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DONALD C. BOWIE
we knew that men were searched by guards on arrival in camps, drugs being confiscated. I do not remember however hearing of any serious punishment being inflicted on men discovered to be carrying drugs.
On 29 July 1945 Saito handed over five cases each marked case 111, of medical supplies from the American Red Cross. These contained cresol, dextrose in saline, saline, capsules of vitamins A and B, distilled water and dried human plasma. I don't know how he got these but they were sophisticated packs of a type quite new to us.
ENTERTAINMENTS
Some entertainment in the form of sing-songs was provided in the seven months after our surrender on occasions when the recreation room was not flooded. At this time few of our patients were fit to go to the recreation room, but we were lucky in another direction. Corporal Carter of the Royal Signals had been wounded, and as he recovered a proposal was made that the wards might be wired and provided with loud speakers to receive a programme of gramophone music coming from a station within the hospital. I was fully occupied as a surgeon at this time and I do not know who conceived the idea. The necessary work was done, though, and the Japanese agreed to allow two periods of music each day. The operation room for this venture was a bunk occupied by Corporal Carter who soon extended his activities. These sessions were very valuable in distracting patients' attention in 1942 and 1943 from the grim realities of wounds, sickness and undernourishment. Carter, an enterprising extrovert, not overburdened with nerves soon contrived to listen to news broadcasts from British sources. He was joined by one or two others, equally bold but perhaps a little more careful, and soon we were having daily bulletins of the contents of British news broadcasts. When I took charge of the hospital these came to me and were made known by word of mouth to patients and staff. I do not now recall that any major news came by this route. The items related to the same events as we read or had deduced from the local newspaper, but of course were put out with the emphasis on our side. Carter was also asked by the Japanese to repair their wireless set on several occasions and did so. He thus had the pleasure of listening to British broadcasts inside Japanese quarters. In his own bunk where he received the