#55. Disgrace on Parade: The March to Cabanatuan

Episode 55 – Harry Whitman – Episode Transcript
Cold Open
[Narrator] The relentless afternoon sun left the air heavy with humidity and the street pavement hot as an oven. But all POWs were required to march. Even the sick ones.
It was a rule enforced by the bayonet end of guards’ guns.
Thus, 27-year-old, malaria-ridden Ensign Harry Whitman – a stout young man with light brown hair, shadowed eyes, and a square, serious face -- stumbled his way through Manila on May 24, 1942. He was a newly captured prisoner of the Japanese. And, with some 5,000 other American POWs, was on parade through The Philippine’s main city so that the Filipino populace would understand the Japanese victors’ might.
Being exposed to the blazing sun for some 4 miles worsened Whitman’s malaria symptoms. His marching companion, Alma Salm, took over the burden of the burlap sack that held all the Ensign’s worldly belongings.
And that helped. A little. For a mile or so.
But Whitman’s fever worsened. He became delirious.
Despite fearing Japanese punishment, Salm pulled Whitman from the marching column. Laying the sick man on the hot ground, Salm covered him with an old raincoat and gave him some quinine. Whitman shivered violently. Both men were saturated in perspiration from their now 5-mile march in 90+ degrees.
Then, just as Salm predicted, Japanese guards were to them in moments, bayonets flashing in the unforgiving sun.
This is Left Behind.

Podcast Welcome
Welcome to “Left Behind,” a podcast about the people left behind when the US surrendered The Philippines in the early days of WW2. I’m your host and researcher, Anastasia Harman. My great-grandfather Alma Salm was one of the POWs, and his memoir inspired me to tell the stories of his fellow captives.

It’s finally May. And all month long, in commemoration of Memorial Day, I’ll be publishing episodes regarding American heroes – all of them single and under age 30 – who gave their lives in service of their country. These men weren’t married, didn’t have children, and as the years pass, are at greater risk of being forgotten. So, during this month, I’m asking for a favor: if an episode or story resonates with you, please share it with a friend – so that together we can work to keep the memories of these men alive for generations to come.
Today I’m sharing the story of one of the original men who inspired this podcast: Harry Whitman. So, yes, my great-grandfather and his memoir are the overall inspiration. But Harry Whitman was one of the first 3 POWs my great-grandfather mentioned who I wanted to learn more about. (Frank Pyzick from episode 1 is the second, and I’ll tell the third man’s story in a future episode.)
Whitman and Salm were marching companions on their way to Cabanatuan, which we’ll learn more about in this episode. In his memoir, Salm mentioned not knowing what happened to his friend Whitman after the war.
When I first read that, and we’re talking a good 20 years ago now, I wanted to know what happened to Whitman as well. So, I began researching his life and found the answer. I’ve been wanting to tell his story since I started this podcast. And today I’m proud to finally share with you the story of Harry Gill Whitman.
Let’s jump in.

POW’s Life Story
Before the War
[Narrator] Harry Gill Whitman Jr.’s story begins 26 and a half years before that dreadful march through Manila, in much an opposite place and time — Connecticut on October 20, 1915. He was the oldest of 5 children — 2 boys and 3 girls — born to Harry Sr and Emily Whitman.
Within a few years, the family relocated to Grand Rapids, Michigan, where Harry Jr. grew up and Harry Sr. was a Vice President for an asphalt company. The family did well, even having a live-in servant in the pre-Depression years. The Whitman’s were a well-known family in Grand Rapids.
Harry joined the Central High School yearbook staff as well as the Phy-Chem club (I think that’s short for physics-chemistry). In fact, young Harry was the “pride and joy” of that club’s adviser, Mr. Barber. Harry graduated high school in June 1934.
He attended junior college in Grand Rapids before transferring to MIT — yep, that MIT, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology — in Boston.
Harry Whitman was commissioned an Ensign in the US Naval Reserves shortly before graduating from MIT in June 1941, where he earned a BS in Engineering with an emphasis in Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering.
Two months after MIT graduation, in August 1941, Ensign Whitman began active duty. And on October 24, 1941, just 4 days after his 26th birthday, he left Honolulu, Hawaii, on a ship bound for Manila.

