|
Post by Bob Hudson on Sept 7, 2012 6:55:39 GMT 8
Nothing is fair in war. The U.S. simply could not let England fall into the hands of the Germans. As bad as that was for our Philippine warriors, the consequences for the U.S. would have been far worse if England had fallen. I believe everything happened as it should have, like it or not.
|
|
|
Post by okla on Sept 7, 2012 11:05:26 GMT 8
Hey Bob....So true. But, sometimes, the "Big Picture" is tough to understand by the guys standing in the "deep doo-doo", doncha agree??? I have always felt that even if we had thrown all our resources into the Pacific, could we have fought our way back to the PI by May 1942. I, seriously, doubt it, but I say again, "what do I know" And I say again, "probably not a Hell of a lot". Postscript....I really appreciate the excellent stuff you are contributing to this Forum.
|
|
|
Post by Bob Hudson on Sept 7, 2012 15:46:39 GMT 8
We couldn't fight anything west of San Francisco in May of 1942. The Japs put us out of commission after Pearl. The only thing we could launch was a weather balloon. The Japs put a lot of thought into how they were going to paralyze us and executed it perfectly. They knew we would kick their ass if the American conscience was behind the war. If we remained the isolationist country that we were and hesitated, it would have been too costly for us to take the entire Pacific back. Fortunately that didn't occur. "Deep doo doo" is a pretty good description of what we were standing in after Pearl.
|
|
|
Post by pdh54 on Sept 9, 2012 10:26:36 GMT 8
Corregidor GI by Sgt Jerome B Leek
page 134
New Year's Day dawned as any other New Year's Day, although the beginning of the end for us, was dawning. The Japs celebrated the day by storming into Manila, from the north. In the afternoon, the fury of Nippon's air force descended on a group of harmless freighters, lying peacefully in the bay, between the Rock and Mariveles. Practically all the vessels were wither sunk or badly gutted by fire. The Mariveles docks were left a mass of shambles.
January 2nd was a normal Philippine day, bright and warm. About one o'clock that afternoon, as I drove my Dodge, along the south shore road, a small hole, about the size of the end of my finger appeared in the hood, directly in front of the windshield. I sat glued to my seat, staring at the hole made without warning. Suddenly, another appeared almost beside the original. I fully realized then what was going on; I was being strafed by a Japanese dive bomber. My first thought was to park the truck under a tree, and start firing back at the diver with my thirty caliber rifle. The I remembered that L Battery, 60th, had a fifty caliber machine gun position, about seventy-five yards ahead of me, just around the next bend. I must get there quickly, for the truck was an excellent target, out in the open and along the water's edge. As I ground my foot to the accelerator, the truck gained momentum. I hadn't yet seen my antagonist; but I knew he was preying on me like a buzzard. The truck glided to a stop near the kitchen of L Battery, under a tree.
As I turned off the ignition and jumped out, all in one operation, a bomb came screaming down. The next thing I knew I was sitting on the ground. My ears felt as if they were on fire. Smoke and dust were all around, I could barely see ahead. I felt for my glasses and found them gone. I shook my head, tying to get rid of my dazed condition. Just then, someone tapped me on the shoulder. Looking up, I found Lt Dronberger standing there, in a suit of blue denims, amidst the smoke and dust. I jumped to my feet saying, “Sir, I am all right.” He answered hurriedly, “Yes, I know, but I sure thought they got you.” He continued, “They hit the command post too. Got it with an incendiary. Camouflage on top is all on fire. Nine men, maybe more, are trapped underneath. Would you help me get the fire and the men out?” I answered, “Hell, yes, where is something to fight the fire with?” As he started to answer, a Marine (Herbert Klingbiel of St. Paul, Minn.) came up from the beach below. The Lieutenant said, “You will find some tools near the kitchen. I'm going to try and find some more men.” A wave of nine bombers were coming in, directly at us. As Klingbiel and I were running toward the kitchen, he gasped, “Reckon they'll get us?” “Damned if I know, I ain't stopping now, because that other one was the one with my number on today.” As we were picking up the tools by the kitchen, a bomb exploded about fifteen yards away, almost half way between us and the command post. With our tools, we started running again, this time toward the command post. As we were going through the bomb crater just made, another bomb came screaming at the kitchen, exploding there and completely blowing it away. Shortly after Klingbiel and I went to work on the fire, Lt. Dronberger came back alone.
