37
SECRET
Sergeant David ann and wife.
1111 Beaver llall Hill
Montreal.
4th December, 1943.
(formerly Miss E. C. K. Clarke of the Hong Kong Civil Service.)
Both Sergeant Mann and his wife look on the whole in good health. Both ost considerable weight in the camp and both have regained about half during The voyage home. Both he and his wife are anxious to continue in government service and both are interested in Hong Kong reconstruction work. Both will serve meantime in any other Colony, as may seem best to the authorities. Sergeant Mann's address in Canada will be c/o. W. Marshall, British Columbia Electric Company, Vancouver, B.C.
I have instructed him to report by letter or in person to the High Commissioner's Office in Ottawa as soon as possible, with reference to payment of salary and further instructions. His temporary financial needs have been met by Mr. Paterson.
Sergeant lann will, in due course, write a detailed report of all he knows of Hong Kong and will submit it to the High Commissioner's Office. In the meantime I append a resume of the main points of his conversation with me.
The morale of Stanley Camp has been good but is now falling off. The food is totally inadequate and supplies of Vitamin B tablets (which alone have staved off serious deficiency illness) are now dangerously low.
The Japanese newspaper, which is circulated in the camp, is not, in Sergeant Mann's opinion, too bad; it is possible from it to piece together a fairly accurate picture of the war news. With the Japanese newspaper as a basis, lir. R. A. C. North has contrived to produce a daily camp-news bulletin which has presented a picture of world events not belied by what they have learned since their release.
Sergeant Liann says that the Chinese population is strongly pro-American but anti-British and anti-Japanese. He bases this opinion on what he saw and heard when he was taken to the town for questioning last year; I could get nothing specific. Kotewall and Shou-Son-Chow are the local bigwigs and both feature in every public activity. Kotewall has publicly made some venomous anti-British and fervently pro-Japanese speeches.
Sergeant Mann stresses the lift to morale given by the recent American air raids on the Colony. He mentions particularly the sortie by P. 38 Fighters which skimmed over the Colony and machine gunned the Gendarmerie headquarters last September.
Sergeant Mann confirms that last July Mr. Pennefeather-Evans, Mr. Walter Scott (D.C.I.) Mr. J. Fraser, (Defence Secretary) Mr. W. Anderson (Controller of Stores) Mr. D. Waterton (Radio Engineering Department) Agt: Superintendent Whant (Hong Kong Police) and several others, were arrested in Stanley Camp and removed to quarters unknown; three weeks later lir. Pennefeather-Evans and Mr. Whant returned to the camp in bad physical and mental shape though lacking any outward sign of violence. Both Officers have since refused to say where they were or what happened to them. There has been no word of the other men