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Bataan Death March

By: History.com Editors

Updated: December 12, 2022 | Original: November 9, 2009

In the Bataan Death March, about 75,000 Filipino and American troops on the Bataan Peninsula on the Philippine island of Luzon were forced to make an arduous 65-mile march to prison camps. After the U.S. surrender of the Bataan Peninsula in 1942 during World War II, the Japanese took control of the area, and the prisoner of war (POWs) were subjected to brutal treatment by Japanese guards. An estimated 17,000 men perished during and after the Bataan Death March.

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The day after Japan bombed the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor , on December 7, 1941, the Japanese invasion of the Philippines began. Within a month, the Japanese had captured Manila, the capital of the Philippines, and the American and Filipino defenders of Luzon (the island on which Manila is located) were forced to retreat to the Bataan Peninsula.

For the next three months, as the United States began its entry into World War II , the combined U.S.-Filipino army held out despite a lack of naval and air support. Finally, on April 9, 1942, with his forces crippled by starvation and disease, U.S. Major General Edward King Jr. surrendered some 75,000 American troops at Bataan to the Japanese.

Did you know? The Philippines is an archipelago consisting of more than 7,100 islands.

The Bataan Death March Begins

The surrendered Filipinos and Americans soon were rounded up by the Japanese in April 1942 and forced to march some 65 miles from Mariveles, on the southern end of the Bataan Peninsula, to San Fernando. The men were divided into groups of approximately 100, and the march typically took each group around five days to complete.

Thousands of troops died because of the brutality of their captors, who starved and beat the marchers, and bayoneted those too weak to walk. Survivors were taken by rail from San Fernando to POW camps, where thousands more died from disease, murder and starvation.

WATCH VIDEO: The War in Japan

War Crimes and Atrocities

Survivors of the Bataan Death March have reported countless atrocities suffered during the march and later imprisonment, including starvation, random beatings and stabbings, and a lack of any water, shelter or basic first-aid supplies.

“One of the POWs had a ring on and the Japanese guard attempted to get the ring off,” said one U.S. prisoner. “He couldn't get it off and he took a machete and cut the man's wrist off and when he did that, of course, the man was bleeding profusely. [I tried to help him] but when I looked back I saw a Japanese guard sticking a bayonet through his stomach.”

The mistreatment of POWs was an order from the Japanese War Ministry, which read in part: “Whether they are destroyed individually or in groups, and whether it is accomplished by means of mass bombing, poisonous smoke, poisons, drowning, or decapitation, dispose of them as the situation dictates. It is the aim not to allow the escape of a single one, to annihilate them all, and not to leave any traces.”

Estimates vary widely, but the Department of Veteran’s Affairs estimates that 650 American and 16,500 Filipino soldiers were killed during and after the Bataan Death March. Other researchers claim the total number of deaths—including Filipino civilians who tried to help the marchers—is even higher.

America avenged its defeat in the Philippines with the invasion of the island of Leyte in October 1944. General Douglas MacArthur , who in 1942 had famously promised to return to the Philippines , made good on his word. In February 1945, U.S.-Filipino forces recaptured the Bataan Peninsula, and Manila was liberated in early March.

After the war, an American military tribunal tried Lieutenant General Homma Masaharu , commander of the Japanese invasion forces in the Philippines. He was held responsible for the death march, a war crime, and was executed by firing squad on April 3, 1946.

Masaharu Homma and Japanese Atrocities. PBS: American Experience . The Bataan Death March. The Ohio State University: Stanton Foundation . Bataan Death March. National Museum of the United States Air Force .

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Exposing atrocity: the davao dozen and the bataan death march.

Thanks to the escape of the “Davao Dozen” from Japanese captivity in April 1943, Americans learned of the Bataan Death March.

Top Image: Left to Right: Captain William Edwin Dyess, Lieutenant Commander Melvyn McCoy, General Douglas MacArthur, and Major Stephen Mellnik in Brisbane, Australia, July 30, 1943. Image courtesy of the US Air Force.

Aficionados of films about World War II will be struck by what appears to be a most glaring oversight in the 1943 motion picture Bataan . The movie, directed by Tay Garnett (remembered also for The Postman Always Rings Twice ) and starring Robert Taylor, George Murphy, Lloyd Noland and Desi Arnaz, captures the spirit and camaraderie of American and Philippine soldiers desperately trying to slow the movement of Japanese forces on the Bataan Peninsula. 

The heroism and defiance of the 12 men led by Sergeant Bill Dane (played by Taylor), up against terrible odds, spoke vividly to American audiences for whom the 1941-42 struggle to keep the Philippines out of Japanese hands was a dark and painful moment of defeat seared into the nation’s recent memory. 

Yet, as stark and unforgettable as Bataan  is, one waits—and waits in vain—for any depiction or even any mention of the Death March. How could this horror have possibly been omitted? After all, Bataan  generated enormous attention and interest in the United States in 1943 as the war against the Axis powers gradually shifted in the Allies’ favor.

This apparent “oversight” seems all the more shocking when one recalls Edward Dmytryk’s Back to Bataan  from 1945, a movie with John Wayne, Anthony Quinn, and Lawrence Tierney, that depicted the Death March and concluded with shots of actual American prisoners who had been liberated from the horrid Japanese POW camp at Cabanatuan. 

Without question, it is always dubious to rely too heavily on film as an index of what people knew. Still, the discrepancy between the two wartime movies is most significant. One can and should use this discrepancy to pose the question: what happened between 1943 and 1945 to expose the atrocities committed by the Japanese against American and Filipino prisoners?

The answer lies in the extraordinary escape of the “Davao Dozen” in April 1943 and the revelations they communicated to the American public. Ten Americans and two Filipinos had survived the ultra-brutal conditions of the Death March only to face the degradation of forced labor. Transferred near the city of Davao on the island of Mindanao in the southern Philippines, the journey from the nightmarish Camp One at Cabanatuan in November 1942 took them 10 days—by foot, train, and freighter. 

The final destination, a penal colony established in the early 1930s, was a plantation. Mindanao was, and is, a major area of agricultural production, and its rice paddies, coconut and banana groves, and coffee fields naturally attracted the attention of the Japanese occupiers. Rations, the prisoners discovered, were less sparse and medical attention more available than at Cabanatuan where maltreatment, disease, and inadequate food imperiled inmates. Once at Davao, the Japanese authorities grouped the US captives with Filipinos. Bonds of solidarity and trust developed as conditions in the Penal Colony deteriorated.

A photo layout of the Davao Prison Camp courtesy of the US Army. 

Several of the American prisoners, eight Marine, Navy, and Army/Army Air Forces officers, and two Army enlisted men, concocted a plan with two Filipinos convicted of murder, Benigno de la Crus and Victorio Jumarong, to break out. After what they had witnessed on the Death March and the conditions of captivity, they felt a powerful burden to live, escape, and bear their chilling stories home. 

John Lukacs has recounted how they succeeded in his 2010 book, Escape from Davao: The Forgotten Story of the Most Daring Prison Break of the Pacific War  and a documentary based on the monograph, 4-4-43 . Lukacs’s research has helped us see fully just what these survivors of the Fall of Corregidor and the Bataan Death March underwent to throw light on atrocities perpetrated by Imperial Japan in the Philippines.

The men chose a Sunday, April 4, 1943, to execute the plan. Sent to work in rice paddies, they bolted for the swamps. “Inhospitable” does not grasp the nature of the environment they entered. It was a frightening place, made all the more forbidding by the presence of crocodiles.After a few hours, the Japanese realized their prisoners had slipped away. Patrols fanned out to find them. The swamp and jungle the prisoners had fled into and seemed so terrifying now hindered their captors. Following a few days of evading Japanese troops, the group headed north. Mountains and rivers tested their resolve.

In northern Mindanao, good fortune came in the form of American and Filipino guerillas. These fighters, led by Lieutenant Colonel Weddell Fertig (he promoted himself to Brigadier General), had refused to surrender to the Japanese and resumed the war in the jungle of Mindanao. Fertig’s contacts with US Navy Lieutenant Commander Charles “Chick” Parsons proved invaluable. 

Parsons kept the guerillas supplied and ensured communications with General Douglas MacArthur (MacArthur demanded steady information about Japanese activities on Mindanao from Fertig). The escapees secured food, water, shelter, and medical aid with Fertig. They stayed with him for weeks, in some cases, months.

Davao escapees from left to right, Maj. Stephen Mellnik, Lt. Cmdr. “Chick” Parsons, Lt. Cmdr. Melvyn McCoy, Capt. William Edwin Dyess, and Capt. Charley Smith pose for a photo before commencing their trek to rendezvous with the USS Trout. Image courtesy of the National Archives.

Eventually, seven of what became known as the “Davao Dozen” departed Mindanao separately by submarine for Australia. Lieutenant Commander Melvyn McCoy, Major Stephen Mellnik, and Captain William Edwin Dyess were among the first to get out. The intelligence they transmitted to MacArthur in the summer of 1943 was absolutely vital. He learned of the Bataan Death March from them. Three others stayed in Mindanao and fought with the guerillas. One of them, Second Lieutenant Leo Boelens, did not survive. He was killed by the Japanese in late January 1944.

Once the seven had the opportunity to relate their experiences to US military leadership, they conveyed horrifying narratives of the Death March, recounting that Americans and Filipinos were beheaded, bayoneted, shot, and buried alive on the 60 miles the Japanese marched them. Mellnik, McCoy, and Dyess (Dyess, tragically, was killed in a plane crash in California in December 1943) served as especially powerful eyewitnesses to the hell of Bataan. They passed on, too, information about the systematic deprivation inflicted on the prisoners once the Japanese placed them in camps.

The survivors also described the incredible escape they engineered and how their group connected with Fertig. McCoy and Mellnik told of how they understood all too well that if “we were caught in the attempt we would be put to death in a manner not pleasant to think about.” No group of US prisoners this size under Japanese control replicated the feat of the Davao Dozen.

Stunningly, the Department of War initially imposed a gag order on the men. They could not speak with the press about what they endured. John Dower, as well as Lukacs, noted that it was not until early 1944 that the US government permitted knowledge of the Death March to become public. On February 7, 1944, after obtaining the approval of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Life  published an article titled “Death Was a Part of Our Life” with photographs of nine of the 10 Americans (Sergeant Paul Marshall was mistakenly left out). Written by Mellnik and McCoy, with assistance from  Lieutenant Welbourn Kelley (USNR), the piece enraged American opinion. A book, Ten Escape from Tojo , appeared later. What these men revealed bolstered morale as new and even bloodier phases of the island-hopping campaigns of the Pacific War began.

Here are the names of the Americans in the Davao Dozen:

Second Lieutenant Leo Boelens First Lieutenant Michiel Dobervich Captain William Edwin Dyess Second Lieutenant Samuel Grashio First Lieutenant Jack Hawkins Lieutenant Commander Melvyn McCoy Sergeant Paul Marshall Major Stephen Mellnik Captain Austin Shofner Sergeant Robert Spielman

Jason Dawsey, PhD

Jason Dawsey, PhD, is ASU WWII Studies Consultant in the Jenny Craig Institute for the Study of War and Democracy. 

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The Bataan Death March

• Peter Mansoor

Although Americans today may take the tactical and operational brilliance of their military forces for granted, such has not always been the case. Perhaps no historical event illustrates the potential disaster awaiting military forces put in a hopeless strategic situation than the fall of the Philippines in the spring of 1942.

Route of the Bataan Death March.

Following strategic surprise and defeats at Pearl Harbor , Guam, Wake Island, the Java Sea, and Singapore, the surrender of tens of thousands of U.S. and Filipino soldiers to the Japanese in the Philippines stunned the American people and filled them with a burning desire for revenge. The result was what historian John Dower dubbed a “war without mercy” waged throughout the Pacific, ending only with the atomic devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945.

American military leaders understood that in the event of a war with Japan, the successful defense of the Philippines was problematic at best. With the exception of one division of American regulars and a few capable Filipino formations, the territory lacked a well-trained and equipped military force that could repel a determined invasion backed by strong air and naval forces. U.S. military leaders crafted War Plan Orange with these limitations in mind.