The three of us put the fire out as several more waves of bombers came in, spraying bombs all around us. Then the dive bombers started coming back strafing. The three of us didn't talk; we were thinking too many things – would they get one of us, two of us, or all of us? Who would go first? Finally, after about an hour and a half of continual bombing and strafing the enemy disappeared. Then the all clear was blown. We had the fire out, and one man who was bomb happy. This pathetic individual would first be crying like a baby, sobbing, “ God d**n 'em, they killed our battery commander.” Then he would be laughing, shouting, gloriously, “Boy, oh boy, they got rid of the bc.” During this entire tense period, he alternated between these mixed emotions.
A few minutes later, about twenty fellows came from a nearby hole, where they had been hiding, to help finish the job the Lieutenant, Klingbiel, and I had started. Shortly, then we reached the other eight men. Four were dead: Captain Hamilton, the battery commander; Corporal Jackson; and two privates, Jones and LeGrande. The four others, including the battery First Sgt. Harrison and three privates were brought out, badly shaken, bruised and cut, but still living.
Then Lt. Dronberger, Klingbiel, and I went and laid down in the grass to attempt to relax, and smoke a cigarette apiece..........................I decided it was time for me to go about my business of distributing rations, so I started to get up,
To my amazement and chagrin, I found that I could not rise. Then I discovered that part of my right hip was gone! I called to the Lieutenant, “Sir, will you please call Sgt Starr at the QM pool, too?” The officer returned asking, “Why?' When he saw my hip, he gasped, “Yes, this is some comparison to the first day we met.”
After the officer and the marine left, I tried and tried to get up, but it was absolutely impossible. The nervous tension I had just gone through had made me numb to the fact that I had a gash in my hip, about six inches long, open to the bone!
Sgt. Starr arrived shortly in a command car. With the help of some of the fellows in L Battery, he sat me up in the rear of the car.
As we drove to the hospital, in Malinta tunnel, he asked, “Boy, how in the dickens did you get that?” I told him I didn't know. He asked, “You don't know. Boy, if I got one like that I'll bet I'd know how I got it.” I replied, “I always thought the same thing until today too. Things just happened too swiftly today for me to know or remember.”
At the hospital I was admitted to Ward 10. Major Barry, the doctor, had me in surgery in short order. There the wound was cleaned; bomb fragments, sand, gravel, little pebbles and pieces of cloth were all taken from it. Then, it being thoroughly disinfected, stitches were taken in it, after which a big white bandage was securely placed on it.......................................
…......................One night as I lay in my bed, I noticed Lt. Hook, followed by a quick stepping Lieutenant Colonel coming down the aisle of the ward. At the foot of my bed, they paused as Lt. Hook said to her companion, “Sir, this is he.” The little Lieutenant Colonel, stepping nearer to my bed asked., “You Leek?” “Yes Sir.” “Your first name and middle, Leek?” I replied, “Jerome B., Sir.” He asked.” Your serial number, Leek?” I was wondering what I was about to get taken over the coals for, as I answered, “Sir, my serial number is 20916717.” He answered, “That is fine. You were in an action at Breakwater Point on the south shore road this last January 2nd . I am Lt. Col. Conzelman of Harbor Defense Headquarters. The General, General MacArthur, ordered an investigation of this action. The investigation has been completed and the report was turned over to the General. As a result, the General has ordered that Lt. Charles Dronberger of L battery, 60th Coast Artillery, be awarded the Distinguished Service Cross; that Private Herbert Klingbiel of the Fourth Marine Regiment, be awarded the Silver Star; and that Private Jerome B. Leek, Headquarters Battery, 60th Coast Artillery, be awarded the Silver Star. You are also receiving the Purple Heart for the wound received in the same action.” I was dazed, I had never dreamed of such a thing when all the action took place..................
