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Post by VeeVee on Mar 24, 2009 22:48:40 GMT -5
My good friend Foxholefrank who lived in Bataan and who did some battlefield archeology there sent me some small relics as a gift. (thanks Frank!) He dug these up along Trail 29 which was west/southwest of Mt. Samat. The 45th Infantry PS fought along this trail following the Japanese breakthrough at Mt. Samat. I was able to identify and match the hardware with those form my web gear. A = Buckle from canvas legging B = Buckle from M1936 suspenders C = D-ring from M1936 suspenders; or from haversack pack carrier; or mussette bag D = Snap from cartridge belt E = Ammo stripper clip (Japanese) F = Shelter half pup tent grommet G = Haversack inner cinch buckle H = Gas mask bag hook Other angle: The backside of the stripper clip
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Post by VeeVee on Mar 25, 2009 8:23:23 GMT -5
Stripper clip is Japanese. RicktheLibrarian's comment, and confirmed by FoxholeFrank.
The stripper appears to be Japanese. I have a number of US ones from pre-WWII and it doesn't look like any of those. Plus, most of the U.S. ones were made of brass.
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Post by VeeVee on Mar 26, 2009 15:28:29 GMT -5
Here are some excerpts from the book, Bataan Uncensored, written by Col. E. B. Miller. These descriptions are from the fighting along Trail 29 where these relics were found. So these were from their gear. I'm awed to say the least. A real connection with history.
------------------ The Philippine Scouts were doing the best they could. Jap mortar fire was heavy. The Scouts had to take it with none to throw back. During the day, I had the opportunity - and honor - of witnessing the mettle of these Scouts.
After the battle had opened in the morning, Colonel Doyle had sent a patrol of Scouts, out to the west, to make contact with our forces. This patrol never returned. All in all, five patrols were sent out in that direction during the day. When the first patrol failed to return, everyone knew what had happened.
As each succeeding group was called up to receive instructions and orders for patrol duty. every last man took his orders with no trace of reluctance or fear whatsoever. There was only explicit obedience in the job they had to perform. They knew the seriousness of the situation which confronted them, and I marveled at their soldierly qualities. They knew that death undoubtedly awaited them, but the last patrol went just as eagerly as the first.
All during this day, many wounded Scouts were brought to the rear. Not once did I hear one whimper of pain or an utterance of complaint.
<Later in the chapter> ----------------
Two tanks were placed at the head of the column. Scouts were sent out in front, on foot, to act as "feelers." The 45th had marched a long distance the day before over mountainous terrain, had fought all this day, and now were on a mission that would have been rough, even for fresh troops. Once again the mettle of these superb soldiers came to the front. During that night, and the events which followed, I never heard one word of complaint, only extreme attention to duty!
<after an ambush> ...Meanwhile, the Scouts had formed a line to our rear and fired blindly in the direction of the Japs to cover our withdrawal. That is the only thing that saved us. Their actions that night would have been more than a credit to the best trained and bravest soldiers in the world.
...Under cover of the fire being delivered by the Scouts, we turned the vehicles, which had accompanied us, to the west. The general withdrawal of the column was covered by our one tank.
...By now, the physical condition of the Scouts we had with us, was near complete exhaustion. On the return march, we saw quite a number of Philippine Army soldiers who had thrown away their rifles and were evacuating to the rear. The Scouts were different. Often one would drop in his tracks. It was only by shame that we could get their exhausted bodies to stumble on. We would look at them and say: "Are you Philippine Army or are you Scout?" Without exception, they would stand as erect as possible - and then plod on. I love them and I'm not ashamed of it!
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Post by VeeVee on Mar 30, 2009 5:45:36 GMT -5
Well here they are now part of my basement "museum". click for bigger
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Post by rickthelibrarian on Apr 3, 2009 17:41:11 GMT -5
Nice display, VeeVee - my little container of Bataan soil is still sitting on the window sill above my desk where I look at it often!
