James Kerr - AIF Joe

Running time
1 min 16 sec
Date made
Copyright
Department of Veterans' Affairs

Transcript

There was always those that were very sadistic and cruel, and delighted in giving you a bashing for the slightest misdemeanour. But every once and awhile there were those that weren't quite as bad. In fact, which a lot of people don't know, a lot of the guards we heard were Koreans.

We had one fellow he was a big Korean too. He was over 6ft, big fellow. And he got the nickname "AIF Joe". And if we struck Joe at the camp we'd go "Joe! AIF Joe!" He never bashed anybody, and that's what we called him, AIF Joe. So as soon as we'd see Joe… he was a great bloke, Joe. A lot of them were, just for the sake of hitting somebody for the slightest misdemeanour. You know, they'd have someone kneel on broken rocks on their knees holding a rock above their head looking into the sun, that sort of treatment.

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