The Jersey Brothers: A Missing Naval Officer in the Pacific and His Family's Quest to Bring Him Home

by Ronald Koenig

Overview

The extraordinary, real-life adventure of three brothers at the center of the most dramatic turning points of World War II and their mad race to change history—and save one of their own.

They are three brothers, all Navy men, who end up coincidentally and extraordinarily at the epicenter of three of the war’s most crucial moments. Bill is picked by Roosevelt to run his first Map Room in Washington. Benny is the gunnery and anti-aircraft officer on the USS Enterprise, one of the only carriers to escape Pearl Harbor and by the end of 1942 the last one left in the Pacific to defend against the Japanese. Barton, the youngest and least distinguished of the three, is shuffled off to the Navy Supply Corps because his mother wants him out of harm’s way. But this protection plan backfires when Barton is sent to the Philippines and listed as missing-in-action after a Japanese attack. Now it is up to Bill and Benny to find and rescue him.

Based on ten years of research drawn from archives around the world, interviews with fellow shipmates and POWs, and primary sources including diaries, unpublished memoirs, and letters half-forgotten in basements, The Jersey Brothers is a remarkable story of agony and triumph—from the home front to Roosevelt’s White House, and Pearl Harbor to Midway and Bataan. It is the story, written with intimate, novelistic detail, of an ordinary young man who shows extraordinary courage as the Japanese do everything short of killing him. And it is, above all, a story of brotherly love: of three men finding their loyalty to each other tested under the tortures of war—and knowing that their success or failure to save their youngest brother will shape their family forever.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781501104145
Publisher:	Simon & Schuster
Publication date:	05/09/2017
Pages:	608
Sales rank:	274,931
Product dimensions:	6.30(w) x 8.60(h) x 1.90(d)

About the Author

Sally Mott Freeman was a speechwriter and media and public relations executive for twenty-five years. She is currently Board Chair of The Writer’s Center, the premier independent literary center in the mid-Atlantic. She graduated with a degree in English Literature from Sweet Briar College, which tapped her for its 2016 Distinguished Alumna award, and also studied Renaissance Literature at the University of Exeter, England. The Jersey Brothers is her first book.

Read an Excerpt

The Jersey Brothers

I have a clear memory of that moment when our innocence was fractured, perhaps because it was in such contrast to our blissful cousin-play. It was a midsummer night in the 1960s, and we were playing badminton on the south lawn of Lilac Hedges, our grandmother’s home in New Jersey. The highlight of those summer visits was seeing our cousin there, whom we adored and rarely saw otherwise. I know it was dusk because that was when the bats started dive-bombing the birdie, our favorite part of the evening.

The adults—my father, mother, aunt, and grandmother—were having their cocktails on the front porch. Suddenly we heard Aunt Rosemary’s voice rise up over the rest, after which she burst into tears. Then we heard a glass break, which is when we stopped our play, got dead quiet, and strained our ears. When I say break, I don’t mean fall-off-the-table break; I mean throw-against-the-wall break. Then we heard our mother try to say something, and then she started crying.

My father was an admiral, and at the time serving as the navy’s judge advocate general (JAG). He usually held the attention of the people around him—at work and at home. But his attempts to restore calm were in vain that evening, as apparently were my mother’s attempts to assist him. We couldn’t hear much, but without a doubt, the ever-charged topic was our mysterious Uncle Barton, a naval ensign who had been wounded and taken prisoner by the Japanese long before any of us was born.

We kids had never met Uncle Barton, but my siblings, cousin, and I all knew what he looked like. There were photos of him on every wall of every room at Lilac Hedges. You would hardly have known that our grandmother had three other children. I especially remember Barton’s imposing oil portrait on the facing wall at the turn near the top of the front stairs. I was sure his smiling green eyes followed my every step as I walked up. We joked that he was winking at us, but whenever I reached that landing, I took those last two steps in a leap of terror, as though fleeing a ghost.

We left Lilac Hedges abruptly the next morning for the drive back to Washington, DC. A flimsy explanation for the early departure was offered as four glum kids took turns hugging our cousin, promising him unconvincingly that we’d be back, and then piling into our old Chevy wagon. I don’t remember what reason was offered, just that none of us believed it.

