The Road Back: A Pacific POW's Liberation Story [Hardcover]

Dorothy Davis Thompson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 1996

The commanding saga of a real-life World War II heroine. Dorothy Davis Thompson was born and reared in Shanghai, the daughter of an American business man and granddaughter of missionaries. In 1937 she left Shanghai to attend nursing school at Columbia University in New York. Shortly thereafter, the Japanese invaded China, and her family fled to the Philippines. Graduating from Columbia, she rejoined her family in Manila. With the city's fall to the Japanese in 1942, Thompson and her family were taken prisoners and interned in nearby Santo Tomas. There they struggled to survive and to cope with ever-mounting concerns for missing friends and other loved ones, including Thompson's fiance, a captured Philippine Scout officer. Putting her newly found nursing skills to the test, Thompson managed to establish a hospital in the camp. Yet, twenty-two months later, she was herself so very ill that she and her mother were released in a prisoner exchange. Recovering in the United States, Thompson was determined to see her family reunited. With few resources other than her own tenacity, Thompson began her most dramatic journey yet, the return to Santo Tomas for the liberation of the camp.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Thompson's very well written, well-balanced memoir of World War II nursing breaks some new ground. In the Philippines before the war as a civilian nurse, she was interned by the Japanese under conditions that she survived but her fiancedid not. Repatriated, she joined the Army Nurse Corps and returned to the islands as part of the American liberation forces. She provides a laudable abundance of information on prewar nursing, conditions in the civilian camps such as Santo Tomas, and many other matters about which there is always something new to be learned--as her book proves. A solid addition to any collection covering the POW experience as well as to comprehensive World War II libraries. Roland Green

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Texas Tech University Press (May 1, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0896723623
• ISBN-13: 978-0896723627
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,811,331 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars The Road Back, November 20, 2009

By 

C. Reicherzer (San Antonio, TX, US) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: The Road Back: A Pacific POW's Liberation Story (Hardcover)

I know the author personally. We attend the same church in San Antonio, Texas. I have read her book and found it to be very interesting. It presents some of the events of WWII from the perspective of an Army Nurse who was taken prisoner by the Japanese while she was serving in the Philippines. The book also contains some biographical information and family background. She's a wonderful lady who is, as of this review, about 90 years old. When the book arrives, I intend to ask her and her husband to autograph it for me. I borrowed the book from the public library and decided I would like to have a copy of my own.