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| Japanese landing at Lingayen Gulf, 22 December 1941. (Naval History and Heritage Command NH73488) |
Published
in 1949
About
the same time that the Japanese were attacking Hawaii, Midway, Wake, and Guam,
they were also beginning their assault on the Philippines. That was Monday, 8
December 1941 (7 December, Pearl Harbor time). Two squadrons of bombers struck
at Clark Field almost simultaneously with the bombing of Baguio, the Philippine
capital in the mountains of northern Luzon. About the same time enemy planes
were bombing the island of Mindanao, some 600 miles south of Manila.
Before
proceeding to a recital of the Japanese conquest of the Philippines, it is
fitting to mention at some length two, of the many, great Americans on whose
shoulders fell the full weight of responsibility for the defense of those
islands.
General Douglas MacArthur
Douglas
MacArthur, son of Lieutenant General Arthur MacArthur, graduated from West
Point at the head of his class in 1903. In the First World War he advanced to
the rank of brigadier general, and led the 84th Infantry Brigade, after which
he commanded the 42nd (Rainbow) Division. He was made a major general in 1918,
the youngest officer of that rank in the U.S. Army. From 1928 to 1930 he
commanded the Department of the Philippines. On 21 November 1930, President Hoover
appointed him Chief of Staff of the Army with the rank of general. He retired
from the U.S. Army in October 1935, and became military adviser to the
Philippine government, and on 19 June 1936 was elevated by President Manuel
Quezon to the rank of Field Marshal of the Philippine Army. From this position
he retired on 31 December 1937. On the insistence of President Quezon,
MacArthur then became head of all Filipino military and constabulary forces.
On
26 July 1941, MacArthur was called back into the service of the U.S. Army and
was placed in command of all American and native forces in the Philippine area,
with the rank of lieutenant general. On the same date the Philippine Army was
incorporated into the Armed Forces of the United States. From 1935 up to 8
December 1941, MacArthur’s chief responsibility was to create and train a
defensive force for the Philippine Commonwealth, so that when the islands
should become independent in 1946, and the American forces be withdrawn, the
Philippine Army could take over the defense of the Filipino people.
General Jonathan M. Wainwright
Brigadier
General Jonathan M. Wainwright arrived in the Philippines in November 1940 and
was assigned to command the Philippine Division, stationed at Fort McKinley. He
found some 7,500 men in his command, the majority of them being Filipinos who
had been accepted into the American Army. The units of his command in 1940 and
1941 consisted of the 45th and 57th Infantry Regiments; the 24th Field
Artillery; one battalion of the 23rd Field Artillery; the 14th Engineers; the
15th Medical Regiment; the 12th Quartermaster Battalion; and the 31st Infantry
(an all-American regiment).
As
the tenseness of the Pacific situation increased in 1941, other military units
were added to the defenses of the Philippines. In the spring of 1941, in
further recognition of the international situation, the War Department ordered
all families and dependents of military personnel to be evacuated from the
islands; this was completed on 14 May 1941, with the sailing of the S.S.
Washington from Manila.
When
the Japanese struck on 8 December 1941, the defensive strength of the
Philippines, as estimated, was as follows: On the island of Luzon there were
about 100,000 Filipinos, newly mobilized and only partly trained; 12,000
members of the Philippine Scouts, who were efficient and ready; the U.S. 31st
Infantry Regiment, on the alert; and the 4th Marine Regiment, which had arrived
from Shanghai, China, in November and was in garrison. In addition, there were
about 8,000 Army Air Force personnel, with 250 aircraft including thirty-five
Flying Fortresses and 107 P-40 fighters.
Of
ground troops there were National Guard units from New Mexico, California,
Kentucky, Ohio, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Mississippi, Washington, and Illinois. In
addition to these, during the final clashes on Bataan and Corregidor there were
about 1,000 sailors without ships, 18,000 civilians evacuated from other areas,
and some 6,000 civilian laborers.
On
the island of Mindanao, Brigadier General William F. Sharp commanded a small
group of American soldiers, but they had insufficient small arms to supply the
30,000 Filipinos who could have been called into service. On the island of Cebu
only 1,500 obsolete rifles were available for the native troops and for the few
Americans assigned to lead them. During the first two months of the war every
effort was made to run ammunition and supplies through the Japanese blockade to
the troops in the Philippines, but two ships were lost for every one getting
through.
There
were, besides the above, four small regiments of harbor defense troops on the
four fortified islands (Fort Drum, Fort Hughes, Fort Frank, and Corregidor) at
the entrance to Manila Bay; and there was the 26th Cavalry, which was later to
make a record on Bataan never surpassed by a cavalry unit, forced finally to
shoot their own horses for food to sustain life in those Americans that
survived that terrific ordeal.
Major
General George Gruener was Commander of the Philippine Department and stationed
in Manila. In late July 1941 General Gruener called all senior officers to
Department Headquarters and communicated to them as follows: “Major General
Douglas MacArthur, retired, is placed upon active duty in the grade of
lieutenant general and is assigned command of all United States forces in the
Far East. The induction of the Philippine Army into the services of the United
States is authorized.”
General
Gruener was returned to the U.S. in September 1941, and General MacArthur
designated General Wainwright as senior field commander and placed him in
command of the North Luzon force, with headquarters at Stotsenburg, and with
General Edward P. King as chief of staff. On 25 November, Wainwright closed his
Fort McKinley office. MacArthur directed Wainwright to continue with the
organization and training of the Philippine Army units, and said: “Jonathan,
you’ll probably have until about April 1942 to train those troops.” From this
we can infer that General MacArthur felt at that time, twelve days before Pearl
Harbor, that war was imminent, but that the Japanese would not begin the attack
for four or five months.
On
arriving at Fort Stotsenburg on the evening of 25 November 1941, General
Wainwright noted the poverty of the situation. All he had with which to
organize a field army was General King, the chief of staff; a post adjutant who
must also serve as adjutant general of the new field forces; a supply officer;
and a surgeon. Little ammunition was on hand: hand grenades, .50 caliber
machine gun, infantry mortar ammunition, and a few shells for 295 mm howitzers,
which model was already obsolete.
This
new field army, which was destined in two short weeks to receive the blow of
almost a quarter million Japanese, had practically no transportation—only a few
trucks and a very few automobiles. The only means of communication with the
various divisions composing this new field army was by public telephone lines,
and the great majority of the soldiers were untrained, undisciplined, and were
led by inexperienced Filipino officers. Of this situation General Wainwright
later said: “The Philippine Army units with the North Luzon force were doomed
before they started to fight. That they lasted as long as they did is a
stirring and touching tribute to their gallantry and fortitude. They never had
a chance to win.”
The
four divisions of this force were scattered, but an inspection was ordered to
begin on 6 December 1941, and on that day General Wainwright inspected the 26th
Cavalry, a battery of the 23rd Field Artillery, and a pack train, which units
were stationed at Fort Stotsenburg. This was Saturday, and the inspection of
the other units of the field army was set to begin on the following Monday.
Such
was the situation when the Japanese struck at Pearl Harbor on the morning of 7
December 1941 (8 December, Manila time). General MacArthur’s assistant chief of
staff, Colonel Irvin, phoned General Wainwright about 4:35 a.m. on that morning
that “Admiral Hart [whose Asiatic Fleet lay in Manila Bay] has just received a
radio dispatch from Admiral Kimmel, commander of the Pacific Fleet at Pearl
Harbor, informing him that Japan has initiated hostilities.”
Initial Japanese Attacks on the
Philippines
Just
before 9 a.m., 8 December 1941, Wainwright was notified by MacArthur’s
headquarters that the Japanese had bombed Baguio, the Philippine’s summer
capital, some ninety-five miles north of Stotsenburg, and directed General
Wainwright to protect Clark Field, which lies close to Stotsenburg. The 26th
Cavalry under command of Colonel Clinton Pierce was deployed to the east of the
field, and a battery of pack artillery was placed at the western end. No
infantry units were available. Not long after midday, about eighty Japanese
planes, mostly bombers with some dive bombers and fighters, swept over Stotsenburg
and dropped their heaviest bombs on Clark Field, most of whose bombers were on
the ground in plain sight. The raid lasted only about fourteen minutes, but
left Clark Field in a shambles. Most of the B-17s that had just come in were
totally destroyed. Barracks and quarters, machine shops and hangars were
leveled to the ground. In this attack, ninety-three were killed outright and
seven died that night, leaving ninety-three wounded.
