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Show Harold W. Poole pril3, 2001 fed us all we could eat of this rich stuff. We couldn't handle it you know. And some ofth crew were getting a little bit upset because they couldn't get in the head. You know what the head i ? Okay. Anyway, one of them asked me, "What in the heck is going on with you guys?" I said "Listen, we haven't sat on one of these seats for over three years." "We're just sitting here enjoying it, you know." In the head! WIN: Okay. Harold, let's go back to your prisoner of war days in Japan. You were working first in the steel mill. As you were there, and you weren't being fed much, and people were getting weak. What was the mortality rate among your fellow soldiers. HAR: Well, in the Philippines, particularly the first few months--like I say from the exposure off that death march, and the different diseases they picked up, there was a lot of death going on. In fact, I was--like I say, one of the well men, and I got over that malaria and was in pretty good shape, you know. And, so, I was on these burial details a lot. They'd send out a grave digging detail in the morning, and dig the grave. Usually it was about ten feet square, and about three feet deep. They had a lot of guys digging it, you know. And then after awhile it got not so wide, and not nearly so deep, because they were so weak they couldn't do so much digging. And then the rainy season came, and they'd go out and dig the hole, and in the afternoon it would rain before we'd get out there with the dead ones. And they'd get water in that hole. It was almost full, you know. We buried them naked because we had to save the clothes. We boiled them in a fifty-five gallon steel barrel, you know, over a fire, and sterilized them, and used them again, you know, what we could. They were all wearing out, and everything else. Our shoes and everything wore out. They didn't issue us any clothes in the Philippines. And, you know, if you go a year 38 |
