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This was on the Table Rock, Nebraska Historical Society Facebook Page Feb, 2017

October 24, 2017

Sharla Sitzman Cerra‎   Table Rock Historical Society

75 years ago today, Ronald Boston of the Table Rock Class of 1934 was a 1st Sgt. And he was one of a desperate military force defending the Phillipines from the Bataan Peninsula on the main Philipine island of Luzon. The battle began with the Japanese invastion in December 1941 and would end in April with the surrender of the defenders. 

So if you are having a bad day today or a contemplative day, consider Ronald Boston's days 75 years ago.

I'd like to do a nice memorial page on the website for him, would like to be in touch with any family members.

Ronald Boston was the son of James and Pearl Boston, and in the middle of a large family of children born between 1910 and 1929, including Genevieve, Delmar, Darrell, Merna, Mona, Lorna, Robert, and Lois, who died just last year. Ronald was born in 1917. 

As I said, he graduated from Table Rock in 1934. .

In 1939, he joined the Army Air Force. 

When the Japanese hit Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, he was in the Phillipines, serving as a 1st Sgt. With the 20th Air Base Group, 27th Materiel Squadron. 

On December 26, 1941, he wrote to his parents, who by then lived in Blue Springs. That was a few days after the Japanese invaded the Phillipines on December 21, 1941. Defense had crumpled and the troops had retreated to the Bataan Peninsula of the Phillipine island of Luzon, with MacArthur commanding from the island of Corregidor to which he had moved his command after the Japanese attack.

Bataan was lost, the defenders surrendering in April 1941. The American and Phillipine troops became prisoners of war. 

The Japanese moved them to a camp 65 miles away in a brutal march that became known as the Bataan Death March; it was later designated a war crime. Over 1,000 American and 10,000 Phillipino soldiers died. 

Among the Americans who survived the march was Ronald Boston, Table Rock Class of 1934. And among the Americans who survived the rest of 1942, the year 1943, and into 1944 was Ronald Boston. 

Ronald Boston’s parents knew nothing more about what had happened to him after his December 1941 letter to them until January 1944, when the War Dept. reported that he was a prisoner of war in the Phillipines. That was reported in a World Herald Article on January 13, 1944. 

Months later, the Japanese began shipping prisoners of war to the Japanese main island, on what later were referred to as death ships. They were unmarked to designate POWs were transported, as required by the rules of war, and were being attacked and destroyed. 

On September 7, 1944, Ronald Boston, having survived the Bataan Death March and years of life as a POW, as on one of the death ships that were destroyed. 

He had been on the Japanese ship "Shinyo Maru," which was loaded with 750 U.S. POW's in the cargo holds. The U.S.S. Paddle (SS-263), not knowing that American POW's were on board, fired torpedoes at the ship off the coast of Mindanao and sank it. Some Japanese guards shot prisoners as they struggled from the holds after the attack or were in the water. 668 POW's died when the ship sank, leaving only 82 survivors. 47 of 52 Japanese guards also died.

His remains were not recovered.

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