During the War
[Narrator] Arriving in The Philippines, Ensign Whitman was assigned to the Cavite Navy Yard, which is about 10 miles southwest of Manila, as the crow flies. 25 miles if you drive.
Before WW2, Cavite Navy Yard was the United States’ only ship-repair facility in the Pacific. I don’t know precisely what Whitman’s assignment was while stationed at Cavite for the month before the war began, but as an officer with a degree in Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering, I assume he was somehow involved with the repair of ships.
He was supposed to have sailed for China, but the war ended that scheme. My great-grandfather was supposed to have gone to China in the end of 1941/early 1942, so I wonder if they would have been serving together regardless of the war.

As a total side note, when my oldest was not quite 3 years old, we went to the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, to watch a Blue Angels air show. He didn’t like the loud noises (despite the ear coverings we brought), so I took him into one of the school buildings. The lobby had on display two large ship engines. That little boy marched right up to one of those engines, turned to me and demanded: “Talk about this!”
I couldn’t, but my guess is that Harry Whitman would have been able to. I always think about Whitman and this story together.

Cavite Navy Yard was bombed and, for all intents and purposes, destroyed on December 10, 1941. From what I’ve found, the Navy personnel were transferred to Mariveles on the very southern end of Bataan. And at some point, Whitman was transferred to Corregidor.
Now this is pure conjecture on my part, but Whitman seems like a prime candidate to have joined the Naval Battalion on Bataan. The Naval Battalion was a rag-tag group of sailors, air corps men, and a few trained Marines, armed with scrounged together armaments, who were tasked with holding a small Japanese invasion force from reaching Mariveles.
After “proving” themselves on Bataan, the Naval Battalion men were sent to Corregidor to help the 4th Marines defend the beaches there. I think it’s possible that Whitman could have been part of the Naval Battalion and beach defenses. Although, he was an officer, so perhaps he wasn’t part of that. There are no records, well, any that I’ve come across, that list the men of the Naval Battalion, so I can only speculate.
BTW -- for more details on the Naval Battalion, see episode 13. It’s among my favorite Bataan stories.

