Remembering April 9, 1942

April 9 is a little recognized American commemoration to recognize members of the U.S. Armed Forces who became POWs. It was created in the 1980s primarily to honor the American fighting men and women on the Bataan Peninsula in the Philippines who were surrendered on April 9, 1942. The infamous Bataan Death March up the peninsula to a squalid, unfinished POW Camp began by the end of the day. Thousands died en route, thousands more died in the camp. 

By law, the President issues a proclamation remembering the sacrifice of all Americans who became POWs. Look for it.

So take a moment on Thursday to remember a sweltering day in the tropics marked by an earthquake when thousands of starving, sick, and dispirited American and Filipino troops were surrendered by their commanding generals to the merciless invading Japanese forces. 

Here are some ceremonies to join:

83RD ANNIVERSARY WREATH LAYING CEREMONY MEMORIALIZING THE FALL OF BATAAN. Thursday, April 9, 2026, 10:00am (CDT), IN PERSON ONLY, Brainerd National Guard Armory, 1115 Wright Street Brainerd, MN. Sponsor: 1st Combined Arms Battalion, 194th Armor Regiment, Minnesota National Guard. To: Remember Company A of the 194th Tank Battalion that bravely fought the invading Japanese in the Philippines at the beginning of World War II in the Battle of Bataan. American and Filipino soldiers were surrendered on April 9, 1942 after running out of ammunition, food and medical supplies. The surrender was followed by the infamous Bataan Death March to Camp O’Donnell. Thousands died. It is believed that of the 64 National Guardsmen who left Brainerd and served on Bataan, three were killed in action and 29 died as POWs with only 32 surviving to return home.Those who survived endured over three years of brutal captivity and slave labor. Keynote Speaker: John Erickson, historian of POWs of Japan. https://www.brainerdvfw.org/bataan.html 

DAY OF VALOR [ARAW NG KAGITINGAN] CEREMONY. Thursday, April 9, 2026, 11:00am-Noon (EDT), Military Women's Memorial, Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, Virginia. Sponsor: Filipino Veterans Recognition and Education Project (FilVetREP). Remembers the valor and suffering of the thousands of American and Filipino troops and civilians who were on the Bataan Peninsula when it was surrendered to invading Japanese forces on April 9, 1942. https://filvetrep.org/ 

COMMEMORATION OF THE 84TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE FALL OF BATAAN. Thursday, April 9, 2026, 11:00am-Noon (MDT), Bataan Memorial Building, 407 Galisteo Street, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Reception to follow at The New Mexico Military Museum, 1050 Old Pecos Trail​, Santa Fe, NM. Sponsor: Adjutant General of the State of New Mexico. The ceremony is also followed by the opening of Last of the 200th: Valdemar DeHerrera that honors his life and legacy. https://eanmng.org/2026/03/29/nm-national-guards-84th-anniversary-fall-of-bataan-ceremony/​ 

BATAAN DEATH MARCH 84TH ANNIVERSARY COMMEMORATION. SATURDAY, APRIL 11, 2026, 9:45am to 12:20pm (PDT). Sponsor: Bataan Legacy Historical Society.  SAN FRANCISCO NATIONAL CEMETERY, One Lincoln Blvd., San Francisco, California. With special honors to the WWII Nurses and the quest for their Congressional Gold Medal. AGENDA  

2026 BATAAN MEMORIAL DEATH MARCH ON THE POTOMAC. Saturday, April 12, 2026, 10:00am (EDT), Start and end at Fort Hunt Park, Virginia, Pavilion 1 along the Potomac River near Washington, DC. Sponsor: Filipino Veterans Recognition and Education Project (FilVetREP). Marchers can choose to do 3, 6, or 14 miles. It is not a race, it is a commemoration honoring those who suffered the infamous 100 mile march and train trip up the Bataan Peninsula in the Philippines to the death camp O’Donnell. The March began shortly after General King surrendered the American and Filipino troops on April 9, 1042 to General Homma and the invading Imperial Japanese forces. Race Registration closes April 10, 2026. 

