Corporal Joseph Roy Brown (aka “Jo Jo”, “Georgia”)

3rd Army, 8th Corp
36th Division, 61st Brigade
2nd Battalion, 131^st Field Artillery, Headquarters Battery

Born: 11/27/1913, Newman, Georgia (Coweta County)
Died: 11/24/1943, 100 Kilo Camp, Burm (Myanmar)
Cause(s) of Death: Dysentery, Tropic Ulcer, Beri-Beri

Joseph Roy Brown Jr. was born in Newnan, Georgia on November 27, 1913. Today Newnan is a bustling suburb of Atlanta, but in 1941 Newnan was the county seat of a very rural Coweta County. Newnan was a small southern town featuring numerous textile mills, a large steel fabrication company, and two intersecting RR lines. The town was also known as the “City of Homes” for its large number of beautiful homes. The Newnan public schools were considered to be excellent. It was in this genteel environment that Joe’s father, a local businessman and his mother, a stay-at-home mom, raised Joe and four girls. The Brown and Askew families had come to Coweta County in the early 1800s so there were a large number of relatives and friends living in the area.

Joe loved sports, especially football, but being small in stature he found that the game of golf was the perfect match for his athletic endeavors. Joe was called “Jo Jo” by his friends and he and his golfing buddies spent many hours playing golf at the local 9-hole golf club. Upon graduation from Newnan High School “Jo Jo” enrolled in Georgia Tech but later transferred to Auburn University to complete his studies. He was a member of the Kappa Alpha Order fraternity. Joe enjoyed both big dance band and classical music, which he listened to on his prized personal radio.

After college Joe returned to Newnan and started his business career with a local Fire and Casualty Insurance Agency. By all accounts Joe was a friendly, easygoing person with a winsome smile. He was often described by friends as outgoing, a witty guy who was fun to be around.

In late 1940 Congress passed this nation’s first peacetime draft requiring all men 21 to 41 to register. Joe completed his form and in May 1941 became one of the first Newnanites to be called to serve in the US Army. Private Brown was sworn in at Fort McPherson in Atlanta on June 14,1941 and soon was sent to Fort Sill, Oklahoma for 13 weeks of basic training. The army decided Joe would be an ideal cook, so after 13 weeks of drilling and cooking he became a Qualified First Cook.

Joe left Ft. Sill on September 23 with orders to join the 131st Field Artillery which at that time was on maneuvers in Louisiana. He was in Louisiana only a week before his unit returned home to Ft. Bowie, Texas. At Ft. Sill Joe had hoped to be transferred to Ft. Benning, Ga. to be nearer home but he accepted the move to Texas in stride saying, “Arrived here about noon. It seems like a good place and I’m sure I will like it. I have met some pretty good boys who have been nice about helping me get things straightened out.” Joe was reassigned from cooking duty to Regimental Headquarters Battery and soon was promoted to the battery clerk and to Corporal with pay of $54 a month. The new position was a much better match for his past work experience and talents. Joe did retain his First Cook certificate as he felt when given a choice a lady would prefer to marry a man who could cook.

As Joe settled into his daily routine of his new job it became obvious, he was beginning to inherit a new name at Camp Bowie. Because Joe was a newbie Kyle Thompson stated that “Knowing Joe was from Georgia, and had a deep southern accent which was pleasant to the ear, he was dubbed “Georgia” Brown and fit right in with us.” With a little encouragement Joe was known to sing Dixie or his school’s fight song (I’m a Rambling Wreck from Georgia Tech).

Joe returned to Newnan for two weeks of leave in October. He was somewhat of a celebrity as letters to the paper describing Army life had been published in the local newspaper. He also was a prolific letter writer to friends and family. These letters had ensured that he had a steady supply of cookies, cakes, cheese straws, and several knit sleeveless sweaters. One news account compared his short visit to Newnan “like a presidential candidate with Jo Jo shaking hands with everyone at the court square, telling jokes and offering tons of advice to future draftees.”

Little did Joe know that this would be his last visit to his beloved hometown. Internationally tensions were rising and the 131st would soon leave for San Francisco, Australia, Java and eventual captivity. The last personal communication received from him was a letter to his parents dated January 27, 1942, from Java. Joe expressed his delight that he was able to talk with his sister when he placed an international phone call home the week before. He was no longer receiving regular mail or any news updates from home. He reassured them that he was well and said that he and his friends were using his prized radio to listen to music and the morning news report in English. His parting words in the letter were, “I really believe that everything will turn out for the best and we will not be here long.” Five weeks later the Allies Forces on Java surrendered to the Japanese.

