Manila American Cemetery-Help Preserve History

My great-uncle through marriage
died in Bilibid as a POW

Aperture Films tells stories.

They are working on a film for the new visitor center at Manila American Cemetery, and are looking for people who are willing to be interviewed on-camera. The film tells the story of battles fought in the Pacific Theater, the powerful bond created between the United States and the Philippines during the war, and most important, the sacrifices made by those who fought and died.

Do you have a personal connection with Manila American Cemetery in the Philippines?

They are looking for interviewees who fit the following description: World War II veteran who served in the Philippines during the war; or Direct next of kin (sister, brother, son, daughter) of a veteran who served in the Philippines during the war.

If you or someone you know would be interested in participating, contact Kaycee Garcia at Aperture Films by email or phone (949) 271-1778. Interviews are not guaranteed.

Be part of history this year, just don't observe!

Angelina Jolie’s ‘Unbroken’ unscreened in Japan amid resentment

The true-life story of an American POW has been attacked as ‘anti-Japanese’

Angelina Jolie arrives to the world premiere of “Unbroken” in Sydney, Australia last November. Photograph: KHAP/GG/GC ImagesAdd caption

by David McNeill
First published in The Irish Times, May 9, 2015

In Unbroken, a 2014 war movie directed by Angelina Jolie, American prisoner of war Louis Zamperini is sent to a Japanese prisoner of war camp in the sleepy coastal town of Naoetsu. Starved and beaten by a sadistic guard, he barely survives.

The ordeal was the nadir of an extraordinary life. A distance runner, Zamperini qualified for the 1936 Berlin Olympics and met Adolf Hitler.

Before being captured by Japanese soldiers, he survived 47 days adrift on a raft in the Pacific. When the second World War ended, he struggled with alcoholism, depression and an obsession with revenge. His says his life rebounded only when he embraced Christianity and publicly forgave his captors.

Zamperini’s story, with its stirring American motifs of individual bravery, triumph and redemption, was turned into a bestselling book in 2010 and translated into 30 languages. Since it opened last year, Unbroken has been screened around the world. Everywhere, it seems, but Japan.

The film, and the translation of the book, was stopped in its tracks by a campaign in the right-wing media, amplified by online ranting that branded it “anti-Japanese”. Toho-Towa, the Japanese distributor for Universal Studios, has yet to announce a release date.

Universal itself has kept its distance from the controversy, except to deny any intention of “spreading a political message” through the film, says Duncan Clark, the studio’s president. Anything to do with the history of the second World War is political in Japan, in particular this year – the 70th anniversary of the nation’s surrender in August 1945.

Prime minister Shinzo Abe belongs to a political tradition that rejects much of the accepted narrative on the war. Education minister Hakubun Shimomura fired the latest salvo from that tradition last month when he announced stricter control over school history textbooks.

Mr Abe’s views were under the global spotlight last week during an eight-day visit to Washington. On April 29th, he became the first Japanese leader to address a joint session of Congress in a speech that expressed remorse for the war but stopped short of an apology.

Japan has produced much of the top scholarship on the war, critical or otherwise, and its movie studios have produced a string of anti-war classics. American-made movies showing mistreatment of POWs, notably Bridge on the River Kwai, have been widely seen in the country.

Official amnesia

But reflection, never easy, has long battled official amnesia. That amnesia is accelerating, says Mindy Kotler, director of the Washington-based think tank Asia Policy Point. “The Abe administration has walked back on every aspect of accountability for the war,” she says.

Kotler says the government has created an atmosphere of “misinformation and self-censorship” at home and sent diplomats out across the world to object to war memorials and complain to history professors and journalists.

In one notorious incident last year, Japanese officials accused Germany’s largest business newspaper of carrying pro-Chinese propaganda against Japan. “There is a clear shift taking place under the leadership of Mr Abe,” wrote the newspaper’s correspondent Carsten Germis. “A move by the right to whitewash history.”

Many ordinary Japanese have fought the retreat from the past. In Naoetsu, a group of locals, working with the families of former Australian POWs, created one of the few domestic memorials to Japan’s wartime victims. A small park marks the spot where the camp once stood.

About 60 Australians died from disease and mistreatment at the camp from 1942-45. When the war ended, eight guards were tried and executed, more than any other POW camp in Japan. Zamperini’s tormentor, Mutsuhiro Watanabe, fled and was never brought to justice. He later became a successful businessman.

The inmates included Irish man Thomas Fanahan Finn, who left Mitchelstown, Co Cork, aged 19 and enlisted with the Manchester Regiment. Towards the end of the war he was transported to Japan in “terrible, vile conditions” for compulsory labour at the Naoetsu camp, says his daughter Kit Clay.

But many of the people who fought to have the park built in 1995 have passed away. Around the town, few seem even aware of the camp or that it has been immortalised by Hollywood. The local library doesn’t have a single record of Zamperini.

“I don’t think people care about something that happened so long ago,” says Yukiko Ishida, who runs a coffee shop less than a kilometre from where the camp once stood.

Shared interpretations

Other countries struggle over how to remember the bloody 20th century, points out Shin Kawashima, a specialist in diplomatic history at the University of Tokyo. But in Asia, nationalism appears to be fuelling a retreat from attempts at shared interpretations of the past.

South Korea has responded to Japan’s textbook changes by announcing that schoolteachers will be given dedicated training on the history of Japan’s wartime military brothels. In China, primary and secondary schools already extensively study Japanese invasions of the 1930s and 1940s; a compulsory text on the 1937 Nanjing massacre was adopted this year for use in all its classrooms.

