Chapter 9
On 17 October 1943, the railway was finally completed when the lines from the north and south met near Konkuita. This was a railway camp 262 kilometres north of Nong Pladuk, Thailand, and 153 kilometres south of Thanbyuzayat, Burma.
By November, F Force was gradually being evacuated from camps up the line to Kanchanaburi and then to Singapore. Its men had probably experienced the worst conditions of any force working on the railway. By the time F Force arrived at Kanchanaburi, its 3600 Australians had lost about one-third of their number, while the British had lost almost two-thirds of their 3400 men. Many were not in any condition to travel any further, and so there was a huge influx of patients into the Kanchanaburi hospitals. The original H Force Hospital was soon overcrowded, and so four additional huts were taken over from the No. 2 Coolie Hospital.1
Hundreds of F Force men died of cholera, but many more died of dysentery, malaria, beriberi, strongyloides or other parasitic diseases, all brought on or exacerbated by overwork and lack of food. In many cases, men just gave up and died in misery.2
As soon as Digger heard that F Force was returning, he was on the lookout for Bobby Small. Digger was used to living and working with men who were underfed and overworked, but nothing prepared him for the condition of the men of F Force. The worst of it was that they were quiet. As bad as conditions were at Kanchanaburi, the Filthy Seven were at least able to joke about them. They knew they would survive and they talked about it constantly. This was not the case for the men of F Force. Many had given up hope and were simply waiting to die. Some, even when they were on the way to recovery, were unable to drag themselves out of their depression.
Digger soon found his mate. Bobby was very ill, and not the man Digger remembered. Digger found him lying on the ground in a corner of the camp. Bobby had no firm and friendly handshake for Digger, who soon learned that he had dysentery and bad malaria at the very least. All that Digger got was a quiet ‘Hello, mate . . . it’s great to see you again’. Bobby was literally half the man Digger had known at Changi.
Digger quickly organised for Bobby to join the Filthy Seven in their hut. Bobby still slept on the floor at night, but during the day he slept in Digger’s place on the bamboo platform. Digger and his mates provided Bobby with medicines and much better food.
Over the next few days Bobby rested as the Filthy Seven went about their gravedigging and other work duties. They would eat together in the evenings, and everyone encouraged Bobby to talk. They spoke about Changi and what a terrific time they’d had there. They reminisced about the snakes in the swamp, collecting the snails to feed and cure Joe Milledge of his dysentery, about how they got one up on the officers by taking their tinned food, and above all about getting drunk on the booze that Bobby had made in the hospital’s boiler room.
They also talked of the future: what they would do when they got home, how soon it would be before the war ended, and what they would do to the fucking Japs when that day came. They all agreed that they would go to Japan and bite the balls off all the breeders!
If willing someone to get better had any effect, then Bobby should have been improving. All Digger’s mates could see how he did everything possible to aid Bobby’s recovery. Bobby had all the quinine he needed and the healthiest and most tempting food that it was possible to acquire in the circumstances, but he showed little improvement. His bouts of malaria fever did not abate.
Digger woke one night to find that Bobby was missing from his usual place on the floor next to him. He found him sitting outside on the ground next to the hut. Digger sat down beside him. The two men leaned against the wall with their feet in the drainage ditch.
‘I thought it might be cooler out here, mate,’ said Bobby, ‘but right now it’s getting a bit cold even.’
‘No worries, I’ll get my blanket,’ Digger replied, knowing well the effects of the malaria.
When he returned, the two sat together with the blanket around them. They talked of how they would get home, and the places they would pass through on their way. Digger did most of the talking and Bobby eventually drifted off to sleep. Digger didn’t have the heart to wake him. Eventually, he too slept.
Digger awoke to a cool dawn breeze on his skin and the first birdcalls from the surrounding jungle. He was aware of Bobby’s head on his shoulder and gently supported it as he attempted to manoeuvre him into a better position. At that moment he had a terrible feeling. He was suddenly conscious that Bobby’s body was as cold as the early morning air. Bobby had already left for home.
