Pvt. James Campbell Secrist

Parents: Orville J. Secrist & Anna Melissa Kennerdall-Secrist

Hometown: Canton, Ohio

Inducted: 

    - U. S. Army

         - 26 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 started 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: 

    Philippine Islands: 

        - Camp O'Donnell

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

        - Cabanatuan

        - Clark Field

            - Work:  POWs built runways

                - detail ended 20 August 1944

        - Bilibid Prison

    Japan:

         - Nomachi

             - Work: manganese mining & smelting 

Hell Ship: 

    - Noto Maru  

        - Sailed: Manila - 27 August 1944

        - Arrived: Moji, Japan - 4 September 1944

Died: 30 April 1945 - acute pneumonia

Buried:

    - Westlawn Cemetery - Canton, Ohio

        - family received urn containing ashes after the war

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