Excerpt from the Kemper Yuki Chapter
One of my distinct memories of the Davao Penal Colony was when McCoy, Mellnik, Dyess, and seven others escaped. Those of us living in the same barracks as these men were put into a disciplinary compound. Our food rations were cut, and because we had not prevented the escape, we were isolated from the rest of the prisoners. One day Major Maeda, Camp Commander, and Lt. Kempei Yuki came into the compound. We were called out for an assembly. Major Maeda made certain threats and told us the American Camp Commander, Lt. Col. Nelson and all barracks leaders were relieved of their duties.
After he left the compound, Lt. Yuki addressed us in his broken English. He said he had trusted us to go out on certain details without guards, but we had broken his trust. He was sorry the escape had happened, but he would forgive us. He said he knew the conditions we were living under were not easy and we missed our families. After a few other remarks he left. I was flabbergasted! There was no trace of bitterness in what he said, and in fact he also remarked, You have to live under difficult circumstances, and I understand. Because of these remarks, I never forgot Kempei Yuki.
In April 1962, I was taking a trip around the world ending in Japan. Remembering Yuki, with some effort I made contact with him through our Episcopal Liaison Officer in Tokyo, the Rev. Kenneth Heim. Yuki now lived in a city called Takamatsu, which required me to fly from Kyoto to see him on another island.
Yuki greeted me at the airport with his two sweet daughters who seemed as excited as he was over the meeting. Yukis hair was gray, but he was the same gentle kind man I knew years before. We first went to a quiet park where we talked about prison camp days. After the big escape from the Davao Penal Colony by Capt. Ed Dyess and his group, he lost his command of American prisoners, and I had the impression he received some kind of severe punishment. But he seemed to have no regrets. We had lunch with some of his friends at a nice restaurant, and then he took me to his home to meet his wife. She spoke no English but seemed anxious to conduct a traditional tea ceremony on the floor, giving me at the end of it the tea bowl in which she had mixed the powdered green tea. I took this back with me as one of my most treasured possessions from the trip.
What a strong and awesome experience this was. Two supposed enemies peacefully talking to one another following the most terrible war in human history. Millions of dead and wounded, military and civilian seemed to linger in the back of my mind as we talked. Japanese and Americans had literally intended to kill one another, and we ended the war with America using the atomic bomb. Yet here we were friends with complete trust and respect for one another. Had we two tricked fatethat power to supposedly make certain events inevitable? We had humanized a set of dehumanizing circumstances and God had blessed us. From the ruins of war, we men still had found a pinnacle of respect and admiration, and I was moved by it.
Yuki and I continued to correspond over the years, mainly at Christmas when he would send me beautiful Japanese greeting cards. When one of his daughters got married he sent me snapshots of the bride and groom.
Finally, years later, one of his daughters wrote me that her father had died of cancer and noted in her letter the high value he had placed on our friendship.
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