*BOOK TALK: DAUNTLESS: THE 1ST & 2ND FILIPINO INFANTRY REGIMENTS, UNITED STATES ARMY (2023). 4/16, 6:30pm (EDT), IN PERSON ONLY. Quezon Hall, Annex Chancery Building, 1617 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Washington, DC. Speaker: author Marie Vallejo. https://philippineembassy-dc.org/special-book-presentation-dauntless-by-marie-vallejo/  

PURCHASE BOOK: https://amzn.to/4bSh8mz 

15th ANNUAL CHESAPEAKE BATAAN DEATH MARCH MEMORIAL WALK. 4/18, Registration begins at 6:00am (EDT), Dismal Swamp Canal Trail, Chesapeake, VA. Closing Ceremony at Noon. Sponsor: SSG Jonathan Kilian Dozier Memorial VFW Post 2894

FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064849921506&ref=embed_page# 

WEBSITE: https://walkchesapeake.wixsite.com/chesapeakebataan

A Gold Medal For All Needed

Descendants of WWII POWs call into question congressional bill that only honors defenders of Bataan and Corregidor

By ROSE L. THAYER
STARS AND STRIPES, November 8, 2022

Descendants of some U.S. troops taken prisoner in the Philippines during World War II have called into question an ongoing effort to award those veterans with Congressional Gold Medals, saying the latest version honors only those who fought in Bataan and Corregidor and excludes other areas of the Philippines and Pacific.

Since 2009, the New Mexico congressional delegation has introduced bills to establish the medal to honor those captured at the Bataan peninsula and on Corregidor Island, two of the main defensive positions that the U.S. established after the Japanese invaded the Philippines within days of the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941. U.S. and Filipino troops on Bataan surrendered on April 9, 1942, after running out of food and ammunition. Corregidor held out for nearly a month before surrendering.

The current version of the bill honors only those who served on Bataan and Corregidor.

It does not mention the thousands of U.S. troops who were fighting in other parts of the Philippines until the top U.S. commander, Gen. Jonathan Wainwright, surrendered all American and Filipino forces in the Philippines when Corregidor fell. Some members of the 1,000-strong Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society would like to see Americans who resisted Japan’s sweep through the Pacific but were captured at Wake Island, Guam, Java, the Aleutians and at sea honored, too.

Some of them were imprisoned alongside defenders of Bataan and Corregidor when the Japanese consolidated many of their prisoners at camps in Japan and Manchuria as other areas once under their control fell to the advancing Americans and their allies.

“It's very much a misreading of the history of the fall the Philippines. You cannot divorce Bataan and Corregidor from everything else that was going on,” said Mindy Kotler Smith, a member of the memorial society. Her husband’s great uncle Fletcher Wood served in the Philippines with the Army Corps of Engineers and died in Bilibid prison in Manila.

Congress has commissioned gold medals as its “highest expression of national appreciation” since the American Revolution. Other groups to receive the medal for service during World War II include Merrill’s Marauders, a unit that served in the jungles of Burma, women who joined the workforce as a “Rosie the Riveter,” the merchant mariners of World War II and the Navajo Code Talkers.

House and Senate rules state that legislation establishing such a medal must be co-sponsored by two-thirds of the chamber membership to advance to committees. If this doesn’t happen by the end of the year, the legislation must be resubmitted in the next session of Congress.

The latest version of the Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Congressional Gold Medal Act was introduced by Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., in April 2021. Rep. Teresa Leger Fernandez, D-N.M., introduced the companion bill in the House a month later. Both have sat idle because they have bipartisan support but not enough co-sponsors.

“Bataan veterans deserve the recognition of our nation’s highest and most distinguished honor for their perseverance and patriotism. We must never forget their undaunted heroism in the face of unthinkable conditions and horrific abuses,” Heinrich said in a statement.

The Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society was founded in 1946 by survivors of the Philippine campaign as they recovered in a Massachusetts hospital following their liberation from captivity at the end of the war, Smith said. As those men grew old and died, their descendants took over the organization, and now focus on education and preservation of this specific chapter of World War II history.

They’ve watched over the years as lawmakers from New Mexico have introduced the different bills to honor their sacrifice and have offered their own guidance on how to better honor the estimated 27,000 American service members held prisoner by the Japanese during World War II. About 12,000 of them died in captivity, according to the memorial society.

They included up to 700 Americans and several thousand Filipinos who died of beatings, beheadings, starvation and lack of water during a 5- to 10-day forced march from Bataan to prison camps that became known as the Bataan Death March. Thousands more perished in the camps.

However, determining who should be honored by a congressional medal has proven a challenge.

Among those who surrendered at Corregidor were 77 Army and Navy nurses, all of whom were liberated when the U.S. recaptured the Philippines late in the war. The memorial society fears the current bill would exclude them because the current wording refers to “troops.”

The first legislation to award medals in honor of POWs in the Philippines dates to 2009, when Heinrich served in the House. He proposed the medal to be presented to defenders of Bataan, Corregidor and the main Philippine island of Luzon. It did not mention any specific units nor Americans taken prisoner in the central and southern Philippines.

