Weixian Internment Camp
The Weihsien Internment Camp (Chinese: 潍县集中营; pinyin: Wéixiàn Jízhōngyíng; Wade–Giles: Wei2hsien4 Chi2chung1ying2) was a Japanese operated ”Civilian Assembly Center” in the former Wei County (Chinese: 潍县; pinyin: Wéixiàn; Wade–Giles: Wei2hsien4), located in the present-day city of Weifang, Shandong, China. The compound was a Japanese-run internment camp created during World War II to hold civilians of Allied countries living in North China. The camp's population initially included British, Canadian, American, Australian, Dutch, Belgian and other citizens. An additional group of Italian internees arrived in the camp on December 30, 1943, after the allied invasion of Sicily and the fall of Mussolini. In total, Weihsien remained in operation after the Japanese invasion until American forces liberated the camp on August 17, 1945. Information on Weihsien has been learned through papers, diaries, official reports and letters written by internees, family members, and other people affected.
Overview of the war
During World War II, the Allies were at war with Japan. The Japanese invaded most of the area from the Aleutian Islands in the far North to the Southern regions of New Guinea, and from Western Burma to the Mid Pacific Ocean. Japan historically invaded China on July 7, 1937, which began the second Sino-Japanese War. Overall, the Japanese held approximately 125,000 civilian prisoners or internees. Of those 125,000 civilian internees, 10% were in China and Hong Kong throughout the war. Many allied civilians, mostly Americans and British, lived in some of the Japanese-occupied areas and were forced to relocate themselves into internment camps. The Japanese called these Internment camps Civilian Assembly Centers. In these camps, death rates were high because of the lack of good sanitation, starvation, and poor treatment. There were the occasional executions and some internees suffered cruelty and torture.
A group of several hundred Americans and Canadians from Japanese-controlled civilian internment camps, including Weihsien, was repatriated by civilian exchange with the Japanese to the U.S. in 1943. The categories of civilians included in the lists submitted by the Allies to the Japanese were: people imprisoned by the Japanese; people compelled to miss evacuation in the national interest; experts and technicians; missionaries; wives and families of the above categories, together with other women and children; the aged and infirm. All categories had equal priority. Yenching University professor Mary Gladys Cookingham and others from Weihsien were included in the second group of civilian internees to be repatriated; this group also included a number of civilians from Hong Kong. The group of civilians travelled on the Japanese vessel "Taia Maru" to Marmagao (Goa) in Portuguese India, where they were exchanged for a group of Japanese civilians who had traveled to Goa from the U.S.
Upon arrival in Goa in October 1943, the Allied civilians expressed their thankfulness for having escaped the semi-starvation of their internment camps, as well as their anxiety for the health of those left behind in Japanese custody. The US-bound group boarded the chartered Swedish ship MS (Mercy Ship) Gripsholm and departed from Goa on October 22, 1943, and traveled via the Southern Atlantic. They arrived in New York City on December 1, 1943. The information they provided upon arrival gave urgency to negotiations with Japan for further civilian exchange agreements, but in spite of unceasing negotiation, this was the second and last group of Allied civilians to be repatriated from Japanese custody until the liberation of the Philippines in February 1945.
Background and living circumstances
The Weihsien camp was established in an American Presbyterian mission compound named "Courtyard of the Happy Way" (Chinese: 乐道院; pinyin: Lè dào yuàn) in Wei County, Shandong, China between Jinan and Qingdao. The compound consisted of twenty-four acres of attractive landscape. The area was 60 years old and filled with shrubbery and fine old tree