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Post by pdh54 on Jul 26, 2012 20:30:18 GMT 8
page 8
Those ten weeks that I lived with the Japanese all around the house, sleeping on the sidewalk out in front, going and coming, made me something of an authority on their behavior. Whether I liked it or not, I was never sure that I would not be an accidental witness while some Son of Heaven took his bath under the hydrant in the yard. They would strip for their shower, launder their clothes and hang them on a fence, then bathe and chatter like mad. Their complete disregard of any sanitary facilities was another feature of their encampment in my yard which was anything but pleasant.
Lee and the radio kept me sane those weeks. Lee was a Chinese who had worked for us for years- for my husband and my son and me. Now, with my son in America and Jack in Bataan, Lee felt responsible for me. Day after day, he slipped up to see me, to make sure I was all right and to shake his head dolefully over my unreasonable behavior.
“Miss Peggy, I tell you true I scare,” he would tell me. But he always came back.
In some ways, the nights were worse than the days. The Japanese soldiers slept tight under my windows and there was one who coughed night after night. I lay there in the dark listening to him, and wondered if he had a family, if his wife worried about him as I worried about Jack.
As the weeks crept on, with no news of the outside world but the radio. Hidden in the tunnel of Corregidor was a radio station called “The Voice of Freedom.” All the time that terrible siege was going on, it talked to the people. At first, the broadcasts were cheerful. They were all confident that “the sky would be black with planes” coming to rescue the men fighting and dying on Bataan. But they hoped and waited in vain. Not a single plane ever left the ground from those airfields of which the Philippines had been so proud. I myself saw rows of them, smashed and twisted, some still uncrated, some as they stood waiting to take off.
Jack had gone to Bataan. Over and over in my mind the different possibilities turned and turned. Maybe he was there, fighting. He could not get word to me. I knew that. Maybe-and so it would goon, day in and day out. And at night I dreamed of him; he was always climbing the stairs, coming up to me, but he never got there.
Bataan fell. But Corregidor would hold out. Help was on its way. And then the impossible happened. I'll never forget that day in May when the last broadcast came from the “Voice of Freedom.” “The men of Corregidor have fought a gallant fight.” the announcer said. “Here they expected to come to a little rest. They found a seared and burning hell. Here they fought on and on, expecting the help which never came. Now they must surrender, leaving their dead....”
I kept wondering: Does that mean Jack? Could he have gone there from Bataan? Had he escaped? Was he in the hills? Had they taken him prisoner? I though so hard that I missed some of the broadcast. But I did hear the last few sentences, which were the saddest words I had ever heard.
“.....And General Wainwright will meet with the Japanese Military High Command at any place they name, will be in a small launch, carrying a white flag.”
Then silence. A white flag. I kept remembering his tall, thin figure on the dock. I had heard how the little boats had taken MacArthur off to continue the fight from Australia. I knew what General Wainwright had tried to do. I knew that he had fought with guns that were obsolete. Now the Japanese were taking him. The words “a small launch carrying a white flag” rang in my ears. It was too bitter for tears.
I looked around the apartment and knew what had to be done. I was going to Bataan to look for Jack.
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Post by pdh54 on Jul 27, 2012 10:00:41 GMT 8
Here is a little history on Margaret Utinsky that might be enlightening. In other words who the heck is she and why am I posting about her. It has been put together using some info from Wikipedia and myself. She is a very fascinating person and I don't think her story is very well known.
Margaret Elizabeth Doolin Utinsky (August 26, 1900–August 30, 1970) was an American wife who worked with the Filipino Resistance Movement to provide medicine, food, and money to aid American and Filipino POW's in the Philippines during WWII. She had been working as a nurse in Manila. She was recognized in 1946 with the Medal of Freedom for her actions
Margaret was born in St. Louis Missouri and grew up in Canada. In 1919, she married John Rowley. He died the following year, leaving her with an infant son, Charles.