On
that day our fighting planes were not at Clark Field but at a new field at Iba,
about forty miles north of Olongapo, but they did not escape. The Japanese
destroyed them at the same time they were raiding Clark Field. The enemy lost
only two planes at Clark Field, these being shot down by the 200th Coast
Artillery’s anti-aircraft battery.
Wainwright
had only the public telephone and telegraph system for communications, and none
were available from General Aiken, MacArthur’s chief signal officer. He had
little transportation except for a few borrowed buses and trucks. He had no
navy and no air force, except reconnaissance P-40s, and besides, all five of
his divisions were still in process of mobilization.
The
beach defenses of the Lingayen Gulf were manned by the 11th and 21st Divisions.
On 10 December the Japanese bombers wrecked most of the installations at Fort
Stotsenburg and destroyed a large part of the men and horses of the 26th
Cavalry.
Recession of the U.S. Asiatic
Fleet
In
addition to these land and air forces, the small Asiatic Fleet of the U.S. Navy
had Manila as its home base and was under the command of Admiral Thomas C.
Hart. The Asiatic Fleet consisted of two cruisers (the heavy cruiser Houston
and the light cruiser Marblehead), twelve overage destroyers, the tender
Langley, twenty-three Catalina patrol planes comprising Patrol Wing 10 (Patwing
10), about twenty-nine submarines, and a few gunboats and auxiliaries, which
could not be counted on for combat. The cruiser Boise happened to be in Asiatic
waters at the time. With these ships we attempted to hold the Japanese in check
until we could muster sufficient strength to make a real resistance.
Late
in November 1941, when the Japanese “creeping advance” down the coast of China
indicated an approaching crisis, Admiral Hart sent the Marblehead and eight
destroyers to Borneo. The Houston, Boise, and the destroyer tender Blackhawk
were also dispatched to operate in southern waters. This left only a skeleton
organization in Manila Bay when the Japanese struck Pearl Harbor on 7 December
1941, and the larger ships still remaining in Manila Harbor left at once for
southern waters, in compliance with standing orders to depart as soon as
hostilities began.
The
part played by our Navy in the defense of the Philippines must be accorded
recognition. While the Navy’s part may not have been as spectacular as that of
the Army, its work was effective and was characterized by many instances of
heroic daring and wise judgment.
On
8 December 1941, the Japanese struck first at the island of Mindanao and
attempted to destroy our naval defenses in that area. Early in the morning of 8
December, Japanese bombers attacked our two seaplanes (our others being out on
patrol) and the seaplane tender Preston on location in the Gulf of Davao. The
planes were destroyed but the Preston escaped after shooting down one enemy
plane. Four Japanese destroyers entered the Gulf of Davao at once.
On
10 December, the third day of the war, the Japanese planes came to Cavite in
Manila Bay and practically wiped it out. Some of our ships escaped to
improvised places along the Manila waterfront, the supplementary naval base
facilities at Mariveles Bay being still under construction and of no present
value, but the submarine Sealion was damaged, as was the destroyer Peary. We
had to sink the Sealion to prevent its capture by the enemy.
Since
our Navy could not operate in or near Manila Bay without danger from enemy
aircraft, Admiral Hart ordered the remaining vessels to move south to safer
waters. On 11 December, Admiral Hart also advised all merchant shipping to leave
the Manila area; thus 200,000 tons of merchant shipping, some of it very
valuable, cleared to the southward, and all but one of the ships escaped via
the Sulu Sea and Makassar Strait. After the major portion of our fleet had gone
south, and the cargo ships had retreated, only a few submarines and motor boats
were left to render what aid they could to our forces as well as to harass the
enemy as much as possible.
While
Cavite was undergoing attack, enemy troops landed at several places on Luzon,
from shallow draft vessels of the Japanese fishing fleet. These shallow craft
were difficult for our submarines to hit. But December 1941 marked the
beginning of a continuous, extensive, and effective submarine campaign in all
Japanese and nearby waters—a gallant fight that continued throughout the war.
Admiral
Hart moved his headquarters from Manila to the Netherlands East Indies about 21
December, and Admiral F. W. Rockwell, in command of our naval defense forces in
Manila Harbor, moved to Corregidor on 26 December. Manila Bay by this time was
under constant bombing attacks. By 31 December, all our submarines had, under
orders, retired to the Malay Barrier in the south. Rear Admiral Rockwell as
senior naval officer remained on Corregidor. By the end of December 1941 our
Asiatic Fleet had been pushed out of the Philippines and had taken refuge in
the waters of the Netherlands East Indies. The Japanese already were preparing
bases at Davao on Mindanao and at Jolo in the Sulu Archipelago.
The
Navy proceeded to reorganize in the south. It was realized that even the Malay
Barrier might not be able to withstand enemy assault, and it was decided to
develop a major naval base at Port Darwin on the north coast of Australia. But
its facilities were not adequate, and the distance was too great to be of much
service for some time to come. So it was that operational command was set up at
Surabaya on the north coast of Java.
The
Japanese objective was to capture and occupy and exploit all the rich area of
the Malay Barrier and the South China Sea. By January the Japanese had overrun
the Philippine Islands, and the greater part of our naval strength was in the
Netherlands East Indies, toward which the Japanese were headed. Our submarines
and motor torpedo boats were engaged in slowing down as much as possible the
advance of the enemy, so as to give us time to get organized for the surface
action that was in prospect.
Japanese Landings in the
Philippines
The
Japanese Army began to land at several places in the Philippines on 10-12 December,
first at Aparri and Vigan on the northern tip of the island of Luzon, and on
the far southeastern coast off the Bicol Peninsula at Legaspi. The Japanese
landing at Aparri proved to be a feint, some 3,000 men trying without success
to pull General Wainwright’s forces away from the Lingayen Gulf.
The
enemy struck in full force at Vigan, just up from Lingayen Gulf, with a task
force of warships and some eighty-four jammed-to-the-rails transports landing
troops. The only air protection Wainwright’s army had was one P-40
reconnaissance plane, and the Navy’s motor torpedo boats were far away to the
south. In the face of such a wave of enemy troops, Wainwright maneuvered for
position in order to delay the Japanese as much as possible, hoping he soon
would have reinforcements sufficient for a counterattack.
The
first land skirmish which really started the long, tedious days and almost
endless nights of killing, being killed, and withdrawing, began on 16 December.
General MacArthur ordered Wainwright to hold a line running across, east to
west, the narrow coastal plain fifty miles below Vigan at San Fernando La
Union. The Japanese came down the coastal plain on 21 December, where they were
met by one battalion of the 13th Infantry Regiment, and one battalion of the
12th Regiment, near San Juan, five miles north of San Fernando. Being
outflanked by the enemy, our forces scattered into the mountains and were
filtering back to our command for a period of two weeks.
The Fall of Manila
By
this time enemy landings had been made at Davao on Mindanao Island, some 600
miles south of Manila. The Japanese also landed in Lamon Bay below Manila and
closed in on that city from the north and south. Before the end of December
1941, due to the recession of the fleet, the Arm’ position in Manila had become
precarious. Manila Bay by this time was under constant air bombardment. Seeing
the impending danger of being encircled, General MacArthur began evacuating
Manila and declared it an “open city” withdrawing all his forces into the mountainous
peninsula of Bataan and to the island fortress of Corregidor. Manila, however,
was bombed by the Japanese in violation of international law and was finally
occupied by them on 2 January 1942.
A
first-hand account of the fall of Manila comes from war correspondents Carl and
Shelley Mydans, who wrote in Time Magazine:
January 2nd, 1942, nearly 3,500
Americans were hauled to the campus of the University of Santo Tomas in Manila.
This was to serve as one of the Japanese prison camps for the duration. We were
housed in two large buildings, with no provision for food, water, sewage,
garbage disposal, or medical care. For a week the only food came from Filipino
friends who were allowed to throw it over the fence to us. It was six months
before the Japanese began to feed us. On 12 September 1942, 125 of us were
removed from Santo Tomas to Shanghai.
The
withdrawal of our troops from Manila and the consolidation of the defense
forces on the peninsula of Bataan on a very much shortened front constituted a
most important and dramatic phase of the Philippine Campaign. On 3 January
1942, the siege of Bataan began.
Withdrawing to Bataan
On
the Bataan Peninsula our defensive operations resolved themselves into delaying
of the Japanese advance toward inner Bataan and nearby Corregidor and making
that advance as costly as possible. Successively retreating lines of defense
were carefully drawn, and heroically defended as long as possible.
In
General Wainwright’s North Luzon army, Lieutenant Colonels Moses and Noble commanded
the 13th Infantry Regiment, and Major Ganahl commanded the 12th Regiment, all
of whom disappeared from the picture.