In the event of a war with Japan, U.S. forces in the Philippines would withdraw to the Bataan Peninsula near Manila and await relief, presumably from a naval task force that would defeat the Imperial Japanese Navy along the way. Of course, military planners did not take into account the loss of eight battleships at the onset of the conflict, four of which now rested on the bottom of Pearl Harbor in the Hawaiian Islands.

War Plan Orange also did not take into account the mercurial personality of General Douglas MacArthur, commander of the U.S. and Filipino forces. Overconfident that the Filipino soldiers he had trained could stand up to Japanese regulars and overlooking the fact that his air force had inexplicably been largely destroyed on the ground on the first day of conflict, MacArthur moved his forces and the supplies that sustained them forward to confront a Japanese invasion at Lingayen Gulf in northern Luzon.

The better trained and led Japanese army quickly defeated the more numerous Filipino and American forces, forcing them to withdraw. Instead of returning to a Bataan peninsula fortified and stockpiled with supplies for a lengthy siege, the Filipino-American forces were forced to abandon a large portion of their supplies during the retreat.

Captured Filipino and U.S. soldiers at the outset of the Bataan Death March. (Photo from National Guard)

The troops immediately went on half rations; by the end of the fighting four months later they were on quarter rations. (Troops in intensive combat require 3,500 calories per day. U.S. and Filipino forces in Bataan averaged 2,000 calories per day in January, 1,500 calories per day in February, and 1,000 calories per day in March and April.) As a result, the tens of thousands of American and Filipino soldiers who entered Japanese captivity in April 1942 were already suffering from malnutrition and disease.

The Japanese intended for captured Filipino and American soldiers to march the roughly sixty-five miles from the Bataan peninsula to a railhead inland, from which they would be moved by train to a prisoner of war camp. The victors, however, were unprepared for the tidal wave of around 75,000 prisoners (65,000 Filipino, 10,000 American) who fell into their hands. Food, water, medical care, and transportation were in short supply. The poor condition of the troops left many of them in desperate shape as they were forced to endure 5 to 10 days of marching in the hot sun.

Captured soldiers along the march with their hands tied behind their backs. (Photo from National Archives)

Japanese cultural attitudes made matters much worse. The Japanese considered surrender dishonorable; their troops were encouraged to commit suicide rather than fall into enemy hands. As a result, Japanese soldiers by and large were brutal captors. More than a third of U.S. soldiers taken prisoner by Japan during World War II died in captivity, compared to just 1 percent in German captivity.

Japanese soldiers denied basic needs – especially water – to the prisoners of war trudging along the dusty roads of Luzon. Soldiers who fell out of the column were beaten, bayonetted, shot, and occasionally beheaded. Although researchers still debate the numbers, it is reasonable to conclude that several thousand Filipinos and several hundred Americans were killed on the march, with as many as 30,000 dying of disease within weeks after entering captivity.

American prisoners use improvised litters to carry comrades too weak to walk along the road. (Photo from National Archives)

The news of the “Death March” eventually leaked out of the Philippines with prisoners who escaped to Australia. The U.S. government in time released some of their testimonials, and a Life magazine story in February 1944 highlighting Japanese atrocities thoroughly enraged the American people.

Propaganda poster featuring the Bataan Death march and Japanese mistreatment of U.S. prisoners of war.

When U.S. troops returned to the Philippines, Gen. MacArthur took great risks to liberate prisoner of war camps before the Japanese could kill their captives. In one notorious incident in the province of Palawan on December 14, 1944, Japanese soldiers murdered 139 U.S. prisoners of war by setting fire to trenches in which the men were taking refuge during an air raid. After the war the Japanese commander in the Philippines during the fall of Bataan, General Masaharu Homma, was tried for war crimes, convicted, and executed by firing squad.

The American people would do well to remember their own history when it comes to the just treatment of prisoners of war, lest we commit actions that, like the Bataan Death March, serve to enrage the enemy, motivate his supporters, and turn world opinion against us. The abuses at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq in 2003 and statements made in the recent presidential campaign seemingly condoning the use of torture against detainees suggests we may have already forgotten.

Learn more about the Bataan Death March:

· Stanley L. Falk, Bataan: The March of Death (New York: W. W. Norton, 1962)

· Donald Knox, Death March: The Survivors of Bataan (Orlando: Harcourt, 1981)

· Manny Lawton, Some Survived: An Eyewitness Account of the Bataan Death March and the Men Who Lived Through It (Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin Books, 2004)

· Commander Melvyn McCoy, Lieutenant Colonel S. M. Mellnik, and Lieutenant Welbourn Kelley, “Death was part of our life,” Life , 16:6 (February 7, 1944): 26-31, 96-111.

· Michael Norman and Elizabeth Norman, Tears in the Darkness: The Story of the Bataan Death March and Its Aftermath (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009)

Learn more about the Pacific War:

· John Dower, War without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War (New York: Pantheon Books, 1986)

· Edward S. Miller, War Plan Orange: The U.S. Strategy to Defeat Japan, 1897-1945 (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1991)

· Edward J. Drea, Japan’s Imperial Army: Its Rise and Fall, 1853-1945 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2009), p. 260.

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Death Marches: Evidence and Memory

Exhibition Type: Main Exhibitions

18 May 2021 - 27 August 2021

The exhibition space will open to the public from Tuesday 18 May. Please note that entry to the Library is only permitted to those who have pre-booked. You can pre-book your tickets here . Please note our COVID-19 opening times and health and safety measures , including wearing a face-covering, before visiting. 

The Library’s new exhibition will uncover how forensic and other evidence about the death marches has been gathered since the end of the Holocaust. It chronicles how researchers and others attempted to recover the death march routes – and those who did not survive them. Efforts to analyse and commemorate the death marches continue to this day.

Towards the end of the Second World War, hundreds of thousands of prisoners still held within the Nazi camp system were forcibly evacuated in terrible conditions under heavy guard. Prisoners were sent out on foot, by rail, in horse-drawn wagons, in lorries and by ship. Conveys split, dispersed and rejoined others, with routes stretching from several dozen to hundreds of miles long. Thousands of people were murdered en route in the last days before the war’s end, although it is impossible to know the exact numbers.

Many of these chaotic and brutal evacuations became known as ‘death marches’ by those who endured them. They form the last chapter of Nazi genocide.

You can now explore over sixty eyewitness accounts of those who experienced and survived the Nazi death marches on the Library’s new digital resource, Testifying to the Truth .

Gallery Walk-Through

Join co-curators Professor Dan Stone (Royal Holloway, University of London) and Dr Christine Schmidt (Wiener Holocaust Library) as they walk through the Library’s new exhibition Death Marches: Evidence and Memory .

Eugene Black in focus

Eugene Black  (formerly Jeno Schwartz, 1928-2016) was a Jewish teenager when he was deported from Hungary to Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1944. There he was separated from his family, whom he never saw again. From Auschwitz, he was sent to Buchenwald and then Mittelbau-Dora camps, where he worked in an underground factory that manufactured rockets in brutal conditions. In March 1945, Eugene was marched to Nordhausen. He then spent seven days on a train travelling in the direction of Hamburg.

Eugene remembered that ‘ the train would pull up, the doors would open, and we had to throw the dead bodies out. ‘ The train stopped at Celle, and the prisoners were forced to march to Bergen-Belsen. The SS guards shot anyone who stopped walking. Eugene arrived in Bergen-Belsen with the remaining prisoners who survived the ordeal and was liberated in April 1945.

Exhibition Catalogue

Curators’ spotlight.

Event Series

Watch past events.

Virtual Exhibition Launch: Death Marches: Evidence and Memory

On Thursday 4 March 2021 the Holocaust and Genocide Research Partnership launched its inaugural exhibition, co-curated by Dan Stone (Royal Holloway, University of London) and Christine Schmidt (The Wiener Holocaust Library). The launch event included a gallery walk-through, short talks by the co-curators and insight from other guest speakers.

Watch back now

Virtual Talk: Iby and Trude: The Death Marches and Me

On Thursday 8 April 2021 the Holocaust and Genocide Research Partnership hosted an event with Iby Knill BEM and Trude Silman MBE in conversation with Tracy Craggs (Holocaust Survivors’ Friendship Association) where they discuss their experiences before, during and after the Holocaust, in particular, the effect that the death marches have had on their lives. This was then followed by a short Q&A.

Virtual Panel: On the Trail of the Death Marches

Dr Henning Borggräfe (Arolsen Archives), Dr Simone Gigliotti (Royal Holloway, University of London) and Ms Yona Kobo (Yad Vashem) discuss the sources and methodologies used to research and narrate the history of the death marches. Chaired by Professor Dan Stone (Royal Holloway, University of London).

Virtual Panel: The Politics of Dead Bodies

This virtual panel of speakers discussed the forensic turn in Holocaust and genocide studies. The panel addressed how forensic evidence, such as sites of mass burial and human remains, has informed research and remembrance of genocide, as well as political and ethical dealings with sites of mass atrocity.

Virtual Panel: Reckonings and Forced Confrontations after the Holocaust

In this panel discussion, our speakers explored the disintegration of the camps system; ‘forced confrontations’ between Allied militaries and the German civilian population; post-war trials of perpetrators involved in the death marches; and the lives of Holocaust survivors in the aftermath of liberation.

Virtual Panel: Remembering the Death Marches

This virtual panel of speakers discussed the different ways of commemorating the death marches, including pilgrimages, memorials at former Nazi camps and other sites of significance, and artistic and photographic responses to such sites.

Virtual Talk: Manfred Goldberg: My Death March Experience

For the final event in this exhibition series, we were joined by Holocaust survivor Manfred Goldberg BEM who shared his experiences of his own death march journey and liberation, led in conversation with Professor Dan Stone.

Press Coverage

We have been delighted to receive the following press coverage for this exhibition: 

• BBC News – Exhibition explores Holocaust ‘death marches’ (14.05.21)
• The Jewish Chronicle – Never to be forgotten (14.05.21)
• The Guardian – First-hand stories shed new light on Nazi death marches (16.05.21)
• Daily Mail – The death march diaries (17.05.21)
• Smithsonian Magazine – When the Nazis Murdered Thousands by Sending Them on Forced Death Marches (18.05.21)
• Jewish News – New exhibition details brutality of death marches (25.05.21)
• Memoria – A new exhibition at The Wiener Holocaust Library (June issue)
• BBC History Revealed – Death Marches: Evidence and Memory (June issue)
• AJR Journal – Remembering the marches (June issue)
• History Hit Warfare podcast – Death Marches: Evidence and Memory (11.06.21)
• UCL Pi Media – Exhibition Review: Death Marches: Evidence and Memory (18.06.21)
• The Times of Israel – London exhibition focuses on ‘overlooked and understudied’ Nazi death marches (28.06.21)
• Bradford Telegraph & Argus – In the footsteps of death marches that left a trail of blood across Europe (30.06.21)
• BBC History Magazine – A brutal end (July issue)

This exhibition is part of the new  Holocaust and Genocide Research Partnership . 

Death Marches: Evidence and Memory  is also on show until 1 September at the  Holocaust Exhibition & Learning Centre at the University of Huddersfield.

With support from the  Ernst Hecht Charitable Foundation ,  University of Huddersfield  and  CHASE . 

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How did the Holocaust happen?

The Holocaust took place in the context of the Second World War, which was started by the invasion of Poland in September 1939.  Here, German soldiers hoist the Nazi Flag over Krakow castle in 1939.

Courtesy of The Wiener Holocaust Library Collections.

Prior to the start of the Second World War , Jews, Roma and those viewed as ‘ a-social ’ by the Nazis faced escalating persecution in Germany and its recently incorporated territories.

More than four hundred antisemitic laws were enacted by the Nazis between 1933 and 1938. In November 1938, the situation worsened, as hundreds of Jews were tortured and arrested and thousands of businesses were destroyed in a targeted pogrom known as Kristallnacht .

