大象传媒

This is Michael Charnaud鈥檚 story: it has been added by Pauline Colcutt (on behalf of the Fernhurst Centre), with permission from the author who understands the terms and conditions of adding his story to the website.

An unusual and true story of a young boy who with his mother became a prisoner of both the Germans and the Japanese May 1942 - August 1945

CHAPTER 5 - FUKUSHIMA 1943 TO END OF1944 ..(PART ONE)

As spring approached and after getting over my chicken pox, I could not help noticing that there were ever increasing tensions amongst the women in the camp. Small pinpricks would become inflated and serious rows would develop, only to be forgotten quickly in the face of some Japanese insult or slapping or other punishment, when everyone would rally round each other to help and sympathise. These tensions were never to go away amongst the women throughout our stay, but the one outstanding person who was a pillar of strength and calmness throughout was Mother. She was like a strong beacon of light amongst the rest, Australians, British, Chinese, Malay, Ceylon Burghers, and a Bengali and from all walks of life. All respected her wisdom, her education, breeding and her quiet inner metaphysical and spiritual grace. She was not in the least bit religious in the church going or biblical sense, but had that deep knowledge of God, or Karma, or Goodness, call it what you will. Undoubtedly her past sufferings in her marriage, in her spiritual readings, and her flirtation with Buddhism had all played a part, and she was universally approached for guidance over all sorts of problems that occurred almost on a daily basis. She was the quiet teacher with a heart of gold and a head filled with wisdom, but with an iron resolve never ever to let oneself be browbeaten by agreeing or compromising with something that one knew to be morally wrong or evil. I was privileged to have her as my own Mother during these harsh years and she gave me a sense of maturity through her guidance far beyond my years. Also the mere fact of living under such an authoritarian regime with ones own kind all around to help and support you , gave one an instinctive sense of loyalty to your own lot against the 鈥淓nemy or them鈥�. This sense of rigid unwavering loyalty has lasted me my whole life, and I still to this day find nothing more abhorrent than people who betray their own kith and kin, their own upbringing and their own nation. Such people instinctively I treat as betrayers or 鈥淨uislings鈥� after the Norwegian traitor who co-operated with the Germans following the invasion of their country.

A serious incident occurred just after I was back to health, when a row blew up between Gabby Lyons and the stewardess Mrs Gleason. It came about from the neglect of Clive who was then about a year old and crying because his nappy had not been changed yet again. The stewardess picked him up and made some caustic remark, whereupon Gabby flew at her knocking her down, and then had her fingers round her throat. Mrs Gleason was a large woman with a broad frame and large hips, and was attacked by someone who was much more petite, but nevertheless she found that she was literally fighting for her life with a wildcat! She said afterwards in her broad Australian accent:
鈥淚 never thought I would get away. I really honestly thought she was going to strangle me, and she would have, had I not been so strong and summoned all my energy to free myself.鈥�

She never again tangled with Gabby again! Tragically however she died four months before the end of the War on 7th April 1945 aged 43 from an intestinal blockage, and never saw freedom.

On a more pleasant subject during the early spring about the time of my 12th birthday, whilst bathing, the women would remark on my sudden growth not only in stature, but also in hairiness down below as puberty developed! It was a point also noted by Lavender (known as Vanda) Yates the lanky 17 year old mentioned before when Mother was thinking of boarding the Nankin. She was always finding an excuse to be near me, sharing a book or whatever as she was very keen on poetry as I was as well, and was forever composing verses. She was also very artistic with a good line, and was continually doing sketches with our meagre paper and coloured pencils. When we had an opportunity to be alone in our room, she would cuddle up to me for warmth from the cold spring air under my quilt and was soon encouraging me to play with her breasts and other naughty places, and she did likewise. This went on unnoticed for a couple of weeks or so, and my head would swim with excitement during our playful pettings and romps, until one day we were caught at it, and there was a great furore between the two Mothers. Mine was rather unperturbed as she was broad minded and looked upon it as part of normal growing up, but Mrs Claire Yates who was a rather tall gaunt lady was adamant that I was now far too old for the women鈥檚 section, and demanded to see Captain Stratford about having me transferred to the men鈥檚 area. He in turn saw the Commandant and eventually they all agreed that Graham and I would both have to go over to the men鈥檚 side, where we would share a room with the Master of the Greek ship Capt. Iannis. As a special dispensation, on account of our young age, we would both be allowed back daily to visit our Mothers, a privilege denied to all the other married men.

