We Refused to Die: My Time as a Prisoner of War in Bataan and Japan, 1942-1945Gene Jacobsen was a nineteen-year-old Idaho ranch kid when he decided to join the Army Air Corps in September 1940. By December 1941 he was supply sergeant for the Twentieth Pursuit Squadron at Clark Field in the Philippines. Five months later he was a captive of the Imperial Japanese Army, enduring the Bataan death march and subsequent horrors in the Philippines and Japan. Of the 207 officers and men who made up Jacobsen s squadron at the beginning of the war, sixty-five survived to return to the United States. We Refused to Die recounts Jacobsen s struggle, against all odds, to remain one of those sixty-five men. In engaging, direct prose, Jacobsen s three-and-a-half year experience as a prisoner of war takes the reader on a brutal and harrowing march through hatred and forgiveness, fortitude and freedom. We Refused to Die is an honest memoir that shines light on one of history s darkest moments. |
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Page 4
... hangars were two more of the same size and vintage and a temporary building that housed the squadron mess . Not much ... hangars adjacent to the airstrip , sleeping on folding cots . In one corner of the hangar , fenced off by extra ...
... hangars were two more of the same size and vintage and a temporary building that housed the squadron mess . Not much ... hangars adjacent to the airstrip , sleeping on folding cots . In one corner of the hangar , fenced off by extra ...
Page 43
... hangar line , where many of us would spend most of our time sweeping and dusting . As we returned from the hangar line ... hangars , I succumbed to pressures applied by the first sergeant . " I have been going over your personal file ...
... hangar line , where many of us would spend most of our time sweeping and dusting . As we returned from the hangar line ... hangars , I succumbed to pressures applied by the first sergeant . " I have been going over your personal file ...
Page 50
... hangars bordering the airstrip . I established my supply operation in one corner of the same hangar . Conditions were bad but not nearly as bad as they were going to become . All of the men were good sports about our living arrangements ...
... hangars bordering the airstrip . I established my supply operation in one corner of the same hangar . Conditions were bad but not nearly as bad as they were going to become . All of the men were good sports about our living arrangements ...
Contents
Attack on Pearl Harbor I | 1 |
Enemy over Clark Field | 4 |
Japanese Invasion of the Philippines | 15 |
Copyright | |
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We Refused to Die: My Time As a Prisoner of War in Bataan and Japan, 1942-1945 Gene S. Jacobsen No preview available - 2004 |
Common terms and phrases
able Air Corps airplane American Army arrived asked assigned barracks Bataan Peninsula began Ben Steele Benjamin Steele beriberi Bilibid Prison bombers bombs building Cabanatuaan Prison Camp Camp O'Donnell canteen cigarettes Clark Field clothing commander completely cooks Corregidor coveralls Died dysentery eager feeling fellows felt fighter Filipino finally forces Fort Stotsenburg guns Hamilton Field hangars Harold Poole huge Islands Japan Japanese guards Japanese officer Japanese planes Japanese soldiers Japanese work detail Japs jungle killed knew later learned looked malaria Manila Bay Mariveles mess hall months morning move Navy never Nichols Field night once Peninsula of Bataan Philippines pilots POWs prisoners of war quinine pills received returned rice road seemed sergeant served shack ship shoes sick sleep squad supervisor supply sure surrender talk Tayabas terribly thing told train troops truck turned walked wanted