The persecution of Jews intensified as the Nazis invaded Poland on 1 September 1939 at the start of the Second World War .

This section will explore the main events of the Holocaust in chronological order.

Escalating persecution and ghettos, 1939

A market inside the Łódź Ghetto.

In the ghettos, people were often forced into labour. Here, inhabitants of the Łódź Ghetto are photographed in a workshop.

On 1 September 1939, Germany invaded Poland . In September 1939, Poland was home to over three million Jews. Prior to the invasion, the Nazis had not drawn up a specific or comprehensive plan for what to do with the Jewish population once Poland was occupied. The resulting policy of ghettoisation was improvised as a temporary solution.

In just a few months, millions of Jews were quickly imprisoned inside ghettos in Poland. Conditions inside ghettos were abysmal, and thousands quickly died from starvation, disease, and poor sanitation.

Forced ghettoisation was a large escalation from the pre-war anti-Jewish policy in Germany. Prior to the war, the Nazis had focused on encouraging Jews to emigrate from the Greater German Reich through their antisemitic policies and actions. By 1939 in Poland, the Nazis escalated their actions, and segregated and imprisoned Jews for future deportation. At this stage, the Nazis planned to deport Jews to Madagascar or lands further east. Later, in 1941, as both of these options were realised to be infeasible, the Nazis created extermination camps to liquidate the populations of the ghettos instead.

Creation of the Einsatzgruppen, 1939-41

An extract from a report written by commander of Einsatzgruppe A Franz Walter Stahlecker for Reinhard Heydrich. The report was a summary of the implementation of the final solution in the Baltics. Here, Stahlecker sets out what the Einsatzgruppen aimed to achieve.

This document is a translation used in the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials.

Courtesy of The Wiener Holocaust Library Collections. 

In the report, Stahlecker also describes pogroms which took place in Lithuania, encouraged by the Einsatzgruppen.

This map featured as part of the Stahlecker report. The map indicates the number of Jews murdered by the Einsatzgruppen. The map shows modern day Belarus, at the bottom, then, continuing clockwise, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Russia.

The Einsatzgruppen   were mobile killing squads that were a part of the SS . Members were chosen for their fanatical belief in Nazi ideology and absolute commitment to Hitler.

The Einsatzgruppen were created by Reinhard Heydrich in 1939 to liquidate the Polish Intelligentsia and prevent them from coordinating a response to the German invasion of Poland .   This was called Operation Tannenberg . The Einsatzgruppen were brutally efficient in their task.

When the Nazis began to plan for the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 , the Einsatzgruppen were actively factored into the plans. Members of the Einsatzgruppen were informed that their role in the operation was to put down resistance behind enemy lines. Several types of enemies were specifically named by Himmler to be targeted: middle and high ranking communists, Jews in service of party or government and other ‘extremist’ elements. The Einsatzgruppen were also instructed to secretly encourage antisemitic or anticommunist pogroms .

General Keitel’s order

The Einsatzgruppen’s power increased in advance of the invasion of the Soviet Union.

On 13 March 1941, General Wilhelm Keitel signed a directive which stated that Himmler had been entrusted with ‘special tasks’ and gave him (and, therefore, the Einsatzgruppen ) the authority to ‘act independently and on his own his own responsibility’ within the context of these tasks.

This order was an attempt to resolve previous issues of friction between the German Army and the SS in Poland and allow the Einsatzgruppen to combat what the Nazis saw as the ‘Jewish Bolshevik’ threat in the Soviet Union.

The Nazis associated Soviet communism, their ideological enemy, with Jews, their so-called racial enemy. They also regarded most Soviet citizens as racially inferior, even if they were not Jewish.

This order increased the power of the Einsatzgruppen and, in turn, their ability to carry out tasks independently. However, the Einsatzgruppen still worked closely with the German Army.

A portrait of Wilhelm Keitel, courtesy of The Wiener Holocaust Library Collections.

Einsatzgruppen preparation for the invasion of the Soviet Union, 1941

The Einsatzgruppen ’s main training for the invasion of the Soviet Union took place in the spring of 1941 at a police training academy at Pretzsch, fifty miles southwest of Berlin. The course took just three weeks and involved lectures on Nazi racial theory and basic military training.

In order to avoid soldiers being prosecuted under military law (as had happened previously in Poland), and to encourage complete ruthlessness when dealing with the enemy, military personnel were given legal immunity prior to the invasion of the Soviet Union. This action cleared the way for further escalation and more intense persecution of those deemed to be enemies.

Before the invasion began, the Einsatzgruppen were split into four groups (A, B, C and D). Each group covered a different territory, following behind the German Army’s invasion lines.

'Death by bullets' The Einsatzgruppen and the Soviet Union, 1941-1945

Jewish women forced to undress sit before members of the Einsatzgruppen before their execution in the early 1940s.

Courtesy of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

This report details the actions and massacre carried out by Einsatzkommando 10B, following their arrival in Czernowitz (modern-day Ukraine) on Sunday 6 July 1941.

This document is a translation used in the Nuremberg War Crime Trials.

A post-war portrait of Paul Blobel taken at the Einsatzgruppen Trial in 1948. Blobel was an SS commander and a part of the Einsatzgruppen . He supervised several mass executions, including the Babi Yar massacre of 1941 . After the war, he was found guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity, and sentenced to death.

Wikimedia [Public Domain].

This affidavit was given by Blobel at the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials and describes some of the Einsatzgruppen massacres he was involved in. In the text, Blobel describes supervising the executions of between 10,000-15,000 people. The actual figure was approximately 60,000.

Blobel describes the typical process of an Einsatzgruppen massacre. Towards the end of the text, Blobel describes using a gas van to murder victims for the first time.

A portrait of five-year-old Mania Halef, a Jewish child from the Ukraine. She was later killed by the Einsatzgruppen during the mass execution at Babi Yar.

Initial invasion

The Nazis regarded Soviet citizens as racially and ideologically inferior, partly due to the Soviet Union’s communist system of rule (which the Nazis saw as the ideological enemy of fascism . The Nazis viewed communists and Jews as key enemies, who needed to be detained and eliminated in order to allow the Nazis to win the war and ensure the survival of the ‘ Aryan ’ race. In many Nazis’ minds, Jews and communists were inseparable.

The mass executions of those deemed to be enemies started almost instantly after the invasion. An indication of this violence can be seen in the actions of Einsatzkommando 9 , a sub unit of Einsatzgruppe B, who, following the occupation of Vilnius on 30 June 1941, shot 500 Jews a day.

Collaboration

The Einsatzgruppen did not act alone. In many cases the German Army or local collaborators participated in the murders, either actively (in the shootings), by identifying Jews or other enemies, or by assisting in security roles, such as guards for camps.  One example of this collaboration can be seen shortly after the invasion in the first week of July 1941, where 5000 Jews in the cities of Riga and Daugavpils were detained and murdered by ethnic Germans and the Lithuanian Activist Front .

Further escalation

By late July 1941, the German Army’s advance on the eastern front had slowed and there were significant food and military shortages in Germany. This resulted in a low morale on the German home front. The Nazis blamed Jews for these shortages and this lack of military success in the Soviet Union, and suggested that Jews were not only sabotaging the war efforts through partisan activity, but were also unnecessarily draining the food supply.

Amid these growing problems on the home front, Himmler paid a series of visits to the Einsatzgruppen units across the Soviet Union in mid-August 1941. During these visits, Himmler orally issued instructions which encouraged the complete annihilation of Jews, regardless of age, gender or a proven connection to communism. After each visit, murders of Jews in that area quickly escalated.

Himmler’s visits further encouraged the widespread mass murder of Jews across the Soviet Union. There were few restrictions on the actions of the Einsatzgruppen, and they accordingly acted with little restraint or uniformity. In many areas, whole Jewish communities were swiftly murdered. In others, some were placed in ghettos. In others, some were spared, although in most cases this was only a temporary measure.

Deportation of German Jews, September 1941

Dr. Hans Schmoller (10 April 1879 – 2 November 1942) was a German Jew from Berlin. In 1942, Hans and his wife, Marie-Elisabeth (2 January 1887 – 16 May 1944), were deported to Theresienstadt. On 2 October 1942, Hans sent this Red Cross Telegram to his sister in law, Johanna Behrend, who had emigrated to England in 1939. He writes ‘On the way to be sent off to Theresienstadt…it will be quite a time until you get any more news’. Exactly a month after sending this telegram, Hans died in unknown circumstances at the hands of the Nazis in the Theresienstadt Ghetto.

This transport list documents Hans and Marie-Elisabeth Schmoller’s journey to Theresienstadt on 14 October 1942.

Courtesy of The Wiener Holocaust Library, International Tracing Service Archive, Document Number 11192721.

Marie-Elisabeth Schmoller (2 January 1887 – 16 May 1944). Following Hans’ death in 1942, Marie-Elisabeth remained in the Theresienstadt Ghetto until May 1944 – when she was deported to Auschwitz and murdered on 16 May 1944. This card was assigned to Marie-Elisabeth in Theresienstadt and shows the date she was deported to Auschwitz.

Courtesy of The Wiener Holocaust Library, International Tracing Service Archive, Document Number 5090097.

In the autumn of 1941, approximately 338,000 Jews remained in Greater Germany. Until this point, Hitler had been reluctant to deport Jews in the German Reich until the war was over because of a fear of resistance and retaliation from the German population. But, in the autumn of 1941, key Nazi figures contributed to mounting pressure on Hitler to deport the German Jews. This pressure culminated in Hitler ordering the deportation of all Jews still in the Greater German Reich and Protectorate between 15-17 September 1941.

Following the order, Himmler, Heydrich and Eichmann attempted to find space for the Jews from the Greater German Reich in the already severely overcrowded ghettos in eastern Europe. Officials in the Łódź, Litzmannstadt, Minsk and Riga ghettos were all informed that they would need to absorb the population of Jews from the Greater German Reich, irrespective of overcrowding.

The Minsk Ghetto was full, so in order to make room for the Reich Jews, the local SD , German Army and local collaborators gathered approximately 25,000 of the local ghetto inhabitants, drove them to a local ravine, and murdered them. German Jews soon filled their places in the ghetto. Similar murders took place in Riga.

In Łódź Ghetto, no local Jews were removed prior to the arrival of 20,000 Jews from the Greater German Reich. Instead, following the success of the experiments in using gas vans for mass murder at Chełmno extermination camp in December 1941, deportations from the ghetto to Chełmno began on 16 January 1942, four days before the Wannsee Conference .

As with most of the Nazis’ murderous actions, the deportation of German Jews was improvised and haphazard . The increased numbers of Jews arriving in the ghettos of eastern Europe led to severe overcrowding, unsustainable food shortages and poor sanitation. This, in combination with the slow progress in the German invasion of the Soviet Union, convinced the Nazis that a ‘solution’ to the ‘Jewish problem’ needed to be organised sooner than had been originally envisaged. The deportations also partly led to the gas experiments at Chełmno, and heightened the Nazis’ sense of urgency to coordinate the policy towards Jews at the Wannsee Conference.

The Wannsee Conference, 1942

The Wannsee Conference Villa, where the Wannsee Conference took place on 20 January 1942. Courtesy of the David Allthorpe photo collection.

The Wannsee Conference formalised the Nazis’ policy of the extermination of Jews in occupied Europe.

On 20 January 1942, leading Nazi officials met at the Wannsee Conference Villa in Wannsee, a south-western suburb of Berlin. The conference had been called to discuss and coordinate a cheaper, more efficient, and permanent solution to the Nazis’ ‘Jewish problem’. The conference was attended by senior government and SS officials, and coordinated by Reinhard Heydrich .

At the meeting, Heydrich gave a review of Nazis’ Jewish policy, highlighting the recent (September-October 1941) removal of the Jews from the German Reich, and framing it as a temporary solution to the larger Jewish problem.

