Forsaken Heroes of the Pacific War by Don Morrow

Author:Don Morrow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The Bedford Group

Now at this point, obviously they’ve taken your weapons.

“Oh, we destroyed all the weapons.”

Rifles, side arms?

“Well, we’d put an off-sized shell in a chamber and fire it and it ripped so it couldn’t be used.”

Chapter 10

The Death March

So now you’re walking. What are you feeling at this point?

“Well, your thoughts were roaming around pretty good. We didn’t have any idea how long we were going to march.”

American prisoners, pictured above, along the March on the way to Camp O’Donnell. For many, provided they survived Camp O’Donnell, this would be the first of several prison camps they would face. Others included the notorious Camp Cabanatuan, several miles east of Camp O’Donnell. Later, hundreds would be crammed into the hulls of “Hell Ships” for days, enduring little air, food or water on their way to slave labor camps in Manchuria, Formosa, Korea, Japan and other places. It is estimated that 40 percent of American prisoners died while in Japanese captivity. This compares with 1.2 percent of American prisoners held in German and Italian prisoner of war camps.

The route stretched approximately 70 miles from Mariveles on the southern tip of the Bataan peninsula to the town of San Fernando. From San Fernando, soldiers were crammed shoulder to shoulder into boxcars for the final 25 mile train ride to Camp O’Donnell. Many died en route in the suffocating heat of the boxcars fighting for air in temperatures that exceeded 100 degrees. Approximately 75,000 American and Filipino soldiers were force marched for six days along this route before they reached their destination. Camp O’Donnell was an American Army Air Corps facility converted by the Japanese into a virtual death camp for prisoners of war. Rather than relief greeting the survivors as they reached the end of the March, more death and misery awaited these sick and starving soldiers for the next 3-1/2 years.

Were you fearful at what was occurring?

“I can’t say I was afraid. I just figured they were going to walk us a mile or two and get us into a camp someplace.”

At this point, was there any hint that your captors weren’t going to play by the rules of the Geneva Convention?

“Well, early on, we were having a little rest in the road and I was sort of in the tail end and this Jap jabbed me in the ass with his bayonet and said, “Speedo!” So I was never in the back of the pack after that. I was always up front.”

Did you see them brutalizing others?

“Oh yeah, there was one 18 year old I knew who fell down, a guard came along and put the gun to his head, pulled the trigger and walked on. But if it was an officer with a samurai sword, they just had them kneel down and just whacked the head off — that happened a lot. If you didn’t stay in the pack, you were in trouble. You were either going to get shot or they’d cut your head off. Sometimes, the Japanese officers would

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