Well, regardless of how he got to Corregidor, Whitman was there when the island fell, and he became a prisoner of war. He spent almost a month at the 92nd Garage (which I described in Episode 50). Then in late May 1942, the Japanese loaded all the American Corregidor POWs onto a transport ship for a ride to Manila.
Alma Salm wrote:
[Alma] “Fortunately we who were on Corregidor escaped the infamous “Bataan Death March.” However we soon learned the Japs were not without their plans for us also.”
[Narrator] The Japanese ship moored about 5 miles south of Manila and 2 miles off shore. The POWs boarded landing barges to take them closer to shore.
[Salm] “When we were about two to three hundred feet away from the beach, we were ordered to jump into the bay. The gunnels of the boats were up to our breasts so we had to disembark out over the lowered ramp in the stern.
“There was only room for about four or five to leap off at one time, and as the barge began to drift seaward caused with the motion of disembarking men, the last occupants (and I was one of them) who jumped overboard were in water nearly six feet deep. That just about left the top of my head out of the water.
“The bay bottom here was muddy and sandy.”
[Narrator] Once they emerged from the water, the POWs were placed into columns.
[Alma] “We were a weary, hungry, bedraggled lot of humanity; unshaven, unkept, and dirty. …
“It was now about high noon, and we almost wilted in the torrid heat. An ideal condition to cause those previously infected to have the dreaded and recurrent malaria which happened in numerous cases during that never-to-be-forgotten march.
“In our sand-filled soggy shoes, we began our long hot trek up the famous Dewey Boulevard, thru the streets of the city of Manila to the old Spanish Bilibid Prison about eight miles away.”
[Narrator] The POWs had left the 92nd Garage the morning before, and had been given no water or food since then – so about 30 hours. The men were weak and tired.
As you may have heard me say before, exact numbers of the captured Americans in The Philippines are hard to know. Approximate numbers suggest there were 5,000 American POWs and 10,000 Filipino POWs on Corregidor. Official records weren’t necessarily kept during the last battle on Corregidor, it’s not known precisely how many Americans died there. Not to mention, there probably isn’t an exact count of how many men were on Corregidor to begin with, because many men left Bataan for the island right before Bataan fell.
All this to say that the Japanese paraded a rather long column of American POWs through the streets of downtown Manila. Japanese guards on horseback flanked the columns.
Filipinos, forced by Japanese soldiers, lined the street as the defeated Americans went by. It was a show of power to the Filipino populace – Japan was mightier than the United States. Here’s Salm again:
[Alma] “But the Japs misunderstood the Filipino character and his loyalty, for the most part, to the American regime. Japanese control during these five months had not convinced the Filipinos. The liberty he enjoyed under America was now strangely missing. He realized he had lost that, and it soured the Filipino.
“As the motley throng of captive American troops were prodded along, many fell, but the Jap guards ruthlessly prodded them to their feet with their bayonets and sabers.
“If Japan thought the moral effect of the Filipinos upon seeing us so degraded would be regarded in the manner they anticipated, they were very much mistaken. The understanding and kindly Filipinos did not smile or jeer nor scorn us, but rather they had the look in their eyes and on their countenances of sorrow and sympathy for us.
“Many of them openly wept.
“Others made the “V” sign with their fingers when the guards were not alert.
“We marched by, doing a pretty good job of holding up our heads, and, with pride, I noted it was going to take more than a Jap bayonet to wipe that courageous grin off the American face. In view of our temporary defeat, this was about all we could offer in return for the gallantry of those loyal Filipinos.
“We remembered then, and so did the Filipinos now looking upon us, that for every white soldier on the “Bataan Death March,” just seven weeks before, there were about nine Filipino soldiers by his side. And together they all endured the brutal punishment and the lash and venom of the Jap conqueror, and in hundreds of cases endured until death mercifully rescued them.”
[Narrator] I found a couple pictures of this march. And I’ve put them on the website, you’ll find the links in the episode description.
A malaria attack is mentioned by Salm in the next passage. So here are some symptoms of malaria, to give you a better idea of what Salm mentions: High fever, shaking chills that can range from moderate to severe, profuse sweating, headache, abdominal pain, muscle pain, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, deep breathing and respiratory distress, impaired consciousness, and convulsions.
So, not conditions in which one is physically up for marching in the sun.
[Alma] “When the column I was marching in neared the heart of the city, Ensign Harry Whitman, USNR, who had been with me on Corregidor and who was my marching buddy, had recurrent malaria induced by exposure to the blazing sun. He began to stumble along, and the only help I could give was the small relief of carrying his burlap sack containing his worldly belongings. This eased things for him a little.
“The added burden of carrying his baggage began telling on me, but after another mile he steadily became worse and his fever was so high he was almost delirious.
“What to do?
“I wasn’t any too sure what the unpredictable Jap guard might do. I wasn’t so valiant I could withstand the jab of a sharp bayonet with calm. Another look at Whitman’s face however, and I dragged him out of the column beside the road, and quickly covered him with an old rain coat we had salvaged on the “Rock.” I fed him ten or fifteen grains of quinine, which I had on me.
“Soon he was shivering violently with the chills that alternate with the fever of a malaria-ridden victim. We both were drenched with perspiration, and I had reached a stage myself where I couldn’t travel much further without a respite after the five miles that lay behind us.
“Almost immediately a couple of Japanese guards and a Jap policeman were upon us.
“I expected and was prepared for the usual violent physical treatment. However, even the Japanese know the sickening and debilitation effect of malaria through their own experience with it. They felt my friend’s hot feverish brow as he lay with closed eyes and colorless face and, wonders of wonders, they actually left us alone. …
I felt a little relieved for both our sakes. He lay there and by and by opened his eyes.
I spied a Filipino pushing an ice cream wagon. Although I knew the Jap did not permit speech or contact with Filipino civilians I managed to purchase several paper envelopes of mango sherbet. I couldn’t be sure how sanitary the ice was, but it was cold. I fed some to my shipmate who began to recover. The cold sherbet, together with quinine and rest of an hour, helped him.
Later a Jap truck came along and picked us up along with other casualties who had fallen out previously and took us to the entrance of Bilibid Prison. We were soon inside the ancient limestone walled enclosure.”
[Narrator] Bilibid Prison was a prison in Manila, which became a POW camp, hospital, and transfer station. POWs being transferred to Japan would stay here for a time before boarding their ships. And on the afternoon of May 24, 1942, when Salm and Whitman arrived, it was filled with POWs sleeping on dirty concrete floors.
So Salm and Whitman fashioned themselves a shelter along one of the prison walls using a couple of canvas shelter halves. And, luckily for them, they had found small patch of grass and had a couple blankets, which helped make them more comfortable during the rainstorm that night.
They were also able to shower and wash their filthy clothing and get some food. Just rice. But better than not eating.
Whitman and Salm remained at the prison the next day. At 3 o’clock in the morning on May 26, they were awoken and marched, with about 1,500 other prisoners, to the Manila train station. Alma Salm wrote:
[Alma] “We were ordered into a train of box cars waiting for us.
“These box cars were much smaller than the standard size used in the United States, but nevertheless they literally stuffed one hundred men and officers in each car until, figuratively speaking, a shoe horn had to be used to squeeze in the last man. No cattle car was ever so crowded.
“Obviously there were no facilities or conveniences therein. We sat down or stood up the best we could in our filthy cramped quarters. There was very little ventilation, except that which came in through the small slide doors in the middle on either side of the car, at which point two Jap armed guards took their positions.
“The train pulled out about 6:30 am and rattled northward across the broiling Luzon plains with its destination the town of Cabanatuan about seventy-five miles away in the rice paddy country.
“The conditions under which we traveled these eight hours in the cars is a story itself.
“The hot, still tropical air and the searing sun burning down on the thin metal roofs of those cars plus partial ventilation almost stifled those who could not get near the side-door openings.”
[Narrator] Many of the men were sick with dysentery and defecated where they stood. The lack of oxygen made the men drowsy. A lethargic Salm was suddenly started awake by loud voices.
An Army corporal was shouting at an Army captain. The captain attempted to disciple the corporal, which angered the corporal even more, and he then began punching the captain.
[Enlisted Man] “You can get away with giving us orders in the Army but not now, brother. You are a prisoner of war just like the rest of us. You don’t have a damn bit more authority than we do. If you think so, try doing something we aren’t permitted to do and see if you can get away with it.”
[Narrator] Other enlisted men joined in:
[Man 1] “Yeah! Try it.”

