[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 106 (Friday, July 29, 2005)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1698-E1699]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
A DEBT OF GRATITUDE OWED TO PAUL LANKFORD
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HON. JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR.
of tennessee
in the house of representatives
Thursday, July 28, 2005
Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Speaker, I have often said that veterans have been
called on to give more for their country than most of us ever will.
Paul Lankford, a survivor of the Bataan Death March and a resident of
Maryville, Tennessee, is living proof of that.
Mr. Lankford was captured by the Japanese military on the Bataan
Peninsula on April 9, 1942, and was freed by Russian soldiers in July
1945. In those three years and three months in captivity, he survived
horrific conditions.
At Bataan, Lankford was forced to march 65 miles in five days in
unbearable heat, walk on human flesh, and bury his comrades. After the
march, he was forced into slave labor.
When Lankford joined the Army Air Corps in 1941, his weight listed at
150 pounds. After being freed in 1945, he weighed 60 pounds.
After taking six months to recover from this terrible ordeal,
Lankford continued his service to the Air Force, retiring in 1968 as
chief master sergeant. A building at McGhee Tyson Air National Guard
Base is named in his honor.
Mr. Speaker, this Country owes a debt of gratitude to Paul Lankford.
He is a fine man, and our Nation is a better place because of his
service.
I would like to call to the attention of my colleagues and other
readers of the Record the following article from the July 17 edition of
the Knoxville News Sentinel.
[From the Knoxville News Sentinel, July 17, 2005]
March of Death, Life
(By Fred Brown)
Paul Lankford slipped back through his memory, as if
turning pages, recalling a scene, and then explaining details
of what he saw. It was like a movie reeling off in front of
him, frame by frame. A war movie. A war movie of hell.
Six decades ago in July 1945, Lankford was a prisoner of
war, having been held by the Japanese military for three
years and three months. He had been captured along with the
rest of Gen. Douglas MacArthur's army April 9, 1942, on the
Bataan Peninsula.
He was 23 years old the day of his capture and 26 upon
release. In July 1945, Lankford still had one more month to
go before being liberated by a wild Russian army.
With the arrival of the Russians, who went on a rampage,
Lankford and other POWS were transformed from slave to
master. The allied soldiers who had been POWS were now
guarding their former masters. The situation was surreal in
the extreme.
In fact, Russian soldiers instructed former American POWs,
including Lankford, to pick out a guard they particularly
disliked, and the Russians would politely shoot him for the
Americans.
Lankford's ordeal began the day MacArthur deserted the
Philippines, leaving the bruised, battered and beaten army to
survive the best way they could. He sent a message from the
safety of his headquarters in Australia that the army was to
fight to the end.
The end came April 9, 1942, after three months of aerial
and artillery bombardment, starvation and disease. Lankford
and the soldiers were out of ammo and food, with no choice
but to surrender.
With the surrender of the Philippines, Lankford and his
27th Bomb Group were corralled. There were perhaps 1,200
defenders on Bataan, but including all soldiers, allies and
Filipinos, the number was around 70,000.
Of that number, maybe 8,000 would survive the next three
years. Of the 1,200 of Lankford's group on Bataan, an
estimated 200 are alive today.
There are few, if any, monuments to the soldiers and
sailors of Bataan--those Battling Bastards of Bataan, as they
were known.
Lankford was born near Gadsden, Ala., and joined the U.S.
Army in 1939. He then made the transfer to the U.S. Air Force
when it was formed in 1948.
Now 86, he lives in Maryville, having retired in 1968 as
chief master sergeant. He became the first commandant of the
Professional Military Education Center at McGhee Tyson Air
National Guard Base until his final retirement in 1981.
But in 1945, he was one of the few who survived the Bataan
Death March.
``I had one canteen of water for 10 days,'' Lankford began
his story.
``There was one rice ball, about the size of my fist,'' he
said, making a ball with his hand.
Lankford was, he said, among the lucky. He was marched 65
miles from one end of the peninsula to the other. He
eventually was moved from the Philippines to Korea and then
wound up in Mukden, Manchuria.
When he left Korea for Manchuria in December 1942, it was
30 below zero. He had little warm clothing for the trip.
[[Page E1699]]
``The Japanese needed slave labor,'' said Lankford. ``I
worked on farms, in steel mills, tool and dye plants, tanning
plants, foundries.''
The day his personal march into hell began, Lankford made a
promise to himself: ``I said I would never give up, I would
survive,'' he said. ``I would take whatever they threw at
me.''
That was a fairly easy deduction for a fellow who was
already down to eating horse, iguana and mule meat to
survive.
``When you get hungry,'' says Lankford, ``you will eat
anything.''
The soldiers who had survived Japanese bombardment were
already listless from four months of half rations, then no
food at all. They suffered from malaria and dysentery.
Lankford had a severe case of malaria and malnutrition with
sores around his mouth, nose and eyes.
``Our fighting men were zombies,'' he said.
He marched from the south in Mariveles, at the very tip of
Bataan Peninsula in the South China Sea, north to San
Fernando and then to Camp O'Donnell, a former Philippine Army
training camp.
Along the way, historians believe some 10,000 Filipino
soldiers died at the hands of Japanese guards. About one of
every six on the march would die from brutality, murder,
dehydration, beatings, starvation or other atrocities.
Of the 70,000 who began the march, some figures cite that
54,000 reached O'Donnell.
Lankford was bayoneted in the right shoulder because he was
not moving fast enough or had infuriated his Japanese guard.
He never knew why he had been bayoneted. He just was.
Lankford marched 65 miles in five days in the broiling sun.
