My Hitch in Hell: The Bataan Death March (Memories of War) [Paperback]

Lester I. Tenney (Author)

Book Description

Series: Memories of War | Publication Date: September 30, 2000

Captured by the Japanese after the fall of Bataan, Lester Tenney was one of the very few who would survive the legendary Death March and three and a half years in Japanese prison camps. With an understanding of human nature, a sense of humor, sharp thinking, and fierce determination, Tenney endured the rest of the war as a slave laborer in Japanese prison camps. My Hitch in Hell is an inspiring survivor’s epic about the triumph of human will despite unimaginable human suffering.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Tenney here recounts his experiences as a GI during the fall of the Philippines in 1941, his participation in the Bataan death march and his three-year ordeal in Camp 17, the harshest POW camp in Japan. He witnessed devastating atrocities, including serial slaughter that was a kind of athletic exercise for the guards. Soon after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, he was set free; his wanderings about the countryside and interactions with Japanese civilians and leaderless soldiers form the most interesting sections of this engrossing book. Tenney suffered unexpected heartbreak when, upon being reunited with his family, he learned that his wife, believing him killed in action, had remarried. He also experienced depression based largely on his image of himself as one of "the losers who had surrendered" in the Philippines. In 1988, he revisited Japan and found that his psychic war wounds were beginning to heal. For all the suffering he witnessed and endured, Tenney's memoir is remarkably upbeat. He is a retired professor of finance at Arizona State University. Photos.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"Superb." - Stephen E. Ambrose" --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 220 pages
• Publisher: Potomac Books Inc. (September 30, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1574882988
• ISBN-13: 978-1574882988
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (31 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,056,452 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

35 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars OUTSTANDING!!, February 7, 2003

By 

DougA (OR, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: My Hitch in Hell: The Bataan Death March (Memories of War) (Paperback)

This is the fifth book I have read about the Bataan Death March, and it is, without question, the best of the bunch. It is written with heart-wrenching stories so vivid you can almost feel the rifle butt slamming into your face too. You almost feel the heat of the tropical Philippine sun as the sick and dying men make their ill-fated trek out of Bataan. And you can almost smell the death in the air.

Tenney does an excellent job of caputuring the unadulterated abuse suffered at the hands of the Japanese. The story culminates with the cruelest irony of all when Tenney finally returns home after three-and-a-half years of daily atrocities so horrific we almost become numb to them. Almost. I won't ruin the end of the book for you and if you don't want to know, don't read the inside jacket cover.

But DO read this book. The pages turn themselves.

I just can't figure out why this book hasn't been made into a movie. The story of the plight of the men in the Pacific theater during WWII has yet to be accurately told. Steven Spielberg! Listen up!

34 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Fellow Captive, September 12, 2000

By 

Joe Cassin (New Orleans, La.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: My Hitch in Hell: The Bataan Death March (Memories of War) (Paperback)

As a survivor of the Bataan Death March, I can vouch for the authenticity of MY HITCH IN HELL. There is not a word of exagerration in this absorbing account of the conditions and events in the Japanese Prison Camps. Too little is known about the slave labor imposed on men who were literally dying of malnutriton and all the accompanying diseases such as beri beri, dysentery, malaria, and scurvy.The toll from accidents in the Japanese coal mines was even greater.

At present the veterans such as myself are in their late seventies or early eighties and now dying off at an alarming rate.

MY HITCH IN HELL at least tells the story of their experience while some of us can have the satisfaction of knowing that our sacrifice will not be forgotten completely.

24 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Deeply personal tale of hope and survival, April 24, 2000

By 

Joseph T. Reeves - See all my reviews

This review is from: My Hitch in Hell: The Bataan Death March (World War II Commemorative) (Hardcover)

"My Hitch in Hell" is a hard-hitting story of one man's survival as a prisoner of the Japanese during World War II. Lester I. Tenney narrates his own story of the cruelty he suffered with a tone of courage and hope. Tenney was captured by the Japanese in 1941 and forced on the infamous Bataan Death March. Following that, he was used for slave labor until liberated in 1945. Tenney describes in vivid detail the inhumane and evil behavior of his captors and guards, and how he managed to cling to hope in a place where hope died for most men. This is not a scholarly work, but it is educational and enlightening. Tenney manages to tell his story in a deeply emotional and personal manner without resorting to a tone of hate and recrimination. By doing so, he accomplishes the near-impossible: living through a nightmarish experience and still being able to discuss it rationally. This is an engrossing story that reflects personal history at its best.