Kentucky: National Guard History eMuseum - Co D 192nd World War II Craft Manuscript

COMPANY D, 192nd TANK BATTALION

We’re the battling bastards of Bataan;
No mama, no papa, no Uncle Sam;
No aunts, no uncles, no cousins, no nieces;
No pills, no planes, no artillery pieces;
...And nobody gives a damn.
Battle cry of the Philippines Defense Forces

The first unit of the Kentucky National Guard inducted into active federal service was Company D, 192nd Tank Battalion – formerly Harrodsburg’s 38th Tank Company—commanded by Second Lieutenant Edwin E. Rue. These Mercer County Guardsmen reported to their home armory on 25 November 1940. They were given physical examinations and those unfit for military service were discharged. Five officers and 71 enlisted men entrained for Fort Knox, Kentucky, arriving on November 28 (1).

The other three National Guard organizations constituting the 192nd Tank Battalion were Company A from Janesville, Wisconsin, Company B from Maywood, Illinois, and Company C from Fort Clinton, Ohio. These companies arrived at Fort Knox by 1 December 1940. Individuals from the four letter companies were transferred to a battalion Headquarters Company and selectees arriving in December trained alongside veteran guardsmen.

Training of the newly inducted soldiers of the United States Army included instruction in military courtesy and discipline, physical conditioning, individual, squad, and platoon drills, and the latest scouting and combat techniques. Intensive training centered on the operation and maintenance of combat tanks. Every day, soldiers attended two classes of advanced instruction in their military occupational specialties and two field training sessions (2).

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The call to arms came none too soon as developments in Europe and Asia increasingly posed threats to United States security interests. In an attempt to discourage belligerent acts against the nation and its protected territories, President Roosevelt issued Proclamation #2487 on 27 May 1941 declaring “the existence of an unlimited emergency requiring that the military, naval, air, and civil defenses be put on the basis of readiness to repel any and all acts or threats of aggression directed toward any part of the Western Hemisphere” (3).

In August 1940, Public Resolution #96 authorized Congress to federalize the National Guard for twelve consecutive months. After the proclamation of unlimited emergency, the length of service was increased to eighteen consecutive months. National Guard units already federalized were included in the extension. Thus, the Harrodsburg guardsmen were to remain in federal service at least until April 1942.

On 31 August 1941 the 192nd Tank Battalion was transferred to Camp Polk, Louisiana to participate in maneuvers conducted from September 2 to October 19. Their superior performance prompted Major General George S. Patton, Jr. to recommend the battalion for overseas duty. The soldiers were told only that they were going on “extended maneuvers” (4).

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A notice was issued at Camp Polk stating that anyone below the rank of captain, who was married and the sole support of his family, could apply for discharge. A shortage of trained troops, however, prevented many applicants from receiving discharges. Men who had surpassed an age restriction imposed by the War Department were transferred to non-combat units. The changes affected few Mercer County men.

When a short furlough was granted before the overseas tour, the men of Company D chartered a bus and rode home. Returning to Camp Polk, they were given the highest priority for issues of equipment and supplies. The battalion, with its full complement of light tanks, entrained for Fort Mason in San Francisco, California, on October 19. The four letter companies took different train routes to California based on War Department plans to disguise troop movements. All four units arrived in San Francisco on October 24.

The battalion was ferried across the harbor to Fort McDowell on Angel Island for final processing. Troops were given shots for yellow fever and malaria and were issued personal and organizational equipment. They returned to San Francisco, where on 27 October 1941 sixty-six members of Company D boarded the transport U.S.S. PRESIDENT PIERCE and sailed for an undisclosed destination.

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Although traveling under sealed orders, most of the Kentuckians knew they were headed for the Philippines. According to William Gentry, the code word for the secret orders was PLUM. Deducing that PLUM stood for “Philippines-Luzon-Manila,” Gentry says some knew the destination before leaving Louisiana. Other Company D members admitted knowing where they were going before leaving California (5).

After a four-day refueling and resupply layover in Honolulu, Hawaii, the battalion continued toward its destination accompanied by the transport U.S.S. PRESIDENT COOLIDGE. Stopping in Guam to take on water, the troops were permitted to mail letters back home. Throughout the voyage, there were daily training sessions in the use of 37-mm. anti-tank and 50-caliber machine guns. Nightly shipboard blackouts were explained as being “part of the maneuvers.”

On Thanksgiving Day, 20 November 1941, the 192nd Tank Battalion disembarked at Fort Avery in Manila. Upon arrival, the battalion was attached to the 194th Tank Battalion and stationed at Fort Stotsenburg located at the foot of the Zambales Mountains on the Island of Luzon.

