Chapter 4
Fighting Boredom
“I have never been bored, one can’t be when kept busy.”1
- Arthur Ray Squires, Royal Canadian Corps of Signals, December 6, 1944
Along with hunger and loneliness, boredom is one of the great adversaries for a prisoner of war. This chapter explores how the Canadians preoccupied themselves and managed to keep busy for three years and eight months, or 1,330 days. Concurrently, it shows that this was another fundamental element in their survival. The POWs were fortunate that they were taken captive in an urban area. As a result, goods such as sports equipment and books could be made available, if they were found by the foraging parties that were sent out in the early stages of captivity and if the Japanese allowed them to be brought into camp. In other cases, the soldiers had to make do with what they had. Adaptation is one of the keys to survival for a prisoner of war, and this is even more applicable for the Hong Kong POWs as the Japanese provided them with very little to ease the burden of their confinement. Necessities and amenities were always in short supply and such shortages encouraged many of the prisoners to display one of their most noteworthy characteristics: ingenuity. Several instances of prisoner inventiveness have been noted in the previous chapters, such as the building of immersion heaters, the making of toffee, and using what was available to create a more comfortable living environment in the camps and hospitals. Ingenuity also extended to prisoner pastimes and, as was so often the case, the men of “C” Force worked together to endure their imprisonment, survive, and complete the second mission.
With plenty of free time on their hands, some of the POWs took the opportunity to learn a new skill or language. Many of the men were motivated to learn new things, not just to quell boredom, but also because they believed that such things could be useful in their futures -- futures they fully anticipated having. Early during their captivity at North Point, the Canadians formed small lecture groups to provide fellow prisoners with makeshift educational classes. One of the foraging parties allowed out shortly after the battle returned with a blackboard and books, and chalk was obtained through an interpreter. Later foraging parties returned with even more books, including texts from Hong Kong University. If the weather was decent, the classes were held outside between the huts, and if it was raining, classes were moved inside.2 Harry White wrote in early February 1942 that classes were started not only with the intention of alleviating boredom, but also to “keep up morale and mental keenness.” He noted that math, civics, public speaking, and French were the first subjects added to the curriculum. In his diary under the heading “time spent in captivity,” Lieutenant Collison Blaver wrote that he had taught arithmetic, shorthand, and an NCO course. In return, he learned algebra, geometry, and French.3
Since as many as 30 percent of the Royal Rifles were Francophones, their Anglophone counterparts seized the chance to learn French from them. This kind of educational engagement had a two-fold purpose for the POWs. It gave them an opportunity to pass the time in a constructive way and, by giving their brains some much-needed exercise, it helped keep their minds sharp. Private Leslie Canivet of the Royal Canadian Ordnance Corps was one of those enlisted to teach French, though he later conceded that he was not sure why he had done so and did not think that he did a great a job of it, although “it filled the hours.” Raymond Elliott took his first French class on January 17, 1942, indicating just how early these classes were started.4 But one prisoner who appeared to take his French studies very seriously was Royal Rifle Sergeant James MacMillan. In addition to his diary and drawings, MacMillan kept a study book which contained approximately forty pages of detailed French language lessons. His notes are well written and well organized, and without context one could easily assume that they were written in a high school or university classroom. One page titled “La Grammaire française” contains a lesson on definite, indefinite, and partitive or contracted articles, with English language explanatory notes and examples written in French. Subsequent pages deal with nouns, pronouns, impersonal verbs, and vocabulary. Another page is clearly indicative of the situation in which James MacMillan and his comrades found themselves. Titled “Personal Injuries, Diseases, Hygiene, etc,” these notes show MacMillan trying to learn what French words would be most useful to him under his current circumstances, that of a prisoner of war with French-speaking comrades whose health was constantly at risk. MacMillan thought it was important to learn words such as infection, swelling, to bandage, sore throat, and diphtheria.5 With this knowledge he could better understand and better help his fellow soldiers if they were not proficient in English.
French, however, was far from the only language learned in a camp with such a linguistically diverse group of prisoners.6 POWs were made to learn their prisoner numbers in Japanese, but James Flanagan went beyond that, wisely believing that it would be beneficial to learn the language of his captors. One day early in his captivity fortune smiled on Flanagan as he happened to find a can of curry that had fallen out of a guard’s knapsack. Discreetly collecting the can, he later traded it and two yen (ten Canadian dollars in 2018) to another guard for an English-Japanese dictionary. “I was determined to learn Japanese” he recalled, “so when a Jap guard showed me the dictionary, I offered him the curry. He took the can and wrote ‘¥2’ in the dirt. I gave him the last change I had in my pocket and he passed me the book.”7 It seems surprising that he would give up food for a book, but perhaps the book was more important to him at the time. In addition to French, Grenadier Major Ernie Hodkinson sought to learn Japanese and Cantonese. Until sometime in 1944, the Japanese permitted their version of the Hong Kong News to circulate in the prison camps and lessons in both languages were often printed inside. Hodkinson kept many of these clippings, and along with his diaries and letters he brought these mementos back to Winnipeg after the war, perhaps to remind him of how he made it through captivity.8
The addition of the Hong Kong Volunteer Defence Corps POWs to North Point camp in mid-1942 brought people “from just about every walk of life that you could think of” according to Leslie Canivet. Professors, engineers, and meteorologists were just some of the skilled volunteers who joined the Canadians and more classes were organized. Signalman William Allister wrote that he tried to learn Chinese (presumably Cantonese) but gave up and tried Chinese history instead. “We sat, paper and pencil in hand, weak and emaciated, probably the world’s hungriest students, filling our minds as we tried forgetting our empty bellies.” But weeks later, the Volunteers were moved again, this time to Sham Shui Po, and with them, wrote Allister, “went a large slice of richness and colour.”9 But in September 1942 North Point was closed, and the Canadians rejoined the Volunteers at Sham Shui Po. However, the drafts of POWs to Japan in 1943 and 1944 to provide additional labour for the Japanese war effort greatly depleted the number of prisoners in Hong Kong while POW escape attempts compelled the Japanese to terminate group classes. The larger the group, the captors reasoned, the more trouble they could cause by plotting together.