As the officer walked down the aisle, Lt. Hook rushed over saying, “I want to be the first to congratulate you on winning the Silver Star.” I replied, “Gee, thank you, but gosh, I was sure surprised.” The nurse spoke, “when he came in and started asking you questions, you looked like you were bracing yourself for a good bawling out.” I answered, “You are not the only one who noticed that.” ..............................
…................A few days later, I was discharged from the hospital to duty, at my own request. My hip still had the stitches in it, and I still wore a large bandage, but I could report back to the hospital for clean dressings.
The old Rock was a huge scar now. Many buildings were destroyed, along with much of its tropical beauty. Trees, bushes, foliage were uprooted, dying. Battery Geary (H Battery, 59th) a twelve-inch mortar battery had taken a terrific hammering. In one day's bombing, this unfortunate battery had lost twenty-nine men. One of these men was Joseph Miller from North Carolina, who had come over on the Pierce. Another man of the Pierce, Bob Moore, had been killed in the Third Echelon Shop the same day I was wounded at Breakwater Point. Bob Moore was the fellow who had came back to the ship that night we stopped in Honolulu, with Jobb, Mr. X and I ..........................
…....................January 16th, I was swinging down the north shore road, from Battery Morrison towards Cold Storage. The route led around the base of Morrison Hill. On the opposite side of the hill were many ordnance ammunition warehouses. On top of the hill was C Battery, 60th, with four anti-aircraft guns. Scattered all over this 'powder keg' were machine gun positions of the I and K Batteries, 60th. Suddenly, bombs started falling and exploding on the trail in front of me. The route was so narrow I couldn't turn around and go back, so I parked the truck under a nearby tree, run up the road in the direction from whence I had just come. This way I figured, if they bagged both the truck and me, they would have to waste two bombs doing it. Then bombs started falling in the road ahead of me, too. So immediately I remembered what the Navy men from Cavite had said, 'Hit the dirt when bombs are falling close to you.' I dropped instantly to a prone position on good old terra firma. As I lie there, fragments and rocks, dirt, grass, weeds, etc., flew over me continually, never hitting me. I heard a terrific crash; looking up, I saw my truck was a mass of pulverized wreckage. A bomb exploding on the hill just over the vehicle, had loosened a gigantic boulder just enough so that it toppled over the cliff, falling directly onto my truck. The vehicle was evenly leveled off with the ground! I had lost my second truck!
When I walked into the motor pool, Sgt Starr asked, “Leek, where is your truck!” I replied, “What is left of it is down on the north shore, between Cold Storage and Battery Morrison.” Capt. Doane walked out of the dispatch office then, asking, “What did you do? Get into some more trouble today?' I told him what had happened. He smiled, as he said, “Leek, if you have to be where hell is always being raised, for God's sake try and save a truck out of the mess just once in awhile. After all, they don't grow on trees out here, you know.” I answered, jokingly, “Sir, that is right, there is a war on, isn't there?” He laughed, “You should know.”
|
|
|
Post by pdh54 on Sept 10, 2012 1:40:40 GMT 8
Does anyone know what the Third Echelon Shop was/did? It is mentioned in the third to the last paragraph above regarding the death of Bob Moore. Patty
|
|
|
Post by JohnEakin on Sept 10, 2012 1:52:51 GMT 8
I'm *guessing* they are referring to the level of maintenance. First echelon is operator maintenance. Second level is onsite unit maintenance. Third level is direct support - usually another unit and this is often at another location/shop. Fourth echelon is general support or depot where they have the capability to do a complete overhaul or rebuild.
If you're talking in the context of vehicles, the operator checks and refills fluids (gas/oil), changes tires, etc. The unit motorpool does tuneups, etc. The direct support unit (usually ordinance) does major maintenance. Depot changes engines, transmissions and often zero times the entire vehicle.
