The War Ends

At the final end of it we were going down the mine to work, we were supposed to change shifts like you know, and we were lined up and the group I was with were lined up to go down to work and we always went with a guard and the camp commander came out and said, “No work today!” So come around for the next shift to go, was supposed to go down and he came out, “No work today.” So this went on for about three days and finally the news broke through that the war was over, Japan had surrendered. We got so used to being there, not going anywhere, not doing anything, getting into trouble for nothing that we just didn’t believe it. The next morning we all got up there, we got up quite early, there wasn’t a guard in the camp, nothing, just the camp commander. Just this little fellow and he stayed until the Americans came and took us out.