Nevertheless, the learning continued. Instead of large classes held outdoors, the remaining POWs instigated a series of lectures and met privately within the huts during the evenings. Men with a background or knowledge of a special interest subject were invited to participate as lecturers. Captain Lionel Hurd was one such man. Having worked in the mines of northern Canada, he presented a talk on his experiences. Sometimes the men petitioned the Japanese to hold bigger pubic lectures, but this was usually denied, as was the case when George Porteous requested to give a talk entitled “Psychology of Personality.” Apparently, the Japanese deemed the topic too incendiary to be discussed among the soldiers. But the talks and classes that were allowed had the desired effect. Author Grant Garneau notes that “to a certain degree depression was combatted and minds were kept active in consideration of events and subjects beyond the camp environment.”10 Anything that lessened the boredom was constructive and learning something new gave the soldiers something to look forward to, including meeting new people and engaging in much-needed social activity. POWs who had a desire for new knowledge discovered that while textbooks were useful, their greatest asset in learning was each other.11
While the prisoners had opportunities to exercise their brains, they also had opportunities to exercise their bodies. Weather permitting, and if their weary frames would allow it, there were occasions that the prisoners could exercise. Walking was the most usual physical pastime as it required no equipment and could be done alone or with others. Collison Blaver recorded that at one point he was walking two or three miles every morning with some friends. William Allister preferred to walk by himself at night as it provided him a chance to “step out of collective living and be alone.” He reflected that the prisoners’ life in the camps was a new kind of war, but that while some of the men were winning, others were losing. While walking one evening he resolved to “develop new combat weapons and, harder still, give this life shape and meaning.”12 Running was also possible, although the small confines of the camps likely meant the men ran in circles or small loops around the perimeter. Delbert Welsh wrote of very little besides food before he succumbed to diphtheria in October 1942, but he did note that on January 31 and February 1, 1942, he was “still running” despite not feeling very well. Donald Geraghty spent much of 1944 in the Sham Shui Po camp hospital as malaria and beriberi ravaged his body. Discharged in November, by December he was feeling well enough to work in the kitchens, resume walking, and on the 2nd “actually did [some] running.”13 If the men were to survive and make it home, they would need healthy bodies for their future lives. Moreover, exercise helped maintain discipline. A sense of normalcy was important. Life had to go on.
One attempt at keeping a normal life was to engage in group sports. The foraging parties sent out shortly after the battle returned with a variety of sports equipment to make it possible to play such games as soccer, softball, field hockey, and cricket. A sports program was initiated early on in North Point and saw considerable participation at first. But by the summer, and certainly by the fall of 1942 when the move to Sham Shui Po was completed, these activities petered out for two reasons. The declining health of the prisoners meant that they had little energy to spare for physical activity, especially since most were engaged in work parties. Moreover, sports equipment could not be replaced if it became broken or overused. Charles Roland provided an example of how a cricket match was abandoned after the only two balls in the prisoners’ possession had burst open.14 Nevertheless, for at least half a year many of the Canadians engaged in group sports and wrote enthusiastically about doing so.
Collison Blaver noted several instances where he played soccer and softball, and at least once he started a hockey game although he did not mention what they used for sticks. Matches were often Royal Rifles against Winnipeg Grenadiers and sometimes the teams were divided by rank, such as one game that Blaver recorded that saw “officers vs sergeants.” Other times “C” Force would engage with different units as Frank Ebdon noted on December 27, 1942, when the HKVDC beat a team of Canadians in softball.15 The competitive nature of the games would have been good for comradeship and bonding and would have provided another opportunity for the men to get to know each other better.
Incredibly, there were even games when the prisoners took on their Japanese captors. Physician and author Tim Wolter wrote that playing ball served as a reminder to prisoners that life existed “beyond the barbed wire” and that “on even rarer occasions could be a fragile bridge between captive and captor.”16 Royal Rifle Sergeant James MacMillan wrote of one such game that took place on December 29, 1942, where a pick-up team of Canadians bested a team of Japanese camp staff in softball. Such a win must have been satisfying and good for morale. If they could not beat the Japanese on the battlefield, at least they could claim this minor victory over their opponents. MacMillan, though, was also quick to point out the irony of this kind of match, “Quite a thing, isn’t it? One day they play a game of ball and the next day they bot [sic] you around with the butts of their rifles.”17 The unpredictability of the Japanese was confounding to the prisoners, but in this instance it was welcome.
Lieutenant Leonard Corrigan attempted to initiate early morning volleyball games, but quickly abandoned it as he “found the others somewhat lacking in ambition in the cold grey light of dawn.” Harry White started a lawn bowling program despite the notable handicap of not having a lawn to play on. He was able to acquire a roller from the Japanese which he used to pack down the sand and dirt. This game proved to be popular for, as White noted, it “doesn’t require much effort.” White also recorded that on May 14, 1944, he had begun a boxing class, but that four days later he had cracked a rib from the activity.18 The injury was unsurprising considering how brittle his body must have been after two and a half years as a prisoner. But the ambition to create such activities shows that many of the Canadians were committed to keeping busy. As was often the case, it was officers such as lieutenants Blaver, Corrigan, and White who took the lead. Competitive spirit was healthy and it helped with the sense of normalcy that the men sought to instigate in the camps. Physical activities, however, became rare once the men were forced to participate in work projects.
