Now available in paperback, Death on the Hellships chronicles the true dimensions of the Allied POW experience at sea. It is a disturbing story; many believe the Bataan Death March even pales by comparison. Survivors describe their ordeal in the Japanese hellships as the absolute worst experience of their captivity. Crammed by the thousands into the holds of the ships, moved from island to island and put to work, they endured all the horrors of the prison camps magnified tenfold. Gregory Michno draws on American, British, Australian, and Dutch POW accounts as well as Japanese convoy histories, declassified radio intelligence reports, and a wealth of archival sources to present a detailed picture of the horror.

A thrilling tale of incredible courage and resilience, a true wartime story of William Ash. The Cooler King is at once uplifting and inspirational, and stands as a testament to the durability of decent values and the invincible spirit of liberty. The Cooler King tells the astonishing story of William Ash, an American flyer brought up in Depression-hit Texas, who after being shot down in his Spitfire over France in early 1942 spent the rest of the war defying the Nazis by striving to escape from every prisoner of war camp in which he was incarcerated. Alongside William Ash is a cast of fascinating characters, including Douglas Bader, Roger Bushell, who would go on to lead the Great Escape, and Paddy Barthropp, a dashing Battle of Britain pilot who despite his very different background became Ash's best friend and shared many of his adventures. Using contemporary documents and interviews with Ash's comrades, Patrick Bishop vividly recreates the multiple escape attempts, while also examining the P.O.W. experience and analysing the passion that drove some prisoners to risk death in repeated bids for freedom.

This book examines attitudes towards German held captive in Britain, drawing on original archival material including newspaper and newsreel content, diaries, sociological surveys and opinion polls, as well as official documentation and the archives of pressure groups and protest movements. Moving beyond conventional assessments of POW treatment which have focused on the development of policy, diplomatic relations, and the experience of the POWs themselves, this study refocuses the debate onto the attitude of the British public towards the standard of treatment of German POWs. In so doing, it reveals that the issue of POW treatment intersected with discussions of state power, human rights, gender relations, civility, and national character.

During the Civil War, 410,000 people were held as prisoners of war on both sides. With resources strained by the unprecedented number of prisoners, conditions in overcrowded prison camps were dismal, and the death toll across Confederate and Union prisons reached 56,000 by the end of the war. In an attempt to improve prison conditions, President Lincoln issued General Orders 100, which would become the basis for future attempts to define the rights of prisoners, including the Geneva conventions. Meanwhile, stories of horrific prison experiences fueled political agendas on both sides, and would define the memory of the war, as each region worked aggressively to defend its prison record and to honor its own POWs. Robins and Springer examine the experience, culture, and politics of captivity, including war crimes, disease, and the use of former prison sites as locations of historical memory. Transforming Civil War Prisons introduces students to an underappreciated yet crucial aspect of waging war and shows how the legacy of Civil War prisons remains with us today.

During the Civil War, 410,000 people were held as prisoners of war on both sides. With resources strained by the unprecedented number of prisoners, conditions in overcrowded prison camps were dismal, and the death toll across Confederate and Union prisons reached 56,000 by the end of the war. In an attempt to improve prison conditions, President Lincoln issued General Orders 100, which would become the basis for future attempts to define the rights of prisoners, including the Geneva conventions. Meanwhile, stories of horrific prison experiences fueled political agendas on both sides, and would define the memory of the war, as each region worked aggressively to defend its prison record and to honor its own POWs. Robins and Springer examine the experience, culture, and politics of captivity, including war crimes, disease, and the use of former prison sites as locations of historical memory. Transforming Civil War Prisons introduces students to an underappreciated yet crucial aspect of waging war and shows how the legacy of Civil War prisons remains with us today.

Bernice Archer's comparative study of the experiences of the Western civilians interned by the Japanese in mixed family camps and sexually segregated camps in the Far East, combines a wide variety of conventional and unconventional source material. This includes contemporary War, Foreign and Colonial Office papers, diaries, letters, camp newspapers and artefacts, post-war medical, engineering and educational reports, biographies, autobiographies, memoirs and over fifty oral interviews with ex-internees. Using contemporary personal accounts, the shock of the Japanese victories and the devastating experience of capture are highlighted. This book also covers wider issues such as the role of women in war, gender and war, children and war, colonial culture, oral history, and war and memory.