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The troops moved by rail to Fort Stotsenburg, leaving equipment and supplies aboard ship. After settling into cantonment areas, a detail returned to port to off-load tanks and half-tracks. They proceeded through the streets of Manila toward Clark Air Field, unaware until informed by a young Filipino soldier that vehicles operate on the left side of the highway instead of the right in the Philippines (6).

The Provisional Tank Group, United States Armored Forces in the Far East, commanded by Brigadier General James R. N. Weaver, was created on 27 November 1941. The Provisional Tank Group was composed of Head-quarters Detachment; 192nd Tank Battalion (Light); 194th General Headquarters Tank Battalion (Light), less detachments; and 17th Ordnance Company (Armored) (7).

On December 1, the Provisional Tank Group was placed on full alert and transferred to Clark Air Field located across the road from Fort Stotsenburg. Senior commanders hoped troop presence would discourage a Japanese attack on the air strip, but that hope was dashed on December 8. At approximately 12:30 p.m. that day, members of Company D commented on the fine airplanes of the American Navy as fifty-four bombers, flying in two groups of twenty-seven, soared into view. Seconds later, the planes—which were actually Japanese bombers—dropped their loads as they passed overhead. Immediately following the bomber assault, Japanese fighter planes flew in at low level and strafed the field.

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There is no doubt the Commanding Generals in the Philippines knew long beforehand that war was inevitable for the United States. William Gentry, Communications Officer, had obtained equipment and set up a communications tent for several ham radio operators in the 192nd Tank Battalion. Gentry states that minutes after the attack on Pearl Harbor, ham radio operators in Honolulu alerted the Philippines forces:

The Commanding General of the post at Fort Stotsenburg was down at the communications tent for a very short time. And General Weaver was there.... reading the messages which we received.... The immediate reaction was, “Well, the war has started” (8).

Attacks earlier that morning in the northern part of the Philippine archipelago portended Japanese intentions of capturing the islands. Yet, instead of being dispersed as required in full war alert, all but one or two planes were conveniently lined in rows along the runway when the strike occurred. Combat tanks were positioned in the woods roughly fifty yards from the air strip to guard against Japanese paratroop landings. Full alert required constant manning of the equipment, but many crew members were not at their tanks. They were waiting for a “chow truck” to take them to a mess hall. Most senior officers were in conference at headquarters when the Japanese attacked Clark Field.

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The initial onslaught lasted a little over an hour. The buildings and installations were in ruins except for headquarters. Only a handful of planes at Clark Field remained operable. Several soldiers had been killed and many others injured. Company D suffered one casualty and four wounded.

The first soldier killed in action in the Eastern Theater of Operations, United States Armored Forces in the Far East, was Private Robert H. Brooks from Scott County, Kentucky. Brooks was drafted into service and processed at Fort Thomas on 22 January 1941. He arrived at Fort Knox on January 25 where he was assigned to Company D. According to Maurice E. (Jack) Wilson, when the attack on Clark Field occurred, Private Brooks was “sitting down in front of his tank looking up at the planes. As the bombs fell, the shrapnel cut the side of his face off and took part of his shoulder” (9).

Major General Jacob L. Devers, Chief of the Armored Force, learning that Private Brooks was the first American casualty of the war, ordered the parade ground at Fort Knox named in honor of the deceased. A letter of condolence was sent to his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Roy Brooks, who were sharecroppers on a farm near Sadieville. Then the Army learned that the light-skinned Brooks was black and may have lied about his race when drafted. One member of Company D remembered thinking that Brooks was of Mediterranean descent (10). Had it been known that he was black, Brooks would not have been allowed to serve with the 192nd Tank Battalion as the armed forces were not yet integrated.

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Preparations for the dedication of Brooks Field were well underway when General Devers was informed that Brooks was black. He promptly ordered that no aspect of the arrangements be changed. In his speech at the dedication ceremony, General Devers stated:

For the preservation of America, the soldiers and sailors guarding our outposts are giving their lives. In death there is no grade or rank. And in this, the greatest Democracy the world has known, neither riches nor poverty, neither creed nor race draws a line of demarcation, in this hour of national crisis (11).

The Pearl Harbor debacle has always overshadowed the catastrophic defeat suffered by the defense forces in the Philippine archipelago. Though the importance of the islands was significant and the loss of life tragic, the War Department decided early that Hitler posed the greatest threat and, at the urgings of Winston Churchill, adopted the principle of “Germany First.” The primary general war plan of the United States, Rainbow 5, conceded the loss of the Philippines before the first bomb was dropped.

The military defense plan for the Eastern Theater of Operations, Orange-3, set April 1942 as the earliest the Fil-American forces could defend the Philippines. The primary weapons intended to prevent an air assault were B-17 heavy bombers many of which were located at Clark Field. In the event of a successful enemy air assault, ground units were to repel landings. The Armored Forces was the intended offensive ground force and, if it failed to repulse the landings, would fight delaying actions.

