Peterson

T/5 Charles A. Peterson was born in Chicago on November 3, 1919, to Charles J. Peterson & Ruth M. Hansen-Peterson. Until the age of ten, he grew up at 3212 West Addison Street in Chicago. In 1930, his family moved to 2135 North 72nd Court in Elmwood Park, Illinois, where he attended Elmwood Park Grade School. He then attended Leyden Township High School in Franklin Park, Illinois and was a member of the Class of 1939.

In early 1940, jobs were extremely hard to get. Charles found himself employed as a shipping clerk at Carson Pirie Scott & Company. Since he did not want to make this his life's work and had heard that all young men were going to be required to serve in the military for one year, he enlisted in the Illinois National Guard as a member of the 33rd Tank Company from Maywood, Illinois.

On November 25, 1940, the Maywood Tank Company was federalized and sent to Fort Knox, Kentucky, for training. At Fort Knox the name of the unit was changed to Company B, and it became part of the 192nd Tank Battalion. While at Ft. Knox, Charles trained to become a motorcycle messenger. He was then sent to Camp Polk with the battalion to Louisiana for maneuvers. The members of the battalion had no idea that they had already been selected for duty in the Philippine Islands by General George Patton.

Charles' family received a letter from him, while he was in transit, on November 2, 1941. This was the last time they would hear from him. The 192nd Tank Battalion arrived in the Philippines just two weeks before the United States became involved in World War II.

When war broke out, Charles rode a motorcycle carrying messages between the company headquarters and the battalion headquarters. He did this throughout the four months that Filipino and American forces slowed the Japanese advance. On April 9, 1942, Charles became a Prisoner of War when American forces, on the Bataan Peninsula, were surrendered to Japan.

As a POW, Charles took part in the death march and was interred at Camp O'Donnell. He was one of 100 POWs sent to Camp Olivaris on a work detail. The men on this detail would work in teams of four. Each team would drive a truck into Bataan to recover vehicles that had been destroyed by the retreating Filipino and American forces. Three vehicles were hooked together and onto the truck. Each vehicle would be driven by a man as it was towed to San Fernando. From San Fernando, the vehicles would then be driven to Manila and loaded onto ships bound for Japan.

During this time, Charles was one of five POWs on the detail hospitalized at the Pamanga Provincial Hospital in San Fernando suffering from malaria and dysentery. Charles and Cpl. William Burns from Company B were considered so ill that they were placed in the isolation ward. It was there that he died of dysentery and malnutrition on September 9, 1942 and was buried outside of San Fernando at Camp Olivias next to Cpl. William Burns by Pvt. Harry Norowul and Sgt. Bob Peterson of B Company. He was 22 years old when he died. His family received word of his death on May 4, 1945.

After the war, Harry Norowul drew a map that helped the Peterson family locate Charles' remains. The family hired an architect who would draw a detailed map of the burial site. Charles Peterson's family requested that his remains be returned to the United States. His remains were returned to Illinois, and a memorial service for Charles was held at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Elmwood Park. He was reburied, with full military honors, at Mt. Emblem Cemetery in Elmhurst, Illinois.