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0 of 3 Premium Clicks used this month SUBSCRIBE Print + Online Subscriber Activation | Register x Forgot Password | Need an Account? subscribe | newsletter | deals Classifieds Jobs Autos Real Estate FEATURED » NEWS NOW House GOP votes to make Paul Ryan next speaker ... Guest Opinion: Make LNG project worth our while ... Ashland School District gets passing grade ... House GOP votes to make Paul Ryan next speaker ... Guest Opinion: Make LNG project worth our while ... Ashland School District gets passing grade ... WE REGRET TO INFORM YOU We Regret to Inform You: Ashland family members shared hellish POW experience Comment By Lynne Hasselman DailyTidings.com By Lynne Hasselman Posted Oct. 27, 2015 at 8:03 PM By Lynne Hasselman Posted Oct. 27, 2015 at 8:03 PM » Social News Editor's note: This is the 11th installment of a series of stories about Ashland residents who lost their lives in military service during World War II. It continues through Nov. 11, Veterans Day. During World War II, the U.S. War Department (since renamed the Defense Department) reminded soldiers: “From the moment you are captured you have certain rights. Stand up for your rights, but do it with military courtesy and firmness at all times. You must be humanely treated at all times … You are a prisoner of war, not a criminal.” Many Ashlanders had firsthand experience when they became prisoners of war (POWs). The rules governing humane treatment were generally followed at stalags (German prison camps), but not so in those run by the Japanese. Four of every 10 Americans held there died of starvation, illness or abuse. This is story of the two men with ties to Ashland — Staff Sgt. John F. Batcheler, whose wife, Lucille, graduated from Ashland High School, and his father-in-law, Tech Sgt. Herbert Dort. When war was declared in 1941, Herbert and his son-in-law were both assigned to the 21st Pursuit Squadron, 24th Pursuit Group, 5th Interceptor Command where they served together through the Battle of the Philippines and the disastrous Battle of Bataan, the largest United States surrender since the Battle of Harper's Ferry in the Civil War. As Japanese POWs, Herbert, John, and 60,000 to 80,000 others were forced on the 60-mile Bataan Death March, forever remembered as one of the most ruthless forcible transfers in history. Marked by beatings, bayonetings and beheadings, heat exhaustion, starvation, and no water or medical care, prisoners who were unable to keep up were killed or left by the side of the road. Those who survived were loaded onto unventilated box trains bound for Camp O’Donnell, a Japanese prison camp. Another 24th Pursuit Group POW wrote, “We stood like rows of logs. No water, no food, no toilet. Just darkness and sweat and hate that welled up inside you until your heart almost burst with rage.” In order to segregate Americans and Filipinos, the Americans were moved to Cabanatuan Prison Camp in May 1942. The conditions there were equally atrocious. POWs lived in bamboo barracks divided into bays with a board running from one wall to the other to sleep on. Each bay, designed for two prisoners, was home to 12 men. Anyone attempting to escape would be responsible for having the entire group killed. The camp hospital was so bad, it was nicknamed the “zero ward” because no one would leave alive. It is unknown what, if any, contact John and Herbert had during their incarceration as Cabanatuan had three separate camps. Herbert was held there for 2½ years until he and approximately 1,788 other prisoners were put on the Arisan Maru, a Japanese “hell ship” bound for Tokyo. The holds had three levels of shelves with about three feet between, too small for men to stand upright. The POWs received scant amounts of rice and water, the heat was unbearable, and many had dysentery and malaria. Men lost their minds and had to be physically restrained. Fourteen days later, at 5:30 p.m. on Oct. 24, 1944, the Arisan Maru, which carried no markings or flag indicating it was carrying POWs, was hit by a torpedo from an American submarine, the USS Shark II (SS-314). The Arisan Maru launched its own torpedo strike and sunk the USS Shark II with all its 87 hands on board. Before the Japanese crew abandoned the Arisan Maru for their destroyer escorts, they cut the rope ladders to prevent escape. Despite this, most POWs were able to get out, jumping into 15 foot high waves and swimming toward the Japanese destroyers for rescue. Instead, they were pushed and beaten back with poles. Eight or nine POWs were able to cling to wreckage until rescued, but only five survived. One survivor later recounted that it was a dark night with no moon. “I could see no one, but I could hear men screaming and calling to one another — someone cried out in pain and the next minute a very large contraption, probably a piece of the ship floated by with about 50 men on it,” he wrote. “They were singing and yelling at the same time. Men were going down now. The sea was getting rougher. It was a strange bereft feeling with so many of my friends drowned all about me.” Herbert was one of those who slipped under the water and was gone. His son-in-law, John, continued to be held at Cabanatuan for an additional six months. In a remarkable accounting of his experiences, John wrote that he and the men who marched there were emaciated, weak with heat stroke, dying of thirst and sick. John collapsed, feverish and hallucinating, by the edge of the road “with not much life to cling to.” A Japanese soldier, risking his own life, gave John a sip of water, put him on his cart under a pile of sugarcane, and took him to the prison gates. “Life became a desolate procession of days, with hunger and disease our main companions,” John wrote about Cabanatuan. “For some time, the death rate hovered between 30 and 40 a day, chopping steadily away the original 10,000 Americans housed in the compound.” By Christmas, the oppressive heat and humidity had been replaced by driving rain and everyone was gravely ill. Again, the Japanese soldier who had first helped John surreptitiously slipped the prisoners a small amount of medicine for the most grievously sick. “At seven o’clock on the night of January 30, 1945, the quiet of the camp was ruptured by a hail of gunfire,” remembered John. “We were herded through a cut in the barbed wire. I couldn’t resist looking back over my shoulder at the inferno on the hillside.” It was the nighttime raid to liberate Cabanatuan, the dangerous rescue mission by U.S. Army Rangers, Alamo Scouts, and Filipino guerrillas. At 7:45 p.m., the first shot was fired and the Japanese were hit with overwhelming ferocity. In less than 15 minutes, any resistance was eliminated. Two Army Rangers died, six were wounded, and 21 Filipino soldiers lost their lives in a bid to rescue the 500 prisoners still alive. Out of the 1,200 men in the 24th Pursuit Group, only 500 survived the war. The other 700 were killed in action, died during the Bataan Death March or, like Herbert, perished on Japanese prison ships. John returned to his wife, Lucille, who during his imprisonment become a Yeoman 2/c in the WAVES, the women’s branch of the United States Naval Reserve (USNR). Her father’s remains were never recovered. Next week: Remembering those who were wounded and those who escaped. By Lynne Hasselman DailyTidings.com By Lynne Hasselman Posted Oct. 27, 2015 at 8:03 PM » Comment or view comments Reader Reaction » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. Southern Oregon Directory Featured Businesses Loading... 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