While Leo Berard was writing his memoir 17 Days Until Christmas, he noted that a new airport was being built in Hong Kong. “I don’t know what is to become of the old airport,” he wrote, “but I do know that the blood, tears and misery of many Canadians and other P.O.W.s still lies mixed with the gravel under the tarmac at Kai Tak.”19 He was not exaggerating. In mid-June 1942, the Japanese ordered that Canadian work parties be sent to extend the runway at Kai Tak Airport on the Kowloon Peninsula.20 Part of the job involved removing an ancient burial hill that contained Chinese tombs. Previously, the British had not extended the runway out of respect for the gravesite, but the Japanese showed no such courtesy. Nor did they show any chivalry to the British POWs who had been working at the airport since early February. Landslides and cave-ins had killed several men and their bodies were left where they had fallen.21 Regardless of the danger, many Canadian prisoners initially were enthusiastic about joining the work parties because, as Lieutenant Corrigan put it, “for about eleven hours, the men were away from the unexciting monotony of camp life.”22 Pay ranged from 25 sen (about $1.40) per day for warrant officers to 10 sen (about 55 cents) per day for rifleman and privates. The Japanese, on occasion, provided the workers with cigarettes. In a rare instance of compliance with international conventions, the Japanese did not require commissioned officers to engage in physical labour, although many senior men chose to accompany the work parties in the hope that their presence would limit the abuse inflicted by the camp guards.23 The effort was not always successful, but it did show the men that their officers supported them.
Winnipeg Grenadier Harold Atkinson described a typical working day: “We would be up at 5:00 in the morning, have breakfast at 5:30 and be on our way at 6:00 to the airport to work all day…Those work parties would finish at 6:00 at night, be back into camp by 7:00, into bed and up the next day the same way.” His Royal Rifle compatriot Vincent Calder elaborated: “It made no difference whether it was raining or not, we still went to work. 12 hours in the hot sun at Kai Tak Airport and you were ready to drop, making 16 to 18 hours from the time you got up until you got back to camp again.” Calder also recalled that every day that they returned to camp, they were notified that more men had died.24 The gruelling work and dismal rations -- sometimes only a bun or a portion of rice was provided for lunch -- quickly dulled the early enthusiasm, but the soldiers found something else in the work to keep them motivated.
Part of the job at Kai Tak concerned mixing the appropriate amounts of concrete and sand to be used for the runway tarmac. Rifleman Kenneth Cambon spoke of how none of the men in his work party had experience with such materials and that they would purposely put as little cement into the mixture as possible, without attracting the attention of the guards.25 Corporal Edward Shayler of the Grenadiers fondly recalled the result of this act of sabotage. Once the runway was complete the Japanese rewarded the prisoners with a piece of bread and invited them to watch the first plane land. According to Shayler, “it got about a quarter of the way down the new part and a wheel broke through the cement and made a furrow about two hundred yards long.”26 The Japanese were furious, took back the bread and beat some of the prisoners. But Leslie Canivet remembered that “the senior Japanese engineer was held responsible since he was in charge,” and he further believed that the Japanese executed the engineer for this deficiency in the work project.27
This was not the only act of sabotage carried out against the airport and their Japanese overseers by “C” Force men. Another task saw the men use small rail trolleys to move rocks and gravel from an uphill quarry down to the airport. Once the load was dumped, a fixed diesel engine pulled the trolleys back up to the quarry.28 Rifleman Philip Doddridge noted that the trolleys were equipped with a simple brake that when wedged against the wheel slowed the car on its descent. Some Canadians were put in charge of operating this device and as Doddridge put it, “we arranged for as many “accidents” as possible.” If the trolleys came into a curve with too much speed, they derailed and spilled their load. Of course, the soldiers were made to carry out the repairs, but Doddridge said they “always found subtle ways to slow the process.” Inevitably, some men were injured during these staged derailments, but a broken ankle was the worst damage endured by a Canadian.29 For some, the temptation to joyride in one of the trolleys was too much to bear. Rifleman James Flanagan was one of the trolley conductors and one day he and a workmate, in what was either a moment of extreme defiance or sheer madness, jumped into the cart and headed downhill. Although Flanagan applied the brake, it was not enough to prevent the cart, and the men, from overturning. Seemingly uninjured, and luckily unnoticed, the two soldiers returned the trolley to the track and carried on with the job.30 Such reckless behaviour may be difficult to comprehend, but perhaps this was a way of injecting some much needed excitement and fun into the tediousness of camp life.
Prisoners of war, especially those under the Japanese, were wise to never directly antagonize their captors, but any act of disruption that would negatively affect the enemy was also a part of their duty as Canadian soldiers. The sabotage activities at Kai Tak were brave displays by men who must have known that repercussions for their actions would be severe, perhaps even fatal. Most of the work at the airport was completed by the end of 1943 and Japanese aircraft arrived and took off regularly after that. But, for a time, the prisoners had prevented and prolonged that from happening, and this surely gave them some satisfaction as they were, no matter how small the measure, continuing to take the fight to their enemy. Other work projects existed in Hong Kong, notably carrying out various repairs and cutting grass, but none of them was particularly exciting or beneficial. However, there was one job that the prisoners were happy to engage in.
One of the more remarkable, and certainly one of the more advantageous pastimes, was the tending of camp gardens. The benefits of keeping a garden are obvious. Firstly, the food would have provided a much-needed extra source of essential vitamins. Fresh fruit was exceptionally rare, and vegetables served were often not much more than chrysanthemum tops. Secondly, the gardens were another social activity that the prisoners could do together. Lastly, it was something in which the men could take pride as they witnessed the tangible results of their hard work.
The Japanese, who provided the POWs with some seeds to start with, saw the gardens as a harmless and productive pastime for the prisoners. It would keep them out of trouble and give them some extra food to eat. The garden at North Point appears to have been started in the spring of 1942. Leonard Corrigan’s diary makes the earliest mention of this on May 1. He remarked that a mixture of Canadian soil and Hong Kong rainfall would make a potent combination. However, the soil in camp was “decent” and though most of the plants looked as though “they lacked permanency,” the bananas were doing rather well.31 Grenadier Thomas Forsyth, put on a gardening project on May 9, two days later wrote that a working party of 25 Grenadiers and 25 Royal Rifles were cultivating an acre and a half of land to ready it for a garden. “We are spading it, picking up stones, carrying down good earth from the hillsides and putting it in long narrow trenches in which we will grow our seeds.” Arthur Squires also partook in the gardening and took a lot of pleasure from it, writing that “I have papayas, bananas, a few tomatoes and some hibiscus.” He added that, “plants grow easily here if watered due to the high humidity. The sun is very strong.”32 For once the men may have actually been happy to see it rain in Hong Kong. When the Canadians were moved from North Point to Sham Shui Po in late September 1942, they took their industrious new hobby with them.