The only time the prisoners were allowed to rest--standing,
not sitting--was at a change of Japanese guards. They were
allowed no food, no water. If they dropped to the ground,
they were shot. If they fell behind, they were shot.
If they cried out in agony, they were shot--or worse.
``If they heard a soldier screaming, they would cut his
head off,'' said Lankford.
``The first day, we lost maybe 50. The second day, we lost
200. The third day, we lost another 300,'' said Lankford.
``Shortly after we started the march, a truck would come
through, and if you didn't get out of the way, it would just
run over you. There were bodies all over the road.
``At times, you walked on human flesh. It was like walking
on jelly,'' said Lankford.
``We marched day and night. What I tried to do was to stay
as far to the right side of the road as I could. Trucks
filled with Japanese soldiers would come by, and they would
bayonet you or hit you with bamboo rods,'' he said.
``It never crossed my mind that I would die, but you never
knew what was going to happen to you.''
Like being stuffed into narrow French-made boxcars on a
narrow-gauge railroad.
The boxcars were big enough for maybe 50 men. Hundreds were
jammed inside. The steel cars had no windows, no ventilation.
There was no air, and it was pitch dark. Lankford said they
were fast using up what oxygen there was in the railcar.
``Some of the men who were claustrophobic went stark raving
mad,'' said Lankford. ``Others died standing up.''
When the cars were unloaded at one of the designated stops
before arriving at Camp O'Donnell, the dead fell out.
He was at Camp O'Donnell until he was moved to Manila in
November 1942. While at O'Donnell, he was placed on burial
detail, bringing bodies to graves that were dug by POWs from
sunup to sundown.
He had to transport his best friend to a grave.
``He had just given up and passed away,'' said Lankford, as
if talking about a wisp of air that passes by and is gone.
During the O'Donnell ordeal, if an escape was attempted,
the guards would take prisoners out and execute them,
Lankford said, as an example to the others.
After working at other camps, Lankford was eventually put
aboard a ship.
He and 1,500 other prisoners were forced down into the
ship's hold, which had been used to transport horses and
cattle. Filthy straw, with scattered piles of manure and the
strong stench of urine, was everywhere, he says.
``We were suffering from dysentery, and some men went
mad.''
Men began dying immediately. They were fed a thin gruel of
fish-head soup and a handful of rice twice a day.
They were sailing from Manila to Korea. U.S. naval vessels
and submarines were hunting Japanese ships. The POW ships
were unmarked and were attacked by the American vessels of
war with impunity, never knowing that U.S. POWs were aboard.
Thousands of American POWs died an ignominious death below
decks in horse manure, human waste, vomit and stacks of the
already dead.
It took his ship one month to go from Manila to Pusan,
Korea. When the ship arrived, Lankford was among the 175 men
in the worst condition.
He was taken to a racing track being used for a hospital.
The remainder of the men he had traveled with were sent to
Mukden, Manchuria.
``Each morning I would wake up, and there would be dead men
on my left and right,'' he said.
The day he arrived in Mukden, he was given a big bowl of
stew. Being from Alabama, he loved beef stew.
``This was dog meat. It tasted mighty good,'' said
Lankford.
``You didn't see many stray dogs around there.''
When he arrived in the Army Air Corps back in 1941, he had
weighed about 150 pounds. In Manchuria at liberation, he
weighed 60 pounds.
The Russians arrived, he said, and things became rather
chaotic.
``I'll never forget it. These Russians were front-line
troops. They were plenty rough. The Russians would make raids
every night.
``It was like the Fourth of July every night. Everybody was
shooting at everybody else.''
Lankford was set free of his Japanese ordeal Aug. 20, 1945.
The Russians put the POWs aboard a train and sent them back
toward American lines.
He arrived in Port Arthur, Manchuria, and ran into an old
navy chief who asked him what he'd like to eat.
``I told him I wanted some ice cream,'' said Lankford.
``But I couldn't eat it. The chief said he'd just put it up
for me with my name on it. I could have all the ice cream I
wanted.''
Eventually he was returned to Manila, put aboard a Danish
ship and sent home.
``We were heading home,'' said Lankford. ``We were so
happy.''
In the state of Washington, he boarded a hospital train.
There he was given slippers and pajamas for the first time in
four years.
``We crossed the big, ol' U.S.A.,'' he said, his face
beaming with pride.
He was able to meet his family in Atlanta and spent about
an hour with them before leaving for Augusta, Ga. Unlike
most, Lankford had been able to let his family know by 1944
that he was a POW. They just didn't know where he was or
under what conditions he had survived.
``I was lucky. Most of the POW families never knew their
soldiers were alive until they got back to America.''
He took six months to recover in an Augusta hospital. After
a short time at home, Lankford decided to make the Air Force
a career.
Today, a building at McGhee Tyson Air National Guard Base
is named for Lankford. It houses all of his medals, and he
plans to be buried there. The tombstone is already up.
But he is at peace now.
``For the first four or five years after I came home, I
hated the Japanese,'' he said.
``Then I got to thinking about it. Why should I hate them?
It didn't have anything to do with the war.''
He and his wife, Edna, of 59 years, returned to Japan in
2001.
``It was no problem, really,'' he said. ``I feel very
fortunate that I got to speak to the Japanese people again.''
But that hasn't stopped the nightmares. He still sees the
brutal guards and their nicknames in his dreams. ``The
Bull,'' was one, he said.
``We knew who to stay away from.''
Some nights in the early months after his return, said
Edna, her husband would scream out and grab her by the
throat.
And then Paul Lankford would wake up. He was back home and
not in Manchuria, dodging the Bull.
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