they would be taken by train to their destinations at various prisons, including Camp O’Donnell, an old Philippine fort the Japanese had converted into a POW camp. The plans called for the quick removal of about fifty thousand.
However, within hours of the surrender, the Japanese realized that they had grossly underestimated. There were seventy-six thousand American and Filipino soldiers, along with twenty-six thousand civilians. Everywhere the Japanese looked there were prisoners, all hungry and in need of food and water. How could the enemy surrender with so many soldiers? Where was their will to fight? They could not contain their contempt and hatred for their captives.
As the march dragged on, and the ranks of the prisoners continued to rise, the Japanese guards were pressured to speed it along. There was no time to eat or drink, no time to rest, no time to stop and assist those who had fallen. There was no time to bury the dead, and no time to worry about stragglers. The generals were yelling at the officers to hurry. The officers were physically abusing the privates, and they in turn released their frustrations on their prisoners. As the columns swelled and slowed, the pressure wound even tighter and the march became even more chaotic. Dead bodies littered the ditches and fields and decomposed in the blistering sun. Black clouds of flies swarmed the rotting flesh and were joined by hungry pigs and dogs. Packs of black crows waited patiently on fences, and some began following the columns, tormenting the prisoners.
* * *
—
Pete had lost track of the men of the Twenty-Sixth. He, Sal, and Ewing were still together, but it was impossible to keep up with anyone else. Groups of emaciated prisoners were added to one column one day and left behind at the camps the next day. Men were falling, dying, and being killed by the hundreds. He stopped thinking about anyone but himself.
On the fourth day, they entered the city of Lubao. The once busy town of thirty thousand was deserted, or at least the streets were. But from the windows upstairs, the residents were watching. When the column stopped, the windows were raised and the people began tossing bread and fruits to the prisoners. The Japanese went into a frenzy and ordered them to ignore the food. When a teenage boy darted from behind a tree and tossed a loaf of bread, a guard shot him on the spot. Prisoners who had managed to eat a bite or two were pulled from the column and beaten. One was bayoneted in the stomach and hung from a lamppost as a warning.
They marched on, somehow mustering the will to take another step, notch another mile. So many men were dying from dehydration and exhaustion that the Japanese relented somewhat and allowed them to fill their canteens, usually at a roadside ditch or a pond used by livestock.
On the fifth day, the column of prisoners ran into another long convoy of heavy trucks packed with soldiers. The stretch of road was narrower, and the guards ordered the men into single file along both shoulders. Being so close to the filthy and unshaven Americans inspired the soldiers in the trucks. For some, it was their first sighting of the hated enemy. They taunted the captives, threw rocks at them, spat on them, and cursed them. Occasionally, a truck driver would spot a prisoner a step or two out of line and ram him with the heavy bumper. If he fell under the truck, he would soon be dead. If he landed in a ditch, the buzzard squads would take care of him later. If he knocked over other prisoners, then the soldiers had a big laugh as they rode away.
Pete was choking on a face full of dust when a soldier leaning from a truck swung his rifle and made perfect contact. The stock crashed into the back of Pete’s head and knocked him unconscious. He fell into a muddy ditch and landed on a tire next to a fire-gutted wagon. Sal and Ewing were ahead of him and did not see it happen.
The highway became a traffic jam and the prisoners were led to a rice paddy for another sun treatment. When Sal and Ewing couldn’t find their comrade, they began whispering around. Someone told them what had happened. Their first instinct was to go find him, but their second instinct kept them in place. The mere act of standing without permission would