As I See It: Two uncles dead in battle for Intramuros

By: Neal H. Cruz
Philippine Daily Inquirer

Before the month of February ends, which is the anniversary month of the liberation of Manila by American forces, I would like to write about the deaths of two of my uncles and the narrow escape of my aunt and her 7-year-old son from the Japanese in the battle for Intramuros.

We lived on an idyllic island in the middle of fishponds in Malabon, but an uncle had a shoe store on Calle Real in Intramuros. It was called Real Shoe Store and was one of the most popular shoe stores there during the Japanese occupation. The store sold made-to-order shoes and boots to Japanese officers.

Workers made the shoes at the back of the store. The second floor was the living quarters for my aunt (the younger sister of my mother), her husband and their young son, and her brother who was crippled by polio.

My eldest sister used to take me there on some Sundays, and I liked it very much because on the way there we passed through the Mehan Gardens which had a zoo with many animals.

After the Americans landed in Leyte and later in Lingayen, and as the battle for the liberation of the Philippines raged closer to Manila, we were advised to evacuate to the provinces as many other families had already done. My aunt and uncles, however, refused to leave. Business was good, the war was still far away and they wanted to earn as much as they could before the battle reached them. That was a big mistake.

The three youngest children in the family, I and two brothers, were told to evacuate with the family of my oldest brother, his father-in-law and mother-in-law, and the families of three brothers-in-law.

We set out on foot with two pushcarts piled high with our belongings. It was like an outing for us children. We were bound for a farm in Pangasinan, and it was estimated that it would take us at least a week of walking to get there.

We cooked our food at the side of the highway and slept either on the ground or in some of the abandoned huts near the road. We bought what we could from markets along the way.

My eldest sister and older brother and my grandfather were left in our house in Malabon. My father and his new family were living in an apartment on Lepanto Street, Sampaloc, Manila. Meanwhile in Intramuros, my aunt and uncles were blissfully unaware of the coming holocaust. They were too busy raking in Mickey Mouse money from the Japanese.

At Barrio Agoso in Tarlac, two American bombers, Liberators, swooped very, very low. We thought they were going to land. But they only dropped leaflets. They said that American forces had landed in Lingayen and were fighting their way to Manila, and advised Filipinos to stay away from the highway and move inland so they would not get caught in the crossfire.

We were in a quandary. If we continued on to Pangasinan, we would meet the American troops and we probably would get killed in the crossfire between the American and the Japanese forces. The barrio folk in Agoso knew that, too, and kindly invited us to go with them across the wide river to a barrio on the other side.

We accepted the offer, and that same afternoon there was a mass evacuation from Agoso to the other barrios on the other side: San Jose, Sta. Maria and Sto. Niño.

The barrio folk piled their belongings into their carabao-drawn carts and led the trek across the river. The river was very wide, but it was summer and there was only a stream flowing in the middle, and pools of water were scattered here and there. The rest was white sand that became so hot in the middle of the day you could not walk barefoot on it. Luckily, the sun was on the way down and we could walk behind the carts.

We led an idyllic life there until Manila was liberated and we went back home.

My relatives in Intramuros, however, went through hell. As the sound of the big guns came closer, they decided to leave. But it was too late. All the bridges across the Pasig had been blown up. They could not go south because there was fighting there.

So they went back to Calle Real. One day, Japanese soldiers went from door to door and told the residents to gather in a church. The men were separated from the women and children.

The men, including my two uncles, were taken to Fort Santiago, but the women and children were taken to a church. They stayed there while the battle raged nearer and nearer. Shrapnel from exploding artillery tore through the roof and windows, but the church remained standing. The people inside took shelter under the pews and even behind the altar. My aunt put a basin on the head of her son as if that would protect him from shrapnel. It turned out, a very small piece tore through the basin and wounded him in the forehead.

When—from the sounds of battle—they knew there was already house-to-house fighting, the church doors opened and there stood several Japanese soldiers. They poured gasoline inside the church, and one Japanese then threw in two incendiary grenades.

Fire raged and everybody thought they were going to die. Luckily, the doors were left open by the Japanese hurrying to get away. So many of the refugees were able to rush through the fire and escape. My aunt, now almost 100 years old, is still alive to tell us the story of their harrowing escape.

My two uncles were not as lucky, however. Their deaths were told by the few who were able to get away.