[Narrator] Finally they arrived at the city of Cabanatuan train station. Cabanatuan City is about 70 miles directly north of Manila, in central Luzon Island. The POWs stumbled off the train, marched about a mile, and were deposited in an area enclosed by barbwire.
Somehow and surprisingly, Salm got permission from a guard to buy a pail full of mangos and bananas from a Filipino woman. Instantly he was surrounded by men asking to buy the fruit.
The men slept under their makeshift shelters that night. Early the next morning they were given a baseball-sized rice ball and then placed into columns of 100 men each and marched out of the encampment area.

I want to stop for a moment to address something: It’s a common misconception that men captured on Corregidor were part of the Bataan Death March. That is not true. Only the men surrendered on Bataan were part of that atrocity.
The Corregidor men were taken by ship to Manila, marched through Manila, trained 70 miles to Cabanatuan City, and then marched to the Cabanatuan POWs camps. No part of their route crossed paths with the Bataan Death March route. I’ve put a map on the website that shows the 2 routes, so you can see the difference.
When Whitman arrived, there were three POW camps near Cabanatuan City – which is why you’ll often hear me say Cabanatuan POW Camps (plural).
As best I’ve been able to make out, Camp #1 was about 5.5 miles east of Cabanatuan City, Camp #2 about 9.5 miles east of the city, and Camp #3 was 14 miles east of the city. I created a map of where I think each of the camps was located; you can find it on the website.
The 5,000 American POWs captured on Corregidor – including Whitman and Salm – were initially marched past camps 1 and 2, to camp 3, the farthest from Cabanatuan City.
Once that camp was filled, the remaining Corregidor POWs were placed in Camp #2. But Camp #2 lacked a water supply, so it closed permanently, and those POWs transferred to Camp #1 in early June 1942.
Now, let’s talk Bataan men. They had been at Camp O’Donnell since late April. (See episode 32 for details on that horrific place.) They were transferred to the Cabanatuan camps around the same time that the Corregidor men were.
But who arrived first? I don’t know; I’ve heard accounts both ways. Perhaps they were arriving at the same time. I know the Corregidor men were sent to Cabanatuan in stages. One account I’ve read says that Bataan Death March survivors arrived at Camp 3 before the Corregidor POWs. Also arriving At Camp 3 before the Corregidor men were the Americans who were patients in Bataan field hospitals when the peninsula was surrendered.
In early June 1942, there were 15-18,000 American POWs in the Cabanatuan POWs camps.