Same basic orginization applies to small arms, field artillery, tanks, etc.
|
|
|
Post by xray on Sept 10, 2012 2:39:15 GMT 8
We couldn't fight anything west of San Francisco in May of 1942. The Japs put us out of commission after Pearl. The only thing we could launch was a weather balloon. The Japs put a lot of thought into how they were going to paralyze us and executed it perfectly. They knew we would kick their ass if the American conscience was behind the war. If we remained the isolationist country that we were and hesitated, it would have been too costly for us to take the entire Pacific back. Fortunately that didn't occur. "Deep doo doo" is a pretty good description of what we were standing in after Pearl. We had 3 fleet carriers at the time, capable of launching more than a balloon. We probably could have successfully defended Wake island using these assets, but the risk was deemed not worthy of the stakes. True, our heavy surface gun fleet was mauled ,,, But surface heavy weapons platforms were already largely obsolete, though it took a while to realize that. There was no danger of a Japanese invasion of Hawaii or Australia. Japan was largely already contained, by default. Our positions in the Philippines & Dutch east indies were recognized early on as untenable against a serious attack, and the only goal here was to resist the inevitable for as long as possible, which the Philippine garrison gallantly did, probably better and longer than anyone had expected. The initial advantage in most any conflict, and especially such a far ranging area as the PTO was, will always go to the aggressor. We set our priorities, long in advance, on what was vital, and what was expendable ,,, And acted accordingly. We knew there were men & materials in the pipeline which would soon win back all that was lost, and could afford to concentrate on Europe while we picked and chose our counter attacks in the PTO. It must be remembered the state of neglect which for many years pre war left our armed forces and garrisons like Corregidor neglected and vulnerable. The Rock was originally planned to be far more heavily armed and fortified than it actually was, but due to 1 sided treaties, budget cuts and fear of provoking the Japs, the Philippine department was allowed to lapse into a state of ill prepared neglect ,,, And the ruthless Japanese were just the folks to recognize this, and take advantage of it.
|
|
|
Post by pdh54 on Sept 10, 2012 2:49:10 GMT 8
Thank you John Patty
|
|
|
Post by pdh54 on Oct 21, 2012 8:37:46 GMT 8
Corregidor GI by Jerome Leek
Page 146
Men were constantly coming to Corregidor from Bataan. They came searching for food, cigarettes, clothing, ammunition, medical supplies, and everything a soldier needs to fight a war with. Cigarettes there were selling for seventy-five to one hundred dollars per package. Everything else was accordingly high. They reported men of the American regiments, 31st Infantry, 200th Coast Artillery, 803rd Engineers, 192nd and 194th Tank Battalions, Air Corps, Ordnance, Signal Corps, Quartermaster and Medical Corpsmen, sailors and marines were all suffering from malaria, strain, hunger, weakness. Men driving ration trucks to the front lines, were being constantly knocked off by Japanese snipers. Men at the front were eating few and far between times. No one ever had any clean clothes, as laundry facilities were completely out.
Then radio KGEI, San Francisco, broadcast the news to us that a large American convoy had landed in northern Ireland. We were definitely on the wrong side of the world! The broadcast also told us that the coal miners in the states were on a strike for wage increases which would amount to more than one dollar per day. One dollar per day was all we were getting in the God-forsaken place - we didn't get that then because the Finance Department's difficulties - if we had received that measly dollar per day it wouldn't have meant much with cans of salmon and sardines selling for fifty dollars apiece! Yet, the coal miners could strike for wage increases while their brother Americans died, sweated, starved, and fought in our own little Valley Forge!
A few days later an inter-island ship came in from Cebu, loaded with rice, sugar, fish and cigarettes. To the starving men of Bataan and Corregidor this was only a drop in the bucket compared to what was actually needed..................