Unbroken should resonate beyond national borders because its central character embraced reconciliation, say those who know the story. Zamperini, who died last year, aged 97, later went to Japan to meet his captors and even requested a meeting with Watanabe, who refused. Zamperini was one of 30,000 POWs in Japan; 10 per cent died in the country, says Kinue Tokudome, executive director of the US-Japan Dialogue on POWs. “People don’t know that history,” she laments. “They must have seen these emaciated Caucasians in the countryside. How could they not remember and talk about it?”

Tokudome says there is still some space in Japan to discuss the uncomfortable past. She points to a new English-language textbook for secondary school children that recounts the tale of another POW.

But like many observers, she worries that this space may be closing. “I’m pleased that at least we now have this one vehicle to reach out to young Japanese people,” she says.

“Otherwise, they have very few opportunities to learn about the history that took place in their country.”

Senator Barbara Boxer Honors the Fifth American Prisoner of War Friendship Delegation to Japan

From the Congressional Record, April 29, 2015

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I wish to honor veterans from America's "greatest generation'' who were held captive as prisoners of war, POWs, by Japan during World War II and to recognize seven veterans-- including three from California--who recently [October 2014] participated in a historic trip to Japan to promote reconciliation and remembrance.

At the invitation of the Japanese Government, the veterans were joined by their family members to become the 5th delegation of American POWs to visit Japan as part of the official Japanese-American POW Friendship Program that began in 2010.

These brave men fought in the historic first battles of World War II and endured years of hardship as POWs. This year, as we commemorate the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, I want to recognize them and honor their service and sacrifice. 

Costa by Dan Rosenstrauch/Bay Area News Group

Anthony Costa, 95, from Concord, CA, was a private first class in the famed 4th Marine Regiment, also known as the China Marines, which arrived in the Philippines days before the Japanese invasion. He fought to defend the island of Corregidor in the Philippines from December 1941 to May 1942 before he was captured by the Japanese. As a POW, Private Costa was force-marched through Manila and taken to the Cabanatuan prison camp, where thousands of POWs died from starvation, dehydration and abuse. He was then moved to Japan to work as a slave dockworker in the freight yards in and around Osaka before being liberated in September 1945. He was awarded the Bronze Star and the Purple Heart. 

Sanchez by James Kimber/Stars and Stripes

William Sanchez, 96, from Monterey Park, CA, was an Army sergeant with the 59th Coast Artillery assigned to the island of Corregidor in the Philippines where he helped defend the harbor against the Japanese invasion. In May 1942, Sergeant Sanchez and the rest of his division were captured and paraded through the streets of Manila to Bilibid Prison. He was later transported to Japan in the hold of a Japanese hell ship, where he endured a 33-day oceanic journey plagued by dysentery, malaria and malnutrition before reaching Camp Omori. At the POW camp, he was forced to work as a slave laborer and dockworker at the railway yards in Tokyo prior to his liberation in August 1945. 

Schwartz by AP Photo/Koji Sasahara

Jack Schwartz, 100, from Hanford, CA, was a Navy lieutenant junior grade serving on Guam when the Japanese Navy attacked the island on December 8, 1941. When Guam fell to the Japanese, Lieutenant Schwartz was taken to a POW camp in Japan where he was repeatedly beaten, starved and provided insufficient clothing to endure the harsh winters. He was sent to several POW camps before being moved to Camp Rokuroshi, which was hidden in the Japanese Alps. After being liberated on September 8, 1945, he remained in the Navy and retired after a distinguished career in 1962. 

My constituents were joined on their trip by Daniel Crowley, 92, of Connecticut, an Army Air Corps infantryman who participated in the defense of Bataan and Corregidor; Oral Nichols, 93, of New Mexico, who served as a civilian medic in the historic defense of Wake Island; Warren Jorgenson, 93, of Nebraska, a marine who defended Corregidor; and Darrell Stark, 91, of Connecticut, who served as an Army infantryman on the Bataan Peninsula.

This trip was part of a reconciliation process that, while undoubtedly painful, is critical to help provide closure to POWs and their families and continue building stronger relations between the U.S. and Japan. It is important that this reconciliation program continue so that this history is remembered and the families can continue to heal.

70th Anniversary of the Great Raid

On January 30, 1945, three days after Soviet troops liberated their first Nazi death camp, Auschwitz-Birkenau, American Rangers and Filipino guerrillas rescued American and Allied POWs from the first of many Japanese concentration camps on the Philippines.

The Great Raid—as the liberation of Cabanatuan was called-was urgent and heroic. General Douglas MacArthur approved the raid ahead of his advance on Manila and the full liberation of the Philippines after an intersected cable revealed a “kill all” order by Japan for all prisoners.

entrance to Palawan Massacre 

Proof that the Japanese were serious about this order was confirmed in early January by reports of the December 14th
Palawan Massacre. On Palawan Island in the Philippines, Japanese forces anticipating an American invasion pushed 150 American POWs into an air raid shelter, doused them with gasoline, set them afire, and then machine gunned, bayoneted and clubbed to the screaming men to death. Miraculously, eleven escaped to tell their story. Last Man Out: Glenn McDole, USMC, Survivor of the Palawan Massacre in World War II is one of these inspiring accounts of survival and perseverance.
One hundred and twenty-three are now buried at Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri.

Nearly 3,000 American POWs had died in Cabanatuan. Further thousands had been transported to Japan for slave labor from the camp. Remaining were the sick and dying.

DVD click to order

Immortalized in the movie, The Great Raid, a group of more than 100 Army Rangers, Alamo Scouts and Filipino guerrillas traveled 30 miles behind Japanese lines to reach the camp on Bataan, Philippines. Along the route, other guerrillas in the villages muzzled dogs and put chickens in cages lest they alert the Japanese.