The final plan for the eleven million Jews in remaining in Europe, as laid out by Heydrich, was to utilise them for work in the east on road works. Those who could not work, or became unable to work after a period of time, would be subject to special treatment. The Nazis used the term ‘special treatment’ as a euphemism for murder.

At the conference, there was also some discussion on the methods of mass murder, although concrete plans were not established. Experiments in using gas as a method of mass murder had already taken place at Chełmno in December 1941, but this was not mentioned and no one method was agreed upon within the meeting.

The meeting lasted approximately two hours.

Whilst the exact methods of mass murder were not laid out in this meeting, it played a significant role in coordinating the Nazis’ genocidal actions. The policy of annihilation to be taken against Jews was made extremely clear by the Nazi leadership. By the end of 1942, six extermination camps were in operation.

Creation of extermination camps, 1941 -1942

This map shows the extermination camps created in occupied Poland.

Courtesy of The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

This leaflet, entitled Rescue the Perishing , was published by British MP Eleanor Rathbone in May 1943. The pamphlet urged the British public to show public support and sympathy for the victims of Nazi persecution, following reports of the Nazi massacres in the British press in 1942. Despite Rathbone’s efforts, there were no major rescue efforts made following the publication of the pamphlet.

Gerta and Rudolf Pollak were assimilated middle class Jews from Prague. On 7 May 1942, they were deported by the Nazis to Theresienstadt Ghetto and shortly afterwards, on 9 May 1942 to Siedliszcze, a forced labour camp in Poland. This postcard, sent to family friend in Prague on 10 August 1942, was the last communication ever received from them. In October 1942, both Gerta and Rudolf were deported to Sobibor extermination camp and murdered.

A pre-war portrait of Gerta Pollak, neé Elischak.

Gerta Pollak’s Theresienstadt transport card, listing the date of her and Rudolf’s transport to Siedliszcze on 9 May 1942.

Courtesy of The Wiener Holocaust Library Collections , International Tracing Service Digital Archive, Document Number 5073422.

The crematorium incinerator at Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. The Nazis used this to cremate bodies of victims after they had been gassed.

A can of Zyklon B, the main poison used by the Nazis to gas their victims in extermination camps.

Following the Wannsee Conference, five additional extermination camps were adapted or established with the primary purpose of efficiently murdering the Jewish population of Europe.

This brought the total number of Nazi extermination camps to six. These extermination camps were:

• Chełmno (in operation December 1941-January 1945)
• Bełżec  (in operation March-December 1942)
• Sobibór (in operation May-July 1942 and October 1942-October 1943)
• Treblinka  (in operation July 1942-August 1943)
• Majdanek  (in operation September 1942-July 1944)
• Auschwitz-Birkenau  (in operation March 1942-January 1945)

In extermination camps, victims were murdered by being poisoned by gas. The process of murder was developed and adapted as each camp was built. For example, initially, at Chełmno, gas vans were used, but as the purpose-built extermination camps were established stationary gas chambers were found to be more effective.

Once they had arrived at the extermination camp, groups of Jews were typically separated into women and children, and then men. Some of the strongest were occasionally chosen for slave labour, but typically the majority were sent straight to the gas chambers where they were murdered.

In camps such as Auschwitz, most of those sent immediately to the gas chambers were told to leave their luggage and get undressed ready for disinfection in a shower. Approximately 1000 people were then shepherded into the false showers and an airtight door was closed. Carbon monoxide gas or Zyklon B was pumped into the room, and suffocated those inside. The bodies were then removed from the gas chamber and sent to the crematoria, and the lethal process began again.

The creation of the extermination camps marked the final, fatal, step in the Nazis’ journey towards genocide. In total, approximately three million people were murdered in the extermination camps. The deadliest extermination camp was Auschwitz-Birkenau, where approximately one million people were murdered.

Genocide in action, 1941-1945

Emil Leon Pilpel (right) (23 January 1889-26 May 1942) was a Jewish accountant born in Lvov. Before the war, he lived in Vienna with his wife, Serla (left), and two daughters, Fanni and Charlotte.

Following the Nazi occupation of Austria in 1938, Emil lost his job as a result of Nazi persecution. Emil retrained as a hotel keeper in the hope of escaping to England. This letter was sent along with his CV to the German-Jewish Aid Committee in England.

Emil and Serla were unable to emigrate and remained in their flat in Clusiusgasse, Vienna, which they were forced to share with several other families. On 20 May 1942 they were deported to the Minsk, and from there to a pine forest a few kilometres from Maly Trostinec camp. Here, they were executed by the Einsatzgruppen on 26 May 1942. This Red Cross Telegram, sent on 10 May 1942, was the last communication the Emil’s daughters, Fanni and Charlotte, received from their parents.

In June 2018, Emil and Serla’s surviving family unveiled a Stolpersteine (a remembrance stone) outside their former home in Vienna.

Courtesy of the Pilpel family descendants.

Auschwitz was established by the Nazis in March 1942 near the town of Oświęcim in southern Poland. In total, approximately one million people were murdered there during the Holocaust.  This photograph was taken shortly after Auschwitz was liberated in 1945. At the front of the photograph, pots and pans used by the prisoners in the camp are strewn across the ground.

Prior to murdering victims at extermination camps, the Nazis confiscated their luggage. This photograph shows some of the shaving brushes seized by the Nazis at Auschwitz.

[From left to right] Sonja, Adolf and Lotte Jaslowitz, a Jewish family from Czernowitz, a city in north Romania. On 4 June 1942, having survived the first Einsatzgruppen sweep through the city, the family were deported to Ladijin Concentration Camp. Throughout the next three years, the family endured horrific and unsanitary conditions in several ghettos and camps. Only Lotte survived the war.

From the summer of 1941 onwards, the situation for Jews and others viewed as inferior by the Nazis continued to rapidly deteriorate.

In Poland, the invasion of the Soviet Union meant that many of those incarcerated in ghettos were put to work manufacturing a variety of items for the war effort.  However, as soon as it became clear that the war would not be over quickly, the fate of the Jews trapped in the ghettos of Poland and eastern Europe was sealed. On 16 January 1942, the first set of deportations departed from the Łódź Ghetto, swiftly followed over the next two weeks by thirteen more transports, totalling 10,103 Jews. Almost all of them, except the 50-60 Jews who formed the Sonderkommado , were gassed shortly after arrival.

Four days after the first transport left Łódź, the Wannsee Conference took place, leading to the establishment of five more extermination camps. Genocide was unleashed as ghettos across Poland were emptied and Jews were sent to the extermination camps. In Warsaw,  between July and September 1942, approximately 300,000 inhabitants of the Warsaw Ghetto were deported to Treblinka and murdered.

The Soviet Union

Following the Einsatzgruppen ‘s  initial advance into the Soviet Union and the resulting widespread massacres, many of the Jews who had been initially spared were forced into ghettos and used as slave labour. Those incapable of carrying out hard labour were murdered.

As Germany’s military advances slowed, the ruthlessness of the actions against the Jews and others seen as racial enemies of the Nazis radically increased. An example of this ruthlessness can be seen in the city of Kauna, Lithuania, where, on 4 October 1941, 1985 Jews were killed by Einsatzgruppen and local Lithuanian collaborators. Karl Jäger , leader of Einsatzkommando 3A, later reported that the massacre was in retaliation for the murder of a German policeman in the ghetto. Just under four weeks later, on 29 October 1941, a further 9,200 Jews were murdered in the city. They were forced to strip naked, with their belongings and valuables taken away, pushed into large pre-prepared mass graves, and then shot with machine guns. This time, Jäger reported that those murdered were surplus to requirements.

The murders in Kauna show the escalation of the Einsatzgruppen ’s actions in the Soviet Union in late 1941, which continued to intensify and spiral out of control as war efforts struggled throughout the following years. By 1945, centuries of Jewish culture had been destroyed and thousands upon thousands of Jewish communities had been decimated .

Death marches, 1944-1945

A clandestine photograph of prisoners on a death march from Nuremberg to Dachau on 26 April 1945.

The ITS (now known as Arolsen Archives) was established to help the millions of people displaced and missing during the Second World War to trace, and be traced by, their families. Following the war, the International Tracing Service (ITS) researched and created these maps, showing the routes that death marches took. This map shows death marches from Flossenbürg camp.

Courtesy of Arolsen Archives, Document Number 10.12.694.

This burial map was also created as part of a post-war research project by the ITS. The map documents a grave, created in the midst of death march, in Michelbach an der Bilz (Baden-Württemberg). Maps such as this helped to document death tolls and routes that the death marches took.

Courtesy of The Wiener Holocaust Library, International Tracing Service Digital Archive, Document Number 101099771.

As the Second World War progressed, the Nazis were pushed into retreat on both fronts.

From spring 1944 onwards, the Nazis ordered the forced evacuation of prisoners from camps across occupied Europe. These forced evacuations became known as death marches.

The Nazis ordered these evacuations for a number of reasons: in order to continue using the prisoners as slave labour in Germany; to use the prisoners to bargain peace with the Allies; and to stop survivors of the camps giving the Allies accounts of the horrors they had experienced.

Malnourished prisoners were forced to trek hundreds of miles on foot to camps into central Germany. Thousands of people died during the marches. Those who were unable to travel were murdered. Thousands more froze to death, starved or were shot on the way.

Liberation, 1944-1945

This sign was erected at the site of Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in the summer of 1945. In total, approximately 50,000 people died at Bergen-Belsen.

After the British liberated Bergen-Belsen on 15 April 1945, unsanitary conditions did not immediately improve. This photograph shows survivors of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, in the aftermath of the liberation.

Former female inmates of Bergen-Belsen after liberation.

As the German Army started to lose the war, they were pushed into retreat towards Germany by the Allies. The Allies then began to liberate the hundreds of camps which the Nazis had constructed across occupied Europe.

On 23 July 1944, Majdanek, in eastern Poland, became the first extermination camp to be liberated by the Soviet Army. Abandoned quickly by the German forces, the camp was almost completely intact.

Over the following nine months, hundreds of camps were liberated across Germany and previously occupied territories, including extermination camps Auschwitz-Birkenau (by the Soviets in January 1945) and Bergen-Belsen (by the British in April 1945).

For many prisoners, liberation was only the beginning of their journey to freedom. The Nazis had stripped survivors of their jobs, their homes, and in many cases, murdered their families. Most had nowhere to go, and many ended up being placed in Displaced Person camps until they could eventually emigrate or settle elsewhere.

The conditions in the camps also took a while to improve because of the poor conditions in post-war Europe. Disease was widespread, and the daily death rate initially remained high. In Bergen-Belsen, 10,000 people died from malnutrition and disease after liberation.

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What happened in May

On 10 May 1933, university students supported by the Nazi Party instigated book burnings of blacklisted authors across Germany.

On 1 May 1935, the German government issued a ban on all organisations of the Jehovah's Witnesses. Image courtesy of USHMM.

On 10 May 1940, German forces invaded the Netherlands, Belgium, France, and Luxembourg.

On 29 May 1942, the German authorities in France passed a law requiring Jews to wear the Star of David.

On 16 May 1944, inmates of the Gypsy camp in Auschwitz resisted the SS guards attempting to liquidate the camp.

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Bataan Death March Survivor: I Saw ‘Thousands of Individual Horrors’

At 12:30 p.m. on April 9, 1942, Brig. Gen. Edward King, commanding officer at Bataan in the Philippines, surrendered to the Japanese. The victorious Japanese then forced more than 10,000 American and 65,000 Filipino survivors of Bataan’s garrison to march 100 kilometers in blazing heat from Mariveles to San Fernando. Already weary from months of fighting, the Filipinos and Americans also suffered from malaria, hunger and thirst. Those who fell along the way were beaten and clubbed—often to death—by their captors.

Six hundred to 650 Americans and 5,000 to 10,000 Filipinos died on the trek.

