Transcript
They marched us to work this morning, and when we got there, they left us standing, and you could see they were all congregating around the main office. I think it was called Sampa Ku a shipbuilding people, a stevedoring company. Anyway, we saw women starting to cry, and some men crying. That's strange. Then after that they came. "No work today. We're going back to camp". They never said anything about the war being finished.
Just said, "No work today. We're going back to camp." Of course, we had start march back to camp. By that time, these other working parties from along the wharf, they were marching back, and I called out, "What do you know?" Of course, some of the Japs had broken the news to some of the boys. Japanese word for war was senso and oeru means finish. They say, "Senso oeru." Anyway. Hope it's true. Because we all knew that if there had have been a landing in Japan, we wouldn't have got out.
They'd wipe us all out. Because we had been drilled to be parade at a minute's notice, to be taken out on parade. That was going to be the end. We got back to camp. This Japanese, he'd never known to hit the guys, and he'd sort of try to get you out of trouble. He said, "Senso oeru" War finished. He and a couple of these Japanese guards, they went away, and they come back with cases of oranges and apples, and dished them out. So we knew then the war was over.
