I Was There, Charley
An Autobiography
by
Book Cover & Preview Text
Since retiring from the United States Army in July of 1946 I have intended, and have been urged by family and friends, to write about my six plus years in the army and more especially the three and half year spent in a Japanese prisoner of war camp. I started this endeavor shortly after being discharged while working for some college friends who were getting started in the printing business. Thanks to their encouragement and that of others, I began to try relating the many horrors, brutality, starvation, sickness and death associated with that experience. The first months I worked at it quite feverishly, but as time went on, the attempts at writing took a back seat. I was newly married, had new employment and was generally getting into the groove. Due to the diversion of everyday existence, pursuing the termination of this book faded into the background and it has only been in the past few years, at the urging of my children and grandchildren, that I have “picked up the old pen” and am going on with the book I started some 50 years ago. This book, or portions of it will be included in my autobiography, which is being written only for family and a few close friends. It would probably be dull reading to any one but the family.
I have copious notes and from September 1943 until January 1945, a diary written (against rules) on my allotted roll of paper-thin toilet paper, a copy of which is shown at the end of this Preface. I’ve used these notes to open the portals of my 88 year-old mind and hopefully, produce a document that is interesting, informative, sometimes controversial, mind-boggling, brutally frank and often amusing. The subject matter contained within is not altogether pleasant, and just writing about it, can never convey to the reader the inhumanity and depravity that the captives of the Japanese were exposed to, nor the traumatic effect it had on me and the many other young men who received this treatment by a supposed civilized nation. I can only relate what I saw and experienced. Many books have been written on this subject over the years, and I do not know that mine will be so different. I only know this is something I set out to do a long time ago and now am doing it, not just for myself, but to give voice to those unfortunate others who lived through this hell on earth with me. Thanks for your time, and for listening.
Formats
Book Details
About the Book
Clemens A. Kathman spent more than three years in Japanese prisoner of war camps during World War II, and this is the first time he’s revealed his full story. From the time he was drafted in March 1941, to his early days of basic training, and then the explosive day when the Japanese bombed Clark Field in the Philippines, he looks back at his ordeals with honesty. Nothing is off limits: He revisits the horrors he witnessed at the Battle of Bataan and the desperation he felt during the Bataan Death March. Seeing people die and contemplating his own death made him realize that Civil War Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman was right when he famously said, “War is hell.” Kathman also reveals details about the infamous O’Donnell and Cabanatuan prison camps, where he was starved on a diet of rice and greens soup, slept on bamboo slats infested with bedbugs and lice, and where he somehow survived hundreds of brutalities. It may not be pretty, but his story is one that needs to be read and remembered as it reveals the ultimate price so many paid for their country. He knows because he was there.
About the Author
Clemens A. Kathman, better known as “Clem” survived The Great Depression only to have his plans interrupted by Hitler, Mussolini, and Tojo. He spent more than three years as a prisoner of war before being liberated in September 1945. After being discharged, he resumed working in the newspaper field, retiring in 1981. This is his first book.