North China Marines - Prisoners of War

All 204 North China Marines were captured on 8 December 1941. All of them were sent to the Woosung POW camp near Shanghai. Two managed to escape temporarily, but were recaptured and sent on to Woosung. See the page titled Escapes and Death.

One man, Major Edwin McCaulley, had retired from the Marine Corps in Peking, but had been recalled to duty. He somehow managed to get himself released prior to the unit being sent to Woosung. The rest of the group have always assumed he was repatriated with the diplomatic personnel in 1942. However, his name appears on the roster of the civilian internment camp at Weihsien in 1943 and then on the roster of the exchange ship Teia Maru in September of 1943. On both of those rosters he is listed as a civilian.

Some of the men managed to escape from Woosung. Go to the page titled Escapes and Deaths and read about Jerold Story.

Two died while at Woosung or Kiangwan. Others died at camps in Japan. Again, see the page titled Escapes and Deaths. Corporal Bucher's death is described in the Biggs, Chittenden, and White books.

To trace the movements of an individual from the rest of the group find the camp he was rescued from. This allows you to trace backwards to see where and when he was sent from Woosung. At this time it seems that eventually all North China Marines (except those who escaped from Woosung and were imprisoned in Ward Road Jail plus Bunn, Dedmon, and Jesse) were sent to POW camps in Japan. Check the page titled POW Camp Reports to see lists of individuals sent to the various camps.

See the page Unit Roster/Camp Sequence as this includes as complete a list as is possible of each camp, in order, each individual was in. Any information you have which would add to this would be very welcome. If the camp of rescue is Fukuoka 3-B, then the individual was sent from Woosung in early November of 1942. It seems that all of the original group of 18-24 which arrived in November of 1942 remained at Fukuoka 3-B until their release on 13 September of 1945. Two of them died at Fukuoka. You need to read either From China Marine to Jap POW and/or Behind the Barbed Wire to get details of duty in China before the war and details of the capture at Peking.

Read The United States Marines in North China to see details of the capture in Tientsin. Then read The Secret Camera to read about capture in Chinwangtao and the entire time at Fukuoka 3-B. See the page titled POW Camp Fukuoka 3-B for pictures, rosters, trial records, and the official report on the conditions in the camp. No other North China Marine appears on any rosters of any Kyushu camps. Any of the North China Marines not sent to Fukuoka (on the island of Kyushu) in November of 1942 were transferred to Kiangwan POW camp when Woosung was closed down in December of 1942. The next group of POWs sent to Japan was in August of 1943. These men were sent to various camps, exactly which ones is not clear. They probably went to camps on the main Japanese island of Honshu in the Tokyo Kawasaki area. If the camp of rescue is not Fukuoka or any of the Hakodate camps the individual was probably in this group.

Read From China Marine to Jap POW to get details. Another group of about 70 men may have been sent from Kiangwan in November of 1943. Where they ended up is unclear. The remainder of the North China Marines were kept in Kiangwan until May of 1945, when Kiangwan was closed out. More escapes occurred while the POWs were being sent by train to Pusan, Korea for travel by ship to Japan. Read ESCAPE!. Most of this group sent to Japan in the summer of 1945 ended up in the Hakodate camps on Hokkaido island.Behind the Barbed Wire covers the events of the Hakodate camps. United States Marines in North China also covers this group. Bunn, Dedmon, and Jesse were not sent to Japan. See details at Escapes and at Ward Road Jail info on page POW Camps Holding North China Marines. See Unit Roster/Camp Sequence for information on each individual North China Marine. If you are seriously interested in the experiences of the North China Marines you should read all the books listed. They can perhaps be found by going to Bookfinder.com. Enter a search for out of print books. They are hard to find now and often very expensive. Check university libraries if you cannot purchase them. If you want to keep down costs read both From China Marine to Jap POW and Behind the Barbed Wire.

These will give you an excellent view of life as a North China Marine and the period of captivity. Of course, if the individual you are interested in is listed on the roster as being rescued from Fukuoka, you must read The Secret Camera.To obtain copies of military records you need to go to the site listed below where you will find directions and forms to send for records. This will also tell you how to receive replacements for ribbons and medals. The serial number required for these forms is on the roster. There are two individuals I have not been able to locate serial numbers for. These serial numbers were obtained from the list of returned Marine Corps personnel and NARA records compiled from data at the end of the war. For information on the Purple Heart and the Prisoner of War medals see page Medals and Decorations.