Comments on: POW Language Use, Nagasaki, 1944-45 http://faroutliers.wordpress.com/2008/06/23/pow-language-use-nagasaki-1944/ Exploring migrants, exiles, expatriates, and out-of-the-way peoples, places, and times Tue, 29 Dec 2009 03:23:46 +0000 http://wordpress.com/ hourly 1 By: Jody Goode http://faroutliers.wordpress.com/2008/06/23/pow-language-use-nagasaki-1944/#comment-4764 Jody Goode Sat, 21 Nov 2009 23:21:47 +0000 http://faroutliers.wordpress.com/?p=1999#comment-4764 Bettye Anne, I think I might have a record of your Dad in a small journal my father, Joseph Dixie Goode, kept while he was a prisoner of war. I'm doing some research on him and his time as a POW. Not sure if your Dad was like mine, but he never spoke of his time as a prisoner, as best as I can tell from late 1941 until 1945. I have a photo of him, Japanese soldiers and other prisoners. I can scan this and send it to you. I don't know if your Dad is included. My Dad mentions Oscar twice: "Oscar Otero, 519 W. Stover Ave., Albuquerque, NM: and later "Oscar Otero, R.I. Box 35, Las Lumas, New Mexico." My Dad was a camp cook. A newspaper article mentions that he "was taken prisoner at the surrender of Corregidor and was confined 47 months" on a main diet of "whistle weed soup". His weight "dropped from 165 to 97 pounds" at the time of his release. I am trying to find out which camp he was at and where. A postcard where he informs his family of his condition [a formatted card] notes that he is at "Phillippine Military Prison Camp No. 10-B." Maybe we can help each other share info if indeed my father and your father were at the same POW camp. Hope this email gets to you. He died in 1981. I'm his daughter and live in Austin, TX. Regards, Jody Bettye Anne, I think I might have a record of your Dad in a small journal my father, Joseph Dixie Goode, kept while he was a prisoner of war. I’m doing some research on him and his time as a POW. Not sure if your Dad was like mine, but he never spoke of his time as a prisoner, as best as I can tell from late 1941 until 1945. I have a photo of him, Japanese soldiers and other prisoners. I can scan this and send it to you. I don’t know if your Dad is included. My Dad mentions Oscar twice: “Oscar Otero, 519 W. Stover Ave., Albuquerque, NM: and later “Oscar Otero, R.I. Box 35, Las Lumas, New Mexico.” My Dad was a camp cook. A newspaper article mentions that he “was taken prisoner at the surrender of Corregidor and was confined 47 months” on a main diet of “whistle weed soup”. His weight “dropped from 165 to 97 pounds” at the time of his release. I am trying to find out which camp he was at and where. A postcard where he informs his family of his condition [a formatted card] notes that he is at “Phillippine Military Prison Camp No. 10-B.”

Maybe we can help each other share info if indeed my father and your father were at the same POW camp.

Hope this email gets to you. He died in 1981. I’m his daughter and live in Austin, TX.
Regards,
Jody

]]> By: BettyAnne Otero Metzgar http://faroutliers.wordpress.com/2008/06/23/pow-language-use-nagasaki-1944/#comment-4285 BettyAnne Otero Metzgar Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:14:00 +0000 http://faroutliers.wordpress.com/?p=1999#comment-4285 My father, Oscar Otero, Phil QM dept., 3 Purple Hearts, who survived the Bataan Death March, Oryoko Maru and Fukuoka #17 did learn to speak Japanese--even before Fukuoka. At the risk of death, he kept a small notepad with Japanese words. He was the personal bodyguard of his CO. My father was fluent in Spanish, the language of the Filipino and the language of New Mexico, his home state. He could also speak German. When he arrived stateside, he had military interpretation missions on the West Coast. About five years after his liberation, he passed away on an Easter Sunday at Brooks Army Hospital---he had cancer in the lungs, groin, stomach, etc. Manny Lawton, Some Survived, described him and several other medics actions on page 203. That "husky" 5 foot 8 inch young man weighed 67 pounds as a pow. We have studio quality photos of his CO and my dad at the home of Baron Mitsui taken after liberation, other interpretation missions, and Albuquerque's Bataan survivors review parade. There was a write up and large picture about him in the XPW Bulletin Jan. 1951 and the San Antonio Express newspaper. Kenneth W. Day, editor of the XPW Bulletin wrote my mother and told her they "literally" had hundreds of members responding, who knew my dad during the Philippine Defense campaign. The CO that my father "chauffered" came to his dying bedside within hours after reading the XPW write up. Like other Bataan pows, he suffered silently and with dignity for the rest of his life. Truly-- a daughter of a survivor of the WW II Japanese prison camps. My father, Oscar Otero, Phil QM dept., 3 Purple Hearts, who survived the Bataan Death March, Oryoko Maru and Fukuoka #17 did learn to speak Japanese–even before Fukuoka. At the risk of death, he kept a small notepad with Japanese words. He was the personal bodyguard of his CO. My father was fluent in Spanish, the language of the Filipino and the language of New Mexico, his home state. He could also speak German. When he arrived stateside, he had military interpretation missions on the West Coast. About five years after his liberation, he passed away on an Easter Sunday at Brooks Army Hospital—he had cancer in the lungs, groin, stomach, etc. Manny Lawton, Some Survived, described him and several other medics actions on page 203. That “husky” 5 foot 8 inch young man weighed 67 pounds as a pow. We have studio quality photos of his CO and my dad at the home of Baron Mitsui taken after liberation, other interpretation missions, and Albuquerque’s Bataan survivors review parade. There was a write up and large picture about him in the XPW Bulletin Jan. 1951 and the San Antonio Express newspaper. Kenneth W. Day, editor of the XPW Bulletin wrote my mother and told her they “literally” had hundreds of members responding, who knew my dad during the Philippine Defense campaign. The CO that my father “chauffered” came to his dying bedside within hours after reading the XPW write up. Like other Bataan pows, he suffered silently and with dignity for the rest of his life. Truly– a daughter of a survivor of the WW II Japanese prison camps.

]]>