They were packed into a cell in Fort Santiago. Some of them began chipping off the adobe roof of the cell. In time, they were able to punch a hole, just big enough for a body to push through. Just then, Japanese soldiers poured gasoline into the cell and lighted it. There was pandemonium as everybody rushed to the escape hole.

One uncle, the husband of my aunt, was already out, but my other uncle, the cripple, called out to him for help. So he went back although the fire was already licking at him. The two of them, and many other prisoners, never got out.

A Philippine Scout's Diary: Revenge Bataan Unit

The Year was 1945.

I was part of the contingent of Philippine Scouts that greeted the first Americans at Lingayen, Pangasinan. We were briefed the night before by our commanding officer to accompany the GIs on their way to Manila to liberate the more than 3,000 prisoners of war interred at the University of Santo Tomas Campus.

So off we went with the 2nd squadron, 8th Cavalry Regiment of the US Army’s 1st Cavalry Division under the command of a certain Lt. Col. Haskett Connor, with tanks, jeeps, weapons carriers, command cars, trucks and engineering and service outfit with one task in mind -- to liberate UST from the enemy.


February 2 -

We encountered a stiff resistance from a hard-fighting unit of the Japanese Imperial Army in the highways off Bigaa, about 18 miles from Manila, but their weapons were no match for our mounted light and heavy machine guns as well as 20 mm & 40 mm mortars. We annihilated them in no time and squeezed into the blown up bridges and pockmarked dirt roads with minimal casualties.

February 3-

We were able to move from Bigaa at noon to Sta. Maria just before midnight with sporadic clashes with the rag-tag enemies. At dawn we could hear the bell tolls from nearby churches and chapels, a signal that the town was liberated of the last bands of Japanese resistance.

The “Japs” fought to the last man. There were no prisoners taken.

Then at 10:00 A.M., on our way out of Sta. Maria, Col. Connor received a report that our Recon team was ambushed and wiped out. We positioned our artillery and shelled the Japanese position. After about an hour or two, a lull in the fighting was declared and we passed by the burning Japanese tanks and the dead bodies littered on the ground. But there were lots of skirmishes and pocket resistance from the “Japs” that slowed down our advance.

A staff meeting was immediately called and Col. Connor was now growing impatient because our objective was to be in Manila before dark. He told us that we should annihilate the last enemy at all costs and be in Manila by twenty hours.

It was raining hard when we finally arrived at Novaliches about eight miles from Manila. The dirt road turned into a soggy slippery mess, bogging down our advance, when all hell broke loose. The Japanese resistance was heavy. From the two-story house on the other end, we could see the smoke and the heavy volume of fire, and hear the familiar staccatos of the Japs’ Machine guns and 75s.

But the 'Revenge Bataan Unit' would not be denied, and after another hour of fierce fighting, the last resistance in Novaliches was finally silenced what with the two-story house that served as the maching gun nest leveled to the ground from the constant bombarding from our tanks and 105-howitzers.

We proceeded without any resistance until we reached the Chinese Cemetery, when a young boy warned us that there were a handful of Japanese soldiers inside, but after consultation with his officers and Filipino volunteers, Col. Connor decided to bypass them and proceed to our main objective.

We passed by Grace Park Airfield with its hangars burning briskly from constant US bombardments, and then we swung into the area of Rizal Avenue until we finally reached the walls of UST. We could see that fires were burning over much of the city.

The half of the University of Santo Tomas front gate was open and the inside was black. We shouted in the dark and got no answer. Then two tanks rumbled into the front gate with their powerful lights turned on. We cut a hole in the fence and crawled in, but saw nothing.

Then, near the guard house at the gate entrance, a Jap with his Arisaka rifle jumped out from nowhere and fired point blank at us. The flash from the gun momentarily blinded me. When I regained my sight, the Jap was gone and my two companions lay dead, but I was miraculously unharmed.

Then a battle basic medium tank rammed and broke into the concrete fence as if it were corrugated cardboard. We made our way inside the Campus with bullets whizzing in between and above our heads from the enemies holed up inside.

Then somebody shouted "Grenade!" and we all scampered and dropped to the ground, but it was nothing but a knee-jerk reaction from an overly anxious soldier that made some of us laugh albeit nervously.

Then an excited voice coming from the main building was heard, "You Americans?

