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Post by victor on Aug 22, 2008 2:46:41 GMT 8
Hi okla, yes the M1 would have been the appropriate rifle. The reason I had the 1903A3 (not even the type that was used in Bataan) on display is because it's an old non-firing, deactivated, drill rifle that I don't mind getting some dust on. I have two garands I could possibly display, one real, and another an airsoft BB gun model. I didn't want either one exposed and gathering dust in the basement so I put out the 1903A3. However I guess for the brief time that I took pictures, I could have put in the M1 in its place. Good point... I might just take some more pictures with the M1's! Maybe attach an m1905 bayonet to it for effect too.
And yes... the 26th Cav had garands during the campaign as well.
It's never too late to visit Bataan and Corregidor. I highly recommend it if you can take care of the money angle. The plane fare is not cheap but once you're in the Phil. most everything is cheap(er).
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Post by victor on Aug 26, 2008 20:30:04 GMT 8
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Post by okla on Aug 26, 2008 23:33:31 GMT 8
hi vic...viewing the pic of the P-40 reminded me of something i read somewhere, either in college or in some of my junk about how just prior to the outbreak of war in the pacific that the P-40s had arrived in the PI minus the prestone anti-freeze that the 40s piston engines required. seems that some quartermaster officer in california didnt think it was essential to place the antifreeze on a priority shipment list for the far east air forces due to the fact that it wasnt needed as quickly as other equipment/materials because the planes were stationed in the tropics. can you imagine how some guy in responsibility would be operating under that kind of illusion. piston engines need antifreeze at high altitude in the tropics just as in northern or western europe. anyhow, due to the late arrival of the prestone the pilots didnt have nearly enough time to familiarize themselves with their new 40s. of course the P-36s, etc were radial engine craft as were the B-17s.(of course, you are aware of all this engine stuff). you talk about a snafu that caused our guys to pay dearly for after the outbreak of hostilities. your certainly have some good stuff. one more thing that you might find kinda interesting....the life magazine partially hidden behind the newsweek mag (the one with the GI standing a "present arms" on the cover. look inside and i believe you will find that his name is private Teed. now why i, after all these years, remember that soldier's name is beyond my comprehension. i havent layed eyes on that particular issue of that Life magazine since college back in the late 1950s when i was preparing a term paper and viewed it on microfilm. by the way, i probably couldnt tell you where my car keys are at this moment, but i can recall private Teed's name. am i a little crazy or not? ?being a bataan-corregidor "geek" does this to people.
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Post by victor on Aug 27, 2008 2:18:44 GMT 8
Unbelievable, his name is indeed Pvt Teed! How do you remember that?
I bought that issue of LIFE magazine because of the Bataan article in it. This issue is dated March 1942 and the Bataan campaign was raging at that time.
But in addition, it has an excellent picture of a soldier in a kelly helmet but carrying a garand. I like showing it to people who authoritatively associate the Springfield 1903 rifle with the kelly helmet.
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Post by okla on Aug 27, 2008 2:46:12 GMT 8
vic....my wife is always asking me how i remember things like this or who won the 1934 world series,etc, but i cant remember my social security number. but ask me my 1951 USAF serial number and i can rattle it off backwards, forwards and sideways. emblazoned in my mind. as for the garand, lot of folks associate it with coming into use more towards 1943, but as we know it was used by the elite units in the PI and evidently from the private teed story in life magazine it was being issued stateside. as we also know the marines hit guadalcanal with .03s, but in the second battle of bloody ridge an army regimental combat team which had been recently landed to beef up the USMC had garands and the japanese were very surprised at the firepower displayed by the army unit when they tried to break thru those particular positions. the nipponese were used to facing much slower firing rate of the marines .03 and the 8 shot, semi auto garands of the dog faces was a jolt to reality.
