The Wilmington morning star., 1945-08-20
Airborne Relief Party
Finds Gen. Kqinwright
Continued from Page One)

Continued from Page One)
Governor General of the Dutch
East Indies.
(Mrs. Wainwright in Skaneateles
N. Y, said the news was Just
The tall and lanky General who
will be 81 years old on Thursday
surrendered his sick and weary
army to the japanese on May s.,
1912, after weeks Of relentless
bombing and Smelling by superior
enemy forces.
Wainwright, promoted to Lieut.
enant General on March 10, 1942,
took oyer when Gen. Douglas Mac
Arthur was transferred to Aus
tralia in March of that year. Ba-
taan fell April 8 and for almost
a month the men on wainwright S
rock" rregidor-and the island
fortresses of Frank, Hughes and
Drum-held out against desperate
enemy attacks.
Wainwright had one chance to
escape, but he turned it down. Il
have been with my merr from the
start, and if captured I will share
their lot" he said. 1--WE have been
through so much together that
my conscience would not let me
leave before the final curtain"
On May 10 Tokyo broadcast an
account of Wainwright's last days
IN the Philippines:
1.-The surrender of the American
commander was one of the most
pathetic scenes witnessed by jap
anese expeditionary forces in the
Philippines" Tokyo said.
'"The initial step in the surren-
der of the American forces came
when the six foot high American
commander, haggard from lack OF
sleep and from worry, advanced
toward the Japanese lines, carry
ing white flag and accompanied
by his aides.
'Ushered into the room of the
Japanese commander, General
Wainwright slumped into a chair
. When the Japanese comman.
der entered the room with his
hands gripping the handle of a
sword, Wainwright and his aides
stood up at rigid attention and sa-
luted. The look of fatigue vanished
from the faces of the American
soldiers, and they showed they
were soldiers above ALL
After the surrender wainwright
was held for a time on Luzon. and
then was removed to Formosa
where he wrote Mrs. Wainwright
that he had lost 80 pounds by June
1913. In November, 1914, the Japa.
nese shifted Wainwright to Man
churia.
The parachutist rescue parties
had no advance knowledge as to
how they would be received by
the Japanese. And although leaf
lets have been dropped near the
camps for the past month, a B-24
Liberator on a leaflet dropping
over Saigon was fired on
yesterday.
Radio messages from the VAIN
wright camp said that the pris-
oners went wild with joy when
hey learned that rescue was
near-three years, two months and
Is days after Wainwright was
forced to surrender Corregidor
These messages reported the pris-
condition much better than
The doctors radioed that the
prisoners had been treated "quite
WE'LL" and reported that there
were only the normal number OF
litter cases. Food was the prison.
er's principal problem.
1t. Gen. Albert C. Wedemeyer,
chief of American forces in the
China theater, who announced
Wainwright's imminent liberation.
disclosed meanwhile that there
were 10000 Allied prisoners of war
and $4,000 civilian internees in
camps within the China theater,
Indo China, Formosa,
Korea and Manchuria.
Approximately 10 per cent, or
;, 500 are Americans, Wedemeyer
said Most of them were bel1 we'd
to have been brought to the area
rom the Philippines, where they
we're captured when Bataan fell
On April 9, 1912, ard when Corregi.
lor fell month later.
The prisoners will have high pri-