Post by chadhill on Jan 16, 2011 15:43:45 GMT 8
I've come across some very sketchy information about two small US Army units.
The 10th Signal Service Detachment, under a LT Mark Rhodes of the SIS (Signal Intelligence Service) was set up in Manila during 1936 to monitor Japanese diplomatic traffic. I haven't found out anything else about the detachment except that a Thomas R. Kennedy, who was assigned to the unit in October 1940, was captured when Bataan surrendered. He died on the Hell Ship Brazil Maru in January 1945.
In 1941 the 2nd Signal Service Company, Detachment 6 arrived, led by Major Joseph Sherr with LT Howard Brown as ops officer, and 15 enlisted personel. On 24 December 41 the 2nd Signal Service Company relocated to Corregidor and set up a small intercept station in Malinta tunnel where they apparently concentrated on Japanese Air Force communication, with disputable results. There is a thread about that somewhere on this fine website, but I have lost it!
Major Sherr, General Spencer Akin (MacArthur's Signal Officer) and Colonel Charles Willoughby (MacArthur's Intelligence Officer) were among those who accompanied MacArthur on the PT boat escape of 11 March. In early April MacArthur, in Australia, set up a new intercept-cryto-intel group called "Central Bureau", headed by General Akin.
At some point LT Brown left Corregidor for Mindanao (I have not learned when or how he got there) and presumably took at least some of his men with him. On 14 April he was flown to Darwin in a B-17, but at least six of his men were left behind. One of these men was killed in a dispute with another US servicemen, and apparently two more were soon captured by the Japanese. Three men, CPL Irving Stein, CPL Michael Maslak and PFC Stanley Kapp got a canoe and tried to sail to Darwin. But after 28 days at sea they landed on New Guinea instead and were eventually captured by the Japanese. Stein and Kapp died as POWs but Maslak survived the war.
Sherr was killed in an airplane crash in New Delhi during September 1943.
All this makes me wonder if the "cryptographers" MacArthur asked Wainwright to put on the April 29th PBY flight may have been from one of these army units, rather than from CAST.
Late update. Here is the link to the 2nd Signal Service Company that I had lost:
corregidor.org/crypto/chs_crypto1/magic1.htm
The 10th Signal Service Detachment, under a LT Mark Rhodes of the SIS (Signal Intelligence Service) was set up in Manila during 1936 to monitor Japanese diplomatic traffic. I haven't found out anything else about the detachment except that a Thomas R. Kennedy, who was assigned to the unit in October 1940, was captured when Bataan surrendered. He died on the Hell Ship Brazil Maru in January 1945.
In 1941 the 2nd Signal Service Company, Detachment 6 arrived, led by Major Joseph Sherr with LT Howard Brown as ops officer, and 15 enlisted personel. On 24 December 41 the 2nd Signal Service Company relocated to Corregidor and set up a small intercept station in Malinta tunnel where they apparently concentrated on Japanese Air Force communication, with disputable results. There is a thread about that somewhere on this fine website, but I have lost it!
Major Sherr, General Spencer Akin (MacArthur's Signal Officer) and Colonel Charles Willoughby (MacArthur's Intelligence Officer) were among those who accompanied MacArthur on the PT boat escape of 11 March. In early April MacArthur, in Australia, set up a new intercept-cryto-intel group called "Central Bureau", headed by General Akin.
At some point LT Brown left Corregidor for Mindanao (I have not learned when or how he got there) and presumably took at least some of his men with him. On 14 April he was flown to Darwin in a B-17, but at least six of his men were left behind. One of these men was killed in a dispute with another US servicemen, and apparently two more were soon captured by the Japanese. Three men, CPL Irving Stein, CPL Michael Maslak and PFC Stanley Kapp got a canoe and tried to sail to Darwin. But after 28 days at sea they landed on New Guinea instead and were eventually captured by the Japanese. Stein and Kapp died as POWs but Maslak survived the war.
Sherr was killed in an airplane crash in New Delhi during September 1943.
All this makes me wonder if the "cryptographers" MacArthur asked Wainwright to put on the April 29th PBY flight may have been from one of these army units, rather than from CAST.
Late update. Here is the link to the 2nd Signal Service Company that I had lost:
corregidor.org/crypto/chs_crypto1/magic1.htm