At San Fernando, the survivors were crowded into stifling, sealed railroad boxcars, in which many more died. When the men arrived four hours later in Capas, Tarlac province, they were forced to get off and begin a 10-kilometer walk to Camp O’Donnell. During the first 40 days in prison, about 1,570 Americans died from malnutrition, disease and beatings. More than 25,000 Filipinos died in about four months, until the Japanese began paroling Philippine army personnel in July 1942. But Philippine Scouts, who were part of the U.S. Army, were kept in captivity.

On June 6, 1942, the American survivors of Camp O’Donnell—except for about 500, who were held primarily for burial detail—moved once again, to Camp Cabanatuan. About 3,000 more Americans would die there, mostly from the lingering effects of the fighting on Bataan, the Death March and Camp O’Donnell.

Retired U.S. Army Maj. Richard M. Gordon was a defender of Bataan and is a survivor of the Death March, Camp O’Donnell, Camp Cabanatuan and three years’ captivity in Mitsushima, Japan. As the founder of a group known as the “Battling Bastards of Bataan,” whose motto is “In Pursuit of Truth,” Gordon has worked hard to dispel some of the myths surrounding the infamous Death March.

“Less than 1,000 survivors of Bataan are alive today,” he said. “In perhaps 10 years, they will all be gone. Most, if not all, would like to leave behind them the truth that was Bataan. To do less would dishonor those men who died on Bataan, in Camp O’Donnell and Cabanatuan, aboard the hell ships taking them to Japan and Manchuria, and in prison camps all over those countries.”

In an interview with John P. Cervone, Gordon recalled those terrible events.

Military History: How did you come to be on Bataan?

Gordon: I joined the Regular Army on August 5, 1940. When I enlisted, I requested the 31st U.S. Infantry Regiment in Manila. I was first sent to Fort Slocum, N.Y., where we received some introductory training. I remained there until September 7, 1940. At the time, Fort Slocum was a staging area for those going on overseas assignments, including Panama, Puerto Rico, Hawaii and the Philippines. From Fort Slocum our unit was taken by tugboat down the Hudson River to the Brooklyn Army Base, where we boarded the U.S. Army transport Grant on September 14, bound for the Philippines. The trip, counting a week stopover at Fort McDowell in San Francisco, took 48 days.

MH: What did you do upon arrival?

Gordon: I received basic training in Manila. I was assigned to Company F and lived in the Estado Mayor Barracks, formerly the home of the Spanish army cavalry when they occupied the Philippines in 1898. At the time, I was paid $21 per month, with an increase to $30 after four months.

MH: What was it like to be stationed there?

Gordon: Being in the Philippines before the war was great. We lived much like the British soldiers in India. Due to the heat, we only trained until noon, except when in the field for jungle training. Rifle marksmanship was a two-week period, once a year. Lack of funds prohibited further firing. This was our routine for 15 months before the war broke out.

MH: What was the general reaction when war started on December 7, 1941?

Gordon: We knew war was coming to the Philippines months before it happened, so it was no surprise. As Americans, we felt unbeatable and thought the skirmish would be short-lived. We looked upon the Japanese soldier with contempt—clearly a mistake.

MH: What did your outfit do in those first days of the invasion?

Gordon: On December 10, 1941, my unit moved into the field from our peacetime post at Fort William McKinley. We moved north with the North Luzon Force, then commanded by Maj. Gen. Jonathan M. Wainwright, acting as the security force for his headquarters and staff. Within two weeks our unit had divided into forward and rear command posts [CPs]. I was assigned to the forward CP. Our platoon, under the command of Lieutenant Henry G. Lee (a noted poet of the time), acted as a skirmish line to contend with Japanese infiltrators.

MH: When did you move to Bataan?

Gordon: We moved into the Bataan Peninsula on New Year’s Eve. The battle for Bataan began officially on January 2, 1942. After we assumed our first major line of defense, the Pilar­Bagac line, we held our ground for nearly two months. The Japanese were defeated trying to crack this line, and things settled down until their replacements arrived. It was during this period that Brig. Gen. Maxon S. Lough of Palo Alto, Calif., assumed command of the Philippine Division, of which the 31st was a part. Events were also set in motion that would set the stage for the next few years. The United States could not decide whether to fight or evacuate the Philippines. In December 1941 Secretary of War Henry Stimson was asked about plans for Bataan and replied, ‘There are times when men must die.’ In early January our rations were cut in half, and in February they were halved again. By March we were existing on 1,000 calories a day, eating salmon and rice. Quinine, used to ward off malaria, disappeared by March 1, and dysentery was running rampant. Much of our ammunition was from World War I. Of 10 grenades, three might detonate. We had mortars, but no ammunition for them.

MH: When did the Japanese offensive resume in earnest?

Gordon: Enemy pressure began to build again in March 1942, with the arrival of replacements. Our division CP began to move backward on a regular basis—we seldom held one area for very long. Gen. Lough never believed in leaving his command post any sooner than necessary. As a result, each night we were required to establish new defensive positions around the CP. During those last nights on Bataan we often heard the Japanese trying to infiltrate our lines. One morning General Lough was entering his staff car just as a unit of Japanese came around a bend in the road. We slowed them up until he was safely away.

this article first appeared in Military History magazine

MH: How long were you able to hold the line?

Gordon: We remained there—on several different lines of resistance—until the final Japanese breakthrough on April 3, 1942.

MH: How did you feel about the surrender?

Gordon: I was captured—I did not surrender. Most of my fellow soldiers felt as I did—that we could not lose. We believed it was just a question of when the promised reinforcements would arrive. We were lied to—but by Washington, not by Gen. Douglas MacArthur. We never knew defeat was imminent until our commanding general told us he had surrendered. At the time, no one believed him, and when they found out it was true, many were in tears. We felt we indeed had been “expendable.” During a later prison camp session held by our Bataan garrison CO, Maj. Gen. Edward P. King, Jr., before he was shipped out to Mukden, Manchuria, he told us we had been asked to lay down a bunt to gain time. The baseball metaphor was probably the best way to explain why we were there in the first place.

MH: How were you taken prisoner?

Gordon: Gen. Lough gave us the word of our unit’s surrender. After hearing this, we camped in combat positions on Mount Bataan, known at the time as Signal Hill. A small group of us went farther up the mountain, in an effort to avoid surrender. Several days passed with no sign of the enemy. Hungry and in need of provisions, Cpl.l Elmer Parks (of Oklahoma) and I volunteered to drive down the hill to our last position in search of supplies. Elmer was driving and I was riding shotgun in a Dodge pickup truck. We gathered up a number of Garand M1 rifles at our former position, left behind by the Japanese, who did not want to use them. Loading the rifles aboard the truck, we decided to go a little farther down the road to where other units had been. Driving down the mountain road, we came upon a huge Philippine banyan tree, so large it served as a road divider. As we approached the tree, a lone Japanese soldier holding a rifle stepped out from behind it. Elmer stopped the truck, and we stared at one another, wondering what to do next. The thought of attempting to run occurred to both of us, as did the thought of picking up one of the newly acquired Garand M1s. But neither of us did a thing, other than stare at the Japanese soldier. Finally, he motioned to us to get out of the truck. At that moment 10 or 15 more Japanese came out from the brush lining the road. They surely had us in their sights all the time and probably would have enjoyed shooting us more than capturing us and adding to their burden. These were front-line troops, scouring the area for enemy resistance. Once we were out of the truck, they took turns hitting us with the butts of their rifles. We were searched, and whatever valuables we had—like wristwatches, cigarette lighters and wallets—were taken. On our way down the mountain I saw our battalion commander, Maj. James Ivy, bare from the waist up and dead, with countless bayonet holes in his back. It was then that Elmer and I knew we were in trouble.

MH: What was it like being marched back by the Japanese?

Gordon: Walking down that mountain, we passed American and Filipino corpses along the roadside. The stench was almost unbearable. Finally, as it was growing dark, we came to where the mountain road leveled off into the West Road of Bataan. Our captors turned us over to another group of soldiers. Unable to see us well in the dark, they felt our shoulders and pushed us through an opening in the bush lining the road. We later found out that the shoulder and collar inspection was to determine if the prisoner was an officer. If he was, he was kicked through the same opening instead of being pushed. That night was so dark and confused that I immediately lost contact with Elmer. I assumed he had died. I never saw him again until a reunion 47 years later at Fort Sill, Okla.

MH: What happened during your first night in captivity?

Gordon: That night in the encampment we were searched and beaten about the head several times. There were so many men crowded into that field that finding a place to lie down was almost impossible. I eventually found a spot near a “field latrine,” in reality, just an open ditch. All night long a stream of sick, diseased soldiers beat a path to that trench over and over again.

MH: Can you describe the march out of Bataan?

Gordon: The very next day, probably the 11th or 12th of April, I began marching out of Bataan. Not one of my fellow soldiers was known to me, American or Filipino. Our first day’s march took us up the infamous Zig Zag Trail, which seemed to last for miles and miles until it leveled off in flat country. Yet it was the first leg of the march, and we were in much better shape than we would be in four or five days. Anyone captured north of Mariveles was fortunate to miss this tortuous leg of the march. Hundreds of bodies were strewn along the side of the trail, men who could not make the steep climb. During that climb, I saw an old friend of mine, Sgt. Florence Hardesty. He had taught me to ride a motorcycle just before the war. Hardesty reminded me of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., sitting, in death, against some sort of wall. He was entirely covered in the white dust that blanketed the trees, the road and the marchers. I almost broke down and cried. Hardesty was an old soldier, and I thought of him as a father figure. I have carried his image with me ever since I first saw him.

MH: What happened once you got to the end of the Zig Zag Trail?

Gordon: We were momentarily elated when we reached the top of that climb—we actually felt we had the worst behind us. Walking became much easier. But depression soon set in when we discovered there was no food or water to be had. Some attempted escape on that second day; others continued to fall, unable to keep up. These soldiers were shot, beheaded or bayoneted and left to die on the side of the road. Each night we were placed in a field and allowed to fend for ourselves. We expected water, if not food, but received neither. When dawn broke and we were put back on the road, a number of bodies were always left behind littering our sleeping field. In some ways, they were the lucky ones. Their miseries were over. For the rest of us, our agonies had just begun.

MH: Is that the way the rest of the march went?

Gordon: Days went by with no change in the routine established by the Japanese. We would stop in an open field and be forced to take off our hats during the hottest part of the day while the Japanese had their lunch—ostensibly to assure that we did not hide contraband under them, but also a deliberate act to cause us more hardship. We were required to sit there for an hour or more. Those caught with Japanese money, diaries, photos or anything taken from dead Japanese soldiers—despite the warning to dispose of such items—were usually executed on the spot. Fortunately, I had absolutely nothing of value left, although those with nothing were often cuffed about the ears as punishment. On the third day, we were marched backward and stopped alongside the road in daylight, in plain sight of Corregidor and the American guns. The guns of Corregidor opened up on the Japanese artillery positions alongside the road. We were being used as human shields. I saw a direct hit on a Japanese 105mm gun—it went up in the air like a toy. Score one for Corregidor! A number of prisoners were hit by the American gunfire, including me. I received a gash across my left leg, which surprisingly did not bleed that much. I covered it with my handkerchief, my last personal object.

MH: Where did you go from there?

Gordon: Days seemed to run together, and I lost track of time. Looking around during those first few days, I saw officers carrying duffel bags to hold their personal possessions. One lieutenant, named Olsen, walked by in his most prized possession, his riding boots. A day or so later, I passed Olsen’s duffel bag, with his name stenciled on it, on the side of road. The next day I passed his boots, which nobody seemed to want. Finally, on the third day I passed Olsen, dead on the side of the road. I was amazed that some officers tried to take things with them, adding to their burden of walking in the extreme heat and humidity. These items invariably led to their deaths.

MH: When did you reach a town or village?

Gordon: I don’t remember what day I arrived in Lubao. In that small town there was a sheet-metal warehouse about the size of a football field. Many prisoners were pushed inside the warehouse to sleep that night until there was room for no more. Unfortunately, I was among that group. There were so many men inside that place that sitting down, let alone lying down, was impossible. The heat beating down on that tin had sent the temperature soaring to 120 degrees and then some. Men stood all night, shoulder to shoulder, among the groans of the sick and dying. The next day dozens of men were carried out dead and left along the road as we began another day of the march. Everyone was dehydrated, with no chance to replenish the lost water.

