[
    {
        "id": 207439,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1975",
        "page_number": 207,
        "title": "RAS-1975",
        "content_text": "CAPTIVE SURGEON IN HONG KONG\n\n199\n\nthe eyes. He and I agreed that neither of us had ever seen a case of pellagra before.\n\nOn 22 January 1943, Saito came in again and was handed a copy of our pellagra report which he should have had already from Takeyama, our interpreter, the night before. He now said that in Sham Shui Po patients were being given 10 mgm nicotinic acid by injection daily, a figure which contrasted with his advice given less than a week earlier. This did nothing to increase my confidence in him as a physician.\n\nA day later Saito came in again. We had heard that 1200 men had left P.O.W. camps by ship having been equipped with some warm clothing, a Red Cross parcel and 10 yen each and that they were accompanied by two British and one Canadian doctor. I tried but failed to extract any more information on this subject. Saito told me that Sham Shui Po then held 2000 men of whom 1000 were sick and twice he emphasised that he did not want our hospital to be used as a hotel by men who were fit for camp. I found this rather irksome coming so soon after the tragedies of the closing months of 1942. I acknowledged that we did have some patients who were apparently in good condition physically but who showed serious visual defects which were evident if any examination of them were to be carried out. I complained that the only information we received about an incoming draft of patients was the approximate number and the time they were expected to arrive and even this was not always reliable while the notice was always short. Because our space was limited the only way we could accommodate new patients was to discharge about the same number of our existing ones. It thus came about that I was asking medical officers for the names of patients best fitted to return to camp and whose progress was unlikely to be jeopardised by discharge, rather than those in whose fitness we had confidence. I said that I could not overrule a doctor's decision on the medical condition of a patient only to be told that the same applied in the Japanese army. I was a little surprised at this. My protest had no effect and on our side we continued making room for new patients by discharging the fittest among the old patients. In 1943 this policy was the only one possible. Eighteen months later we did have patients admitted from camp, chosen by Saito, who seemed to us to be in better shape than some that we had to discharge.\n\nA Colonel Watanabe of the Japanese medical service visited us",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 207440,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1975",
        "page_number": 208,
        "title": "RAS-1975",
        "content_text": "200\n\nDONALD C. BOWIE\n\nunexpectedly on 26 January and saw three of our wards. I told him that by now every patient coming from Sham Shui Po had symptoms of some form of deficiency disease. I did not discover his standing as a physician but having seen three patients in one ward and two in another he left without making any comment. Still in 1943, on 29 January we were required to make a return of patients to the Japanese and this showed that we had 213 cases of deficiency diseases in hospital out of a total of 331 patients and the total included 62 war injuries. It is clear that about this time the Japanese were interested in the incidence of deficiency diseases among prisoners, and on 6 February Saito required a report on all such cases admitted from Sham Shui Po since the end of February 1942, that is during the preceding year. We were given certain headings under which to make the report and two of these referred to the effect of Apellagrin and of the diet we provided. We had later to enlarge this to give many more details about the cases of visual defects.\n\nOn 29 March Professor Uehara, said to come from the Imperial University, Tokyo, together with a colonel of the Japanese Army Medical Service, Saito and other medical officers visited the hospital without warning to see some patients suffering from pellagra. The professor seemed specially interested in the skin manifestations and I believe he attributed the visual defects to beri-beri though we had no discussion with him on clinical or therapeutic measures.\n\nIt is impossible for me to say what effect all these visits and reports had on our wellbeing. Certainly the Japanese rations continued as before, though no improvements were made. On the other hand it is just possible that the Red Cross bulk supplies to which I have referred earlier and which began about this time may have been a response to our predicament. This is a pure guess on my part.\n\nOur Japanese were very keen on getting reports from us. For example on 27 January 1943 Takeyama, interpreter at the time, transmitted a demand for lists of hospital equipment held by patients e.g. boots, shoes, shirts, blankets, beds, mattresses etc. In March we were again required to bring up to date lists of our patients who were over the age of 60, blind or had suffered amputations.\n\nOn 28 May Saito having previously warned us, we were inspected by Lieutenant General Hamada Chief of the P.O.W. department, Tokyo. We had to display flowers, put white cloths on the tables",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 207442,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1975",