"Yes"

Followed by a chorus of-

"Thank God you're here."

"Oh how long we’ve waited."

"God Bless America!"

Suddenly, there was firing from the Education Building, just to the right of the Main Building. We were told that about 65 “Japs” with 201 American interns were holed inside. The “Japs” were on the second floor, the Americans on the third. The troops attempted to break in, but the enemy had an overwhelming advantage -- besides, the Education Building was composed of steel-reinforced concrete.

February 4-

There were short and sporadic exchanges of fire between our men surrounding the building under Col. Connor and the Japs inside, and we suffered light casualties as the day wore on. The next day negotiations went on and it was agreed upon to give the Japanese forces safe conduct passes which was accepted by some of the men grudgingly. The Officers told their men to keep their fingers off the trigger and honor the terms of the agreement.

We hastily formed a unit to escort the remnants of the Japanese Army out of UST with Col. Connor himself leading it. Slowly but surely, the Japanese soldiers emerged and staggered from the building and marched in formation with their weapons, until we arrived at Legarda and Aviles Sts.

Col. Connor then told a certain Col. Hayashi, the Commander of the Japanese Army,

"This is as far as we go. This is the front line. You are on your own."

They then saluted each other as the Japanese Army marched up north to live and fight another day, but we couldn’t care less, for what was important at that point in time were the lives of the Prisoners of War that we liberated.
#

(As told to the author, Bill Mitsuru T. Shimizu, by Mang Berting, an indigent patient and a frail old man in his 80’s during a Medical Mission in Bagong Nayon, Antipolo, Rizal in 1996)

Reveille: February 1945

By: Ramon Farolan
Philippine Daily Inquirer


This is for the generations of young Filipinos who have never known the difficulties, the deprivations and the horrors of war.

* * *

On Sept. 2, 1945, aboard the US battleship Missouri, Japanese Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu signed the Instruments of Surrender, formally ending World War II. In the euphoria of victory, not many people remembered that six months earlier, Manila, once the proud “Pearl of the Orient,” was completely destroyed in a battle that some historians considered unnecessary. And if there was a rape of Nanking, there certainly was a rape of Manila.

During the last few months of the Pacific War, our family stayed in Ilocos Norte, while my father, Modesto Farolan, remained in Manila where he served as the general manager of the Philippine National Red Cross. At that time, the Red Cross offices were on Isaac Peral St. (now UN Avenue) corner Taft Avenue. It was a modest two-story building that was built in 1932 and was now converted into an emergency hospital. In February 1945, it was the only building left standing in the area. Most others had been destroyed by American shellfire or were burnt by Japanese marines defending the city.

In his book “By Sword and Fire,” Alfonso J. Aluit provides a graphic account of some of the events that took place in Manila from Feb. 3, 1945 (when a column under Gen. William Chase reached Santo Tomas internment camp to free American prisoners) up to March 3 (when the Battle for Manila officially ended). The account includes my father’s experiences during this period.

After the war, my father would relate to us what happened to him on a Saturday in February that year: In the afternoon of that day, he was in his office with a volunteer nurse Marina de Paz, when Japanese Marines entered the Red Cross premises shooting and bayoneting everyone in sight despite protestations that it was a Red Cross Hospital. One of the victims was Corazon Noble, a popular movie star of the pre-war era, who was stabbed several times in the chest, abdomen, back and other parts of her body while protecting her 10-month-old baby in her arms.

As soon as one of the Japanese soldiers opened his door and went on a shooting rampage targeting anyone in the room, my father ducked underneath his desk and luckily was partially covered by the falling body of one of the doctors who got hit in the first volley of fire. Author Aluit continues that “the Japanese peered under the desk where Modesto Farolan crouched and fired twice. The bullets passed between his feet. The Japanese turned to the others in the dispensary, killing a mother with her 10-day-old baby and the baby’s grandmother as well. Under his desk, Modesto Farolan froze. He could hear shooting from all over the building. He could hear screams of terror and pain, the agonized cries of women and children, and the sound of feet scurrying in panic every which way.”

One of the more pitiful accounts in Aluit’s book, which reads like a page from a Holocaust story, concerns the rounding up of families in the Ermita section of Manila. The residents were gathered at Plaza Ferguson and the young women and girls, some 400 out of 1,500, were brought to the Bayview Hotel fronting Dewey (now Roxas) Boulevard, while the men and children were dispersed among other buildings in the area.