That same year, former Sen. Tom Udall, also a New Mexico Democrat, introduced the companion bill in the Senate, but with a more narrow focus. It only authorized medals for those who were taken prisoner at Bataan but not Corregidor or other locations overrun by the Japanese.

Heinrich’s office did not respond to queries about whether he would consider changes to the legislation in the next congressional session.

“It is our hope that they will amend and modify the bill so that we can support it,” said Jan Thompson, president of the memorial society whose father, Navy pharmacist’s mate Robert E. Thompson, surrendered on the island of Corregidor. “We’re not comfortable supporting it as it is, and we’d like to be able to support.”

POW Convention May 3-5 in New Mexico

AMERICAN POWS OF JAPAN

COMMEMORATE THE 76^TH ANNIVERSARY

OF THE BATAAN DEATH MARCH

May 3-5 in Albuquerque, NM

                                                                                                                        

A leading voice for Pacific War veterans and their families, the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor MemorialSociety (ADBC-MS)/, holds its annual convention Thursday, May 3 through Saturday, May 5 at the Hotel Albuquerque Old Town in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

The Convention features a panel discussion with former POWs and family members who traveled to Japan last year as guests of the Japanese government. There will also be presentations on the Texas Lost Battalion, a Texas National Guard unit surrendered on Java in early 1942, on the life of a New Mexico survivor of the Bataan Death March, and on the fate of 19 members the 27th Bomb Group, who evaded capture on Bataan by hiding in the Filipino jungles.

Keynote speakers will be Dr. Frank Blazich, curator for the Division of Armed Forces History at the National Museum of American History (Smithsonian), discussing his new book, Bataan Survivor, in a talk entitled, Dapecol: the Davao Penal Colony as Experienced by Col. David L. Hardee and Major General NM Kenneth A. Nava, The Adjutant General, New Mexico National Guard. Two New Mexico National Guard units, the 515th Coast Artillery and the 200th Coast Artillery, fought in the defense the Philippine Islands.

Free and open to the public will be a screening on Saturday, May 5 at 2:30pm of Paper Lanterns (60 minutes), an award winning documentary on the quest of a Hiroshima survivor to discover the identities and honor the memory of the 12 American POWs who were killed in the bombing of Hiroshima.

The ADBC-MS promotes education and scholarship about the POW experience in the Pacific and supports programs of reconciliation and understanding.  The ADBC-MS is the point of contact for all official U.S. government activities affecting American POWs of Japan, such as the annual Japan/POW Friendship visits to Japan and the annual White House Veterans Breakfast.

Over 26,000 Americans were POWs of Imperial Japan. Nearly 11,000 died in POW camps, aboard “hell ships,” or as slave laborers to Japanese companies. Only an estimated 15,000 returned home.

Conference attendance for the three-day event is only $110.

BATAAN DEATH MARCH 75TH ANNIVERSARY COMMEMORATIONS

Over the next few days, numerous ceremonies will be held to honor the fallen and survivors of the Bataan Death March on its 75th anniversary and National Former POW Recognition Day, April 9th. 

WASHINGTON, DC

75TH COMMEMORATION OF ARAW NG KAGITINGAN [BATAAN AND CORREGIDOR DAY]. 4/7, 3:15-4:30 PM, Washington, DC. Sponsor: Embassy of the Philippines. A wreath laying ceremony at the WWII Memorial at the National Mall. 5:30-7:30pm Commemoration Program at the Romulo Hall of the Embassy of the Philippines. Location: Embassy of the Philippines, 1600 Massachusetts Avenue, NW. Contact: http://www.philippineembassy-usa.org/news/5507/589/75th-Commemoration-of-Araw-ng-Kagitingan-on-07-April-2017/d,phildet/  Information: veterans@philippinesveteransaffairs.org  

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS

75^TH COMMEMORATION OF ARAW NG KAGITINGAN (DAY OF VALOR). 4/8, 9:00 AM, Chicago, Illinois. Wreath laying ceremony (weather permitting) at the Bataan-Corregidor Memorial Bridge at the corner of State Street and Wacker Drive, Chicago to pay tribute to thousands of Filipino and American soldiers who displayed extraordinary gallantry and courage beyond the call of duty in defending Bataan and Corregidor in 1941-1942. After the wreath laying ceremony, a short program will be held around 10:00-11:30 AM at the Kalayaan Hall of the Consulate General of the Philippines, 122 S. Michigan Avenue, Suite 1600, Chicago, Illinois 60603. Contact: http://www.chicagopcg.com/; chicagopcg@att.net and http://www.chicagopcg.com/pr16-17.pdf

