He Shouldn’t Have had Three Pips up There, he Should Have had Three Halos.

Heroes Remember

He Shouldn’t Have had Three Pips up There, he Should Have had Three Halos.

My nose suddenly became so dry, my mouth also and my eyes. I thought I was going blind. But anyway, I went to the doctor and he told me, he says, “You’ve got pellagra so,” he said, “make sure you make your water clear. Make sure that you don’t get any bad water and,” he says, “I’ll give you one caramel a day.” Where he got them I don’t know. Our doctor, Doctor Reed, he shouldn’t have had three pips up there, he should have had three halos up his shoulder, the way that man. You know, because, he’d buy from the black market, Japs that would, “Oh, I’ll get you this for the money,” and different things. So we’d get this doctor, like, I never smoked in my life, but I put down on my little pay book there two packages of cigarettes but I didn’t buy them. I gave the money to the doctor so he could buy these vitamins from, vitamin pills which weren’t that good, because after all, they didn’t have the strength that our pills had there. But then when the doctor went and lifted a dead man’s body, lifted his pillow and all the pills were underneath there. What a heartbreak situation this doctor had to go through and many died. They were dying, sometimes three a day, sometimes more. Anyway, the doctors were doing their very best. We had good doctors. The Japanese wouldn’t let, our Doctor Crawford was a man 6' 7" tall. A Jap, one day, tried to hit him because they were saying that we weren’t doing enough for our sick men. And he wanted to slap Doctor Crawford. He had to jump up to slap his face. What a humiliating situation for a great man like him.

Mr. Bérard discusses the fact that the POW’s were blessed with terrific doctors. Despite this, these MD’s often suffered disappointment and humiliation.

Léo Paul Bérard

Léo Paul Bérard was born in Ste Anne des Chenes, Manitoba, in 1915. He was one of only four of the family’s thirteen children to survive. His father was a farm and forest worker. Mr. Bérard studied carpentry in school, and helped his crippled brother to learn the trade. In 1933, he enlisted with the Winnipeg Grenadiers to join their ball team - he was given the rank of corporal. He pursued extensive NCO training, attaining the rank of sergeant. Mr. Bérard offers us a view of the Honk Kong/Japan internment through the eyes of a soldier who deeply respected his officers and men, and who was in turn respected by them. Many of his clips include very personal references of this sort. After returning from the war, Mr. Bérard remained in the Army, where he trained soldiers for the Korean deployment.