BATTERY CROCKETT

 

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.

 

 

 

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