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Witness History: Families interned in WW2 China

Documentaries

Families interned in WWII China

23/02/2023 GMT

Families interned in WW2 China

BBC World Service - Witness History, Families interned in WW2 China

A first-hand account of being sent to a Japanese internment camp in Shanghai as a child

Thousands of people from Allied countries living in China were interned by the Japanese in World War Two. Christopher John Huckstep, 93, was 13 when his family was imprisoned.

Despite facing malnutrition, starvation and disease, Christopher John Huckstep's father set up a school in the Japanese internment camp where his family was sent in 1943.

Herbert Huckstep ensured the 350 children of Lunghwa Civilian Assembly Centre were taught a wide range of subjects using brown paper bags to write on. The school was called Lunghwa Academy and it had its own badge, motto and certificates. A syllabus was followed, exams were taken and there were even evening classes for adults. 

The Japanese set up more than 20 internment camps in China and Hong Kong holding an estimated 14,000 people, but it is not believed that such a sophisticated schooling system was established elsewhere.  

In spite of the many hardships, educational standards were kept so high that qualifications taken in the camp were later recognised by the Cambridge exam board when the exam scripts were taken to England after the war. 

Christopher John Huckstep shares his memories with Josephine McDermott.

(Photo: Christopher John Huckstep and other children at Lunghwa Civilian Assembly Centre, Shanghai, in 1945. Credit: Oscar Seepol. Image courtesy of Susannah Stapleton and Special Collections, University of Bristol Library)

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