American and British POWs
From the Coral Maru hellship and Osaka-area prison camps
Written by Cpl. Conrad Russell, 4th Marine (now deceased)


    "In October 1943 eight hundred Americans from the Philippines arrived in Japan aboard the Coral Maru.   They, like most of those arriving before and after them, were soon working in the steel, mining and transportation activities which were vital to the Japanese war effort.

    Over 400 of the new arrivals went to two camps in the Osaka group.   Most went to Hirohata, sixty miles west of Osaka, where they fired the furnaces, broke the slag and laid railroad tracks for the Seitetsu Steel Company, while others unloaded and loaded ships at the docks near the plant.   A smaller detail joined British POWs at Sakurajima, near Osaka, where they became shipfitters and laborers in the Osaka Ironworks, a factory which produced steel for Japanese destroyers and fuel tankers.

    About 350 Americans took a long train ride to Niigata, a seaport and industrial city on the sest coast of Honshu.   POWs working out of this camp, one of the Tokyo group, labored in the Niigata Ironworks, coaled ships and stevedored at the docks.   As it had been for their predecessors, the first winter in Japan was a hard one for the men arriving on the Coral maru, but with an additional year to adjust to POW life, the death rate was not as high as it was for the 1942 arrivals.

    Following are the names of some men who were liberated with me on August 25, 1945."

            AMERICANS:

    Addison, H.
    Alfano, Frank P.
    Boek, Harvey
    Dominquez, Henry G.
    Eichans, Arnold
    Finch, LeRoy A.
    Gordon, George W.
    Hibbs, Richard G.
    House, J. A.
    Humphrey, A. L.
    Larock, Sherwood H.
    McKenna, Chester R.
    Meyer, Ray
    Myers, Alfred F.
    O'Toole, Edward M.
    Roufe
    Saynor, J. T.
    St. James
    Torres, Johnnie B.
    Vidal, D. C.
    Welsh, Frank
    Wood, James
    Wyse, L.    		 Benge, Clyde A.
    Bennett, Pat
    Cavin, James J.
    Earhart, R. W.
    Farber, M. O.Farber, M. O.
    Gaynar, J. T.
    Grant, Walter
    Holden, Wesley
    Hoyny, W. G.
    Jeffries, George T.
    Leowe, Emmerson G.
    McLean, A. E.
    Miller, Thomas O.
    Nardini, John E.
    Romanelli, Joe M.
    Ryan, Fred
    Smith, M.
    Thompson, C. R.
    Truluek, Walter H.
    Wallace, Henry
    Woffard, Ira L.
    Woodyard, Lester
    Zukauskas, Stanley B.


            BRITISH & AUSTRALIAN
    Ansel, Vic
    Bennett, F. W.
    Davis, Stanley
    Edmunds, D.
    Fancey, A.
    Gale, L. R.
    Hennal, Ray
    Hunt, A. J.
    Johnstone, Alex
    Langford, Dick
    Miles, W.
    Prittem
    Sedgeman, R. P.

    Barnaby
    Broad, Ted
    Mason, W.
    Nicholas, P. F.
    Skillicorn, W. H.
    Wyre


    		 Arlis, George
    Burrell, W. T.
    Eburn, W. J.
    Evens, Douglas
    Finley, Bernard
    Graham, George
    Head, A. J.
    Hutchins, A. G.
    Lang, A. D.
    Mauthus, C.
    Oldreive, Harry F.
    Rafferty, MSG
    Wilson, A. G.

    Brumley, D. L.
    Long
    McAleese, A. C.
    Santos, F. J.
    Stevens