Our
forces suffered a setback, but they held on as best they could. On the night of
21 December, sixteen more enemy transports landed troops just south of Bauang
and along the shores of Lingayen Gulf, as far down as Agoo. Here they met our
11th Division, which was not able to stand the onslaught of superior numbers.
Neither was the 71st Infantry and the battalion of field artillery under
Colonel David Bonnett. Bonnett was ordered to retire to a better position. The
26th Cavalry also had to withdraw from the death trap at Damortis. The reason
was the enemy had planes, we did not. A company of sixteen tanks from the
command of Brigadier General R. N. Weaver was requested, but only five were
sent, and they were not adequate to hold the enemy in check. Many incidents of
valor marked the withdrawal of our soldiers to Bataan before the avalanche of
Japanese troops.
Wainwright’s
new field headquarters were established at Alcala on the Agno River. The 26th
Cavalry had lost about 150 men killed and wounded in the fighting from Damortis
to Bued. On 23 December, Wainwright withdrew behind the Agno River. When
General MacArthur ordered General Wainwright to withdraw his troops to Bataan,
Wainwright’s still scattered forces numbered about 28,000, of whom 25,000 were
still only partly trained for warfare. Before he could withdraw the 150 miles
necessary, he had to round up and consolidate his forces as much as possible,
so that his rear guard could delay the Japanese advance as he retreated. He
ordered that the line of the Rio Grande de Pampanga be held fast, so as to
enable General Jones’s command of the South Luzon forces to withdraw north from
the Japanese attacking in the south, and to swing around Manila Bay and come
into Bataan about the same time that Wainwright’s North Luzon forces arrived
there.
The
Filipino and American forces on Bataan at first made an effort to defend our
secondary naval base at Subic Bay. An increasingly large number of enemy troops
being thrown into the line, our forces were compelled to fall back to the main
line of defense running across the peninsula. In fox holes, trenches and
dugouts, our forces fought on from the middle of January to early April, waging
a fight so gallant that it inspired the American people to unceasing endeavors
to achieve a successful outcome of the war.
After
Malaya, Singapore, Burma, and the Netherlands East Indies had fallen to the
Japanese, more troops were released to reinforce the Japanese armies in the
Philippines. General Yamashita, who had commanded the Malaya offensive, was put
in command for a final and overwhelming drive against our troops in the
Philippines.
Our
men were worn out by exposure, weakened by short rations, and many of them were
ill from malaria and other tropical diseases; yet they fought on. In their
desperation they at times were compelled to eat carabao, monkeys, and even
horses and mules. It is estimated that 20,000 of them were disabled by malaria
of a malignant type, and no quinine was available with which to combat the
disease. The only air protection they had was a few Curtiss P-40s flying from
emergency air strips carved out of the jungle. Tanks and heavy guns—they had
none. Under these conditions even the most valiant soldiers could not hold out
indefinitely.
Brigadier
General Clyde A. Settick commanded the 71st Division at the time. It was a
difficult task to round up thousands of inexperienced and bewildered men and organize
them for withdrawing before the enemy. On 24 December some elements of the
enemy got behind our forces and between them and Bataan. The 26th Cavalry,
under Colonel Pierce, was busy trying to protect the retreat of the 71st to
Agno. Checking up on 24 December, the 26th had been reduced by casualties to
about 450 men. At Binalonan the 26th held off the Japanese in overwhelming
numbers.
According
to a report from General MacArthur, American air defense was almost impotent:
on Luzon we had thirty-five B-17s, thirty medium and eight light bombers, 220
fighters, and twenty-three other planes. At the end of the first day of
fighting, we had left only seventeen heavy bombers and about seventy fighters.
Fourteen of the B 17s reached Australia after a short time, but all our
fighters were destroyed.
Wainwright’s
withdrawal toward Bataan was in five phases: D1, D2, D3, D4, and D5.
Wainwright’s forces were to delay the Japanese advance as long as possible to
permit General Jones’s South Luzon force to clear around Manila Bay and get
into Bataan; also to enable Major General George M. Parker to prepare the
Bataan defenses.
The
withdrawal into Bataan was not exactly a retreat, for we fought delaying
actions all the way. It was hard for an American, even at that. The withdrawal
toward Bataan began on 23 December and ended 31 December 1941. At Cabanatuan on
27 and 28 December, the 91st Division had to fight the Japanese tanks, cavalry,
and infantry. Late on 29 December, the 91st was attacked again and routed with
heavy losses and was forced to retire toward the south. About a thousand troops
of the 12th and 13th Infantry Regiments that had been trapped two weeks before,
broke through and joined the 11th Division at D5. The 91st Division reformed
its broken forces and started on its retreat toward Bataan.
The
South Luzon forces under General Jones, withdrawing north to reach the only
road leading to Bataan, had to cross the Pampanga River by means of the
Calumpit bridge. The bridge was known to the Japanese and to us as a
bottleneck. The 500 men left of the 91st Division plus a regiment of the 71st
Division and a battalion of field artillery took position along the Pampanga at
11:00 p.m. on 30 December to protect the crossing of the South Luzon forces.
During the night a company of the 192nd Tank Battalion was added to the
defense.
The
Japanese struck at 10:30 a.m. on 31 December, while General Jones’s Southern
Luzon forces were crossing the bridge under heavy fire, being protected by the
11th and 21st Divisions. Most of them were across on the road to Bataan by
midnight. New Yea’ Day, 1942, the last elements of the 91st Division had
crossed, just as the advance Japanese guard rushed the bridge. At 6:15 a.m. our
forces blew up the bridge. The Japanese now had before them the wide, deep, and
unfordable Pampanga River.
Wainwright’s
and Jones’s North and South Luzon forces reached Bataan on 6 January—Bataan
that was to be the scene of unspeakable suffering and humiliation. During the
withdrawal to Bataan, Wainwright’s North Luzon forces had been cut down from
28,000 to about 16,000, and they were in poor shape to undertake the defense of
Bataan. The march into Bataan was costly and depressing, but at that it was
only a suggestion of the march out of Bataan, the “Death March” some three
months later.
Our
men walked into Bataan, many of them shoeless, stumbling, feeling that Bataan
was or might be a death trap awaiting them.
About
7 January, General Wainwright was designated by MacArthur as commander of the I
Philippine Corps, to defend the western side of the Bataan Peninsula, while
Major General George M. Parker was to command the II Corps of Philippine troops
to protect the east side of the Bataan Peninsula.
Between
these two corps, the Silanganan Mountains, running north and south, divided
Wainwright from Parker, and steep jungle walls of the mountains made it
difficult for them to maintain contact and liaison with each other. Besides,
this situation favored Japanese penetration between the forces of the two
American commanders.
On
arriving and taking up position on Bataan, it was necessary to put all men on
half rations, and these were Filipino rations, not sufficient for the
Americans. To supplement the shortened rations, soldiers were sent out to shoot
and bring in every carabao they could find, and veterinary supervision was
given when these animals were killed and issued for meat. Even young carabao is
not any too palatable, and the old carabao had to be soaked in salt water
overnight, and then beaten to a pulp before it could be eaten.
On
19 January, General MacArthur came to Bataan and inspected the I and II Corps.
Just after MacArthur had returned to Corregidor the Japanese penetrated down
Mount Silangayan, hugging the slopes on both sides, and this threatened to
separate the I Corps from the II Corps. So Wainwright’s 31st was assigned to
Parker’s II Corps, to attempt to hold the enemy.
By
16 January, fresh Japanese troops had landed from the sea at Port Binanga on
the northwestern coast of Bataan, then marched through the jungle and attacked
the 1st Philippine Division. The 26th Cavalry, aided by units of the 1st
Division, drove the Japanese back across the Moron River. Meanwhile, Parker’s
II Corps was deteriorating rapidly, and Wainwright’s I Corps was threatened on
three sides, west, north and east. This situation made it necessary for the
American line to be so extended that they were in great peril.
By
21 January the Japanese had infiltrated through our lines and had taken
possession of the Moron-Bagac Road. The 1st Philippine Division was in a trap
and had to fight its way south along the narrow beaches of the China Sea on the
west and the Moron-Bagac Road on their east, which was controlled by the
Japanese. In this escape all heavy guns had to be destroyed, and all transportation
equipment also. Carrying their wounded by hand, the survivors worked their way
back. On orders from General MacArthur, all forces withdrew to the reserve
battle position at the waistline of Bataan Peninsula.