MH: Where did you stop next?

Gordon: Within a day or two, I found myself in the town of San Fernando, a railroad junction in Pampanga province. Here again I had to sleep in the schoolhouse, with conditions almost equaling those in Lubao, but we were promised food the following morning. When morning came we were moved out, again without food or water, and put aboard the boxcars that would take us to Capas and Camp O’Donnell, our next destination.

MH: How did you survive?

Gordon: Words cannot really describe those days or the thousands of individual horrors. Suffice it to say, I went nine days without food and with very little water. My training as an infantryman paid off. I conserved water in my canteen by taking a sip, swishing it around in my mouth and letting a little drip down my throat. I would do this until I reached the next potable water spot. Others, untrained and dying for water, would prostrate themselves along the side of the road and drink water from puddles. All this water was contaminated with flies and fly feces and brought on death from dysentery. Thousands of Filipinos and several hundred Americans died this way. The Japanese beat any who attempted to break ranks and obtain water, killing a number of them in the process. Japanese tanks, moving south to take up positions to attack Corregidor as we marched north, would deliberately drive over the dead and dying on the side of the road.

MH: Did you and your colleagues try to help one another get through the march?

Gordon: No. There was a complete lack of assistance on the part of our fellow Americans. I did not witness a single act of kindness. The desire to survive overcame any idea of helping one another. I was a stretcher-bearer for a wounded officer, having volunteered to do so—out of sense of duty and responsibility. After one complete day of carrying the man, we could not get another four volunteers to relieve us, despite what amounted to begging on our part. That night, when compelled to stop, we left the officer to himself. He was later seen by a friend begging for help along the way. Even fellow officers who had originally carried him deserted him. I believe a lack of discipline led to this horrific situation. Most of our American soldiers had recently arrived in the Philippines, and very few had the discipline necessary for this.

MH: What was it like after you had completed the march?

Gordon: The train ride to Capas was another horrific experience, as men were jammed into each boxcar and the doors closed tightly. Men died standing up. One of our guards did open the door to let a little air in during the slow ride. Filipinos attempted to throw food into the car when it slowed down. Those standing in the doorway caught the food and ate all they could catch—nothing was passed back to anyone. Another instance of every man for himself. Arriving in Capas, we unloaded seven dead men from my car and proceeded to march another 10 kilometers to Camp O’Donnell.

MH: After having survived the Death March, how did you end up in Japan?

Gordon: Our first extended stop was in Camp O’Donnell, and it was there that I almost died from malaria. A buddy of mine, Fred Pavia of New Jersey, stole some quinine and saved my life, only to succumb to malaria and die himself three weeks later. My next “home” was Camp Cabanatuan, where I was placed on the grave-digging detail. The guards at Cabanatuan placed the head of a soldier who attempted to escape on a 20-foot pole, which they marched down the center of the camp as a warning. Soon after this grim reminder, we prisoners were placed in groups of 10. If one man escaped, the remaining nine in his group were shot. My malaria returned at Cabanatuan, and I became so ill that an American doctor recommended I volunteer for a work party going to Japan. On his recommendation, I was moved to Bilibid Civil Prison in Manila on October 31, 1942, awaiting shipment to Japan. Housed in this prison was a complete dental unit that had been captured on Corregidor. Imagine, Army and Navy dentists, with all their equipment, including dental chairs, and clean starched uniforms! For a while, we actually imagined we were back home in a dental clinic. Prisoners being moved to Japan were offered the chance to have their teeth checked. For me that meant a half-hour in a chair while two teeth were pulled and one was filled. In my three years in Japan, I never had a toothache.

MH: What was the voyage to Japan like?

Gordon: My ship, Nagato Maru , sailed on November 7, 1942. I was three decks below, in the pitch-black hold of the ship. For 20 days we suffered with no toilet facilities, save for five-gallon buckets that they would pass down to us every four or five hours. We were given rice and fish for the first few days and then just rice. Water was passed down in five-gallon drums once a day. Thirteen men died during that voyage. Just outside Manila we were attacked by a submarine. The Japanese took the few life preservers left in the hold and put them on boxes containing the ashes of their own dead. We survived the attack, but by this time many were hoping a torpedo would have hit us.

MH: What awaited you in Japan?

Gordon: My new home was Mitsushima, a village in the town of Hiraoka, where I would spend the next three years—three years of misery, freezing every winter. We had no heat and scarce rations. We were employed as slave laborers, building a hydroelectric power dam, which is still in use today. Eventually, I was placed in charge of a 40-man work detail for a civilian contractor handling cement for the dam and was held responsible in every way for their actions. On one occasion a number of the men refused to do some extra work. We were all taken into the camp and forced to stand at attention until the main body of the prisoners returned. Then we were beaten in front of the inmates. I was placed in solitary confinement for three days and two nights because of my men’s refusal to work.

No one knows what freedom means until one loses it. Retired Army Maj. Richard Gordon

MH: Can you describe your feelings when you were released?

Gordon: I was returned to American military control on September 4, 1945, after more than 3 1/2 years of captivity. We were taken to Arai, a town on the Japanese coast. There we were met by U.S. Navy personnel wearing strange-looking helmets and carrying strange-looking weapons, which turned out to be M1 carbines. Placed in landing ships, we saw the American flag for the first time in more than three years. It was at that moment that I realized how much my country meant to me. We had placed our faith in our country, and our country had kept that faith by bringing us home. I don’t think there was a dry eye in the boat after seeing the Stars and Stripes. From that moment on, I was on a high and did not come down for a year.

MH: Corregidor has sometimes been associated with the Bataan Death March, but you have said that that is not true. How so?

Gordon: In 1982, a joint resolution of Congress honored the men of Bataan and Corregidor who made the Death March, but Congress was unaware that Corregidor had not surrendered until May 6, by which time the Death March was over. Nobody in its garrison participated in that march. For the past 40-odd years, many have assumed Bataan, Corregidor and the Death March to be interrelated. In fact, Corregidor had no connection with the Death March whatsoever.

MH: Any final comments on your experience?

Gordon: No one knows what freedom means until one loses it. Most Americans take it for granted, forgetting that thousands and thousands of their fellow Americans died to give them that freedom. We in Bataan paid our price for our country’s freedom, and most of us would do it all over again if we had to. Many returned sick and died shortly after the war. Many, even today, are seeking something from their country to ‘pay’ for their suffering. They, too, have forgotten that freedom is not free. For my part, I was a Regular Army soldier. I enlisted. I asked for the Philippines. Everything that happened was of my doing. I have no regrets, and my country does not owe me anything.

Each April, the Annual Memorial Bataan Death March is held in White Sands, N.M. Individuals from all over the world march for 25 miles in the White Sands Desert to honor the memory of Bataan’s defenders.

This article was written by John P. Cervone and originally published in the December ’99 issue of Military History magazine. Sergeant John P. Cervone is a a charter member of the Philippine Scouts Heritage Society, an organization dedicated to the troops who fought in the Philippines during WWII. For further reading, try: Give Us This Day , by Sidney Stewart; and Surviving Bataan and Beyond: Colonel Irwin Alexander’s Odyssey as a Japanese Prisoner of War , edited by Dominic J. Caraccilo.For more great articles be sure to subscribe to Military History magazine today!

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January 17, 1945

Death March from Auschwitz

As Soviet troops approach, SS units begin the final evacuation of prisoners from the  Auschwitz  camp complex, marching them on foot toward the interior of the German Reich. These forced evacuations come to be called “ death marches .”

In mid-January 1945, as Soviet forces approached the Auschwitz concentration camp complex, the SS began evacuating Auschwitz and its subcamps. SS units forced nearly 60,000 prisoners to march west from the Auschwitz camp system. Thousands had been killed in the camps in the days before these death marches began. Tens of thousands of prisoners, mostly Jews, were forced to march either northwest for 55 kilometers (approximately 30 miles) to Gliwice (Gleiwitz), joined by prisoners from subcamps in East Upper Silesia, such as Bismarckhuette, Althammer, and Hindenburg, or due west for 63 kilometers (approximately 35 miles) to Wodzislaw (Loslau) in the western part of Upper Silesia, joined by inmates from the subcamps to the south of Auschwitz, such as Jawischowitz, Tschechowitz, and Golleschau. SS guards shot anyone who fell behind or could not continue. Prisoners also suffered from the cold weather, starvation, and exposure on these marches. At least 3,000 prisoners died on route to Gliwice alone; possibly as many as 15,000 prisoners died during the evacuation marches from Auschwitz and the subcamps.

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"To Sympathize and Exploit": Filipinos, Americans, and the Bataan Death March

The Bataan Death March of 1942 has entered historical consciousness as one of the ultimate measures of Japanese wartime barbarity. At a level bound up with deference to the veterans who experienced such hardship, a compelling reality emerges: Helpless Americans marched under the watchful eyes and cruel bayonets of the Japanese oppressor, and the Filipinos, in despair over the defeat of their defenders, wept in sympathy as they watched. The pattern reinforces pleasing notions of a benevolent colonial relation, the "good war" against a barbarous enemy, and loyal allies enlisted in a righteous cause. Yet thousands of men, women, and children of three nationalities and various classes participated in the complex drama that came to represent the Death March. Their complexity demands an interpretation that goes beyond the simplicity of "oppressor – victim – sympathetic observer." This article finds another story which does not replace the first but which includes American racism and colonial support for Filipino elites, and Filipino divisiveness, poverty, resentment, and Death March exploitation of American weakness and need.

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First all-female team runs in Bataan Memorial Death March

On April 9 th , 1942, tens of thousands of American and Filipino troops became prisoners of war to Japan during World War II; six were known Clemson Alumni, including Col. Ben Skardon. The troops were forced to march North 65 miles by their captors in brutal conditions to confinement camps located across the Philippines. Throughout both the Bataan Death March and imprisonment, an estimated total of 17,000 men died.

To honor the men who lost their lives during this infamous event, the first Bataan Memorial Death March was hosted in 1989. Sponsored by the Army ROTC Department at New Mexico State University, the participation for the event has grown over the years. Starting with around 100 marchers in 1989, the average number has increased to an estimated 9,600 marchers.

This year, for the first time ever, a team of all-female Clemson students will fly out to New Mexico in March to participate in the memorial, running the 26.2-mile course. Before flying out to New Mexico, Clemson University will host the Clemson 8 Challenge, another memorial event to honor the six Bataan Death March alumni and other Clemson alumni POWs. This event raises money for endowments dedicated to the ROTC program, including sending teams to the Bataan Memorial Death March. The women have been relentlessly training for the past couple of months for the memorial and are humbled by the opportunity to pay tribute to the participants of the death march.

Alexa Gubanich, 2024

Alexa Gubanich, a senior landscape architecture major, has been involved in the Clemson Army ROTC since her first year. Originally a resident of Fairfax, Virginia, she grew up with her parents and twin sister, Janna. Going into college, Gubanich knew she wanted to attend a university with a strong ROTC program prior to her time at Clemson. She applied and received a ROTC scholarship and chose Clemson to be her new home.

Since Gubanich started in 2020, she has been committed to the program and found a community amongst the female cadets. With the upcoming memorial, Gubanich is excited to participate with her teammates. “It’s truly such an opportunity that I never thought I would be able to partake in. I am part of an incredibly supportive team that I am so thankful for. With Clemson’s military heritage in mind, like the six Clemson POWs and Col. Ben Skardon, it’s truly an inspiration that will keep me going during the memorial. ”

Janna Gubanich, 2024

Janna Gubanich is a criminal justice major from Fairfax, Virginia. During high school, a family friend went through the ROTC scholarship process, and Gubanich decided to apply as well. When she visited Clemson, she fell in love with the school and the ROTC program, where she found a supportive community. Gubanich and her friends, including her twin sister Alexa, aspired to run a marathon together. Coupled with their ambition and the inspiration from Colonel Skardon and other soldiers during the Bataan Death March, they decided to participate in the memorial this year as the first all-female team.