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Post by Karl Welteke on Oct 15, 2008 15:01:17 GMT 8
To friends Okla and Vic Like to express my appreciation to Vic and his tireless effort in keeping History alive and to you Okla for your intense interest and numerous contributions. I truly wished you would have the opportunity and visit this vast Battlefield as I can almost every day. Okla, tried to get your email and express my appreciation by email but it is hidden. I truly appreciate all the contributions by all the members and visitors but I hate to clutter up the threats with my unimportant comments. Thanks to you all
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Post by okla on Oct 16, 2008 5:30:19 GMT 8
hey karl....thanks so much for the kind words. i have been, as stated before, a bataan-corregidor "geek" since i was in elementary school during WW 2. while in the USAF i worked with several veterans of the death march and picked their brains as much as some of them would allow you to pick. it has become an addiction with me over the years. sites such as this and the one belonging to vic have sharpened my interest, even at the advanced age of 76. knowing that i will never get to visit these hallowed places, these sites are the next best thing. i would like to take this opportunity to clear up some postings that i made in the recent past regarding a bataan survivor. as i stated previously my new niece in law's grandfather served in company G, 31st infantry regmt. he arrived in the philippines in april 1941 and fought thru the bataan campaign. it was thought, until i cleared it up just recently, that he was one of the 100 or so 31st survivors who made it to corregidor before being sent to the prison pens one month later. this has turned out to be not so. i was given the privilege of going thru his personal effects/papers/etc and i discovered that he did not reach corregidor, but was in hospital at either hospital #1 or #2 in southern bataan when genl king surrendered the bataan force. he did miss the bataan death march due to being laid up and was either trucked or taken by barge to bilibid prison hospital a few weeks later. either way, he was fortunate enough to miss the "march". he did forced labor later, after recuperating, at clark field and ended the war back in bilibid where he was liberated in early 1945. where the misconception his family labored under about him being on corregidor originated, i can only guess. perhaps, the fact that he didnt endure the death march automatically meant that he had made it to the "rock". or just maybe, he and some other wounded/injured/sick troops who were captured in hospital were taken over to corregidor's malinta hospital and thence, along with the corregidor patients, moved to manila and bilibid. i am inclined to think the japs would have executed them before hauling them to corregidor, but the enemy did some strange things, things that western troops would find difficult to fathom. the "being on corregidor" element that his family had taken as fact might have come from these happenings. he was definite, according to his niece, that he did not participate in the death march, but he evidently didnt elaborate on much else of his philippine story, other than he ended up in a POW compound/hospital. i am amazed that his children, especially his son, didnt read this old 1946 newspaper that i found in his effects. it was published on veterans/armistice day in 1946 in his home town. it honored all the local boys, both living and dead and gave written descriptions of their world war 2 experiences. right there in black and white it told of this man being captured april 9, 1942 at a field hospital on bataan. it also told of another area boy, also from the 31st who did make it to corregidor, but only to perish on one of the "hell ships". maybe the mix up had its genesis with this other guy. anyhow, just wanted to clear up what i had posted in error earlier. oh, how i wish this fella was still living. i really could have learned a lot from him, had he been willing to talk. you gotta ask questions. his kids sat aroundf all those years and never learned much from him just because they evidently didnt ask. but i can certainly understand not quizzing gramps about the abucay line, mount samat or the "pockets". all they knew was the grandpa was in the pacific islands and was in a Japanese POW camp, but thankfully came home. go figure.
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Post by The Phantom on Oct 16, 2008 6:59:11 GMT 8
I also want to commend all in this thread for the excellent work. I really enjoyed reading your entries.
A trip to Bataan or Corregidor can be a life changing adventure. I know nowhere else in the world today where you can get as close to real history as in those two locations. Karl lives there, the lucky so and so........
Evidence of the past is everywhere, including artifacts on the ground, in the tunnels etc.
The tunnel behind Mac Arthur's early island housing is a good example of what awaits the traveler.
A little background.
There is a row of Officers Quarters on the tail above and east of Officers Beach, on Infantry Point. We left the main road near the Philippine monument. To get to the old Officers Quarters we had to cut through some tough jungle growth which at one time had been a road,(you could see the old curb every so often, with some sidewalks). It was apparent no one had been that way in some time. One of the houses was Mac Arthur's, another Manuel Quezon's, before they were bombed out, and they moved into Malinta tunnel.
I had read in many books about how the brave Mac Arthur had stood on "his steps" and counted the Japanese planes as they approached Corregidor from Clark to bomb the island. I found this hard to believe since he had his wife and son with him at the time and the house was exposed. Our group found the house described in books and I decided to explore the area behind the house. I walked in the jungle growth behind his house, towards the high cliff facing Bataan. ( There were still ornamental plants from a garden growing wild behind the house)
I almost fell down some concrete stairs as they were overgrown by vines. The steps and the tunnel was concrete in construction, about 30 yards long with 2 or 3 rooms. Tunnel entrances at each end. The inside was in pretty good shape compared to others I had entered. I called the rest of the group and we explored the tunnel and immediate area.
In the middle of the tunnel, near one of the room openings, I found a row of small green buttons on the floor, from the front of a shirt, with some brass metal clasps nearby, and below, a few feet from the buttons were the soles of 2 Japanese shoes.
"Someone had died right there" I thought. I looked further and near the row of buttons in the dirt were two 30 caliber slugs. That's history.
And Mac's viewing steps? Could they have been those of the bunker as they faced Bataan and Clack Airbase from the cliffs edge?
On my trip last February 2008, I took the Corregidor staff to this tunnel which they didn't know existed. They found more slugs in the tunnel and coins from that era, also some brass buckles, etc.
Yes I would say Corregidor and Bataan have many more stories to tell. Make the trip.............
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Post by okla on Oct 17, 2008 9:29:25 GMT 8
hey karl....i failed to mention that your comments are hardly unimportant.
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Post by okla on Oct 17, 2008 9:40:06 GMT 8
hey phantom....that is flatout good stuff. it must be absolutely mind numbing to be able to actually prowl around corregidor at your leisure and still find relics,etc this many years after the fact. if i could ever (will never happen at my time of life) make it to the "rock", the three most important things for me to see would be, first...malinta tunnel and i mean every inch that people are allowed to visit, second...the "mile long barracks". i would feast on being able to prowl accessible areas of that crumbling old structure. third...battery Way. would give anything to be able to stand where "wild bill massello" held forth in those last hectic hours before we got the order to surrender. i read somewhere that massello tore the field phone from its connections in order not to receive the cease fire order. they dont make "em like that anymore, do they?
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