Small brown glass medicine bottle containing vitamin C (ascorbic acid) pills. The bottle has an aluminum screw-on lid and a paper label around the exterior. Col. James C. Hughes may have acquired the pills while being held as a Japanese Prisoner of War during World War II. Born in Topeka, Kansas, in 1888, Hughes served in the Mexican Border Conflict, World War I, and World War II. During the latter conflict, he commanded a Philippine regiment (Filipino soldiers led by American officers), which surrendered in 1942 on the Bataan peninsula. Hughes spent the next 41 months in various Japanese P.O.W. camps. He was liberated by Russian forces at Camp Hoten, Manchuria, in 1945. Hughes died in 1964 and is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.
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