The
withdrawal was completed by 26 January and gave the I and II Corps the
advantage of less rugged terrain in which to fight. This put the Americans and
Filipinos in possession of the lower end of Bataan Peninsula, including the Bay
of Mariveles. Our troops had now fallen back to their last position on Bataan,
and it was do or die. No food, and little hope of getting any. No letup of the
steaming jungle heat by day or night. No quinine to stop the malaria that was
killing our men. No cessation of the moans of the wounded. Altogether it was a soul-racking
thing to go through. Our men had to shoot the horses of the 26th Cavalry and
eat them to keep themselves alive.
And
now the Japanese landed at four points along the southern and western extremity
of Bataan. At Longaskaway they were met by the 45th Infantry of Philippine
Scouts and by about 450 sailors, under command of Commander Bridgett of the
U.S. Navy. They also landed at Quinaun Point, where they were met by a group of
Air Corps engineers, and the 3rd Battalion of the 45th Infantry under command
of Major Dudley H. Strickler.
The
Japanese also landed at Agloloma Point. In their landing operations they were
shelled and machine-gunned by our few P-40s and ground troops, and those not
exterminated were scattered. They also landed at a small peninsula between the
Anyasan and Salaiian Rivers, and this landing proved most dangerous, for if the
enemy succeeded in landing, he might cut the road south to Mariveles, the
take-off point from which our forces might escape to Corregidor. The
miscellaneous troops guarding this point were thrown back by superior numbers
and fierceness of the attack.
The
battle at Quinaun Point lasted twelve days, the 3rd Battalion of Major
Strickler doing heroic fighting. As no troops could be spared to aid them, the
battalion fought alone. When it went into action, the battalion had a major,
four captains, eight or ten lieutenants, and 600 men. Twelve days later, after
having driven the Japanese into the China Sea, the battalion was commanded by a
second lieutenant, with only 212 men, the rest of the battalion having been
killed or wounded.
Many
of the Japanese troops took cover in caves along the shores of the China Sea.
They would not surrender. A small American gunboat was called into action to
shell the caves, while our engineers crept in from the land side and lowered
electric mines into the mouths of the caves and blew the cliffs to pieces.
A
strong Japanese force attacked our forces on the center of the 11th Division
and penetrated a mile in depth and a mile in width, while a smaller Japanese
force infiltrated down the gorge of the Cotar River, attempting to link up with
the first-mentioned force, which coordinated action resulted in cutting off a
large number of our men. But the tables were turned when, after a week of fighting,
the 1st Philippine Division encircled the smaller enemy force.
The
11th Division, plus a battalion of the 2nd Philippine Constabulary, two
battalions of the 91st Division, and a battalion of the 45th Infantry Scouts
under Lieutenant Colonel Lathrop, encircled the other Japanese force. Both
Japanese forces dug in, in fox holes and tunnels, and it required twelve days
to exterminate them. It was a fierce fight, much of it being underground. By 17
February our forces held every foot of ground they had occupied on their
arrival at the reserve battle position.
In
this intense fighting our losses were heavy. The land was dotted with crosses
of our dead, and our improvised hospitals near Mariveles were crowded with the
wounded. Two of the best native generals, Brigadier General Segundo and
Brigadier General Vinconte Lim, of the 41st Division, suffered at the hands of
the Japanese. General Lim was murdered in the most horrible way the Japanese
General Yamashita could devise. Segundo, as well as many other Filipino
officers, were also murdered by Yamashita.
The
Japanese were now preparing for an all-out attack. Their forces outnumbered
ours six, to eight, to ten to one. Many of our patrols were composed of loyal
Filipino Igorots, whose ability to move Indian-like through mountains and
jungles proved that they were our best and often our only means of
reconnaissance.
MacArthur Ordered to Australia
On
10 March 1942, General Wainwright was summoned to headquarters on Corregidor,
where he was informed that twice in recent weeks the President had strongly
suggested that General MacArthur retire to Australia to command the
newly-created Southwest Pacific Area, preparatory to a counterattack. MacArthur
had just as strongly protested leaving the Philippines. But now, explicit
orders had come from Washington and MacArthur was to go at once.
Wainwright
was placed in command of all American troops in the Philippines. On Luzon he
had the I Corps under command of General Jones, the II Corps under command of
General Parker, all service troops, and the troops scattered in the Cagayan
Valley and the mountain provinces in the north. General Moore was to command
the Manila Harbor defenses, General Chenoweth to command the troops on the
Visayan Islands, and General Sharp to command the troops on Mindanao. These
subcommands were to be under the supreme command of General MacArthur from
Australia.
On
that day, 10 March 1942, MacArthur is reported to have said: “If I get through
to Australia… I’ll come back as soon as I can.”
General
Wainwright now had under his command only about 70,000 men, a small proportion
of them being combat troops. Meanwhile, a new Japanese landing under General
Homma had brought the enemy total to around a quarter of a million men.
At
7 p.m. on 11 March, four MTBs under command of Lieutenant Bulkeley started
south with General and Mrs. MacArthur, their son Arthur, a nurse, and the
personnel of the general’s staff. It was a hazardous journey through the enemy
mine fields at the entrance to Manila Bay, ever in danger of being spotted by
enemy surface ships or aircraft.
By
dawn on the 12th the party reached the Cuyo Islands, where they hid from sight
for the day. By now one of the four MTBs was out of fuel and had to remain at
Cuyo. Clearing the Cuyos at 6:30 p.m., running in sight of enemy ships and
through a rough sea, the party reached Cagayan in the Mindanao Sea early on the
13th. Four Flying Fortresses had been ordered from Australia to carry the party
on the last lap of their journey to Australia, but these airplanes had been
delayed and would not be available for five days.
While
waiting at Cagayan, two of the MTBs went to Negros Island and brought over
President Manuel Quezon of the Philippine Commonwealth, who would accompany the
party to Australia. General MacArthur arrived at Melbourne, Australia, on 17
March and assumed command of all American Army forces in the Southwest Pacific
area.
General
MacArthur’s official entourage on his trip to Australia consisted of the
following members of his staff: Major General Sutherland, chief of staff;
Brigadier General Richard J. Marshall, deputy chief of staff; Colonel Charles
P. Stivers, assistant chief of staff, G-1; Colonel Charles A. Willoughby,
assistant chief of staff, G-2; Captain Joseph MacMicking, Air Corps, assistant
chief of staff, G-2; Brigadier General Spencer B. Aiken, signal officer;
Lieutenant Colonel Joe R. Scherr, assistant signal officer; Brigadier General
William S. Marquat, anti-aircraft officer; Brigadier General Harold H. George,
air officer; Brigadier General Hugh J. Casey, engineer; Lieutenant Colonel
Sidney L. Huff, aide-de-camp; Lieutenant Colonel Francis H. Wilson,
aide-de-camp; Lieutenant Colonel Legrande A. Dillar, aide-de-camp; Major
Charles H. Morehouse, Medical Corps; Master Sergeant Paul P. Rogers, secretary.
Back
on Bataan, the enemy contemplated a continuous assault regardless of losses,
thinking that by numerical superiority he could crush the defenders, but every
bit of ground was fiercely contested by our troops, with heavy losses on both
sides. Bataan became a hell of bombs and fox holes and destruction, with enemy
infiltrations along the beaches on the west coast, savage hand-to-hand fighting
in the underbrush, infantry skirmishes, sharp artillery duels, aggressive
patrol duty on both sides, relentless air raids, bloody attacks, and fierce
counterattacks.
The
Japanese resorted to propaganda leaflets, urging Filipino soldiers to give up
their arms and go home. The fighting Filipinos paid no attention; they fought
on. Enemy attempts to land troops were broken by deadly artillery fire. Those
who reached the shore were quickly mopped up. But fresh enemy reinforcements
kept coming in, and the enemy was able, through the prodigious use of aircraft,
tanks, and artillery fire, to keep the weary defenders under constant
harassment day and night. With each man subsisting on only fifteen ounces of
food a day for several weeks, exhausted by the ceaseless fighting, outnumbered
in both men and materiel, the defenders were pushed back and back.
The
months of fighting on Bataan were heart-breaking ones. Ever since the surprise
air attack on the first day of the war, which destroyed most of their planes on
the ground, the Americans had fought valiantly against impossible odds. They
had retreated foot by foot through Luzon and Bataan until their backs were to
the sea. There, with a small trickle of supplies, makeshift defenses, and
magnificent bravery, they withstood the Imperial Army of Japan. Day after day
they held their ground, at times even attacking the enemy and forcing him to
retreat. So tenaciously did they hold that one Japanese general was reported to
have killed himself in humiliation.
