|
 The
attack was made by the 3d platoon, I believe. Dan Lee was the 3d platoon
leader.
I believe the 2d platoon
were out as, security guards. The action lasted more like
twenty minutes. Had it lasted much longer the main body of the Japs
would have gotten involved, and this was not the intent. The intent was
a hit and run attack.
Early this morning the
Filipinos showed up, were briefed and given an SCR-536 radio. Both
forces left with Jessie and his men acting as guides. Lee detrucked his
men at the point that Jessie had recommended. They quietly proceeded
and, nearing the river bend, they crawled in the tall grass up to the
bank. As they approached they heard laughing and talking. A group of
Japs were bathing below them in the foot deep water of the river. As
soon as everything was in place Lee opened his radio net. It was 1700
hr. To his great surprise he got an immediate reply, the Filipinos were
in place and ready. Lee had the mortars open their barrage. The LMG's
and BAR's joined in. They shot down the Japs in the river and shot up
the house. When the smoke round from the 60mm mortar exploded
every-one charged down the bank, across the river and the lawn, and into
the house.
To the surprise and
consternation of our men, the Filipinos beat them into the house and got
several sabers and pistols. Lee ordered everyone back to the trucks and
thence to Victorias. They had completely
by
passed the Jap defenses and wiped out
the headquarters as planned. The Filipinos arrived back first,
having the shortest distance to travel, and our mess fed them. When Dan
Lee and his force arrived we found he was the only American casualty. He
has suffered a gunshot wound in the left thigh, just as he had on 9
April at Sinaypanan. One of the Filipinos had suffered a gunshot wound
in his leg. Lee estimated thirty Japs killed.
Jessie and his team went
back up the next day. The Japs were gone - back to the mountains.
Strangely, the Japs had scampered without burying their dead. Jessie
counted twenty-seven bodies. I do not remember a prisoner being taken.
If one was taken, it probably would have been the next day when Jessie
and his men went there. A laborer might have been hiding there. Bill
Bailey had devised a brilliant plan to drive away a far superior force.
Dan Lee had performed brilliantly in his command position. The men of
both forces had done a superior job.
Unfortunately for "F"
Company, though, we would see Dan Lee no more. He did not return
from the hospital, and was sent home directly. We concluded that a
second shot in the leg was one shot too many for Lt. Lee. We would
have been glad to have the 3d Lt. and his men operate with us but we
never saw them again. One might think this vindicates some guerrillas,
but the Third Lieutenant let us know quickly that they were not
guerrillas. They were Philippine Regulars. After seeing them in action
we knew it. This was a classic action - well scouted, well planned, and
well executed.
The two agricultural
experts, M. Scott and Mr. Sanford, now arrived at Victorias, and I
was given the task of seeing to their welfare while they assessed the
agriculture facilities in the sector. Much of their time was spent in
examining the Victorias Milling Company and several other sugar mills.
Mr. Scott was probably fifty years old and a long time employee of the
United States Department of Agriculture, with years of experience in the
Philippines. Mr. Sanford was probably fifteen years his junior. Their
assignment was to assess the damage and estimate how long it would take
to get the "bread basket" back into production. The Victorias Milling
Company was a small town mill, and little damage had been done to
it, so operations could begin with little effort.
Mr. Scott, whom I got to
know quite well, was well familiar with the region, and with the social
system which had developed there. It was a throwback in time, and
entirely feudal in nature. We had seen as much already and had formed
the very same opinion. The planters owned thousands of hectares of land,
and with ownership of the land seemed to come the ownership of the
laborers who worked it. Sugar cane
was the money crop, and there was no land entitlement except bare
self-sufficiency at the mercy of the plantation owners. It was an
ideal climate and they produced two crops a year. Many growers had
acquired large coconut groves, rice fields, and other crop lands. These
planters, Scott told me, were amongst the richest people in the world.
Many planted, vacationed in Europe until harvest time, came home for for
harvest time, and started the cycle over again. "When a planter dines in
a fine restaurant in Europe," he added, "they take a spoonful of sugar
from the sugar bowl and throw it on the floor. This is the international
sign of the sugar planter." After a couple of days their task was
completed, and I took them back to Bacolod.
While
we were at Victorias one of the planters, living out in his rural
hacienda, offered us his cars. He took us to a large bamboo thicket where some of his
employees had recently cut a wide path into the thicket. Were it
not for the path, no one would ever have noticed a corrugated steel
building hidden there. It was a sizeable building, and inside it were
twelve cars. Most were large, expensive cars. One was sent to Bacolod to
serve as a limousine for visiting VIP's. I believe it was a Packard or
a Cadillac. One was a small, older car, a Whippet. We were
tempted to take this one to Victorias and use it for our own purposes,
but RCT had told us that under no circumstances were we to remove any of
the other cars, except the limousine they had selected.
Late
one afternoon a wrinkled, gray-headed old Filipino and his ancient wife
came up the asphalt, U-shaped drive to the front of the municipal
building. He was leading a caribou which pulled a two wheel cart. The
old woman was sitting in the cart. They stopped at the entrance, the old
woman got out, and the old man pulled out a tightly bound Jap soldier
who had been lying on the bed of the cart. In fact the old woman had
been sitting on him. They spoke no English, so one of the locals had to
interpret their Western Visayan dialect. The old man's nose had almost
been severed. The old man said early that morning the Jap had come into
their house up in the mountains brandishing a bayonet and demanding
food. The old man had refused, and the Jap struck him across the nose
with his bayonet. The old man subdued the Jap, bound him up, and they
headed for Victorias to turn the Jap over to us. Fortunately, the
old fellow had brought the severed nose with him.
We
put the Jap in the
city jail and sent the old man and woman to Bacolod for medical
treatment. There, our surgeons
and medics sewed the old man's nose back into place, and ultimately sent
him back to us by jeep. The fellow hitched up their caribou and
cart, his wife climbed into the cart, and they were last seen headed
back for the mountains and home. Like mountain folk everywhere these
people were tough. |
