On the bow of the Wasp-class amphibious assault ship USS Bataan (LHD 5), the sun settled over the ship and the Norfolk Waterfront as the crowd of Sailors gathered for a special visitor Aug. 15, 2026. Abel Ortega Jr., carried it tight in his arms, as he navigated the foreign p-ways of its name-sake ship.
With careful handling, the current new and clean Union Jack was lowered from its spot on the jackstaff and replaced with a flag of more sentimental value, an American flag so old that its red, white and blue colors have faded, a flag that hasn’t felt the wind lift it since 1945. Its creator, Ortega Jr’s father, lives on only in memory,
This historic flag was a key piece of a special flag-raising ceremony to celebrate the 81st anniversary of Victory over Japan Day, also known as V-J Day. The last time this flag flew for its nation was on the original V-J Day over the prison camps holding the survivors of the Bataan Death March.
“We have a responsibility to carry on their legacy, to never forget,” said Capt. Rodolfo Jacobo, the commanding officer of USS Bataan.
In 2004, Abel Ortega, with the help of his son Abel Ortega Jr., released a book telling the story of his time as a prisoner of war in the Philippines and Japan, as well as being a part of the Bataan Death March. Three and a half years of his life was held hostage by a war. Three and a half years ended with the raising of a handmade American flag in the middle of a Japanese labor camp.
“When they were raising the flag at the camp, they all cried. All the POWs cried because the war was over, but they also cried for all their fellow soldiers they lost on the Death March, the Hell-Ships, and the prison camps,” said Ortega Jr. “That flag was raised for them. For all those that were lost, defending Bataan.”
Ortega talked about the flag in the last chapter of the book, and in 2014, five years after Ortega’s death, his son received a call from a woman named Joyce in California.
“She called me and said, hey, I came across your book, and the last chapter, where your dad talks about the Camp Mai-bara, and the flag. Well, my dad was the one who drew the straw, and I have the flag,” said Ortega Jr.
In 2023 Joyce brought the flag from California to Austin, Texas, to allow Ortega Jr. and his family the opportunity to see the history that his father had been a part of.
“Dad had wondered where it had been for all of these years,” said Ortega Jr. He told Joyce of the fears his father had, if the flag had been burned or lost and the longing to see it again.
Joyce, who had been planning since 2014 to return the flag to his family, told Ortega Jr. “Well, your dad didn't have to wonder anymore, because the flag is yours, that's why I brought it”.
In March of 1941 Private Abel Ortega was drafted into the United States Army to fight in World War II. He was one of six Ortega boys that were drafted.
After graduating basic training, he was assigned to the 753rd Tank Battalion. While he was stationed at Camp Polk, his command received orders that the 192nd Tank Battalion was to be sent to the Philippines to help train their army. Being a few people short, the Battalion asked for volunteers to fill the spots, and Pvt. Ortega was the first to step up, said Ortega Jr.
“They arrived in the Philippines on Thanksgiving Day of 1941, and a few days later, Pearl Harbor was bombed. They were still cleaning all the equipment, still checking out all the tanks and half-tracks and getting stuff ready. They'd only been there about two weeks when the war broke out,” said Ortega Jr.
After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Ortega and his battalion fought the Japanese from December 8, 1941 to April 9, 1942 but eventually their resources and strength ran out and forced them to surrender.
Approximately 75,000 American and Pilipino POWs started that Death March.
The first segment entailed a 65-mile march that lasted between 5 to 10 days for some groups. After, they were loaded onto a train, a little box car, that took them about 25 miles, where they were dropped off and made to march about another 10 miles.
Out of the 75,000, only about 65,000 reached the first camp.
An estimated 10,000 POWs, 500 to 650 Americans and 5,000 to 18,000 Filipino, died on the march.
“They were shot, bayoneted, they were decapitated, left on the side of the road, run over by the Japanese trucks,” said Ortega Jr.
Ortega avoided death by moving smartly through the groups, migrating towards the inside of the columns they were forced to march in to avoid the slashing or bayoneting from the mounted Japanese soldiers.
“Once you fell you couldn't get up. Nobody could pick you up because the line was moving,” said Ortega Jr. “If you had stopped to help somebody, then you were shot or killed.”
Through his smart survival techniques, Ortega arrived at Camp O'Donnell somewhat on the healthier side, so he was placed on a burial detail. Because those POWs were dying about 100 a day at the prison camp, he would have to carry them over to a mass grave where he would bury them.
“Dad always said he took the dog tags off of them. If they had dog tags, and put them in their mouths before he buried them,” said Ortega Jr.
Eventually the bodies piled too high and Camp O’Donnell was closed. Ortega and the other POWs were moved to another camp, Cabanatuan. When he got there, Ortega found a way to be on work details again, trying to spend as much time away from the disease riddled camp. Over the next three years he moved from camp to camp, spending anywhere between a few months to a year at each.
Ortega had gone through 7 prison camps before the war ended, he went from Camp O'Donnell, to Cabanatuan, to Camp Murphy, to Lipa Batangas, to Camp Toroku in Formosa, to Camp Wakinohama, in Japan, and then Maibara, in Japan.
Then the United States dropped two atomic bombs on Japan.
The first one on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. The second one on Nagasaki August 9, 1945. Six days later on August 15, 1945, Japan signed their formal surrender, marking the day as Victory Over Japan Day, V-J Day.
“Soon after Japan surrendered, they gave the American command all the different coordinates for all the prison camps. Once they were located, they loaded up B-29 bombers with 55-gallon drums of food, medicine, clothing, supplies and things to drop at the POW camps.” said Ortega Jr.
The barrels floated down from the sky, their relief carried down with red, white, blue, and green parachutes.
In the midst of the celebration an officer also in the prison camp with Ortega came to him with a request, he told him to go to the POWs of each country, American, British, Australian, and Dutch, draw their flags, what color goes where, and get all this parachute material and make some flags.
Three and a half years of pain, torture and fear. Three and a half years ended with freedom.
Three days later, the freed POWs tied the flags to bamboo poles and raised them at the front gates to their POW camp, telling everyone that the Japanese no longer had control over them.