The FReeper Foxhole Profiles The American Ex-Prisoner of War Organization - Dec. 20th, 2002

American Ex-POW Organization ^

[SAMWolf]

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A brief history of the
American Ex-Prisoner of War Organization

In 1942, information was leaking out about the atrocities and sub-human treatment that American prisoners of war were receiving in Japanese prison camps in the Pacific. When wives and mothers heard about their sons and husbands who had been taken prisoners, they started calling and writing their Congressmen in an effort to find help or get assistance for their loved ones. Finally, two mothers whose sons were members of the 200th Coast Artillery and had been captured by the Japanese came up with an idea.

It was Mrs. Charles W. Bickford and Mrs. Fred E. Landon who, on April 10, 1942, persuaded other parents and relatives to hold a mass meeting and formed an organization to get relief to the captured boys on Bataan. On April 14th, the Bataan Relief Organization was formed with Dr. V. H. Spensley, of Albuquerque, as Chairman. Their motto was "We will not let them down."

This group was very active trying to get relief to the POW’s and exchange of information as it came through. From this group in Albuquerque, other chapters sprang up all over the United States. The "BRO" was incorporated September 8th, 1943.

In 1945, the control of the Bataan Relief Organization was turned over to the liberated members of the New Mexico’s 200th Coast Artillery Regiment at an annual meeting held in Albuquerque, New Mexico. In 1946, the name was changed to Bataan Veteran’s Organization.

The first National convention was held May 14, 1948, in Albuquerque. The second National convention was held in Hollywood, California, April 1949. At this convention, it was voted to change the name to American Ex-Prisoners of War and change the name of the bulletin to XPOW. The reason for the change was so veterans from the European Theater would realize that they were eligible for membership. By changing the name to American Ex-Prisoners of War, it would welcome all former POW’s from any war. There were 800 at the 1949 convention.

In 1949 there were 7 local groups within the framework of the organization:

The Bataan Veteran’s Organization, The Lost Battalion

The Seattle Barbed Wire Club, Orphans of the Pacific

The Dad MacMannis Post, The Southwest Barbed Wire Club

The Barbed Wire Club of North Carolina.

Click on the Logo to Visit Their Site

The AX-POW emblem was designed as a lapel pin by former prisoner of war, Bryan T. Doughty of Denver, Colorado, in 1949. The heraldic symbols, representing Justice, are balanced on swords. The curves at the top of the shield portray the two massive military defeats suffered by the United States Armed Forces in World War II: Bataan and the Belgium Bulge. Later, the Ex-POW motto was adopted: NON SOLUM ARMIS, Latin for "Not by Arms Alone."

[SAMWolf]

Of course , if I wanted to not get criticized, I should have stayed single and not picked up a Mother-in-Law.

[MistyCA]

[MistyCA]

LMAO!

[MistyCA]

[MistyCA]

[SAMWolf]

Robert Reppa's ordeal began in the morning hours just a week before Christmas 1944. During the second day of the Battle of the Bulge, Reppa's cavalry troop headquarters was overrun by advance elements of the German 1st SS Panzer Division in Honsfeld, Belgium.

At the time, many American prisoners of war were being killed, but Reppa was among the lucky ones to be shipped to Nuernberg and later, Hammelberg.

The POW life was one of cold, crowded boxcars and prison camps, with just one coal-dust briquette per day to warm the room's stove. Food was scarce, and POWs depended on the twice-monthly arrival of Red Cross parcels to help pull them through.

Hope finally came to the prisoners in March 1945. Gen. George Patton sent the 4th Armored Division's Task Force Baum to fight 60 miles through German territory to liberate the POWs at Hammelberg. Unfortunately, the force was too small to handle the hundreds of POWs who were wandering around in the darkness. The task force was surrounded and wiped out, but Reppa was among the lucky few to escape.

Four days after making their way west, the escapees were recaptured by the Germans and returned to the camp; there, they helped bury their fellow POWs who had died trying to free them.

For Reppa, freedom came following a month-long forced march that ended just east of Munich when the Germans prematurely blew up a bridge at Gars. Reppa and another soldier escaped, taking refuge in a German house that flew a white sheet. They waited for the American forces to get closer. When they did, the former POWs were finally free.

Reppa gained a pound a day for 32 days and vowed never to go hungry again.

