Pvt. Carl H. Franklin

Pvt. Carl Franklin was born to Jackson Franklin & Helen Hirsch-Franklin on February 28, 1919 in Harvey, North Dakota.  With his three brothers and sister, he grew up in Goodrich North Dakota.  He was inducted into the U.S. Army and sent to Fort Lewis, Washington for basic training.  It was there that he was assigned to the 194th Tank Battalion.     Carl arrived in the Philippine Islands in October 1941.  He was present at Clark Airfield when the Japanese attacked just ten hours after the attack on Peal Harbor.  On April 9, 1942, Carl became a Prisoner of War.  He took part in the death march from Mariveles to San Fernando.  At San Fernando, the POWs were packed into small wooden boxcars and taken to Capas.  Those who died remained standing since there was no room for them to fall.  As the living left the cars, the dead fell to the ground.     Carl was held at Camp O'Donnell and later Cabanatuan.  In late 1942, Carl was sent to Manila where he worked on the Bachrach Garage Detail.  The POWs on the detail repaired vehicles for the Japanese.  In early October 1944, the detail was ended and the POWs on it were selected for transport to Japan.  The reason for this was that the Japanese were attempting to prevent the POWs from being liberated.     On October 4th, the POWs were boarded onto the Arisan Maru.  They had been scheduled to sail on the Hokusen Maru, but since one of the POW groups had not arrived and the ship was ready to sail, the Japanese switched groups so that the ship could sail.     Carl and 1803 other POWs were packed into the ship's number two hold.  Along the sides of the hold were shelves that served as bunks.  These bunks were so close together that a man could not lift himself up while laying down.  Those standing also had no room to lie down. The latrines for the prisoners were eight five gallon cans.  Since the POWs were packed into the hold so tightly, many of the POWs could not get near the cans.  The floor of the hold was covered with human waste.     On October 11th, the ship set sail but took a southerly route away from Formosa.  Within the first 48 hours, five POWs had died.  The ship anchored in a cove off Palawan Island where it remained for ten days.  The Japanese covered the hatch with a tarp. During the night, the POWs were in total darkness.  This resulted in the ship missing an air attack by American planes, but the ship was attacked by American planes while in the cove.  Each day, each POW was given three ounces of water and two half mess kits of raw rice.  Conditions in the hold were so bad, that the POWs began to develop heat blisters.     Although the Japanese had removed the lights in the hold, they had not turned off the power to the lights.  Some of the prisoners were able to wire the ship's blowers into the light power lines.  This allowed fresh air into the hold.  The blowers were disconnected two days later when the Japanese discovered what had been done     The Japanese realized that if they did not do something many of the POWs would die.  To prevent this, they opened the ship's number two hold and transferred 600 POWs into it.  At this point, one POW was shot while attempting to escape.     The Arisan Maru returned to Manila on October 20th.  There, it joined a twelve ship convoy.  On October 21st, the convoy left Manila and entered the South China Sea.  The Japanese refused to mark POW ships with red crosses to indicate they were carrying POWs making them targets for American submarines.  The POWs in the hold became so desperate that they prayed for the ship to be hit by torpedoes.        According to the survivors of the Arisan Maru,  on October 24, 1944, about 5:00 pm, some of the POWs were on deck preparing dinner for the POWs in the ship's two holds.  The ship was near Shoonan Island off the coast of China.  Suddenly, sirens and other alarms were heard.  The men inside the holds knew this meant that American submarines had been spotted and began to chant for the submarines to sink the ship.     The Japanese on deck ran to the bow of the ship.  As the POWs watched, a torpedo passed in front of the bow of the ship.  Moments later, the Japanese ran to the ship's stern and watched as a second torpedo passed behind the ship.  There was a sudden jar and the ship stopped dead in the water.  It had been hit by two torpedoes amidships in its third hold where there were no POWs.  It is believed that the submarine that fired the torpedoes was the U.S.S Snook.     One of the Japanese guards aimed his machinegun and began firing at the POWs who were on deck.  To escape, the POWs dove back into the holds.  After they were in the holds, the Japanese put the hatch covers on the holds but did not tie them down.     As the Japanese abandoned ship, they cut the rope ladders into the ship's two holds, but since they had not tied down the hatch covers, some of the POWs in the second hold were able to climb out and reattached the ladders.  They also dropped ropes down to the POWs in both holds.     The POWs were able to get onto the deck of the ship.  At first, few POWs attempted to escape the ship.  Many raided the ship's food lockers and ate their last meals.     A group of 35 POWs swam to a nearby Japanese ship, but when the Japanese realized they were POWs, they pushed them away with poles and hit them with clubs.  The Japanese destroyers in the convoy deliberately pulled away from the POWs as they attempted to reach them.     As the ship got lower in the water, some of the POWs took to the water.  These POWs attempted to escape the ship by clinging to rafts, hatch covers, flotsam and jetsam.  Most of the POWs were still on deck even after it became apparent that the ship was sinking.   At some point, the ship split in two.  The exact time of the ship's sinking is not known since it took place after dark.     Five of the POWs found an abandoned lifeboat, but since they had no paddles, they could not maneuver it to help other POWs.  According to the survivors, the Arisan Maru sank sometime after dark.  As the night went on, the cries for help grew fewer until there was silence.     Of the 1803 POWs who board the ship in Manila, only nine survived the sinking of the Arisan Maru.  Only eight survived the end of the war.  Pvt. Carl H. Franklin was not one of them.  Since he died at sea, his name appears on the Tablets of the Missing at the American Military Cemetery at Manila.

 

 

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