Private Leslie Canivet, who spent his entire captivity in Hong Kong, recalled that it afforded the POWs more open space than the camps in Japan, and that they took advantage of this.33 He remembers growing sweet potatoes but they rarely ate them although he did not say why, choosing instead to cut the tops off and use the greens. But as with much else in camp, the garden depended on whether Japanese officers felt like allowing it or not. “Every now and then the Japs would come in and take away our garden, except for one or two potatoes, and we’d have to start all over again,” he reflected in an interview.34 Beyond Japanese interference, keeping the garden productive was not always easy and, as they so often did, the Canadians had to resort to self-made solutions. Lieutenant Donald Languedoc said the garden was a great method to combat boredom and they had many tomato and bean plants, but that they had to resort to using their own “waste” as fertilizer. Without rain, irrigation was an obvious problem, but the men got around this by using what was available to them, namely scrap lengths of pipe and old water tanks.35
As time wore on and as rations became scarcer, the garden took on even greater significance. Lieutenant Harry White of the Grenadiers, ever the leader and often more concerned with others than himself, wrote in April 1943 that he was hoping the garden would produce food not only for the soldiers in camp but “particularly for the hospital.” In addition to working on the group garden, he started a small one of his own in October 1943. By November 1944, he recorded that gardens had taken over every possible plot of available land and that everyone was “at it to try and get something to help our diet.”36 According to Kenneth Baird, by December 22, 1944, the men were also raising chickens that produced about 30 eggs a day, “and as we have 470 people in this camp we should get one every 20 days if the hens and ducks keep working.” The same day saw Baird fry a couple of tomatoes from the garden. “Believe me they were good,” he wrote.37 It must also have been gratifying to eat “homegrown” produce. Captain Stanley Banfill, one of the chief medical officers, noted that, especially in the last two years of the war, “gardening was not only a recreation but made valuable contributions to our diet.” In their postwar study, medical officers John Crawford and J. A. G. Reid recorded the average daily diet, in grams, for Canadian POWs in Hong Kong by tabulating what the Japanese issued and what was provided from other sources. From July 1944 until the end of the war there was the sudden appearance of fresh vegetables and undoubtedly this was due to what the gardens were generating as these were never issued by the Japanese.38 Many pastimes and means of keeping busy existed in the Hong Kong prisoner camps, but it is difficult to imagine that any of them were more important to the men’s survival then their communal gardens.
However, besides food, there were other concerns, and once again resourcefulness came into play. Once the men were herded into prison camps with what few belongings they could carry, it became clear that their army boots would not make appropriate footwear for Hong Kong’s hot and rainy weather. One of the soldiers, Rifleman Kenneth Cambon, entered camp without anything to protect his feet and had developed nasty blisters. He was fortunate that his friend, Rifleman J. S. Hickey was a competent artisan who crafted a pair of sandals for his mate. Cambon had no idea where the materials came from, but noted the durability of the sandals as he still had them in his possession when he was sent to Japan in August 1943.39 Indeed, sandals became prominent as they provided some foot support and allowed weary feet a chance to breath. Thomas Forsyth wrote in early January 1942 that Major Baird had advised them to make “wooden sandals or clogs to save our shoes.” Baird himself wrote a few weeks later that he was making sandals of his own as he only had one pair of shoes and that they had to last him an indeterminate amount of time. In May, Baird wrote that his men were making “sandals and all sorts of things to sell for cigarettes.” In addition to his homemade sandals and cribbage board, Baird also was the proud owner of a wooden cane his men had made and given to him as a gift. This generous token showed that the soldiers still respected their senior officers. Sandals were apparently available for purchase at the canteen, but the prices were so exorbitant that nobody could afford them.40
Other commodities or necessities were quickly manufactured or improvised. One Royal Rifle was seen eating rice out of an ornamental hubcap he had repurposed for a bowl. A Signalman with Brigade Headquarters found a small knife and carved himself a spoon and cup to replace those he had lost during the battle. He went on to make more of each which he would sell for cigarettes.41 Collison Blaver took up the carving of small ashtrays, Grenadier Joseph Kitkoski carved a set of chess pieces, and Rifleman Raymond Elliott shaped a piece of cotton into a passable mosquito net. Philip Doddridge recalled that “some enterprising chap built a steam generating device out of an old oil drum.” The intention was to rid their clothes of lice and, though it was not successful, at least an attempt was made.42
Other creations were more fruitful. Small tin cans with strings dipped in peanut oil provided some light during the dark evenings.43 Foraging parties brought back electrical pieces from downed aircraft that were used to make a clandestine radio. Leslie Canivet called the radio their own “bamboo telegraph” and that they were able to keep up to date with BBC news. He also remarked that the Japanese knew that they had the radio, but they could never find it as it was constantly moved around and kept by trusted people. Harry White wrote that on September 14, 1943 they were made to stand in the sun for nine and a half hours while the Japanese searched for the radio. White noted that the radio was no longer in camp, but he did not mention what happened to it.44 Another success was created by Royal Rifle Lance Ross who fashioned a device to catch Chinese doves. Using a box with a long piece of string as the trap and a bit of leftover rice for the bait, he waited patiently until an unsuspecting bird landed to pick at the rice. A pull of the string added some meat to his meager diet. But the next day more hunters and more boxes appeared and soon the doves grew wise and never returned.45
With so much inventiveness and creativity it is hardly surprising that some handicraft exhibits were held in the prison camps. Presumably, the Japanese authorities saw no problem with this and two displays were held in North Point in May and July 1942, while at least one was held in Sham Shui Po on November 30, 1944. Major Baird described the first exhibition: “some of the carvings and woodwork are really wonderful: rings made of silver coins, gloves, socks, mitts knitted on needles made of wood, drawings, etchings and carvings, inlaid cigarette cases, boxes, canes and dozens of things.” He noted that there were more than 60 entries, including several drawings that were etched by a member of the Royal Rifles. The handicraft show held in 1944 was organized with an even greater purpose: to raise money for the widows and children held in the civilian internment camp at Fort Stanley. Baird was eager to display a brass plaque that he had made from a shell casing and on which he had been working industriously since February 1942. Such a long-term project “helped me to fill in many weeks that were darned tough to get over in the past two years,” he wrote. Baird was clearly patient and motivated to accomplish something that helped keep him occupied. On December 7, 1944, he declared with great pride that the show was a success and that “lotteries, sideshows, games, and sales of articles” had raised a considerable amount of money for their designated charity.46 It is a striking show of character that after nearly three years as prisoners, men who had so little were committed to sharing what they did have with those whom they considered in greater need. The generosity and ingenuity displayed by the Canadians did not go unnoticed by some of their fellow prisoners.