The hate that burned in Digger’s heart for the Japanese – for what they were responsible for – was as real as the grief he felt for his dear friend. For the next few days, Digger hated everyone as he grieved both for his friend and for his own predicament. Whose fault was it that his friend had died and he was stuck in this hellhole? The Japanese. It was their plans for the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, and the way they went about achieving them – men working to death on starvation diets and with no medical supplies. Everything for the fucking Emperor, no matter who died in the process.
Bobby would not have died if that mouse mouth, General Percival, and the other superior Pommy bastards had done the right thing and fought for Malaya and Singapore instead of surrendering. What a fucking balls-up that had been. Never mind the British officers – the Australians couldn’t even trust their own bloody officers, who seemed to think they were entitled to more food than those in the hospital at Changi. Christ!
Most of all, Digger thought about his own part in all of this. Why the hell had he volunteered? How stupid had he been? He’d thought it would be bloody marvellous to be one of the boys, off to the war, seeing far-flung adventurous places, fighting for King and country. What a load of ignorant, nationalistic crap!
Here he was, twenty-two years old, and what had he achieved in his young years? Absolutely bloody nothing. It seemed like this wouldn’t change for a while yet.
After a few days, Digger’s feelings of grief and self-pity lessened, particularly as he thought more and more about taking revenge against his present masters. He had no concrete plans yet, just a few ideas, but the bastards would pay for Bobby’s death, one way or another. Of that he was sure. By the end of the week, Digger had recovered and was back to his old self again.
H Force also passed through Kanchanaburi on its way back to Changi. Among its men was one outstanding officer, Major Dr Kevin Fagan. It was no exaggeration to say that the men whose lives he saved worshipped him. He was praised by all men in H Force, and others – such as Digger and his mates – who got to know him during his time at Kanchanaburi. Above all, he was admired for his courage during the long 150-kilometre march from Bam Pong north to Tonchan and Konyu, where H Force worked on the line. Years later, Russell Braddon paid tribute to him:
Above all, there was the extraordinary courage and gentleness and the incredible endurance of the medical officer, Major Kevin Fagan. Not only did he treat any man needing treatment to the best of his ability; he also carried men who fell; he carried the kit of men in danger of falling, and he marched up and down the whole length of the column throughout its entire progress. If we marched one hundred miles through the jungle, Kevin Fagan marched two hundred. And when, at the end of our night’s trip, we collapsed and slept, he was there to clean blisters, set broken bones and render first aid. And all of it he did with the courtesy of a society specialist who is being richly paid for his attention and the ready humour of a man who is not tired at all.3
Dr Fagan, who was quite sick himself with malaria when he arrived in Kanchanaburi, continued to perform operations. Digger determined to support him as much as he could by donating the substantial sum of money he had accumulated through his trading activities. He also organised to purchase drugs ordered by Dr Fagan through Boon Pong.
Dr Fagan was particularly skilled in treating bad tropical ulcers, which included performing the amputations that were frequently required. Digger learned a great deal during the brief periods he could assist Dr Fagan, when he was not required to be at the romusha gravesite.
Dr Fagan later wrote of the relative luxurious operating conditions he experienced in Kanchanaburi.
