The War that Hurt us All

The War the Hurt us All

Thomas Bennett, Canadian WWII soldier and prisoner in the battle of Hong Kong, 28 years old.

I winced as the warm, wet cloth dabbed my tender shoulder. Pain blossomed through my arm, and I grimaced.
Needles of agony prickled under my skin. I had gotten beaten up pretty badly. I could only imagine how ghostly and sickly I looked.

It was September 18, 1945. I was finally headed back to my home in Saskatchewan. World War Two had officially ended, but the damage had been done. I just hoped-prayed- that everything would eventually return to normal.

I lay on my back on a cot that felt like rocks, aboard a boat that was so packed no one could even move. The air smelled of sweet ocean saltiness mixed with the rancid, vile scent of blood. A pretty nurse looked down at me with sea-blue eyes full of pity. She was young enough that I could've been her father.

I closed my eyes. Agony pulsed through my flesh, matching the rhythm of my thrumming heartbeat. I had gotten the injury in a hellish Japanese concentration camp. I had been one of the 'lucky' ones- I had escaped with my life, unlike some of my other fellow Canadian soldiers. However, I wish I could have dodged the bomb that blew off my right arm- all that remained of my limb was a gorey hunk of shoulder.

"Sir," the nurse said, as her careful hands delicately wrapped my shoulder in strips of clean, white bandages. I forced my eyes open, even though I knew they were filled with tears. Her eyes were sorrow-filled and she averted them from mine, focussing on the bandages. "What...happened?"

I was shocked for a second, the horrors of the war coming back to me like a flood. I gasped, my body beginning to shiver uncontrollably as the nurse watched me, nervousness crossing her face and her body tensing.

I took a few deep breaths, forcing myself to relax. Blinking a couple of times, I hoped that would clear the pertifying images. I caught sight of a few other soldiers staring at me, their faces pale and sunken, and their bodies looking as bad as I felt.

"That's a...complicated question. On many levels," I said, trying to act casual. I shifted uncomfortably on the rock-hard cot, still weirded out by the sensation of not having an arm- I hadn't gotten used to it yet.

"Oh," the nurse said, her eyes falling.
I sighed- I wasn't acting very kind and heroic.

"It's a pretty long story," I started, thankful to have something to distract me from the pain. "But I suppose it'll pass the time."

The nurse looked at me expectantly, and after securing the bandages, shuffled closer to me, itching to hear my story.

"This whole mess actually began in 1929," I said, "when the stocks crashed. I was about twelve at that time, and I remember listening to the radio one Saturday morning. Thankfully, my family hadn't invested too much in stocks, but I thought it was interesting to read the newspaper everyday to see major businesses close down and people losing heaps of money. Little did I know that the Great Depression would come next," I said, shivering at the memories.

"My family were farmers in Saskatchewan, and we got most of our money from selling our crops. Imagine our reactions when we found grasshoppers eating our wheat- not to mention the hail and the drought. It was our lowest prices in history! Our family lost a ton of money, and we had to rely on government relief to pay for essentials. My father even began to 'ride the rods,' and he travelled from different cities to look for better work. He'd never found a well-paying job, because so many other men were unemployed and searching for opportunities as well.

"My family barely got by, but miraculously, we all survived it. We lost our farm and had to move into a very cramped house, but somehow we made it work. Everyone thought things were looking up at the end of the thirties, but then Hitler got Germany on their feet, and they started causing trouble. They took over Poland in September, 1939, and we- Canada, that is- entered the war to help Britain and France on September 10th."