Mistreatment by Japanese guards

Heroes Remember

Mistreatment by Japanese guards

Transcript

They treat them cruel. Interviewer: Did you see anything? I stood outdoors in the rain all night, short sleeves and bare head because they missed three men. And the Japs took out people laying on stretchers and laid them out in the rain. I saw that, I was there, I was standing out in the rain too, short sleeves, bare head and bare feet. Interviewer: Why did they do that? Just to be dirty. They done that, they wasn't supposed to do that but they done that. Look when they landed in the hospital. They raped nurses, they killed fellows that was in there wounded. I don't know what to think of them.

Description

Mr. Devouge describes being forced to stand outside all night in the rain, alongside of wounded on stretchers. He also references the rape and murder of the hospital's nurses.

Cecil Devouge

Cecil Devouge, the eldest of eight children, was born in Belle Anse, Quebec in 1913. As the eldest in the family, he was required to work with his father cutting pulp to support his family, and thus never attended school. After working on his own for as little as a dollar a day, he enlisted in July, 1940 in Gaspe at the request of a recruiter for the Royal Rifles. One month later he was married. Before going overseas to Hong Kong, Mr. Devouge spent time in several maritime military bases; St. John and Sussex, New Brunswick, and St. John's, Newfoundland. After the Hong Kong garrison surrendered, he became a POW, eventually being sent to Japan to work as slave labour in the Niigata foundry. After the war, Mr. Devouge returned to his home in Gaspe.

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