The nighttime raid, under the cover of darkness and a distraction by a P-61 Black Widow, surprised the Japanese forces in and around the camp. Hundreds of Japanese troops were killed in the 30-minute coordinated attack; the Americans suffered minimal casualties. The POWs were escorted back to American lines, often with Rangers carrying two emaciated men on their backs. In the end, the rescuers rounded up nearly 60 caribou carts to transport the survivors. The rescue allowed the prisoners to tell of the death march and prison camp atrocities, which sparked a new rush of resolve for the war against Japan when it was made public in March 1945.

click to order

The raid was considered successful—489 POWs were liberated, along with 33 civilians. The total included 492 Americans, 23 British , three Dutch, two Norwegians, one Canadian, and one Filipino. The rescue, along with the liberation of Camp O'Donnell the same day, allowed the prisoners to tell of the Bataan and Corregidor atrocities.

The Great Raid was soon followed by additional successful liberations, such as the raid by the 1st Cavalry Flying Column of Santo Tomas Civilian Internment Camp on February 3, raid of Bilibid Prison on February 4, and the 11th Airborne's raid at Los Baños on February 23. 

A poorly worded and inaccurate joint resolution by Congress directed then-President Ronald Reagan to issue a proclamation designating April 12, 1982 as "American Salute to Cabanatuan Prisoner of War Memorial Day".

Sourcing Japanese Denier History

Denying cannibalism by Japanese troops is a popular trope used by Japan's Rightwingers to discredit the book and film Unbroken. The net-uyoku have accused the author of Unbroken of spreading a lie about Japanese having a “custom” of cannibalism. They proudly declare that Japan has no "food culture" of cannibalism, thus it is simply untrue that Imperial Japanese soldiers and sailors consumed POWs out of hunger or triumph. This denial is at the heart of the online petition to ban the movie in Japan. However, neither the book nor the movie depict acts of cannibalism.

Unbroken is a biography of Olympian and former American POW of Japan Louis Zamperini. The author, Laura Hillenbrand, tries to capture in one paragraph (p 315), the litany of abuses heaped upon those captured by the Japanese. One clause in one sentence refers to "eaten alive in ritual acts of cannibalism." Nowhere else is this mentioned.

The book has not been translated into Japanese nor has the film been shown in Japan. Thus, what is the source of this misperception?

It seems that it can be traced to an one-word mistranslation in a book review of Unbroken in Wedge, a conservative magazine published by a subsidiary of JR Central [see below]. The honorary chairman of JR Central is Yoshiyuki Kasai and the then-adviser to the magazine and JR Central was Tomohiko Taniguchi. Kasai is a confidante of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and lead promoter of hi-speed rail in the United States. Taniguchi is now in charge of the Abe government's international public relations. 

Neither man has moved to clear up this misunderstanding. Both are deeply concerned with Japan's global public image. The result is that the campaign  against Unbroken is intensifying and in December a book was published embellishing the false notion that Unbroken is part of a campaign to dishonor Japan. This view is part of a greater ideology that the war crimes trials were based of falsified information and the product of victor's justice.

As many readers of this blog know, JR Central now owns the railcar manufacturer Nippon Sharyo, a company that used American and Allied POWs as slave labor at its factory in Narumi. A founder of the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor, Sam Moody, was tortured at the camp. JR Central is vying for high speed rail contracts in Texas and the East Coast. Nippon Sharyo will be part of these bids as well as bids by JR East for this year's high speed rail contracts in California.

The reports of cannibalism are true. Officers were prosecuted in war crimes trials and hanged. Imperial Japan's excessive abuse of its military and civilian prisoners is also true.

The following, for scholarly understanding and analysis, is a provisional, annotated translation of the Wedge article that propagated the campaign against Unbroken.

Very Popular Book In U.S.A. Stirs-up Anti-Japan Feelings
-- Japanese Military's Abuse of POWs, Why Bring It Up Now?

Wedge Magazine, February 20, 2011
By Soichiro MORIKAWA -- Journalist who has experience of living in New York during the time of IT Bubble
Link: 反日感情をあおる本が米国で大人気

* * * * * * * * * *
COLUMN: What best-seller books are being read in America? Learn about trends/signs of the times. You think you know, but may not really know, the true state of affairs in America -- and this is essential for thinking about Japan.
* * * * * * * * * *

"UNBROKEN", by Laura Hillenbrand, published by Random House. $27.00

A non-fiction book which describes the true story, in great detail, how a Japanese soldier abused a U.S. POW during World War II. It is unmistakably a book which will certainly heighten anti-Japanese feelings in America, and is being widely-read in the U.S. It is a special category book listed in the New York Times weekly non-fiction bestseller list, and has ranked in the top-five for thirteen-straight weeks. Most recently it dropped to number two, but for six weeks before that it was at the top of the list.

-- JAPANESE MILITARY'S ABUSE OF POWS

Louis Zamperini, is currently a healthy 93-year-old American man of Italian ancestry. The book follows/describes the misfortunes he experienced during his lifetime -- in particular how he had to deal with inhumane treatment as a POW held by the Imperial Japanese military.

As a young 19-year-old middle-distance runner, he raced in the 1936 Berlin Olympics as part of the U.S.A.'s team. He did not win a medal, but his hard-running style drew the attention of Adolf Hitler, who was watching from the stands -- and there is an anecdote that later on,

Hitler shook Zamperini's hand.