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Post by oklahoma on Apr 3, 2009 20:42:25 GMT -5
rick...you are a man after my own heart. i thought i might be the only person who does things like that. i have a pebble i picked up from the area of pickett's charge just in front of the copse of trees at gettysburgh. i also have a small bottle containing water from pearl harbor. was never at pearl, but i had my nephew do me the favor when he was on his senior trip back in 1985. on second thought i also know a guy who was on iwo jima who keeps a vial of iwo sand on the mantel above his fireplace. its a comfort to know there are others, few as they might be. i would say vic has a quite nice museum, wouldnt you? ?
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Post by VeeVee on Apr 5, 2009 0:45:55 GMT -5
You're not alone okla. Same here.
As for my museum, April 9th is coming up. Last year there was an observance/commemoration event in the Philadelphia area for Bataan Day. It was organized by the local Filipino community. I couldn't go because it was also my daughter's bday party. Well this year there's no birthday party and I was going to offer to display my collection at the event. Well lo and behold there isn't one this year. So disappointing.
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Post by RayAdillO on Apr 5, 2009 1:31:18 GMT -5
...By now, the physical condition of the Scouts we had with us, was near complete exhaustion. On the return march, we saw quite a number of Philippine Army soldiers who had thrown away their rifles and were evacuating to the rear. The Scouts were different. Often one would drop in his tracks. It was only by shame that we could get their exhausted bodies to stumble on. We would look at them and say: "Are you Philippine Army or are you Scout?" Without exception, they would stand as erect as possible - and then plod on. I love them and I'm not ashamed of it! [/i] [/quote] I don't mind such remarks by the Col Millers of the world. Fine, if there must be a scapegoat for everything that went wrong in Bataan then it must be the Philippine Army...so the Philippine Army soldier was the "Frenchman" of the allied line prone to surrender and run away. However we must bear in mind that the Philippine Scouts was just one division (some 9000 to 12,000 men) in a Bataan holding force of 90,000 men, the much greater majority of whom were Philippine Army. Now somewhere in that mass of Philippine Army soldiers must have been 9000 to 12,000 souls which did fight well, won their share silver stars and purple hearts, or at least didn't throw away their rifles on the march.
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Post by VeeVee on Apr 5, 2009 7:26:03 GMT -5
Don't take it personally Ray, in the book Bataan Uncensored, that is the only mention by Col. Miller that may show the PA in a negative light. And that was even mentioned because that's truly how they got the faltering PS guys to get going. It's no different from any inter-service rivalry motivations.
I'm planning to portray PA in Reading this year. I'll wear that uniform just as proudly as the PS uniform. (it just took so long to find a guinit helmet, thanks for that by the way).
Actually in that book, Col. Miller was most condemning towards the superiors and the powers that be and held them responsible for the lack of equipment and training of the PA. While other books and American first hand accounts blamed the PA for a lot of things, Col. Miller's book had nothing negative to say about them aside from stating facts.
Now a book with a lot of disdain towards the PA, is The Naked Flagpole by Col. Mallonee who served with your dad's 21st Division. It has a lot of praises too especially for the field artillery battalions, but heck you might mistake it for a blame-fest.
Lastly, I had posted this a long time ago but has been forgotten so let me post them again: -----------
From "Bataan, Our Last Ditch" by John W. Whitman
"Considering how bad the Philippine Army was when compared to the Scouts, it is amazing how remarkably well they actually did. For although they had shortcomings in all areas imaginable, they kept the more experienced and better-armed Japanese at bay for nearly one hundred days. The Philippine Army provided the vast majority of the soldiers on Bataan, occupied most of the fighting positions, were employed in the frontlines longer than the Americans or Scouts, and suffered the majority of combat and nonbattle casualties. Although performance during the first battles, especially before arriving in Bataan, was often disastrous, and although blind panic and refusal to obey orders were not uncommon, instances of entire battalions deserting their officers declined sharply as time passed. On Bataan the Filipinos were paragons of soldierly virtue when compared to their earlier performance. The Filipino soldier did stop the Japanese, did inflict staggering losses on him, and certainly delayed the complete and early conquest of Luzon. And considering the state of training, equipment, and unqualified, poorly trained native leaders, these facts are astounding. The Filipinos were good material, but they needed training and leadership. With training and effective officers, they performed well. This is the recurring theme, the oft-repeated "if only" of Bataan veterans. If only there had been more time, if only the Philippine Army could have been trained to the level of the Scouts. If only! Untrained recruits of all nationalities will break and run with depressing regularity, and the Filipinos were no exception."
