Lt. Owen Romaine
Kentucky Post, Friday, 19 March 1943, page 1
Word has been received from the War Department that Second Lieut. Owen W Romaine, son of Mr. and Mrs. Hugh Romaine, 9 Taylor avenue, Ft Thomas, is a prisoner of the Japanese, his parents reported Friday. Lieut. Romaine was reported missing in action after the fall of Bataan and Corregidor. Last word received from him was a letter dated Feb 14, 1942, containing a notation that it had been carried through the Japanese blockade by submarine and transferred to a freighter.
The ship was bombed and sunk by the Japs, but the mail pouch containing the letter was recovered and forwarded. Commissioned a lieutenant in the communications branch of the Army Air Corps in January 1941, he was assigned to Clark Field in the Philippines Oct 1, 1941. He attended the University of Kentucky and was employed in the office of the E Kahn Sons Co Cincinnati meat packers, before entering the Army.
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Kentucky Post, Tuesday, 4 May 1943, page 1
Second Lieut. Owen W Romaine, son of Mr. and Mrs. Hughbert Romaine, 9 Taylor avenue, Ft Thomas, is a prisoner of the Japanese, according to a release by the War Department. Lieut. Romaine, 27, is a nephew of William Hume Norman, after whom Norman Barnes Post American Legion, Covington, was named.
A communications officer in the Air Corps, Lieut. Romaine was sent to the Philippines in September 1941, and went through the campaign until his capture. He was reported missing in action a short time after the fall of Corregidor. Six weeks ago the War Department notified his parents he was held by the Japs and informed them they could write to him. Since that time the parents have written one letter each week, none if which has been received.
Lieut. Romaine, a graduate of Highland High School, attended the University of Kentucky two and one-half years. He entered and received his training at Sikeston Mo. and at Scott Field near St Louis.
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Kentucky Post, Monday, 23 August 1943, page 4
A communication from their son, Lieut. Owen W Romaine, 28, who is held prisoner of war by the Japs was received Sunday by Mr. and Mrs. Hugh Romaine, Ft Thomas. The communication was dated from Military Prison Camp 1, Philippine Islands and stated the Ft Thomas soldier was in good health and uninjured.
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Kentucky Post, Friday, 2 November 1945, page 13
A tale of torture treatment, beatings and general abuse was told by 2nd Lt. Owen W Romaine, son of Mr. and Mrs. Hughbert Romaine, Ft Thomas, when he arrived home recently after 42 months as a prisoner of the Japanese. Arriving home in time to celebrate his 30th birthday Thursday, Lt. Romaine said, "I can tell you what happened to me but I'm afraid the general public will believe it fantastic."
He has suffered daily beatings, a death sentence which for some unknown to him was never carried out, torture while being tied to bamboo poles and other things which the sadist Japs devised and of which the majority of Americans could not possibly conceive. "I was acting as a supply officer for a prison camp on the island of Kyushu Japan, when they caught me smuggling Jap newspapers into the camp for the boys to read. They threw me in a prison and told me I would suffer the death penalty. For some reason I never learned the execution was stayed and when a new Jap commander took over about a month later I was released."
Although the Japs slipped up on his murder, he says he got a regular beating each morning right on the date at 9 am. This occurred for every day of the 31 he spent in prison. Captured three days after the fall of Bataan, his time as a prisoner was spent in four camps, two in the Philippines, one in Japan and the last in Manchuria, where he was liberated by our forces soon after the end of the war. He says he would like to return to Japan some day in some capacity besides that of prisoner.
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Ft Thomas Living Magazine
Outwitting his captors for eight months while held prisoner in a Japanese camp will remain the outstanding incident in the military career of Lt. Owen W Romaine, Air Corps communications officer captured at the fall of Bataan, who arrived Tuesday night at the home of his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Hugh Romaine, 9 Taylor Avenue, Ft Thomas.
Forced to march for 17 days though suffering from shrapnel wounds in both feet, received April 11, 1942, when Bataan was captured, Lt. Romaine arrived at Camp O'Donnell, former American Army post in Tarlac Province on the island of Luzon. From there he was sent to the notorious Cabanatuan prison camp and alter in July 1943, to Kyushu, Japan. In April 1944 he was moved to Mukden Prison Camp at Manchuria, where he remained until Aug 19, 1945 when liberated by the Russians.