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The province of Bataan, the key to controlling the Philippines, was to be held at all costs. This was no small task for a grossly undermanned, hastily trained, poorly armed force constantly in need of supplies, especially food and medicine. To compound matters, the American force was partnered with a Filipino Army whose situation was even more desperate. As a result of inadequate combat preparations and logistics, the Japanese Air Fleet, in a little more than an hour, dismantled the Armored Force, obliterated the Air Force, and negated all hope of successfully defending the Philippine Islands (12). The only course left to the defending forces was to hold out as long as possible and delay the Japanese timetable.

After the air raids on Clark Field, the Armored Force moved a few miles from Fort Stotsenburg and bivouacked. The battalions were reorganized and the 192nd cut down to three letter companies; A, C, and D. Some Company D members were reassigned to Headquarters Company and went to Manila as operations personnel for General Wainwright. The remainder of the battalion moved to Mintinlupa, 15 miles south of Manila, remaining there until the Japanese landed in the north.

General Weaver divided the Fil-American forces into the Northern Luzon Force and Southern Luzon Force. The 192nd Tank Battalion was the sole support of the Northern Luzon Force commanded by General Wainwright. They moved to the Lingayan Gulf vicinity on December 22. The 194th Tank Battalion, sole support of the Southern Luzon Force, was sent to Lamon Bay on the east Coast of Luzon to help repel landings there. The two forces were directed to conduct delaying actions and make contact at San Fernando (13).

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The 192nd Tank Battalion was positioned south of Lingayan Gulf where the troops, hidden by mountains, watched Japanese ships unload men and equipment. The Armored Force had artillery in the mountains, but were under orders not to fire. The Japanese came ashore, and, in the words of Marcus Lawson, “From then on it was just more or less a hit and run affair,” in which the defense forces would, “pull up and get hit and then pull back and get away” (14). General MacArthur, Commander of the Eastern Theater of Operations, refused to send reinforcements to repel initial landings, opting to wait for the main landings.

Defensive positions were established according to the war plan. In the north the 192nd Tank Battalion fanned out to cover its sector with Company A on the west side, Company C on the east, and Company D covering the central perimeter (15).

American forces found it difficult to destroy Japanese tanks because the sloping plates deflected armor-piercing ammunition. They quickly learned, however, that high explosive ammunition, which burst on impact, would disable the tanks.

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From Rosario to Umingan, the 192nd Tank Battalion supported the 26th Cavalry, a group of Filipino scouts. The battalion fought rear guard actions, “cleaning out pockets” of Japanese machine gun and artillery emplacements. They retreated to San Quentin behind the D-2, or second defensive, position. The battalion fanned out in an effort to hold the line, but were spread so far apart they couldn’t communicate properly. They were directed to hold the D-2 position until the D-3 line was established, but lack of effective communication doomed the operation (16).

The 192nd Tank Battalion was forced back to the D-3 line at San Jose, then retreated to Bongabon located midway between the D-3 and D-4 defensive lines. At Bongabon they engaged the Japanese, then fell back to Cabu, where they crossed the bridge at the D-4 line and destroyed it leaving the enemy on the other side, but only for a short time. The battalion withdrew to Cabanatuan where it discovered a stockpile of Japanese equipment. The tankers destroyed as much material as they could before retreating south down Route 5, the only highway to San Fernando, where they were to contact the Southern Luzon Force. Halting at Gapan near the D-5 line, the last defensive position before the Bataan peninsula, they were ordered to defend that line with every available resource.

The 192nd Tank Battalion fought continuously while moving back to Baliaug. A scouting patrol found a railroad bridge that had not been destroyed. This was the only point at which the Japanese could cross the river. The battalion positioned itself at the south end of the bridge and waited for the Japanese to concentrate their tanks and troops at the north end. When a large force gathered, the battalion planned to open fire in a surprise attack.

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On December 31, the Japanese discovered the bridge and assembled at its head. Infantrymen crossed first followed by engineers who had to lay planks across the railroad tracks before the Japanese tanks could cross. The enemy spotted an American officer as he drove up and stopped in front of a house where the commanding officer of the 192nd Tank Battalion was hidden. The battalion commander told the officer about the operation in progress and ordered him to get back into his jeep and drive off quickly. Knowing the Japanese would send a scouting party to the house, the tankers could not delay their attack.

While the enemy was distracted by the activity at the house, a platoon crept behind the Japanese and positioned itself to cut off a retreat. When the platoon was in position, the tankers opened fire, completely surprising the Japanese. The enemy retreated, into the fire of the platoon behind them. American forces at Baliaug completely routed the Japanese without suffering a casualty.