Our new quarters were in a similar sized small room on the front of the upper floor over the Guards quarters, and upon entering it for the first time I was immediately struck by footprints that were plastered all over the ceiling, which gave the impression that someone had been dancing upside down, but. I was told that they were made by one of the previous occupants swatting mosquitoes with his slipper whilst in a frenzy! The Banksian roses were all in flower outside the room with bunches of double yellow blossom hanging over the window sills and sides, which added a nice touch.

The Greek Captain whom Graham and I shared a room with, had been rejected by all the other crew who were all fanatical Communists, and who daily prayed for the revolution to sweep into Greece with the advancing Red Army. The Captain in contrast was a right wing royalist who threatened to have his whole crew prosecuted for mutiny after the war, and spent his time cursing them at every available moment. They mostly came from the Islands of Samos and Lesbos and a couple of years later, when we heard that the British had landed in Samos, they were utterly dejected that we had beaten the Russians in saving Greece from the Germans for the free world.
Life on the men鈥檚 side was in complete contrast to the women鈥檚. There was a general quietness and a peaceful harmony everywhere. The men spoke in soft tones rarely if ever raising voices apart from the Greeks who would shout and gesticulate at each other across their large room. There were all sorts of activities going on to help pass the time. There were classes by experts in such fields as Spanish, Malay, History etc. I was immediately enrolled to commence some daily studies in various subjects, although apart from History and Geography I cannot say I can ever remember learning that much from them. The Geordie seamen in their large room took us both under their wing, and we would play cards, chess dominoes etc. Over the following months I came to learn by heart all the Tyneside songs such as Bladen Races, and Phil the Fluters Ball as well as a lot of Irish Republican ones such 鈥淭he Wearing o鈥檛he Green鈥� plus a lot of rude pub ditties.
There was a multitude of different races and nationalities, about 20 Greeks, a Somali, four Cape Coloureds, two Arabs, about six Chinese, Australians and British. There was even a Spaniard there, and when I asked him why he a neutral allowed himself to be in the camp, he replied that being a Communist if he were to declare himself , he would be shot by the Germans. So it was better to keep quiet, put up with the conditions, and being an experienced prisoner who knew the ropes and how to lie low, and this one was his fourth prison camp that he had been in, with some having been far worse, he would quietly sit it out to the end!

Amongst the Geordie crews was a Norwegian boatswain 鈥淟ugs Larsen鈥�, named because he had enormous elephantine ears. He would tell me that when he was a small boy and had done something naughty, his Father would reach for a large chopping knife, which he would hand to him with an order to go into the woods and return with a birch branch . He would then have to bend over and be given 6 swipes with it, and finally an extra one for what he had not yet been caught doing, so he could remain in credit! One day after I had bothered him, he grabbed hold of me over his knee, and gave me one whack on my bottom with his broad leather belt 鈥淭hat did not hurt 鈥�, I said as I rose up smarting. So he grabbed me and gave me another one . 鈥淭hat didn鈥檛 hurt either 鈥� I said again, barely able to hold back my tears as I was so sore, so I got a third whack and cried and did not answer back the third time. He was a very kind and gentle man and a great friend of mine and I bore him no ill will but instead the greatest respect for his firm action. .