The facilities available for surgery in the Thailand prison camps were not elaborate. My operating theatre, for example, was at first the open air, later a tent fly, and still later, when we returned to the plains at Kanchanaburi, a luxurious affair of palm leaf with a mud floor, but completely fly proofed with American Red Cross mosquito netting. Sterilising of towels, instruments and dressings was done in a four gallon ‘dixie’ on an open fire outside the operating theatre. Under these conditions, in addition to excisions of ulcers, such operations as appendectomy, mastoidectomy, craniotomy, ‘pinning’ of the tibia and skin grafting were performed with a minimum of septic complications. This fact was due to the skill and devotion of the theatre orderlies, who fortunately had received their training in better circumstances and earlier in our captivity.4
Another person Digger met through Dr Fagan was Ronald Searle, an artist who later became known around the world for his St Trinian’s cartoons. He was a member of H Force and stayed at Kanchanaburi while he recovered from beriberi and tropical ulcers. He later wrote:
When most of H Force was eventually shifted from Kanchanaburi to be taken back to Singapore and returned to the authorities that owned us, I had to be left behind. I have one or two memories of a great hut in Kanchanaburi in which I lay, no longer able to move. High, endlessly long and crammed with skeletal looking bodies sprawled on raised bamboo platforms, it was a luxury hotel compared with what we had just left in the jungle. I was adopted by a cheerful bunch of Australians and two Dutch officers, all of whom were still in rather a mess themselves. They nursed me, spent their money on eggs and extras from the natives for me, washed me and, of all unlikely things, procured some sulphur drugs from somewhere for me. Anything was possible for the Australians – even the impossible. They saved my life and got me back on my bare feet again.5
Digger and Yabba had many conversations with Ronald, who described to them the conditions under which H Force had worked. They were expected to work at ‘speedo time’, whether they were sick or not, as they cut through solid rock at Konyu on the bank of the Kwai Noi River. As Ronald wrote:
Needless to say the ‘speedo’ order did not decrease the casualty rate, nor did it speed the advance of the railway. Parading for the count at dawn we were a sorry looking lot. Most of us were suffering from something colourful or dramatic that made it a misery to exert ourselves or stand for long periods. Nevertheless we went through the motions. As the first thin rays of sunlight appeared through the vast canopy of trees above us, the order to stand to attention was yelled. It was regularly answered with whoops from the families of gibbons that gazed down on us as our guards bared their shaven heads. Then the signal was given and we faced the east, bowing low five times as we chanted as best we could after our guards the soldiers’ ‘prayer’ to the Emperor.
Hitotsu: Grunjin wa chusetsu o tsukusuo honbun to subeshi!
Hitotsu: Grunjin wa reighi o tadashiku subeshi!
Hitotsu: Grunjin wa buyu o toutobu beshi!
Hitotsu: Grunjin wa shinghi o omonzubeshi!
Hitotsu: Grunjin wa shisso o mune to subeshi!
And translated it means:
A soldier must honour loyalty as his most important virtue
A soldier must be impeccably polite
A soldier must be courageous
A soldier must treasure his principals
A soldier must be frugal
Our dawn chorus over like good Japanese soldiers we politely, courageously and ever so bloody frugally, pushed off for ten hours or so of Imperial rock-breaking down by the muddy Kwai.6
As the men of H Force recovered, they were transported back to Ban Pong and then all the way back to Changi. When it was Ronald Searle’s time to go, he took Digger aside and presented him with a few of his drawings as thanks for how Digger and his mates had looked after him.
By April 1944, Japanese medical officers – and even other officers and privates who had no medical qualifications – were staffing the hospitals in the Kanchanaburi area. They provided little treatment and interfered with the treatments recommended by the POW medical officers. In some cases, the prisoner MOs had no more status than a dresser.
By this time, the L Force medical orderlies were all on manual work: digging latrines, construction work, road-making, constructing air-raid shelters for the Japanese, felling, cutting and carrying wood and bamboo, and plucking grass. Major Kudo’s reason for assigning the medically qualified POWs to manual work was very likely so that he could pocket the money he had been allocated to feed romusha labourers for these tasks.7
This state of affairs made little difference to Digger, Mick, Jack and Yabba, who continued as the gravedigging team. They were by now very familiar with the routine and totally dedicated to doing all they could to make money, to enable them to buy extra food and drugs. Two events then occurred to upset their routine.
First, Takeo Harada was transferred. He was the one and only decent guard whom Digger ever encountered. The two were never friends – that was impossible – but trust had built up between the two. Just before he left the camp, Takeo gave Digger a large box of Japanese cigarettes.
Second, the Japanese had neglected to pay any attention to the camp hospitals’ sanitation and hygiene. All suggestions in this regard by POW medical officers were resented. New latrines were not dug until the old ones were full and overflowing, and the Japanese never took advice about where these should be. The romusha were defecating everywhere, flies swarmed and dysentery was rife. Colonel Benson stated that ‘conditions could not have been worse than in the dirtiest of Indian Bazaars’.
