The Bataan Death March is a tragic event that marked one of the darkest moments of the Second World War. In April 1942, the Imperial Japanese Army ordered nearly 75,000 Filipino and American soldiers, who had surrendered in the battle of Bataan, to march 65 miles through the sweltering heat of the Philippines without food, water, or medical care. The aim of this forced march was to take the prisoners to different prison camps where they would be held captive under brutal and inhumane conditions.

The journey was an arduous one, with prisoners experiencing unimaginable suffering at the hands of their captors. They endured extreme exhaustion, illness, and malnutrition due to the lack of food and water, which caused many to die from exposure or inhumane treatment. Others were beaten with sticks, bayoneted, or shot for no apparent reason, as the Japanese soldiers showed no mercy towards the prisoners. The men had to survive with little water or food for the entire length of the March, which took about five days for each group to complete. They were not allowed to stop or pause even for a moment, and any attempt to do so would result in death. The guards were relentless and chased off, bayoneted, or shot any Filipino civilian who tried to help the suffering prisoners with water or bits of food.

The prisoners had to endure unimaginable horrors on the march. At various points along the path, the Japanese guards singled out prisoners, sometimes in groups, tied them to trees or fences, and shot them to death as examples to the others. The Japanese guards killed between 7,000 and 10,000 men during the death march, and no one knows the exact number, as they kept no records.

The first atrocity of the march was committed by Colonel Masanobu Tsuji, who summarily executed about 350 to 400 Filipino officers and non-commissioned officers under his supervision in the Pantingan River massacre. Despite General Homma's instructions that the prisoners be transferred peacefully, Tsuji issued clandestine orders to Japanese officers to kill all American captives. Following this terrible event, the behavior towards prisoners became even more brutal, with Japanese soldiers relishing in the chance to exact revenge on their captors.

During the march, the prisoners were subjected to severe physical abuse and torture, with the "sun treatment" being a common form of torture. Prisoners were forced to sit under direct sunlight without helmets or other head coverings, and anyone who asked for water was shot dead. Trucks drove over some of those who fell or succumbed to fatigue, and some men were told to sit within sight of fresh, cool water but were not allowed to drink it. The brutality only increased as they marched, with the Japanese soldiers showing no mercy towards the prisoners.

Top photo: April, 1942: U.S. Army soldiers surrendering on Bataan. Source: U.S. National Archives. In the Public Domain.

Middle photo: April, 1942: Allied prisoners on the march. Source: U.S. Army and Associated Press. In the Public Domain.

Bottom photo: Left: Paul Kerchum, circa 1946. Right: Paul, age 95 in 2015. Source: Public Domain.

When the survivors arrived at their prison camp, Camp O'Donnell, they experienced even worse conditions. Existing barracks designed to accommodate around 10,000 soldiers had to be crammed with 60,000 survivors of the death march, leaving little space for movement or ventilation. The living conditions were dire, with little running water, sparse food, inadequate medical care, and only slit trenches along the sides of the camp for sanitation. The heat was unbearable; flies rose out of the latrines and covered the prisoner's food, and malaria, dysentery, beriberi, and other diseases ravaged the prisoner's already weakened bodies. They began to die at the rate of 400 per day.

The situation at Camp O'Donnell soon became so dire that by July 1942, the Japanese had to replace the camp commander, move the American prisoners to another camp called Cabanatuan, and decide to parole the Filipino prisoners.

From September through December 1942, the Japanese gradually paroled the Filipino soldiers to their families and mayors of their hometowns, who would be held personally responsible for each man's conduct. However, it was not an easy process; they had to sign an oath not to participate in guerrilla activity, but above all, they had to be well enough to walk. Those who were too sick to walk were held captive in the camp until they either got better or died. The death toll was catastrophic: by the time Camp O'Donnell closed in January 1943, after eight months of operation, 26,000 of the 50,000 Filipino prisoners of war there had died.

The American prisoners in Cabanatuan went through similar conditions, although conditions were marginally better than in Camp O'Donnell. They were still subject to inhumane treatment, and the death rate was high. In 1944, as the US forces approached the Philippines, Japan evacuated the American prisoners to Japan and Manchuria, intending to use them as slave laborers in Japanese factories and coal mines. Again, thousands of men were crammed into dark holds of cargo ships so tightly that the men could not sit or lay down. They could scarcely breathe, and food, water, and sanitary facilities were scarce. Men suffocated to death standing up. Even worse, some guards did not let the dead bodies be removed from the holds.

The Japanese ships were unmarked, and American planes attacked some of them, while others were torpedoed by American submarines. The condition of these prisoners was horrific, with malnutrition and exposure claiming more of the men's lives. It was upon Japan's surrender that the US army could liberate the Bataan POWs, but at a considerable cost of the men's lives. Two-thirds of the American prisoners had died in Japanese custody, marking the end of one of the most brutal and inhumane episodes of WWII.

The last survivor of the Bataan Death March was Paul Kerchum, a member of the U.S. Army's E Company, 27th Infantry Regiment. He passed away on 17 December 2022. A few years before his death, he wrote a 17-page letter for the Veterans Breakfast Club synopsys detailing his experience. He writes:

After 93 days of fighting on less than ½ rations, obsolete weapons, and overwhelming odds; General [Edward P.] King, the Commander of the Armed Forces on Bataan—after considerable soul searching, knowing the poor condition of his army, knowing that help was not coming from the States, and knowing the Japanese general, known as the Tiger of Malay and recent conqueror of Singapore, where 60,000 British soldiers surrendered, had just entered the Philippines—decided to surrender the Army on Bataan. He surrendered a completely exhausted, hungry, sick, disease ridden army suffering from malaria, dysentery, malnutrition, and other diseases. The men were not ready for the Bataan Death March.

