Description: This site is dedicated to the memory of the "Lost Battalion," the American soldiers captured on Java in 1942 by the Japanese Imperial Army during World War
This site is dedicated to the memory of the “Lost Battalion,” the American soldiers captured on Java in 1942 by the Japanese Imperial Army during World War II; specifically, the Second Battalion, 131st Field Artillery Regiment (36th Division of the Texas National Guard). As prisoners of war, they, and survivors of the heavy cruiser USS Houston (CA-30), suffered 42 months of slave labor, much of the time building the 258-mile Burma-Thailand “Death” Railway connecting Burma and Thailand. They were worked and
Nearly a year passed after their capture before the U.S. government learned the fate of the soldiers of the 131 st Field Artillery/2 nd Battalion. In the interim, it was assumed the unit was entirely lost (most of the men designated as MIA – Missing in Action) when Japanese military forces invaded the island of Java – hence the moniker, “the Texas Lost Battalion.”
The surreal and astonishing story of the men of the 131 st and USS Houston (CA-30) must not be allowed to fade. As brothers in captivity, their camaraderie in chains created a unique and life-long bond. The grueling conditions of their imprisonment forever seared them as eyewitnesses to some of the most unimaginable atrocities committed in twentieth-century warfare. Of the 902 soldiers of the 131 st and the survivors of USS Houston (CA-30) captured on Java, 668 of them were transported via “hellships” to Bu