--------------------- On April 6, the Americans and Filipinos staged a last ditch counterattack...
Three hundred men from Col. Whetherby's 41st Infantry (PA) pushed eastward early that morning to establish a line across Trail 29 to which the 45th Infantry (PS) could advance. Hoping to surprise the enemy, the 41st Infantry decided against using an artillery preparation; it would be a sneak attack. It is amazing that the Filipinos could still be called upon for an offensive operation and, more amazing still, it was a night attack, one of the most difficult and hazardous of military maneuvers.
...Whetherby was ordered to use only 300 of his 650 effectives - a provisional battalion of three 100-man companies commanded by Filipino Major Zobel. After Col. Fortier gave them orders about 1600 hours on April 5, American and Filipino officers organized their men for the effort and put them into motion. Leaving the west bank of the Pantingan river just after midnight, the 41st Infantry slithered down the 300-foot tall banks, crossed the boulder-strewn brush-cloaked river, and slowly scaled the steep wooded cliffs of the opposite side. After catching their breaths on the east bank, the Filipinos crept cautiously into their old kitchen area. Straining to see in the dark, they found a small number of Japanese asleep in the rear-area shelters and huts the 41st Infantry had recently evacuated. These Japanese were old enemies, their Abucay and Trail 2 opponents, men of Nara's 65th Brigade.
About 2 hours after clibming into and out of the river, the Filipinos stole across the darkened terrain, bayoneted and knifed some sleeping enemy, and pushed ahead of their objective, Trail 29...
But Japanese who escaped from the kitchen area sounded the alarm, and before noon the Japanese counterattacked with forces equalling a reinforced battalion and pushed the Filipinos off Trail 29 into a defensive position on a small ridge paralleling the Pantingan river. Here the 41st Infantry held.
Drawing on their experiences in Abucay and Trail 2, the hardened survivors of 4 months of war dug in. In the next 36 hours, the Filipinos, backed against the Pantingan, and armed only with rifles and machine guns suffered 30 percent casualties, 100 men killed or wounded while defending their little ridge.
-------------------- Buying Time, the Guagua-Porac Line
...Only the artillery prevented complete disaster. The 21st Artillery had three under-strength battalions commanded by Philippine Army second lieutenants... The Filipinos -- Pangasinans, Ilocanos, Pampangans, and Bontocs -- fired point-blank direct fire for six long hours and serviced the guns as cooly as if it were a peacetime practice.
Standing fast and firing at visible enemy required trmendous courage from the gunners and strong, steady leadership from the officers. For six hours the artillerymen were the most advanced elements of the entire division...
Lt. Valdez's 1st Battalion, 21st Artillery, swung its eight British model-1917 75mm guns to the left front and fired shrapnel shells at targets less than eight hundred yards away, stopping a Japanese penetration in the center of the division. West of the road, Lt. Mercado's wooden-wheeled 2nd Battalion, and Lt. Acosta's 3rd Battalion fired high explosive up the Pio ravine into an assembly area holding Japanese tanks. The two artillery battalions fired eight rounds per minute from each of sixteen cannon and turned the assembly area into a smoking cauldron. The tanks did not attack.
...The 21st Artillery defended the division so well that the Japanese made no efforts against the line the next day.
-----------------
Incidentally one of my best buddies' grandfather who was a PMA grad commanded one of those 21st field artillery battalions and was mentioned in the book. I met him in 1988 but didn't know he was a Bataan vet.
