Whenever bad Nips are in command of a camp the rank and file follow their example. For no fault at all, one Korean private broke the jaws of two officers within a week. There was another little beast nicknamed ‘The Admiral’ because he was in charge of the barges that came up to the camp, and he varied the incessant swipes he gave by first throwing dust into the eyes of his victims. For this initiative and improvement he was promoted to Ishi’s batman.

With these two beauties in the saddle and with more and more of the Light Sick going up and down the line to work and the camp getting more and more sick returning to it, it wasn’t long before the officers were coolieing again. Of course, it started with the thin edge of the wedge, and the Nips asked for workers on the inside gardens – several hundreds of them! We had the misfortune to be commanded at the time by a perverse and unpopular C.O., and when he addressed a very bolshie officers’ parade, two majors stepped out of the ranks and protested to him in very plain language. Within a month all the junior and non ‘camp-employed’ officers (of which I was luckily one, the theatre not yet being closed) were working daily on the outside gardens and or in the rebuilding of the huts in the camp. Coolies once more!