The four most notable characters were ‘Fitz’ Berringmore, a young sherry party wit, and a very fine example of a steel fist in a velvet glove in his manner; Harold Raleigh, a very much travelled young G.3; Kerr Peace, the Education Officer, who was clever enough to find other people to do all his work for him, and an authority on Marx and Chianti; and the most solid character of the lot, Richard Blane, the sort of Scot the Civil Service is lucky if it can lure into its service. But the important thing about ‘C’ Mess was that all and every topic was there discussed as it was nowhere else in the area. The younger officers who wished to exercise their minds a little could do so there, and furthermore they did not talk about Poona, they did not talk about the Malayan Campaign, and they didn’t blimp.

After the first three or four weeks the first working parties were called for. As this was a change and appealed to our curiosity, and took us on lorries to Singapore, there were always plenty of volunteers. The work was nearly always loading or unloading ships at the Empire Docks, and wonderful opportunities of loot were missed due to the fact that we had not yet got really to know what the I.J.A. stood for, and Senior Officers in charge of these parties were ridiculously scrupulous in seeing that the troops behaved themselves well, never pinched anything, and did carefully what the Nips ordered.

From these parties men came back with food about 200 per cent cheaper than the Black Market gangs, and we tasted again our first bread for a month, made by Chinese bakers. One small slice of bread was reverently and slowly chewed as some rare thing; and with jam it was the original ambrosia.

The food shortage led in the early days to an unofficial Coconut War, brought about by hungry men raiding the trees. On one occasion a troop, caught up in a tree in the night by a serious-minded officer, hurled coconuts at the officer until he retreated, and managed to escape. On another occasion, a C.O. on his way to the latrine at night saw a dim figure slinking out of the coconut plantation with a sack over its shoulder. He shouted at it, and started to run. The figure in front of him ran too, and was finally forced to throw overboard his cargo at the same time as the C.O.’s sarong fell down, thereby tripping him up. Later on it transpired that the despoiler of the coconuts had been the Corporal of the Guard on duty that night!

The most odd thing about these early conditions was the huge space we were allowed, which, in the northeast tip of the island, ran into several square miles, guarded only by sentries along wire fences, or else by the sea. Perhaps it sounds as though it should have been fairly easy to escape, but it was not so, as can easily be shown.