This book, one of the first ever written on its subject, focuses on Russian America and American Alaska and their impact on the native population. From the closing years of the 17th century when the Russians first set foot on the shores of the far-flung Aleutian Islands, through the war years, to the reparations hearings of the late 1970s, it sheds light on the little-known story of the Aleut people and the events in war and peace that shaped their lives. The actions that led to the internments of the Aleuts are documented through official records, letters, and personal accounts that reveal the true story of a native people who suffered and died in the camps while posing no threat to national security in time of war. Dozens of books have been written about the internment of Japanese Americans. Many Americans are familiar with that story but are unaware of the internment of native Alaskans in camps that in some cases were almost as bad as the Japanese POW camps.

On August 7, 1862, George Alfred Hitchcock, who was born in Ashby, Massachusetts on January 15, 1844, left Ashby looking forward to a reunion with his older brother, Henry Sparhawk Hitchcock, and membership in Company A, 21st Massachusetts Infantry. From this date until January 1, 1865, Hitchcock composed a personal narrative, keeping a meticulous, detailed record of his daily activities in pocket diaries. His first experience in battle was at Fox' Gap on South Mountain, and then by an attack across Burnside's Bridge at Antietam. This was followed by the disastrous Union advance toward Marye's Heights at Fredericksburg; a journey by rail to Paris, Kentucky via Pittsburgh, Columbus (detailed conflict of drunken 21st soldiers with local security) and Cincinnati; the protection of the Mount Sterling, Kentucky, area from guerrillas; an expedition from Camp Nelson through the Cumberland Gap to Eastern Tennessee; the skirmishes and battles in Burnside's Knoxville campaign; the arduous return march to Camp Nelson during a severe winter with Confederate prisoners; the persistent effort to regain his health and then his return to the 21st Regiment; and an compelling personal account of his capture at Cold Harbor and imprisonment at Andersonville, Georgia, Millen, Georgia and Florence, South Carolina; and finally, his release and life after 1865.

This is a documentary work offering a first-person account of a Union soldier's daily adversity while a prisoner of war from 20 September 1863 to 4 June 1865. In 1891, while a patient at the Leavenworth National Home, Irish immigrant Edward Glennan began to write down his experiences in vivid detail, describing the months of malnutrition, exposure, disease and self-doubt. The first six months Glennan was incarcerated at Libby and Danville prisons in Virginia. On 20 March 1864, Glennan entered Camp Sumter, located near Andersonville, Georgia. He reminisced about the events of his eight-month captivity at Andersonville, such as the hanging of the Raider Six, escape tunnels, gambling, trading, ration wagons, and disease. Afflicted with scurvy, Glennan nearly lost his ability to walk. To increase his chances for survival, he skillfully befriended other prisoners, sharing resources acquired through trade, theft and trickery. His friends left him either by parole or death. On 14 November 1864, Glennan was transported from Andersonville to Camp Parole in Maryland; there he remained until his discharge on 4 June 1865.

When Andrew Carson joined the United States Army in 1941, he was promised good food, travel, a supply of clothing, a place to sleep, and thirty dollars a month. Within seven weeks, Private Carson was shipped to the Philippines - with no boot camp, no training, not one minute of close order drill. Captured by the Japanese less than one year later, the young soldier endured the hardships of the Cabanatuan prison camps, nearly died from dysentery, and then was put aboard a Japanese hellship bound for Japan. There, he worked in the Fukuoa coal mines, a virtual slave laborer until Japan surrendered. This is the harrowing tale of one man's survival, and how he came through the ordeal with dignity and respect for his fellow soldiers.

This book highlights how, and why, torture is such a compelling tool for states and other powerful actors. While torture has a short-term use value for perpetrators, it also creates a devastating legacy for victims, their families and communities. In exposing such repercussions, this book addresses the questions What might torture victims need to move forward from their violation and How can official responses provide truth or justice for torture victims

Building on observations, documentary analysis and over seventy interviews with both torture victims and transitional justice workers this book explores how torture was used, suffered and resisted in Timor-Leste. The author investigates the extent to which transitional justice institutions have provided justice for torture victims; illustrating how truth commissions and international courts operate together and reflecting on their successes and weaknesses with reference to wider social, political and economic conditions. Stanley also details victims experiences of torture and highlights how they experience life in the newly built state of Timor-Leste

Tracking the past, present and future of human rights, truth and justice for victims in Timor-Leste, Torture, Truth and Justice will be of interest to students, professionals and scholars of Asian studies, International Studies, Human Rights and Social Policy.