The
I Corps under General Jones had about 25,000 men; the II Corps, under General
Parker, about 35,000 men. Among these troops were about 10,000 service
corpsmen, some quartermaster troops, and about one hundred American nurses. Two
guerrilla bands of about 2,000 men were operating in the far north of the
island. On Corregidor and the three smaller islands in the bay, Fort Drum, Fort
Frank, and Fort Hughes, were about 10,000 men. Most of these were commanded by
Major General George F. Moore. All the navy that was available to us at the
time was four motor torpedo boats, commanded by Lieutenant John Bulkeley, a few
small minesweepers, and a few miscellaneous craft. The air force was now
reduced to one P-40, and it was in poor condition. Our other three P-40s had
cracked up after a raid on a concentration of Japanese ships in Subic Bay.
General
Wainwright moved his headquarters twenty miles south, just east of Mariveles
Bay, where General MacArthur had had his advance headquarters. General Beebe on
Corregidor was in charge of supply, and on 15 March he announced that a lack of
supplies made it necessary to further reduce the ration from one-half Filipino
rations by another one-third, if our men were to be able to keep alive another
month.
On
20-21 March General Wainwright was notified that he had been advanced to the
rank of lieutenant general, and that all the forces in the Philippines were to
be called the U.S. Forces in the Philippines, with him as commander in chief,
as of 21 March. General Wainwright thereupon took up his headquarters at
Corregidor.
On
22 March the Japanese served their first demand for surrender, dropping it from
a plane over Bataan: “If you do not reply to this by special messenger within
three days we will feel free to act in any way at all.” This demand for
surrender was signed by “the Commanders in Chief, Imperial Japanese Army and
Navy Forces in the Philippines.”
General
Wainwright made no reply.
Food
was rapidly playing out, and the men on Bataan were famished, sick, war-weary,
hollow-eyed, yet they fought on. The Japanese, having established long-range
105 mm guns six miles away at Cavite, began to bomb Forts Drum, Hughes, Frank,
and Corregidor, wreaking great havoc.
The
Japanese commander, General Yamashita, issued a demand for the surrender of the
American troops, a demand which General Wainwright rejected. Then during the
first two weeks of April the enemy, with superior numbers of troops, was able
to penetrate our lines and turn back our flanks, until we became powerless to
sustain the delaying action on Bataan much longer. From the air the enemy
dropped bombs in ever increasing number. On 22 March, our Bataan forces were
confronted with the main Japanese Army, aided by more and more warships that
had come into Manila Bay.
By
24 March the intensity of the bombing of Corregidor made it necessary for our
personnel to take to the tunnels, especially Malinta Tunnel. On 25 March and
again on 28 and 29 March the Japanese made furious assaults on Bataan.
The Fall of Bataan
On
29 March 1942, the Japanese bombers hit a plainly marked base hospital on south
Bataan, killing men on stretchers and nurses and doctors, who were standing by
their patients. Bataan was now receiving in mounting fury the Japanese assault
from warships, from the air, and from land troops. On 4 and 5 April the
Japanese had mounted 75 mm guns on the barges and had struck General Parker’s
line from his rear.
Late
on 7 April 1942, General Parker sent word to General Wainwright that he might
have to surrender because of Japanese pressure on his malaria-ridden,
half-starved forces. General Wainwright’s orders were for General Parker’s II
Corps to hold out, and for both him and General Jones’s I Corps to attack
again. But it was futile, as man after man dropped in his tracks utterly
exhausted, as he attempted to move forward.
On
8 April the Bataan nurses, what remained of them, were put on a barge and taken
to Corregidor. They were disheveled, many of them were wounded, they were
fatigued, but they were a gallant lot. After weeks of waiting, two submarines
brought food on 9 April for the men on Bataan, but few of them lived to receive
any of it, many dying of starvation.
On
9 April General King was compelled to surrender. After noon on that day of 9
April 1942 there was silence on Bataan, but it was the silence of death. For it
was on 9 April 1942 on Bataan that a small open car displaying a white flag
could be seen rolling along the highway toward the Japanese lines in the
vicinity of Limay, thus signaling the surrender of the American-Filipino forces
on the Bataan Peninsula. In addition to the soldiers surrendering, there were
also many civilians. Our stand was gallant but hopeless. Our men had the
courage but not enough food. At last, weakened by malaria and dysentery, with
the enemy bombing them day and night and pushing forward by the overwhelming
weight of numbers, they surrendered because of sheer exhaustion.
Bataan
had fallen. But the noble defenders, both American and Filipino, had written an
imperishable page on the scroll of fame.
The Death March from Bataan
The
humiliation of defeat was bad enough, but worse was yet in store for our heroic
defenders of the Philippines: the Death March of Bataan and the unspeakable
atrocities of Japanese prison camps. Many of these men were to die of
starvation and malnutrition, all of them to bear in their bodies for life the
scars of one of the most inhuman experiences that men were ever called upon to
suffer.
By
15 April the Death March from Bataan had begun, up the peninsula toward Camp
O’Donnell. From reports since available, we find that the Japanese rounded up
our defeated men and put them in groups of about 1,000 each. The first stage of
the march was about sixty miles, to San Fernando Pampanga, a continuous march
of a day and night. Then they were herded into railway boxcars and shipped to
Capan in the province of Tarlac. They were then taken out of the boxcars and
marched seven miles more to Camp O’Donnell. Their only food en route was a
small amount of rice, and scarcely any water.
Camp
O’Donnell was the home cantonment of the 71st Philippine Army Division before
the war started, and water and sanitary systems had not been installed, except
for a few pumps. The only water available was three miles away, the muddy
Bampan River. No transportation was available, and the Japanese having taken
all of the prisoners’ canteens away, there were no containers with which to get
water. These thousands of starving and thirst-crazed prisoners were in torment.
According
to Captain Reeder, American medical officer in Camp O’Donnell, from about 20
April to the end of July, at least 20,000 of the 45,000 Filipino and 1,400
American troops there died of starvation, disease, and torture. Men who were
craving water and stopping to lap a little from muddy creeks were shot or
bayoneted while drinking. The principal diseases were malaria and dysentery,
and no medicine was allowed the men.
Sergeant
Carl A. Carlsson: From his own memories of the Death March of Bataan, Sergeant
Carl A. Carlsson relates: “I’ll never forget it. What hell! No words ever could
describe it—cold, brutal, and all unnecessary. They’ll shove a man in a hole
and bury him alive if he was too weak to walk. Some of the men would fall back
out of line, and we’d hear a shot or a scream and the next thing we knew, a Nip
would come up the road wiping off his bayonet, and you knew there was one
less.”
Among
these wearied, hunger-stricken marchers, were two American chaplains, Colonel
John K. Borneman and Colonel Alfred C. Oliver. Both of these chaplains managed
to survive the horrors of the prison camps. Colonel Borneman says that he
witnessed twelve murders of U.S. Army officers at Cabanatuan, murders following
sadistic beatings for twenty-four hours. Colonel Borneman also tells what
happened to Colonel Oliver, who was beaten pitilessly for days, and then
suffered a broken neck. He in some way survived the ordeal, but he must go the
rest of his life with his head in a high leather collar. Colonel Oliver lived
to tell the story of his experience, but never once mentioned his own
sufferings as he portrays for us in a later section of this article the
sufferings of his comrades in the Japanese prison camps.
Last Days on Corregidor
Bataan
having fallen, the Japanese now concentrated their attacks on Corregidor, using
surface ships, air bombs, and long-range artillery. We had at Corregidor about
11,000 men, opposed to about 250,000 enemy troops, advancing on us like a
mighty torrent. Some 2,000 men and women were able to cross the two-mile wide
water from Bataan and found refuge for the time being on Corregidor, on the
night of 8 and 9 April. About 300 survivors of the 31st Infantry (American) and
a number of Filipino troops, some Navy men from Mariveles, about four survivors
of the 26th Cavalry, and the nurses—these also escaped Bataan.
By
this time all hospital facilities on Corregidor were crowded, with hundreds
more waiting to be hospitalized. The sick and wounded were laid out on the
beaches.
In
order to defend Corregidor every available man was used, including some 1,500
Marines recently from China, commanded by Colonel Sam Howard, and the 300
survivors of the 31st Infantry.
The
enemy began to bomb Corregidor from the shores of Bataan, two miles away, with
240 mm howitzers. This, added to the incessant bombing by 105 mm guns from
Cavite and with continuous air bombardment, made Corregidor a living hell. On
top of the 4,700-foot Mariveles Mountains, the Japanese observation posts gave
their gunners correction of fire. The shelling of Corregidor did not entirely
cease at any moment during the twenty-seven days our troops were under attack.