On a visit to the Philippines in the late 1920s, Margaret met and fell in love with John "Jack" Utinsky, a former Army captain who worked as a civil engineer for the U.S. government. They married in 1934 and lived in Manila.
As the likelihood of a Japanese attack grew in the region the U.S. military ordered all American wives back to the United States. Unwilling to part from her husband, Margaret refused to obey the order and took an apartment in Manila while Jack went to work on Bataan.
In December 1941, the Japanese invaded the Philippines. When Japanese troops occupied Manila on January 2, 1942, she was forced aboard the Washington, the last ship leaving with Americans. She snuck off the ship at the last moment and returned to hide in her apartment rather than go into internment. She was determined to get to Bataan and look for her husband.
Undiscovered after ten weeks in hiding, Margaret ventured out and sought help from the priests at Malate Convent. Through various contacts, she obtained false papers, creating the identity of Rena Utinsky a Lithuanian nurse—as Lithuania was a nonbelligerent country under armed occupation by Nazi Germany. She secured a position with the Filipino Red Cross as a nurse, and went to Bataan to search for her husband.
She was shocked by the state of the survivors of the Bataan Death March. She resolved to do all she could to help the POWs that survived. Beginning with small actions, she soon built a clandestine resistance network that provided food, money, and medicine such as quinine to the thousands of POWs at Camp O'Donnell and later at the Cabanatuan prison camp.
After she learned that her husband had died in the prison camp, she redoubled her efforts to save as many men as possible. Her code name was "Miss U".
Suspected of helping prisoners, the Japanese arrested her, held her at Fort Santiago prison, and tortured her for 32 days. She was beaten daily, hung with her arms tied behind her back, and sexually assaulted. During one night five Filipinos were beheaded in front of her cell. On another night, an American soldier was tied to her cell gate and beaten to death. His flesh lodged in her hair. She was then confined to a dungeon for four days without food or water. She never revealed her true identity and was released after signing a statement attesting to her good treatment.
She spent six weeks recovering from injuries at a Manila hospital. The doctors wanted to amputate her gangrenous leg, but she refused. She left the hospital before fully recovered and escaped to Bataan Peninsula, where she served as a nurse with the Philippine Commonwealth troops and the Recognized Guerrilla forces, moving from camp to camp in the mountains until liberation in February 1945.
When the American troops re-entered the Philippines, Margaret was taken through the Japanese lines by the local people to the American lines. She had lost 45 pounds, 35 percent of her pre-war weight, and an inch in height. Her auburn hair had turned white and she looked like she had aged 25 years.
Yet, within a few days, she wrote from memory a 30 page report listing the names of soldiers she knew had been tortured, the names of their torturers, and the names of collaborators and spies. She was attached to the U.S. Army Counter Intelligence Corps, and later was flown to meet the 511 survivors, out of 9000 original prisoners, who were rescued from the Cabanatuan POW camp.
She died in Lakewood, California on August 30, 1970, and was buried at Roosevelt Memorial Park, in Gardena, California.
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Post by okla on Jul 27, 2012 21:02:01 GMT 8
Hey Patty....Thanks for posting. Of course, I had heard/read/etc about M. Utinsky, but I also had heard/read/etc of Claire Phillips, the American Woman (with phoney ID papers) who ran the Club/Dance Hall/etc) in Manila where her "girls" solicited the Japanese Officer clientele for military information. Somehow, over the years these two courageous women became "one" in my deteriorating memory. Your info has gotten me back to reality and the fact that, actually, we have two heroines, operating under the guise of being citizens of neutral or occupied European nations, stranded in the PI. I continue to learn something, on the Forum, almost daily. Cheers.
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Post by JohnEakin on Jul 27, 2012 23:30:07 GMT 8
Thank you, Patty, for sharing that with us. That story is like something out of the movies, except one couldn't make that stuff up.
How sad it would be to forget not just the heroes and heroines, but all the men and women who gave so much - gave all in many cases.