Albert Schwenn was called up by the SS Cavalry Replacement Battalion in Warsaw in October 1942, and in March 1943, was seconded to the SS Cavalry Division. Schwenn gives a vivid account of the brutal combat on the Russian front, and especially operations against partisans, where he took part in so-called pacification actions behind the front lines. In August 1943, his division was transferred to the front near Kharkov. After recovering from wounds received during the Soviet offensive, he served as an instructor, lastly with the SS Cavalry Replacement and Training Regiment in Bohemia. In addition to nearly three months of action during the Warsaw Uprising in 1944, Schwenn also took part in operations during the Prague Uprising in May 1945. Because of his participation in operations against partisans in 1943, he was given a death sentence, and ultimately served nearly eleven years as a POW in the USSR.

The book takes a hard hitting look at the drug wars taking place in Mexico between competing gangs, cartels, and mercenary factions; their insurgency against the Mexican state; the narco-violence and terrorism that is increasingly coming over the border into the United States, and its interrelationship with domestic prison and street gangs. Analysis and response strategies are provided by leading writers on 3GEN gang theory, counterterrorism, transnational organized crime, and homeland security.

Narcos Over the Border is divided into three sections: narco-opposing force (NARCO OPFOR) organization and technology use; patterns of violence and corruption and the illicit economy; and United States response strategies. The work also includes short introductory essays, a strategic threat overview, an afterword and selected references. Specific topics covered include: advanced weaponry, internet use, kidnappings and assassinations, torture, beheadings, and occultism, cartel and gang evolutionary patterns, drug trafficking, street taxation, corruption, and border firefights.

This book was published as a special issue of Small Wars and Insurgencies.

Early in the Civil War, prisons were adequate to hold the numbers of prisoners. As the war continued and the number of prisoners increased, so did the number of facilities. Some 150 locations were utilized to hold soldiers captured on the battlefield as well as political prisoners suspected of disloyalty. Facilities can be classified in six categories: 1) existing jails or prisons, 2) coastal fortifications, 3) converted commercial buildings, 4) barracks enclosed by a high fence, 5) cloisters of tents enclosed by a high fence and 6) barren stockades. Many prisoners, both Confederate and Federal, came to feel that a quick death from a bullet would have been better than slowly starving to death in a cold, crowded, filthy prison. The hope of freedom was sometimes the only thing that kept a prisoner alive, and if that prisoner wanted to see his home once more, he tried every way possible to escape. This work is divided into two sections--the Federal prisons and the Confederate prisons. The facilities have been organized alphabetically for easy reference. Facts about each prison include when it was established, type of facility, location, number and kind of prisoners held, known escapes, and other available data. An appendix lists the monthly Federal prison population from July 1862 through late 1865 and the escapes reported each month.

On December 14, 1944, Japanese soldiers massacred 139 of 150 American POWs. This biography tells the story of Glenn ('Mac') McDole, one of eleven young men who escaped and the last man out of Palawan Prison Camp 10A. Beginning on December 8, 1941, at the U.S. Navy Yard barracks at Cavite, the story of this young Iowa Marine continues through the fighting on Corregidor, the capture and imprisonment by the Japanese Imperial Army in May 1942, Mac's entry into the Palawan prison camp in the Philippines on August 12, 1942, the terrible conditions he and his comrades endured in the camps, and the terrible day when 139 young soldiers were slaughtered. The work details the escapes of the few survivors as they dug into refuse piles, hid in coral caves, and slogged through swamp and jungle to get to supportive Filipinos. It also contains an account and verdicts of the war crimes trials of the Japanese guards, follow-ups on the various places and people referred to in the text, with descriptions of their present situations, and a roster of the names and hometowns of the victims of the Palawan massacre.

