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BATAAN DAYContinued from Page Iour food as we walked pastcane fields. We walked all day |There was nothing to do but to and half the night.” place the hundreds whoIf a soldier faltered there was ihe crunch of a rifle butt against hi* skull, or the slashing thrust of a boyonet. No one got a second chance.HELPED EACH OTHERSome Brainerd men attempted to get together so they could lend assistance to each other. McComas and Straka were in a group of five and through helping each other all five were able to make it.Henry Peck. Route S, Brainerd, remembers that he had suffered an attack of malaria the night before the march began. “I managed to stagger along, he said, when you have a bayonet looking at you, you can do most anything.”Al Brown, a 21-year-old private at the time was in a group that marched five days and five nights.Their only food was that which was tossed to them by Filipinos. It consisted of sugarlumps.Everywhere the story was the same—those who didn’t keep up were killed without further adieu.Ihe Japanese guards changed often so that there was always a fresh group in charge.TEN DAY TRIPStraka said it took 10 days for his group to make the trip to O’Donnel. All the food they gave us could have been put in a quartbucket.” Hiroshima that brought the conThe 79 to 100-mile trip ended Iflict to a close. Planes flew over-at Camp O'Donnell. For the pris-jhead and parachuted packages of oners who survived, this ^ was Inohaven. They were fed minute quantities of rice and the water swam with dysentery germs.The men had beri beri, dysentery and every other malady that went with malnutrition. They died by the hundreds.From O’Donnell they were sent to Cabanatuan, another hole of misery and death.I was one of the last ones out of O'Donnell,” said Ahlgrim, who today is a custodian at the Highway department shops here. ”1 was on the burial squad.”Shallow, unmarked common graves were the order of the day.TO WORK DETAILSFrom Cabanatuan the men weresent out on work details and here their plights varied.Straka, however, had contracted a serious case of malaria and was• HFLPMAN ORlished c tionall ucts ivestmer weekly ime. \Inc., P-iMALEi1 VfrT I1i*i m“rri1T-i.....ntr * 11 .WANTED all*arou; HI 6-451-m.in neat rows and wait.When things started to go badly for the Japanese in the latter stages of the war the men were sent on prison ships to Japan where they toiled, in steel mills, copper mines, or unloading ships.LITTLE FOODAlways the routine was the same. Work from morning until night, very little food.MacDonald went to Japan In September of 1943 and worked in a steel mill until the end of the war. We stopped working when they dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, he said.Ahlgrim spent his first six months in Japan in an underground copper mine and then worked on a copper smelter. Peck worked in the copper mines.Brown was a mechanic and then he served as a truck driver.Straka, too, wound up in Japan and worked in the steel mills asdid Hollingsworth.Gordon was the only one to remain on the island of Luzon until it was liberated by the alliedforces.Suddenly in the very last stages of the war, the old cruel guards • KKMAI. were replaced by more friendly ones and the soldiers saw American bombers flying overhead.FOOD PROPPEDThen there was the bomb onWANTED man, aj ing to for Natiing. $10! area. Slt; tel, St. 10, 4 p.■i——»im«W Jy 'NATION A er 106 n youngrate $1paid reman. VDispatcl■ 11—i—I i i ----- 'SALFor contaition nee Businesi 50-miie Specialt Memorii an unu£ nent an Com mis with a( $125 wet Write Bin the camp hospital. The only thing different about it,” he recalled, was that we didn't havefood to the men. Even the joy of plenty was coupled with sadness. Some of the starved, dehydrated men ate so much, so rapidly thattheir bodies could not withstand it and they died on the spot.American troops then moved in and it was a routine of hospital care by friendly persons In clean surroundings for the prisoners and then the trip to the states and finally home.McComas was the first from Brainerd to arrive. After picked off his island refuge by the submarine he spent a short time in the hospital and then was allowed to return to Brainerd.When the survivors returned home, Brainerd swallowed its sorrow and showed its pride by staging a special celebration in their honor. There was a parade through the streets and a special banquet and program held later in the day.How did those who came through, survive the more thanWANTEDgrocery m. to 8 urday. \WANTED a newHamiltodryer.obligaticpaymenpaymenthroughMINNA• SITU AIWANTED 82 9-4531CUSTOMdone. FiPhone 8WILL DC home bj 9-4451. 1CARPET I terating ERD C North 4tRELIABLIsales ft plumbin, ing. Sev KE work But then our rations were jthree years of imprisonment?“Will power, is that’s 1 all,'W saidcut in half too.”For one and one-half years he suffered in this condition. “When I went to sleep at night, he said, I prayed that I would not wake up. Because of my religion 1 would not kill myself, but there seemed no hope.