History of WWII internment camp bonds Westerners, Chinese friends

Among the detained civilians were notable figures such as Briton Eric Liddell, the 1924 Paris Olympics 400m track champion, and Arthur W. Hummel Jr, who later became the second US ambassador to China.

The camp was surrounded by barbed wire, high walls, watchtowers, and searchlights, with the foreign nationals stripped of their freedom and subjected to forced labor.

Charles A. Stanley, from the US and now aged 83, was sent to the camp with his parents when he was only 10 months old. His memories of staying there come from his parents' recollections and public records. "Everyone in the camp had to work for the camp to run," he said. "My father was given a job as a baker and had to get up at 4 am every morning to help bake bread for everyone in the camp."

Stanley's father jokingly referred to his son as "seventh-generation Chinese" as his father's family had lived in China for four generations since the 1860s and his mother's family for three generations since the 1910s. Both Stanley and his parents were born in China.

Conditions in the internment camp were extremely harsh, with families crammed into small student dormitories and individual internees living in crowded classrooms, offering no privacy.

Due to poor nutrition and medical care, as well as abuse from Japanese guards, at least 31 internees died during their imprisonment, although 33 babies were also born.

Eighty-year-old Angela Cox Elliott, who holds both British and Canadian passports, was born in the camp. "It must have been difficult for all internees to appear at the frequent roll calls by the Japanese guards. Everyone had to give their number in Japanese when it was called, and they always had to bow to the Japanese as well," she said, recalling her mother's description of events at the camp.