Popularized by books and films like Andersonville, The Great Escape, and The Hanoi Hilton, and recounted in innumerable postwar memoirs, the POW story holds a special place in American culture. Robert Doyle's remarkable study shows why it has retained such enormous power to move and instruct us. Long after wartime, memories of captivity haunt former wartime prisoners, their families, and their society-witness the continuing Vietnam MIA-POW controversies-and raise fundamental questions about human nature and survival under inhumane conditions. The prison landscapes have varied dramatically: Indian villages during the Forest Wars; floating hulks during the Revolution and War of 1812; slave bagnios in Algeria and Tripoli; hotels and haciendas during the Mexican War; large rural camps like Andersonville in the South or converted federal armories like Elmira in the North; stalags in Germany and death-ridden tropical camps in the Philippines; frozen jails in North Korea; and the "Hanoi Hilton" and bamboo prisons of Vietnam. But, as Doyle demonstrates, the story remains the same. Doyle shows that, though setting and circumstance may change, POW stories share a common structure and are driven by similar themes. Capture, incarceration, isolation, propaganda, torture, capitulation or resistance, death, spiritual quest, escape, liberation, and repatriation are recurrent key motifs in these narratives. It is precisely these elements, Doyle contends, that have made this genre such a fascinating and enduring literary form. Drawing from a wide array of sources, including official documents, first-person accounts, histories, and personal letters, in addition to folklore and fiction, Doyle illustrates the timelessness of the POW story and shows why it has become central to our understanding of the American experience of war.

On graduating from West Point in 1940, Lieutenant John Wright was assigned to Corregidor, Philippine Islands. Captured there by the Japanese, he endured three and a half years of POW conditions described in subsequent war crimes trials as the worst of World War II. This book is built around a diary he smuggled through countless inspections during his imprisonment. A detailed account of the voyage of the 'hellships' carrying prisoners from Manila to Japan; the disease, the hunger, and the different ways prisoners coped - or failed to cope - with their ordeal.

Colonel Donald Gilbert Cook was the first U.S. Marine captured in Vietnam; the first and only Marine in history to earn the Medal of Honor while in captivity; and the first Marine POW to have a U.S. Navy ship named in his honor, the USS Donald Cook (DDG-75). On December 31, 1964, while serving as an observer with a South Vietnamese Marine Corps battalion on a combat operation against Viet Cong forces, he was captured near the village of Binh Gia in South Vietnam. Until his death in captivity in December 1967, Cook led ten POWs in a series of primitive jungle camps. His leadership and adherence to the U.S. Military Code of Conduct earned him the nation's highest military award, but Cook never received historical attention commensurate with his enormous accomplishments.This is the first book-length biography of Colonel Donald G. Cook. With background information on Cook's life and prewar career, the book concentrates especially on his three years in captivity, and is the first book exclusively about a Marine POW held in South Vietnam. It covers the ten other POWs under his command, including Sgt. Harold George Bennett (the first American POW executed in Vietnam) and Sgt. Isaac Camacho (the first American POW to escape in Vietnam). The author outlines the circumstances surrounding Cook's Medal of Honor citation and death. Throughout, Cook's adherence to the Corps' traditional leadership principles and knowledge of the Code of Conduct are highlighted, and his biography is a unique case study of exemplary leadership under extremely difficult conditions. Nearly 70 photographs are included.

This book highlights how, and why, torture is such a compelling tool for states and other powerful actors. While torture has a short-term use value for perpetrators, it also creates a devastating legacy for victims, their families and communities. In exposing such repercussions, this book addresses the questions ?What might torture victims need to move forward from their violation and ?How can official responses provide truth or justice for torture victims

Building on observations, documentary analysis and over seventy interviews with both torture victims and transitional justice workers this book explores how torture was used, suffered and resisted in Timor-Leste. The author investigates the extent to which transitional justice institutions have provided justice for torture victims; illustrating how truth commissions and international courts operate together and reflecting on their successes and weaknesses with reference to wider social, political and economic conditions. Stanley also details victims? experiences of torture and highlights how they experience life in the newly built state of Timor-Leste

Tracking the past, present and future of human rights, truth and justice for victims in Timor-Leste, Torture, Truth and Justice will be of interest to students, professionals and scholars of Asian studies, International Studies, Human Rights and Social Policy.

In July 1864, while hemmed in by Grant at Richmond, General Robert E. Lee conceived a bold plan designed not only to relieve Lynchburg and protect the Confederate supply line but also to ultimately make a bold move on Washington itself. A major facet of this plan, with the addition of General Jubal Early's forces, became the rescue of the almost 15,000 Confederate prisoners at Point Lookout, a large Union prison camp at the confluence of the Potomac River and Chesapeake Bay. This volume takes an in-depth look at Lee's audacious plan, from the circumstances surrounding its inception, simultaneous cavalry and amphibious attacks on Point Lookout, and its somewhat ironic finale. With international recognition hanging in the balance for the Confederacy, the failure of Lee's plan saved the Union and ultimately changed the course of the war.This work focuses on the many factors that contributed to this eventual failure, including Early's somewhat inexplicable hesitancy, a significant loss of time for Confederate troops en route, and aggressive defensive action by Union General Lew Wallace. It also discusses the various circumstances such as Washington's stripped defenses, the potential release of imprisoned Southern troops and a breakdown of Union military intelligence that made Lee's gamble a brilliant, well-founded strategy.