[Peaches]

Thank you.
This thread brought back sad memories of a book that I read a few years ago. I don't remember the name or the author; I'm not sure if my Dad still has it.
It was written by a Bataan Death March survivor. It was a heart-breaking story of the hell these men endured. God bless them and their families.
Thank you both for this service for our veterans. Without veterans, there would be no America.

[SAMWolf]

Harold Kaschko survived three months of combat field artillery duty with Gen. George S. Patton's Third U.S. Army in World War II only to be taken prisoner in the Korean War.

Kaschko was the commanding officer of Battery C, 38th FA Bn., 2nd Inf. Division, when it went into action on Aug. 20, 1950, at the Naktong Perimeter. On Dec. 1, he and several other soldiers were captured. On that day, his division had 1,461 casualties.

The POWs were herded into a four-foot-high mine tunnel near Sunchon, North Korea, where they stayed for six days. Soon after, they began a 20-day series of night marches, covering nearly 200 miles before ending in the appropriately named "Death Valley."

Many POWs dropped out of the march along the way, from illness, injuries, wounds or exposure. Many more simply died.

Food and sleep were luxuries at their camp. "We could not lie down to sleep for about two months, as there was not enough room in the Korean hut," Kaschko said. "We had to sit up all night with our knees in the back of the man in front of us."

Food consisted of half-cooked mush, he said. "I didn't have a spoon or bowl to eat from for about four weeks, so I used my helmet liner cap and ate like a pig. Later, I received a spoon when someone died."

Death stalked the compound. Diseases like pneumonia, dysentery, pellagra and beri beri were rampant. Starvation, exposure and enemy harassment accounted for more deaths, Kaschko said, especially before the Armistice negotiations began in July 1951.

Kaschko and others were repatriated on the last day of the prisoner exchange, Sept. 6, 1953. He retired from the Army as a lieutenant colonel in 1962.

"I am 100 percent convinced that I am alive today because I prayed to God for help," he said.

Jack Sulser was a squad leader in the 106th Infantry Division's Company F, 423rd Inf. Regiment, on Dec. 16, 1944.

The 423rd, along with the division's 422nd Regt., was in the Allied front lines during the Germans' last big World War II offensive - the Battle of the Bulge.

Some 24 hours into the battle, the Germans broke through the regiments' perimeter defenses, surrounding Sulser and his comrades.

"We were ordered to hold our positions," Sulser remembered. "A U.S. armored division was expected to fight its way to us the next day." But only a fragment of the division actually arrived, not enough men to counterattack.

On Dec. 18, the U.S. regiments were ordered to fight their way out, Sulser recalled. "By then, the Germans had been reinforced by SS and elite armored units. And by midday Dec. 19, a quarter of both regiments had been killed."

The regimental commanders, realizing further escape attempts would be in vain, surrendered their troops.

"Soon after, we were herded into boxcars, en route to our first POW camp," Sulser recalled. "We arrived at Bad Orb, 'Stalag IXB,' on Christmas Day and had the first food we'd eaten since Dec. 16."

Ten days later, Sulser was herded aboard another boxcar for a POW camp at Ziegenhain. Until March 30, when U.S. troops liberated the camp, Sulser lived on what a U.S. Army doctor estimated was a 900-calorie diet: herbal tea for breakfast, soup for lunch and a slice of bread for supper. By January, the men began dying of malnutrition.

"We slept in triple-decker bunks, without heat, and had only cold water for washing and the use of one outside latrine," Sulser said.

"On Easter Sunday, as the ex-POWs began conducting their own sunrise worship service, a U.S. Army chaplain arrived and passed out communion wafers and hymnals. It's then that we felt truly liberated," Sulser reflected.

[SevenofNine]

Good morning Freeper Soldiers

Well report off hareetz wire that US and Israeli forces are teaming up on new weapons apparently they develop a weapons that could spot and laser hit him 1,000 yard aways

It was developing by fun-loving Mossad

Also another report is reporting off UK Telegraph in today cycles that possibity the war on Saddam going happen mid Januray or early Februrary NOT SURE YETTT

[Peaches]

Thank you for this additional information.
Here's wishing all veterans a very Merry Christmas!! You are not forgotten.

[Light Speed]

Goodmorning Misty,Sam

This topic is one I have laughed until pulling stomach muscles.... programs like Hogans Hero's..but have also become angry with a few nationalities...and yes..the stereo type does stick.
I find it hard to trust a few cultures now..because of the way they treated prisoners..and how they deny culpability to this day...yet have the nerve to tell us that we have no honor.
Some nations still have not reaped...what they sowed.

