Cpl. John Koleczek

Parents: Peter & Mary Koleczek

Siblings: 2 brothers, 2 sisters

Home: 4102 East 123rd Street - Cleveland, Ohio

Inducted:

    - U. S. Army 

        - 25 March 1941 - Cleveland, Ohio

Training: 

    - Fort Knox, Kentucky

    - Camp Polk, Louisiana

Overseas Duty: 

    Philippine Islands

Engagements: 

    - Battle of  Luzon

    - Battle of Bataan

Prisoner of War: 

    - 9 April 1942

        - Death March

            - Mariveles - POWs start march at southern tip of Bataan

               - POWs ran past Japanese artillery firing on Corregidor

               - American artillery on Corregidor returned fire

            - San Fernando -POWs put into small wooden boxcars used to haul

              sugarcane

               - each boxcar could hold eight horses or forty men

               -  Japanese packed 100 POWs into each boxcar

               - POWs who died remained standing

            - Capas - POWs left boxcars - dead POWs fell to the floor

            - POWs walked the last ten miles to Camp O'Donnell 

POW Camps: 

    - Philippine Islands: 

        - Camp O'Donnell

            - unfinished Filipino Army training base 

            - Japanese put camp into use as POW camp

            - one water spigot for the entire camp

            - as many as fifty POWs died each day 

            - POWs went out on work details to get out of camp 

        - Cabanatuan #1

    - Japan: 

        - Fukuoka #17

            - Work: Coal Mining

Hell Ship:

    - Clyde Maru

         - Sailed: Manila - 23 July 1943

         - Arrived: Moji, Japan - 9 August 1943  

            - POWs taken by train to Omuta, Kyushu

Liberated: September 1945

Discharged: 5 May 1946

Died: 29 July 1946 - Cleveland, Ohio

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