Thereafter, Zamperini continued to train as a runner, hoping to compete in teh 1940 Olympics, which were schedule to be held in Tokyo -- but due to the Japan-China War, those games were postponed, and he joined the U.S. Army Air Force. However, bad luck later struck when his aircraft developed engine trouble and it crashed. He eventually drifted ashore on Kwajalein Island, located in the Marshall Islands, about 3,900 KM southwest of Honolulu, Hawaii.

That was when Zamperini became a POW of the Japanese military, in a place which was called "Execution Island." Zamperini was not executed, once the Japanese military realized he was an Olympic athlete, and he was sent bakc to the mainland Japan.

After that, we had to survive being a POW, who was moved from place-to-place in camps at Ofuna, Omori, and Naoetsu, and eventually returned alive to America in August 1945. The book describes, in a cool/factual style, the numerous cases/examples of maltreatment Zamperini received while in the POW camps -- and, conversely, this really causes the image of the cruel Japanese soldiers to vividly emerge.

In particular, the most involved/powerful descriptions of abuse and cruelty are those which cover the actions of Japanese Corporal Mutsuhiro Watanabe, who came to be called "The Bird." The book calls Watanabe a sadist, who seemed to derive sexual pleasure feelings from punishing/tormenting the POWs. For example, the following is one example of innumerable POW-abuse scenes which
are written in the book:

--"THE BIRD," SADISTIC WATANABE

"The Bird swung the belt backward, with the buckle on the loose end, and then whipped it around himself and forward, as if he were performing a hammer throw. The buckle rammed into Louie’s left temple and ear. Louie felt as if he had been shot in the head. Though he had resolved never to let the Bird knock him down, the power of blow, and the explosive pain that followed, overawed everything in him. His legs seemed to liquefy, and he went down. The room spun." (page 251)

Corporal Watanabe, aka "The Bird", made Zamperini his personal enemy, and almost every day he would beat Zamperini, and would also prevent him from receiving adequate amounts of food. The book also states that Japanese soldiers would seize food from International Red Cross relief packages, and prevent distribution of such food to the POWs.

The book further describes, using statistical information, to show that Japan's treatment of POWs was clearly much worse and cruel than Nazi Germany.

"In its rampage over the east, Japan had brought atrocity and death on a scale that staggers the imagination. In the midst of it were the prisoners of war. Japan held some 132,000 POWs from America, Britain, Canada, New Zealand, Holland, and Australia. Of those, nearly 36,000 died, more than one in every four. Americans fared particularly badly; of the 34,648 Americans held by Japan, 12,935? more than 37 percent?died. By comparison, only 1 percent of Americans held by the Nazis and Italians died." (pages 314-315)

POWs were subjected to especially cruel treatment, supposedly, as described in the following passage...

"Thousands of other POWs were beaten, burned, stabbed, or clubbed to death, shot, beheaded, killed during medical experiments, or eaten alive in ritual acts of cannibalism. And as a result of being fed grossly inadequate and befouled food and water, thousands more died of starvation and easily preventable diseases." (page 315)

** TRANSLATOR'S NOTE: Here Mr. Morikawa (mis)translated the phrase "ritual acts of cannibalism" as hito-kui fushu de-- he used the word fushu for "ritual," but,  fushu's meaning is "customary, or common practice -- which does not really match the nuance of ritual.**

The book then tries to explain why the Japanese military's abuse of POWs occurred so routinely/commonly. As is shown in the following quote, the cause can be seen from one aspect of the Japanese military's unique "culture": "In the Japanese military of that era, corporal punishment was routine practice. “Iron must be beaten while it’s hot; soldiers must be beaten while they’re fresh” was a saying among servicemen. “No strong soldiers,” went another, “are made without beatings.” For all Japanese soldiers, especially low-ranking ones, beating was inescapable, often a daily event." (page 194)

Since Japanese soldiers themselves routinely experienced being beaten, their resentment/anger was thereafter directed at the POWs.

This writer, Morikawa, at the time of reading this section of the book, recalled reading the war novel: "The Human Condition", by Junpei Gomikawa, which described the irrational/unreasonable aspects of the army, and I found myself nodding in agreement with what was written about the reality/true nature of the Japanese military in UNBROKEN.

-- JUSTIFICATION OF THE A-BOMBINGS

However, I cannot accept the logic deployed by the book that: since POWs were abused/treated cruelly, therefore, the large-scale bombings of Tokyo and other cities, and the A-bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were unavoidable.

For example, the book tells of a newly-released POW, right after the end of the war, travelling by train through central Hiroshima after the dropping of the a-bomb, and looking at the scene he said:

“Nothing! It was beautiful.”

The American POW felt it was due to the A-bombings that he was able to meet/reach the end of the war, where he were released from captivity. So this is the deep emotion he had when he saw devastated nothingness of the central explosion area -- and to him it looked beautiful. The book records the ex-POW's comment using the following expression:

“I know it’s not right to say it was beautiful, because it really wasn’t. But I believed the end probably justified the means.” (p320)

-- IS JAPAN'S DIPLOMACY COPING/ABLE TO DEAL WITH THIS BESTSELLER?

The typical thinking/logic of America's conservative class can be seen in the assertion that the A-bombings were unavoidable actions, which were required to end the war. While UNBROKEN goes into great detail explaining the abuse of POWs by Japanese soldiers, it does not mention at all that hundreds of thousands of civilians were killed by the A-bombings. The following passage from the book is written as if to say that, from the start, the Japanese government was really responsible for the victims of the A-bombings:

"That same night, B-29s showered leaflets over thirty-five Japanese cities, warning civilians of coming bombings and urging them to evacuate. The Japanese government ordered civilians to turn the leaflets in to authorities, forbade them from sharing the warnings with others, and arrested anyone with leaflets in their possession. Among the cities listed on the leaflets were Hiroshima and Nagasaki." (page 297)

To be honest, this writer, Morikawa, had no previous knowledge about the issue of how Japan handled/treated POWs during the Second World War. So, I had numerous confused/bewildered thoughts as I read UNBROKEN. I also have no ability to judge/verify the statistical information which was cited in the book.