‘ We knew about how many were in the hospital ana we counted therate at which they were dying We had it figured out just about how long we could live.”It was easier to die than live. All that had to be done was quit eating for several days and the dysentery germs did the rest.I made up my mind they would have to kill me, said Lee MacDonald The 20-year-old soldier, who today is a husky 175 pounds went down to 80 pounds while in puson camp.CiROUPS OF TENThere was little chance for escape and what little there was went out the window with a Japanese edict. Ihe men were placed in groups of 10. if one escaped the other nine would be shot.Ralph Hollingsworth. The men simply refused to die.What about today, wha$ does Bataan mean to these men':' To one of Brainerd’s most widely known soldier citizens, the late Col. Ernie Miller, it meant a gigantic Military fiasco and he wrote a book, Bataan Uncensored, giving his outspoken views.To Jim McComas today it just seems that it was impossible it could have happened. I used to wake up screaming and fighting Japs, but I don’t do that anymore. 1 look at it now with a detached view.”§•'. NorthLOS I4.»......— ■LOST: G; fanning and BraWANTITwo Missing Schoolboys Found By HelicoptersIPSWICH, Mass. (AP) — Two were found early today by spotters in a Coast Guard helicopter.Doctors at Cable Memorial Hospital, Ipswich, said they were in good condition.The youngsters, James Stewart, 7, only child of Mr. and Mrs.WANTED i ron ro, Box 464WANTED used ril tols. ShiWANTED: Cheap. J tion. Wi DispatchWANTED:200 tracl walzek.ta.Philip “Stewart, and jPeter IMouri-Besides that the machine gunsikas, 8, son of Mr. and Mrs. Petersurrounding the compounds were faced in instead of out to repel invaders. Jim McComas thinks the plan was to execute all prisoners in case of an allied invasion. ‘ Ihe only thing that saved us. in my opinion, was the atomic bomb because it ended things so fast,” McComas, who today is a policesergeant, said.McComas lived something of a charmed life. After surviving the death march, he was placed on a work detail in the rice fields until in 1944 when he was put aboard a ship with 800 other prisoners for a journey to Japan.The ship was torpedoed and McComas, along with a mere 80 others of the entire group, managed to escape and swim to shore. There * they joined a band of Filipino guerillas and fought with them until word could be gotten out and they were picked up by an American submarine.MADE CUPBOARDSRalph Hollingsworth and Ken Gordon were put on an axe-making detail. I didn’t have it too bad on Luzon,” said Hollingsworth who today is employed at a lumber yard in Nisswa. We started out on the axe detail, but later they had us making such things as cupboards and for this they would sometimes give us a little extra. One day I had toast and tea with a Japanese doctor.Later in Japan, however, Hollingsworth was caught trading cigarettes for food and was beaten and put into a special prisonThere were some good ones though,” he says in commentingon the Japanese guards.However, for the most part the prison camps presented a never ending misery of work, disease, indescribable filth, and the ever present spectre of death.There were about 30 days in the beginning when we couldn’t burv anv bodies until CorregidorC. Mourikas, are classmates at Burley Elementary School.They disappeared Sunday afternoon near a thick forest.DIAL 82 9-4705WANTED: John Ziilager. P p. m.—............1Wool, Hidf Dewey Hide anlt;• MISCELFOR SAL! Phone 8^FOR SALI 5790, 518PARTS fo Jewel BoMMNFOR SALE Size 12-1i616 10th A'FOR SALIdal gowi96 3-24651 Insertion2 Insertions3 Insertions4 Insertions5 Insertions I Insertions8 cents per word 19 cents per word 12 cents per word 14 cents per word II cents per word 18 cents per wordFOR SALE and cyli zek, PilltContract or Monthly ClassifiedRatos on Application.Copy must bo in the office by 9:31 o’c ock in the forenoon to insure insertion on the same day.The Dispatch while exercising reasonable care in accepting ads, warns those answering to investigate the proposition offered and to be careful of any ad requiring a cash bond.t’M'if INALSFOR SAL! range. E years oldappotMrn* ...mu!FOR sal:size 12, 5389.WWWFOR SALEand Inttractors.-.......- - -~-PERSONAL income tax service Tom Grimes. Phone 82 9-3175.■W* ^9* *v ..*• -• . .. ■ .....-V.Hudrlik. ... V■*.. . . .....Crosbv 546Carpet, Linoleum laying. Call TonyosbDOWN TOWN parking by the month. 8th and Front and 6th and Front. Phone 82 9-8617.FOR SAL!length aGood corFOR SALI box spriilent con after 6.miw i iivh ...........If vour lin sold, on makes it han HareFOR SALE 9x12 twe vision st 82 9-3282................. www.ww.il i mi ii iiiSaWhiMiw.. •— ....—.. W.-.1. «W I . W '^WWWWHfcWJWfa^rt^WWfc^WtP.....FRIENDS! Huge stock! Cheaper! Study list! Write! Come! Irv Hanson’s, Willmar NurseryIWHIW' 1» I nwm i.MIiw.imwiwi n i H....w«i». . ■ .*..■■■ii.i^iif^rijwidifcJSf^.-■ —.......... m-TAPPETITE LIMP? TRY OUR SHRIMP . . . Rau’s Dairy Way Drive-In. 1202 South tith St.Phone 82 9-6327.i ..... — uu.■wMMnnRwiwSUNDAY DINNERSme Wood Cafe, Pine River, serves appetizing Sunday dinners from 11:30 A. M.—Open every day, year around, 6 A. M. to midnight.Braim 3422 East CSHOES wi given pr Shoe RefFOR SALI ments a Dispatch Mailed aGUARANT Fast, frie Jewelry,mtwfwwi.WANT
Newspaper Details
Brainerd Daily Dispatch
Brainerd, Minnesota, US
Mon, Apr 09, 1962
Page 11
Full Page
Clipped by
James O.
USA 30 Oct 2019
Other Publications Near Brainerd, Minnesota
Brainerd Dispatch
Brainerd Daily Dispatch