There was one small red haired seaman Sid Powell who was fairly bald and constantly wore a woollen knitted hat, who was a man of few words who spoke little and only enjoyed playing cribbage with his mates. However prior to coming to our camp he had already been torpedoed and picked up four times in the North Sea and the North Atlantic before he went down for yet a fifth time on the Kirkpool and had somehow survived. During the terrible shelling of the Kirkpool as the crew had congregated forehead, he quietly and without any fuss got out the first aid kit and was busy patching up and bandaging victims as they lay shell shocked during the action, some with their entrails all hanging out across the deck. The unsung sheer heroism of these ordinary merchant seamen who would lay their neck on the line every time their ship left port during the Battle of the Atlantic, under the freezing cold conditions and the expectation of almost certain death should they be torpedoed, was an inspiration to everyone that knew them. They all looked after us boys as though we were their very own sons or brothers. Never once, in spite of been severely warned by Mother, did I ever have any sort of homosexual approach by any member of these working class lads from Tyneside, who throughout the two years that I was in their company , acted always like perfect gentlemen and who nurtured us both in sickness and health and helped us grow with supplements from their meagre rations! David Millar Chief Officer of the Kirkpool, who used to give me lessons in maths, too had been sunk previously off the North East Coast at night in mid winter, and was lucky to survive a second time as his letter to Mother included at the end of this chapter, graphically illustrates. He was a tremendous character, a real leader, and an inspiration for everyone with his quiet level-headedness and philosophical approach. He greatly admired Mother, who was very similar and would regularly write to cheer her up when she was depressed and in the blues. Another man with a tremendous spirit who always saw the funny side of life was the Kirkpool鈥檚 radio operator Malcolm Scott. A radio operator in those days would sit earphones on listening and transmitting messages in Morse Code鈥�.dots and dashes. They were so fluent and conversant that they could hear the messages and write down the text instantly as though it were the spoken word. He would always have a funny story to tell, always had a chuckle on his lips and excelled at writing doggerel rhymes often nicely and amusingly illustrated. He was an inspiration to us all and we were fortunate to have such a man with us to cheer everyone up.
One of the key occupations on the men鈥檚 side was in following the progress of the war each day. We had no newspapers at all as the Tokyo English Editions never came our way. So a scheme was devised to get round the problem so that we could discover what was going on in the world and the progress of the war, that proved foolproof and was never discovered by the Japanese Guards. Each morning two sweepers from our prisoners would go down to the Guards Office and Common Room to clean and tidy it whilst the guards were in the dining room having their breakfast. A copy of the Japanese Edition of the Mainichi would be 鈥渂orrowed鈥�, then taken upstairs and the salient points noted, and read by Fred Garner who before the War had been British Vice Consul in Shanghai and who was fluent in reading the main Chinese and Japanese Character Script. He would sit in the lavatory with prisoners on watch reading the news, sometimes tracing a map with the battle fronts, and twenty minutes later the paper would be back in the Common Room ready for the Guards return. The next thing then was to pass the news onto the women鈥檚 side, which had been slow and cumbersome at first, and could only be done by whispers at the dividing steel fire doors that were permanently shut.. However once we boys were going back and forth daily, the problem solved itself, and I was detailed to memorise the main facts of the news and relay them verbally, a job that greatly appealed to me. I would have to memorise maps and be able to pinpoint the exact British advances in North Africa and later Sicily and Italy, and together with the Russian re-conquests in the Ukraine etc. as well as the steady island hopping tactics of the Americans as they advanced their airfields across the vast distances of the Pacific Ocean to bring Japan itself within bombing range. Also we followed the RAF鈥檚 bombing campaign over Germany. The Geordies with whom I was in such close contact had suffered severely from the Luftwaffe attacks on Tyneside where Newcastle and Northshields had been badly blasted. As our might grew and we heard of 300 bomber raids, they cheered! And as this was slowly increased to 500 bomber raids, they cheered even louder and so on until there were 1,000 bomber raids and later still 2,000 bomber raids! With those simple folk retribution is what they demanded for the unprovoked attacks that had killed their very own loved ones and ruined their poor meagre terraced homes. They had suffered so much, they had been through the depression of the thirties, and now their meagre possessions, their loved ones had all been lost or wrecked, they demanded from their country retribution. It was a message heard loud and clear from everyone in authority. From the King and the Royal family, to the Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and all members of the Labour government there was no dissension. After the War many middle class Liberals expressed horror at what we had done, but at that time, with the country in that mood no alternative was politically possible.

Cont/鈥︹�ee A Child鈥檚 War part Ten

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