Nagoya POW Camp #1-B
Kamioka

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Location:
Nagoya 1-B KAMIOKA
Employer of slaves: MITSUI KOZAN (Mitsui Mining Co.)
GIFU-ken, YOSHIKI-gun, ASOFU-mura, WASAHO 1444
Satellite    
Relief map of area
Aerial (Sept. 1945, before food drop)
Aerial (Nov. 1947; courtesy of Japan Map Archives GSI)

Looking uphill at the barracks



Camp History:
10 Nov 1942: Dutch POWS arrive from Kamakura Maru ex Java (Surabaya)
08 Dec 1942: Established as Osaka KAMIOKA Branch Camp
18 Feb 1943: Renamed Osaka 7-B
25 Mar 1944: Dr Jackson & Dutch Medical Officer Irens arrive from Ichioka (Osaka Stadium Hospital)
29 May 1944: 150 Yanks Arrive ex Mukden
06 Aug 1944: 194 more Yanks arrive-
ex Nissyo Maru through Moji from Manila/Formosa
06 Apr 1945:
Jurisdictional control transferred to Nagoya POW Camp 1-B
Aug 1945: Renamed Nagoya 7-B
Sep 1945:
Rescue effected



Camp Layout:
Sketch #1 - Sharp hand drawn layout
Sketch #2 - not as clear- photostat original


Reports:
Camp history statements (RG 407 Box 148)
Assorted letters regarding conditions at Kamioka Camp [External site] - by Theunissen (NEI Army), Jackson (RNVR surgeon), Goldsmith (US Army), Pase (US Army)
Reports on various camps, including Nagoya #1 (名古屋第1分所−神岡収容所), in Japanese can be found on this page (Japan POW Research Network)


"The Bug House - My Home at Kamioka" - photo courtesy of Bob Harle, grandson of British POW Stephen Harle. Per Harle in his email:
Just to update your information on British prisoners in Kamioka: "Walker" was Thomas John Walker, also of 100 squadron RAF, and featured regularly in my father's POW diaries - as was the attached image.

Tom Stitt I don't think I've seen anywhere in the diaries. There were only a few English prisoners, so you'd think his arrival would be mentioned.

The doctor you mention, Tony Jackson RN, arrived on 26th March 1944 and immediately operated on my father's hand - otherwise he would have apparently lost it. There's also mention of a Dutch doctor arriving in October 1943 and American prisoners arriving in May and August 1944.

Nick (Nicholas Guthrie) Glenton was also from 100 squadron and Charles James Brandon was 242 squadron.

Report by Adolf L. Thierens (courtesy of Dolf Thierens)
This is the report that my father wrote to tell about his experiences during the war. A nephew of mine was so kind to translate it for me. It may give a better idea of the life and circumstances in the Kamioka camp as perceived from the view of a Dutch POW.
I am very interested in the KAMIOKA camp where my father was from December 1942 until the end of the war. As a Dutch officer, he wasn’t forced to work in the mines since the commanding Dutch officers had made the Japs believe that our Queen had forbidden that officers should do physical labor and the Japs supposed the Queen to be as holy to the Dutch as the Japanese emperor to the Japanese people.
Instead of working in the mines, my father secretly learned Japanese and translated newspapers that workers smuggled in from the mine where they bought it from corrupt guards. Later my father also did some woodchopping because he might find some woodworms to eat... I am glad that he wrote secretly a diary. Later he administrated the Dutch POW's by order of the commanding officer. (Thieren's POW Index Card)


Primary Slave Labor Use:

Zinc and lead mining.
Mitsui Mining was a private company in command of camp - see Mitsui info sheets on Kamioka Mine and later research.
NOTE: Frequently misrepresented as Omuta but that is another sub-camp in the Fukuoka area. Read commentary by Ray Makepiece.

Camp Rosters:

Now located at NARA, RG 407 Box 102.
(verified 193 Yanks plus one British doctor)
American Roster- draft based upon POW Diaries; approx 150 Americans yet to be documented.
Dutch (see also external link to Dutch rosters 305 Dutch and 6 British and at liberation)
Original roster