…............March 24, 1942, I was on top of the Rock's 'powder keg' Morrison Hill, supervising a detail of Filipinos who were cutting wood for the field messes. We were almost to the top of the slope just below C-60th and it's four anti-aircraft guns. The air warning sounded. Planes were heard, close to the island, coming from the north. I told the natives to get in the truck and I would drive them to an air raid shelter. At the base of the hill, near Lourdes barrio, were many Ordnance Ammunition warehoused from which, I knew, several truck drivers and details had been busy of late hauling ammunition; as the structures were of cement. I thought I would try to get shelter for the natives in one of the empty buildings. The Nip planes were almost over us, so I didn't have time to drive another half a mile over crooked trails to the shelter of Middleside. At the bottom of the hill, I pulled into the narrow lane leading to the buildings. The first wave of planes was directly overhead now; their bombs were exploding on the trail I had just taken, coming down the hill. Parking the truck by the first building we came to, I, with two of the natives, hurried up on the porch, and swung the huge door open. The big room in front of us was packed full of twelve inch ammunition. I shouted, “We'll have to try another building,” as I started to shut the door.
The next thing I knew I was on the ground, at the foot of the steps leading onto the porch of the building. I was laying on my face in the dirt, with the rest of my body laying uphill, behind me on the steps. I felt so sore I didn't know whether I could move or not. My face was thoroughly skinned, my right arm hurt terribly. Then I remembered where I was before I found myself in this position and thought of the two Filipinos. Jumping up, I started to run toward the truck to the others. I stumbled over something in the dust and smoke – one of the natives, Crisostomo, who had been on the porch with me. He was unhurt, just lying there, praying. I shook him, shouting, “Where is Corrales?” He answered, “Oh, Joe, he is there , Joe. He is dying, Joe.” Crisostomo was pointing as he talked. I thought, 'My God, he is dying. It is my fault. He has a wife and seven little children.' Running in the direction Crisostomo pointed, I found Corrales with the right side of his stomach completely cut away. He was bleeding terribly.
I had to get Corrales to the hospital, in the tunnel, which was over a mile away. As I gathered him up in my arms, he attempted to fight me, saying, “Joe, leave me here, Joe. Me die here, Joe.” I didn't pay any attention to his arguing, but carried him to the truck. After getting in, he started to crawl out, saying, “Joe, let me on ground, Joe. Me die there, Joe.” I answered, “God damn it, you ain't going to die. I am going to take you to the hospital, where they will make you well.” With one arm locked around him, I drove with the other hand. As the lane was so narrow I couldn't turn around. I started to back out to the main trail. Then another bomb fell in the trail behind me, blowing open a huge crater, so that my passage backwards, or frontwards, was blocked. The railroad track paralleled the trail by the buildings, so I turned around on the railroad track, and drove down it to the Middleside car station. As I was turning around, on the track, I shouted to Crisostomo, “Get everyone you can find, I am going to Malinta tunnel.” As I drove down the tracks I noticed Capt. Byrnes and five of his Philippine Scouts, coming towards the burning building. I didn't ask any questions of them then, because I figured they were going to save as much of the ammunition as possible.
Getting to Middleside, I hit the road to Bottomside and the hospital in Malinta tunnel, at breakneck speed. At the gate to the tunnel, the M.P. On duty stopped me, asking, “What's the matter?” I answered, “Just a man dying, that is all.” He answered, “Well, if I unlock the gate, you drive slow through the tunnel because there is an air raid on.” I shouted, “You say there is an air raid on? Well, I'll be damned; I didn't know that.”
Pulling in to the entrance of the hospital lateral, I was met by two medical corpsman, who gently took Corrales and laid him on a litter. One of the 'pill rollers' says, “Jese. he got a dirty one.” A doctor, Captain, rushed out, feeling the little brown man's pulse. The doctor turned and called, “Hey Pete, there is work to do. Get everything ready.” Looking up, I saw Second Lt. Mollie Peterson hurrying towards one of the emergency rooms. She was wearing her extra large coveralls as usual.
Then I checked up on my Filipinos. One was still missing.................................
…........................I went back to Morrison Hill; how I got through, I don't know – only that my number wasn't up, I guess. Capt. Byrnes and his Scouts were just starting to leave the conflagration, now out of control. I asked the Captain, “Sir, did you see anything of a native civilian around here anywhere?” “Why, no, I didn't. You loose one?” Hurriedly, I told him what had happened. He answered, pointing, “Maybe he went down that ravine, running for shelter at Cold Storage.” I replied, “Sir, it sure defeats the hell out of me. I am responsible for him, and damn it, I can't even find him.”
