Several Navy nurses were captured by the Japanese at the fall of Manila in 1942 and remained in a prison camp until 1945. Initially serving in the infirmary at a prison camp in Santo Tomas, they voluntarily transferred to the prison camp at Los Baños, despite its notoriously poor conditions, to care for internees there. They were liberated from captivity in 1945. Shown here are liberated Navy nurses with Vice Adm. Thomas C. Kinkaid in 1945. All of the nurses received the Bronze Star and a Prisoner of War medal. Left to right: Susie Pitcher, Dorothy Still, Basilia Stewart, Goldie O’Haver, Eldene Paige, Kinkaid, Mary Chapman, Laura M. Cobb, Maureen Davis, Mary Nelson (née Harrington), Helen Gorzelanski, Bertha Evans, Margaret Nash, Helen Grant, and Edwina Todd.

Last Updated: 29 March 2023