The battalion moved to Calumpit. They found that the Calumpit Bridge, the only way across the Pampanga River, had been blown up by a retreating American force. The Japanese were closing in and they had to act quickly. Moving north, they set up defensive positions near some rice paddies. Knowing the Japanese would attack at night, the battalion positioned its tanks one hundred yards apart. The men planned to direct their first round of fire at the dried rice stalks lying around the field. The stalks would ignite and light up the field, yielding enough light for them to see the enemy. The troops intentionally made noise to lure the Japanese into the trap.

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The plan worked. As soon as the Japanese were in position, the tankers opened fire, fighting successfully against a superior force until they ran out of ammunition and had to retreat to the town of Porac. It was a hasty retreat because the Japanese were about to seize San Fernando and Route 3, the only road the tanks could take to Bataan. Along the way, the battalion found a Filipino platoon pinned down by Japanese artillery. Locating the three artillery pieces, the tankers destroyed them, forcing the Japanese to disperse. The Filipino and American soldiers gave chase and, “Took care of as much infantry as they could” (17).

The 192nd Tank Battalion then pulled back to the Formosa Bridge. After the Northern Luzon Force troops had crossed, the battalion completed its crossing and destroyed the bridge. The Japanese were not delayed long. The 192nd tankers were positioned to cut off a Japanese offensive expected to come around the mountain. Instead, forces came over the mountain, surprising the Fil-American troops and breaking the defensive line.

Throughout the operations, the Japanese had replaced weary and wounded troops with fresh soldiers at will. American forces could not. As the campaign wore on, the loss of American soldiers became increasingly critical. The same was true of logistics. Early on, the Japanese had cut American supply lines and materiel could not reach the troops. As shortages of replacement parts for equipment became severe, rumors spread that troops were under orders to limit weapons fire (18).

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In Bataan, the 192nd Tank Battalion was assigned to beach defense. At this point, food shortages were taking a toll on the troops. They had been reduced to half-rations soon after the war began, but many soldiers did not get that much food. The troops became so hungry they ate all of the 26th Cavalry’s horses and then the pack mules. The weakening of troops due to lack of food was compounded by the presence of disease-carrying mosquitoes; quinine for malaria was not available. Prevalent ills among the Philippines defenders were dysentery, diarrhea, and beriberi. In the weeks before capitulation, more American casualties resulted from starvation and disease than from Japanese infantry or artillery.

In early April the Japanese sensed the American forces were in serious trouble and increased troop strength in preparation for a final offensive. There was a pause in the action while the Japanese reorganized, but the desperate condition of the Fil-American forces prevented them from launching an offensive of their own. On the rainy night of 5 April 1942, the Japanese made “the big push,” breaking the last line of defense down the center of the east and west sectors. On April 9, after four months of fighting against overwhelming odds, the Fil-American forces had no choice but to surrender Bataan. Before falling in to surrender, they destroyed their supplies and equipment.

The Japanese timetable had called for the capture of the Philippines in fifty days. Because of the tenacity and ingenuity of the Fil-American forces, it took them twice as long. Their stand lasted from 8 December 1941 to 9 April 1942. It has been hypothesized that they could have defended the islands indefinitely had they not run out of food and medicine (19).

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Fil-American soldiers were ordered to surrender and warned that escape was considered desertion. Believing the Japanese had no intention of taking prisoners, several members of Company D risked an escape to Corregidor. They decided that if they were going to be killed by the Japanese they were going to die fighting.

Corregidor was the next Japanese objective. Believing the offensive to capture the fortress island could not begin until all Americans were removed from Bataan, an evacuation plan was devised. Prisoners were assembled at Camp Cavin, an old Filipino Army camp near Mariveles, and held for three days and nights with no food or water. Then they marched 25 miles east to Balanga, the central gathering point. The Japanese believed the evacuation could be completed in two days, but they underestimated the prisoners’ numbers and poor physical condition and the march lasted from April 9-23. At Balanga prisoners were divided into groups of 75 to 100 men then marched 90 miles to Camp O’Donnell on the trek known as the “Bataan Death March” (20).

While American prisoners in Bataan were struggling to survive, soldiers on Corregidor were trying to hold off Japanese incursions. Company D escapees first went to one of many tunnels used as shelters, but were promptly assigned to beach defense. Some Company D members were attached to a Marine Corps unit and sent to Monkey Point, where the Japanese had landed and fighting had been heaviest. Others volunteered to go to Fort Drum, a concrete fortress in Manila Bay. All fought bravely, but on 6 May 1942 the forces on Corregidor and Fort Drum were forced to capitulate.

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While all prisoners of war suffered at the hands of the Japanese, some fared better than others. Several Kentucky National Guardsmen remained in Bataan after the surrender. Of those, some endured the death march and some did not. Prisoners from Corregidor were not forced to walk the 90 miles to Camp O’Donnell. Instead they rode trains. Some of the men from Harrodsburg became ill before surrender and were confined to a hospital. About half of the original Kentucky Guardsmen sent to the Philippines in 1941 returned home. According to Jack Wilson, none of the original members of the 38th Tank Company were killed in action. Instead, casualties among the Mercer Countians resulted from starvation and disease endemic to POW camps.