[sneakers]

Funny and touching - especially poignant because it really happened.

[SAMWolf]

Bill Freeman was with the 38th Infantry in Korea for only 12 days before he was captured on Feb. 12, 1951. Only 126 soldiers of his battalion survived the attack during which he was captured. Freeman was a POW 30 months and seven days.

After the first 14 days of Freeman's captivity, the Chinese decided to release 26 wounded soldiers to fend for themselves. Freeman and the other men attempted to take the Chinese up on their offer and made for freedom, but eventually were recaptured by another group of enemy soldiers.

He and other soldiers were marched to Bean Camp, some 23 days and 400 lives away. They hid during the day and marched at night, sucking rice paddy mud for water. A beating during the march left Freeman deaf and wondering if death was a better choice than the life he was barely living.

"I just kept thinking about my wife and kids," Freeman said about what got him through that time. Another incentive was to return to the conflict. "I wanted to get back and fight communism."

Freeman's drive to survive came from an unusual plan: to convince his captors he was crazy by acting odd.

"I started to act strangely, rolling my eyes, snapping my false teeth and complaining of strange noises: bells on top of the mountain, and whistles back near the camp," he said. What finished it, Freeman said, was refusing to eat for six days. His captors believed him, seeing him as the harmless old man of camp. He remained "crazy" until his camp's repatriation began on Sept. 8, 1953.

[MistyCA]

[MistyCA]

Thanks for your contribution to the Foxhole!

[MistyCA]

Thanks, Peaches.

[firewalk]

Thanks for the ping AntiJen....

Good morning/afternoon everyone

[MistyCA]

Hey....I have to leave for a while before I clutter the entire thread with graphics! :) BBL...I have a lot more!

[quietolong]

Wow only at 57 most of the time I get to these post there over 300

Here's A song for you all!

Jefferson and Liberty-Thomas Jefferson's 1800 presidential campaign song-A theme Song For Us here?

[SAMWolf]

Technical Sergeant Ellis Pierson

Unit : 379th Bomb Group, US 8th Air Force

Prison Camps : Dulag Luft, Stalag VIIA.


'I was the radio operator and gunner on a B-17 and we were shot down over the target at Magdeburg Germany on Sept 28, 1944. I was captured immediately as I fell on the outskirts of the city as bombs were still falling. People were waiting for me on the ground even before I landed.'


Dulag Luft

'After a little pushing around we (several other members of my crew and I) were taken to Wetzlar in early Oct where the Luftwaffe interrogation center was located. I was put in a cell with a Tommy who had been captured near Arnhem (I guess). I introduced myself and tried to start up a conversation. All the Tommy would do was point to the walls and put his finger on his lips. This guy was smarter than me and I quickly realized that Jerry was listening. We didn't talk anymore and soon I was moved to solitary for five days of softening up before interrogation. Later, after the quiz, I was moved to Dulag Luft, a Luftwaffe redistribution depot. There were dozens of British paratroopers there, all in full kit as you would say. They taught me 44 verses of "Roll me Over". They had high morale and were a great group! I was captured in flying clothes and the Germans gave me pieces of RAF and French uniforms. I must have looked real scraggly!! There were a bunch of American NCO's and we all were in much the same shape. Imagine our surprise when one day in marched a PARADE of well dressed, neat-as-a-pin company of British in perfect step and regulation as if on parade in Piccadilly.'


Stalag VIIA

'After many months and several removals I ended up at Moosburg, Stalag VIIA. This camp was reputed to have 20,000 Allied prisoners of 26 different nationalities. This was now April '45 and the Germans were not so cocky anymore, but they and we were all about out of food. We did occasionally get a half of red cross package. The next lager over were British POW's mostly ground troops captured in N Africa. We were somewhat on the interior of the camp and we breached the fence between our lagers. It turned out that the Tommies had been getting some American packages too and didn't like the coffee. We had some tea, but really didn't care for it. I offered mine to one of the chaps and he showed me how to brew up a cuppa in the proper manner. It was much better than any I had made and we shared many a tale over the next few days. I have been a great admirer of the British soldier every since.'


Post-War

Ellis Pierson currently resides in Florida, USA, and has been back to England many times since the war for matters of business and pleasure.