Surrender terms for allied groups in Java were signed on March 12, 1942. For many weeks after the signing Joe and his fellow 2nd Battalion POWs were housed in various temporary facilities in Java. Then on May 14,1942, the entire group was transported by train to Bicycle POW Camp where they would remain for 6 months. This camp had formerly been an army post for a Dutch army bicycle battalion hence the name. In addition to Joe’s 2nd Battalion, the Bicycle camp housed British, Dutch and Australian POWs. Also housed in the camp were sailor and marine survivors of the sinking of the USS Houston by the Japanese in the Sunda Strait naval battle.

In mid October,1942 as a member of Java Party 5A (1500 POWs that included 554 Americans), Joe was transported by ship from Java to Singapore arriving on October 17, 1942. Upon arrival Joe and fellow POWs were transported to nearby Camp Changi now a major Japanese POW camp that formerly was a large British military post. After spending several months in Changi Joe was included in a group of POWs destined to participate in the construction of the Thai-Burma railway. The Japanese plan was to begin work at each railhead of the railway with the two work parties meeting midway near the Thailand and Burma border. Joe’s group was to start work from the Burma railhead. This railway was later dubbed the “Death Railway” or the “Railway of Death” by POW survivors. This name was well deserved as the construction of 258 miles of railway cost the lives of 16,000 allied POWS and the lives of 90,000 conscripts from the Asian countries.

The Japanese war machine’s rate of advances in southeast Asia were shockingly fast. These lightening conquests stretched the resupply efforts for the Japanese armies fighting in the Burma campaign. Initially supplies were sent by sea but by mid 1942 these sea-lanes were being disrupted by allied bombers and submarines. Desperate for a solution the Japanese rushed to complete a railway between Ban Pong, Thailand, and Thanbyuzayat, Burma, that would create a land transportation route between Bangkok and Rangoon. This chosen path was through a jungle and over terrain most inhospitable for railway construction. The inventory of heavy construction equipment was limited, so the task of constructing bridges over gorges and rivers, cuts through mountains and the filling of ravines fell to manual laborers made up of Asians and POWs using hand tools. The conditions in which these forced laborers lived and worked were beyond deplorable. Long, exhausting work days, lack of food and medicine, poor sanitary conditions and physical punishment left both Asian workers and POWs exposed to sickness and death from Malnutrition, Malaria, Tropical Ulcers, Dysentery, Beri-Beri and Cholera.

Jo Jo’s group of fellow POWs departed Camp Changi near Singapore on January 9, 1943. Their ultimate destination was the Burma rail head near Moulmein, Burma. Joe and other POWs were transported packed like sardines into small railroad boxcars to Penang. At Penang Joe boarded the DAI MOJI MARU an old Japanese freighter traveling to Moulmein, Burma. On the voyage the DAI MOJI MARU and fellow ship NITI MEI MARU were attacked by American bombers. The NITI MEI MARU was sunk underscoring the Japanese need to rush completion of the railroad. The DAI MOJI MARU arrived in Moulmein on January 17, 1943. After spending several weeks in ancient Moulmein, Joe was sent by rail to Thanbyuzayat, and from there Joe was transferred by truck to his first railway work camp called the 18 Kilo Camp located at the edge of the Burma jungle. There Joe became a member of Kumi 5 and assigned POW number 10173 (Kumi is the Japanese name for work party). On March 15,1943, Joe left 18 Kilo Camp and went by truck further down the line to the 85 Kilo Camp. The stay there was short, as in early April he was ordered to walk back to the 80 Kilo Camp. In May the rainy season started ushering in months of monsoon weather. It was on May 29th that Jo Jo left the 80 Kilo Camp and trudged in rain and mud to the 100 Kilo Camp. As Joe made this walk he could not envision the unspeakable horrors that awaited him at the 100 Kilo camp.

