The intensity of the air and artillery
attacks increased during the latter part of April. After the 18th the
240-mm. howitzers which had been moved from Cavite added their weight to
the bombardment. With high-angle fire and heavy charges they were able
to hit targets which the flat trajectory weapons had been unable to
reach, and to blast the heavily reinforced concrete protecting the
large-caliber coastal guns. On the 24th they put Battery Crockett, with
two 12-inch guns, out of commission, demolished the protective
barricades, ruined the shot hoists, and started fires which fortunately
were brought under control before they reached the powder room. The next
evening, a 240-mm. shell exploded outside the west entrance of Malinta
Tunnel where a large group of men had gathered for a breath of fresh air
and a smoke before turning in. "There was a panic-stricken rush for the
gate, but the concussion had closed it and it could not be opened from
the outside." Then another shell landed. "We worked all that night,"
wrote a nurse, "and I wish I could forget those endless, harrowing
hours." At least thirteen were killed outright; more died later, and the
number of wounded was estimated as high as fifty.
The shelling never really stopped. With
over one hundred pieces ranging in size from 75-mm. guns to the giant
240-mm. howitzers, the Japanese were able to fire almost steadily. They
destroyed gun emplacements, shelters, beach defenses, buildings-almost
everything on the surface-at a rate that made repair or replacement
impossible. First they concentrated on the north shore batteries and,
when most of these were destroyed or neutralized, adjusted fire on the
batteries on the opposite shore. They fired at regular periods, starting
just before dawn and continuing until about noon. There was a lull
during the early afternoon-Colonel Bunker called it a Japanese
siesta-after which the fire would begin again about 1500 to continue
with varying intensity almost until midnight. Usually by 1000 most
telephone communications had been knocked out. Crews repaired the lines
during the night but the next morning they would be cut again.
Air attacks usually accompanied the
shelling from Bataan and followed the same schedule. Between 9 April and
the end of the month there were 108 air alarms, totaling almost eighty
hours. Practically all of the attacks were directed against Corregidor.
At first the planes came in at high altitude, over 20,000 feet and
beyond the range of all but two of the antiaircraft batteries. But as
the days passed and damage to equipment and installations mounted, the
Japanese pilots became bolder. They came in at lower altitudes and
bombed more accurately. It became more and more difficult for the
defenders to keep their guns and height finders serviceable. During some
periods there was but one height finder in operation and the altitude of
attacking planes had to be sent by telephone to all antiaircraft
batteries.