CALIFORNIA

BATAAN DEATH MARCH 75TH ANNIVERSARY COMMEMORATION. 4/8, 9:00am-Noon, The Presidio, San Francisco, California. 9:00AM Laying of Wreaths at the ABMC WWII West Coast Memorial at Kobbe & Washington Aves. 10:00AM Commemorative Program At Pershing Square/ Presidio Officers Club. Contact: www.bataanlegacy.org; Program http://zif7.r.ah.d.sendibm4.com/zmo9s9vonf.htmland http://usa.inquirer.net/1829/bataan-death-march-75th-year-rites-set-sf-presidio-april-8     

NEW YORK

75TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE BATAAN DEATH MARCH COMMEMORATION. 4/8, 1:00-4:00 PM. Bataan Road, Orangeburg, New York. Ceremony, concert, presentations. Contact: Jerome Kleiman, https://www.facebook.com/events/1168848923170955/

VIRGINIA

75TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE BATAAN DEATH MARCH AND UNVEILING THE BEN STEELE COLLECTION. 4/9, 2:00-4:00 PM, Norfolk, VA. Sponsor: MacArthur Memorial. As part of the unveiling, the Memorial will screen the documentary film Survival Through Art. Produced by American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society President and professional filmmaker Jan Thompson and narrated by Alec Baldwin,Survival Through Art tells the story of Ben Steele's remarkable life. Location: MacArthur Memorial Visitors Center, 198 Bank Street, Norfolk, VA 23510. Contact: http://www.macarthurmemorial.org/Calendar.aspx?EID=62&month=1&year=2017&day=12&calType=0 or

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ben-steele-collection-unveiling-tickets-31132965538

6^TH ANNUAL BATAAN DEATH MARCH MEMORIAL WALK/RUN.  4/22, 6:00AM-2:00PM, Chesapeake, VA. Sponsored by the SSG Jonathan Killian Dozier Memorial VFW Post 2894 and FilVetRep. Location: Dismal Swamp Canal Trail North Parking Lot, 1113 George Washington Highway South, Chesapeake, VA 23323 Contact: https://www.virginia.org/listings/Events/BataanDeathMarchMemorialWalk/

https://www.facebook.com/Chesapeake-Bataan-Death-March-464188050284397/

MINNESOTA

BATAAN MEMORIAL WREATH LAYING CEREMONY. 4/9 10:00 AM, Brained National Guard Training and Community Center, 1115 Wright Street, Brainerd, MN  56401. Mr. Walter Straka, the last surviving member of the Brainerd 34th Tank Company as it began, and A Company 194th Tank Battalion after federalization, will lay the wreath while Taps is played. The names of those who were killed in combat or captivity will be read as their dog tags are hung on the barrel of the M3 Stuart tank. Contact: Captain Chris Bingham (651) 268-8117,http://www.brainerdbataan.com/wreath-laying-ceremony.html ;

20TH ANNUAL BATAAN MEMORIAL MARCH, 9/9, Brainerd, Minnesota.  http://www.brainerdbataan.com/

NEW MEXICO

COMMEMORATIVE CEREMONY HONORING 75TH ANNIVERSARY. 4/9, 4:00-6:00 PM, Las Cruces, NM. Sponsor: The Remember Bataan Foundation of Las Cruces. Location: Veteran’s Memorial Park, 2651 Roadrunner Parkway, Las Cruces.

http://www.bataanmuseum.com/event/commemorative-ceremony-honoring-75th-anniversary/

BATAAN MEMORIAL CEREMONY. 4/8, 1:00 PM, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Sponsor: Bataan-Corregidor Memorial Foundation of New Mexico. Location: Bataan Memorial Park, 748 Tulane Drive, NE, Albuquerque. Contact: MAJ Richard A. Luena, USAF-R (Ret.), https://www.facebook.com/events/1763311350552957/

BATAAN MEMORIAL CEREMONY. 4/9, 10:00 AM-2:00 PM, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Sponsor: New Mexico National Guard. Location: 200th CAC marker on the southeast side of the Bataan Memorial Building, 407 Galisteo Street, Santa Fe. http://www.bataanmuseum.com/event/nmng-honors-world-war-ii-bataan-veterans-on-75th-anniversary/