The men were shot, bayoneted, beheaded or beaten to death on that hot, dusty road. At San Fernando we were stuffed into freight cars, standing room only. After a 4-hour freight ride we were unloaded at the village of Capas and then 9 miles to the nearest POW camp, Camp O’Donnell, a former Philippine Army camp.

When our group entered Camp O’Donnell, a Japanese officer greeted us yelling, screaming. “You are not POWs but captives and you will be treated like captives.” And some were.

1,500 Americans and a thousand Philippine soldiers died at Camp O’Donnell early June ‘42. I was in a group transported to the main POW camp, Cabanatuan. One day while we were there, we were chased out of our huts, forced to watch Pvt. [Irvin] Penvose, B Co. 31st Infantry, dig his own grave and be executed by firing squad.

Early on, work details were sent to Bataan, airfields, and other areas on salvage operations. Work details were also sent to Taiwan, Korea, Japan, and Manchuria to perform slave labor in mines, factories, and shipyards. Ships that sent men to those areas became known as hell ships. 5,080 Americans went to the bottom of the ocean when they were on hell ships, sunk by American submarines or American aircraft.

Early October, 1943, I was part of a 500-man work detail sent to an area near the village of Las Piñas, 40 miles from Manila. There for the next 12 months we built an airfield. One day early November, 1944, we were at the end of the runway when one of the men began yelling and pointing towards Manila—American and Japanese aircraft [were] in aerial combat.

Later, we learned that that was the time General MacArthur returned to the Philippines. The next morning 1,100 of us were stuffed into the forward holds of the Japanese ship, the Haro Maru.

The ship was part of a 9-ship convoy with Japanese destroyers as escort, destination Japan. The convoy no sooner left Manila Bay that it was attacked by American submarines. The holds were covered, and they remained in complete darkness. It seems like endless days that I kept hearing the exploding depth charges from the destroyers.

We ran all over the South China Sea being chased by American submarines for 18 horrendous days and nights. On the eighteenth day we pulled into Hong Kong. When we docked, I happened to be by the ladder when a guard motioned for me to come up. I scrambled up the ladder, grabbed a water hose, poured water over my head, drank and drank, filled my two canteens, and hooked them back on my belt. Began filling canteens and water bottles as they were sent up from the hold. This went on for about 4 hours when suddenly the air raid sirens rang out.

Here come American planes looking for targets of opportunity. Back down to the hold and off we went.

We pulled into the port of Mogi on the northern tip of Kyushu, the 2nd largest Japanese island. We were ferried across the strait and unloaded on the largest Japanese island and home of Tokyo. We were stuffed into a train and headed north. This was late Nov. ‘44, and B-29s were bombing everything in sight. The train had to stop frequently for rail repairs. We finally reached Sendai and took a narrow gauge railroad way up the mountain to the village of Hosokura where we worked at the Mitsubishi mine No. 11. Every morning, a Japanese guard squad would escort us to the main tunnel and turn us over to civilian workers.

In the evening, they would escort us back to the camp, and we were on our own. One day a B-29 came over head, bombed the shelter, several buildings, and the narrow gauge railroad. Bombing the railroad was important, because it was the only way down to Sendai. One day, we were marched to the tunnel and machine guns were placed at each end of our group. A Japanese officer was on the phone. When he was finished he hung up the phone and said something to the Japanese Lt., and we were marched back up the hill.

The next day a B-29 came over and dropped food, clothing, medicine, and news that the war ended. However, we had to wait 30 days while the narrow gauge railroad was repaired.

Finally we went down to Sendai and got on a hospital ship, received showers, med shots, and for the first time in 4 years, I slept in a REAL bed! I began eating well and, soon enough, I was no longer a 75-pounder. 

For a moving and insightful work on the Bataan Death March and its survivors, check out Tears in the Darkness: The Story of the Bataan Death March and its Aftermath by Michael Norman and Elizabeth M. Norman. The husband and wife team spent 10 years researching and writing this contribution to the literature. Their work included interviewing more than 400 people and made four trips to Asia in gathering their primary source material. From the publisher: "For "Tears In The Darkness: The Story of The Bataan Death March and Its Aftermath," he as his co-author, his wife, Elizabeth M. Norman, interviewed more than 400 people, among them former soldiers in the Japanese Imperial Army and scores of Filipinos who witnessed the death march. The Normans traveled to Asia four times across ten years and collected some 2,800 books, documents, photographs and other material from archives around the world to complete the story of Bataan and the death march and to make it a three-dimensional experience for the reader." Pick up a copy here.

Bibliography

"1942 - 1943, The Bataan Death March." The United States Army. Accessed January 6, 2024. https://www.army.mil/asianpacificamericans/bataandeathmarch.html.

"Bataan Death March." National Museum of the United States Air Force™. Accessed January 6, 2024. https://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/Visit/Museum-Exhibits/Fact-Sheets/Display/Article/196797/bataan-death-march/.

Kerchum, Paul. "In My Heart, I Forgave: Survivor of the Bataan Death March Remembers." Veterans Breakfast Club. Last modified October 14, 2022. https://veteransbreakfastclub.org/in-my-heart-i-forgave/.

Norman, Michael, and Elizabeth M. Norman. Tears in the Darkness: The Story of the Bataan Death March and Its Aftermath. New York: Macmillan, 2009.