Spirit Lake Man Returned
From A Jap Prison Camp
Mrs. John Swanlund of Spirit Lake has been advised that her son, now Major Lloyd Allen, has arrived in San Francisco from the Mukden, Manchuria, Japanese prison camp. He seems to be in good health and was promoted from captain to major upon his liberations, his wife has reported from the coast by telephone. She was flown to the coast to meet her husband.
Major Allen was with the 24th field artillery in the Philippines, having gone there in April, 1941, from Stewart (sic), Iowa, where he was employed in a drug store, and where his wife still lives. He was taken captive on Bataan on his eighth wedding anniversary.
Last week Mrs. Allen had official notice that he had been liberated from the prison camp at Mukden. She was later advised that he had been returned to government control, and then received a letter from him. It arrived Friday, Sept. 7, and had been written Aug. 19.
In the letter the former prisoner said he was on a prison ship in the Subic bay bombing by American planes and that he was slightly wounded and bruised. That was in December, 1943. He was again injured and bruised in an American bombing while he was in prison at Formosa. He reached Nagoya Jan. 29, 1945, and was taken on to Mukden.
The first Allen knew that the war had ended was the news brought by the American parachute troops in the mercy team that reached his camp at Mukden.
Last Saturday an army captain and WAC visited Ms. Allen at Stewart (sic) and arranged for her to fly to San Francisco from Des Moines Monday, to meet her husband. He apparently reached there first as she had telephoned his mother soon after her arrival there.
Allen was graduated from the Spirit Lake high school with the class of 1925. He is the first arrival from a Jap prison camp made known in this area.
Source: The Milford Mail, Milford, Iowa, Thursday, September 13, 1945, Page 1
***Further Research:
Lloyd Clayton “Doc” Allen was born July 7, 1907 to Luther L. and Olive Pearson Allen. He was the step-son of John Swanlund. He died Aug. 14, 1989 and is buried in Ames Municipal Cemetery, Ames, IA.
Capt. served with the U.S. Army in World War II and Korea. He retired as a Lt. Colonel in 1953. Capt. Allen was an officer with the 88th Field Artillery, Philippine Scouts. He was stationed in the Philippines when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. He became a POW on Apr. 9, 1952, and took part in the death March.
While being transported to Japan, he survived the sinking of the Oryoku Maru on Dec. 15, 1944, by American planes in Subic Bay, Philippines. He also survived the sinking of the Enoura Maru on Jan. 9, 1945 at Takao, Formosa. On a third transport, the Brazil Maru, he made it to Japan. He was held in a POW camp in Japan before being sent to Mukden, Manchuria in April 1945.
Source: ancestry.com
