Sisters Under the Rising Sun

The remaining women reach Camp IV in November 1944 and settle into better huts with concrete wells. Nesta and Vivian reunite with Norah, Ena, Audrey, June, and Jean. The wells soon run dry, so Mrs. Hinch and Nesta appeal to Captain Seki, who permits them to fetch water from a stream. Following Captain Seki’s orders, Mrs. Hinch assigns new work details, including building a barbed-wire fence. When Betty Jeffrey collapses, Vivian and Jean carry her to the hospital hut.

Rations, which had briefly improved, shrink again. Anticipating deaths, Nesta and Mrs. Hinch press Seki to do something, but he merely acknowledges the likelihood of deaths and provides inadequate burial tools: machetes. Audrey and Norah prepare the cemetery and carve wooden crosses. For Christmas, the women cook pork and sing carols; Seki attends. Afterward, the women reminisce about the voice orchestra, which no one now has the strength to maintain.

In early 1945, Ena falls ill with Banka fever. Norah trades her wedding ring to Tante Peuk, a “comfort woman” with extra rations, for food to save Ena. Ena recovers, but by the end of January, 77 women have died. Sister Ray, the first nurse to pass away, receives a formal military funeral; Blanche Hempsted dies soon after.