Wake, War And Waiting…
5/5
()
About this ebook
Captivity for the prisoners was a war in and of itself; and Kephart’s short narrative gives a vivid account of the daily struggles against starvation, against the petty viciousness or outright brutality of the captives, against dirt, time and terror.
Yet, despite his photographic realism, Mr. Kephart’s saga is not essentially one of pessimism or despair. Out of the darkness of slavery flash those small victories or omens that men could cherish and hold against the ultimate hope of freedom—the Christmas celebration, the miracle of a Red Cross package, the sight of the first American bomber. And then, with the surrender of the Japanese, came that unforgettable moment. They were free men again! For the reader who has lived through the disappointments and triumphs of the book, that long- awaited moment will be no less thrilling.
Rodney Kephart was born in Spencer, Iowa, in 1917. After attending school in South Dakota, he went to Bethel Junior College in St. Paul, Minnesota. Until his capture on Wake, he was at various times a farmer, a carpenter, and an unofficial Protestant minister. Since his return from the Pacific he has been studying business administration, first at the Boise Junior College and later at the University of Minnesota.
Rodney Kephart
See Book Description
Related to Wake, War And Waiting…
Related ebooks
Kayaking Adventures In Beautiful British Columbia: True Stories of Adventure While Kayaking in BC Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSun Fish Moon Fish Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Shipwrecked Orphans Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOcracoke Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBest Places to Bird in British Columbia Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsKing Mombo Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWind In My Wings Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLion Ben of Elm Island Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFish Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Little Savage Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWhite Harvest Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Treasured Islands: The explorer’s guide to over 200 of the most beautiful and intriguing islands around Britain Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAustralian Search Party Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIn The South Seas Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVoyage of the Harrier Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Coral Sea Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5People of the Sea Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsShort Sketches from Oldest America Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIn the South Seas (Annotated) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFuture Sea: How to Rescue and Protect the World’s Oceans Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Nature's Restoration: People and Places on the Front Lines of Conservation Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Fisherman's Happiness Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCoastal Britain: England and Wales: Celebrating the history, heritage and wildlife of Britain's shores Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWood Made Flesh: The Twelfth Imam Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAustralian Search Party Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Run: Observations on the Natural History of the Alewife Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Amazing World of Flyingfish Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Treasure of the Blue Whale Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wild Shores: The Magic of Ireland's Coastline Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
European History For You
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dry: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mein Kampf: English Translation of Mein Kamphf - Mein Kampt - Mein Kamphf Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Rise of the Fourth Reich: The Secret Societies That Threaten to Take Over America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Blitzed: Drugs in the Third Reich Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Masters of the Air: America's Bomber Boys Who Fought the Air War Against Nazi Germany Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Quite Nice and Fairly Accurate Good Omens Script Book: The Script Book Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Oscar Wilde: The Unrepentant Years Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Finding Freedom: Harry and Meghan and the Making of a Modern Royal Family Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Anarchy: The East India Company, Corporate Violence, and the Pillage of an Empire Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Jane Austen: The Complete Novels Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Killing England: The Brutal Struggle for American Independence Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Anglo-Saxons: A History of the Beginnings of England: 400 – 1066 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Psychedelic Gospels: The Secret History of Hallucinogens in Christianity Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Celtic Mythology: A Concise Guide to the Gods, Sagas and Beliefs Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Galileo's Daughter: A Historical Memoir of Science, Faith and Love Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Book of English Magic Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Witch: A History of Fear, from Ancient Times to the Present Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Faithful Spy: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the Plot to Kill Hitler Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Putin's People: How the KGB Took Back Russia and Then Took On the West Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Law Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Violent Abuse of Women: In 17th and 18th Century Britain Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Celtic Charted Designs Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Dark Queens: The Bloody Rivalry That Forged the Medieval World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Forgotten Highlander: An Incredible WWII Story of Survival in the Pacific Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Negro Rulers of Scotland and the British Isles Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related categories
Reviews for Wake, War And Waiting…
1 rating1 review
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Very interesting first hand account of the trials and tribulations of an American PW in Japan.
