Sendai 4B-Ohashi Formerly Tokyo 6-B ex Hakodate 2-B Also known as Kamaishi & Iwate

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Hakodate Camp 2-B becomes Tokyo-6 then Sendai 4 Employer of POW Slaves (NIPPON SEITETSU KAMAISHI [=OHASHI] KOZAN) IWATE-ken, KAIHEI-gun, KATSUSHI-mura Map of area     Satellite View from Google History: 30 Nov 1942: Established; first located at KAMAISHI-shi 1 Apr 1943: Moved to IWATE-ken, KAIHEI-gun, KATSUSHI-mura No. 1, WARICHI 20 29 Apr 1943: Cable received from Red Cross listing 60 Americans tansferred to this camp. PDF file-6 Mgb- ask for copy 20 Apr 1945: Jurisdictional Control transferred to TOKYO POW CAMP 6-B 14 Aug 1945: Jurisdictional control transferred from TOKYO POW CAMP 6-B to SENDAI POW CAMP. Established as 4-B Sep 1945: Rescue effected Visit to POW Camp by Daughter of Jerry Bunch: A fascinating and well written "travelog" of her visit to Kamaishi and the camp- reading time about 3 minutes. Worth reading. Speech by Yoshiko Tamura in Japan: ANZAC DAY 25/4/2004 Thank you very much for the invitation to speak today. It's indeed an honour as a member of POW Research Network Japan which was founded in March 2002 to get a chance to talk to you again about one soldier buried here in this New Zealand Section of the British Commonwealth War Cemetery, Yokohama. In this section, there are 13 New Zealand graves. All of them, except for one, died on duty in BCOF, the British Commonwealth Occupation Force. Only one of them lost his life as a prisoner of war in Japan. If you look at his plaque, just like all the others', you can only learn his name, his rank and organization, age and his death date. Some of them have inscriptions provided by the family. So you can see that his name was William Henry Brodie (CD 10), the Fifth Engineer Officer, Merchant Navy, serving on the m.v. Hauraki. He died on 10th August 1945 at the age of 30. According to the cemetery register, his home town was Canterbury, New Zealand; just five days before the end of the war. What happened to him? And where was he at that time? You can't get any more information from his grave marker. We have worked very hard to get more information, although we were told originally that there were no record left as all the documents were destroyed just after the war. But little by little we could manage to find and now we have covered almost all the personal details of each casualty. According to our research, we found Brodie was in the Kamaishi Camp (this camp) in Iwate Prefecture and his death was caused by critical burns through shelling. At the last stage of the war, many POW camps in Japan suffered heavy damage from air raids in which many POWs lost their lives. Kamaishi, an industrial area near the sea, was badly damaged twice when allied warships bombarded shore instalations in North Central Honshu. First on 14th July in 1945, the city and the ironworks were shelled. 1460 houses were burned and about 240 citizens died. 5 POWs were killed at the ironworks. A second time, on 9th August, the city of Kamaishi was again bombarded by British warships. This time they were rained with 2700 shells. 1470 houses were set on fire and over 100 citizens lost their lives. In the camp, 5 POWs died. Within the ironworks, workers and POWs ran into the sheiters. 17 POWs died through gas inhalation and 20 others were injured. As a result of these two shellings, 32 POWs died, mostly Dutch and including 4 Americans, 2 British and 1 New Zealander. Last month, Mrs. Taeko Sasamoto, one of the co-representatives of our group, and I visited the U.K. to make further enquiries of some former POWs. One of them happened to talk about the shelling in Kamaishi. He was in the Ohashi Camp, which is in the mountains, about 15 km from Kamaishi. On the day Kamaishi was attacked, a camp doctor in Ohashi told the men that many POWs in the Kamaishi Camp were hurt and desperately needed help. He asked for volunteers to assist. This British POW decided to go with him. As he entered the camp hospital, he told us that he was astonished at the awful smell in the room and how badly the victims were burned. He took care of one man. He tried to give him some spoonfuls of soup. But his face was so badly gashed that he was terrible to see. He remembered this man couldn't drink well because of his damaged jaw. He tried to talk with him, but his voice was too weak and very hard to hear because of his poor condition. The only thing he could understand was that this man was British. After returning to Japan, I received an e-mail from New Zealand that this William Henry Brodie lived in New Zealand but his nationality was British. Only two British and 1 New Zealand casualties were in Kamaishi. Who can say that there's no chance that the British former POW we met last month in the UK took care of the dying Brodie? Our group has investigated many POW camps in Japan. We have accumulated a vast amount of information about the individualities buried here, but we still have work to do. Recently we are greatly encouraged, because quite often we exchange information not only with Japanese but also with people overseas and sometimes we get interesting information by internet. Our group members helped me a lot in preparing this talk and I have included as much information as possible. Just before closing, I would like to tell you something. We have believed there's only one New Zealander's POW casualty in this cemetery. But there's also another New Zealander whose grave is in the British Section. This was pointed out by a young New Zealander who visited Japan recently. The sailor's name is Robert McNeill of Auckland (GD 13). He was working in a dockyard in Nagasaki and died there from acute pneumonia on 15th April 1944 at the age of 23 according to the record. Let's go and visit his grave, too, after the ceremony. There's one more I would like to tell you. The commandant of the Kamaishi Camp passed away some years ago, but his daughter is here today to attend the ceremony. Thank you very much for this honorable chance to talk to you.

