Dr Roy Mills as a Captain, 2/10th Field Ambulance, Second World War, interviewed by Dr John Mitchell

NX35139 Captain Roy Markham Mills, 2/10th Field Ambulance, relates his experiences as a medical officer (MO) and prisoner of war (POW) in F Force. This is one of 21 interviews conducted by Dr John Mitchell, relating experiences of doctors and medical practitioners who were POWs held by the Japanese forces in Thailand, Burma and Japan. Most interviews include discussions of medical conditions, improvised medical treatments and survival in the POW camps.

Topics discussed include: making and using used canulas of bamboo; finding a used ampoule and using it for saline infusions; their method for making saline from roof water and kitchen salt, for pow's suffering from choldera-induced dehydraytion; his attempt to control dysentry by constructing 'fly-proof latrines' from bamboo and wire; spending three hours a day on two minute medical examinations of up to 50 individuals a day; length of a working day (sixteen hours); deriving phenol from beans out of the food ration, for use as disinfectant, particularly on foot ulcers; use of boiling water to prevent spread of disease; lice and typhus; treating scabies with sulphur secretly derived from telegraph posts; being challenged to a fight to the death by a Japanese captain, in a place near Konkoita; being presented with a copy of George Bernard Shaw's ' A Doctor's Dilemma', by Captain Adrian Curlewis, following a debate held to keep the men awake during a potential bombing attack; contraction of Weil's disease by Corporal Noel Chitty; contracting an ear infection (from his rat-chewed stethescope) and being treated during a chance meeting with Major Stevens, an ear throat and nose surgeon; return to Changi in 1944; the extraordinary powers of memory developed by himself and other inmates; contracting malaria; McGregor's Farm; use and importance of Condy's Crystals; post war life and medical studies; the after effects of his ear infection; later life and career as a physician and head of the Thoracic Society of NSW.
Persons mentioned include: George Beecham, James Hardacre; Corporal Matthews; Captain Barnet; Colonel Pond; Captain Drevermann; Padre Dolan;Herman Wiedersehn; Flight Lietutenant Dowy; Colonel HArvey; Bruce Hunt; Peter Hendry; Kevin Fagan
Places mentioned include Takunun; Taimonta; Nike