Book preview
Wake, War And Waiting… - Rodney Kephart
This edition is published by PICKLE PARTNERS PUBLISHING—www.picklepartnerspublishing.com
To join our mailing list for new titles or for issues with our books – picklepublishing@gmail.com
Or on Facebook
Text originally published in 1950 under the same title.
© Pickle Partners Publishing 2014, all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means, electrical, mechanical or otherwise without the written permission of the copyright holder.
Publisher’s Note
Although in most cases we have retained the Author’s original spelling and grammar to authentically reproduce the work of the Author and the original intent of such material, some additional notes and clarifications have been added for the modern reader’s benefit.
We have also made every effort to include all maps and illustrations of the original edition the limitations of formatting do not allow of including larger maps, we will upload as many of these maps as possible.
Wake, War and Waiting…
By
Rodney Kephart
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
TABLE OF CONTENTS 4
DEDICATION 5
INTRODUCTION 6
Chapter One. . . 7
Chapter Two. . . 10
Chapter Three. . . 14
Chapter Four. . . 18
Chapter Five. . . 21
Chapter Six. . . 24
Chapter Seven. . . 27
Chapter Eight. . . 31
Chapter Nine. . . 35
Chapter Ten. . . 38
Chapter Eleven. . . 41
Chapter Twelve. . . 44
Chapter Thirteen. . . 49
Chapter Fourteen. . . 53
Chapter Fifteen. . . 55
Chapter Sixteen. . . 59
Chapter Seventeen. . . 63
Chapter Eighteen. . . 66
Chapter Nineteen. . . 69
REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER 72
DEDICATION
DEDICATED
TO
MY GODLY MOTHER,
who in faith awaited the return of her missing son and never once doubted that day would come.
INTRODUCTION
Because wars break into the rage of battle very suddenly after the brooding of the war-clouds, and after a long siege of battle the combat ceases almost as abruptly as it began, I have tried to paint a word picture that will not let the reader forget this war as rapidly as it began or ended.
The blood-strewn battle front; the cruel pain of a body broken by war; the long anxiety of the days spent in waiting for the dawn of peace; the suffering of life without liberty; the agony of existing on an impossible fare all add up to this broken body that is calling together in his feeble way a resume of the days of Wake, War, and Waiting.
These pages that follow are the things which I am able to collect through a memory which is not good after this lengthy experience. Whether first hand or hearsay (the which I am not able to separate at this time), the information is intended only to give a picture of the aftermath and is not intended for authentic or statistical use.
I hope that this work will give the reader a better understanding of the totality of war and help the reader to influence others in the effort to establish peace for the sake of all.
Rodney Kephart
WAKE, WAR AND WAITING
Chapter One. . .
WOOMP—BOOM! TAT-tat-tat! Bomber overhead! Look, it’s the Japs! There goes the Airport! Pan American! Oh, God, we’re trapped! We’re trapped!...Rats in a trap!...Men gathered at the mess-hall! Trucks zooming to the hospital, from the hospital! Dead....Wounded....Fires....Officers frantic! Men mad with excitement!...WAKE ISLAND HAS BEEN BOMBED!
Wake Island—what is it? Where is it? Most people knew very little about Wake when the war broke out, back in December of ‘41. Wake is a small coral reef that has developed around the top of a submerged and inactive volcano. It is an approximate horseshoe in shape, open to the west, and coming to a point to the southeast. The south side of the island is almost a straight line, the southeast corner being an acute angle; maybe that is why it is called Peacock Point. The eastern shoreline of the island extends almost due north, thus the southern shoreline runs slightly north of due west. The short north wing of Wake extends to the southwest. Peale Island lies to the west of the west point of the north wing of Wake, in a northwest-southeast direction. Flipper Point is a thumb-like projection on the lagoon side of Peale. To the west of Wake’s south wing, is a rectangular island, called Wilkes Island. The three islands are surrounded by a coral reef, which extends about a half a mile to the north of the islands. It closes the lagoon at the west end, and makes an abrupt drop-off on the south side of the island. From Peacock Point northward the reef widens to meet the extended reef off Heel Point, on the northeast.
