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In November we were sent a medical officer, who had a long experience in China, and we also at last received some medical supplies, including a limited quantity of quinine. We were able to treat the sick students and also give some assistance in the neighbouring villages, an assistance which was much appreciated and created a lot of goodwill. A severe epidemic of meningitis broke out soon after; our stock of sulfanilamide was barely adequate to cope with the cases amongst our own students and staff and for lack of the drug we had to watch many around us die.
Late in December the first lorry got through to us with a small supply of much-needed explosive. In the previous summer the roads had been destroyed by removing the wooden bridges, and cutting trenches across the roadway at a number of places. The trenches had now been filled in again with the spoil left on the roadside, but with rain the filling settled so as to leave a six-inch drop where the trench had been; it made for slow and rough driving, and it was very hard on the vehicles. The bridges were not replaced until later, but in winter the water level in the rivers fell and tracks were cut down the river banks so that the lorry could be driven across through the water.
There was some delay in winding up our affairs and we were still in the midst of it, when I was suddenly informed that a party of Americans had arrived. I wired this information to our people in Chungking and as it was the first they had heard of it they were even more surprised than we. The American party, consisting of men who had not been in China before, were able to pass on to them a lot of information regarding local conditions, for although they had spent five months in Chungking en route, much in the country was strange to them. They were also unused to the food. One of them, Bill, suddenly developed acute appendicitis, and our medical officer had hurriedly to perform an emergency operation with crude instruments to save his life. The operation was successful and the invalid stayed in our mess until he was stronger; his companions shot pheasant for the pot, a luxury to which we were unaccustomed as we had no shotgun. Bill had been a member of the guard on the American Embassy in London during the Blitz and he gave us descriptions of those days which were of great interest to us, as we had none of us been home at the time. It was not till May, 1943, that all our affairs were settled and we then left our new American friends with real regret. Several of them had been through our Commando schools in England, had seen something of England at war, and understood some of the difficulties