“VE Day brought a sense of optimism to the camp”

Last night after the NHS clap I popped across the road to chat to our good friends and neighbours Lesley and David (at a socially acceptable distance). The talk turned to VE Day and David reminded me that he had been in a Prisoner of War Camp in Japan on VE Day. On hearing this I asked him if I could photograph him for my blip today and share a little of his story with you.

David was 10 months old, in July 1942, when the ship he was on with his parents and sister was captured on the high seas in the Indian Ocean by the Germans. The occupants of the ship were taken to Japan and placed in a convent, all but two of the nuns were kicked out and the men and teenage boys were separated from the women and children. For the next three years David only saw his Father a couple of times a year. David recalls the excitement of Red Cross parcels and the Americans occasionally dropping food for the camp, but food was not plentiful. You can imagine how the adults must have felt, three long, hard years later,  when a member of the camp got hold of a Japanese newspaper that one of the guards had been reading. The newspaper was handed to the man who knew enough Japanese to translate for the others that Britain and its allies had accepted Germany’s unconditional surrender in the war. David, at nearly 4 years old, recalls the feeling of optimism that swept through the camp, though it was to be another 4 months before they would leave the camp in Japan. Although he also recalls that the Japanese guards became a lot more conciliatory with the prisoners at this point as they were worried about repercussions after the war.

Three years ago, David travelled back to Japan and visited the site of the Convent. There was enough of the entrance to the building left for him to recognise it and a small museum dedicated to the prisoners. It was a moving experience. In this photo David is holding a picture of his family taken in 1945.