POW CAMP SEARCHES . . . (con’t.)
TOROKU and INRIN CAMPS

     Following the great day at Shirakawa, the team were eager to locate the other camps at Touliu and Yuanlin.
      Information received from two of the survivors of the Toroku Camp stated that the camp was in operation from November 1944 through January 1945, and was used to house 294 American POWs who were on their way from the Philippines to Japan.
      The temporary camp was located in a one-story school near a sugar factory, and the POWs were billeted in the school buildings during their time there.
       Michael had contacted his sources at Taiwan Sugar Corp. and they confirmed the existence of the camp and gave the name of the school where it was located.
       Leaving Chiayi they made their way along the highway towards Touliu. Suddenly they came upon a roadsign that gave the name of the village they were looking for. Just up the road on the right was the school and about 200 yards on was the remains of the old sugar factory. Eureka - they had found it!
       They went into the school grounds for a closer look. The oldest part of the school at the front was still a single-story concrete building - just as one of the POWs had described it. There were newer two-story buildings added on to the end and behind the main building, and the parade ground which had been in front of the building was now the school’s athletic field. A local neighbour confirmed that the layout of the school was the same today as in wartime years.
       After taking some photographs the team laid a poppy cross in the garden in front of the school, and paused to remember the men who had been interned there. Now at last they would not be forgotten!

Then the team headed north toward Yuanlin to try to find the two camps there, but as the day wore on they simply ran out of time. Another effort will be made as soon as possible to try to find those camps.

NEW POW MEMORIAL TO COMMEMORATE TAICHU POW CAMP # 2

       Finally, after almost a year of negotiations and suspenseful waiting, permission was granted by the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Economic Affairs of the ROC government, for the Taiwan POW Camps Memorial Society to erect a memorial stone on the site of the former Taichu POW Camp #2.
       A letter from Mr. Chang Yao-Tse, Chief of the Hydraulic Research Station - the present site of the former camp, was received this summer. Naturally the committee was elated at the news and wasted no time in passing it on to several of the FEPOWs who had a part in helping to locate the camp in the first place.
        In early September another piece of beautiful green Taiwan marble was procured and taken to the engravers for carving. After this was finished Stuart, Dominic and Michael took the stone down to the site of the former camp and installed it in a garden which is located along what was formerly the back wall of the camp.
        The location is adjacent to where the former prisoners’ huts were located, and near the little stream that flowed just outside the wall. The stream is still there but has since been shored up with concrete to form an irrigation canal. Flowers have been planted around the memorial stone as a further tribute.
       This November, when several of the FEPOWs return to Taiwan for the annual Remembrance Week, a service of dedication will be held on the site of the old Taichu Camp. Expected at the time of writing, are Sid Dodds - who was instrumental in helping us find the camp through his recollections and drawings of the surrounding area, and Ben Slack, who spent almost thirty days in solitary confinement in this camp, and might have died if his mates hadn’t saved enough of their food for him.
       Jack Fowler, who is coming with the Royal British Legion group, was also in the camp. Jack and Ben were sent to Kinkaseki in August 1943, while Sid went later in November of that same year.
       We want to thank Mr. Chang and the government authorities for their kindness and generous assistance in helping to make this memorial for the men of Taichu a reality at last.
       A full report of the dedication service with photos of the memorial will be included in our next issue of Never Forgotten.