While I was getting back to the truck with my faithful companion, Crisostomo, the all clear blew. Passing over a culvert untouched in the midst of the day's bombing, I heard a voice, calling, “Joe, here me am, Joe” I saw Martinez crawling out of one end of the culvert. I asked, “You been there all the time? Didn't you see me take Corrales to the hospital? Why didn't you let me know where you were?” He answered, “Joe, me see Joe take Corrales hospital, Joe. Me all right, Joe. No need me go hospital, Joe. Me all right all time, Joe.”
Then I drove down to the first aid station at Engineer’s Level, where a doctor, Lt. Belinki, dressed my arm. As he was taking bomb fragments, gravel, small rocks, dirt, and dust from it, he exclaimed, “Kind of got into some action today?” “Yes, Sir, I kinda did.”
Page 156
A few days later, I asked for duty in Bataan..............
…...............Getting ready to go to Bataan, I stocked myself down with all the cigarettes I could get my 'mits' on, for the men at the front. I also carried my Springfield rifle with its three hundred rounds of ammunition, two pistols with one hundred and eight rounds, bayonet, canteen, mess equipment, one blanket, and wore my tin hat, sun-tans, and leggings.
The trip across the channel to Mariveles, was made in a small boat, under cover of darkness. The Navy officer in charge of the little skiff was a young ensign, named Johnson from St. Joseph, Missouri. The night was blacker than the Ace of Spades; everyone thanked God that is was. The officer asked, “How does it came you are going to Bataan? Get shanghaied?” “No, I asked for it.” He replied, “Ask for it? My God, wasn't it bad enough on Corregidor?”
At the quartermaster dump designated by Capt. Norton, I found Major Cavendor, Sgts. Reynolds and Chamberlain, and several other. Reynolds, a good looking chap, spoke, “You from Corregidor?” “Yes” He answered, “Boy you guys really been taking it over there. Good gosh, all the bombs and shells they have laid on you fellows I wouldn't think there would be anything left.” I answered, “ The old rock is just a huge scar; but the guys are keeping their spirits up pretty good. Of course, we have had some crack up, but that has to be expected.” He replies, “Yes, that's to be expected. If any of us ever get back, they'll lock us all up as nuts.”
Late the next afternoon I started my first drive to the front lines of Bataan. The truck, a Ford, was loaded with rice, milk, and canned fish. The drive was over crooked trails pockmarked from terrific bombing and shelling. I was thinking about snipers but I felt they wouldn't get me. I made it through, ducking several 'pot shots'. On the front I found the real men of Bataan, men who were resisting an entire nation while coal miners at home struck for increase wages, and convoys landed in northern Ireland! These men, in rags and dirty clothes, were unshaven, their hair was long; their ribs showed – they were almost bare skeletons. Yet, they fought with reckless abandon. I, who am a devout adherent to the principles of humanity, could think of only one thing; “Here were starving, ragged men, from the land of plenty, in this position because of those few politicians. Only stupidity, selfishness, blindness had wrought this crime on these innocent men.
I passed out my cigarettes. The men couldn't believe they were free. They had been paying far too much for the few they did see. For these smokes, I received the promises of the best dinners to be bought in San Francisco, New York City, and all points between.
|
|
|
Post by okla on Oct 21, 2012 23:40:10 GMT 8
Hey Patty.....Reading your post, I was reminded of that Coal Miner strike. I was just a kid in the 4th grade of Elementary School, but I distinctly remember the outrage of most of the local folks. I well recall one of our school Custodian/Janitor guys saying that if that had happened in Germany, Hitler would have had the miners all shot. He went on to say that he would have been in full agreement with "Der Fuhrer's" actions. One of his sons was somewhere aboard a Cruiser in the Southwest Pacific at the time. If memory serves the son survived the war although he took a "bath" one time down in the Solomons. Cheers.
|
|