Twelve hours after Pearl Harbor, Clark Field in the Philippines was attacked by Japanese aircraft. Among the survivors was Private Victor L. Mapes, who spent the next three years fleeing from and then being imprisoned by the Japanese military machine. When the tide of battle in the Pacific turned against the Japanese, Mapes experienced more harrowing conditions than before. After his unmarked prison ship was torpedoed by an American submarine, the wounded author struggled in the water against the elements and the enemy, as the Japanese tried to kill the escaping POWs. Mapes' memoir chronicles a gruelling three-year ordeal that was punctuated by strange and often amusing encounters with fellow Americans, Japanese, Filipinos, and the fierce Moros of Mindanao Island. The memoir includes photographs and maps, as well as a bibliography and index.

Experiences of captivity in Japanese-occupied Asia varied enormously. Some prisoners of war (POWs) were sent to work in Japan, others to toil on the 'Death Railway' between Burma and Thailand. Some camps had death rates below 1 per cent, others of over 20 per cent. While POWs were deployed far and wide as a captive labour force, civilian internees were generally detained locally.

This book explores differences in how captivity was experienced between 1941 and 1945, and has been remembered since: differences due to geography and logistics, to policies and personalities, and marked by nationality, age, class, gender and combatant status.Part One has at least one chapter for each 'National Memory', Australian, British, Canadian, Dutch, Indian and American. Part Two moves on to forgotten captivities. It covers women, children, camp guards, internee experiences upon the end of the war, and local heroines who fought back.

By juxtaposing such a wide variety of captivity experiences - differentiated both by category of captive and by approach - this book transcends place, to become a collection about captivity as a category. It will interest scholars working on the Asia-Pacific War, on captivities in general, and on the individual histories of the countries and groups covered.

Previously published as Guantanamo Diary, this momentous account and international bestseller is soon to be a major motion picture The first and only diary written by a Guantanamo detainee during his imprisonment, now with previously censored material restored. Mohamedou Ould Slahi was imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay in 2002. There he suffered the worst of what the prison had to offer, including months of sensory deprivation, torture and sexual assault. In October 2016 he was released without charge. This is his extraordinary story, as inspiring as it is enraging.

In contrast to the plethora of works focusing on the tragic loss of human lives during the First World War, little is known about the more hopeful realities of thousands of prisoners of war from Britain, France, Germany and Belgium who were sent to Switzerland from 1916. This book explores the everyday lives of these prisoners and their impact on Switzerland. Internees were warmly welcomed by local people and given education, training and employment. Leading relatively free lives, they were able to engage in leisure activities and develop new relationships. However, they also contributed to the country's economy, helping to keep Swiss tourism alive at a time when businesses were struggling and alleviating Switzerland's labour shortage as Swiss men were called-up to defend their borders and preserve the country's neutrality. Drawing on a wide range of sources from official records to magazines and postcards, Susan Barton provides an absorbing account of the social and cultural history of internment in Switzerland.

On September 25, 1944, Hitler attempted to shore up his faltering forces by creating the Volkssturm or People's Army. His new draft called into service all remaining able-bodied men, including those whose civilian labor had previously been deemed indispensable. Among the latter was a Prussian farmer named Hans Thiel, who suddenly found himself on the Eastern front, fighting not to bring glory to the Nazi Party (for which he felt at best a troubled resignation) but to save his country from destruction. With the defeat of the Germans, Thiel was taken prisoner by the advancing Bolshevik forces. From the closing days of World War II through three years of postwar captivity, this memoir details the experiences of Hans Thiel. Beginning with the realities of agrarian life during World War II, it goes on to describe Thiel's conscription, his combat experiences, and his life as a postwar prisoner, held first by the Bolsheviks and then transferred to camps under Polish control. The atrocities these prisoners suffered at the hands of their captors - as retaliation for German military war crimes - are discussed in detail. The book includes two glossaries (general terms and geographical names), an appendix commenting on German agrarian policy under the Third Reich, and a second appendix discussing the difficulties of tracing Thiel's route through the war-torn countryside. Photographs and maps are also included.