Whitson's
platoon had advanced only fifty yards along the road leading into (James) ravine
when it received fire from a Nambu machine gun. With an opening three round
adjustment burst from a concealed position somewhere on the ravine floor,
the Japanese machine gunner managed to kill the platoon's lead scout,
Private First Class James S. Segobia. The enemy gunner quickly shifted his
point of aim to Private First Class Edward T. Redfield, the next man in
line, and wounded him severely with a second burst of three.
Realizing that they had walked right
into the enemy's line of fire, Whitson's men withdrew several yards before
hitting the dirt and taking cover along the shoulders of the road. As was
his custom during such situations, Whitson rushed forward at a crouch from
his position in the middle of the platoon to see exactly what had happened.
Arriving at the head of his troops, he dropped to the ground and crawled on
all fours until he was within ten feet of where the badly wounded Private
Redfield lay motionless in a ditch beside the road. Machine gun bullets were
kicking up clods of dirt all around Redfield's partially protected position,
making his rescue an impossibility until the enemy gun was silenced.
Whitfield slapped a clip of tracer ammo into his carbine and motioned a
nearby Browning automatic rifleman,
Private Carroll F.
Redding, to come
forward and join him.
The lieutenant pointed down in the
general direction of the machine gun nest then squeezed off three fast
tracer rounds to clearly mark its location. He said to Redding, 'I'm going
to run out and drag Redfield back here where our medic can go to work on
him. You keep that machine gunner's head down until I get back in here with
Redfield. I'll take off running just as soon as you start shooting."
Enemy riflemen were also beginning to
fire on his grounded platoon as Whitson turned toward the wounded trooper
and raised himself up, cocking one leg like a runner in the blocks waiting
for the starter's pistol shot. Keeping his eyes riveted on the wounded
trooper to his front, Whitson waited for his automatic rifleman to start
firing. When some
thirty seconds had passed and there still was no sound of
his covering fire Whitson became annoyed. Turning around, he saw
Private
Redding slumped dead on top of his weapon. He had been killed by a sniper's
bullet.
Gerard
M. Devlin
Back to Corregidor
St
Martin's Press, New York (1992)
(out of print)
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