Bless 'em all; Retaking The Rock by William T. Calhoun and Paul F. Whitman
FULL DISCLOSURE; I have not read every book on the retaking of Corregidor, but of the ones I have read this one stands alone as my favorite.
The scope alone of this book is amazing, it contains it all, photos, personal accounts, official documents. I have not seen a book that has so many different facets.
Official Documents.
Operational Priority Messages. See the actual documents ordering the assault on The Rock.
Communications between commands. CO 503rd to CIC Southwest Pacific Area
Official 503rd journal entries by Regiment, Company and Platoon.
Personal Accounts.
I am sure you will understand that there are way too many of them to list.
Hearing in their own words what these combatants saw and felt leaves you in awe of these mere boys. And I say "mere" referring to their age, not their stature as men who have lived and help write history. That feat needs no acknowledgment on my part.
Photographs.
I spent a great amount of time here pouring over every picture. The quality of them, even the full page ones were fantastic. So crystal clear, they look like they were taken last week. And so many of them, a book of them alone would have made this effort worth it. But so much more to see here.
You can see men jumping out of their planes. You can see bombs going off just feet from their assault vessels. And you can here the understated heroic tasks being completed when you read the official journal entries. Men in combat are not wont to aggrandize themselves and their achievements. They just state the obvious and move on. Indeed, Bless em All.
Anyone writing a book about a subject like this cannot rely on dogged research. Without the recollections of those who were there, you are just reciting facts. There is nothing more to the point than a remembrance of someone who lived it. Page after page here you will hear the words of the guys who slugged it out, sweated, prayed and lost best friends in the process. How could any human endeavor match this? Indeed, Bless em All.
Throughout this book was evidence of something that I have decried on more than one occasion and that was the serious intelligence failures. And understand, I am not just referring to the estimated troop strength of the Japanese estimates of 600 to 800 combatants when in fact there was somewhere north of 6,000. No ,that one has been hashed out ad infinitum. I am referring to the fact that these Americans were tasked with retaking this island and given INADEQUATE MAPS to do it. A SPECIAL MAP (contour intervals 50 ft) was issued, but it contained neither names of the batteries nor most of the tunnels. None of the buildings were named, nor their purposes. (Relevant if one of them is the telephone exchange, or another a munitions storage). There were no names of ridges, hills or ravines on this “jump map”. The names of trails were left as a complete mystery. Not even Col. Jones was in possession of such secrets! When asked by a member of the 503rd why they were not given the better (20 ft contour) maps, General Marquat very haughtily replied "Oh, those are top secret." The reason you classify something is to prevent the enemy from gaining that knowledge. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? The Japanese had been in possession of that island for nearly 3 years! Did anyone think they were walking around there blindfolded? The Japanese had the better maps! As anyone with even just a passing knowledge of combat will attest, to have detailed maps of the battleground would be invaluable! And to deny these brave men the tactical advantage they need and was at our fingertips is nothing short of unconscionable and criminal! Someone should have been hung out to dry and gone to prison for this stupidity! And I think the list should start with Marsquat (misspelling intentional) himself. How many of our brave men died there because they had little to no knowledge of the terrain and fortifications while the Japanese enjoyed knowing where EVERYTHING was? Can you tell my blood pressure is up?
Back to the book. To finally put faces to names we have all heard many times was a real treat. One in particular stands out to me. Lieutenant Colonel John Erickson, CO 3rd battalion, the first man to jump on Corregidor. And the photo bonanza does not stop there. Page after page of pictures I had never seen before. So many books that I have read of this subject just have a handful of pictures stuck in the middle just giving a slight glimpse. You get the whole view here, not just a glimpse. And so many of them so clear, you will want to spend hours looking at every detail, I know I did. And these were not after the fact pics. Most of them taken during the action, during the parachute drop, during the amphibious landing, during the fighting. As mentioned, you could make a separate book just with the photos. It brings to life for you just what these guys were faced with and did not hesitate a moment. Indeed, Bless em All.
So many things here I did not know and had never seen. If I had seen pictures before of the 3rd battalion of the 34th infantry division landing I cannot recall. And if I did I am sure it was but one or two. There is page after page of the assault boats coming ashore. You see the mortar rounds exploding right next to them. With a little imagination, you can feel the heat of a hot day in the middle of combat seeing men doing their job and doing it superbly.
And every now and again in this book you come across something that just stops you in your tracks to just linger over the thought. There is a picture of current day Battery Wheeler on page 101 and the caption read; "Battery Wheeler still fights being invaded, though only by overgrowth and indifference." I felt my heart sink so low when I read the truth of that caption. Too much of what we all here know of this hallowed ground is being lost to the indifference of generations not interested or actively fighting to erase the memory of the heroism and sacrifice that is Corregidor 1942 and 1945. If we don't take a stand and demand that these men and their deeds not be forgotten, we are at risk of losing everything they fought and stood for. They deserve better. Indeed, Bless em All.