Labor: Slave labor in KAMAISHI IRON MINING Co. and the NITTO Comapany Charcoal Mfg Plant. Hell Ships: Most of the British & Dutch men arrived Jan 1934 on the AWA Maru after having been transferred from Batavia to Singapore on the Tufuku Maru. Story of US shelling of Camp: A thorough analysis of Navy attack on camp which killed a number of POWS, 14 July 1945. SCAP- Initial Camp Inspection Report: By Capt Todhunter and Lt. Kocher - details camp history, deaths and conditions. This was the preliminary inspection. USMC- Jack Elkins Newspaper article [external linel] Aerial Photograph of Camp Scan Courtesy of Wes Injerd Photograph Group photograph appears to be taken at this camp at liberation - POW Elvin W. Nygaard web site -slow loading . Men listed were at this camp. Rosters: American - 43 men at rescue; 24 were moved to the Morioka Hospital under the care of Navy doctor James E. Eppley, captured on Guam. Australian - 8 British - 56 POWS as reported Canadian - 198 Canadians as reported. Special thanks to Tony Banham and Vince Lopata for data base cross checking. Canadians came from Tok-03D-Tsurmi when came burned 16 Apr 1945 (per Vince Lopata- Canadian Military historian) Dutch - 93 (pending) Deceased: Link to list of deceased- names may not be exact as we have not cross checked with the National rosters. We have corrected American names- see below. For accurate names, see the SCAP Inspection report, paragraph #9. American Dead: Fanghor, Gene, GM3c, 3421075, USS Houston, 19 Dec 1942, Beri beri & Pneumonia Seidel, Alfred Glenn, EM2c, 3418737, USS Houston, 19 Dec 1942, pneumonia Japanese Staff: Apparently the last Camp Commandant, 1st Lt Yoshida, was considered unusually kind to the POWs. A letter was written asking the occupation forces to treat him kindly. Signed by Americans Ziegler, Humble and Tuckers. 1st Lt YOSHIDA Zenkichi- Commandant at termination of war 1st Lt INAKI Makato - previous commandant Sgt Maj NEKO Zenzo - Medic on staff except from 26 May 1945 to 27 August 1945 IWASHITA Hiroe - Cleck employed by Kamaishi Iron Mining Company and appointed to look after the affairs of PWs emplyed at the firm NAGATA B. - President of NITTO & Co and emplyers of PWs through Kamaishi Iron Mining Company. OGURA Susumo - Manager in charge of work Kamaishi Iron Mining Company WATANABE Suekite - Doctor at Kamaishi Iron Mining Company

NATIONALITY	OFFICER	NON COM. AND PRIVATE	TOTAL	CIVILIAN	TOTAL
AMERICAN	6	34	40	---	40
BRITISH	---	56	56	---	56
CANADIAN	---	198	198	---	199
AUSTRALIAN	---	8	8	---	8
DUTCH	---	93	93	---	93
TOTAL	6	389	395	---	395