These conditions were certainly in evidence at the No. 2 Coolie Hospital. Not surprisingly, cholera broke out in May 1944, and immediately the Japanese replaced their own dressers in the cholera wards with Allied medical officers and orderlies. Sanitation was then immediately attended to.8
When cholera broke out, Digger was ordered to report to a sergeant in the guards’ quarters, between the camp and the railway. The sergeant quickly and forcefully explained to him that he was now ‘sanski boy’ for Major Buto and the other Japanese officers who lived there. This meant he was now their house boy, cleaner, servant and general dogsbody, and he did not like the idea.
Digger was not too sure why he was chosen for this job, but it probably had something to do with the fact that he was always clean in appearance and habits, polite and – on the face of it – willing in all his work. He knew he would loathe it, however, and he also knew he could not steal anything from them without being immediately suspected.
I didn’t want to be a sanski boy for these bastards but I could see it offered me opportunities to get back at them. Getting away with it would be the trick. It would be a bit like using the snakes against them. The lads that worked outside the camp were always on the lookout for snakes. Usually they caught them for the pot – the bigger, thicker ones such as pythons. But the smaller snakes were often the nasty poisonous little beggars, and the men used to capture them alive if they could.
They would smuggle these snakes into camp and pass them on to any POW who had access to the Japanese guards’ quarters. The snakes were surreptitiously released into the drainage ditches that surrounded all the Japanese dormitories. These ditches were built quite deep and wide so that if an air raid came during the night, the Japs could just sort of roll out of their bunks and into the ditch. They’d then get bitten by one of our snakes – that was the theory, anyway! I don’t know if it ever happened but it was worth it just thinking about it.
Although the opportunities for revenge were good, Digger did not enjoy his new job. He might have appreciated the relatively easy life but the respectful demeanour that had to be maintained at all times, along with the ever-so-polite and ingratiating conversations he was forced to conduct with the Japanese officers, began to get him down after a week or two. Eventually, all that he could think of was how to get out of this job.
The only thing he could do was contrive to somehow get sacked. Asking for a transfer was not an option. One of Digger’s daily tasks was to fill and heat a large drum of water for Major Buto to bathe in. One day Digger built a larger than usual fire under the bathwater. Strangely, it was not really an intentional decision on Digger’s part. He knew perfectly well what he was doing, but while one part of him was telling him to stoke the fire, another side was thinking about the likely consequences of this act. They weren’t pleasant.
By the time Major Buto arrived for his bath it was too late to stop what was about to happen. Digger simply braced himself.
Major Buto was short-legged and obviously well fed, not at all like the majority of the lower Japanese ranks. He always looked very smart in his uniform, complete with belt, sword and scabbard, leather knee-length boots, cap and badges of rank, but as he climbed up the timber steps to get into the drum, he looked a little ridiculous and decidedly vulnerable in his nudity.
Digger felt dread at his impending bashing, but this was somewhat offset by the sight of the major confidently plunging his right leg into the water, right up to his testicles. He then let out a huge roar and scrambled out, trying to escape the pain. That brought other officers out of the nearby house.
Buto grabbed a bamboo pole from another guard and, with both hands, smashed the pole into the left side of Digger’s head. This fat little Japanese officer, completely nude, with one red leg and one white leg, continued to shout and bash Digger about the head for what seemed to Digger like an eternity. He only just managed to remain standing. Major Buto threw the pole down and barked an order to an officer, who dragged Digger to the gate of the small compound, threw him to the ground, kicked him repeatedly and told him to be on parade the next morning.
Digger dragged himself to his hut. As he approached, he was conscious of Yabba and Vic helping him inside and gently laying him onto the sleeping platform. Within half an hour Digger’s eyes had almost disappeared amid his swelling face, and his jaw, which may have been broken from previous bashings, was certainly broken this time. He was fed a thin soup through his swollen and bruised lips, but Yabba swore he could see the beginnings of a smile on Digger’s face.
‘What the fuck have you been up to?’ asked Vic. ‘No, don’t answer that. I can see you can’t, so just shut up for now and swallow the soup.’
Despite the considerable pain Digger was in, he went over the scene in his mind. God, how he wished he could tell the story now. But he couldn’t speak, so he took Vic’s advice and concentrated on getting the soup down.
The next morning at parade, Digger was not surprised to find himself allocated to the cholera ward. This was probably the worst job that Major Buto could think of, as a suitable punishment for this fool who was unable to get his bathwater to the correct temperature. It probably never entered Major Buto’s mind that Digger had intentionally made the water too hot. If Buto had thought that, Digger knew, he would not be alive now.