One thing was certain: there was always tension when this Uncle Barton’s name came up. Each time, I felt a familiar tingling at the back of my neck and then braced myself. Here we go again. What was going on here? As children, and then teens, and then young adults, we analyzed every syllable whenever the topic sprang from its dark corner, hoping to elicit conclusive details. But the mystery persisted long into our adulthood. Speculation on what had happened to him—and when—became a sort of a parlor game for us, and it never ended satisfactorily.

When I set out to unravel this family mystery, my objective was to uncover the facts that led to the anguished outburst that night—and which ended our traditional summer visits to Lilac Hedges. I was determined to learn more about this Uncle Barton, but what I uncovered would have stunned the adults on that porch.

Editorial Reviews

03/01/2017
Freeman's (board chair, the Writer's Ctr.) latest book is an investigation into her uncle's fate. Barton and his brothers Benny and Bill were navy officers during World War II. While serving in the Pacific theater, Barton was captured during the Japanese invasion of the Philippines. The primary theme is the family's attempts to determine Barton's whereabouts during and after the war, with the conflict in the Pacific as the backdrop. The narrative provides insights into Japanese treatment of POWs and the daily life of these prisoners. Some chapters are nearly documentary histories, with transcribed correspondence among family members. Some flaws hinder the book's value, including its length and that many conversations are not cited. Interviews conducted more than 60 year after World War II form the basis for much of the content. VERDICT A touching story that would have been better in abbreviated form. Recommended for readers looking for personal accounts of World War II, instead of a history.--Matthew Wayman, Pennsylvania State Univ. Lib., Schuylkill Haven

Library Journal

★ 2017-03-21
The plight of three brothers and their mother during one of the most shameful episodes of World War II.The abandonment of American servicemen in the defense of the Philippines in 1942 propelled Freeman—a former speechwriter and public relations executive and current board chair of The Writer's Center in Bethesda, Maryland—to re-create the tragic story of her uncle, Barton Cross, who suffered a long imprisonment in Japanese POW camps. In a fluid, restrained, and deeply researched narrative, the author returns to the awful chaos just after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, when Cross, a Supply Corps officer on the submarine tender USS Otus, was wounded by shrapnel in the subsequent Japanese air attack on Cavite Navy Base, Manila, and inexplicably left behind by his ship at Sternberg Hospital. Moreover, while Gen. Douglas MacArthur had ordered the evacuation of the Army wounded on the last vessel to depart Manila before the city fell to the Japanese, the 30-some Navy wounded were again neglected. They were eventually transported over the next three years—along with thousands of other captured American servicemen—from one miserable Japanese POW camp to another. "The macabre displays," writes Freeman, "were intended to humiliate the captured Americans and brandish the new Japanese dominion over the Filipinos." Meanwhile, Cross' two older half brothers, Benny and Bill, "lifelong protectors" and "Annapolis-minted officers," along with their mother, Helen, frantically lobbied to find news of their lost brother, as conditions in the camps were notoriously bad, and several of the POW ships were bombed late in the war by U.S. attacks. Freeman has reopened the long-closed inquiry into her uncle's account and scoured the diaries and letters that Helen wrote to Washington, D.C., as well as those written by fellow prisoners. The result is an obvious labor of love, a touching, suspenseful, and deeply troubling story of one family's patriotic devotion and betrayal. A grieving family ultimately finds closure in this meticulously researched and compelling history.

Kirkus Reviews

Highly dramatic history. [Mott’s] book is liable to break the hearts of Unbroken fans, and it’s all true.”
– The New York Times

“A masterpiece of storytelling, infused with heroism and adventure. This moving portrait of three brothers is a brilliantly researched and written history of America’s wartime role in the Pacific.”
– Lynne Olson, New York Times bestselling author of Those Angry Days

“An evocative real-life tale of agony and triumph about brotherly love and a young American who discovers his personal courage amidst the tortures of war. Freeman had me rooting for these Jersey boys on every page.”
– James Bradley, New York Times bestselling author of Flags of Our Fathers

“Better than fiction because it is real.... The Jersey Brothers demonstrates that a well-told story is just that, whatever its genre.”
– New York Journal of Books

