In 1943, a special branch of the
Kenpeitai under Lieutenant Colonel
Haruzō Sumida was charged with finding the culprits responsible for acts of sabotage in Singapore, mainly the cutting of telephone lines and the burning of warehouses. Sumida strongly suspected that the saboteurs were being organised by internees in Changi Prison, and made preparations for a raid on the prison to catch the ringleaders. Sumida's chief suspect was British barrister Rob Heeley Scott, a prominent
Foreign Office employee who had previously been detained for his anti-Japanese propaganda, released by the
Kenpeitai, and then later sent to Changi Prison. However, neither Scott nor anyone else in Changi was involved in the sabotage, or with the raid that led to serious repercussions on 10 October—"the double tenth", as it happened on the tenth day of the tenth month, which is the
National Day of the Republic of China. On 28 September, Scott received a message from one of his contacts in the city, telling him that on the previous morning six
Japanese ships had been blown up in Singapore Harbour (now
Keppel Harbour). This was the first major sabotage since the Japanese had captured the island. The loss of ships in such an important place was an enormous blow to Japanese prestige. Scott and his fellow internees supposed that the saboteurs must have been
Chinese guerrillas who had slipped across the
straits from their base in
Malaya. Sumida, however, believed that Scott and his associates had planned the operation from Changi Prison.
Innocent victims Seven days after the Double Tenth,
Bishop John Wilson of
St Andrew's Cathedral was taken to the YMCA, and placed in the cell next to Elizabeth. He was severely beaten for three days before the Japanese accepted that he was not one of the ringleaders in their imagined conspiracy. One night, Elizabeth saw Rob Scott, by then badly disfigured as a result of the beatings and
water tortures that he had been subjected to. At the end of one session, Scott was told that he had been sentenced to death, and was forced to write a farewell letter to his wife. He was later sentenced to six years' imprisonment in
Outram Road Prison, the site where convicted
sepoy mutineers had been detained and executed by the
Singapore Volunteer Corps in 1915. Elizabeth was held in the YMCA for nearly 200 days, during which time the
Kenpeitai meticulously followed up every point in her story, cross-examining people she said she had helped. After a huge dossier of interviews had been compiled, the Japanese concluded that she was telling the truth and set her free; however, Khun Heng was sentenced to 12 years in Outram Road Prison. People avoided Elizabeth following her release, too terrified to speak to her. Fifteen internees died in the
Kenpeitais cells during the Double Tenth inquisition. The suffering spread to the entire civilian population of Changi Prison; rations were cut, and games, concerts, plays and school lessons were forbidden for months. =="Double tenth" trial==