Obligation and the Bataan Death March Memorial

99-year-old Ben Skardon completes 10th walk in Bataan Memorial Death March 

Skardon, a newly minted captain in 1941, led Company A of the 92nd Infantry Regiment PA (Philippine Army), a battalion of Filipino Army recruits on the Bataan Peninsula. Skardon started out with 120 men in his command, and ended in April, 1942, with 60 men left. He himself was in hospital for malaria when the surrender came, but was ambulatory and forced to make the Death March. He earned two Silver Stars and four Bronze Stars for valor. He also survived 3 years in POW camps on the Philippines, the bombing and sinking of two unmarked hell ships by US planes as he was shipped to China. He survived to become a professor of English literature at Clemson University.
March 30, 2017

WHITE SANDS MISSILE RANGE, New Mexico — The 75th anniversary of World War II’s infamous Bataan Death March was commemorated by 7,200 participants who gathered in the wee morning hours for the 28th Bataan Memorial Death March, Sunday, March 19.

 Once again, Clemson University alumnus and professor emeritus Ben Skardon, 99 years young, was the oldest participant and the only survivor of the real Bataan Death March who walked in the event. 

He walked eight and a half miles through the unforgiving New Mexico desert, with temperatures reaching 90 degrees, and refused to stop until he matched his distance from the previous nine years. Skardon is a Clemson institution, so Clemson orange was the color of choice for the 64 members of “Ben’s Brigade” — the die-hard support group made up of friends, family, former students and relatives of his fellow prisoners of war — who accompanied him. The swarm of orange T-shirts was only given competition as Skardon crossed through several bright yellow fields of blooming California poppies between the four- and six-mile markers.

Skardon stopped at each mile marker to address his Brigade, usually with a joke or the cry “Oosh!” which is the command he says his Japanese captors gave to keep moving.

As the temperature rose, members of Ben’s Brigade took turns holding an American flag at angles that would shade him. He moved at his normal pace of two miles an hour, but stopped to rest or talk to people several times between each mile marker — something he hadn’t done in years past. Spirits rose as they reached one mile marker after another, but there was concern he might not make it the whole way this year. He had just recovered from a bout of the flu weeks earlier, and the temperatures were 10 degrees hotter than in previous years. It would take nothing away from him if he couldn’t go his traditional 8.5 miles again — if he only walked a mile it would still be an astounding feat — but nobody could question the power of his will either. He never mentioned quitting.

At mile marker six, he left the road to sit on a folding chair and rest in the shade of one of the support tents. The members of Ben’s Brigade, themselves sweaty and tired at this point, gratefully accepted water and gatorade from the volunteers who had waited for them. Somebody put a wet handkerchief around Skardon’s neck and handed him an orange slice to suck on. The two Army medics assigned to him took his vital signs and suggested he should take it easy on himself this year.

“Four minutes,” he said.

Four minutes later, he stood up and walked on.

At mile marker eight, Ben’s Brigade gathered around him one more time.

“Our destiny is right here,” he told them. “What I want to say is ‘thank you,’ and if I haven’t already shaken hands with you, please shake my hand after this. I can’t tell you, personally, how much this has meant to me, especially the new people who come out here for 8.5 miles. A few of you still go out and do more and that’s more power to you, [but] the power in my feet has gone! I have two very stalwart gentleman [the Army medics] who are actually dragging me through to the finish line. It touches me every time I look around and see you. So goodbye to a lot of you. This is the last point we’ll all be together today. Once we get to the finish line, they take me to an air-conditioned tent. You’ll all have to sweat it out!”

At that point nobody in Ben’s Brigade doubted he would reach his goal of 8.5 miles again. They weren’t wrong. He crossed the finish line less fifteen minutes later.

The Bataan Memorial Death March honors a special group of World War II heroes responsible for the defense of the islands of Luzon, Corregidor and the harbor defense forts of the Philippines. On April 9, 1942, tens of thousands of American and Filipino Soldiers were forced to surrender to Japanese forces. The Americans were Army, Army Air Corps, Navy and Marines. Among those seized were large numbers of the 200th Coast Artillery, New Mexico National Guard — the reason the memorial march is held in New Mexico.

Often overlooked are the four months of fierce fighting that took place before the American and Filipino forces surrendered. For instance, Skardon earned two Silver Stars and four Bronze stars during that short time span.

This was Skardon’s 10th time walking in the march, which he considers a personal pilgrimage. He says it’s his sacred responsibility to attend every year and walk with the thousands of others who come to honor those who didn’t survive the real Bataan Death March or the years of confinement in prisoner of war camps that followed.