“A gripping, deeply moving saga of an American family whose experiences cast a new light on one of the most harrowing and heroic periods in American history. In their devotion to each other and to their country, these three brothers inspire us with courage, intelligence, and exceptional resilience.”
– Sally Bedell Smith, New York Times bestselling author of Elizabeth the Queen

“The Jersey Brothers shines in singularity. A blend of history, family saga and family questions, [Freeman’s] first book proves to be a winning and moving success.... A decade in the making, The Jersey Brothers adds an authoritative entry to the vast canon of war literature, one that elicits cheers, tears and a few jeers.... Freeman’s dogged investigative skills, the truth they reveal and her ability to render it with grace combine to make her book — a gripping story of courage and carnage, heroism and horror, devotion and death — unforgettable.”
– Richmond Times-Dispatch

“A captivating tour-de-force that immediately stands tall with the best of other World War II combat literature.... Freeman weaves together a story that will tug at the emotions of anyone who has ever known someone who has worn our nation’s uniform in peacetime or at war.”
– San Antonio Express-News

“In her moving new epic The Jersey Brothers, Sally Mott Freeman captures a story of love, devotion and perseverance shared by three inspiring siblings caught in the epicenter of some of the war’s most crucial actions... A rare look into the deepest personal emotions of a family of America’s Greatest Generation.”
– The Dallas Morning News

“The Jersey Brothers captures the real-life story of three brothers whose bond to family and love for country take them to extraordinary lengths at one of the most pivotal points in American history. From the decks of the USS Enterprise to the depths of the Japanese prison camps, Sally Mott Freeman takes readers on an epic journey in this remarkable tribute to the Greatest Generation.”
– Senator John McCain, New York Times bestselling author of Thirteen Soldiers

“A terrific book that I was just totally captivated by.”
– Hillary Rodham Clinton

“A great summer read by a splendid writer.... The characters are vividly drawn, the action riveting, and the suspense almost overwhelming.”
– Karl Rove, former White House Deputy Chief of Staff

“A searing story of courage, love, and family. The Jersey Brothers is impressively broad in scope—from Roosevelt’s White House to the great battles of the Pacific to prisoner of war camps deep in the Philippine jungle—and brimming with endlessly fascinating details that only real soldiers could know.”
– Jay Winik, New York Times bestselling author of 1944

“Do we need another book about WWII? If it is as engaging as The Jersey Brothers, the answer is a resounding yes.... The Jersey Brothers is an important addition to the historical record; it's also a spellbinding cliffhanger.”
– New Jersey Monthly

“Richly informed by Freeman’s deep research, The Jersey Brothers is a powerfully evocative story of three brothers and their remarkable love, courage, and adventure during a decisive moment in World War II.”
– Don Katz, founder and CEO of Audible and author of Home Fires: An Intimate Portrait of One Middle-Class Family in Postwar America

“An obvious labor of love.... A touching, suspenseful and deeply troubling story of one family’s patriotic devotion and betrayal.... Meticulously researched and compelling history.”
– Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“Freeman’s riveting account reads like fiction, and proves that the well of compelling war narratives has nowhere near run dry.”
– Business Insider

“Author Sally Mott Freeman takes an intimately human approach to this war story, adding a meaningful and memorable chapter to our understanding of the Greatest Generation.”
– The Amazon Book Review (Best Book of the Month)

“A riveting war story. But it is a family story as well, its gripping moments in time meticulously assembled by Freeman.”
– Bergen Record

“Too exciting to be quite believable as fiction; luckily, it’s entirely true.... Deeply researched, intelligently judged, vividly presented.... And at its heart [The Jersey Brothers is] a serious, indeed deeply moving, family novel: you’ll remember the mother of these guys as vividly as the brothers themselves.”
– Sullivan County Democrat

“Freeman proves to be a strongly motivated researcher, who poignantly conveys a sorrowful experience encountered by thousands of American families in WWII.”
– Booklist

“A touching story.... Provides insights into Japanese treatment of POWs and the daily life of these prisoners.... Recommended for readers looking for personal accounts of World War II.”
– Library Journal

From the Publisher