[Narrator] Salm, Whitman, and the other POWs began their 14-mile march to Cabanatuan Camp #3 in the pre-dawn hours of May 27, 1942. The sun soon rose, bringing stifling heat. The men’s packs felt heavier and heavier. Some men collapsed but were prodded at bayonet point back into a marching column.
After about 5 miles, the columns halted for a change of guard. Looking around for water, all that the POWs could find was a ditch of stagnant water that the carabao water buffalo wallowed in. With no other choice, men scooped it up, treated it with iodine (if they had some), and drank. It tasted like poison but gave their dehydrated bodies some moisture to survive on.
As they set to marching again, the men could see a large compound with dozens of thatched-roof nipa buildings. They got excited, their journey was almost ended, they could finally rest. As they walked past this compound, which turned out to be Camp #1, they became utterly disheartened.
My great-grandfather wrote:
[Alma] “Marching in the direct rays of the sun which hung like a hot molten ball in the cloudless sky, Ensign Whitman beside me had another attack of malaria. His fever rose rapidly as it invariably does when this happens. He likewise could hardly stand on his feet.
“I attempted to carry his belongings again in addition to my own so he would not lose them.
“My companion began to waver and finally to lean on me.
“With each step, the jungle fever sapped more of his waning energy. He was a large husky fellow, a former champion swimmer, and sustaining his weight plus carrying two packs was a little more than I could maneuver in my exhausted condition. But at least, I thought, I didn’t have five degrees of fever as he had walking along in that torrid heat.
“I tried to explain to a very surly guard we were unfortunate to have flanking us, that my companion was too sick to walk further. I said “malaria” and touched Whitman’s forehead to indicate fever. …
“The guard just scowled, looked at me fiercely, and very menacingly pointed his bayonet at me in answer.
“We were both on the verge of a black out. Realizing something had to be done to ease the load, I reluctantly discarded our baggage containing all our blankets and all of Harry’s worldly belongings along the side of the dusty road. …
“Finally my companion just slithered from me as I was unable to support him any longer. The guard attempted to make him get up with the prick of the bayonet, and I was fearful the treatment might result in something less playful.
“I mustered all my remaining strength, and with the help of another man, himself in difficulties, we lifted [Whitman] up. In a semi-conscious state, we half dragged him for about a block.
“The guard pointed forward with his gun and said, “house-o.”
“When he said, ”Hous-o” we thought he meant a small nipa hut a short distance away in a rice paddy and assumed it to be, perhaps, a First Aid Station.
“I was wrong in my conclusions for as we broke from the column and started down the little path toward the bahay, it was only too evident we did the wrong thing.
“The Jap guard came screaming at us. He was very wrathful as he approached. With bayonet fixed to his rifle he made a lunge at us. We both felt the impact of cold steel. As I felt its meaning prick, I half pulled, half dragged my companion and myself back in the column again being banged intermittently with the butt of [the guard’s] weapon.
“By the will of God we traversed another two hundred yards, but each new step became a distinct and contemplated torture for us. Then, at the foot of a hill, our strength came to an end.
“I arose and tried to pull [Whitman] up. It was no use. Whitman had slipped into merciful unconsciousness.
“At last the unfeeling guard let him lie in the deep grass bordering the road and planted a tall spiked bamboo stick to which was attached a piece of white muslin painted with Jap Kanji (pronounced Kahn -gee) characters, indicating that a recumbent form lay at its base.
So many others in the column near us were weak or half sick from malaria or dysentery, and it was all they could do to stand on their own feet, so help could not be expected from them.
“I felt pretty rotten about leaving Harry there, but I knew a truck would pick him up eventually.
“Later that day when a truck brought [him to] Camp Number Three, Whitman told me that after he came to his senses, he looked up and saw a Jap guard nearby who was attracted to him when he began to stir.
“Harry said he looked up with a pleasant look and slight smile on his face. He was naturally a good-natured individual.
“The guard mistook this as an indication that he had been playing opossum and apparently thought a person who is sick is certainly not able to smile about it. … Whitman told me that the Nip was just about to slash him with that bayonet he held poised above him. Sensing a crisis, [Whitman] tapped his head whereupon the guard realized he was a sick man.
“It was a tense moment. That well-intentioned smile was almost his nemesis.
“He was a splendid fellow, and I enjoyed my associations with him thru the months at Camp Number Three and on the Nichols Air Field detail. His hobby was “small” boat building, and I sincerely hope he may return safely and enjoy the fulfillment of his plans of which he spoke to me often.”
[Narrator] That last line is what started my research into Whitman’s life – started my research into all the Filipino and American servicemen and women who I’ve highlighted so far and will continue to highlight going forward.
Whitman remained in the Cabanatuan camps for nearly 2.5 years. Cabanatuan was a rough camp, with scarce food and medical attention compounded by copious disease and beatings.
At some point, Whitman spent time with my great-grandfather at the inhuman hell-hole work camp of Nichols Field. The Japanese forced the sick and starving POWs to hand dig a new air strip. They dug the bottom of a hill until it collapsed, sometimes burying POWs alive.

