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[Page 6]
cooking, and our food consisted of a pint of boiled wheat and one pound of black bread per day. The work was 5 miles distant from the Billets and walking to and from work and subsisting on such mean fare greatly reduced our physice, added to this we lacked a change of clothes, or even a blanket and the vermin in the house was something beyond what I can describe. Here prisoners were thrashed out to work and the whole treatment, and conditions caused the majority to be stricken with Typhus, at one time 90% were in the Hospital, I amongst them, being unconscious for 15 days, with a Temperature averaging 103.2. I found myself with another Englishman in a ward occupied by Turks, and but for this Englishman, who administered my wants in medicine and food, would certainly not have lived to tell the tale. The Turkish stole the food and medicine intended for me as well as the few poor rags of clothing which I possessed and sold them. I was discharged about the end of April, almost without clothes, and sent to a rest home for a month where the treatment was more severe than a working camp.
On the 25th May 1917 I was declared fit for work, but Maleria being in my system again attacked me, eventually turning to Rheumatic fever from which I would certainly have succumbed but for a good Armenian Doctor who spoke fluent English, listened to my explanation of my case, and treated me accordingly. In this hospital I witnessed a deed which I am sure is not in the rule of warfare. A Turkish Doctor made it a practice of injecting a fluid into prisoners in a low condition, a dope which hastened their end. This was fully explained to me by the Operator himself, which fact hastened my discharge from the Hospital. After resting a few days I discovered that I was suffering with heart trouble, and asked to be repatriated on that score. I successfully passed three Turkish Medical boards, and finally sent on to Constantinople for further examinations. I appeared before a board here consisting of German &am; Turkish Doctors, who decided that as I had not