        "page_number": 210,
        "title": "RAS-1975",
        "content_text": "DONALD C. BOWIE\n\ntime with very ill patients, with food and from uncertainty about our future. We seemed to be living from day to day. In March however, during an administrative inspection, Saito required us to repair the ward damage and also to remove the 'Mimi lau' concrete blocks with which we had protected the ground floor wards on the harbour side during hostilities. We took this as an indication that a move was not imminent. Our sappers, helped by some of our own R.A.M.C. men, made an excellent job of the repairs and in due course the recreation room became usable again.\n\nAt this time our interpreter was Takeyama, an amiable buffoon on whom I spent some time trying, though without any success, to talk about war news. On 1 April 1943 he caught me for an April fool over visitors' parcels, and this is the only attempt I can recall at joking between the Japanese and me.\n\nOn 13 April 1943 the so-called 'unfits', e.g., those over 60, the blind and those who had lost limbs were sent to camp. Numbers of our patients in the hospital with neurological disabilities were notable and pathetic sights about the hospital with their high-stepping gaits, seeking the support of walls to maintain their balance as they moved. Those with visual defects developed a characteristic carriage of the head as they tried to see round their blind spots.\n\nAbout now we had a series of searches in the hospital and on 26 April all civilian clothing which was discovered was removed by the Japanese. This belonged to those of us whose peace-time base had been in the hospital and who, on the departure of our wives, had been allowed to store personal possessions in some of the vacated married quarters. These married quarters were thoroughly looted after our surrender, probably by Japanese. On one hasty stolen visit I paid soon after our surrender, I found the storage rooms thigh-deep in the possessions of the families of our men. Boxes had been broken open and the contents had been strewn about. I rescued a few of my own possessions but lost these again when the Japanese seized them later. When this civilian clothing was taken away, I protested strongly and made great play with the fact that the Japanese had no right to remove the possessions of medical personnel, and I handed in lists of all personal clothing known to have been removed. Of course, they were never returned, and in August 1945, I learned of the eventual fate of these possessions.\n\nPage 210\n\nPage 211",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 207455,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1975",
        "page_number": 223,
        "title": "RAS-1975",
        "content_text": "CAPTIVE SURGEON IN HONG KONG\n\n215\n\nmuch space as possible. The raiding plane on 26 October had therefore been seen by many of our population in the hospital. The sequel came on 3 November when, in the middle of afternoon, all up-patients and all staff were ordered to parade on the tennis court. Sentries had been posted overlooking the court and Lieutenant Saito and Mr. Hasegawa, an interpreter from Japanese Headquarters, were present. Two days earlier Sgt. Seino had told Major Charles Boxer that the Japanese navy had reported to the Japanese army that our men had been seen on the hospital verandahs during air raids. The intense rivalry between the two services was well known, and after Boxer's warning I saw to it that all staff and patients were ordered to keep off verandahs during air raids. The precaution came too late, however, and at the tennis court parade Saito made a speech interpreted by Hasegawa to the effect that many people in the hospital had laughed at and criticised the Japanese Military Authorities during and after the air raid. All on parade who had not laughed or criticised were ordered to hold up their hands and all did so. Hasegawa then said he did not believe this and I was called further forward from the head of the parade and asked if I knew who had laughed or criticised. On replying that I did not know I was dealt a buffet on each side of the face by Saito. His fist was not clenched but he was quite a powerful man and my cap was knocked askew and the inside of my cheek was cut though I suffered no real injury. Boxer was then called forward and asked why he had not signed an undertaking not to escape about which I shall have something to say later. Boxer replied that a Japanese officer would not have signed such a document and he then received two blows on the face from Saito. The parade was then dismissed and Saito went to No. 3 ward at the top of the building where up-patients were paraded on the verandah. These were mainly men recovering from diphtheria and any who had been on verandahs during raids were ordered to stand forward. When none did all were slapped. A new interpreter to the hospital, Takeyama, had just taken over and the latter told me formally that any further complaints of this nature would be followed by the closing of the hospital. We therefore arranged that verandahs on the harbour side would be policed by us during raids and that no one would even go on the verandah on the harbour side to get to lower floors where shelter was better. Shortly afterwards, on Japanese orders all beds were removed from verandahs on the harbour side of the",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d",
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    }
]