And here’s the rest of Whitman’s story, which Salm never knew:
On December 13, 1944, Ensign Whitman entered the rear hold of the Japanese ship Oryoku Maru in Manila. The Japanese were transferring prisoners to camps in Japan.
More than 1,600 POWs were stuffed into the ships’ 3 holds as it sailed around the Bataan Peninsula.
The ship wasn’t marked. So, US planes didn’t know what cargo the ship contained when they attacked the ship. Fortunately, 1,300 POWs escaped the sinking ship and swam to shore at the Olongapo Navy Base.
Some official sources say Whitman was one of 300 who died during that attack, the sinking, and/or swimming to shore. And since Whitman was, according to my great-grandfather, a champion swimmer, my guess is that he would have been killed before escaping the ship.
However other official sources give a different death date for Whitman.
If those sources are correct, then once on shore, Whitman and the other survivors spent several days on the base’s tennis court, unprotected from the scorching Philippine sun. Again, they had inadequate food and water. Eventually they were trained 100 miles north to Lingayen Gulf.
Here Harry Whitman entered either the Enoura Maru or the Brazil Maru, both of which sailed from The Philippines on December 27, 1944.
The “hell ships” were filled with sick, starving, dehydrated POWs. After 2.5 years of incarceration, many weighed under 90 pounds. That would have been a drop of some 100 pounds for the 5’9″ Whitman.
One colonel described the conditions:
[Colonel] “Many men lost their minds and crawled about in the absolute darkness armed with knives, attempting to kill people in order to drink their blood or armed with canteens filled with urine and swinging them in the dark. The hold was so crowded and everyone so interlocked with one another that the only movement possible was over the heads and bodies of others.”
[Narrator] Both ships reached Takao, Formosa (in present-day Taiwan), on New Years Day 1945, where all the POWs were transferred to the Enoura Maru.
The ship was, of course, unmarked. And on January 9, 1945, American planes bombed it as it was anchored in Takao Harbor.
350 POWs died in the attack. Among them, those other official sources say, was Ensign Harry G. Whitman.
He was just 29 years old.
The Cabanatuan POW camp would be liberated only 21 days later. Alma Salm was among those rescued from that camp. He never knew what happened to his friend Harry.

