This work - the story of Herbert Zincke's survival - is drawn from the secret diary he managed to keep out of his Japanese captors' hands. Zincke recollects being spared death by the Japanese camp commander's samurai sword, the diet of rice and thin soup that resulted in drastic weight loss and an inability to do the required factory work, the POW British doctor who attended the prisoners and was frequently beaten because of his constant efforts to keep the sick men from going to work, and many of the other terrible conditions and experiences he endured during three years of imprisonment.