SYDNEY J. TAVENDER, Vice Chairman of the Japanese Labour Camp Survivors of Great Britain, says of this book: "Here is a story of both suffering and
ingenuity. For nearly four years these civilian prisoners were forgotten and
left to struggle on amid malnutrition and disease. But they faced their ordeals
courageously, and after the Allied victory came they returned to their home
countries to restart their lives, having lost all their possessions."
ABOUT THE BOOK
This
is a unique book, in that for the first time a description has been given of
all the Japanese civilian internment camps in China and
Hong Kong. Here the story is told of the major events affecting Allied
personnel in China following the raid on Pearl Harbor. A brief
history is given of each of the internment camps ― the food, the
accommodation and experiences of the inmates. Certain conclusions are formed
about the failure of the Japanese government to make adequate provisions for
the 11,000 prisoners, half of whom were women and children. The defeat of the
Japanese could have ended in the wholesale killing of prisoners, but
providentially they were released after the Japanese surrender without any such
incidents.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr.
Norman Cliff was interned in his late teens, first in Temple Hill, Chefoo,
and then in Weixian Camp. He has written of his
experiences in these two camps in his widely read Courtyard
of the Happy Way. His new book, Prisoners of the
Samurai, is the fruit of further research which he has carried
out on all the Japanese civilian camps in China and
Hong Kong. In it he tells a fascinating story of how 11,000 Allied prisoners
bravely survived the long years of the war.
The
reader will form a picture of squalor, malnutrition and cramped accommodation,
but will also be surprised to meet individual Japanese, who acted with humanity
and kindness amid the tensions of war.
Norman Cliff now lives in retirement in
Harold Wood, Essex.
ISBN
0 9533295 0 X
Price £8.95