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Austin W. Bach
March 12, 1920 - June 12, 2010
| Birthplace: | Japan | |
| Resided In: | Hume Virginia | |
| Funeral Home: | Moser Funeral Home |  |
| Service: | June 19, 2010 | |
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Col. Austin W. Bach, Decorated WWII Veteran, Dies at 90;
In 1945, a LIFE magazine photographer chronicling the last days of the war with Japan, shadowed a young Captain Bach of the U.S. Army. Bach was working with an American medical officer assessing the sick and wounded. They came upon a gravely ill prisoner. Captain Bach spelled out his own name for the prisoner and proceeded to question him. He asked where he was from. The prisoner told Bach he was from Hoita Street in Kumamoto City, Japan. Ironically, Bach also grew up on Hoita Street in Kumamoto. The Captain asked the prisoner if he could remember the family that lived in the foreign house. The prisoner thought for a long while and said yes he remembered the house and playing with the children with a big rocking horse. He recalled it was long ago and the name of the family was Bakku. Captain Bach replied, “That rocking horse was ours, and those children you played with was me.” This exchange was witnessed and recounted by the photographer. IT ran as a story in TIME magazine, July 1945.
Colonel Bach was born to Lutheran missionary parents in Moji, Japan on March 12, 1920. He was the third of six children. At age 17, he crossed Asia and Europe on the Trans Siberian Railway on his way to visit his ancestral homeland of Denmark. While traveling through Germany he witnessed a speech given by Adolph Hitler, which he found very unsettling.
In 1938, after a year in Denmark, he moved with his family to Blair, Nebraska. In 1941, he joined the U.S. Army serving with the 37th Infantry Division in the South Pacific, the Philippines and Japan. He trained as a light machine gunner, but soon found himself working in Army Intelligence aided by his mastery of several languages, including Japanese. Toward the end of the war, he landed with General MacArthur to liberate the Philippines and worked to negotiate the details for surrender of Japanese forces in and around Luzon. He also contributed to the efforts in preparation of the ceremony for the signing of the Formal Instrument of Surrender that was conducted September 2, 1945 aboard the USS Missouri. He was awarded a Purple Heart and two Bronze Stars.
He attended the U.S. Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. He was a graduate of the University of Michigan and continued working as a Japanese translator after his retirement from the U.S. Army, specializing in Scientific Research.
He was widowed twice. In 1975, he married the former Christine Colley and settled in Hume, Virginia where he was a beloved member of the Old Dominion Hounds. From 1987–2004 he was a part-time resident of St. John U.S.V.I. where he enjoyed sailing his boat CAVU. He served on the board of Hospice Support of Fauquier County and on the vestry of Leeds Episcopal Church in Markham.
He is survived by his wife, Christine Colley Bach, six children, three siblings and nine grandchildren. His son, Jon Bach, predeceased him.
A memorial service will be held at noon on Saturday, June 19 at Leeds Episcopal Church.
In lieu of flowers, donations are welcomed in his honor to the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute (SCBI), 1500 Remount Road, Front Royal, VA 22630 or to Hospice Support of Fauquier County, 42 N. 5th St., Warrenton, VA 20186.
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