Governor to Present Purple Hears and POW Medals to Bataan Survivor

Photo Courtesy: ghostofbataan.com

(SALEM) - Governor Ted Kulongoski will present the Purple Heart and a Prisoner of War (POW) medal to a World War II veteran and survivor of the Bataan Death March. More than 60 years later, Omar McGuire, 85, of Eugene will receive the medals during a ceremony on May 30th at 1:00 PM, in the Governor's ceremonial office.

In March 2006, a curious McGuire wrote and sent copies of his military records to the U.S. Air Force Personnel Center at Randolph AFB, Texas to inquire about receiving a Purple Heart. On May 15th, the Air Force replied saying that he was eligible to receive both the Purple Heart and the POW medal.

The Purple Heart is awarded in the name of the President of the United States to any member of an armed force or any civilian national of the United States who, while serving in or with one of the U.S. Armed Services has been wounded or killed in any action.

At age 19, while serving as an Army Air Corps mechanic stationed on the Bataan Peninsula in the Philippines in April 1942, McGuire was injured three times while fighting off attacking Japanese soldiers.

On April 9th, he was among more than 75,000 American military, Filipino military and civilians who surrendered to the Japanese. These prisoners of war were then beaten, tortured and some even killed by their captives as they were forced to march nearly 100 miles across the peninsula to prison camps in what would be called the Bataan Death March.

McGuire spent more than three years as a POW in camps in the Philippines and Japan. He was forced to build bridges, roads, and military airstrips. Eventually he worked in an enormous steel-manufacturing complex in Kokura, Japan. On the morning of August 15th, 1945, U.S. bombers attacked Kokura, which created fires and smoke— smoke that would save the lives of McGuire and thousands of other POW's. During the bombing, McGuire received a severe facial injury.

Kokura was to have been the target for the second U.S. atomic bomb, but because of the smoke, American B-29 bombardiers couldn't see the city and were diverted to their alternate target—Nagasaki.

When he was debriefed in the Philippines after the war, McGuire didn't report his injuries. Like many servicemen, he just wanted to return home.

After retiring as a letter carrier in 1986 from Temple City, Calif., McGuire and his wife of nearly 60 years, Lucy-Le, moved to Eugene to be closer to their family. Mrs. McGuire will assist the Governor in presenting the medal.

McGuire is a member and the past-National Commander of the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor (POWs of the Japanese in WWII); 2002-03.