My wife used to work with a guy from the Philippines - nicest, gentlest soul you'll ever meet. After they had known each other for several years they were comparing war experiences (my wife grew up in London during the war). Max mentioned that he was four when he saw the Japs execute his parents and most of his family.
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Post by okla on Jul 27, 2012 23:53:58 GMT 8
Hey John....I have a cousin (retired USAF M/Sgt) whose wife also grew up in London). She tells of watching, with her classmates, during school recess on the playground, of the vapor trails of RAF "Spits and Hurricanes" tangling with Goerings's Luftwaffe during the 1940 Blitz. Yvonne distinctly remembers spending more than a few evenings in the "Tubes" with the rest of her family. I have posted this previously, either on this Forum or VeeVee's Fil Scout Board. Her Father and Step Father were at Dunkirk and Singapore. I have forgotten which man was at which location, but both survived the war. Just thought you might find this tidbit of some interest in case you missed my post of a year or so ago. Cheers.
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Post by JohnEakin on Jul 28, 2012 0:12:37 GMT 8
Thanks, Okla - its good to be reminded of what war is like. Americans living today have never experienced that - which is a good thing - but I think we've forgotten the lessons learned.
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Post by Karl Welteke on Jul 29, 2012 20:32:04 GMT 8
Hi Patty Read with interest your many inputs to the board. Your reply’s re Miss U -----Margaret Utinsky are very interesting. I have heard of her but didn’t read her book. The book -Code Name High Pockets-, the story about Claire Phillips by Edna Bautista Binkowski is in my library. Margaret Untinsky is mentioned a lot in it. Since I live in Subic Bay and consider Bataan my backyard, that makes both ladies even more interesting to me. I love the excerpts you put on the board. I would like to see even more.
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Post by pdh54 on Jul 29, 2012 21:57:18 GMT 8
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Post by pdh54 on Jul 30, 2012 11:09:10 GMT 8
Chapter 2 page 11
The Japanese were no longer making such a business of stopping people on the street to look at their passes........
As soon as it was dark, I slipped out of the house. I knew I was taking a big risk but I figured that if I kept away from the main street and the lights, and was lucky in avoiding drunken soldiers, I ought to be all right.. My plan was to go to the Malate Convent and see Father Lalor, the gentle priest who was to help me so much and who was burned to death by the Japanese for his efforts.........
I had first met Father Lalor and the other priests at the Malate Convent in1941. A school belonging to the convent had been turned over to the Red Cross to be used as a clinic and I had been assigned to work there. Not in the beginning, however; I always seemed to start things the hard way. I was assigned to work in a hospital which was a long distance from my home. At that time, shortly after Pearl Harbor, another nurse occupied the first floor of the building in which I lived. One night there was a series of heavy, dull reverberations and the window rattled. I did not know what had happened, but the nurse downstairs had lived in Russia and China. She knew a bomb when she heard it and we ran at top speed for the hospital, in case we were needed.
There was a blackout, of course, and we got lost. At length we came to a grave yard. It was a thick circular wall into which coffins were pushed.(Later we set up our radio receiving set there.).....
It was late that night when I slipped inside the church and then out into the convent garden. The church was some seven hundred years old, of Spanish architecture, while the convent itself was much more modern..........
Father Kelly was thunderstruck when he saw me and he exclaimed, “Look who's running around loose! Where have you been?”
“Hiding,” I replied.
“But you can't do that.”
“But I am doing it,” I pointed out. “Now tell me what has happened.”
Father Lalor joined us and they told me that the British and Americans had been put in internment camps, most of them at Santo Tomas; that Greeks and Egyptians were allowed to go around the city if they wore armbands. A few Americans were still free, if they were under a doctor's care and were certified as unable to survive internment, but they had to wear red armbands on the street and they were confined to the city limits.
“But why haven't you been interned?” I asked.
“Because we are all Irish,” Father Kelly explained.
