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to Nanking might possibly indicate that the well-remembered and authenticated horrors of that occasion influence both Chinese and foreigners into believing easily similar stories about the hated common enemy. It is however noteworthy that several writers agree over the atrocities performed on Chinese, including some first-hand witnesses as above.
Writing from Chungking on 27.2.42 P. J. STONEMAN of the Stabilisation Bourd of China gives the following information with no indication of source. "White men are being humiliated in every way, women subjected to the lowest abuse. British soldiers were shot at the Repulse Bay Hotel if they did not give a suitable reply to the Jap soldiers or go on their knees." It seems that this writer's position makes him likely to meet escapers, It is noteworthy that he too makes no mention of mass rape, and that the insults he does specify are exactly those to which the Japs did subject white men and women in Tientsin etc. in 1937-38.
Another writer from Tsing Yuen, Kwantung, S. China, J.E. MORRISON, states on 10.2.42 that foreigners are kept in barbed- wire-enclosed concentration camps where Chinese soldiers were formerly kept (men on one side and women with children on the other). (Note: This refers probably to the regiments that escaped over our border from the Jap invasion of Kwantung two years ago and were interned in the Colony.) He confirms the twice daily bowl of rice with a little salt fish, and says that foreigners are seen picking lice off themselves and killing them. Japanese soldiers rape Chinese women as they did in Canton. Again one notes that there is no reference to mass horrors and the report of para 8 and the eyewitness letters is confirmed. The camp he mentions is not the P. 0. W. camp as there were no women there. It must be a confusion with the Stanley camps.
Another Chinese writer, YU YUEN KEE, The Oriental Academy. Chungking, mentions insulting treatment of British soldiers, who were put to clearing the streets and removing rèfuse. Their food consists of three bananas a day or three cakes, He notes that Indians and Chinese have received better treatment, especially the lutter, and remarks "This is the policy of con- ciliation." It is curious that this is the only mention of "most favoured nation" treatment, and that this writer conflicts so strongly with all others who refer to racial treatment.
On 22nd March, L. J. MEAD of the Standard-Vacuum Oil Co., Chungking, wrote: "It would seem that those interned in Hong Kong are really suffering....We are told that the foreign troops are really suffering from lack of food and sanitation. Most reports say that they are being slowly starved....We are told that the Japanese refuse to co-operate or to allow neutral countries to assist in any way."
In conclusion one might venture to suggest that taking y everything into account, source, distance from Hong Kong and reliable information, character of writers, and their sources when these are given, the milder reports by Heath, Haist, Stoneman, Morrison, "Mary, Harrop, Mead and Arnold seem to be more reliable. They more or less confirm each other and are in accord with what is already known of Japanese behaviour to Europeans and Chinese in other cities which have been under their control.
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