Russ was in one of the first groups moving out. He had wrapped tape around his watch and would hit it with his hand as if to start it, so no Jap took it.  He had also scuffed his shoes and  dented  his canteen so he could keep it - the Japanese only took shiny things.  He smuggled a straight  razor  through  in a small bag by asking if "knife okay?" and showing the guards a tiny knife that came out of crackerjacks.  When  the Japs would grab his bag to search it,  he would pull out the tiny knife and while they were distracted,  he would put his things back in  the bag and move along.  He also sewed $1,600 into his jacket and took it through the prison camps.  It helped buy medicine and food for him and others. He loaned some to other men who promised to pay him back, but he never heard from any of them after the war. 

The Geneva Prisoner of War 
Convention set the normal days march at 12 and 1/2 miles unless the necessity of reaching water  and  food  requires  longer stages.  The Japanese assumed  that  all  the captives could be brought together at Balanga in a day or less.  The next  feeding point  above Balanga was the town of Orani,  about 8 miles at the base of Bataan peninsula.  Then 5 miles further to the northwest at San Fernando, the captives would have their last meal before a short train ride to internment camp. There were to be two field hospitals each to accommodate 500 to 1,000 patients. 

While  the Japanese plan called for the prisoners to move on foot as far as Balanga, it did not specify how the captives would travel the thirty-one miles from that point to San  Fernando.  It was apparent they would walk. The end of the journey would be Camp O'Donnell,  a former temporary Philippine Army post. 

Under the best of circumstances the Japanese plan would have been difficult to execute.  The assembly,  organization and march from Bataan  to Camp  O'Donnell of thousands of American and Filipino prisoners of war was a demanding operation. It proved to be a horrible episode. 

The Japanese had the task of feeding and caring for their sick and wounded.  Their force totaled nearly 81,000 and their supplies were exceedingly scarce. 

The march began slowly because most were barely able to stagger.  When men collapsed and died they were left or buried where they fell.  Columns of prisoners continued to leave until the 17th of April and it was the 23rd before the last of the men deported. 

The men marched in an aimless, confused fashion.  One group sat in the hot sun without food or water until mid afternoon. The ditches were strewn with burned trucks,  battered artillery  pieces,  abandoned equipment and rotting bodies.  Adding to this confusion were hundreds of Filipino civilian refugees seeking to find their way north.