How the prisoners fared on the death march depended largely on the characters of the Japanese guards supervising their group. Some of the guards were humane and compassionate; however, according to the testimonies of many survivors, most were brutal. William Gentry, one of the “Harrodsburg boys” who participated in the death march, recalled that it took his group two weeks to get from Camp Cavin to Camp O’Donnell. The guards marched them at night. During the day the prisoners were forced to sit in the hot tropical sun without their hats. Gentry estimates that he was allowed seven canteens of water, about seven quarts, and, “One ball of rice about the size of a baseball,” for the entire eleven-day trek (21).

Cecil Vandiver, a Kentucky National Guardsman, describes his experience on the death march:
And then they took us and lined us up and started marching us out....And we walked. They would let us rest maybe five minutes out of every hour....As we was marching up the road, they would promise us food at the next stop....I went three days and nights without any food or water. And my mouth swelled up and my tongue bursted open and I couldn’t hardly talk. Finally, when we came to water, they’d post guards around the water holes and fight us off. They wouldn’t let us get it. Finally, I spotted a well and broke line and caught about half a canteen and just when I turned it up to take a drink, a Jap guard hit me with a rifle butt and knocked me down and knocked the canteen out of my hand and spilt all the water out (22).

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Vandiver was fortunate. Most who broke line for any reason were either shot or bayoneted on the spot. In concluding his recollections he says, “It was just like a nightmare. I can’t remember the number of days we walked or anything. It just seems like a dream or something. I can’t remember” (23).

Charles Reed marched only to the first camp. There he fell unconscious from malarial fever and was taken to a hospital. Reed remembered the hospital:

After staying in there one night, the next morning I woke up. Around eighty of the hundred fifty that were there were dead. So I crawled out of that hospital. They had a detail of six hundred men go out on bridge construction work and I got into that bunch. And as they loaded up, they put me in that truck also (24).

Just before the surrender of Bataan, Kentucky Guardsman Ralph Stine contracted malaria and entered an army field hospital located approximately five miles from Corregidor. The Japanese fenced off the hospital, placed artillery around it, and began shelling the island across the bay. Artillerymen on Fort Drum returned fire unaware that their shells would land so near a hospital filled with American soldiers. Some shells hit the hospital killing and wounding several Americans (25).

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Marcus Lawson, a member of Company D, was at Monkey Point on Corregidor fighting with a marine unit. He recalled the surrender of the island: “We saw [General] Wainwright when he came out [of the tunnel where he tendered the surrender]. He was crying, saluted us all” (26). The prisoners were searched and their valuables taken. Then they were marched to a “big concrete yard” which was actually a Filipino Army ordnance warehouse. Held there for three days and nights, they were given no food or water. In the middle of the fourth night, a Japanese guard awakened them and permitted them to get some water from a tap. Their only nourishment was scavenged from a “chow pit” of food discarded by Japanese soldiers.

John Elsmore Sadler was one of the Kentucky National Guardsmen who volunteered to go to Fort Drum. He recalled that the soldiers on the concrete ship shared clothing, food, and medical supplies with the arrivals from Corregidor. The heavy artillery positioned on Fort Drum made it a primary target for Japanese aerial attacks. Bombers often missed the small target and their bombs exploded in the water. “Then the boys would all jump out in the water and pick up the fish they’d killed and we’d have a big fish fry.... And then as everything happens,” he concluded, “they pulled a surrender” (27).

After the surrender, the Japanese boarded Fort Drum and searched the prisoners. Sadler relates how he lost his shoes:

I had a pretty pair of shoes on. They was really shining. A Jap kept looking at them. He took a liking to them right now. I’d move around a little and he’d move around pretty close to me. Finally, he motioned at his shoes and mine. I told him “No, too little.” He said he’d fix. So he cut the end out where my foot would stick out over the shoe (28).

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The prisoners from Fort Drum were taken to Corregidor and held with the others. Jack Wilson, another Kentuckian who escaped to Corregidor, remembers that on the fourth day of imprisonment a senior officer was given a wheelbarrow and told he could get water from a nearby creek. The creek ran through the residential district of Corregidor. The Filipinos dumped their waste into this creek so it would be carried to the ocean. The prisoners tried to purify the water with chlorine as it was the only source of water permitted them. Wilson says they were given food that same day. Each man was issued one can of American “C” rations, biscuits, coffee, and a piece of hard candy. Thereafter, they received one can of rations for every two men and a small quantity of rice (29).

After a week Sadler and other prisoners were taken to an abandoned sugar plantation to rebuild a concrete dock the Japanese wanted to use as a runway. Another man from Harrodsburg, Joe Riley Anness, was assigned to a work detail taking boatloads of supplies from Fort Drum to Corregidor (30).

