Caroline Elkins' tells the story of the 'Hola Massacre' in her Pulitzer Prize-winning book, "", (2005), pages 344-353. According to Elkins, much of the story of the British and Colonial administration was covered-up during the transition to independence in Kenya, and many official documents had been intentionally destroyed during the transition. Elkins, by carefully tracing available original documents and interviews with surviving Kenyans and colonial staff, indicates that part of Hola Prison was used as a remote punishment camp for 'hard core' Mau Mau insurgents who refused to recant their oaths or affiliation to the movement. Physical and psychological abuse were used to 'break' detainees, so they could be 'rehabilitated' and moved out of the concentration camp pipeline and back to Kikuyu reservations.