M/Sgt. John Hando


Born: 22 May 1918 - Piney Fork, Pennsylvania

Parents: Ignatius Hando & Veronica Haydu-Hando

Siblings: 1 brother, 4 sisters

Resident: Trumbull County, Ohio

Inducted: U. S. Army

    - Cleveland - 28 March 1941

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

    Japan:

        - Fukuoka #23

            Work: Coal mine

Hell Ship:

    - Nissyo Maru

        - Sailed: Las Pinas - 14 July 1944

        - Arrived: ship stopped at Takao, Formosa

                - ship survived attack by American submarines

        - Arrived: Moji - 6 August 1944

Liberated: September 1945

Discharged: 6 June 1946

Married: Dorothy Wansack - 19 January 1947

Children: 1 daughter, 1 son

Lived: Youngstown, Ohio

Died: 27 December 2004 - Sharon, Pennsylvania

Buried:

    - Saint John's Orthodox Cemetery - Hermitage, Pennsylvania 


 

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