American Prisoners of War During the Bataan Death March
On April 9, 1942, U.S. forces surrendered the Bataan Peninsula to the Japanese and it was bad news for the American soldiers on the Philippine island of Luzon during WWII. This became known as the Bataan death march because Japanese soldiers forced about 75,000 American and Filipino prisoners to march 65 miles to prison camps. Many of these prisoners died of malnutrition and dehydration before they reached the camps.