Changi Jail was built by the British in about 1936, I think. It had a double wall with a road between and a few exercise yards. It had a guard tower on each corner with searchlights and there was a big cook house and a chapel.
When the Japanese took it over, it was run down. The cells were about 2m wide and about 3m long with a squat-down toilet that did not work. There was a concrete slab in the middle for the bed and there were no washing facilities. We had no lights. There was only a very small barred window.
When we were put into the jail it was very dirty. The toilets consisted of bore holes (long drops) in the yards. When most of our guys had dysentery, being on the top floor it was a long way to go to the bore holes so there were a hell of a lot of accidents.
Changi Jail was made mostly of concrete and steel. It has now been pulled down and a new one built.
The bedding we had was a blanket and a pillow. It was that hot and stinking at night we did not need any covers.
The food was brought up from the kitchen in big ex-army containers. Two meals a day - rice and sometimes a bit of fish or some other thing, but mainly just rice. We mainly relied on the food we could get on the different working parties. The local people were very good to us but they ran a great risk.
The guards now were mostly Koreans or Indian soldiers who had taken over from the Japanese and they were just as bad as the Japanese.
There was no barbed wire. They knew that we could not escape as we had nowhere to go.
I believe there were two POWs who tried to escape but were caught and executed on the beach not far from the jail. That's where most of the executions took place, not that we saw any. We did see a lot of the beatings that happened.
There were a few different working parties and I did go on some of them. The main one, of course, was the railway but that did not concern us guys. The one that we worked on was the landing strips for the Japanese aeroplanes. It was where Changi Airport is now.
The funny thing was the Japanese started to pay us, but it was pretty worthless. I just cannot remember how much it was but it was not that much. We would buy tobacco from the locals. We called it "Javaweed". We would roll it in newspaper.
The Japanese were demanding more labour so we had to be very sick to not go on a working party. Some of the guys were coming back from building the railway in Thailand and they sure were in a bad state.
The airstrip was one of the worst working parties because of the heat and the guards shouting: "Speedo, Speedo" if we were not going fast enough. They would give you a belt with the bamboo canes they had.
The only time they carried rifles and bayonets was when we had to march from the jail and back.
I forgot to mention that we had to salute the guards whether they were Japanese, Koreans or Indians. Some of the guys who did not salute would be given a hiding.
As time went on things got worse with malnutrition and diseases. The death rate started to climb. One of the most common skin diseases was the drying up of the scrotum. It would break out in sores and it was painful. We nicknamed it "Changi balls". I think most of us got it. Wearing the fundoshi [linen G-string was a big help].
There were secret radios in the camp, not that I ever saw one, but we used to get a bit of the news. Sometimes they would be what we called "bore-hole rumours". But we knew that things were not going too well for the Japanese.
One good thing was the concert party started by the Aussies and the Brits with the help of some of the Jap officers. There were some clever people. It was amazing the things they did in the jail.
I only saw a couple of the concerts but it was very professional. The actors and the music were top rate. The guys who dressed up as women were really good. Even the Japanese used to come and watch it. It did help to lift the morale of the guys. But for some it did no good.
Some of them did not help themselves. They got very depressed and thought they would not get out of the jail. The guys I was with, our outlook was pretty good.
The main problems were malnutrition and hygiene. We had lice and bugs, bedbugs. Most of us had our hair shaved off. That helped.
• Mr Barron's serialised account will continue in next week.