Arthur Ernesto Gomes, a Portuguese volunteer who served with the HKVDC, was a prisoner of war in Sham Shui Po with the Canadians. In an oral history interview for the Imperial War Museum he recalled that a uniquely Canadian stereotype held true, at least for him. The Japanese brought large logs into camp for the prisoners to use as firewood. Gomes said that all they had to cut it with was a small hand axe, making it an implausible task. “But the Canadians showed us how to do it,” Gomes recalled. “They were lumberjacks.” By taking a four-foot length of waterpipe and affixing the hand axe at one end they created an implement that could be swung hard enough to split wood. Gomes marveled at how the Canadians could hit the same spot every time and that after 30 or 40 strokes the wood would crack open.47 This kind of skill is hardly a revelation considering many of “C” Force’s soldiers were recruited from rural areas, especially the men of the Royal Rifles, who largely hailed from Quebec’s eastern townships, the Gaspe Peninsula, and the Maritime provinces. “Many were farmers, fishermen, lumberjacks, paper makers, and miners,” wrote Company Sergeant Major George MacDonell. “They were used to hard work and life in the open, and they were fit and tough as nails.”48 But less strenuous activities were always welcome. Sometimes the men simply wanted to sit down together and play cards.
Games constituted an easy form of mental occupation for the members of “C” Force. The Chinese tile game of mahjong was a favourite with some prisoners, as was chess which, as Signalman Arthur Squires remarked, “is a good game for this place.”49 By improving his own game and by teaching a friend, Squires had found something that could occupy large amounts of time. A more peculiar game was mentioned by Raymond Elliott who wrote on April 8, 1942 that he had made a Monopoly board.50 Unfortunately, there is no further mention of this in his diary and it is unclear what he would have used for the board or game pieces, but his creation reflected his ambition to find a way to keep busy, as Monopoly, as with chess, can be played over long periods of time. Collison Blaver and Kenneth Baird both recorded making cribbage boards, and there is one on display at the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa that was made from the sole of an old shoe.51 On December 14, 1944, Lieutenant Harry White recorded that a different game had made its way into camp: bingo. The classic game was modified for camp use by Francis ‘Huck’ O’Neill, an officer with the Canadian Auxiliary Services, and proved to be very popular with White noting that at least half the camp had gathered one afternoon with “bits of cards and some stones for markers.” O’Neill asked for a few Japanese sen (maybe 10 or 15 cents) per card to play, allowing him to hand out a few cigarettes as prizes.52
Undoubtedly, the most popular game played among the POWs was bridge. Requiring only players and a deck of cards, bridge was a game that could be easily played in prison camps and provided another opportunity for social interaction. Leonard Corrigan remarked that on days when rain would keep them inside, bridge was the obvious choice to pass the time. Corrigan taught others how to play, but also noted that he managed to lose to his pupils quite often.53 For those looking to learn the game on their own there was help available in the form of a unique guide. Captain Charles Price of the Royal Rifles possessed a notebook that indicated it was bound and printed in Sham Shui Po in April 1943, though precisely how is unclear. Notes on Contract Bridge, compiled by Lieutenant William Nugent of the Grenadiers, contained information that he presented in a series of talks in camp to encourage more men to play bridge. The notebook also served as a guide and source of reference for those who attended classes on the subject. Nugent’s preface contains a humorous disclaimer that says, “The writer finds that he has positively no desire to interview the irate partners of any players into whose hands this book may fall.” Part one details ‘bidding and strategy’ and part two covers ‘hints on playing’.54 Many Canadians played bridge to pass the time and the game is referred to often in the diaries and memoirs. Interestingly, there is only one mention of someone playing solitaire. The games played in the Hong Kong prison camps focused on teams or groups rather than individuals. After all, the men survived together, not on their own. And for group entertainment, it was even more imperative that the soldiers worked together.
The two most prominent and common forms of mass entertainment were to attend concerts and stage plays. Remarkably, many musical instruments had survived the destruction wrought from the battle. The Winnipeg Grenadiers arrived in camp with virtually all their band instruments intact, while, luckily, a piano had been salvaged from St. Elbert’s Convent Hospital and brought into North Point camp. Furthermore, members of the HKVDC, with permission from the Japanese, were able to have friends and relatives on the outside send in even more instruments.55 As a result, bands and orchestras were organized, and music became a constant and welcome presence in the prison camps.
The first concert, according to prisoner diaries, occurred very early on during captivity. Rifleman Delbert Welsh wrote on January 6, 1942, that a Japanese band had played for them before breakfast. Grenadier Thomas Forsyth bluntly remarked that, “we were invited to attend - or else.” But he added that “not to be outdone, what was left of our band, along with the remainder of the Royal Scots band got together and played a few selections.”56 For some, music has exceptional healing powers, and it is evident that having music in the prison camps had a profound effect on the mood and morale of the soldiers. Harry White wrote on January 24, 1942 that a guitar and saxophone had made their way into the camp, and at night the prospect of music would bring the men together. “Funny how an hour’s singsong can take you right out of the camp altogether. You can forget your surroundings, etc.” he said. Signalman Georges Verreault also found that music transported him to a better place. On February 22, 1942, he wrote that “last evening I was happy for a few hours. I had saved myself some bread and made myself some toasts on a small fire while the Grenadier Orchestra in the next hut was playing dance music. During these hours, I forget this hell.” Later in Sham Shui Po, Kenneth Cambon recalled a concert that was “simply fabulous” due to its elaborate costumes and staging. He credited this show to the imaginative Pole Jan Solecki, who was raised in Harbin, China, and joined the HKVDC shortly before war’s outbreak. “These concerts did much for the morale of everyone as for an hour or two one was wafted over the barbed wire into another world.”57 The concerts were aided in no small part by the fact that many talented musicians were amongst the prisoners.