Furthermore, what I cannot understand is why this book was published at this time -- and, beyond that, that fact of how it has become a top best-seller.

Japanese should take notice/be aware that such a book is selling well in America. I think it would be wise for Japan's MOFA to read and analyze the contents of UNBROKEN, and then develop a countermeasures plan as part of a diplomatic strategy to improve the image of Japan.

Untold stories of heroism and valor still to be told

The American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor (ADBC) Memorial Society needs your help to tell journalists about the rich resources available on the American POWs of Japan. Help get the truth out there!

Success of Angelina Jolie's Movie "Unbroken" Highlights 

Untold Stories of World War II POWs 

American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Supports Surviving Veterans, Can Help Journalists Connect 

with Former Prisoners of War of Japan

CARBONDALE, Ill., Dec. 30, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The box-office success of "Unbroken," a movie about the true-life war-time experience of Olympian Louis Zamperini, has brought new attention to the issue of the appalling treatment by ImperialJapan of its prisoners of war during World War II.

As we approach the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, many remarkable and compelling stories of valor, perseverance and survival remain untold.

The American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor (ADBC) Memorial Society has maintained constant support and engagement with surviving POWs of Japan and their families and the ADBC is uniquely positioned to provide unrivaled media access to these veterans who are located throughout the United States and their incredible histories. A number of former POWs from California, Connecticut,Nebraska, and New Mexico recently returned from a reconciliation trip to Japan.

These men, all in their 90s, represent all the Services. Most were POWs longer than Mr. Zamperini and some were held with him in the Ofuna, Omori, and Naoetsu POW camps. Others are survivors of the infamous Bataan Death March, the building of the Thai-Burma Death Railway, and solitary confinement in occupied China.

"The box office success of Angelina Jolie's biopic 'Unbroken' on the heels of this coming year's 70th anniversary of the end of World War II highlights a history shared by thousands of Americans that needs to be better known and should not be lost," Jan Thompsonpresident of American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor Memorial Society said today.

For help in contacting these American heroes, please contact the ADBC Memorial Society President Ms. Jan Thompson at (618) 521-3654 or janithompson@gmail.com. Website: http://www.dg-adbc.org/

The ADBC Memorial Society is also available for any information on the backgrounds of these men or details on the historical context to help bring their stories to life.

American POWs of Japan in Japan

At Japan's National Press Club October 15, 2015

5^th Delegation of American Former 

POWs of Japan

October 11-20, 2014

 Anthony (Tony) COSTA, 94, lives in Concord, California, the town in which he was born on January 8, 1920.  After graduating from Mt. Diablo High School, he worked in the nearby oil refineries. In December 1939, he joined the U.S. Marine Corps. He became a member of the legendary 4^th Marine Regiment, also known as the “China Marines”, stationed in Shanghai on Embassy guard duty. In late November 1941, the China Marines were transferred to Olongapo on The Philippines Islands.  After the bombing of Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, December 7, 1941, the most of the China Marines were moved to Corregidor Island in the Bay of Manila. On reaching Corregidor on 29 December, Pfc Costa was assigned to the newly formed 3d Battalion, Company L to engage in beach defenses until surrender on May 6, 1942. For three weeks, in the tropical sun with little food or water, the Japanese kept the POWs at the 92nd Garage area. Taken to Manila on May 25^th, the survivors of Siege of Corregidor were paraded down Dewey Boulevard to Bilibid Prison on what was called the "March of Shame” before the Filipinos and foreign residents. The following day they were moved by train and foot to the squalid Cabanatuan POW Camp. At Cabanatuan, 2,660 POWs died due to poor sanitation, starvation rations, limited medical care, and abuse.  On November 7, 1942, he was taken by the Hellship Nagato Maru via Formosa to the Japanese port of Moji, the main disembarkation point for most POW transport ships. He arrived by train on November 26^th, Thanksgiving Day, in Osaka. He remembers that the rags and loincloths that had been adequate in the Philippines were insufficient for the biting cold found in Japan. The POWs were never given adequate clothing that first winter. With many of the POWs from Nagato Maru, Costa worked for Nippon Express as a slave stevedore in the freight yards in and around the city of Osaka at Umeda Bunsho Camp in Osaka (Osaka 2-D UMEDA). In March 1945, after his POW camp was firebombed, he was transferred to Osaka POW Camp 5-B TSURUGA were he was again a slave stevedore for Nippon Express and Tsuruga Transportation Company. Costa was liberated in September 1945. During the defense of Corregidor, 72 members of the 4^th Marines were killed in action. Of the 1,487 members of the 4th Marines captured on the Philippines Islands, 474 died in captivity. Following repatriation, Mr. Costa returned to California where he became a heavy machinery factory worker. In 1949, Mr. Costa built his own house, in which he still lives, and became the construction inspector of his hometown of Concord. He received his Purple Heart and Bronze Star 50 years after the fact, but he is still fighting to receive his back pay for his time as a POW.

POW#: UNKNOWN

Daniel W. CROWLEY, 92, a Connecticut native lives in Simsbury, Connecticut.