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victoree
History Buff
V for Vacate, Joe
Posts: 119
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Post by victoree on Apr 5, 2009 9:42:32 GMT -5
The Phillipine Army should get a tremedous amount of credit. They were a barely trained force, that did a outstanding job of dealing with the Japanese, given the conditions that they were under. Martin
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Post by oklahoma on Apr 5, 2009 10:30:58 GMT -5
i have always maintained that the PA troops who made it into bataan were a tough bunch. the sheep had been separated from the goats. these guys had their "basic training" the hard way....with live rounds being fired at them from lingayan to layac junction. that's what i call learning by experience. on the job training in the rawest sense and the guys that made it to the abucay line were, for the most part, good soldiers. maybe not as good as the scouts (i dont think any troops, whether japanese or american were equal to the scouts), but good enough to whip the japs had they been better equipped and fed. they proved as much to my satisfaction. i dont believe any of these books or after the fact narratives are necessarily trying to "put down" or denigrate the individual PA soldier, but rather its a knock on the system and how the PA suffered from it and that in turn caused much grief for the US forces. as i keep saying, the whole bataan/corregidor senario was a greek tradegy. "murphy's law" to the nth degree. "what could go wrong, absolutely did go wrong".
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Post by RayAdillO on Apr 6, 2009 3:36:44 GMT -5
My apologies gentlemen, and thanks for your remarks.
When taken in context of the situation they had in Bataan, it wasn't really my intention to sound reproachful. Ah but yes, I may have taken it a little too personally.
Nevertheless I felt that the point needed an explanatory footnote of some sort.
Having spoken to many Philippine Army veterans, including my dad and Commodore Alcaraz plus many other ordinary civilians of that generation, I have yet to meet one who had any disparaging thing to say about the Philippine Scouts, not one hint of envy.
It was generally understood that the P.A. was the junior among the services, and scouts were the elite troops, they were always highly respected by the P.A., and many a pre-war Philippine Army soldier aspired to join the ranks of the P.S.
If there was an inter-service rivalry, it was between the Philippine Scouts and the Philippine Constabulary who felt that they too were an elite force in their own right.
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Post by 26th on Apr 6, 2009 10:10:16 GMT -5
Ray
They are all hero's when under fire. Only the individual that might have ran will know what he did under fire and will answer to the Man at the "Gates of Hell".
Without a doubt your dad was one of those "Hero's".
But on the point of dug up relics and dirt, boys> I put some of my Bataan dirt in my salad and some how in my mind I will carry it with me no matter where I am. Thanks for bring me some back Victor.
Peace and will see some of you soon. Make sure you come early to the reunion for a beer Ray.
Captain Rudy
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Post by VeeVee on Apr 6, 2009 23:12:59 GMT -5
Here is Ray's dad in Balanga, Bataan. Early January 1942. He's the officer in khakis with his NCO's. I have nothing but respect for them. Check them out - they look very squared away A few days after this picture was taken, they were called upon to counter-attack in Mabatang to help the Philippine Scouts. That's right they reinforced the 57th Infantry PS. And according to Ray's story, that's how his dad came in possession with a... (drumroll)... an M1 garand of his own Got it from a dead PS. I'm so stoked to do a PA impression in Reading this year.
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Post by RayAdillO on Apr 7, 2009 7:14:51 GMT -5
Ray They are all hero's when under fire. Only the individual that might have ran will know what he did under fire and will answer to the Man at the "Gates of Hell". Without a doubt your dad was one of those "Hero's". But on the point of dug up relics and dirt, boys> I put some of my Bataan dirt in my salad and some how in my mind I will carry it with me no matter where I am. Thanks for bring me some back Victor. Peace and will see some of you soon. Make sure you come early to the reunion for a beer Ray. Captain Rudy Thanks Captain Rudy, oh yes I'll be there to "blow the froth with ye" so to speak, he, he. And I hope to finally see you too VeeVee....cheers! ;D
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Post by oklahoma on Apr 7, 2009 11:25:08 GMT -5
they look like fine troops to me. a full belly, adequate medical support, and proper equipment and you have as good a unit as you ordinarily could want.
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