This text was obtained via automated optical character recognition.
It has not been edited and may therefore contain several errors.

---

Baxter 11
half a ton. The cars were pushed along rails mounted on an archaic, rickety trestle about twenty feet off the ground, and the coal dumped at different stockpiles around the area or directly into a railway coal carrier on the tracks below. Many times during heavy snowstorms P.O.W.'s were blown off the trestle and killed or maimed for the rest of their lives. Other coal cars were loaded by prisoners using yo-ho poles, i.e., heavy wood poles with a wicker basket hanging on each end and the load balanced on the bearer's shoulders. Under the adverse conditions this would have been a difficult endeavor even for an experienced, well-fed coolie. The underfed prisoners, most of whom lacked solid shoes and warm clothing, worked outside in the grimy environment in all kinds of weather on this most arduous detail, their only material reward being the coal that they stole and brought back in their pockets to burn in the barracks stoves. This inefficient operation was managed by a Japanese civilian named Kojima, an older man with a long black beard. "Whiskers," as he was known to the P.O.W.'s, spoke guite adequate English, but he proved to be a hard taskmaster and was responsible for many deaths, although he managed to evade punishment later in the War Crimes trials. His foremen, referred to as honchos, supervised the P.O.W.'s and the Japanese men and women in the work details. The honchos were all discharged army veterans of the China campaign and no longer fit for duty. A few were decent, but the majority varied from plain mean to outright psychotic, Sgt. Sato being the worst of the group. Sato's specialty for punishment was slapping with heavy rubber work gloves. Sometime in December, 1944, Sato (also known as "Alley Cat") caught me retrieving sour soybeans from the bilge of a coal barge and eating them. He ordered me to attention and began slapping me on both cheeks with the rubber gloves until my face was a bloody pulp. He too escaped punishment after the war. Later, with the war going badly for Japan, most of the tougher honchos and guards at Niigata were replaced.