“I don't intend to be interned,” I said. “So what can I do about it?”
Father Lalor said that if I could wangle a medical certificate I could stay out of Santo Tomas. But that would not do. In the first place, they would get me sooner or later. In the second place, a medical certificate would keep me confined to Manila and I intended to go to Bataan.........
So I went home to think. If I was not going to spend the rest of the war cowering in that apartment, I had to do something about it. If I couldn't be an American, I'd be something else. My husband had a big atlas and I took it down and studied it, trying to figure out what nationality I dared to assume. Jack's name gave me a clue. He came from Virginia, but generations ago the Utinsky family had emigrated from one of the Baltic States. And there was Lithuania, which did not have a consul in Manila, so there would be no inconvenient record of Lithuanian citizens.
Good, I would be a Lithuanian. The only city whose name I could pronounce was Kovno, so that became my birthplace. Peggy did not have a Baltic sound to me, so I changed my name to Rosena. And there Rosena Utinsky, spinster nurse from Kovno, Lithuania, was born, …..............
The next night I risked another visit to the Malate Convent. “I am a Lithuanian,” I told them, “Now how do I prove it?”
Father Lalor explained that I would have to get a residence pass at the City Hall. Everyone had to have one in order to move freely about the city. Of course, he warned me, I would have to arrange for its issuance through some Filipino, as only a Filipino could do it without arousing suspicion. The pass would then have to be signed and countersigned by Japanese officials.
I remembered that before my husband had gone back on active Army duty, we had a Filipino chauffeur, named Brehada, who was an accomplished penman. I found him with Lee's help, and for twenty-five pesos, $12.50, he agreed to forge a certificate for me and he got the proper Japanese signature for it. I still have that pass.
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Margaret now tries to join on expedition of Filipino doctors and nurses that was to be sent to Bataan to check out possibly setting up emergency hospitals and clinics for civilians. She was unable to use her Red Cross connections as no one trusted any one else. They didn't know who was on what side.
She finally went to a friend of her husband and son, an American married to a German, Elizabeth Kummer and Max Kummer.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ If it had not been for Elizabeth Kummer, none of the work our group did could have been accomplished. If it had not been for her, I would not be telling this story now. What she did for me was her way of doing her bit for the Allies. She and Max could not work openly; they did their job through me.
Max had been a German consul in Manila, though he had never been a Nazi. Indeed, he was regarded as a man without a country and he was under a cloud, so far as his own people were concerned. At one time he had been President of the German Club, but he was thrown out of office because he was not regarded as a Nazi; later he was even forbidden to enter the place. But, as a German, he was allowed to keep his radio and after I destroyed my own, along with my American identity, his wife constantly kept me informed of what was happening. She never told me outright, “I heard this over the radio,” but every scrap of information she gave me was correct, and time and again, as I got organized, she was able to warn me in time about people who were in danger.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Margaret, with Mrs. Kummer's help now had to get the Japanese to authorize her joining the Filipino Red Cross expedition to Bataan. Taking a little over a week, Mrs. Kummer was able to get this from a mid level Japanese clerk who responded to her flattery of his important job.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ The next step was to persuade the Filipino doctors connected with the Red Cross that is was safe to accept my services. She (Elizabeth) took to me to Dr. Sison, in charge of the Filipino relief work, and introduced me as Miss Utinsky. It is a queer thing, but from that time on I actually began to believe my own story. Dr. Sison was in desperate need of experienced graduate nurses and he passed me on to Dr. Thomas Gann, head of the Institute of Hygiene in Manila, who was to lead the Red Cross unit into Bataan.
When I actually held in my hand the papers that meant the High Command had given me permission to go to Bataan, I was ready to believe in miracles
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Post by sherwino on Jul 31, 2012 8:05:03 GMT 8
Thanks, Patty. It sure is a good story to follow, just like Phantom's posts about "I was on Corregidor". I guess Chad's passion is contagious.
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