Diseases

Interviewer: The diseases that were going through the camp at that time, do you recall dysentery?

Dysentery, malaria, beri-beri, pellagra, diphtheria. I recall at one time when we were back at North Point camp, there was eighty-four people in what we called the ‘Diphtheria Ward' and twenty-one of them come out alive, the others people died. The deaths were at one time, the bugle, the last post was played for each death, and that had to be stopped because the camp was getting too down in spirits and, eventually when these diphtheria people were passing away, we were sometimes putting two and three people in the same grave. Just wrapped in a blanket, that was it, covered up and the other diseases was, well we had what they called the ‘Agony Ward,' that was where we had what we called ‘hot feet'. It was, actually I'd say, a form of torture that's brought on by malnutrition. This hot feet, well it was called hot feet, or electric feet, or I've seen a man sit on his bed, stretch his feet out and, and he had his cane that he was walking with and he beat his feet which he couldn't feel from the outside and call them every name he could think of, and he treated them right and put good shoes and socks on them and they treat them like this. And I remember one of our officers who wasn't particularly liked, got hot foot, and some of our fellows used to go past his hut at night just to hear him moan. It made, it seemed to make them feel a little better, but, ‘cause he was suffering too.