History:

The Bataan Relief Organization (BRO), originally conceived of by two mothers from New Mexico became a reality in 1942. The mothers were Mrs. Charles W. Bickford and Mrs. Fred E. Landon, whose sons, members of the 200th Coast Artillery (CA) were captured by the Japanese. On April 10th, these women spoke with the father of another 200th CA prisoner and asked him to preside over a meeting. The purpose of this meeting was to form an organization to send aid to the captured men on Bataan.

That historic meeting was held on April 14, 1942 and the Bataan Relief Organization was created with headquarters in Albuquerque, NM. The name Bataan Relief Organization was suggested by Dr. V. H. Spensley, the first chairman of the organization. Spensley pointed out that the initials BRO are a shortened form of the word “brother” and that all the imprisoned men were their brothers. The group adopted as its motto: “We will not let them down."

The Bataan Relief Organization was made up of the mothers, fathers, wives and sweethearts of the captured men who very actively worked to get relief to their loved ones. They gathered every bit of information about the men that they could find and exchanged this information with others prisoners’ families. Mrs. M. I. Bradley of Albuquerque had a standard listening post set and received messaged daily from the Tokyo station. A group of volunteers worked with her to type and mail out these messages.