Former Child POW to Speak at Veterans Museum This Weekend

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Although in his mid 80s, Robert Wheeler often recalls his childhood in the Philippines. Specifically, he recounts the day that United States paratroopers from the 11th Airborne Division rescued him and his family from an internment camp during World War II.

“The people who were still alive were living on rice, dogs, cats and slugs,” he said.

This weekend, Wheeler will speak at the Korean War Veterans and Prisoners of War/Missing in Action Remembrance Day at the Veterans Memorial Museum in Chehalis. 

The museum holds the event annually. Chip Duncan, director of the Veterans Memorial Museum, said it has been more difficult in recent years to find former POWs. The museum combined the events to honor Korean War veterans, former prisoners of war and those still missing in action, years ago.

The event begins with opening comments, a video presentation for the Korean War veterans and a performance from the Salzer Creek Band. The event then transitions into the POW/MIA portion, with a ceremonial setting of the POW table.

Wheeler, who is both a former POW and a Korean War veteran, will speak at the event.

“Bob was just a young kid at the time, but he can remember all of the things quite vividly,” Duncan said. “Then in 1945, there was a very famous raid. … What it was is that we (the United States) knew that the Japanese were executing prisoners of war, because they knew the war was coming to end.”

During World War II, Wheeler was a child POW. He and his family were captured in 1942, when he was only 9 years old. For the next three years, Wheeler, his father, his stepmother and his younger brother were POWs in the Philippines.

In 1945, when Wheeler was 12 years old, United States paratroopers from the 11th Airborne Division rescued him and his family from Los Baños Civilian Internment Camp.

“There was a fear they were going to (execute) expats at Los Baños,” Duncan said. “They rescued prisoners there, got them out to the coastline and evacuated them.”

Wheeler said he didn’t know at the time that the Japanese intended to execute the POWs.

“We found out later we were supposed to be executed that day,” Wheeler said. “They had trenches dug for our graves. … I’m glad I didn’t know it until later on. I just walked out the door, went to roll call that morning, looked up at the sky and there were these nine airplanes and all the parachutes started coming down.”



Wheeler said that even though he saw the paratroopers coming in, he still ate breakfast.

“I was so hungry that I was going to eat no matter what,” he said.

At this point, Wheeler and his family were only eating one meal per day. At 12 years old, he weighed 57 pounds. He and his family lived on bug-filled rice mush, weeds, slugs and in some cases cats and dogs.

Wheeler’s stepmother, who is 103, currently lives in California. He said they still talk about the internment camp.

Wheeler is currently writing a book about his life and his time as a child POW, titled “A Child’s Life Interrupted by the Imperial Japanese Army.” Duncan asked Wheeler to speak at the event after he saw a draft of Wheeler’s manuscript.

“I’ve done a lot of writing in my career,” Wheeler said of the book. “Thank God for word processing, where you can change sentences and move words.”

The book is about Wheeler’s whole life, but the centerpiece is about the rescue that he and his family experienced.

“I’m a bit of a historian on the raid,” Wheeler said. “... It’s been a process. I started several years ago and put it away. Suddenly I got the urge and I’m writing again.”

Wheeler appeared in the war documentary “Rescue At Dawn: The Los Baños Raid” on the History Channel. As part of filming for the documentary, he flew to the Philippines with three paratroopers who were part of the raid.

“They were special people,” said Wheeler of the paratroopers from the 11th Airborne Division. “They had been in some terrible battles before they came to rescue us. But they think that that rescue is the greatest thing that they did. When I thank them, they say ‘oh no, we were just doing our job — you guys were the heroes.’ They really believe that’s the best thing they did in the whole war.”

This event takes place at 2 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 22 at the Veterans Memorial Museum. The museum is located at 100 SW Veterans Way in Chehalis.