Pfc. Robert S. Ainsworth

    At Fort Knox, Kentucky, Robert was assigned to Headquarters Company of the 192nd Tank Battalion.  The companies job was to repair and supply the tanks of the four letter companies. 

    In the fall of 1941, the tank battalion was sent to Louisiana to take part in maneuvers.  It was after the maneuvers that the tankers learned that they were being sent overseas.  He and the other members of the battalion arrived in the Philippines seventeen days before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

    Being a member of HQ Company, Robert's duties required that he work to get the letter companies of the battalion the supplies they needed to fight the Japanese.  He would do this until the Filipino and American defenders of Bataan were surrendered to the Japanese.

    On April 9, 1942, Robert became a Prisoner of War.  He took part in the Death March from Mariveles to Capas.  At Capas, he and the other prisoners were crammed into steel boxcars and transported to San Fernando.  From there, they walked the last few miles to Camp O'Donnell. 

    It is not known if Robert went out on any work details, but he was held at Cabanatuan.  It is known that in October, 1942, Robert and other prisoners were taken by ship to Davao, Mindanao.  There, they were used as labor on a farm and later building runways for an airfield.  It is not known how long he remained on this detail, but it is known he was also held at Clark Airfield where he also built runways.

    When it became apparent to the Japanese that it was just a matter of time before American forces would be invading the Philippine Islands, the Japanese began transferring the POWs to other parts of the Japanese Empire. 

    Robert with other prisoners were marched to the Port Area of Manila.  His group was scheduled to sail on the Hokusen Maru, but since all the POWs had not arrived at the pier and the ship was ready to sail, the POWs from another group were boarded in their place.

    Robert's detachment of POWs were boarded onto the Arisan Maru on October 11th.  The ship sailed but instead of heading to Japan, it headed south to Palawan Island.  In a cove off the island, the ship hid from American planes.  During this time, the ship was attacked by American planes.

    The POWs in the hold discovered that the Japanese had removed the lights from the hold, but that they had not turned off the power.  Some of the prisoners hotwired the ventilation system into the lighting system.  For several days the POWs had fresh air.  When the Japanese discovered what had been done, they cut off the power.

    A few days later, the Japanese realized that unless they did something many of the POWs would die.  To solve the problem, the Japanese transferred POWs into the ship's number two hold.  During the transfer one POW attempted to escape and was shot.

    On October 20th, the ship returned to Manila.  The next day, October 21, 1944, the Arisan Maru sailed for Takao, Formosa as part of a twelve ship convoy.  That evening,  twenty POWs were on deck preparing dinner.  Suddenly, the Japanese on deck ran toward the bow of the ship and watched a torpedo pass in front of it.  Moments later the Japanese ran to the stern of the ship as another torpedo missed the ship.  

    The ship shook and came to a dead stop in the water.  It had been hit by two torpedoes amidships.  A Japanese guard aimed his machinegun at the POWs and  fired at them.  The POWs dove into the ship's holds.  After they were in the holds, the Japanese put the hatch covers on but did not tie them down.  A short time later, the Japanese abandoned ship.  Before they left, they cut the  rope ladders hanging down into the holds.

    Since the hatch covers had not been tied down, some of the POWs in the second hold made their way back on deck.  These men reattached and dropped rope ladders to the men in the holds.  For the next two hours, the ship remained afloat.   The POWs who could not swim stuffed themselves with food from the ship's kitchen.  Others attempted to find anything that would float.  35 POWs swam to another Japanese ship, but they were pushed away with poles and hit with clubs.

    As the ship sank lower in the water, many POWs tried to escape.  At some point, the ship split in two.  Five of the POWs found a lifeboat that had been abandoned by the Japanese.  Since it had no oars, they could not maneuver it.

    A Japanese destroyer came near to the boat and looked like it was about to open fire on it.  The POWs played dead and at the last second it turned away.   The men in the boats listened to the cries for help.  As time went on, there were fewer cries.  Then there was silence.

    Of the 1803 men who boarded the Arisan Maru, only nine survived the its sinking. Eight of these men survived the war.  Pfc. Robert S. Ainsworth was not one of them.

    Since he was lost at sea, Pfc. Robert S. Ainsworth's name appears on the Tablets of the Missing at the American Military Cemetery outside Manila.

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