The maximum elevation on the three islands is seventeen feet above the sea. The total area is about two and one half square miles. Wake has a prevailing northeasterly current; this explains the long extended reef to the north and east of the island. The breakers keep the island washed back from the reef. The island is well sea-rounded.
It is possible to throw a stone (rather, a piece of coral, as there are no stones on the island) to three thousand feet of water from any point on the reef, or from the island at Peacock Point.
The climate on Wake would be classified as subtropical. Wake is located about nineteen degrees north latitude and one hundred sixty-five degrees east longitude, about eleven hundred miles west and south of Midway and about fourteen hundred miles east and north of Guam. The rainfall is very heavy, running up into feet. The average temperature is about eighty degrees, varying a few degrees in a year’s time. The shade, what little there is, is always cool due to the perpetual breeze. There are no fresh water collection basins; therefore, no mosquito breeding places and no tropical fever.
There is a variety of natural vegetation. Along the lagoon and lower parts of the islands of Wake and Wilkes is found a considerable amount of ironwood, which grows to a maximum height of about fifteen feet. Around the higher parts of the islands is found a soft, pulpy, white wood. To the north of the lagoon on Wake there is lots of so-called cocoa-wood; it is also plentiful on parts of Wilkes. Numerous small plants and vines make the brush impregnable in most places.
The parts of the island that are not covered with a growth of vegetation, are white patches of coral or coral sand—white as the drifted arctic snow.
Habitation on the island prior to the arrival of man was very limited. The first noticeable life on Wake is the albatross churning the air like corn husks in a whirlwind, screaming like the infernal Japs. There is also the Gooney bird, a large bird—larger than the wild goose—lazy and inquisitive, which is always in your way and to walk around it is usually easier than moving the big lummox. There were several other types of wild fowl and bird life but I am not acquainted with most of them. Wake is the nesting ground for the Arctic tern, a small grey tern, very noisy and stubborn when approached near its nesting grounds. It lays its eggs on the sand (the ground will be blue with eggs) and flies low over the ground near the eggs. One can see millions of these birds hovering in one place during the nesting season.
The phenomenon of the bird life on Wake was the bosun bird. A white bird, a little larger than a large dove, it has two long red tail feathers from one and a half to two feet long. The interesting thing about this particular species of bird life is its ability to fly backwards. It gets its body in a perpendicular position and then drives itself backwards with its wings.
In the early history of the island, a ship was wrecked off Heel Point (northeast point of the island). Rats from the ship were able to reach the shore, and through years of propagation, the island is now overrun with tiny inbred rats.
The Pan American Airways introduced the salamander as a flycatcher, and it has since become a part of Wake Island animal life.
Hermit crabs are a peculiar species of the crustaceans. They are of a red-orange color, having a hard shell over the forepart of their bodies and their claws. They take refuge in any shell of the snail type that fits their particular body size. The crab backs its tail into the shell and takes it wherever it goes and when that shell wears out from being dragged around, the crab picks up a new one. When the shell is touched or picked up, the inhabitant retracts into the shell with its hard-shelled claws forming a shield which blocks the opening in the shell.
Wake is a fisherman’s paradise. The lagoon affords sponge fishing and coral of many shapes and colors plus cowries and other shell-covered sea animals. The outer reef offers the best of shell fishing and lobster fishing. Lobster fishing is a dangerous but exciting sport. The lobsters loiter in the caves and crevices of the reef where Moray eels, octopuses, and sea turtles are also commonly found.
In the shallow water of the lagoon and on the surrounding reef are found many varieties of tropical fish, of every shape,