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#36 5-13-00 Corregidor-I Was There...Conclusion
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Sat, 13 May 2000 02:12:09 EDT
#36 May 13,2000 When Corregidor Fell I Was There Part III
©copyright 2000 RK
(Editor's note. I used Textbridge software to scan Richard's
Corregidor
letters into editable text. Everything looked fine on my Mac
and in the
e-mail I copied it into...however some readers with PCs, found a
lot of HTML
symbols added in odd places of the letter. I have tried to
correct this for
Part III. Please let me know if there are any problems with
your copy.)
It's early evening. The date is May 5th. The constant shelling
of the island
has ceased for the moment. But we hear new sounds, grenades,
field mortars,
fifty caliber machine guns, three inch artillery rifles. These
are the
weapons we have been holding in reserve for the landing defense.
(We didn't
want the enemy to know we had them till we needed them to fight
off a
landing.)
This says, there's a landing going on somewhere! Sounds like
down by Monkey
Point where we built that Abatis.
We make a point, Rocher and I, of wandering by the platoon
lieutenant's positi
on. We again ask whether we might be needed where the fighting
is so
obviously going on. As before the answer is "No, stand by your
assigned
posts. We know where you are. If we need you we’ll come and
get you."
I think we could have made a difference! If our lieutenant had
been a young
Patton or MacArthur we would probably have been in the middle of
it. But he
wasn't, and we weren't.
As the night progresses the noise gets ever greater. Bad news,
more noise
means more men on the island.
Rocher and I return to our area. No way we can sleep, so we find
a
comfortable road bank beside a ditch. We jump down in the ditch,
lean on the
bank and proceed to spend the night in mindless but relaxing
conversation.
That was a long night.. I am excited in a way. I’m finally
going to get a
chance to do the job I was hired to do. Shoot at an enemy.
(Let's make that a
little stronger, after three weeks of shelling and death I am no
longer a
happy camper. I want to kill those guys that are trying so hard
to kill me).
It’s dawn now, the next morning, Rocher and I are sharing a
can of pork and
beans from our stash. The lieutenant sees us and yells over. "1
need you guys
on a detail. Tell your corporal, bring your weapons, and come
with me". (He
doesn't need to tell us to bring our weapons. We never go
anywhere with out
them. We're Marines).
Hey. that's great. Anything is better than just sitting doing
nothing.
We jump up and join a group of some six men selected by the
lieutenant for
this detail. "Our job will be to clear the tank trap and arm
it. We have
word there are tanks on the island," he says.
He's talking about a trench we dug across the main road of the
island. It's
about half way betveen our position and the entrance to Malinta
tunnel, about
a quarter mile down the road.
No problem except, judglng from the noise level, the fighting is
getting
closer to our own positions. Well, that's the lieutenants
problem. not ours.
Only, once again we are headed away from the fighting, not
towards it.
We run, more or less separated, from shell hole to shell hole
(for some small
protection from the flying steel and lead) We get to the 'Tank
Trap', the
trench across the road now bridged over with railroad rails and
wooden
planking. Our job will be to remove all of this, destroy it so
it can't be
returned, and leave the trench as one impassable gap in the
road.
There is a bit of a problem now. The damn thing is under machine
gun fire.
There is lead flying everywhere. We stand there for a moment
and just stare
at it. The Lieutenant is on the ball now. He yells. "Come on
man. this is
war."
He's said the right thing. We run out onto the planking over the
trench and
proceed to tear it apart. Unbelievably the bullets keep singing
through the
air around us, but no one is hit. We work fast, get the job
done, and look up
at our lieutenant for what's next?
He points back to our position and says. "We can't go back
there. That area
is under fire now. We will join the Tunnel defense unit.
— Thanks Lieutenant! You see fighting and we go the other
way? Right? —
Anyway the decision is his, not ours. We follow him. We soon
find ourselves
in front of the Malinta tunnel entrance. There is a long
defensive trench dug
in at an angle around the entrance. There are some dozen or
soldiers there in
the trench now. Our lieutenant says, "you are here to stop all
enemy entry
into the tunnel."
In everyday English he's saying, "Stop the bastards. Make them
pay. If they
get by you the island is lost"
Well, we wanted to see some action. He finally found it for us!
We nod at the soldiers stationed around us; we apparently are
the first
Marines to join the group.
We do have a problem here. The entrance to the tunnel is cut
into verticle
rock face some 50 feet high. This face is being shelled
constantly. Shrapnel
is flying everywhere. Standing in this trench takes some
planning to make
sure you are not exposed unnecessarily to the singing steel.
I’m reminded again of my old sergeants advice. "Don't get
killed unless
necessary. You are out there to kill, not get killed." Always
good to have a
wise saying to justify an act of caution.
We crouch down in the trench, away from the strafing, and make
ourselves
comfortable. This is a suicide assignment. We might as well be
comfortable
till it is over. We can now see movement off in the distance,
back where
our fox holes still are. Hope our buddies are OK.
We lean against the back of the trench wall and wait. It's
getting into
early afternoon now. Suddenly, in spite of the constant
shelling, the main
door to the tunnel cracks open. A clean, neatly-uniformed medic
sticks his
head out and asks if we are thirsty.
Hell yes, fellow. This is the Philippines. (We are not
sympathetic with
these tunnel denizens). Unbelievably he brings out a cooler and
some paper
cups.
Paper cups? We haven’t seen any of these since the States.
These guys in the
tunnels must come from another worId.
We do enjoy the cool drinks. We thank our brave friend. He
risked his life to
do that!
We lean back and go on with our waiting. We don't know it but
the war will be
over for us in another two hours.
As we stand there, still against the back wall of the trench, we
notice the
tunnel entrance doors are being opened again. We watch with
interest.
Two neatly uniformed soldiers come out. One of them is carrying
a pole. like
a flag pole. The other has something folded up under his arm.
The two stop
for a moment in the open. One of the men unfolds a white sheet
and ties it on
to the pole the other is carrying. They then set off down the
road towards
the enemy. Neither is carrying a weapon.
We wonder idly, what's going on. Some sort of negotiations we
guess.
After a bit we see our two men off in the distance talking to
two Japanese
officers. At least we assume they are officers. They are
dressed in field
uniforms, a light tan cotton material. They have field caps on
with Kepis
hanging down from the back of the cap. They are both wearing the
classic
Japanese samurai swords. They are armed. Both have neat Luger
leather
holsters on their belts.
The meeting breaks up, we see. Our men walk back to the tunnel,
still
carrying the white flag. They won't stop to talk as they return.
So we have
to guess at what's going on. As we wait and discuss it the
shelling
continues. We are still ready to stop any enemy attack on the
tunnel.
Nothing has changed, yet.
However, the tunnel doors open up again. Nov we see some 6 Army
officers step
out the open. They’re in full uniform. This has to be
important. They walk
off down the same road. We see them meet a group of a dozen or
so Japanese
officers at the same halfway point on that road.
More Field uniforms and all carrying those long Samurai swords
and wearing
hats with Kepis.
We can see some sort of a meeting taking place. Then it breaks
off and our
men return. Strafing and the shel1ing of the tunnel entrance
has finally
stopped.
We jump out and ask what's going on. This group can't get by
without somebody
saying something. Yet they do.
One of the officers breaks off from the group and comes over to
talk to our
officer, an army lieutenant, and says "It’s over guys. Your
orders are to
destroy your weapons and stand down. Your next orders will come
from the
Japanese."
Yes, I do remember May 6th. That was the day I cried.
Richard Keech
semper fi
Richard Keech 