“Coming here is an obligation,” he said. “I ought to do something, and the best way I know, physically, is to walk every time I get a chance in their memory.”

He says nothing he does now, even at 99, can compare to the ultimate sacrifice of his brothers-in-arms who didn’t return from the war.

“The word ‘hero’ does not apply to me at all,” he insists, quoting the Bible verse John 15:13: “‘Greater love has no man than this, than to lay down his life for his friends.'”

Las Cruces, New Mexico

In Las Cruces, New Mexico stands the only federally funded memorial dedicated to the memory of the those soldiers and civilians forced on the Bataan Death March in April 1942 at the start of Pacific War. The Bataan Death March Memorial Monument is located in the town’s Veterans Park. It was dedicated in April 2001.

Las Cruces artist Kelly Hester designed and sculpted the larger-than-life bronze statue depicting the struggle of those on the Death March. Two men try to hold up their buddy and move him forward. If they did not succeed, he would be shot, bayoneted, or beheaded—or all those things. Footprints are imbedded in the concrete in front of them... footprints made by boots as well as by bare feet. These footprints were made by those who had survived the March and their ordeal as POWs of Japan.

The Battle of Bataan and it bitter aftermath is deeply rooted in the state of New Mexico. Of the 12,000 Americans on the Bataan Death March, 1,800 were from the 200th and 515th Coast Artillery of the New Mexico National Guard. They came from nearly 300 New Mexican communities, and some 300 came from southwest New Mexico alone, where Las Cruces is located.

In addition to the national memorial to the Bataan Death March, the Las Cruces area has also hosted, since 1989, the annual Bataan Memorial Death March. The March takes place every March at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. Over 5,000 people from all over the U.S. and the world participate. Service members march in uniform.

The local congressman is Republican Steve Pearce, an Air Force veteran and Tea Party Caucus member who has established a Veterans Advisory Council for his district. Despite this commitment to New Mexico’s veterans, Congressman Pearce has not yet signed on as a co-sponsor of H. Res. 333, honoring those who were POWs of Japan, many of whom were from New Mexico. (August 13, 2011)

UPDATE: On December 9, 2011 Congressman Pearce became a co-sponsor of H. Res. 333.

New Mexico and Bataan

Bataan Medal

New Mexico’s 200th Regiment was sent to to provide air defense on the Philippines in September 1941. On December 8, 1941 they were the “first to fire” on Japan and by evening the Regiment was split, forming the 515th Coast Artillery to provide anti-aircraft protection to Manila, the first battle-born unit of World War II. Few regiments have given and suffered so much to defend the United States.

The 200th and 515th Coast Artillery batteries were among the most highly decorated in American history. They received four Presidential unit Citations, five Battle Stars, the Bronze Star, the Bataan Medal issued by the State of New Mexico and a Philippine Presidential Unit Citation. Of the 1,816 200th and 515th Coast Artillery (Anti-aircraft) men identified: 829 deaths (46%) — 24 battle-related; 803 as POWs (44%) including five who were massacred on Palawan; 2 post-liberation (related to abuse as POWs).  There were only 988 survivors (54%) and 40 deaths post-liberation for a ten year period (4%). (Source: B. Charley Gallegos, Bataan-Corregidor Memorial Foundation of New Mexico, Inc.)

Although in 1943, the City of Albuquerque vowed to build a memorial to New Mexico’s 200th and 515th Coast Artillery and created the Bataan Memorial Park, a city memorial was not dedicated until April 7, 2002. In 1960, family members and friends of the Regiment’s survivors had erected a stone memorial to the Regiment in the Park.

The new Memorial features granite pillars bearing the names and story of the men of the 200th and 515th Coast Artillery (AA) units arranged such that one may get a sense of marching alongside a man, toward the original stone memorial. Behind the flower garden, is a ramada to providesshade for benches on which visitors can sit and look across a series of stepping stones which delineate the island nation of the Philippines to the original marker, or beyond to the grassy lawn of the park and children at play.

This Memorial provides a physical reminder that the park is integral to the history of Albuquerque and New Mexico. It is maintained by the city and the Bataan Corregidor Memorial Foundation, which also hosts an excellent website on the Regiment's history.

Albuquerque’s congressman is Martin Heinrich (D-NM-1) and he is a co-sponsor of H. Res. 333. New Mexico’s other congressmen, Steve Pearce (R-NM-2) and Ben Lujan (D-NM-3) still have not signed on to support the Resolution.