Digger was happy in the cholera ward because he knew that the last thing he would see there would be a Japanese guard. The Japanese were terrified of cholera. Most of them carried around a small bag filled with herbs of some kind, which they believed increased their body temperature and thus protected them from the disease. Digger and his mates knew how to protect themselves from cholera – you simply didn’t drink water that was likely to be unclean – and as he recovered slowly he concentrated on keeping himself out of bother.
Both the death house and the cholera ward had split-bamboo walls and attap palm roofs. The romusha patients lay on the bare earth down one side of the hut; down the other side, inside the hut, was the latrine. This was so that those who were otherwise unable to walk far could relieve themselves close to where they slept. Many patients were actually past walking, so the conditions inside these huts for all whose misery ended here was utterly appalling.
Digger never once saw any romusha patient receive treatment for his condition in the death house or in the cholera house. As a medical orderly in the cholera ward, all that Digger was permitted to do was to get the patients, if they were fit enough, to kneel with their bare backsides facing him in a row, and he would spray their arses with a liquid given to him by the Japanese. Digger expected this was just salt water. No romusha ever recovered in these wards. The cholera patients all had other complicating and debilitating conditions, such as dysentery, malaria and beriberi.
It took Digger a good two weeks to recover from the bashing. His jaw was still painful and tender when he attempted to chew, but since there was no steak on the menu this didn’t trouble him too much. He knew that as the bones mended this would come good over time. His hatred for the Japanese had only grown.
Digger had three things going for him as he planned his revenge. He knew the routine in the officers’ quarters back to front. He also knew and trusted the new sanski boy POW who was employed there. Finally, he had twenty-four-hour access to the cholera house.
Digger still had a large syringe in his kit that he had acquired in his days working in the mortuary at Changi. One afternoon, he filled it with liquid from the latrine trench that was laden with cholera bacteria; it was a relatively clear liquid. He went to the officers’ bathhouse and gave each toothbrush on the rack a good soaking straight from the syringe.
Major Buto survived this attack of biological warfare, and Digger was unable to find out whether any other officers had succumbed. If officers did get sick, they were always immediately removed from the camp. Still, Digger felt much better to have taken some revenge. He resumed his usual activities of stealing and dealing.
In fact, opportunities for this expanded while Digger was working in the cholera ward, mainly because no Japanese guard or officer would come near it. Digger was free to deal with the local Thais through the back fence. He was able to buy food and sell old clothing; woollen clothing, in particular, was in great demand. The Thai women would unravel the wool and make the most wonderful new garments with it. An old sock, no matter how worn, would get Digger a few bananas; a pair would get him a duck’s egg.
By late 1944, the cholera epidemic had subsided. Digger and most of the Filthy Seven were back at their manual labouring jobs around the camps at Kanchanaburi. They knew the area very well by this time, and through their stealing and dealing they were able to provide themselves with the necessities of life. They still got malaria and dysentery occasionally, but they were able to survive.
In early 1945, the bridge over the Mae Klong River was bombed. This was the famous ‘bridge on the River Kwai’ – the river was later renamed to fit the famous story.
I was in Kanchanaburi when the bridge over the Mae Klong was destroyed. I don’t remember the time, but twenty-one Lancaster bombers appeared and an ack-ack battery opened up on the formation. One Lancaster peeled off to take care of the ack-ack battery. It disappeared but reappeared seconds later. The ack-ack battery was silenced. Three Lancasters then peeled off and knocked out the three middle spans of the bridge. The remaining seventeen Lancasters pattern-bombed the Japanese stores depot. We were ordered to clean up the mess the next day. There were Japanese bodies everywhere.
On 6 April 1945, all L Force and K Force personnel were transferred from Japan’s Malaya Command to Japan's Thai Command. They were moved twelve kilometres south, to a large camp at Tha Muang. Unfortunately, this meant the end for the Filthy Seven as well as the two forces.
Digger was sent east to Lop Buri, in Thailand. He was to serve as a medical orderly for a group of about 200 POWs who were building an airfield.