There was no escape from the enemy fire except in the deep recesses of the
Malinta Tunnel, and it could hold only a small part of our forces.
On
9 April about a dozen planes commanded by Brigadier General Ralph Royce raided
the enemy installations at Nichols Field, and then returned to Mindanao. On
13-14 April, a squadron of American bombers from somewhere in the south
successfully attacked Japanese installations and shipping in the Philippine
area. Then came two weeks of even more intensive enemy bombardment by planes,
ships, and artillery. On 5 May the Japanese avalanche buried many of our shore
batteries under a landslide, and under cover of darkness the enemy crossing the
narrow channel from Bataan, were able to make a landing on the North Point of
Corregidor. The shattered defenses were unable to check the enemy tide; our
depleted and exhausted troops were in danger of being overwhelmed.
Late
on 9 April, General Wainwright received from President Roosevelt an assurance
of confidence, giving him freedom of action to do as he thought best, and
hoping that he would still be able to hold Corregidor. General Wainwright
replied: “The American flag still flies on this beleaguered island fortress.”
On
16 April, a week after the fall of Bataan, the enemy landed in force at Iloilo
on North Panay Island, and prepared for a mass attack on Mindanao.
On
18 April, General Marshall sent the following message to General Wainwright:
“The continuing demonstration that you and the members of your command are
giving to the world of courage and devotion is worthy of the finest traditions
of American and Filipino soldiers. We are immeasurably proud of every man
serving in the fortifications of Manila Bay. Please convey the special
commendation and gratitude of the War Department to the nurses on Corregidor,
whose service is an inspiration to all of us.”
First Bombs on Japan
On
18 April 1942, the world was electrified at the news that a squadron of
American planes under command of General James H. Doolittle, accompanied by
seventy-nine other aviators, had raided the Japanese mainland, striking Tokyo,
Yokohama, Kobe, Nagoya, and Osaka, flying at low altitude in broad daylight.
By
25 April the Malinta Tunnel hospital was treating 1,000 wounded men each
twenty-four hours and blood-stained doctors and nurses worked day and night,
most of the 150 nurses being veterans of Bataan. On 28 April, the Japanese
barrage increased in fury. A 240 mm shell exploded near General Wainwright,
bursting his left eardrum.
On
the night of 29 April, two U.S. Navy rescue planes succeeded in landing at
Corregidor. Fifty men and women, thirty of them nurses, were put on board, and
started south. One plane reached Australia; the other was marooned on Mindanao,
and the occupants were captured and made prisoners of war by the Japanese. The
rest of our people on Corregidor remained to fight off as long as possible the
hour of doom.
Because
of damages to the water and electric system, damages caused by the enemy guns,
those facilities began to play out. For a few weeks only, an occasional
two-seater plane would reach Corregidor with medicine, and took away about a
dozen more of our people.
On
3 May they managed to evacuate from Corregidor by submarine a fairly good
number of nurses, and officers that were key men or who were in desperate
physical condition. Some of the nurses, from a sense of duty to the wounded,
refused to leave on that first submarine; among them was Captain Mieler, chief
nurse of the Malinta Tunnel hospital.
On
4 May the Japanese bombing reached an all-time high from 7:00 a.m. until 12:00
noon. It is estimated that a 500-pound bomb hit Corregidor every five seconds
during that five-hour period, twelve every minute, or 3,600 shells in five
hours, enough to fill six hundred trucks, and all this in addition to thirteen
air raids on that same day.
Codes and Treasures
As
the war in the Philippines waxed ever more furious, more and more American and
Filipino treasure was moved to Corregidor for safekeeping. Just before
Corregidor fell, $140,000,000 in Philippine currency and $15,000,000 in silver
were locked in Corregidor. The gold reserve of the Philippines had in the early
days of the war been sent to the U.S. for safekeeping. Following MacArthur’s
instructions, Wainwright put down the serial numbers of the bank notes and
radioed them to the Treasury Department at Washington. Then he cut up and
burned the money and destroyed the lists. The $15,000,000 in silver was sealed
in wooden boxes, towed into Manila Bay, and sunk at locations that were radioed
to Washington, and all records and codes were destroyed.
By
5 May it was evident the enemy was ready to invade Corregidor, and surrender
would be inevitable. At 8 p.m. on 5 May, the Japanese began a furious
bombardment preparatory to landing, and at 11:15 on the night of 5 May, the
landing began.
The
night of 5 May and the following day was to be their last stand. The first wave
of Japanese came in landing boats and motor boats. Our beach forces gave them
the strongest fight that was in them, but the enemy, by sheer weight of
numbers, broke through our defenses and advanced toward the Rock. At 4 a.m. on
6 May General Wainwright received the following message by radio from President
Roosevelt: “In spite of all the handicaps of complete isolation, lack of food
and ammunition, you have given the world a shining example of patriotic
fortitude and self-sacrifice. You and your devoted followers have become the
living symbols of our war aim and the guarantee of victory.”
Our
men continued to fight the Japanese at every step. About 10 a.m. on 6 May the
Japanese landed more men and tanks and headed for the tunnel. At this moment
our troops on Corregidor faced these appalling facts: All beach defenses had
been blown to dust; all barriers had been wrecked; machine gun emplacements had
been pulverized; seacoast guns and fire control instruments, destroyed;
forty-six out of forty-eight of our 75 mm guns had been knocked out;
communications had been severed. The landing of the enemy could not be stopped
by what we had.
At
10:15 a.m. on 6 May 1942, General Wainwright announced his momentous decision,
that in order to save the sick and wounded and starving men and women, he would
cease firing at 12 o’clock noon. At 10:30 General Beebe went on the radio:
“Message for General Homma: For reasons which General Wainwright considers
sufficient, and to put a stop to further sacrifice of human life, the
Commanding General will surrender to Your Excellency today the four fortified
islands at the entrance to Manila Bay, together with all military and naval
personnel. At 12:00 noon, 6 May 1942, all firing will cease, unless a landing
by Japanese troops in force is attempted without flag of truce.”
But
the Japanese continued the attack; at 11:00 a.m. General Beebe repeated the
message, and at 11:45 a.m. the fighting had not stopped.
Between
10 a.m. and 12 noon, 6 May 1942, General Wainwright sent a radio message to
President Roosevelt saying: “With broken heart and head bowed in sadness, but
not in shame, I report to Your Excellency that today I must ask for terms of
surrender of the fortified islands of Manila Bay. There is a limit of human
endurance, and that limit has long since been passed. Without prospect of
relief, I feel it is my duty to my country and to my gallant troops to end this
useless effusion of blood and human sacrifice.”
Promptly
at noon the white flag went up and all firing by the Corregidor defenders came
to an end, but the Japanese continued to maul us without let up. At 12:30 p.m.
General Beebe went on the radio again, and a Marine officer with a white flag
went to the enemy forward positions, now within a few hundred feet of the
entrance to Malinta Tunnel, to request the senior Japanese officer to come into
the tunnel and meet with General Wainwright. For nearly an hour the Japanese
guns were firing on our troops continuously. When the Marine officer returned,
he reported that the Japanese senior officer would not come to see Wainwright but
insisted that Wainwright come to see him.
General
Wainwright, Major General George F. Moore and his aide Major Bob Brown,
Wainwright’s aide Colonel Johnny Pugh, and Major Tom Dooley started for the
enemy lines. Japanese planes swooped low and sprayed machine gun bullets upon
them as they approached the Japanese lines. More than two hours after our white
flag had been raised, the enemy bombers were still attacking our troops, and
continued to bombard Corregidor until late in the afternoon.
The
Japanese officer was a dudhead, so General Wainwright insisted upon seeing
General Homma. After long delay, Wainwright and his staff were ferried to
Bataan, where finally they met General Homma. After vain attempts by Wainwright
for justice and fair play for his troops on Corregidor, Homma refused, and
announced that fighting would go on until Corregidor’s personnel had been
destroyed and all of the Philippines had been surrendered. Being taken back to
Corregidor, Wainwright found that large parties of Japanese had landed and now
were overrunning everything. It was close to midnight before the surrender
papers were completed. General Wainwright and all personnel were made prisoners
of war. But any further continuation of resistance would have meant utter
annihilation to all on Corregidor.
The
next day, 7 May, Wainwright was taken to Manila, where at 1 a.m., 8 May, he was
required to go on the radio and broadcast that he had surrendered and give the
terms which he had been compelled to sign. General Wainwright, against his
will, was forced to surrender all troops in the Philippines wherever stationed.