After two weeks of captivity on Corregidor, the prisoners were shipped to Luzon. The ship could not anchor near land. The prisoners had to wade to shore. Some from Company D could not swim. They struggled to shore, usually with the help of a friend. They were marched through the streets of Manila to Bilibid Prison, the “Walled City.”

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The prisoners remained at Bilibid for a few days before being transported to Camp O’Donnell. They were subjected to a train ride similar to the one their compatriots in the death march had suffered. The gauge of track used in the Philippines was smaller than that used in the United States and, consequently, the railroad cars were smaller. Like those evacuated earlier from Bataan, the prisoners were herded into boxcars, 75 to 100 men per car. They were packed so tightly that a man passing out had nowhere to fall; the others simply held him up. Many prisoners suffered from diarrhea and dysentery. Once in the boxcar, the door was shut and they were locked inside for the remainder of the journey. Men defecated standing among others in the unventilated railroad car.

The train stopped at a depot some twenty miles from the prison camps. The captives spent an unsheltered rainy night at an abandoned schoolhouse. The next morning they marched to Cabanatuan where the Japanese had converted a Filipino Army post into prison camps. The “Harrodsburg boys” were held in Camps #1 and #3. Those who had escaped to Corregidor were reunited with their fellow Kentuckians who had survived the death march.

According to Joe Anness, prisoners in Camp #3 fared much better than those in Camp #1. “Camp #1 in four months time lost 2,600 men. Died from starvation, dysentery, and malaria fever, and everything else that goes along with prison life,” adding, “In the same period of time at Camp #3, we lost only 72 men” (31).

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The prisoners at Cabanatuan were sent on work details to various sites and assigned a variety of duties. Many repaired air strips destroyed by Japanese bombers at the outbreak of the war. Others repaired roadways and bridges.

A few men from Company D became seriously ill and were transferred to a hospital. The most common illnesses were malaria and dry beriberi, caused by a vitamin deficiency resulting from malnutrition. Prisoners needing medical treatment were generally sent to Bilibid Prison, which had been converted into a makeshift hospital by the Japanese. Upon recovery, prisoners were immediately released from the hospital and returned to their work details.

Prisoners volunteered for any work detail they could get because the rule was, “No work, no food.” One Kentuckian relates:

We could go out on work details, if you was lucky enough to get one. And for that you got a bun about two inches square. The food was poor. You got pumpkin soup and a little rice.... [T]he rice was full of worms. When I first started getting this, we would save most of it ‘til night and eat it after dark so we couldn’t see the worms in it (32).

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Another prisoner agreed that the two small meals per day could not sate the appetites of the prisoners or improve their health. The men took full advantage of opportunities to get additional nourishment. Once they cooked and ate a cat that wandered into the prison compound. They sucked the marrow from bones and made soup from carrot and sweet potato tops discarded by the Japanese guards. “It was pretty rough,” according to Jack Wilson:

I knew one boy got his Red Cross box and he sat there and eat the whole thing up. And there he laid dead the next morning. His stomach was small and he just wasn’t used to eating. And he had overdone himself eating that ten or twelve pounds of food that was in that Red Cross box. And he was laying there dead the next morning (33).

Wilson admitted having trouble eating some of the food that was issued—especially grasshoppers, an oriental delicacy. The insects were cured in a salty sauce and two teaspoons a day were given to the prisoners. Eating them was difficult, he said, because “The little fuzz on that grasshopper’s legs, after it was dried up, it was just like steel wool. It would tear your throat all up.” Snails, also an oriental delicacy, were occasionally given to the prisoners. “It’s a certain way you can open a snail and it pulls the mud out from the meat,” Wilson says, “but I never could find out how you separate it. And by the time you eat five or six of them, your mouth would be all full of mud and taste muddy” (34).

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William Gentry was assigned to a work detail on a farm on Mindanao Island for eighteen months planting and cultivating rice. Knowing that the food they were producing was feeding Japanese soldiers, Gentry admits that the prisoners’ “sole purpose” was to, “Sabotage this rice any way we could.” They dropped the paddies in the mud and trampled them. They never filled the baskets to capacity and, “Made sure the thrasher blew as much out in the chaff stack as possible.” Stacks of rice were left out in the rain to mold. At the mills prisoners stacked rice piles twenty to thirty feet high then poked holes in the roof of the warehouse so rain would leak in and ruin the grain. As to their success Gentry concludes, “In the eighteen months we were down there, they were only able to take a truck or a truck-load-and-a-half of rice out of the place” (35). Gentry was transferred to a hemp plantation where he says the prisoners intentionally built flaws into the ropes they made for the Japanese.