Private Bill Ashton of the Winnipeg Grenadiers recalled that his unit had “the best swing band in the nation” and that many members of their marching band were professional musicians from around Manitoba. One of them, George Sweeney, was a highly regarded clarinetist and saxophonist, while another, Johnny Matheson, “could make a trumpet drip honey.” Ashton noted that not only was music allowed by the Japanese camp commandant, but that after the second concert in North Point the commandant ordered a shipment of lumber to be brought in, so a stage could be constructed. The commandant occasionally sat and watched the performances with his interpreter.58 Verreault wrote that his new friend William Allister was the host for many of these musical soirées and that, for a time, the intermission entertainment was provided by amateur wrestlers “Bruno and Charron” who were so good that Verreault declared “professionals could not make it more realistic.” Cambon also remembered the array of talent, and that it extended to the staff at the Bowen Road Hospital where, perhaps, the healing power of music was needed most. A piano and a few string and brass instruments in conjunction with the “surfeit of entertainment talent among the hospital staff” provided weekly concerts for the infirmed.59 Fortunately, musical instruments were not lacking, and even those who did not have their own managed to find a way around that problem.
The much-discussed ingenuity of Canadian prisoners also extended to music. On August 7, 1942, Thomas Forsyth wrote that two of his Grenadier companions, James Murray and Thomas Weir, had “constructed a curious string instrument and are producing some weird sounds from it.” And Lance Corporal Thomas Weir was apparently not one to give up easily. On March 16, 1943, Forsyth wrote in his diary that Weir was “still trying to make a stringed instrument,” but that many within camp were hoping that he would fail.60 Weir, despite his resourcefulness, was not a talented musician. Harry White also wrote about how ingenuity was a contributing factor in maintaining musical harmony throughout the camp. In an example often mentioned in other works, he explained that Major Maurice Parker of the Royal Rifles had fashioned a cello out of an old oil drum and that he was actually able to play it in spite of its large and awkward size. In the same entry, White wrote that another prisoner named Kubichuck somehow managed to construct a guitar.61 The theatrical shows also involved a degree of inventiveness and participation, and though once again Canadians were heavily involved, the Portuguese contributions were just as noteworthy.
Major Kenneth Baird wrote to his wife and daughter on January 27, 1943, that the Portuguese contingent of the HKVDC had staged a “really excellent” show. It was so popular that it ran for three consecutive evenings and motivated Baird to see it again. “Wish you could come,” he wrote to his family, but on second thought he persuaded himself that, “No, I don’t – I wouldn’t have you in this damn country for all the gold in the world.”62 Harry White, ever the prolific scribe, recorded on May 21, 1943, that the prisoners had managed to get some lights for their stage,63 and that the previous evening they had produced their best play thus far. He noted the creativity that went into making the props and costumes, “wigs from the string of rice sacks, mosquito nets for evening dresses, wooden frames with paper glued on for wings, rice glue, and some chalk colouring the Japanese had provided.” However, a performance by one of the Portuguese actors came in for special praise. Ferdinand “Sonny” Castro performed the female lead in most of the stage plays as he “has all the little quirks of a girl. He’s a good looking lad anyway, and his smile, the way he rolls his eyes, his hands, etc., he could pass as a girl anywhere,” White remarked. Captain Lionel Hurd of the Royal Rifles also noted that Castro was “a marvel at impersonating a girl.”64 This unnamed show also ran for three nights, and one of those evenings was especially for the hospital and all able-bodied patients were moved out to see it. “It’s wonderful for the morale of the whole camp,” White concluded.65
Lionel Hurd recalled that on Dominion Day 1943 “a splendid 3 act drama” titled Here Comes Charlie was performed with a cast largely composed of Canadian officers.66 White was one of those officers who caught the acting bug and he made his debut the following year having a lead role in the play Once in a Lifetime, despite his claim to have “done no memory work since school days, years ago.” The play was another success and propelled him to tackle a bigger challenge in 1945, a part in the skit Ole Silver of the Range which required him to memorize 150 lines of dialogue within a week.67 The theatrical shows were not only good for providing desperately needed entertainment, but for those eager to participate, the task of memorizing dialogue would have been good for keeping one’s mind and memory sharp, and the execution of a role on stage in front of a crowd would have been good for one’s confidence. As with concerts, the plays became what Royal Rifles historian Grant Garneau called a “focal point in camp life.” These forms of entertainment were something that the prisoners could look forward to. For those involved in the production and performance of the concerts and stage shows, it instilled a source of pride and accomplishment. According to Garneau, “even when conditions were at their worst the vicarious experience of watching a play somehow momentarily relieved the reality of the grim existence within the camp.”68 Historian Sears Eldredge has expanded on the idea, writing that for POWs:
Every show they put on, every piece of music played, song sung or laughter provoked, every glamorous female impersonator who dared to tease audiences with “her” sexuality, was understood not only as a momentary triumph over adversity but a temporary victory over their captors. During times of performance, they were fully human again – and free.69
Musical and theatrical entertainment, concluded Sears, played a key role in prisoner morale and survival. This was certainly true for the audiences in Hong Kong as evident by how frequently these forms of entertainment are mentioned in prisoner diaries, memoirs, and interviews. Concerts and plays were two of the dominant pastimes, but many smaller-scale diversions existed as well.
