Tatsuji Suga
Tatsuji Suga | |
---|---|
Lieutenant Colonel | |
Commands held | Prison Camps |
Battles/wars | World War I Second Sino-Japanese War Pacific War |
Early life
Suga was born in
Suga graduated from Meido Middle School in Hiroshima and then the
Toward the end of World War I (during which Japan was an Allied power), Suga served in Siberia, Korea, Manchuria and China. In 1924, he took early retirement as a Major, and decided to pursue a career teaching English. He sailed to the United States, leaving his family in Japan, supported by his pension.
Suga studied to become a certified
Suga taught English as a lecturer at the Hiroshima High School of Technology (now the Department of Technology, Hiroshima University), Japan, before he was called back to active service in 1937, to serve in the Second Sino-Japanese War. He became ill with diabetes and retired again in October 1941. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Suga volunteered for service as a prison camp commander on an advice of his younger brother,[4] believing that his language skills would prove useful. He was appointed commander of all POW and internment camps in Borneo.[5]
Borneo
On Borneo there were Japanese-run
Suga was based at Batu Lintang but was often absent on business at the other camps.Suga is described in Three Came Home, an account by Agnes Newton Keith, a female civilian internee at Batu Lintang:
- A little Japanese man, onetime graduate of the Catholic; a hero and a figure of ridicule; a Japanese patriot, Commander of All Prisoners of War and Internees in Borneo.[7]
Rosemary Beatty, an Australian who was a small child when she was interned at Batu Lintang, recalled Suga's acts of kindness to her and other children:
- I suppose the thing that really sticks in my mind really is Colonel Suga coming through the gates in his car and we would sneak into it and hide, and then he would drive off and find we were there. He'd take us up to his residence and serve us coffee[,] fruit and show us magazines... He'd even give us lollies [sweets/candy] to bring back to camp.[8]
Brutality by the guards at Batu Lintang increased when Suga was away; internees wondered whether he left instructions for this to happen or whether the juniors left in charge took advantage of his absence to further abuse the prisoners.[9]
The
Suga attended the official surrender of the Japanese forces in the Kuching area by their commander, Major-General
The following day Suga, together with several of his officers were flown to the Australian base on Labuan, to await their trials as
- Now, with the end of the war, he awaited a military tribunal. His country had been destroyed; his army defeated; his family lost. And, apart from the despair in his heart, the bushido tradition, the code of the Japanese warrior, had deep roots. The fateful day came on September 16th, one week before his 60th birthday, traditionally a time when a family would gather round in celebration. Colonel Tatsuji Suga believed he had no-one to gather around; and he had no desire to see that day alone.[2]
Evaluation
As Commander of all POW and civilian internee camps, Suga was legally responsible for the many atrocities that took place in these camps, including the Sandakan Death Marches.
As the war closed, Suga was given multiple orders to execute all prisoners within the camp, orders which he failed to carry out.
Although Keith admired some of his personal qualities and felt that he had saved the life of her husband, who was also interned in the camp, she also recorded: "Against this, I place the fact that all prisoners in Borneo were inexorably moving towards starvation. Prisoners of war and civilians were beaten, abused and tortured. Daily living conditions of prison camps were almost unbearable." Keith added:
- At Sandakan and Ranau and Brunei, North Borneo, batches of prisoners in fifties and sixties were marched out to dig their own graves, then shot or bayoneted and pushed into the graves, many before they were dead. All over Borneo hundreds and thousands of sick, weak, weary prisoners were marched on roads and paths until they fell from exhaustion, when their heads were beaten in with rifle butts and shovels, and split open with swords, and they were left to rot unburied. On one march 2,790 POWs started, and three survived ... For these black chapters in captivity Colonel Suga, commander in Borneo, must be held responsible.[16]
Another internee at Batu Lintang, Australian
After liberation the bodies were exhumed from the cemetery and sent to Labuan for reburial in a central military cemetery there. A large number of the graves of prisoners from Batu Lintang now at Labuan are unidentified: after the Japanese surrender Suga destroyed many camp records. The cemetery in Labuan is cared for by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.
In the 1950 film adaptation of Keith's book, Suga was played by Sessue Hayakawa.
Notes
- ^ Tatsuo, Hoshino (1980). Hotobashiru Hagane – The Life of the YMCA Headmaster Giichi Suga. Tokyo: YMCA Tokyo. pp. 14–28.
- ^ a b Southwell 165
- ^ "Guide to the William C. Smith Papers 1924–1927". Retrieved 10 December 2007.
- ^ Hoshino 406–407
- ^ Southwell 145–147
- ^ Wigmore 595 note 9
- ^ Keith 205
- ISBN 0-85905-211-7. Rosemary Beatty's surname is mis-spelled as Beattie
- ^ Mackie 261
- ^ Bell 113; Ooi 1998, 618; Keith 182. Although sources vary, the most likely date appears to be 24 August
- ^ Bell 113; Keith 206, Southwell 159
- ^ Southwell 368
- ^ Hoshino 405
- ^ Long 563; AWM photographs 041062-041071, 116168-116175
- ^ Ooi 1998, 667
- ^ Keith 205–206
- ^ Robert Taylor, "Survivor tells of Borneo hell" (The West Australian, April 14, 2007, p. 14)
References
- ISBN 0-9516984-0-0(Originally published in 1990, same ISBN)
- Keith, Agnes Newton (1955) Three Came Home London: Michael Joseph (Mermaid Books). Originally published in 1947 by Little Brown and Company, Boston, Mass.
- Long, Gavin (1963) The Final Campaigns Australia in the War 1939–1945 Series 1 (Army), Volume 7. Canberra: Australian War Memorial (Online in PDF form at [1] Archived 2006-08-27 at the Wayback Machine)
- Mackie, John (2007) Captain Jack, Surveyor and Engineer: The autobiography of John Mackie Wellington: New Zealand Institute of Surveyors ISBN 0-9582486-6-4
- Ooi, Keat Gin (1998) Japanese Empire in the Tropics: Selected Documents and Reports of the Japanese Period in Sarawak, Northwest Borneo, 1941–1945 Ohio University Center for International Studies, Monographs in International Studies, SE Asia Series 101 (2 vols) ISBN 0-89680-199-3
- Southwell, C. Hudson (1999) Uncharted Waters Calgary, Canada: Astana Publishing ISBN 0-9685440-0-2
- Wigmore, Lionel (1957) The Japanese Thrust Australia in the War 1939–1945 Series 1 (Army), Volume 4. Canberra: Australian War Memorial (Online in PDF form at [2] Archived 2008-06-23 at the Wayback Machine)
- Hoshino, Tatsuo (1980)"Hotobashiru Hagane – The Life of the Headmaster of YMCA Giichi Suga" Tokyo, Japan: Suga GIIchi Den Kankokai: distributed by YMCA Tokyo
- Hayashi, Hifumi (2016)"Agnes Keith's Borneo and Japan (1) – Land Below the Wind", Meiji University Kyoyo Ronshu (Liberal Arts Essays) vol. 513, Tokyo (Online in PDF form at [3] [Japanese]
- Hayashi, Hifumi (2017)"Agnes Keith's Borneo and Japan (2) – Three Came Home and Tatsuji Suga",Meiji University Kyoyo Ronshu (Liberal Arts Essays) vol. 523, Tokyo (Online in PDF form at [4] [Japanese])