Born in Payette, Idaho Capt Kirk graduated with a Bachelor’s of Arts in Vocational Education from Oregon Agricultural College. While serving with the Army’s 20th Air Base Group Headquarter Squadron he was captured by the Japanese.
On 14 Dec 1944 more than 1,600 American POWs left the Philippines bound for Japan on a hellship called the Oryoku Maru. Later that day aircraft from the USS Hornet found the ship in Olongapo Bay near Subic and bombed it but didn’t sink it. The following day they returned and sank the crippled ship, with the loss of more than 300 POW lives. Following the bombing of the Oryoku Maru, those POWs who survived were re-assembled at San Fernando La Union, Philippines and put aboard two more hellships to continue their journey to Japan.
About 1,040 men were forced into a hold of the Enoura Maru, and the remaining 240 men went on the Brazil Maru. Prior to the prisoners boarding, the Enoura Maru had been used to transport horses and the hold was filthy with manure and wasn’t cleaned before the POWs, including Capt Kirk, were forced down into it. Some of the prisoners were so hungry that they ate the grain that had been dropped by the horses when they were feeding, and which was now mixed in with the manure.
The Enoura left the Philippines on 27 Dec 1944 and headed north. All of the POWs on the Enoura Maru were crammed into the second hold aft of the bow. They suffered from hunger, thirst and the filth in the hold of the hellship. Diseases broke out and many of the men were violently ill (The Bombing of the Enoura). Capt Kirk is reported to have either died the day after the ship left port or when the Enoura was later sunk by American forces on 9 Jan 1945.
While there is some confusion published for the ships sinking date in reference to his death (some of the writing for his death says it was sunk in December, we know it was sunk in January) we have listed his date of death as what was published on the American Battle Monument Commission’s website. He was survived by his wife, daughter, parents and two siblings.
http://www.powtaiwan.org/archives_detail.php?THE-STORY-OF-THE-BOMBING-OF-THE-ENOURA-MARU-17
https://www.abmc.gov/node/519077
https://oregondigital.org/catalog/oregondigital:fx71bp974#page/18/mode/1up/search/weldon+kirk (pg 18)
https://oregondigital.org/catalog/oregondigital:fx71bp974#page/18/mode/1up/search/weldon+kirk (pg 18)
https://oregondigital.org/catalog/oregondigital:fx719v29v#page/474/mode/1up/search/weldon (pg 482)