Dwindling ranks of former Bataan POWs gather for 66th reunion

Every year since 1945, a group of soldiers captured during the massive American surrender at Bataan and Corregidor has reunited to talk about their time overseas during World War II.

The former prisoners of war gathered for the first time in Pittsburgh, just months after the war had ended and the soldiers had finally returned home.

The under-supplied Allied troops at Bataan Peninsula in the Philippines surrendered to the Japanese on April 9, 1942, after three months of battle. The POWs were forced to walk more than 60 miles to a prison camp in severe tropical heat without food or water.

Many were beaten, some to death, during what is now called the Bataan Death March. When American troops surrendered nearby Corregidor Island to the Japanese after another month of fighting, they were also sent to POW camps. Resistance fighters persisted in the Philippines until the Allies liberated the islands from the Japanese in 1944.

This week, the convention of ex-POWs returns to Pittsburgh — but instead of telling stories, the emphasis will be on saving them.

The four-day convention, which starts Wednesday, will honor the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor. While veterans and their wives are still welcome to discuss their personal experiences in panels — the cornerstone of past conventions — this week’s meeting focuses on efforts to cement the Bataan-Corregidor story in the historical record.

via Dwindling ranks of former Bataan POWs gather for 66th reunion :: The Republic.