The Japanese transferred most prisoners of war to camps in Japan and Manchuria. Those transferred to Manchuria in 1942 recalled arriving during the winter wearing clothes that were threadbare. Many died from exposure shortly after arrival. The ground was frozen so solidly that the dead could not be buried. The guards permitted them enough lumber to allow one prisoner, who was a carpenter, to build coffins in which to store the bodies until they could be buried.

The prisoners were issued only one bucket of coal per day to warm a 1,500 man barracks. To avoid freezing to death, they posted lookouts to watch the guards. After guard rounds, prisoners sneaked into the warehouse, took a body from a coffin, and placed it in a coffin with another body. They returned to the barracks with the empty coffin, broke it up, and used it for fuel.

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The prisoners worked in a factory three miles from the camp. They walked to and from work every day. The scarcity of food was a constant problem for all prisoners of war; if a cat or a dog ran into the line, someone would grab it, cook it, and eat it (36).

Lieutenant Edwin Rue was an “able bodied” man transferred to Japan. “Strange as it may seem,” says Rue, “after arriving at Manila on Thanksgiving Day 1941, I landed in ... Japan on Thanksgiving Day 1942” (37). Although he traveled to Japan with others from his unit, he was not held with them because he was assigned to a camp for officers.

Like their compatriots in Manchuria, many American prisoners of war arrived in Japan in the middle of winter. Rue estimated that one-third died from exposure. As for Rue, he suffered from dry beriberi. He relates how he survived his ordeal:

At first, it seemed the only relief was to spend the night walking back and forth until about five o’clock in the morning, we’d be able to lay down. Then when we were unable to walk, we layed head to foot and rubbed each others feet. Then it became so severe, one couldn’t stand to have anything touch the feet at all. During that time, it was difficult even to live. But we seemed somehow to exist and wear it out before it wore us out. In other cases, men were inclined to give up a little bit. But it was up to each person to take care of himself and do as much as he could for his buddy, the other prisoners (38).

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One Mercer County man described his trip to Japan as, “The roughest ride I think anybody could ever take.” The prisoners were crowded into the hold of the ships. Meals consisted of “green” meat, rice that had been swept off the floor, and soup containing a, “Little piece of meat floating in a canteen cup of water” (39).

The ships were so crowded that one Kentuckian, on his way to Manchuria, remembered having to sleep on the stairs. “And finally, next night I made it down underneath and found a bed down there. Got in between two other guys. Two guys laying on each side of me the next morning dead. And another just a little piece further. They was dying like flies”(40). These vessels were often referred to as “hell ships” because so many passengers died from unsanitary, overcrowded conditions and lack of food and medicine.

On another ship the Japanese guards celebrated the return home by getting drunk. During the celebration they vomited and urinated on the prisoners below them.

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The American Navy unwittingly increased the hazards of the journey to Japan during the latter part of the war. American submarines on patrol were unaware Americans were aboard several ships they torpedoed. Ships frequently were forced to stop in Formosa (Taiwan). Sometimes they remained a week. Prisoners were not permitted to leave the ship’s holds. When layovers were extended, prisoners were assigned work, usually planting vegetable gardens.

Generally, the prison camps in Japan and Manchuria were as rough as those in the Philippines. Sanitary conditions were poor, food scarce, medical care limited if available, and the labor hard. Upon arrival, prisoners were divided into groups of ten. Each man was compelled to sign an acknowledgement stating that if any of the ten escaped the others would be executed. Apprehended escapees were also executed. According to some captives, prison guards were less brutal in Japan, although treatment varied from camp to camp. Many learned to gage the war’s conduct by the treatment they received. When things were going well for the Japanese brutality declined, but when events favored allied forces violence increased and intensified (41).

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Not all prisoners of war in Japan fared well. Joe Anness was held in a camp where brutality occurred daily. He worked in a copper mine. “Late in the afternoon, about five or six o’clock, we’d climb back up the 457 stairs [leading out of the mine] and have to walk approximately three mile back to our camp. Now here a lot of men were treated extremely cruel. If they didn’t work good during the day, they were beaten with pick handles at night time.” Recounting a personal incident of brutality Anness states:

One particular night, about twelve o’clock...I went to the mess hall to try and get a cup of water for my headache....One of the Jap guards grabbed me there and marched me over to the guardhouse where all the guards...had come out to slap me or beat me or kick me or something....Finally, after about an hour of this treatment...one of our own American officers that was stationed at the camp with me happened along. And he told [the guards] that I had to work the next day. So the sergeant of the guards said that, “We’ll beat him up a little more and, if he has to work tomorrow, he’d better get some rest. Better put him to bed.” So after some of this maltreatment of an hour, hour-and-a-half, I was released to go to bed so I could work the next day (42).

Anness went to work the next morning with two black eyes, bruised arms, and a sore head.

