PACIFIC NET

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 21854, 26 October 1945, Page 5

PACIFIC NET

GATHERING IN JAPS. MANY ISLAND CAMPS BIG TASK UNDER WAY (R.N.Z.A.F. Official War Correspondent.) (9 a.m.) FAURO ISLAND. Oct. 25. It was a big job marshalling 18,491 Japanese on Fauro Island and the adjacent islets o£ Tauno, Masamasa, Piedu and Samanso, in the Solomons. Those .Japanese mostly came from Bougainville, but a few odd groups came from Shortland and other islands. The total is, of course, in addition to the 9000 odd Japanese interned at Torokina. Even allowing for the internees brought from Nauru and Ocean Islands, the roll call has revealed something like 25,000 Japanese on Bougainville. The job of interning the Japanese at the southern end of Bougainville started on September 24 and was finished on October 4. The internees largely used their own barges under Australian supervision and they were given no opportunities to linger, General Kanda, commander of the Japanese 17th Army, and 11 other highranking officers were taken to the midget island of Samanso. Some 8000 naval personnel went to Masamasa and Piedu, and an army totalling 12,000 haS been put in nine different carnps on the northern portion cf Fauro Island. Tauno Island is being reserved for JOOO Japanese officers, who will be sorted out and put there shortly. The barges in which the internees transoorted themselves wore practically derelict, but the operators understood the work in hand. They sailed over dangerous water without hitting any reefs. It has been authoritatively stated that the Japanese bargemen did t.wo years’ night training in Japan before they were considered capable of doing their work. The Japanese have been required to build their own camps. The Australians gave them 20 tons of roofing iron and other material, like 12 tons of nails, but timber they must get for themselves. Rations on Sustenance Basis The rations are also being issued each week on a mere sustenance basis and the internal urge will encourage the Japanese to develop gardens and catch fish, but they make every effort and use every subterfuge to get increased rations, as a letter from a medical officer will testify: “I received a week's rations and articles of daily use for 331 persons yesterday,” the letter, written in English from Surgeon-Commander Yamagishi, stated. “The total number at the hospital is 409. Your supply causes a shortage of 98 persons. As we owe you the whole nutrition, your exact supply of rations is indispensable to keep life, especially in the case of patients suffering inanition. Considering these circumstances, please send us a week’s rations for 78 persons more.” The doctor had not previously notified the increase in his patients, while an inspection showed that he had not even used the previous week’s rations. His patients had been living on fish or not living at all. Generally speaking, the Japanese seem to be treating their internment lightly. They go about building their camps and doing work for the garrison troops with a smile on their faces. Now that they are coming under strict sanitation control, many of them are living better than they ever did. When one of them at Torokina Camp was asked just how he liked the conditions, his reply was that the conditions were all right, but neither lie nor the other Japanese liked machine-gun towers or barbed wire.

They want to get back to Japan as quickly as possible. Every Japanese tries to ask you if you can tell him when he is going home.