explain the second statement as a misunderstanding of a 

statement made in an unfamiliar language, but how explain the first? Although we all long to

do so none of us dares believe that the war really is over. We have so often been deceived with

circumstantial stories of landings in Sumatra, phenomenal advances in Burma (is it just faith

that leads us to believe that that country is really in our hands at last), the capitulation of

Germany, and more than once before, the cessation of hostilities in the Far East.

There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that is evidence of the cessation of hostilities.

There are Nip fighters buzzing around over my head as I write this. Troops, perhaps they were

local 'volunteers', have had manoeuvres just outside the wire fence all day. Yesterday a

reconnaissance plane was flying around at its usual fantastic height. Moreover our routine of

life has altered in no smallest detail: we are still half-starved, we still parade for morning and

evening roll-calls, we still have to work almost naked at digging tunnels in and around the

camp, and still go about all the usual fatigues both inside and outside the camp. And yet hope

will not be stilled, perhaps we really shall be free tomorrow or the next day instead of in five or

six months time as reason would lead us to believe. So I say, it is a mad world.

Everything does go on as usual. We eat, a little; we work, also a little; we sleep,

much, we talk far too much; people die, and they are born (to new internees only!); our hosts

behave much as they have always done, though they are perhaps rather less truculent than they

used to be; and as ever our contact with the outside world is almost nil. Perhaps the most

noticeable change in the working of the camp has been the depletion of the ranks of the

gardeners to provide workers to plant tapioca outside the camp boundaries and to cultivate it,

and to dig the many tunnel that are being prepared, presumably against the threatened invasion

of Singapore. The gardens are of course languishing in consequence, the older and less active

men and the children cannot possibly keep up the previous level of production. There are four

tunnels being dug in the camp and many more have been dug by POW's in the nearby

residential area. If this part of the island is anything to judge by Singapore must be a regular

rabbit warren.

Following the usual evening roll call this notice has been read out: Notice from the

Men's Representative: SNAILS (the giant snail, Achatina). 1. In view of the shortage of

animal protein, the Executive Committee has decided that an attempt should be made to supply

cooked snails to those internees who express their willingness to eat them. 2. The snails in the

Camp can be eaten after proper preparation without risk, and contain a large amount of valuable

protein. 3. The Commissariat Officer, South, has been put in charge of the organisation for the

collection, breeding, preparing, cooking and issuing of snails. 4. A 'Snail Farm' is now being

developed under Mr Shebbeare, where immature snails will be fed until ready for eating, and

where snails will breed. 5. Snails from the daily collection which are unsuitable for immediate

consumption and not required for breeding, will be prepared, cooked and issued to huts in

rotation, as soon a possible. The number available will probably be small for some time to

come, but if the daily collections are satisfactory and if breeding on the farm is successful, it is

hoped that eventually an appreciable and important addition will be made to the diet. 6. The

snails will be issued to huts as a 'side-dish', and until all or a large majority of internees

consume them, rice will not be used in the preparation of these side-dishes, while the use of oil

will be kept to the absolute minimum. 7. The Ex. Comm. wishes to express its thanks to Mr

M. Weinberg, who drew the attention of the Comm. to the possibility of eating the Camp snails

and demonstrated very successfully that palatable dishes could be prepared using snails as the

main ingredients. (To such food are we reduced!).

The fisheries venture came to naught as anyone could have predicted; the snails,

though nauseating to think of, seem a more practical proposition. I for one will try the 'side-

dishes' when they appear.

16th August   The day after I last wrote we heard that Russia had declared war on Japan,

and the excitement in the camp, already intense, was fanned to fever heat. Since then our

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 anticipation of freedom has declined from hours to days, from days to weeks, and weeks to

months. We had resigned ourselves once more to the inevitable. But today the camp has been

set buzzing by stories of what POWs have shouted over the wire to a number of people.

Peace, they say, was signed on the 11th. British forces will take over Singapore on the 21st,

and a civil government headed by S. W. Jones will arrive on the 26th (I think I have the dates

right). That the POWs believed what they said seems likely enough, also that it is believed in

the town, but that the story has any foundation in fact seems highly improbable. Naturally the

topic is hotly debated and every possible and impossible observation brought to bear on it and

arguments innumerable. The unbelievers cite the signs that everything goes on as usual, such

for instance as the announcement yesterday that our firewood would again be cut by half as

from the 20th, while the believers only see in this further evidence that the Nips mean to keep

us in the dark until the last possible moment. It is argued that British forces would take over

such an important key point as Singapore within a few hours of peace being signed, and

conversely that POWs in Germany did not know anything about the end of the last war until

long after hostilities had ceased. Personally I find the story inherently improbable, though I

cannot help having my hopes raised by it. We will settle down again until the next rumour

comes along to set us hoping again, and the 21st will pass with no more than a few witticisms 

- that the date has been postponed, or that the Nips had not been informed.

An event or events which I have omitted to mention have been the deaths of the three

diabetics. Their stock of insulin began to run low nearly two years ago and they were taken

into hospital so that they could be fed on a predominantly protein diet and kept at rest as much

as possible. Since then they have hung on gradually getting weaker until finally they snuffed

out. To begin with they had good insulin that they brought in or the little that the camp was

able to buy in the town; when that was exhausted small supplies were sent in from time to time

by the Nips, some of it of such poor quality as to be useless. Trevor Hughes (MCS) died a

few months back from some mild complication with which in his weakened condition his

system could not cope; then more recently Rupert Pease the artist [a distant relative] died under

similar circumstances; and finally Owen (of Raffles College) died two or three weeks ago, three

days after the last of the insulin was exhausted. It has been a tragic business for which there is

no conceivable excuse. I am very sorry for Pallister who has had endless trouble and incessant

worry trying to keep them alive and healthy under conditions of unprecedented difficulty.