This was almost impossible to effect, owing to lack of communications, however,
orders were sent out in the expectation they might be received. On 11 May
Wainwright was informed that Major General William F. Sharp had surrendered in
Mindanao, the Japanese having completely overrun the island. Our troops on
Palawan and at Legaspi also had surrendered. Other groups, mostly natives in
scattered positions, chose to become guerrillas rather than surrender. And of
these guerrillas, representing the masses of the people of the Philippines, it
can be said: “The Philippines never surrendered.”
While
our campaign of Bataan and Corregidor resulted in an inglorious defeat, yet as
a delaying action, to further the interests of the Allies in the Southwest
Pacific, it has been pronounced a success, a triumph of American and Filipino
courage that gave a promise that would inspire their brother Americans to
transform defeat into victory before the war should end.
And
after Corregidor fell, General MacArthur spoke as follows: “Corregidor needs no
comment from me. It has sounded its own story at the mouth of its guns. It has
scrolled its own epitaph on enemy tablets. But through the bloody haze of its
last reverberating shot, I shall always seem to see the vision of its grim,
gaunt, and ghostly men still unafraid.”
The
only three-star general in the war to suffer the bitterest experience in a
soldier’s life, Jonathan M. Wainwright stood up and surrendered in the
Philippines after directing some of the fanciest holding tactics of that
desperate, drawn-out struggle. Already holding the Distinguished Service Medal
for staff work against the Germans in World War I, he received the
Distinguished Service Cross “for extraordinary heroism in action” against the
Japanese, awarded after his capture and imprisonment.
In
defending the Philippine Islands, our troops had fought a gallant delaying
action designed to slow down the Japanese advance into the South Pacific. It
was well understood in Washington that the islands, almost surrounded as they
were by Japanese-controlled areas, could not hold out for long against a strong
and determined enemy attack. But a delaying action would facilitate our plans,
already considered, for building up supply lines to Australia so as to have in
the Southwest Pacific a base for developing a counterattack.
Wainwright
and his staff were kept under guard at the University Club in Manila. In one of
the last days they had the heartbreaking experience of seeing a long column of
ragged Americans and Filipinos trudging down the street. They were the men of
Corregidor being marched through the streets of Manila to let the thousands of
native Filipinos know that the Japanese were a superior people. At Bilibid
prison the Americans were separated from the Filipinos, the Americans to be
sent to Cabanatuan, while the Filipinos were to be sent to Camp O’Donnell.
One
of General Wainwright’s last acts before being carried away to Tarlac prison
camp was to write a letter to General Homma of the Japanese Army, requesting
him to radio President Roosevelt asking that a ship be dispatched to the
Philippines with food, clothing, and medical supplies for the American and
Filipino prisoners of war, who were dying at the rate of three hundred a day.
This request was ignored by the Japanese officer.
General
Wainwright and his staff arrived at Tarlac prison camp on 9 June 1942, where
about 180 other American officers were already imprisoned. They were crowded, all
180 of them, into a building designed to hold just eighty. Thus began the years
of torture and suffering, as these valiant Americans were shuttled back and
forth from prison camp to prison camp—Tarlac, Formosa, Japan,
Manchuria—covering a period of more than three years. Heroes, all of them.
Indicating
the valiant spirit of General Wainwright and the troops under his command, the
general wrote in a letter just before Corregidor fell the following words: “As
I write this we are subjected to terrific air and artillery bombardment, and it
is unreasonable to expect that we can hold out for long. We have done our best,
both here and on Bataan, and although beaten, we are still unashamed.”
Losses
in American and Filipino personnel at Bataan and Corregidor have officially
been set as follows: On Bataan, 36,853; and on Corregidor, 11,574; making a
total of 48,427 killed or taken prisoner by the Japanese.
The
defense of Corregidor lasted from 9 April to 6 May 1942. In the other islands
of the Philippine Archipelago approximately all our troops surrendered and were
made prisoners of war. On 8 April, 15,000 Japanese troops captured the island
of Cebu and the capital by the same name. The enemy hurriedly occupied every
city and port.
Quite
a number of American officers and men escaped to the mountains of the various
islands where they were hidden and protected from the enemy by the native
Filipinos, and then organized and conducted an underground and guerrilla
movement to harass the enemy and prepare the way for the return of General
MacArthur and his liberating American forces; for General MacArthur, in leaving
the Philippines for Australia, had said: “I shall return.”
Philippine Incidents
Before
bringing this article to a close, we wish to invite the reader’s attention to
certain personal experiences and observations that have found a lasting place
in history. No one’s pen is capable of portraying all the incidents of bravery
connected with our defeat in the Philippines. The story of many a hero is
buried with him in the silent halls of death, and innumerable instances of the
highest valor may never be revealed. However, the picture of this epic battle
would be too incomplete without a reference to certain known incidents and
personalities.
Experiences
at Japanese Prison Camps O’Donnell and Cabanatuan
From the report of Colonel Alfred
C. Oliver, Chaplain Emeritus of the National Sojourners, and formerly Chief of
Chaplains of the U.S. Army.
Colonel
Oliver was on duty in the Philippines at the outbreak of the war and was taken
prisoner by the Japanese. The statements given below, taken from the National
Sojourners Magazine for August 1945, give his observations and experiences in
Japanese prison camps. This is perhaps one of the most scathing indictments of
the inhumanity of the Japanese soldiers ever written.
According
to Colonel Oliver, the Japanese do not react like normal civilized human
beings; whenever they are stripped of the veneer of their present-day
civilization, they always act as savages. These opinions are based on years of
experience, of association with and observation of the Japanese.
The
general attitude of the Japanese soldier toward all Filipinos was cruel and
domineering, and toward all Americans, one of deepest hatred. The Filipino
people have always shown friendship for the Americans and often risked their
lives to supply them with water or some dainty like sugar or rice. Because of
these acts of mercy, Colonel Oliver saw young girls and old women beaten
cruelly by the Japanese guards with the butts of their rifles. One woman, large
with child, was bayoneted through the abdomen and left along the road writhing
in horrible death agony.
When
the Japanese guards wished to severely punish one of the American prisoners of
war, they would strip him to only a “G string” and then tie him up by his
wrists outside one of their guard houses which was located at the main prison
camp gate alongside the public road. Here, as the Filipino country women came
walking by on their way to market, balancing baskets of garden stuff on their
heads, the Japanese guards would require them to stop, remove their baskets,
bow, and then compel them to beat the American prisoners hanging there. For
this purpose, they provided a four-foot long, two-inch thick, green bamboo
cudgel. And if a woman refused to beat the American severely, she was herself
severely beaten.
There
is one other phase of Japanese barbarism which Colonel Oliver feels should be
presented: namely, their treatment of helpless, sick prisoners of war. He ran
into this at Camp O’Donnell where the survivors of the Bataan Death March were
imprisoned. When these thousands of American soldiers arrived, there was only
one faucet available to them for water. Desperately dehydrated men got in line
and stood there sometimes twenty-four hours to obtain a drink. Later, the
strongest carried water a mile and a half from a polluted river. During the
first six weeks, when 1,700 men died, there was never sufficient water except
for cooking and drinking.
The
American Army doctors had no medicines or surgical equipment. Fifty percent of
the prisoners had malaria, ninety percent had beri beri, and at least
ninety-five percent had dysentery. Practically everyone in camp was burning up
with fever from one or the other of these diseases. Prisoners in rags, without
blankets, lay on the bare hospital floors, on bamboo slats in the barracks, or
on the ground. Hundreds were too weak to go to the latrines, and the stench
from fecal matter was sickening. Clouds of big blue flies arose from around the
feces and bodies of those to whom Chaplain Oliver tried to give a drink.
Desperately sick men crawled down by the latrine and under the buildings to
die, sometimes remaining there for days before they were found and buried.
Soon
after arriving in Camp O’Donnell, the senior American Army doctor and the
chaplain wrote a joint letter to the Japanese camp commander pointing out the
above conditions and requesting help under the Articles of the Geneva
Convention. These two officers were called before the Japanese commander who
categorically refused each and every request made. These officers then begged
the privilege of sending out those Americans who needed emergency operations to
either Japanese or Filipino hospitals. This was also denied. The Japanese
commander became more and more furious as other requests were made, until
finally he said: “Japan did not sign the Geneva Convention. I hate you
Americans and will always hate you. The only thing I am interested in is, when
one of you dies, then I’ll see you bury him.” This closed the interview.
