World War II Honoree

Daniel William Crowley

Branch of Service

U.S. Army Air Force

Hometown

Greenwich, Connecticut

Honored By

Pearl Thomas

He enlisted in the US Army Air Corps in October 1940 and was sent to the Philippines in March 1941. He was assigned to Nichols Field, which was destroyed when the Japanese attacked December 8, 1941 and the US entered the war. He fought on the Bataan Peninsula with the US Army's Provisional Air Corps Infantry Regiment fending off three Japanese amphibious landings. After the Bataan Peninsula was surrendered April 9, 1942-the single largest military surrender in American history-he swam the three miles of shark-infested, mined waters to Corregidor Island in Manila Bay. On Corregidor, he became part of the 4th Marines fighting a dangerous and desperate shore defense until the island fortress fell on May 6, 1942. After surviving a series of brutal work details on the Philippines, in 1944 he was sent aboard a "hell ship" to Japan. There, he was a slave laborer mining copper, first for the Hitachi Company and then by the Furukawa Company at their Ashio mine. He was liberated on September 4, 1945, and was home to Connecticut by Christmas.