Roy Hobert McPeters was the son of Samson David McPeters and Nancy M. Laymance. He had three brothers and six sisters.
Sergeant Roy H. McPeters, US Army Air Force, was assigned to Headquarters, 27th Bomber Group L. This unit was caught in the Philippines and fought at Bataan as infantry before being sent on the Bataan Death March. His date of death is 7 September 1944, and he is listed on the Tablets of the Missing, Manila American Cemetery, Philippines.
Sgt McPeters was captured on 7 May 1942 at Philippine Islands and taken Prisoner of war. He was sent to PW Camp #2 – Davao Mindanao Philippines 7-125 and died non battle on the Shinyo Maru on 7 September 1944.
The Chattanooga Daily Times, August 19, 1942
Word was received at Rockwood this week that Sergt. Roy Hobart McPeters was “missing in action.” He was in service at Corrigedor. Sergt. McPeters is the son of Mrs. Nancy McPeters, of Rockwood and was a graduate of Rockwood High School. He also has a brother in the army.
The Knoxville Journal, September 23, 1943
Sgt. Hobert McPeters is alive and well but a prisoner of the Japs in the Philippines, his sister, Mrs. Charles McNeal, has been informed by a card from her brother. This is the first message received from Sergeant McPeters since the fall of Corregidor. His mother died recently.
The Tennessean, November 14, 1945
The death somewhere in the Pacific of Sgt. Roy H. Peters has just been verified in a personal letter of sympathy from Gen. Douglas MacArthur to his sister, Mrs. Amy Edmondson of A-2 Dixie Court. Sergeant McPeters was one of those gallants who became a prisoner of the Japanese at Corregidor at the outset of the war. His sister and other relatives, aware that he survived that ordeal had never given up hope that he might be living, although they had reason to believe that he had later perished on one of the Jap torture ships on which he was being transferred, in September, 1944.
His brother, Sgt.. John C. McPeters, also a Pacific fighter, never gave up hope and as he engaged in fighting on Leyte, Mindoro and other hot spots, made as thorough search as possible – always with the same results. Finally, Mrs. Edmondson, whose husband, Ben Edmondson, is a disabled naval survivor of the Pacific war, wrote to General MacArthur and in return received the personal letter: “My deepest sympathy goes to you in the death of your brother, who died in action against the enemy. You may have some consolation in the memory that he, along with his comrades-in-arms who died on Bataan and Corregidor and in prison camps, gave his life for his country. It was largely their magnificent courage and sacrifices which stopped the enemy in the Philippines and gave us the time to arm ourselves for our return to the Philippines and the final defeat of Japan. Their names will be enshrined in our country’s glory forever. In your brother’s death I have lost a gallant comrade and mourn with you. Very faithfully, Douglas MacArthur.
“Sergeant McPeters, a student at time of his enlistment in the Army Air Corps in 1939, was a native of Rockwood and made his home there and in Nashville, where he was well known.
- Rank: Sergeant
- Date of birth: 2 October 1916
- Date of death: 7 September 1944
- County: Roane
- Hometown: Rockwood
- Service Branch: Army/Army Air Forces
- Division/Assignment: 27th Bomber Group Light
- Theater: Pacific
- Conflict: World War II
- Awards: Purple Heart
- Burial/Memorial Location: Manila American Cemetery, Fort Bonifacio, Manila, Philippines
- Location In Memorial: Pillar XVII, Top Panel
- Contact us to sponsor Roy H. McPeters
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