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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 940.54
EAN: 9780671787189
ISBN: 0671787187
Label: Atria
Manufacturer: Atria
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 352
Publication Date: May 01, 2000
Publisher: Atria
Studio: Atria

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Editorial Review:

Amazon.com Review:
"Found worms in my oatmeal this morning. I shouldn't have objected because they had been sterilized in the cooking and I was getting fresh meat with my breakfast.... I'm still losing weight and so are most of us..."

Ruth Marie Straub, an Army nurse, wrote those words in her diary on March 15, 1942, just over three months after the Japanese first bombed the U.S. military base in Manila. She and her colleagues had evacuated the city and established, in the Philippine jungle, hospitals for the skyrocketing numbers of casualties. In the face of the advancing Japanese Army, the nurses and other military personnel continued to retreat, first to the Bataan Peninsula, and then to Corregidor, a rocky island in Manila Bay. Straub was one of the lucky ones; she was evacuated with a handful of other nurses in April 1942. Her remaining colleagues, meanwhile, surrendered with the rest of the U.S. forces in May and were taken to STIC--Santo Tomas Internment Camp, where they were to spend nearly three years in captivity.

We Band of Angels tells the stories of these courageous women, tagged by the American media as "The Angels of Bataan and Corregidor." Utilizing a wide range of sources, including diaries, letters, and personal interviews with surviving "Angels," Elizabeth M. Norman has compiled a harrowing narrative about the experiences of these women--from the country-club atmosphere of prewar Manila; to the jungle hospitals where patients slept on bamboo cots in the open air; to the Malinta Tunnel on Corregidor, where they choked on dust and worked while the bombs rained down above them; to the STIC, where per-person rations were cut to 900 calories a day and the women resorted to frying weeds in cold cream for food. The story Nelson tells is compelling but slightly flawed: like many biographers, Nelson has a deep affection and respect for her subjects, which causes her to soften rough edges. At the same time, however, Nelson argues that these women were not heroes--nor were they angels (in the acknowledgments, Nelson notes that she didn't want the word angels in the title, but the publishers had their way). Perhaps because Nelson is a nurse herself, she is trying to stress that her profession is noble and that these women were, in a sense, just fulfilling their duties.

Nursing is noble, of course, but it is clear that these women were something special. Amazingly, all of the Angels of Bataan, some 99 in number, survived their ordeal--and clearly helped hundreds of the other sufferers survive. We Band of Angels deserves a space on the bookshelves of anyone interested in World War II. --C.B. Delaney

Product Description:


Hailed by The New York Times Book Review as a "grippingly told" story of "power and relevance," here is the true, untold account of the first American women to prove their mettle under combat conditions. Later, during three years of brutal captivity at the hands of the Japanese, they also demonstrated their ability to survive. Filled with the thoughts and impressions of the women who lived it, "every page of this history is fascinating" (The Washington Post).

We Band of Angels

In the fall of 1941, the Philippines was a gardenia-scented paradise for the American Army and Navy nurses stationed there. War was a distant rumor, life a routine of easy shifts and evenings of dinner and dancing under the stars. On December 8 all that changed, as Japanese bombs rained on American bases in Luzon, and the women's paradise became a fiery hell. Caught in the raging battle, the nurses set up field hospitals in the jungles of Bataan and the tunnels of Corregidor, where they saw the most devastating injuries of war, and suffered the terrors of shells and shrapnel.

But the worst was yet to come. As Bataan and Corregidor fell, a few nurses escaped, but most were herded into internment camps enduring three years of fear and starvation. Once liberated, they returned to an America that at first celebrated them, but later refused to honor their leaders with the medals they clearly deserved. Here, in letters, diaries, and firsthand accounts, is the story of what really happened during those dark days, woven together in a compelling saga of women in war.






Rating: - we band of angels
this book was very enlighting. i didn't realize that nurses were still on Bataan or corregidor when they fell into Japanese hands. the nurses all displayed a great amount of courage. This was a different view point than from the mens. The book opened up new avenues of discussion with my mother who is in her 80s and remembers when the nurses came home. A good read all the way from start to finish.

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Rating: - The Hard Truth: When Japanese Raped & Starved American Women & Children
Let's let the book speak for itself:

"Around 8:00 p.m. on April 10 [1942], one day after the surrender, an American officer at Hospital #2, recuperating from a bullet wound in his lung, heard a woman screaming in the tent next to him. In the darkness he propped himself up and saw an American medic quickly approach the tent, only to be sharply turned away by a [Japanese] sentry wielding a rifle and bayonet. The cries continued for a while, then stopped. In the morning, Ehtyle Mae Mercado ... Read More

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Rating: - Praise for "We Band of Angels."
Like many other people, I've always wanted to know what happened to our American nurses who were captured on Bataan and Corregidor? Elizabeth Norman not only answers this question, but through her interviews with the nurses who survived three years of captivity by the Japanese, has described the experience in great detail. And in the telling, I got a lot more than just an answer to my question; I gained an insight into what made these remarkable women tick, and why it was that they were able to ... Read More

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Rating: - couldn't put it down
It has been SO LONG since I've read a book that I could not put down, and that I didn't end up dozing off with late at night. I work in a bookstore, I read all genres. A co-worker, who runs the history sections, and a Vietnam Vet, recommended this when I ventured into his section looking for something new to read. He didn't even hesitate, he reached right for it, and said it's one he just hangs on to, and leaves on the shelf 'past its prime'. It wasn't a bunch of hype, and it wasn't so graphically horrific ... Read More

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Rating: - It has opened my eyes!!
Being a child of the 70's I slept thru most of high school. I'm also a nurse. This book has shown me things I never knew about WWII, the Pacific and Gen. MacAuthur (who wasn't a hero). These nurses are the heros and shows what real nursing is all about!!

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