The Bataan Memorial Death March is impactful on Gubanich, as she will soon be commissioned after graduating. “Over the course of my time in ROTC, some of our most difficult rucks and physical events have created long lasting friendships for me and showed how supportive and a selfless people can be. Throughout the Bataan race, there are stops dedicated to different soldiers who were in the actual Bataan March. I want to hear their stories and share them with friends and family to keep their stories and traditions alive.”

Tate Lewis , 2025

Tate Lewis, a third-year parks, recreations, and tourism management major is excited to run in the Bataan Memorial Death March this year. Originally from Fairfax, Virginia, she has participated in sports, including lacrosse and basketball since high school. When transitioning to higher-level education, she knew she wanted to join ROTC to give herself structure while also honoring her country. Since she has fallen in love with the program and the friendships she has made.

She is looking forward to the Bataan Memorial Death March, as it is another way she can honor those who passed. “The Bataan Memorial Death March will impact me by being able to remember those that lost their lives during this tragic event, but also to honor the 6 Clemson alumni that survived it. In this time before the marathon, I’ve been able to learn and connect with Clemson’s military history on a whole new level.”

Caroline Yell, 2026

Caroline Yell is a second-year landscape architecture major who grew up with her family in Pittsboro, North Carolina. Yell began her love of running as early as fifth grade, running her first ultramarathon when she was 12. She grew up volunteering regularly at her local food pantry, church, high school, and other organizations. When deciding on her path following her high school career, she chose to apply for the ROTC scholarship and join Clemson’s Fighting Battalion to continue to serve her community.

With the upcoming memorial, Yell explains how her time at Clemson has influenced her. “After joining Tiger Platoon and Scabbard and Blade, two military history and service clubs, I realized just how important it was. Hearing about the countless alumni who went through the ROTC program, joined the Army, and made an impact in the world inspires me every day. This desire to do something great and make an impact, just like those before me, inspired me to participate in the Bataan Memorial Death March.”

Erin Sweeney, 2027

Erin Sweeney, a first-year history major from Haymarket, Virginia, was inspired to join ROTC by her brother, who is an officer in the infantry. Sweeney was awarded an Army ROTC National Scholarship and has since found a love for ROTC, the structure and the community found within it. She is currently involved in a club lacrosse team in addition to ROTC and the Ranger Challenge Team. She expressed her gratefulness to the support system she has found in her teammates, saying how she immediately felt welcomed when she started her year in August.

 The historical significance of the Bataan Memorial Death March is important to her as she prepares for the upcoming trip to New Mexico. “The significance of the Bataan Memorial Death March will truly provide me with a perspective of pain and perseverance as the American POWs marched 70 miles without food or water,” she explains. “During the race, my team and I will have access to food and water, and keeping in mind the fact that the POWs had no access to basic necessities like that will push me even further to complete the race to honor their pain and sacrifice. “

To find out more about how to support the women featured in this article, visit the Clemson 8 website to sign up for the race or the donation link for the trip.

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• Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/survivors-of-holocaust-and-oct-7-attack-join-memorial-march-at-auschwitz-death-camp

Survivors of Holocaust and Oct. 7 attack join memorial march at Auschwitz death camp

OSWIECIM, Poland (AP) — Holocaust survivors and survivors of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel were among thousands who took part Monday in the March of the Living, a yearly memorial march at the site of Auschwitz that honors the 6 million Jews killed by Nazi Germany and celebrates the state of Israel.

This year, the mood at the march was overshadowed by the war in Gaza after the October attack on Israel by Hamas, the deadliest violence against Jews since Adolf Hitler’s regime sought to destroy the entire Jewish population of Europe.

That attack, in which Hamas militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took some 250 people hostage, unleashed a deadly Israeli offensive that has killed over 34,000 Palestinians, destroyed much of Gaza and pushed hundreds of thousands of people to the brink of famine.

READ MORE: Israel examining Gaza cease-fire proposal, but framework differs from its offer

Israel’s Gaza offensive has been fueling pro-Palestinian protests, including at many U.S. campuses. Israel and its supporters have branded the protests as antisemitic, while critics of Israel say it uses such allegations to silence opponents.

While some protesters have been caught on camera making antisemitic remarks or violent threats, organizers of the protests, some of whom are Jewish, say it is a peaceful movement aimed at defending Palestinian rights and protesting the war.

In the Polish town of Oswiecim, a small group of pro-Palestinian protesters waving Palestinian flags stood along the side of the road as participants marched with Israeli flags from the Auschwitz site in the Polish town of Oswiecim to that of Birkenau about 3 kilometers (2 miles) away. The area was under German occupation during World War II and today the former death camps are preserved as memorials by the Polish state.

“Through this protest we want to say that we bow down to the victims of the Holocaust too,” said Omar Faris, president of an association of Palestinians in Poland. “At the same time, we demand an end to war, an end to genocide.”

WATCH: How some colleges and students have reached agreements over pro-Palestinian protests

The march took place on what is Holocaust Remembrance Day in the Jewish calendar. A grim landscape of watchtowers and barracks were filled with the blue and white of Israeli flags, a celebration of Jewish survival at the place of genocide.

The event, now in its 36th year, usually draws thousands of participants, including Holocaust survivors and Jewish students, leaders and politicians. This year, Israeli hostages released from captivity in Gaza and families whose relatives are still being held captive also joined.

Judith Tzamir, a Holocaust survivor from Germany who moved to Israel in 1964, had long avoided visiting Auschwitz. But she was inspired to join this year’s march after her kibbutz fended off an attack by Hamas on Oct. 7

“See, I try not to remember it all the time. But on the 7th of October they brought me the remembrance very, very harshly back,” she told The Associated Press at the site of the former death camp. “And that was a moment when I decided, ‘okay, this is the time you should go to Auschwitz.’ To see it, even to myself, to remember it again.”

Amid the backdrop of pro-Palestinian protests that have roiled American campuses, Rabbi Ari Berman, president of Yeshiva University in New York, led a delegation of leaders from Catholic, Evangelical and historically Black colleges and universities.

“The message here is clear. The dangers of allowing hate to go unchecked are real. And we don’t need to get to the cattle cars in order for it to be unconscionable and unacceptable,” he said, referring to the cattle cars used to transport Jews to their deaths at camps under German wartime occupation.

He said it was essential for university leaders “to call out, and in no uncertain terms, when there is intimidation and hate and antisemitism. We’re seeing it on campuses and college campuses, and it needs to have a response.”

Some who had planned to attend had to cancel to deal with the protests at home, Berman told the AP, though he did not name them.

Vanessa Gera reported from Warsaw.

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The yearly memorial march at the former death camp at Auschwitz overshadowed by the Israel-Hamas war

U.S. university presidents joined Holocaust survivors and thousands of Israelis on Monday for the March of the Living, a yearly memorial march at the site of Auschwitz that honors the 6 million Jews killed by Nazi Germany and celebrates the state of Israel. (AP video/Rafal Niedzielski)

People walk through the former Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau as they attend the annual Holocaust remembrance event, the “March of the Living” in memory of the six million Holocaust victims in Oswiecim, Poland, Monday, May 6, 2024. The event comes amid the dramatic backdrop of the violence of the Israel-Hamas war after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, the deadliest violence against Jews since the Holocaust, and as pro-Palestinian protests sweep U.S. campuses. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

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People sit on the train tracks at the former Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau as they attend the annual Holocaust remembrance event, the “March of the Living” in memory of the six million Holocaust victims in Oswiecim, Poland, Monday, May 6, 2024. The event comes amid the dramatic backdrop of the violence of the Israel-Hamas war after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, the deadliest violence against Jews since the Holocaust, and as pro-Palestinian protests sweep U.S. campuses. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

A man walks through the former Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau in Oswiecim, Poland, Monday, May 6, 2024 during the annual Holocaust remembrance event, the “March of the Living” in memory of the six million Holocaust victims. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

People holding an Israeli flag pose for a photo at the former Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau in Oswiecim, Poland, Monday, May 6, 2024 during the annual Holocaust remembrance event, the “March of the Living” in memory of the six million Holocaust victims. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

People carry Israel’s flags as they march through the former Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau during the annual Holocaust remembrance event, the “March of the Living” in memory of the six million Holocaust victims in Oswiecim, Poland, Monday, May 6, 2024. The event comes amid the dramatic backdrop of the violence of the Israel-Hamas war after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, the deadliest violence against Jews since the Holocaust, and as pro-Palestinian protests sweep U.S. campuses. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

A man holds Israel’s flag at the former Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau during the annual Holocaust remembrance event, the “March of the Living” in memory of the six million Holocaust victims in Oswiecim, Poland, Monday, May 6, 2024. The event comes amid the dramatic backdrop of the violence of the Israel-Hamas war after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, the deadliest violence against Jews since the Holocaust, and as pro-Palestinian protests sweep U.S. campuses. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

People pose for a photo at the former Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau as they attend the annual Holocaust remembrance event, the “March of the Living” in memory of the six million Holocaust victims in Oswiecim, Poland, Monday, May 6, 2024. The event comes amid the dramatic backdrop of the violence of the Israel-Hamas war after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, the deadliest violence against Jews since the Holocaust, and as pro-Palestinian protests sweep U.S. campuses. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

People attend the annual Holocaust remembrance event, the “March of the Living” in memory of the six million Holocaust victims in Oswiecim, Poland, Monday, May 6, 2024. The event comes amid the dramatic backdrop of the violence of the Israel-Hamas war after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, the deadliest violence against Jews since the Holocaust, and as pro-Palestinian protests sweep U.S. campuses. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

Protesters wave Palestinian flags as the annual Holocaust remembrance event, the “March of the Living” in memory of the six million Holocaust victims takes place in Oswiecim, Poland, Monday, May 6, 2024. The event comes amid the dramatic backdrop of the violence of the Israel-Hamas war after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, the deadliest violence against Jews since the Holocaust, and as pro-Palestinian protests sweep U.S. campuses. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

People attend a ceremony at the former Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau during the annual Holocaust remembrance event, the “March of the Living” in memory of the six million Holocaust victims in Oswiecim, Poland, Monday, May 6, 2024. The event comes amid the dramatic backdrop of the violence of the Israel-Hamas war after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, the deadliest violence against Jews since the Holocaust, and as pro-Palestinian protests sweep U.S. campuses. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

Holocaust survivors attend a ceremony at the former Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau during the annual Holocaust remembrance event, the “March of the Living” in memory of the six million Holocaust victims in Oswiecim, Poland, Monday, May 6, 2024. The event comes amid the dramatic backdrop of the violence of the Israel-Hamas war after the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, the deadliest violence against Jews since the Holocaust, and as pro-Palestinian protests sweep U.S. campuses. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

OSWIECIM, Poland (AP) — Holocaust survivors and survivors of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel were among thousands who took part Monday in the March of the Living, a yearly memorial march at the site of Auschwitz that honors the 6 million Jews killed by Nazi Germany and celebrates the state of Israel.

This year, the mood at the march was overshadowed by the war in Gaza after the October attack on Israel by Hamas, the deadliest violence against Jews since Adolf Hitler’s regime sought to destroy the entire Jewish population of Europe.

That attack, in which Hamas militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took some 250 people hostage, unleashed a deadly Israeli offensive that has killed over 34,000 Palestinians, destroyed much of Gaza and pushed hundreds of thousands of people to the brink of famine.

Israel’s Gaza offensive has been fueling pro-Palestinian protests, including at many U.S. campuses . Israel and its supporters have branded the protests as antisemitic, while critics of Israel say it uses such allegations to silence opponents.

While some protesters have been caught on camera making antisemitic remarks or violent threats, organizers of the protests, some of whom are Jewish, say it is a peaceful movement aimed at defending Palestinian rights and protesting the war.

