The camp was already over-crowded. Tom managed to find a space on the bare earth next to one of the huts, where someone had stretched out a shabby tarpaulin for shelter.
Talking to some of the men already there, mostly Australians who had also been working on the railway, he discovered that the place was called ‘River Valley Road Camp’. Although some people had been there for some time, it functioned as a sort of transit camp.
‘Transit?’ asked Tom. ‘For what?’
‘The Japs are shipping prisoners to the motherland to work in mines and factories there,’ said one of the Australians. ‘I don’t suppose you lads are going to be here for too long. We’re supposed to be out of here tomorrow. There’s a ship waiting for us in the harbour. Then you might be able to find somewhere to sleep.’
In fact, they were there for over a month. During that time Tom and the others were taken out daily on work parties to the docks and ordered to unload food and equipment from cargo ships. It was back-breaking work and, as on the railway, the guards urged them on all day, with sticks and rifle butts, beating up anyone who appeared to be slacking.
On the first morning, Tom had watched as a group of prisoners lined up on the dock. They were in a pitiful state, bone-thin and unshaven, naked but for their Jap Happys. But strangely they all carried packs that appeared to have just been issued.
The vessel was an ancient cargo ship that looked as though it had recently been transporting coal. It was black and filthy. It took hours to load the prisoners onto it; there seemed to be thousands waiting on the quayside. Tom could not believe how many were crammed on board. They just kept on loading them. Hundreds and hundreds of them walked unsteadily up the gang-plank and were forced below through hatches. When they were all aboard, Tom watched as the guards battened down the hatches. A chill went through him.
That will be us one day, Tom thought to himself.
Soon it was indeed their turn to march down to the docks and assemble in the heat of the midday sun with what was left of their belongings. They had their first glimpse of the ship that was to take them to Japan. It was a rusty old tub, a cargo ship, with no name painted on the side. To Tom, it looked impossibly small to carry all the prisoners crowded before it. Like the other groups that Tom had watched before, they were each issued with a pack containing a set of thick clothes for the colder climate they were bound for.
They began to be loaded on board. There must have been over a thousand of them, Tom thought as he looked at the press of bodies on the quayside. The crowd pressed forward, and one by one the prisoners walked the rickety gang-plank onto the deck. They were then driven across the deck to a hatch, where a ladder descended forty feet into the bowels of the ship. As Tom crossed the deck, he overheard one of the senior officers arguing with the Japanese commandant.
‘You can’t expect all these men to travel on this ship. There simply isn’t enough room. The holds are already full to bursting, and you’re still loading. Do you want them all to die before they get to Japan?’
‘They are lucky they did not die in battle,’ was the only response from the stony-faced Japanese officer.
‘At least tell me you won’t batten the hatches. The men will suffocate. I’ve heard on some ships the hatches have been nailed down. I give you my word that no-one will try to escape.’
‘Get below with your men, Colonel. All will be well.’
Tom hesitated as he stood at the top of the hatch and looked down. The hot air and stench of the hold hit him as he leaned over and looked down. The idea of being trapped down there in the heat and the dark with hundreds of other men appalled him.
He felt a sharp jab between the kidneys.
‘No wait! You get down,’ scowled the guard. ‘Hurry!’
He had no choice. He slowly lowered himself onto the ladder and began climbing down, rung by rung, into the darkness. As he descended, the clammy heat of the stinking hold enveloped him. He climbed down past two decks full of men, crammed in so tightly they could barely move. At each level stood a guard holding a bayonet, barring his entrance.
‘Go down, go down,’ they shouted, and he was forced to descend right to the bottom level. The filthy boards were already half full with nearly naked men, sitting there miserably in their own sweat. Tom found a small space for himself not too far from a tiny porthole; although inadequate, it might at least let in some air once the ship started moving.
Tom did not know how he was going to survive this.
It was hours before the ship was loaded, and the temperature must have reached a hundred degrees inside by then. Men were shouting for water and air. Some fainted in the heat, collapsing onto their neighbours. They could hear officers pleading with the guards for water, but none came until the ship had cast off and moved out onto the open sea. Then a bucket was passed around and men dipped their metal cups into it. The temptation was to gulp it straight down, but experience had taught Tom that it would be a very long time before any more water was given to them. He sipped his as slowly as he could.
Later