In 1940, the age of 18, he enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Corps hoping to “take long trip somewhere at the expense of our country. He was sent to The Philippines in January 1941 and stationed in Manila at Nichols Field with the 24^th Pursuit Group, V Interceptor Command, 17^th Pursuit Squadron. With the start of the war after the after bombing of Pearl Harbor, he was sent to fight on the Bataan Peninsula as part of Provisional Air Corps Infantry Regiment. Although designated as infantry, U.S. Army refuses to this day to recognize the veterans as such and denies them their Combat Infantry badges. After the Bataan Peninsula was surrendered April 9, 1942, his unit made their way to the tip of Bataan and the town of Mariveles to surrender. Refusing to become prisoners, they hide among rocks on the shore and then made their way to Corregidor aboard life boats with sailors from various American ships that had been scuttled in Manila Bay and Mariveles Harbor. On Corregidor he became part of the 4th Marines regimental reserve under Maj. Max Schaeffer working shore defense. On May 6, 1942, he became a POW of Japan with the fall of Corregidor. On May 25^th, he and other POWs who were interned in the 92nd Garage Area were paraded through Manila on the “March of Shame.” He was then taken by rail and foot to the POW Camp Cabanatuan. In the summer of 1942, Crowley was sent to the island of Palawan where he labored with other POWs building an airstrip. He was returned to Manila in early 1944. On December 14, 1944, the Japanese, believing an U.S. invasion imminent, herded his friends, the remaining 150 prisoners at Palawan into a shelter, dumped in gasoline, and set them on fire while machine-gunning escapees. Some prisoners did succeed to escape the massacre, but 139 men were killed. Crowley was sent to Japan via Formosa on March 24, 1944 aboard the Hellship, Taikoku Maru arriving April 3^rd. He was taken to Hitachi then to Tochigi, Japan where he was a slave laborer mining copper ore for Furukawa Kogyo. (today’s Furukawa Company Group) at Ashio POW Camp Tokyo 9-B until the end of the war. Returning home, Crowley became an insurance agent and raised a family. He says that veterans who were held prisoners of war by the Japanese were stigmatized."Corporations here in the states thought we were nuts," he said. "The majority of us re-joined the Army or worked for the postal service." Crowley believes he enjoyed a good life in Simsbury, but he will never forget the years stolen from him by the Japanese. "It's a living thing with me," he said. "It's not ancient history at all." His most recent efforts to recognize those with whom he served was advocating for the state legislature to name the bridge on Route 185 in Simsbury the “Bataan Corregidor Memorial Bridge” in memory of those soldiers who fought alongside Crowley and who lost their lives at the Battle of Bataan and the Battle of Corregidor. The dedication took place on December 7, 2013.

POW#: 101

Warren JORGENSON, 93, lives in Bennington, Nebraska. He grew up in a small town outside of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. After high school, he enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps in 1939 and was stationed in Shanghai by May 1940 with the 4^th Marine Regiment, the legendary “China Marines.” They were deployed to the Philippines in November 1941, arriving days before the war began. He was wounded during the defense of Corregidor.. After the surrender of Corregidor on May 6, 1942 he was kept for nearly a year on the Island as a POW laborer and buried the dead. He was moved to Clark Field in 1943 working maintain the air strip. He was sent to Japan on August 27, 1944 aboard the Hellship Noto-Maru. Jorgenson remembers that there was not enough room to even stand up as they were stacked together. The tropical heat created a living hell and then the hatch covers were closed. The hold was airless and the heat unbearable. Sick, starved, and suffocating the POWs had only buckets provided for bathroom facilities. In Japan, he was taken to Sendai #6 (Hanawa) POW camp where he was a slave laborer for Mitsubishi Goushi Company (today’s Mitsubishi Materials) mining cooper ore. The mine closed in 1978 and was turned into a museum, the Osarizawa Mine Historical Site that recounts the 1300-year history of mining the mountain. Visitors can also go through some of the main tunnels. An amusement park and museum were opened in 1982 as “Mine Land Osarizawa.” In 2008, the site was renovated with the amusement section, Cosmo Adventure [sic], focused on space-themed indoor shooting games. The museum makes no mention of the slave laborers who worked the mine during the war. After repatriation, Mr. Jorgenson received a degree in Commercial Science from Drake University on the G.I. Bill.  He then went on to work in the phonograph music industry first at Capitol Records and then at Musicland.

POW#: 407

Oral C. NICHOLS, 93, lives in Carlsbad, New Mexico.  He is a 1939 graduate of Woodbury College (now Woodbury University) in Burbank, California.  Following graduation, he worked as a bookkeeper and as miner in California. He then joined Morrison-Knudsen, a Boise, Idaho-based construction company that was working to upgrade the airfield on Wake Island in the Pacific. When the war started on December 8, 1941, he participated, as a civilian medic in the legendary defense of Wake Island. For nearly two weeks, a garrison of some 400 Marines and a handful of the 1,500 civilians working on the atoll fought off an invading Japanese armada. It was the only time during the Pacific War that a Japanese amphibious assault was repelled. The battle was a rare example of success in the War's early months. After the island fell on December 23, 1941, the Japanese considered him and all the civilians as prisoners of war. He was sent with the majority of POWs in January 1942 to China. The POWs left on Wake were tasked with finishing the air strip and hard labor. On October 7, 1943, the 98 remaining POWs were bound with barbed wire and machined gunned to death. A lone, still unknown survivor scratched the date on a rock near the massacre. He was tracked down and beheaded. In China, Nichols was first placed at the Woosung Camp  outside of Shanghai. In December 1942, he was moved to Kiangwan another camp in the area. Nichols typing skills garnered him a clerk’s position at Kiangwan’s interpreter’s office. The chief interpreter, Isami Ishihara, was called the Beast of the East as he was exceedingly sadistic and was sentenced to death after the war. Nichols was eventually moved to Japan in May 1945 to Sendai Camp #11 Kamakita near Aomori in Northern Honshu. There he was a slave laborer in an open pit iron mine for Nippon Mining (today’s JX Nippon Mining and Materials). After repatriation, Nichols worked a variety of jobs in California and Arizona before moving back to his family’s ranch in New Mexico. It was not until 1981 that Congress enacted the bill that became a public law granting Nichols and the other civilians on Wake status as war veterans and provided them with honorable discharges and attendant benefits as U.S. Navy veterans.

