Prisoners of the Japanese
marches, inhumane treatment and forced labour during their stay in the Japanese prison camps. In addition, unlike those taken prisoner by the Germans in Europe, the Japanese did not allow many of their captives to have access to Red Cross aid. The mortality rate among Japanese POWS was 27 per cent, compared to 4 percent for Allied prisoners held in German and Italian camps.
Having decided that it made more sense to turn prisoners of war into slaves so that more Japanese could be freed for the armed forces, a series of transports to the Japanese homeland began. Most of the Canadian prisoners were transported to Japan aboard coal ships (known as “Hell Ships”) in which each prisoner was given one square meter of space in the hold. During these voyages, many men died of dysentery and dehydration.
For the severely malnourished Canadians, forced labour in Japan’s mines and shipyards followed. During their time as Japanese prisoners, they had to endure disease, torture, forced labour and starvation. The Doull brothers were held in various Japanese prison camps, including North Point and Sham Shui Po in Hong Kong, and Niigata-rinko, Tsurumi and NiigataTekko in Japan.
Camps were surrounded by barbed wire or high wooden fences, and those who tried to escape were executed in front of the other prisoners. In some camps, the Japanese also executed ten other prisoners. Attempts to escape from Japanese camps were rare. Camps were generally housed in barracks, and prisoners were provided with mats to sleep on. Very few Japanese guards spoke English or French, and internees were forced to learn Japanese to understand the orders given to them. Non-compliance with instructions earned a thrashing. Tenko was the name given to the daily roll call and prisoners had to call out their prisoner number in Japanese.
The work they were forced to do, along with the other captives, included repairs at Kai Tak airfield, longshore work at Niigata port, coal mining, and work in a smelter. Lloyd contracted beriberi and dysentery and, because of a case of trench foot, was at one time considered terminal. He weighed 155 pounds ( 70 kg) before leaving for Hong Kong in September 1941 and in September 1943, two years later at Camp Niigata in Japan, he weighed only 100 pounds (45 kg). Bill lost most of his vision due to malnutrition and became extremely weak, having lost half of his weight.
Like all Japanese POWS, Lloyd had his prisoner number written on his overalls, 1444. A photo of Bill Doull taken in 1942 while he was a prisoner of the Japanese showed that he was identified as prisoner number 194. Prisoners were not allowed to have their photos. One day, a typhoon blew off the roof of the shack that contained the prisoner’s files and the next day one of Bill’s comrades found his photo in the rubble and gave it to him. Bill kept it in his possession until his release in 1945. If it had been found in his possession, he would most likely have been decapitated by his captors.
Of the Canadians captured during the battle for Hong Kong, 267 later perished in Japanese prisoner of war camps.
Liberation
With the dropping of atomic bombs by the Americans on Hiroshima on August 6 and Nagasaki on August 9 in 1945, the Japanese army, government and emperor realized that they could not defeat the Allied nations and surrendered to them. The Americans then set about locating all the POW camps in Japan, delivering medical and other emergency supplies to the prisoners and organizing their repatriation. As the prison camps were visited and prisoners were identified, telegrams were sent to their families informing them that they had been found and would be returning home.
Bill Doull, along with many of his comrades, were evacuated to a U.S. hospital ship in early September 1945 and then flown to a U.S. military base in Guam. After a few weeks in Guam where they regained their strength, the Canadians were flown to San Francisco where they boarded a train to Seattle and then Vancouver. The Americans had exchanged the rags the Canadians wore as Japanese prisoners for American military uniforms. Upon their arrival on Canadian soil in Vancouver, they received Canadian military uniforms for the return flight to Quebec.
The Post-war Years
Both Doull brothers returned to Drummondville in 1945 where they both had long and successful careers with the Canadian Celanese. They were both active and valued participants in
their Drummondville community. In 1946, Bill married Claire Bullard and they raised three children together. He passed away in 2013 at the age of 93. Lloyd was married to his wife, Margaret (“Peggy”) Mckinnon, for 55 years and they had two children. He died in 2005 at the age of 88. Lloyd devoted much of his time to fighting for the welfare of his fellow veterans, serving as President of the Hong Kong Veterans Association.
The defence of Hong Kong had a significant Canadian human cost. Approximately 290 Canadian soldiers died in combat and, during their captivity, approximately 264 others died as prisoners of war, for a total of
554 deaths. In addition, nearly 500 Canadians were wounded. Of the 1975 Canadians who went to Hong Kong, more than 1,050 were killed or wounded. The casualty rate was over 50%, probably one of the highest casualty rates of any Canadian theater of action in the Second World War.
In 2009, more than 60 years after the events, Canadian veterans who served in Hong Kong during the Second World War had their sacrifices recognized with the unveiling of a memorial wall in Ottawa, which Bill Doull and his family attended. An apology was finally presented to Canadians by Japan in 2011. Three Canadian veterans travelled to Japan to receive the apology.
Many Canadian veterans of the war in Hong Kong had to bear the physical and emotional scars of their war experiences for the rest of their lives.
The information in this article was gathered from the following sources:
Banham, Tony; 2009; We Shall Suffer There: Hong Kong’s Defenders Imprisoned, 1942-45; University of Hong Kong Press; p.247; ASIN B003ODI6LA
Others who were born or living in Drummondville or its area at the time of enlistment and who served with the Royal Rifles in Hong Kong include Waldorf Cardin, Élisée Côté, Émile Demers, Clifford Murray Nicholson, Harry Simpson, Samuel Shane and Thomas Smith. (Source: Hong Kong Veterans Commemorative Association)
Government of Canada; Veterans Affairs Canada; Canadians in Hong Kong; 2020; https:// www. veterans. gc. ca/ fra/ remembrance/ history/ second-world-war/canadians-hong-kong
The Record (Sherbrooke), 2019-11-07; Remembrance Day Obituary
Skaarup, Harold A.; 2020; The Royal Rifles of Canada; http://silverhawkauthor.com/newbrunswick- military- units- the- royal- rif les- ofcanada-new-brunswick-elements_475.html
Hibbert, Joyce; 1985; Fragments of War: Stories from Survivors of World War Two; Dundurn Press Limited; p. 115; ASIN B01K92SX8O
Roland, Charles G.; 2001; Long Night’s Journey into Day: Prisoners of War in Hong Kong and Japan, 1941-1945; Wilfred Laurier University Press; ISBN 0889203628
Daws, Gaven; Prisoners of the Japanese; Pocket Books; ISBN 1416511539
Kozak, Warren; 2011; Curtis Lemay: Strategist and Tactician; Regnery Publishing ISBN 978-159698-769-2
Mansell, Roger; Center for Research: Allied POWS Under the Japanese http://www.mansell. com/pow-index.html
Doull, Murray; communication
Government of Canada; Veterans Affairs Canada; Canadians in Hong Kong; 2020; https:// www. veterans. gc. ca/ fra/ remembrance/ history/ second-world-war/canadians-hong-kong 2019-11-05; personal
Lieutenant (N/S) Christina Fraser
Enlistment Age: 25
Regiment: Royal
Medical Corps
Served: 1941 to the end of the war
Canadian
Army
Lieutenant (N/S) Christina Fraser, my mother, served with the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps from the age of 25 in 1941 until the end of World War Two. She was stationed at the #2 Canadian General Hospital in Bramshott, England. She was born in Scotland, at the age of 10 immigrated to New Brunswick with her family and lived her later years in Sutton, Québec.