.
At 1140 on 29 December 1941 a flight of
Japanese aircraft approached Corregidor. Air-raid sirens sounded,
but most of the 4th Marines paid little attention to them, believing
in the safety of Corregidor's antiaircraft defenses. Lieutenant
Sidney Jenkins remembered, "bombs screaming to earth with shattering
explosions, the crack of AA guns, the neat 'plop plop' of the AA
shells bursting all over the sky . . . there we were, the whole
regiment flat on our bellies on the lower deck of Middleside
Barracks."
Marines in the upper decks of Middleside Barracks
sprinted for the lower deck for protection. Most of the bombs that
hit the building exploded on the second and third decks, but Private
First Class Don Thompson and 20 other Marines on the first deck felt
an explosion and a shower of cement dust. He looked up and saw blue
sky though a hole in the ceiling of the supposedly bombproof
barracks. Bombs continued to fall for the next two hours. Corporal
Verle W. Murphy died of multiple wounds to the head and chest while
trying to clear the building, and nine Marines were wounded in the
attack.
Photo courtesy of Dr.
Diosdado M. Yap |