Various other hobbies were practiced among the POW’s. Georges Verreault started a choir to perform at church masses, while William Allister joined a choir of Russian expatriates who were members of the HKVDC. Allister could not speak Russian, but he felt that he could memorize the words well enough to add his voice to the ensemble. The words were not the point anyway, he argued, instead noting that “the spirit of the song made its own transcendent language.” Allister accompanied the Russians as they toured the camp sick wards. “I felt this power as we sang,” he remembered, “this joining of ourselves to the others and to these gaunt faces, this giving and receiving.” Many of the prisoners’ activities were empowering and propelled them to keep up the fight for survival. Verreault and Allister would later combine some different talents in a type of business venture. Allister, a capable artist, painted sunset landscapes that the two men sold for cigarettes. Verreault provided the supplies, making the paint brushes and using pieces of an old tent he found in the garbage for the canvases.70 Arthur Squires and Thomas Forsyth did pencil sketches, as did James MacMillan whose works were a mirror into his life as a prisoner of war. Among the many titled drawings that accompany his notes and diary are such pieces as “North Point Delousing Parade”, “Buns For Sale”, “Sea-Wall Latrine”, “Old Rifle North Point Kitchen”, and “Ration Square,” which depicts a group of men who are lining up to carry supplies from a truck into a building.71
A sketch by James MacMillan. ©Matthew Schwarzkopf
MacMillan’s notes are varied and emblematic of a man who had a lot on his mind and a desire to keep busy. He kept track of his days as a prisoner and the pay he was due. He also kept a list of all the letters that he received while a prisoner and a list of all the books that he read during his captivity. In addition, MacMillan found it meaningful to write out several things that he had to remember to do after the war. Once home he had to pay “all back-insurance premiums” and pay off a bet that he had lost to Carl Olsson, a rifleman in MacMillan’s battalion.72 MacMillan intended to pay two of his mates for having cut his hair in camp, buy a pipe for another, and have dinner with two others at their homes once they returned to Quebec. He also sought to purchase a good address book and to “develop idea of a Friends Scrap Book with pictures, etc.”73 Collison Blaver kept similar lists and notes. He recorded the books that he read in camp, the Red Cross supplies that he received, the deaths of his comrades, and wagers that he made in camp. For example, he bet Harry White a bottle of scotch that the war would be finished only after November 15, 1944. Next to the wager he wrote “won.” As with MacMillan, he made a checklist of “things to be done when I get home.” Blaver had ambitions to do things such as: pay off all mortgages and bills owing, try for a position near home “and get one!”, complete various chores at his properties, buy a Chevrolet Coupe or Buick, and take some radio and management classes.74
Other men also planned for their returns to Canada. Donald Geraghty compiled an address list of the new friends that he had made in camp, many of them Britons, so that he could keep in touch with them after the war. Thomas Forsyth wrote in his diary about Grenadier Edward Cole and how he drew “endless plans of the house he intends to build when he gets home.” He added that other men discussed the cost of starting up a farm.75 All of these men were thinking ahead, planning for their futures lives because they believed that they would have them. They were motivated to survive and committed to making it home, and these notes and diary entries show that they anticipated having plenty to look forward to. Foreseeing a bright future made the dark present more bearable.
The varied and inventive pastimes partaken by the men of “C” Force indicate a desire to keep themselves occupied and to instill a sense of normalcy into the tediousness of camp life. They engaged in activities which exercised both their bodies and their minds. Most of these pursuits were done communally, thereby strengthening the bonds between soldiers and reaffirming their commitments to survive captivity together. They were productive and imaginative, enthusiastic about learning new things, and managed to have some fun even though their circumstances dictated that was likely the last thing that should have happened. And they thought about home and looked forward to getting there. Most of them would.
1 CWM, Squires Diary, December 6, 1944.
2 Garneau, The Royal Rifles of Canada in Hong Kong 1941-1945, 103.
3 CWM, White Diary, February 4, 1942; CWM, Blaver Diary, 1942-1945, no date.
4 CWM, Canivet Interview 1995; CWM, Elliott Diary, January 17, 1942.
5 CWM, MacMillan, Study book, 1941-1945.
6 The HKVDC was largely Chinese and the officers were mainly British, but there were also Portuguese, Russians, and other European expatriates within its ranks.
7 Flanagan, The Endless Battle, 60-61.
8 Hodkinson, Ernie’s Story, 55.
9 CWM, Cavinet Interview, 1995; Allister, Where Life and Death Hold Hands, 70 and 72.
10 Garneau, The Royal Rifles of Canada in Hong Kong 1941-1945, 127-128.
11 Midge Gillies, The Barbed-Wire University: The Real Lives of Allied Prisoners of War in the Second World War (London: Aurum, 2011), 197.
12 CWM, Blaver Diary, no date; Allister, Where Life and Death Hold Hands, 60.
13 CWM, Welsh Diary, January 31 and February 1, 1942; CWM, Geraghty Diary, December 3, 1944.
14 Garneau, The Royal Rifles of Canada in Hong Kong 1941-1945, 103; Roland, Long Night’s Journey into Day, 101.
15 CWM, Blaver Diary, no date; LAC, Ebdon Fonds, diary entry for December 27, 1942.
16 Tim Wolter, POW Baseball in World War II: The National Pastime Behind Barbed Wire (Jefferson: McFarland & Company, 2002), 5.
17 CWM, MacMillan Diary, December 30, 1942.
18 Corrigan, The Diary of Lieut. Leonard B. Corrigan, 47; CWM, White Diary, December 10, 1943, May 14 and 18, 1944.
19 Bérard, 17 Days Until Christmas, 105.
20 The Japanese viewed POWs as an expendable and essential source of labour for their war effort. After all, the soldiers were fortunate that they had been spared on the battle field so why should they have it easy as prisoners? Philip Towle, “Japanese Culture and the Treatment of Prisoners of War in the Asian-Pacific War,” in Prisoners in War, edited by Sibylle Scheipers (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 146-147.
21 Garneau, The Royal Rifles of Canada in Hong Kong 1941-1945, 286; Greenfield, The Damned, 263.
22 Corrigan, The Diary of Lieut. Leonard B. Corrigan, 93.
23 Garneau, The Royal Rifles of Canada in Hong Kong 1941-1945, 103, and 125-126.
24 HKVCA Personal Accounts, Harry Atkinson’s Story, https://www.hkvca.ca/historical/accounts/HarryAtkinson.php; HKVCA Personal Accounts, Vince Calder’s Account, https://www.hkvca.ca/historical/accounts/Vince%20Calder/index.php.