There has been another escape, a Jew again; this time his relatives only have been put 

on half rations for a week.

Today's notice: Snails: 1. As from the issue of this notice, all snails within the Camp

Area are Camp property, whether found within the Camp or brought in from outside sources.

In future, no snails may be destroyed. 2. Snails in Camp Gardens: it is requested that all

snails found in Camp Gardens be collected under section leaders' own arrangements and placed

in the containers to be provided at the following points .... Arrangements will be made for all

snails to be removed daily to the snail farm. 5. Snails found in the course of work outside the

Camp should if possible be collected and brought in by the gang concerned and delivered to

Hut 40. The co-operation of leaders and members of outside fatigues is earnestly sough.

18th August   The Camp is in a fever of excitement. Stories, in all of which evidence of

our early release is found, follow hotfoot one on another. 'What's the latest?' is the question

put to anyone and everyone. All work on the tunnels was stopped this morning and the tools

handed in and the gardeners have been told to have the gardens 'tidy' in five days. Junior Nips

have repeatedly said that the war is over and they act as though they believe it; one of them was

seen this morning in a great state of excitement writing on small bits of paper, crumpling them

up and swallowing them - seemingly a Nipponese form of prayer. Another Nip was this

afternoon in tears over a newspaper, not in his own quarters but in one of the huts! But still

there is no announcement by the Camp authorities and life proceeds as normally as is possible

under the circumstances. It is hard to concentrate on anything at such a time and almost

impossible to keep one's mind on anything except the one vital topic, 'Is it peace?' It is clear

that something is happening and by now most of us believe that if peace has not been signed it

very soon will be. To add to our perplexities there was a plane over at lunch time today and it

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was followed by bursts of A.A. fire; more than that one cannot say, it was impossible to be

certain that it was a British plane and if the A.A. fire was meant to bring the plane down it had

very little chance of doing so, being far too inaccurate.

R.B. MacGregor still seems to think that we should stay and work here on our

release. Maybe he is right in principle but there are few of us fit to do a hard day's work and

fewer still, I should think, who have any wish to stay here one moment longer than is

necessary. For myself, my loyalty to this country will not have a chance against my obsession

to get back to you my darling if we have any say as to our fates.

This morning I helped carry two coffins from the women's hospital to the church.

Strangely it was the first time that I had been in the women's camp since our first days here. A

recent order made by the Nips took effect for the first time and the two interments took place in

the Camp instead of in the cemetery as previously. There is a small cemetery in the northern

part of the camp where some of our troops who were killed in action or who died shortly after

are buried. Why the Nips should have insisted on burial in the camp at this time it is hard to 

conceive.

19th August   It has come at last! There really can be no doubt by now that the war is over,

at least as far as we are concerned. It is difficult to analyse one's feelings, after three and a half

years of prison; it is hard to realise that one is free again. The chief feeling is I think one of

devout thankfulness that one is still alive and that this part of the world at least has not had to

go through the hell of war again. Excited of course we are, but we can only express our

excitement in restrained high spirits, in talk and laughter. We have scarcely yet the energy for

much more and we are still interned and not free to go into the town and 'beat it up' in any

way. That is just as well; the more gently we are let down the better, riotous living just now

would be the death of many people through injudicious eating and drinking. Strangely there

has not yet been any announcement that peace has been signed, the Nips have not told us the

war is over or that hostilities have ceased and we are still in the dark as to what is happening

outside this camp. It is only from newspapers smuggled in in the usual way and from

inferences which we draw from the behaviour of the Nips that we can conclude the was is over.

Last night a Malay paper gave us the news that negotiations were in progress in Penang for this 

country to be taken over by our forces. Then later the Nips announced that our rice ration was

stepped up to 500 grams per head per day form the previous low level. You may laugh but that

was what finally convinced most of us! Suddenly from starvation to find ourselves surfeited

with food, there could no longer be any doubt.

The excitement was too much for most of us in two ways. We could not get down all

the food, not because of the quantity but simply because our tummies shut up on us. It was an

unappetising 'hash' that is simply a thick stodgy mess of rice that is designed merely to fill, and

this it does most efficiently, most of us simply could not face it. And then at night excitement

kept us from sleep.  Rupert doped all seven of us but even so we none of us got much sleep, I

must have got off about 12 to wake again before six. David must have been overdosed because

he did not properly come to life until lunch time - once he did get to sleep. My tummy is

beginning to return to normal; I managed to get down a large dish of kunji at breakfast well

sugared and with milk for the first time for nearly three years, at lunch I could not face more

hash and I dined well off three ration biscuits and sardine, and at tea we had dry rice and onion

and belis sauce in greater quantity than most of us could cope with. Tonight David is frying up

a dish of everything that we have available and do not normally eat - not much I hope, tea is till

lying heavily in my middle. The old tummy is so shrunk with starvation that it is protesting

against the unusual distension.

Monday 20th August.         Announcement by the Men's representative. 

  "General Saito has just informed me, together with Miss Hegarty, the Women's

Representative, through Mr Davison (the interpreter), that it is possible we may shortly be

going back to lead our normal lives. He pointed out, however, that the precise moment has not

arrived, nor is it yet known. Negotiations are now proceeding and we must await the final

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