Sgt. Robert H. Mitchell

Hometown: Watsonville, California

Enlisted: California National Guard

Inducted: 

    - U. S. Army

        - 10 February 1941 - Salinas Army Air Base

Training: 

    - Fort Lewis, Washington

Units: 

    - 194th Tank Battalion

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 Japanesee artillery firing at Corregidor
                - Americans on Corregidor returned fire
            - San Fernando - POWs put into small wooden boxcars
                - each boxcar could hold eight horses or forty men
                - 100 POWs packed into each car
                - POWs who died remained standing
            - Capas - dead fell to floor as living left boxcars
            - POWs walked last ten miles to Camp O'Donnell    

POW Camps:

    - Camp O'Donnell

        - unfinished Filipino training base
        - Japanese put camp into use as POW Camp
        - only one water spigot for entire camp
        - as many as 50 POWs died each day
        - Japanese opened new POW camp to lower death rate   

    - Cabanatuan #1

Died: 

    - 9 September 1942 - dysentery

        - Approximate time of death: 6:00 A.M.

Buried: 

    - 5 June 1950 - Golden Gate National Cemetery - San Mateo, California

        - Plot: O  Site:  1538

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