American Valor Quarterly Issue 1 - Winter 2007 | Page 17

Miyamura: On my way down the mountain, I ran into one many of the men start to turn into human skeletons. We of the enemy, we came face to face, and I bayoneted him. lost a lot of them along the way. Out of our group, we As I withdrew, I fell backwards and at that instant, he had a arrived at the prisoner camp with about half of what we concussion grenade in his hand from which he had pulled started with. the pin. I felt it hit my foot and it went off. I didn’t know it at the time, but I ended up with a piece of shrapnel in my Once we arrived there we thought the treatment would be leg. I tried to keep making my way down the mountain. much better. That first year was no better than the first When I arrived at the bottom, I ran into a barbed wire night we got captured. We still received no medical attention. entanglement that was strung across the road. I didn’t know The food was not any better, and w