POW#: 4410 and 4406

William R. “Bill” SANCHEZ, 96, a California native lives in Monterey Park, California. He grew up on the Eastside of Los Angeles.  He went on to study international trade and finance at Woodbury College (now Woodbury University) in Burbank, California and enrolled in graduate classes at the University of Southern California.  Believing that war was on the horizon, in 1940 he enlisted in the U.S. Army and asked to go to The Philippines. "I figured the Philippines is adventure," Sanchez recalled. He became an Army Sergeant with 59th Coast Artillery Regiment, Battery “I” assigned to Corregidor first working intelligence on General Douglas MacArthur’s staff and then harbor defense against the invading Japanese. He remembers he was in combat continually for five months until the island was surrendered on May 6, 1942. Battery “I” was the first to fire on the enemy. After surrender, he and fellow POW Harry Corre appeared in the famous staged photo at the entrance of Malinta Tunnel of the American surrenders with their hands in the air to Japanese forces. He, along with all the Americans captured on Corregidor, was forced to billet for three weeks at the 92nd Garage area on island with no protection from the sun and little food or water before they were moved to the main island. In Manila, the Japanese forced the survivors of Siege of Corregidor onto what is now called the "March of Shame” a “parade” through Manila from Dewey Boulevard to Bilibid Prison. From there, he was taken to the POW camp at Cabanatuan.  Sanchez was among the first group of POWs moved to Japan. Deep in the cramped and fifthly hold of Hellship the Tottori Maru, Sanchez began his voyage to Japan on October 8, 1942. The ship traveled to Formosa, then Korea, and finally arrived in Moji, Japan on November 11^th.   In Japan, he was sent to Omori Tokyo Base Camp #1 work on reclaiming land.  Sanchez also worked as a slave stevedore for Nippon Tsuun (today’s Nippon Express) at the railway yards in Tokyo. Returning home, he worked for various companies in international trade. His work found him returning to Japan several times. He is an avid Los Angeles Angels baseball fan.

POW#: UNKNOWN

Library of Congress Veterans History Project:  http://lcweb2.loc.gov/diglib/vhp/bib/66895

Jack W. SCHWARTZ, 98, lives in Hanford, California. He graduated from Hollywood High School when he was 15 years old.  At the California Institute of Technology, he earned both his BA and MS degrees in civil engineering. He worked at various engineering jobs until joining the U.S. Navy in 1940 as a lieutenant junior grade in the Civil Engineering Corps. After Schwartz’s first Navy assignment at Pearl Harbor, he was transferred to Guam in January 1941. On Guam, he was a Public Works officer, in charge of maintenance and inspecting new construction. The Japanese Navy attacked Guam several hours after Pearl Harbor on December 8, 1941. The Battle of Guam lasted barely two days with the tiny Marine and Navy garrison quickly overwhelmed by Japan’s invading forces. On 10 December 1941, Guam became the first American territory formally surrendered to an enemy in WWII. One month later, Schwartz and most of the officers on Guam were boarded aboard Mitsui’s passenger ship Argentina Maru and transported to the Japanese port of Tadotsu on the island of Shikoku. Arriving in Japan on January 16, 1942, he was taken to the Zentsuji POW Camp about 400 miles west of Tokyo. During WWII, it held mainly officers plus enlisted ranks from Guam & Wake Island. It was used by the Japanese as a “show camp” for the Red Cross with marginally better conditions than others. At the camp, he was repeatedly beaten and put on reduced rations for asking camp officials for better food and medical supplies. Officers did not have to work and he passed his time doing calculus problems and macramé. Enlisted POWs at the camp were slave stevedores for Nippon Express (still in operation under the same name) at the Sakaide Rail Yards and the Port of Takamatsu. In September 1942, he was transferred to Tokyo 2B Kawasaki (Mitsui Madhouse). Again, as an officer, he was not required to work and did not participate in the slave stevedore work at the camp. However, he was the senior officer and thus was in charge of recording work hours and pay (most of which was never distributed). He was returned to Zentsuji in August of 1944. The camp was dismantled and he was sent in June 1945 to do subsistence farming at POW Camp 11-B Rokuroshi (Camp Mallette) in the Japanese Alps. With severely restricted rations, overcrowding, and no winter clothes, all the men at the camp were convinced that they would not survive the winter. Hidden in the mountains, the POW camp was not liberated until September 8, 1945. After the war, Schwartz remained in the Navy, retiring in 1962. In Hanford, California he was Public Works Director and City Engineer for 18 years.  Since retiring in 1980, Schwartz has been on many city and county work groups, including eight years as a City Planning Commissioner and five years on the Kings County Grand Jury.