25 Cambon, Guest of Hirohito, 41.
26 Quoted in Palmer, Dark Side of the Sun, 61.
27 CWM, Canivet Interview, 1995. According to Canivet this was true, but it has not been confirmed through other sources.
28 Flanagan, The Endless Battle, 76.
29 HKVCA Personal Accounts, Memories Uninvited Phil Doddridge’s Story, https://www.hkvca.ca/memoriesuninvited/index.php.
30 Flanagan, The Endless Battle, 77.
31 Corrigan, The Diary of Lieut. Leonard B. Corrigan, 63.
32 LAC, Forsyth Fonds, diary entries for May 9 and 11, 1942; CWM, Squires, Diary, June 14, 1942.
33 As a long-time member of the Hong Kong Veterans Association of Canada, Canivet likely made this presumption after talking with veterans who had been sent to Japan.
34 CWM, Canivet Interview, 1995.
35 Canadian War Museum Archives, 58A 1 29.6, Peter Louis MacDougall, Notes and Letters, 1941-1945, transcript of interview with Donald Languedoc; LAC, Forsyth Fonds, diary entry for May 24, 1943.
36 CWM, White Diary, April 10 and October 29, 1943, and November 24, 1944.
37 Baird, Letters to Harvelyn, 221.
38 Quoted in Garneau, The Royal Rifles of Canada in Hong Kong 1941-1945, 321; J. N. Crawford and J. A. G. Reid, “Nutritional Disease Affecting Canadian Troops Held Prisoner of War by the Japanese,” Canadian Journal of Research 25, no. 2 (1947), 55.
39 Cambon, Guest of Hirohito, 36.
40 LAC, Forsyth Fonds, diary entry for January 1, 1942; Baird, Letters to Harvelyn, 63 and 105.
41 LAC, Forsyth Fonds, diary entry for January 19, 1942; Verreault, Diary of a Prisoner of War in Japan, 54.
42 CWM, Blaver Diary, no date; LAC, Forsyth Fonds, diary entry for July 26, 1942; CWM, Elliott Diary, April 23, 1942; Hong Kong Veterans Commemorative Association Personal Accounts, Memories Uninvited - Phil Doddridge's Story, https://www.hkvca.ca/memoriesuninvited/index.php.
43 Allister, Where Life and Death Hold Hands, 52
44 CWM, Canivet Interview, 1995; CWM, White Diary, September 14, 1943.
45 Garneau, The Royal Rifles of Canada in Hong Kong 1941-1945, 287.
46 Baird, Letters to Harvelyn, 109, 217, and 219.
47 Imperial War Museum Archives, Arthur Ernesto Gomes Interview, Catalogue Number 21131: Reel 7, March 23, 2001, https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/80021242.
48 MacDonell, One Soldier's Story 1939-1945, 44.
49 CWM, Squires Diary, September 10, 1942.
50 CWM, Elliott Diary, April 8, 1942.
51 CWM, Blaver Diary, no date; Baird, Letters to Harvelyn, 63.
52 CWM, White Diary, December 14, 1944.
53 Corrigan, The Diary of Lieut. Leonard B. Corrigan, 46 and 71.
54 Library and Archives Canada, Papers of Charles E. Price, “Notes on Contract Bridge,” compiled by W.F. Nugent, MG30-E437, R7031-0-2-E.
55 Garneau, The Royal Rifles of Canada in Hong Kong 1941-1945, 104; Roland, Long Night’s Journey into Day, 95.
56 CWM, Welsh Diary, January 6, 1942; LAC, Forsyth Fonds, diary entry for January 6, 1942.
57 CWM, White Diary, January 24, 1942; Verreault, Diary of a Prisoner of War in Japan, 60; Cambon, Guest of Hirohito, 50.
58 Quoted in Dancocks, In Enemy Hands, 242.
59 Verreault, Diary of a Prisoner of War in Japan, 82; Cambon, Guest of Hirohito, 47.
60 LAC, Forsyth Fonds, diary entries for August 7, 1942 and March 16, 1943.
61 CWM, White Diary, September 9, 1942.
62 Baird, Letters to Harvelyn, 158.
63 By this point the Canadians were in back in Sham Shui Po camp. They had returned to find the church largely destroyed, but the stage and walls were still intact, and this is where productions were mounted until the end of the war.
64 Diary of Captain E. L. Hurd, quoted in Garneau, The Royal Rifles of Canada in Hong Kong 1941-1945, 194.
65 CWM, White Diary, May 21, 1943.
66 Diary of Captain E. L. Hurd, quoted in Garneau, The Royal Rifles of Canada in Hong Kong 1941-1945, 194.
67 CWM, White Diary, February 24, 1944 and June 3, 1945.
68 Garneau, The Royal Rifles of Canada in Hong Kong 1941-1945, 126.
69 Sears Eldridge, “Wonder Bar: Music and Theatre as Strategies for Survival in a Second World War POW Hospital Camp,” in Cultural Heritage and Prisoners of War: Creativity Behind Barbed Wire, edited by Gilly Carr and Harold Mytum (New York: Routledge, 2012), 32.
70 Allister, Where Life and Death Hold Hands, 74; Verreault, Diary of a Prisoner of War in Japan, 88.
71 CWM, Squires Diary, August 2, 1942; LAC, Forsyth Fonds, diary entry for January 11, 1942; Canadian War Museum Archives, 58A 1 271.3, James C. M. MacMillan, Poetry and Illustrations of POW James C. M. MacMillan, 1942-1945.
72 The bet was likely over how soon the war would end or when the prisoners would be released as these were common speculations for gambling.
73 Canadian War Museum Archives, 58A 1 271.1, James C. M. MacMillan, Journals and Notes of POW James C. M. MacMillan, 1941-1945.
74 CWM, Blaver Diary, no date.
75 CWM, Geraghty Diary, Pages 27, 28, and 29, no dates; LAC, Forsyth Fonds, diary entry for July 22, 1942.