As noted by POW survivor, Kyle Thompson of HQ Battery, the 100 Kilo Camp soon earned the reputation of a “place to die”. Since POWs at the 100 Kilo Camp were often shuttled between the old 80 Kilo Camp, this camp also fit Thompson’s apt “a place to die” description. June began with all railway work now running behind schedule and great pressure from Japanese leaders to speed up completion of the railway. The monsoons now brought daily rains. Footing was treacherous especially at the dangerous work sites. Rivers were swollen and the current swift. Few supplies of any type arrived in camp as trucks were disabled by the mud. In this hostile environment starving men were expected to perform long daily shifts of manual labor. To meet the required daily quotas of workers only the critically ill were excused from work details. Inhumane is the only word to describe the treatment of those overworked, ill and starving men during these difficult months.

Charley L. Pryor (USMC, USS HOUSTON, pow# 10131)a fellow prisoner who knew Joe as “Georgia”recalled in a telephone call in June, 1989, that he worked in Kumi 2 and Georgia worked in Kumi 5. These two Kumis often worked at the same railway job sites. Pryor and fellow POW Ike Parker both recall Georgia’s southern drawl and dry cracking wit. Some of Joe’s sayings noted were: ”You don’t have to worry we will make it back;” “I got blisters on top of blisters;” “This is a WPA government job;” “Pounding a typewriter ain’t as hard as pounding rocks;”(and sadly, near the end) “I’ll simply have half of that half ration of food.” In the phone call Pryor recalled Georgia in his final days as being malnourished and suffering from Dysentery and a large Tropical Ulcer. In his book Benjamin Dunn, a friend in HQ Battery, said Sam Bussey and Georgia Brown were so sick they were unable to move about. Ike Parker said that after arrival In Moulmein, Joe suffered from bouts of Malaria but so did most POWs. Parker said every man was slowly starving and in early November 1943, Joe became sick with Beri-Beri and Dysentery and quickly became critically ill. Three weeks later on November 24,1943, a malnourished Joe aka Jo Jo aka “Georgia” died from Beri-Beri, Dysentery and a Tropical Ulcer. His death occurred one day before the ceremonial opening of the Death Railway and three days before his 30th birthday. His friend Sam Bussey perished two months later at a POW camp in Thailand.

Parker stated in a media interview that Allied prisoners that died were given military funerals limited by circumstances. He stated following Joe’s death that he and a small procession of Dutch, Australian and American POWs walked the short distance from the POW camp to the grave yard at the 100 Kilo Camp and buried Georgia in a well marked, shallow grave. Parker officiated at the simple military service and paid tribute to Joe. Parker said he closed the service with the words “ We therefore commit his body to the ground, earth to earth and ashes to ashes, dust to dust, looking for the general resurrection and the last day”. A lone bugler then played taps.

At wars end and a few days after Major William D. “Ike”Parker returned to America, he placed a telephone call on a Friday night in September to pay his respects to Joe’s family. He and Georgia had become friends as Ike was also a southerner from south Alabama and had played football at Joe’s alma mater, Auburn. On this call Major Parker was shocked to learn that the Brown family had not been notified of Joe’s death by the War Department. He immediately made arrangements to meet with them on the following Monday in Newnan. Major Parker filled the family and the local news media in on all the terrible details of their capture and forced labor in Burma. Parker reflected that he had been with Joe from the time they sailed from San Francisco on the USS Republic until his death. Parker told the family that until the day he became critically ill, Joe was convinced that they would one day be liberated and would get home. After Parker completed his detail account of years of horror, he presented the family with a few of Joe’s personal belongings( billfold with a picture of his young niece) including a drawing of “Georgia” done by Noel Mason on 8-16-1942 at the Bicycle Camp in Java. As the Monday meeting concluded, Major Parker’s last words to the Browns were “And that’s all, I just wish I could have brought your son back to you.”

After the war, grave recovery teams removed POW remains from numerous jungle cemeteries along The Death railway and Joe’s remains were taken for reburial at the American Military Cemetery at Barrackpore, India. The Brown family was notified by letter from the War Department on June 4, 1947 that they could decide if Joe’s remains would stay in a well kept America Cemetery on foreign soil or be returned to America. That choice was an easy one for the family.

In late May,1948, Joe’s remains were returned to Newnan. A formal grave side military service was held with many tributes to the “young boy we knew and loved”. Major William D. “Ike” Parker representing the 131st (The Lost Battalion) presented the folded American flag to Joe’s parents. Finally, five years after his death, and seven years after his last visit home, this citizen soldier’s remains were returned to Newnan. This day was to be the third military burial and the third and last time taps would be played over Joe’s remains. His long difficult journey had ended. His fervent wish to return home granted.

Bio and photos submitted by nephew, Herb McKoy.