After the War & Legacy
[Narrator] Harry Whitman’s remains were never found. He was declared Missing in Action and Non-recoverable.
As I said earlier, official documents give different accounts of when Whitman perished. For example, one un-dated military document for Whitman and entitled “Non-Recoverable Remains Reexamination of Records,” states:
[Record] “Oryoku Maru – Remains recovered at Takao, Formosa, impossible to segregate satisfactorily.”
[Narrator] This statement is confusing because the Oryoku Maru sank in The Philippines, not Takao, Formosa.
If Whitman did indeed perish in the ship bombing at Takao, then his remains would have likely been added to a mass grave near that port. After the war, that grave was uninterred and the mixed remains recovered. That’s why the report said it was impossible to segregate the remains – some 350 men could have been buried in that grave. Those mixed remains were reinterred at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific – i.e. Punchbowl.
But here, again, I’m a little confused, because the parents of other men who were known to have been interred in the Takao grave received official letters from the military stating their son’s remains were at Punchbowl. I can’t find such a letter in Whitman’s official death file.
So did Whitman die when the Oryoko Maru was attacked and sunk or in Takao when the Enoura Maru was bombed. My guess is that the military didn’t get any good answers from Oryoku Maru survivors after the war. So that piece of information is lost to history.

Today, Ensign Harry Gill Whitman’s name appears on the Tablets of the Missing at Manila American Cemetery and his family erected a cenotaph at the Greenwood Cemetery in Petoskey, Michigan.
Whitman received a Bronze Star and Purple Heart, posthumously.
Harry’s only brother was a member of the Army Air Corps in Africa during WW2. He returned home, married, and eventually had a son — who he named Harry Gill Whitman.

When Ensign Whitman and the other POWs arrived at Cabanatuan, one of the first things they were told by their captors was that escape was futile and would be severely punished. However, after just a few days, a small group of young men did just that.
So be sure to hit the follow button because there will be more on that in the next POW story.
This is Left Behind.

Outro
Thanks for listening! You can find pictures, maps, and sources about Harry Whitman’s story on the Left Behind Facebook page and website and on Instagram @leftbehindpodcast. The links are in the show description.
If you enjoy this podcast, please subscribe so you’ll know when I drop a new episode and leave a review wherever you listen to podcasts.
Left Behind is researched, written, and produced by me, Anastasia Harman.
- Voice overs by: Paul Sutherland, Tyler Harman.
- Special thanks to: John Eakin for providing Harry Whitman’s Individual Deceased Personnel File, which helped me (attempt) to figure out when Harry Whitman died.
- Dramatizations are based on historical research, although some creative liberty is taken with dialogue.
And remember to subscribe to left behind because you won't want to miss the first escape from Cabanatuan.

Sources
“1920 US Federal census,” database online, entry for Harry Whitman, Ancestry.com, accessed 20 October 2011
“1930 US Federal Census,” database online, entry for Harry G Whitman, Ancestry.com, accessed 20 October 2011.
“Camp O'Donnell and Camp Cabanatuan,” POW Camp O'Donnell and Camp Cabanatuan (mansell.com), accessed 25 April 2024.
Degree Candiddiates at MIT, Boston Globe, 10 June 1941, page 4, Newspapers.com, accessed 15 April 2020.
Ens Harry Gill Whitman Jr. (1915-1944) - Find a Grave Memorial, accessed 25 April 2024.
Harry G Whitman Jr, passenger list for SS President Harrison, departing Honolulu, Hawaii, 24 October 1941, Honolulu, Hawaii, Passenger and Crew Lists, 1900-1959, database online, Ancestry.com, Original data: Passenger Lists of Vessels Arriving or Departing at Honolulu, Hawaii, 1900–1954, NARA Microfilm Publication A3422, 269 rolls; A3510, 175 rolls; A3574, 27 rolls; A3575, 1 roll; A3615, 1 roll; A3614,80 rolls; A3568 & A3569, 187 rolls; A3571, 64 rolls; A4156, 348 rolls. Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, Record Group 85. National Archives, Washington, D.C., Passenger and Crew Manifests of Airplanes Departing from Honolulu, Hawaii, 12/1957-9/1969, NARA Microfilm Publication A3577 56 rolls. Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, 1787-2004, Record Group 85. National Archives, Washington, D.C, accessed 14 April 2020.
Harry Gill Whitman, U.S. WWII Draft Cards Young Men, 1940-1947, database online, Ancestry.com, accessed 14 April 2020.
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