The Ient Family: Family History

We Leave Japan

Eventually, a ferry came and they took us up to Tokyo. I’ve never seen so many ships in all my life. It was full of aircraft carriers and battle cruisers and so on. The Yanks were in charge of us. We were told to strip off, whatever we had on, into the fire it went. And the next thing they gave us was a bar of scented soap! [Laughs.] There was a long passageway to showers – hot and cold water come out of the showers, and you just marched in there ... [Mimics washing – laughs.] We got to the other end, they gave us a great white bath towel – dried ourselves with this bath towel. That was taken and put into a furnace – it was burnt, because they didn’t know what we had. I mean, we don’t know what we had either. Also stories had got out lads had gone a bit, I don’t mean queer, queer, but they’d gone a bit funny in the head and how would they take to eating all this food and so on.

Anyway, we came out of there and we take to the stores. We were told we could have what we liked. Typical British, we said 'We can have what we want?' They said, 'If you can carry it, you can take it.' So I got army boots and God knows what else, staggered out with this stuff. ‘If you could,' because, let’s be honest about this, I was one of the fit ones and I was 6 stone 7.

I was 13½ stone when I became a POW and 6 stone 7 when I came out. To give you some idea, I had a belt; this is the actual belt – [demonstrating by showing where it was buckled]

6 stone 7, an hourglass figure. My wife did have an hourglass figure at one time, but unfortunately all the sand dropped to the bottom!

Laughter.

We got aboard this Australian aircraft carrier, HMS Ruler, which took us out there. Up until then, the Americans didn’t refer to us as prisoners, they always referred to us as ‘our guests’. So we got all kitted out – we were all washed and shaved and looking lovely. Then we heard the speakers say ‘Will our guests please go to hangar one.' Well, we go to hangar one and they gave us a great big tray with indentations on it for your food. The hangar was full of food! We couldn’t believe it; there was custard, there was jelly, meat, and so on. Of course, some of the lads, they just went hammer and tongs at it, they just couldn’t stop eating. Anyway, the next announcement was ‘Will our guests please go to hangar number four.’  Oh, by this time there was an orchestra playing.

So we go down to hangar number four, nobody was pushing us, just asking us very gently and very nicely. We were formed into long lines and queued to meet a sergeant at a desk and a bloke with a typewriter taking name, rank and number. Over to one side were, what they called a WACs [Women's Army Corps] in the American Army. Over there, they had a shop with all sorts of stuff –there was chocolate, razor blades, all sorts of things. So I went over there and I said, 'Do you take Japanese money?' And she said, 'No, I don’t take that.' I said, 'Well, I’ve got no dollars and no pounds.' I said, 'How do you get hold of this stuff?' She said ‘Well, just tell us what you want, you can have it!’ [Laughs.] So I got loaded up with this stuff and came back to the lads; they said ‘Where did you get that, Chick?’ I say, 'Over there.' They asked, ‘How much?’ I said 'Nothing.' Whoosh! They were all over there. [Laughs.]

Then we were taken out to this Australian aircraft carrier, HMS Ruler. I knew we were back [meaning in the British forces]! There was a line three times round the ship, sign here for your money, your knife, fork and spoon, nothing’s changed! [Laughs.] Anyway, HMS Ruler took us down to Sydney, Australia.


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