Yellow Pages
MOUNT VERNON — It’s been a long time since Casey T. Bazewick Sr. endured savage beatings as a prisoner of war in World War II. But some 64 years after his release from a prison camp in the Philippines, the U.S. Marine veteran finally received a Purple Heart.
Bazewick’s 4th Marine Regiment was among the defenders of the Philippine island of Corrigedor. He was taken captive along with his surviving comrades when the island fell to the Japanese on May 6, 1942.
He was beaten by guards because of his refusal to bow to the guardhouse in the camp. They would beat him until he passed out, revive him and beat him again.
“He may be one of the very few recipients of the Purple Heart who knows the names of the enemy who wounded him,” said his son, Casey Jr.
Bazewick Sr. was held for 39 months. He survived beatings, starvation and the killing winters of Manchuria in Northern China, where he and other American POWs were transported by their captors.
Now 91 and living in a Mount Vernon senior care center, Bazewick had never received a Purple Heart. Until 1996, injuries received while held prisoner didn’t qualify.
That later changed, and Bazewick’s son pursued a Purple Heart for his father after reading an article in a veterans’ magazine in 2008.
The Marines presented Bazewick with his Purple Heart Wednesday at Life Care Center of Mount Vernon while about 50 people, including three generations of his family, watched.
“It’s an honor to be here, sir,” said Capt. Mike Rosen of the 4th Marine Landing Support Battalion at Fort Lewis. “This is the first time I’ve presented a Purple Heart to a World War II veteran and a Korean War veteran.”
Bazewick Sr. said that he never expected to receive a Purple Heart.
When he saw the certificate, he told his son: “How about that. That’s beautiful. That’s beautiful!”
National POW/MIA Recognition Day is Sept. 18.
