"Then we were told to line up-in columns of twos. We started the
march on a dirt road some six miles to Camp O'Donnell."
"Some captives had marched all the way from Bataan close to one
hundred miles."
"It wasn't the march that killed us; it was the continual delays along the march the standing in place for two or three hours at a time without food or water."
"If you stepped out of line, you were apt to have a bayonet in
your gut."
The exact number of dead from the "Death March" was probably known only to God. The best estimates were anywhere from 12,000 to 17,000.
Deaths at Cabanatuan: During the first eight months of camp, deaths totaled 2,400. Some thirty to fifty skeletons, covered by leathery skin, were buried in common graves each day. The Japs issued documents certifying that each death was caused by malaria, beriberi, pellagra, diphtheria, in fact, anything but the real cause starvation and malnutrition.
After the war, when the Graves Registration searched the Cabanatuan cemeteries, they found and disinterred 2,637 bodies.
Sanitation: From the beginning of camp, sanitation was a serious problem. Flies, including the blue and green bottle types, were present everywhere. Maggots thrived in the latrines, weakened the walls, resulting in cave-ins, and sometimes engulfing the visitor. Daily rains further weakened the walls.
After several months some engineer officers, under the leadership of Major Fred Saint of Elmhurst, Illinois, organized a sanitary detail, and succeeded in building deep septic tank type latrines that would not cave in. They applied lime daily to control flies and maggots. Gradually they dug ditches along all walks and around all buildings in order to promote draining and to prevent quagmires.
Labor Details: The camp had not been in operation many days before the Japanese requested that the American headquarters furnish labor details of various sizes and types to work both inside and outside the camp. Although an occasional detail would be commanded by a very cruel Jap guard and unbelievable brutality followed, the men on some details had reasonable guards, received extra food and remained relatively healthy.