I next remember standing in the high office of the D.G.M.S. being told that I had been chosen to represent Canada in a far field, laden with Imperials, who must, by my deportment, be suitably impressed with the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps.
While this preamble was going on, my mind had been wandering under the influence of sub-tropical stations, from North Africa to Jamaica, finally settling on the latter in view of some late grapevine news I had received a few hours before.
Imagine then, the appearance of my face when the D.G. ended his talk by clapping me on the shoulder and whispering that, while it was a secret that I must impart to NO ONE, yet I was, in fact, going to Hong Kong. The turn of my brain over 12,000 miles was almost vertiginous.
— Captain John Reid, Office of the Director General Medical Services, Canadian Department of National Defence, Ottawa, October 6, 1941, Reid Family Papers