A Kentucky Guardsman was told not to whistle in the mines because the mine god enjoyed music so much that, when hearing it, he forgot to hold up the roof. Actually, sound vibrations could cause the roof to collapse and kill all inside. They also had to bow to the mine god upon entering and exiting (43).

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Some prisoners worked in mills and factories under civilian control. Once, prisoners laboring in a steel mill were treated so badly the military intervened. Under care of the Japanese Army, food allotment was increased, medical care was provided, and the men were allowed to rest themselves. When they were healthy again, they were returned to the civilians (44).

The Japanese performed medical experiments. One man from Harrodsburg lost his sight as a result of dry beriberi. Confined to a hospital, he was given a variety of medicines which he continued to take even though experimental because he did not get sick. Later he was taken to a prison camp by the Sea of Japan where he was made to unload the ships. On one occasion, the cargo included bombs. The prisoners refused to unload it. Japanese guards beat them with baseball bats, but the prisoners did not unload the ship (45).

The Japanese surrendered in August 1945 after atomic bombs were dropped on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. John Sadler was in a camp near Nagasaki and recounted the dropping of the second bomb:

I was in the mess hall and they dropped that bomb. And at first we thought it was an earthquake, but she came with such a roar. And the window lights flew out of the building. And she [the building] swung way over, looked like a forty degree angle, but then she straightened back up. So we got outside and got to looking and saw an awful toadstool across the bay. And it towered up there, I guess about 4,500 feet high....[T]hat night, that old Jap [a soldier who had befriended Sadler] gave me that information [as he] walked along by me going to the mine. He told me the Americans had a new weapon and it wouldn’t be long before I’d be going home. And Nagasaki was just like that highway; everything was just as level. It killed and burnt the whole city, one shell of some sort (46).

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After the surrender, Sadler went to Nagasaki, “To see what that bomb did to that city.”

...[y]ou could pick up a rock in your bare hand and just crumble it to powder. And Pullman cars was laying five and six blocks from the railroad tracks. There wasn’t anything you couldn’t break with your hand or a pipe....And there would be people sitting in foxholes; there’d be their carcass sitting up there, that never had fallen over, with all the meat gone off it (47).

Guards did not inform prisoners of the surrender. On the morning of the 16th, they were told that they did not have to work because it was a “holiday.” The prisoners did not believe that. They had never had a holiday.

The good news spread rapidly. Soon prisoners learned the war was over and quickly moved to take over the prison camps. They disarmed the Japanese, then painted “PW” on barracks roofs to attract American Navy planes. Airplanes dropped barrels of food, clothing, and medical supplies. Prisoners received instructions to wait until liberated. After forty months of captivity many could not wait. All in Japan went to the coast to American hospital ships. Healthier men were flown to the Philippines, then to San Francisco, California. In Manchuria, prisoners were liberated by troops, flown to china, to the Philippines, then to San Francisco.

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Some were not evacuated from the Philippines before the Allied invasion. William Gentry suffered from dysentery and was too ill. He says, “There were six hundred of us left in Camp #1 when the invasion come on Luzon and the group was liberated by the Ranger Battalion” (48).

Sixty-six soldiers from Company D went to the Philippines in November 1941. Thirty-seven returned in 1946. They were provided with extensive medical treatment for extended periods of time after the return. Most accepted military discharges. Some served in Korea. Grover Whittinghill said, “I was a prisoner of war 1,249 days. I made that death march, but I wouldn’t go through it again for all the money in the world” (49).

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The valiant efforts of the Fil-American forces did not go unacknowledged. Commendations and awards were issued to them. Two citations were issued from the War Department to the Provisional Tank Group, including the 192nd Tank Battalion. The first was for outstanding performance of duty covering the withdrawal of the Luzon Forces into the Bataan Peninsula from January 6 to March 8, 1942. “This group was charged with the support of the I and II Philippine Corps, the cordon of defense of the coasts of Bataan, and the defense of three major landing fields.” The tankers were credited with preventing, “[A] projected landing of airborne and paratroop enemy, as well as several abortive thrusts across Manila Bay, any one of which would have meant early disaster in Bataan.” The citation continued, “Under constant air attack, these units, despite heavy losses in men and materiel, maintained a magnificent defense and through their ability, courage, and devotion to duty contributed in large measure to the prolonged defense of the Bataan Peninsula” (50).

The other citation honored the tankers for taking, “Battle positions on 1 December in the vicinity of Clark Field and Fort Stotsenburg, from which it fought a notable action in the defense of these critical points in the initial hostile attack.” In the performance of its duty, the 192nd Tank Battalion was, “Constantly in the field, covering the supporting four divisions of the Northern Luzon Force... [contributing] most vitally in all stages and under extraordinary handicaps to the protraction of the operations and the successful withdrawal.” They were the last unit out of Northern Luzon, and the last into the Bataan Peninsula, on 7 January 1942 (51).

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38th Tank Company, Kentucky National Guard