The Forgotten Highlander - Alistair Urquhart [62]
Like on the death march some men found the going easier by teaming up and making a close bond with another prisoner. They would fight railway life together, sharing whatever food or water they had, helping each other wherever they could and always having their back. They even took beatings together to share the blows and the pain. It was not the way for me. I watched the heartache of men losing their best pals and suddenly being left alone. They never usually lasted very long and soon followed their mates to the grave.
By now the cuts on my feet and legs had turned into painful – and dangerous – tropical ulcers. When I suffered scrapes on the railway, or had a rash, I could not tend to it until yasume-time or until I was back at camp. Then I wrapped leaves around the cuts at night to keep the flies off but it was useless, and the ulcers usually spread. They rotted your flesh, muscle and tendons; people were left with gaping holes as the flesh simply fell away. An ulcer would eat deep into your flesh, so deep you could sometimes see the white of bone. Even worse, if you were not careful they could become gangrenous, and many men lost legs that way – by improvised amputation, without anaesthetic or drugs.
I went to the medical hut for advice. In common with most of the men, tropical ulcers had engulfed my feet, ankles and lower calves. I had avoided the medical hut until that point. It was set aside from the sleeping huts and about the same size as ours. The RAMC officer in charge was Dr Mathieson, a likeable character from Paisley, just outside Glasgow, where he had studied medicine. He had come to Singapore about the same time as me and would later, in much different circumstances, save my life. On this my first encounter with him he would at least save my legs.
Sneaking under the cloud of black flies that circled outside the hut like a swarm of miniature vultures, I entered nervously. The overpowering stench immediately had me gasping. Stepping across the cadaverous forms of five or six men who appeared to be rapping on death’s door, Dr Mathieson introduced himself.
I had not spoken for so many days that when I went to reply my parched throat failed me.
‘Here,’ he said, handing me a half-coconut cup of water, ‘get this down you.’
I sipped the cool water down and thanked him, asking how his patients were.
Dr Mathieson, in his mid-thirties at that point, appeared weary beyond his years. He was probably on self-imposed half-rations just to keep some spare for his patients. The men had spoken highly of him and many of our doctors were revered as saintly figures.
The doctor took me by the arm and led me down to the far end of the hut away from the men. In a soft west-coast accent, he said, ‘Half of these men will die within days. The other half? Who knows? If I had access to some proper clinical treatments, drugs or instruments, they might live but that is not possible as I’m sure you know.’
I could only nod in agreement. The squalor and stench of death inside the hut was appalling.
‘What can you do for them?’ I asked.
‘Quite simply not a lot. I try and give them some hope if nothing else.’
He pointed with his boot at a chap sleeping and said, ‘He’s got ringworm. On his testicles. I’m surprised he’s able to sleep. I’ve been applying a coating of wet clay to see if that helps.’
I nodded as he went on. ‘It’s easy for these men to give up and when they lose hope the fight just seeps right out of them. On countless occasions I have seen two men with the same symptoms and same physical state, and one will die and one will make it. I can only put that down to sheer willpower.’
I considered this for a moment and looked around the hut. You could tell the men who were dying by the look on their faces. Their gaze was lost before it reached