Newsletter No. 30/2017

“With great sorrow, my condolences go to his family and also to the extended family of Bata-men who took part in the building of the largest Czech investment in the Philippines in 1930's - the Bata Shoe Organization - only to give it up to help saving the Philippines,” says the Czech Ambassador Jaroslav Olša, Jr.

LAST CZECH DEFENDER OF BATAAN DIES AT 97

Mr. Karel Aster, the last living Czech Defender of Bataan passed away on August 13, 2017 after living last decades on Captiva Island in Florida, US. Karel Aster’s granddaughter Jenny Ellis Murray says: “Heaven gained an amazing man today. He was 97 years young. He will be greatly missed by those who were lucky enough to know him.”

Karel Aster was one from a group of 14 Czechs who volunteered to join ranks with Filipino and US armies in November 1941. Many members of this group came from the ranks of Bata Shoe Company employees, the first ever Czech investment in the Philippines that started in Manila in 1930’s. Smaller part was formed by Czech businessmen, and Jewish refugees from occupied Czechoslovakia. It also included personalities working in or with the Czech diplomatic service at the Czech Consulate in Manila. While all of the Czechs became prisoners of war, their families had to endure a life in difficulties, surviving in the wartime Manila with only scant resources, often not to meet their husbands and fathers anew.