In the Polish town of Oswiecim, a small group of pro-Palestinian protesters waving Palestinian flags stood along the side of the road as participants marched with Israeli flags from the Auschwitz site in the Polish town of Oswiecim to that of Birkenau about 3 kilometers (2 miles) away. The area was under German occupation during World War II and today the former death camps are preserved as memorials by the Polish state.

AP AUDIO: The yearly memorial march at the former death camp at Auschwitz overshadowed by the Israel-Hamas war

AP correspondent Jackie Quinn reports on an 80-year-old Holocaust survivor from Israel, marching to the site of the death camps in Poland, to commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day.

“Through this protest we want to say that we bow down to the victims of the Holocaust too,” said Omar Faris, president of an association of Palestinians in Poland. “At the same time, we demand an end to war, an end to genocide.”

The march took place on what is Holocaust Remembrance Day in the Jewish calendar. A grim landscape of watchtowers and barracks were filled with the blue and white of Israeli flags, a celebration of Jewish survival at the place of genocide.

The event, now in its 36th year, usually draws thousands of participants, including Holocaust survivors and Jewish students, leaders and politicians. This year, Israeli hostages released from captivity in Gaza and families whose relatives are still being held captive also joined.

Judith Tzamir, a Holocaust survivor from Germany who moved to Israel in 1964, had long avoided visiting Auschwitz. But she was inspired to join this year’s march after her kibbutz fended off an attack by Hamas on Oct. 7

“See, I try not to remember it all the time. But on the 7th of October they brought me the remembrance very, very harshly back,” she told The Associated Press at the site of the former death camp. “And that was a moment when I decided, ‘okay, this is the time you should go to Auschwitz.’ To see it, even to myself, to remember it again.”

Amid the backdrop of pro-Palestinian protests that have roiled American campuses, Rabbi Ari Berman, president of Yeshiva University in New York, led a delegation of leaders from Catholic, Evangelical and historically Black colleges and universities.

“The message here is clear. The dangers of allowing hate to go unchecked are real. And we don’t need to get to the cattle cars in order for it to be unconscionable and unacceptable,” he said, referring to the cattle cars used to transport Jews to their deaths at camps under German wartime occupation.

He said it was essential for university leaders “to call out, and in no uncertain terms, when there is intimidation and hate and antisemitism. We’re seeing it on campuses and college campuses, and it needs to have a response.”

Some who had planned to attend had to cancel to deal with the protests at home, Berman told the AP, though he did not name them.

Vanessa Gera reported from Warsaw.

The yearly memorial march at the former death camp at Auschwitz overshadowed by the Israel-Hamas war

U.S. university presidents have joined Holocaust survivors and thousands of Israelis for a yearly memorial march at the site of Auschwitz

OSWIECIM, Poland -- Holocaust survivors and survivors of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel were among thousands who took part Monday in the March of the Living, a yearly memorial march at the site of Auschwitz that honors the 6 million Jews killed by Nazi Germany and celebrates the state of Israel.

This year, the mood at the march was overshadowed by the war in Gaza after the October attack on Israel by Hamas, the deadliest violence against Jews since Adolf Hitler's regime sought to destroy the entire Jewish population of Europe.

That attack, in which Hamas militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took some 250 people hostage, unleashed a deadly Israeli offensive that has killed over 34,000 Palestinians, destroyed much of Gaza and pushed hundreds of thousands of people to the brink of famine.

Israel's Gaza offensive has been fueling pro-Palestinian protests, including at many U.S. campuses. Israel and its supporters have branded the protests as antisemitic, while critics of Israel say it uses such allegations to silence opponents.

While some protesters have been caught on camera making antisemitic remarks or violent threats, organizers of the protests, some of whom are Jewish, say it is a peaceful movement aimed at defending Palestinian rights and protesting the war.

In the Polish town of Oswiecim, a small group of pro-Palestinian protesters waving Palestinian flags stood along the side of the road as participants marched with Israeli flags from the Auschwitz site in the Polish town of Oswiecim to that of Birkenau about 3 kilometers (2 miles) away. The area was under German occupation during World War II and today the former death camps are preserved as memorials by the Polish state.

“Through this protest we want to say that we bow down to the victims of the Holocaust too," said Omar Faris, president of an association of Palestinians in Poland. "At the same time, we demand an end to war, an end to genocide.”

The march took place on what is Holocaust Remembrance Day in the Jewish calendar. A grim landscape of watchtowers and barracks were filled with the blue and white of Israeli flags, a celebration of Jewish survival at the place of genocide.

The event, now in its 36th year, usually draws thousands of participants, including Holocaust survivors and Jewish students, leaders and politicians. This year, Israeli hostages released from captivity in Gaza and families whose relatives are still being held captive also joined.

Judith Tzamir, a Holocaust survivor from Germany who moved to Israel in 1964, had long avoided visiting Auschwitz. But she was inspired to join this year's march after her kibbutz fended off an attack by Hamas on Oct. 7

“See, I try not to remember it all the time. But on the 7th of October they brought me the remembrance very, very harshly back," she told The Associated Press at the site of the former death camp. "And that was a moment when I decided, ‘okay, this is the time you should go to Auschwitz.’ To see it, even to myself, to remember it again.”

Amid the backdrop of pro-Palestinian protests that have roiled American campuses, Rabbi Ari Berman, president of Yeshiva University in New York, led a delegation of leaders from Catholic, Evangelical and historically Black colleges and universities.

“The message here is clear. The dangers of allowing hate to go unchecked are real. And we don’t need to get to the cattle cars in order for it to be unconscionable and unacceptable,” he said, referring to the cattle cars used to transport Jews to their deaths at camps under German wartime occupation.

He said it was essential for university leaders “to call out, and in no uncertain terms, when there is intimidation and hate and antisemitism . We’re seeing it on campuses and college campuses, and it needs to have a response.”

Some who had planned to attend had to cancel to deal with the protests at home, Berman told the AP, though he did not name them.

Vanessa Gera reported from Warsaw.

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The yearly memorial march at the former death camp at Auschwitz overshadowed by the Israel-Hamas war

U.S. university presidents have joined Holocaust survivors and thousands of Israelis for a yearly memorial march at the site of Auschwitz

OSWIECIM, Poland — Holocaust survivors and survivors of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel were among thousands who took part Monday in the March of the Living, a yearly memorial march at the site of Auschwitz that honors the 6 million Jews killed by Nazi Germany and celebrates the state of Israel.

This year, the mood at the march was overshadowed by the war in Gaza after the October attack on Israel by Hamas , the deadliest violence against Jews since Adolf Hitler’s regime sought to destroy the entire Jewish population of Europe.

That attack, in which Hamas militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took some 250 people hostage, unleashed a deadly Israeli offensive that has killed over 34,000 Palestinians, destroyed much of Gaza and pushed hundreds of thousands of people to the brink of famine.

Israel’s Gaza offensive has been fueling pro-Palestinian protests, including at many U.S. campuses . Israel and its supporters have branded the protests as antisemitic, while critics of Israel say it uses such allegations to silence opponents.

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While some protesters have been caught on camera making antisemitic remarks or violent threats, organizers of the protests, some of whom are Jewish, say it is a peaceful movement aimed at defending Palestinian rights and protesting the war.

In the Polish town of Oswiecim, a small group of pro-Palestinian protesters waving Palestinian flags stood along the side of the road as participants marched with Israeli flags from the Auschwitz site in the Polish town of Oswiecim to that of Birkenau about 3 kilometers (2 miles) away. The area was under German occupation during World War II and today the former death camps are preserved as memorials by the Polish state.

“Through this protest we want to say that we bow down to the victims of the Holocaust too,” said Omar Faris, president of an association of Palestinians in Poland. “At the same time, we demand an end to war, an end to genocide.”

The march took place on what is Holocaust Remembrance Day in the Jewish calendar. A grim landscape of watchtowers and barracks were filled with the blue and white of Israeli flags, a celebration of Jewish survival at the place of genocide.

The event, now in its 36th year, usually draws thousands of participants, including Holocaust survivors and Jewish students, leaders and politicians. This year, Israeli hostages released from captivity in Gaza and families whose relatives are still being held captive also joined.

Judith Tzamir, a Holocaust survivor from Germany who moved to Israel in 1964, had long avoided visiting Auschwitz. But she was inspired to join this year’s march after her kibbutz fended off an attack by Hamas on Oct. 7

“See, I try not to remember it all the time. But on the 7th of October they brought me the remembrance very, very harshly back,” she told The Associated Press at the site of the former death camp. “And that was a moment when I decided, ‘okay, this is the time you should go to Auschwitz.’ To see it, even to myself, to remember it again.”

Amid the backdrop of pro-Palestinian protests that have roiled American campuses, Rabbi Ari Berman, president of Yeshiva University in New York, led a delegation of leaders from Catholic, Evangelical and historically Black colleges and universities.

“The message here is clear. The dangers of allowing hate to go unchecked are real. And we don’t need to get to the cattle cars in order for it to be unconscionable and unacceptable,” he said, referring to the cattle cars used to transport Jews to their deaths at camps under German wartime occupation.

He said it was essential for university leaders “to call out, and in no uncertain terms, when there is intimidation and hate and antisemitism. We’re seeing it on campuses and college campuses, and it needs to have a response.”

Some who had planned to attend had to cancel to deal with the protests at home, Berman told the AP, though he did not name them.

Vanessa Gera reported from Warsaw.

Watch CBS News

Pregnancy-related deaths fall to pre-pandemic levels, new CDC data shows

Updated on: May 3, 2024 / 4:51 PM EDT / AP

U.S. pregnancy-related deaths have fallen back to pre-pandemic levels, new government data suggests.

About 680 women died last year during pregnancy or shortly after childbirth, according to provisional CDC data. That's down from 817 deaths in 2022 and 1,205 in 2021, when it was the highest level in more than 50 years.

COVID-19 seems to be the main explanation for the improvement, said Donna Hoyert, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention maternal mortality researcher.

The coronavirus can be particularly dangerous to pregnant women. And, in the worst days of the pandemic, burned out physicians may have added to the risk by ignoring pregnant women's worries, experts say.

Fewer death certificates are mentioning COVID-19  as a contributor to pregnancy-related deaths . The count was over 400 in 2021 but fewer than 10 last year, Hoyert said.

The agency on Thursday released a report detailing the final maternal mortality data for 2022. It also recently released provisional data for 2023. Those numbers are expected to change after further analysis — the final 2022 number was 11% higher than the provisional one . Still, 2023 is expected to end up down from 2022, Hoyert said.

The CDC counts women who die while pregnant, during childbirth and up to 42 days after birth from conditions considered related to pregnancy. Excessive bleeding, blood vessel blockages and infections are leading causes.

There were about 19 maternal deaths for every 100,000 live births in 2023, according to the provisional data. That's in line with rates seen in 2018 and 2019.

But racial disparities remain: The death rate in Black moms is more than two-and-a-half times higher than that of white and Hispanic mothers.

"In the last five years we've really not improved on lowering the maternal death rate in our country, so there's still a lot of work to do," said Ashley Stoneburner, the March of Dimes' director of applied research and analytics.

The advocacy organization this week kicked off an education campaign to get more pregnant women to consider taking low-dose aspirin if they are at risk of preeclempsia — a high blood pressure disorder that can harm both the mother and baby.

There are other efforts that may be helping to lower deaths and lingering health problems related to pregnancy, including stepped-up efforts to fight infections and address blood loss, said Dr. Laura Riley, a New York City-based obstetrician who handles high-risk pregnancies.

But there's a risk that those kinds of improvements are being offset by a number of factors that may reduce the ability of women to get medical care before, during and after a birth, she said. Experts say the list includes the closure of rural hospitals and a 2022 U.S. Supreme Court decision that did away with the federally established right to abortion — and contributed to physician burnout by causing doctors to feel constrained about providing care during pregnancy-related medical emergencies.

"I think there's good news. We're making strides in certain areas," said Riley, head OB-GYN at Weill Cornell Medicine. "But the bad news and scary news is ... there are these other political and social forces that make this (reducing maternal deaths) difficult."

• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

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