711.94114 Supplies/85: Telegram

The Consul General at Vladivostok (Ward) to the Secretary of State

5. I was today permitted to view for first time storage facilities provided for war prisoner supplies mentioned in your 89 October 13.

Warehouse number 4, a non-heated frame structure sheathed and roofs with corrugated iron, has been set aside for storage of supplies not subject to damage from frost and 18,000 of the 22,574 food packages shipped on Soviet vessels Sovetskaya Gavan, Novofohnihsk [Novorossisk] and Tungus are now stored therein. I was not shown remaining 4574 packages, which are stated to be stored temporarily elsewhere in port. While warehouse is suitable in every respect for storing goods not subject to damage from frost, it will not accommodate all food packages mentioned above and nonfreezable goods now en route on the Argun (your 97 November 16) and the second shipment on the Tungus (your 107 December 31). Port administration will, I am told, make available such additional unheated storage facilities as may be needed as well as heated facilities for medical supplies in the Argun shipment.54

Ward
  1. For a summary of steps taken by the Department of State at this time in behalf of American nationals who were in Japanese custody, including the shipment of relief supplies to the Far East, see Department of State Bulletin, January 15, 1944, pp. 78–84.