Original death rosters for Nagoya camps
Nagoya Main Hospital patients
Nagoya camps #1~#11 rosters (RG 407 Box 104 Folders 5, 6, 9-11) - Dutch, US, British, Australian, and other nationalities
Nagoya asst. death rosters (RG 407 Box 187)
Folder 1: English, Dutch, American, Australian, Indian
Folder 2: American, British, Australian, Indian, Dutch, Canadian, Portuguese, Russian, Polish, Czech, Jamaican, Finnish
Folder 4: Nagoya Main Camp List of Ashes - American, Dutch, British, Australian, Indian
Folder 5: American, British, Australian, Indian, Dutch
Folder 9: Nagoya Group #6-#3 Sub-Camp Death Reports - Mitsushima, Funatsu, Kamioka, Takaoka locations; POW population and transport totals in other regions; British, Malayan, American POW health reports leading to deaths
Folder 11: Nagoya #6 (Takaoka) - American deaths with medical details

erler_kamioka_text.jpg
erler_pic.jpg

Known British:
Boulding, Walter Frederick,Gnr
Charles James Brandon, 242nd RAF Sqn
Nicholas Guthrie Glenton, 100th RAF Sqn
Stephen Robinson Harle, LAC, 100th RAF Sqn
Tom McRobert Stitt, 155th Field Regt. RA
Walker
Camp Doctor: Tony Jackson (British)- Royal Navy Surgeon. Also known affectionately as "The Doc" or "Jocko"; previously at Osaka Ichioka POW Hospital.


Japanese Camp Staff:

A partial list of Japanese staff including rank. Guard staff was changed weekly.
Japanese staff at Nagoya camps

War Crime Trials:
Sgt Mantani, Unosuke - Guard; Life imprisonment
Pvt Shimoda, Ryoichi - Guard; 20 years hard labor

Pase Diary
Detailed
history of events leading to men arriving at this camp by 1st Sgt Joseph G Pase- outstanding diary of major events during captivity at Kamioka plus extensive timeline.
Original Pase diary
Asst. Pase diary and files (RG 339, 331) - courtesy of Lowell Silverman (Delaware's World War II Fallen)


Books Describing Life at Kamioka:
Jackson, Charles R. (Edited by B.H. Norton) "I AM ALIVE" Marine captured on Corregidor and rescued at Kamioka. Fantastic reading!

WORMSER, J.A., De nacht van de rijzende zon. Een Hollandse krijgsgevangene in Japan, 1942-1945. Orig. edn.Kampen, Kok, s.d. [circa], 1995. Verbatim text, in English, of the speech as held by Colonel Mirata, commander Osaka P.O.W. camp, 11th December 1942, addressing P.O.W., name-list of 302 Dutch and British P.O.W. as held at camp Kamioka, Osaka, incl. marking those who perished, table being exchange-rates of goods for food/medicine, incl. examples of loss of weight to Dutch P.O.W., glossary of Malay/Japanese words and  expressions-Dutch.


Camp Photographs
and Modern Day Pictures of Kamioka

Can you help identify these men?

Group photo of POWs (some of whom were at Kamioka), taken at March AFB in the early 1950's.
Photo courtesy of Steven Bull: "My dad is sitting between the third and fourth row, last man on the left, behind the guy in the mustache."
Son of Wade Waldrup: "My Dad [far right, standing in front], Wade Woodrow Waldrup, HQ Company, 31st US Infantry, arrived in Japan from Cabcaben on the Nissyo Maru in July, 1944, and was then at Nagoya #1-B Kamioka until liberated." (Related: Wade Waldrup story in Augusta Chronicle 25 May 1997 - link out of date)
Following courtesy of Ernestine Köhne-Hoegen (author, translator, editor):

Diaries and memoires:
H.A. Bouman (Dutch), diary in the form of letters to his elder brother, March 1944 - August 1945, Kamioka (in Dutch). Kept in the Archives of Groningen in the Netherlands. Reference: Groninger Archieven nr. 2553 inventory number 19.

Private papers S.R. Harle (British), diaries and notes from Kamioka (in English). Kept at the Imperial War Museum in London, Catalogue number Documents.8460.

Memoires of Jan Honing (Dutch), Herinneringen aan het leven in Indië [Memories of life in the Indies]. Santpoort: Brave New Books, 2014 (self-publication) (in Dutch) [Separate chapters on Kamioka]

P.J.C. Meys, diaries 1942-1945, Java and Japan, of which the final three months were spent in Kamioka, in: NIOD institute for war, holocaust and genocide studies in Amsterdam, archive 401, inventory nr. 216. (In Dutch)

M. Van der Vlerk, Diary 1942-1945, Java and Japan, final three months in Kamioka, in: NIOD institute for war, holocaust and genocide studies in Amsterdam, archive 401, inventory nr. 125 (In Dutch)

Book:
Ernestine Hoegen, Een strijdbaar bestaan. Mieke Bouman en de Indonesische strafprocessen [A militant life. Mieke Bouman and the Indonesian criminal trials]. Uitgeverij Unieboek | Het Spectrum, Amsterdam 2020 (in Dutch). [Chapter 3 is about H.A. Bouman’s experiences in Kamioka.]