MEN'S COMPLAINT

Evening Post, Volume CXL, Issue 57, 5 September 1945, Page 6

MEN'S COMPLAINT

SHIP CONDITIONS

BOAT KIWIS WALKED OFF

Bitter complaints about troop accommodation and food were made by New Zealand ex-prisoners of war, 1337 of whom reached Wellington today after a 27-day voyage from Liverpool via Panama in the former liner Orion. The Orion, which carried part of the Second Echelon to the Middle East in 1940, had almost 5000 service personnel aboard when she arrived today, including- Australians and Royal Navy officers and.men, and was the ship on which 147 New Zealand prisoners and several R.N.Z.A.F. men refused to embark at Liverpool early last month owing to allegations of overcrowding. * . .

New Zealanders aboard said that an officer came to Liverpool to inspect the ship, as the result of reports that the accommodation was overtaxed, and there was a suggestion that the repatriation party was to be reduced by 200 because of this. The officer, however, reported to Major-General Kippenberger, who is in charge of the repatriation from England of New Zealand war prisoners, that the accommodation was adequate, and an original party of 1373 N.Z.E.F. personnel, with more than 40 officers included, were entrained from their reception areas in southern England to embark. More than 150 R.N.Z.A.F. personnel were also included, but when the men saw the accommodation about 70 of them and more than 200 of the N.Z.E.F. draft walked off the ship. A lot of the airmen and several soldiers subsequently returned because their anxiety to get home outweighed their dislike of the conditions on the Orion, but 147 other ranks of the N.Z.E.F. persisted in their refusal to sail and were taken back to the reception centres. MORE WOULD HAVE GONE. Apparently the suggestion to walk off the ship was not widely known among the troops, because several of the men who arrived today said they did not hear of the move until it was too late to join in. Many of them asserted that they, too, would have left if they had known of the suggestion. The men were accommodated in mess decks, one series on the waterline and another below it. They ate and slept in the same quarters, either slinging their hammocks above the mess table or sleeping on thin mattresses between the tables. The non-fraternisation orders as applied between officers and men restricted other ranks to inadequate sections of the lower promenade decks which were open to fresh air only at the sides and not above, and were insufficient to allow any form of sport for exercise. Weather conditions had the men almost literally between the devil and the deep blue sea. In the tropics it j was possible to sleep on deck, although strict black-out conditions were observed on the whole voyage, but the heat in the mess decks made eating an ordeal, even when the men stripped to the barest clothing. In colder weather they could not sleep on deck and the mess deck ventilation was not adequate for the sleeping needs of men in crowded conditions. A perhaps more bitter complaint i was in regard to the food. The men said there were only two changes in diet —from fish to bully beef or from bully beef to fish. Particularly in the I

tropics the bully beef had a deteriorative effect on health, and the manner of cooking the fish, which .was partially cooked in batter and then warmed in the morning for breakfast, made it dry and unappetising. The only bright spot in the menu was stuffed pork and a Christmas pudding last Sunday. Bread was served in inch-thick wedges painted with melted butter, and although the size of the slices was reduced after complaints, it was soon back to where it started.

Several soldiers used a description in describing the tea that would strike a familiar note in the ears of all servicemen. It was weak and stewed, and although an improvement was made in the later part of the voyage when New Zealanders were put in charge of the tea-making, the tea ration and the quality of it combined to prevent a satisfactory drink being made. This point was rubbed home in a way the men did not like at all by the fact that it was possible for twopence to buy a good cup of tea, hot, strong, and well-made, in the canteen, while their own ration remained almost undrinkable. Similarly with food, for prices which they considered too high the soldiers could use their own money at the canteen to buy biscuits, chocolate, and a variety of tinned foods which made it possible to make a fair meal and they not unnaturally wondered why this should be so when their own rations were not up to standard. CANTEEN PRICES. They complained that prices of all commodities, except cigarettes and tobacco, at the canteen on board run by the ship were far too high. Pyjamas sold at fifteen shillings a pair were described as being no better than paper, and cheap Indian-made cotton underclothing which should have been free of all taxes on board ship sold at 3s 6d a garment. And — crowning: misfortune to any aggregation of New Zealand servicemen—the ship was dry for the troops, although the crew had its own wet canteen. VJ Day, spent in the Atlantic, could not be celebrated as they would have wished. One troop-space to accommodate 250 men Avas equipped with only three conveniences (one out of order), three showers, and nine wash basins. In another section for 500 men there were two conveniences and six basins. Letters received in New Zealand from some of the men who left the ship described its conditions in strong language. "I've been a prisoner for a long time, mum, but it shook me," | was a typical comment.