During
the period described above by Chaplain Oliver, the Red Cross tried to deliver
two truckloads of medicines and other needed supplies, but this same Japanese
commander would not permit them to be unloaded. Colonel Oliver believes that
the Japanese have great possibilities for development; but we in America must
ever keep in mind that it will take not only years but generations for the
Japanese people to acquire the ingrained characteristics of gentleness which
are now the passion of civilized people and acquired after centuries of trial
and error.
For
months after the Bataan and Corregidor survivors were assembled at Camp No. 1
near Cabanatuan, the treatment by the Japanese of the sick American prisoners
of war was as criminally culpable as at Camp O’Donnell. Some 2,700 American
prisoners of war lie buried at Camp No. 1. During July 1942, over 750 died
here. Practically every death was the result of Japanese starvation and failure
to provide the sick with the medicine needed. The most pitiful incident of this
period was the death of 135 Americans of diphtheria. American doctors had to
stand impotently by and watch these helpless men choke to death. They died in
horrible agony because the Japanese refused to supply the necessary anti-toxin,
although it was in a storehouse about one hundred yards away. This was equally
true in the hundreds of malaria deaths due to the lack of quinine, which the
Japanese had on hand and refused to supply to our doctors.
Colonel
Oliver closed his report with a call to Americans to be on their guard, because
the Japanese do not react like civilized human beings. And the world is in
danger until they do.
New
Mexico’s 200th Coast Artillery
Among
the National Guard units on Bataan were two tank battalions coming from many
states of the west and south. There was a whole regiment of anti-aircraft from
New Mexico: Deming, Carlsbad, Clovis, Silver City, Gallup, Taos, Roswell,
Hobbs, Santa Fe, Albuquerque, and the A and M College at Masilla Park. They
belonged to the 200th Coast Artillery whose fantastic marksmanship made news
day after day as they shot down enemy planes by the score and prevented others
from flying low enough to deliver accurate fire. Of them Helena Huntington
Smith, writing in Collier’s for 29 August 1942, said:
They stood up
without complaint under constant furious fire for more than three months. They
were besieged by land, blockaded by sea, cut off from all sources of help in
the Philippines and America, and they knew it. But they only fought the harder.
Again:
The men of Bataan
have done all that human beings could do to the limits of endurance. They were
sustained every day of their fight by something more than physical strength. I
knew the men out in Bataan, and I knew they were thinking of their people and
their country and of freedom and dignity and pride. It was no ordinary fight.
Early
in 1940 this regiment, originally cavalry, was converted into anti-aircraft,
and was inducted into the Federal service in January 1941. Being trained at
Fort Bliss, this regiment was chosen for Philippine service because it was
efficient, and for the further reason that a large percentage of its members
had knowledge of the Spanish language. At the end of August 1941, the regiment
was headed west, destination unknown to its members. And when the Japanese
struck at Pearl Harbor, these eighteen- to twenty-two-year-old boys were on
Bataan. They fought on through February, March, and into April, giving
devastating blows to the enemy planes and ships. They pushed back wave after
wave of enemy troops, who outnumbered them by many times, and on 5 April
frustrated a landing attempt, with heavy losses to themselves. Weary, hungry,
sick, they came to their limit on 6 April, and on the 9th from “complete
physical exhaustion” they were compelled to surrender: “In such a fight as
this, the flesh must yield at last, endurance must melt away, and the end of
the battle must come. Bataan has fallen but its spirit stands, a beacon to the
liberty-loving peoples of the world.”
Three
officers and 104 enlisted men of the 200th escaped to Corregidor, and there
fought on until the surrender of that island fortress.
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| Philippine Islands. |
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| Japanese troops on Bataan during the spring of 1942. |
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| Mortar squad assembling an 81 mm Mortar M1 during training in the Philippine Islands in 1941. In 1936 a program for national defense was initiated in the Philippine Islands. A military mission of U.S. officers was charged with the organization and training of Filipino regular troops. In July 1941 the Philippine Army was ordered into the service of the Army of the United States and U.S. troops were sent to the islands from the United States. |
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| New recruits are given instruction in use of the Browning .30-caIiber machine gun M1917A1. |
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| Filipino troops training with a 37 mm antitank gun M3. As a result of the war warning to all overseas garrisons on 27 November 1941, the U.S. forces in the Philippines went on a full war alert. |
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| Filipino troops training with a 37 mm antitank gun M3. Over a period of years the Japanese had collected a valuable store of information about the Philippines and planned to occupy the Philippine Islands, eliminating all U.S. troops there. |
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| Loading a bamboo raft before crossing a river during maneuvers. |
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| Troops and mules preparing to swim a river. By December 1941 U.S. ground forces in the Philippines numbered about 110,000, of which a little over 10,000 were U.S. personnel. The remainder were Philippine scouts, constabulary, and Philippine Army troops. As in the Hawaiian garrison, the hastily mobilized army lacked training and modern equipment. |
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| Engineer troops stand ready to place sections of a ponton bridge in position during a river-crossing maneuver in the Philippines, 1941. |
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| Troops crossing the newly constructed ponton bridge. |
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| Cavite Navy Yard, Luzon, during a Japanese aerial attack. |
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| Residents of Cavite evacuating the city after the Japanese bombing raid of 10 December. |
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| Medium bombers, B-18s of the U.S. Far East Army Air Force attack infantry troops during 1941 maneuvers in the Philippines. |
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| Pursuit planes, P-36s of the U.S. Far East Army Air Force attack infantry troops during 1941 maneuvers in the Philippines. |
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| Japanese advancing during the drive on Manila. The medium tank is a Type 94 (1934), with a 57 mm gun with a free traverse of 20 degrees right and left. It had a speed of 18 to 20 miles an hour, was manned by a crew of 4, weighed 15 tons, and was powered by a diesel engine. |
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| Camouflaged 155 mm Gun M1918 (GPF) parked on the Gerona-Tarlac road, December 1941. |
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| Aerial view of Corregidor Island off the tip of Bataan. On 25 December, Headquarters, United States Army Forces in the Far East, was established on Corregidor. Manila was declared an open city on the following day and the remains of the naval base at Cavite were blown up to prevent its supplies from falling into enemy hands. |
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| Tank obstacles and barbed wire strung to delay the enemy advance on Bataan. |
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| Members of an antitank company in position on Bataan. |
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| Japanese prisoners, captured on Bataan, being led blindfolded to headquarters for questioning. |
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| Japanese soldiers firing a machine gun Type 92 (1932) 7.7 mm heavy machine gun, gas-operated and air-cooled. This was the standard Japanese heavy machine gun. |
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| Japanese firing a 75 mm gun Type 41 (1908), normally found in an infantry regimental cannon company. Called a mountain (infantry) gun, it was replaced by a later model. Light and easily handled, it was very steady in action. When used as a regimental cannon company weapon it was issued on the basis of four per regiment. |
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| Gun crew with a 3-inch Antiaircraft Gun M2. |
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| U.S. prisoners on Bataan sorting equipment while Japanese guards look on. Following this, the Americans and Filipinos started on the Death March to Camp O'Donnell in central Luzon. Over 50,000 prisoners were held at this camp. A few U.S. troops escaped capture and carried on as guerrillas. |
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| Soldiers in Malinta Tunnel on Corregidor, April 1942. With food, water, and supplies practically exhausted and no adequate facilities for caring for the wounded, and with Japanese forces landing on Corregidor, the situation for the U.S. troops was all but hopeless. The commander offered to surrender the island forts on Corregidor to the Japanese. When this was refused and with the remaining troops in danger of being wiped out, all the U.S. forces in the Philippines were surrendered to the enemy on 6 May 1912. Couriers were sent to the various island commanders and by 17 May all organized resistance in the Philippines had ceased. |
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| Coastal defense gun on Corregidor. |
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| 12-inch mortars on Corregidor. Corregidor's armament comprised eight 12-inch guns, twelve 12-inch mortars, two 10-inch guns, five 6-inch guns, twenty 155-mm. guns, and assorted guns of lesser caliber, including antiaircraft guns. The fixed gun emplacements were in open concrete pits and exposed to aerial attack and artillery shelling. The Japanese kept up strong concentrations of fire against the defenses on Corregidor until most of the defending guns were knocked out. |
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| Captured American and Filipino troops after the surrender on Corregidor. The 11,500 surviving troops on Corregidor became prisoners of war and on 28 May 1942 were evacuated to a prison stockade in Manila. The fall of Corregidor on 6 May marked the end of the first phase of enemy operations. The Japanese had bases controlling routes to India, Australia, and many islands in the Central and South Pacific and were preparing for their next assaults against the Allies. (This picture is reproduced from an illustration which appeared in a captured Japanese publication.) |