POW#: 171

Darrell D. STARK, 91, lives in Stafford Springs, Connecticut. He grew up in a large migrant labor family in Oklahoma and joined the U.S. Army when he was 17 on March 5, 1941. He was assigned to the 31st Infantry Regiment United States, M company and was immediately sent to the Philippines Islands aboard the USAT Republic. He did his basic training on the Philippines where he was assigned to a heavy weapons company and was a weapons carrier and runner. With the Japanese invasion of The Philippines on December 8, 1941, the 31st Infantry covered the withdrawal of American and Filipino forces to the Bataan Peninsula. Despite starvation, disease, no supplies, obsolete weapons, and often dud ammunition, the peninsula’s defenders fought the Japanese to a standstill for four months. On April 9, 1942, Bataan was surrendered to Japan. At the time, Stark was delirious with malaria in Bataan Hospital #2. He did not participate in the 65-mile Bataan Death March and was instead transported by truck to Bilibid Prison in Manila. From there, he was eventually sent to Cabanatuan. Stark was soon sent to work in the Davao Penal Colony, a prison camp on the southern Philippines island of Mindanao, where he and 2,000 other prisoners farmed 1,000 acres of rice and 600 acres of fruits and vegetables. Japan closed the camp on Mindanao in late spring of 1944. On July 4, 1944 Stark was sent to Japan with 1,024 Allied POWs aboard the Hellship Sekiho Maru (also known as the Canadian Inventor or the Mati Mati Maru or Wait, Wait Ship). After 62 days, and stops in Formosa and Japan, the freighter arrived at the Japanese port of Moji on September 1, 1944. From there, he was sent to Nagoya #5-B Yokkaichi POW camp where became a slave laborer at a copper foundry owned by Ishihara Sangyo Kaisha in Nagoya, a port city south of Tokyo. Much of the work involved melting down bells seized from churches. Other Allied POW slave laborers at this POW camp mined coal or manufactured sulfuric acid for the company. The Yokkaichi facility and company, Ishihara Sangyo Kaisha (ISK), where Stark slaved still exists. After an earthquake in May 1945, he was among the POWs moved to Nagoya-07B-Toyama to work as slave laborers for Nihon Sotatsu (Nippon Soda Company. Ltd.). He was liberated on September 5^, 1945. Stark returned to the United States and spent 18 months in a San Francisco hospital recovering from disease and injuries. According to Army records, roughly half of his regiment, 1,155 men, died in captivity. He moved to Connecticut working several jobs until he became Deputy Jailer for Tolland County. He went on to become a Captain with the State of Connecticut Department of Corrections, where he set up the Department’s Correctional Transportation Unit (CTU). Since his retirement in 1972, he has spoken widely to students about the history of the defense of the Philippines and to veterans who suffer, like him, from PTSD.

POW#:  563

Library of Congress Veterans History Project: http://lcweb2.loc.gov/diglib/vhp/bib/11216

Never The Same: The Prisoner Of War Experience

Loretta Swit and former POWs of Japan

The documentary, Never The Same: The Prisoner Of War Experience, will be shown in Las Cruces, New Mexico. The film is narrated by MASH-star actress Loretta Swit. Her all-star supporting cast includes Ed Asner, Alec Baldwin, Jamie Farrell, Robert Forster, Christopher Franciosa, Robert Loggia, Christopher Murray, Don Murray, John O’Hurley, Kathleen Turner, Robert Wagner and Sam Waterson.

More than 20 years in the making, this documentary depicts the experience of American POWs of Imperial Japan during World War II and reveals their indomitable will to survive. Our honored guests at all four screenings will include former POWs, Narrator Loretta Swit and Director Jan Thompson. A brief Q & A session will follow each film.

Film screening times are Friday, March 21 at 7pm; Saturday, March 22 at 3pm and 7pm, and by popular demand, Monday, March 24th at 7pm. Tickets are $12 general admission and may be purchased on-line at www.RioGrandeTheatre.com , at the Doña Ana Arts Council offices located on the second floor of the Rio Grande Theatre, or at the door. Doors open one half hour before show time.

The Rio Grande Theatre is located at 211 N. Main Street, Las Cruces, New Mexico. For tickets and more information call (575) 523-6403 or visit www.RioGrandeTheatre.com.

Qs & As at Temple University

On October 17th, Temple University's Japan Campus Institute of Contemporary Japanese Studies hosted the seven visiting American former POWs of Japan. The video below is of the Qs & As. They speak from their heart about their mixed feelings about returning to Japan. One daughter talks about how she protects her father from reading books about the POW experience. They also recommend the forthcoming documentary The Tragedy of Bataan about the infamous Bataan Death March. Listeners are astounded at the incredibly horrendous conditions in the POW camps.

Best Seller: Unbroken

Since the day it was published in November 2010, Laura Hillenbrand's Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption has been a bestseller. This memoir of an American POW of Japan has remained among the top ten on the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Barnes & Noble, and Amazon lists.

Californian, Olympian, airman, Louis Zamperini experienced the worst of Imperial Japan's POW camps. He was tortured, experimented upon, interrogated, beaten, whipped, starved, humiliated, and forced to give a radio broadcast. He survived torture at the infamous Ofuna Naval Interogation station in Kamakura and was then shipped to to work in Japan's two most horrific prison camps: Omori where he slaved for Nippon Express and then Naoetsu where he labored for Shinetsu Chemical and Nippon Stainless. These companies still exist.

As Hillenbrand writes: 

Virtually nothing about Japan's use of POWs was in keeping with the Geneva Convention. To be an enlisted prisoner of war under the Japanese was to be a slave. The Japanese government made contracts with private entities to send enlisted POWs to factories, mines, docks, and railways, where men were forced into exceptionally arduous war-production or war-transport labor. The labor, performed under club-wielding foremen, was so dangerous and exhausting that thousands of POWs died on the job. In the extremely rare instances in which the Japanese compensated the POWs for their work, payment amounted to almost nothing, equivalent to a few pennies a week. (p. 234)