“The group of young women and girls brought to the Bayview Hotel was composed of many nationalities. Aside from Filipinas and Chinese, there were caucasians, mestizas of Spanish, American, Russian, French, Portuguese parentage.

“Some of the ladies were assigned rooms in the hotel but the big mass of them was confined in the main dining room on the second floor.

“From this night, Bayview became a joro house, a brothel for the Japanese military. Singly or in groups, Japanese soldiers, sometimes intoxicated, would come into the rooms where the women were held. They would shine flashlights, lighted candles or kerosene lamps at the faces of the women and by force and violence take away the ones they would fancy into any of the rooms in the hotel.”

* * *

Another book, “The Battle for Manila” by three writers Richard Connaughton, John Pimlott, and Duncan Anderson, dwells more on the details of the battle. But the authors also bring up some interesting points.

Why was the battle fought? One of the reasons given was “General MacArthur’s personal obsession with Manila as a symbol of his promised return. Until he could hold the victory parade in the city and publicly hand power back to a Filipino Commonwealth government, his self-appointed task was incomplete… he viewed the capture of Manila as the key to victory, deciding to surround the enemy leaving them no avenue of escape. When this decision was carried out, Manila was doomed. As the Chinese strategist Sun Tzu pointed out more than 2,400 years ago, it is an integral aspect of the art of war to ‘leave a way of escape to a surrounded enemy’.”

Even before the city had been secured, there were detailed “Plans for Entry of the Commander-in-Chief and Official Party into the City of Manila,” issued by General Headquarters, Southwest Pacific Area, dated Feb. 2, 1945.

It was only on March 3 that Manila was completely in American hands and the organized resistance ended. A few days earlier, General MacArthur, speaking at Malacañang Palace, formally announced the reestablishment of of the Commonwealth government.

The tally of fatalities involved in Manila’s recapture was: 1,010 Americans, 16,665 Japanese (counted dead), and approximately 100,000 civilian inhabitants. In the fire raid on Tokyo in March 1945, 84,000 were killed. In the Hiroshima atomic bombing, casualties came up to 78,150. The destruction of Manila was on the same scale as the destruction of Warsaw, Poland, and slightly less than that of Berlin or Stalingrad.

The authors point out that “the manner in which hospitals and residential areas were systematically bombarded by US artillery is really indefensible. The desire of any commander to protect his men’s lives is understandable; it is what is expected of him. Where the line is drawn is when the guns of war are loosed upon inhabited areas where the enemy is either not present at all or present in such small numbers as not to justify carpet bombardment. There comes a time when the civilian population, even when it is not of one’s own nationality [they were friendly civilians—Filipinos], has to be a key consideration in deciding on the means employed.”

As Carmen Guerrero Nakpil narrates in her book “A Question of Identity: Selected Essays”: Those who survived Japanese hate did not survive American love. Both were equally deadly; the latter more so because it was sought and longed for.

* * *

Liberation can have many meanings. Death and destruction are two of them.

PGH 1945: Days of terror, nights of fear

The battle for the liberation of the Philippine General Hospital (PGH) on Taft Avenue in Manila was only one of a series of street-by-street, house-to-house and building-to-building fights that was the story of the liberation of the city in 1945. It was also one of the fiercest.

American and Filipino soldiers who participated in the liberation of Manila, which took place from Feb. 3 to March 3, 1945, told civilian survivors it took them three days to cross the intersection of Padre Faura Street and Taft Avenue, advancing toward Paco Cemetery.

The automatic weapons fire that raked the American lines from heavily defended buildings of the hospital and the University of the Philippines forced them to call for armor assistance in spite of the heavy artillery carpet barrages that the area was subjected to for one week.

My school, Ateneo de Manila on Padre Faura, was closed and taken over by the Japanese Imperial Army as it was considered American, and therefore, enemy property. The Japanese, however, allowed some schools, like De La Salle College on Taft Avenue, to reopen. It was then that my odyssey as an Atenean at De La Salle College began.

Blue invasion

Despite the “blue invasion,” the La Salle Brothers and La Sallites were kind to us Ateneans and treated us well.

After De La Salle suspended classes indefinitely, our family moved to Baguio City in early October 1944, returning only to PGH—where my father was confined—the following year.

Before they closed the school, the La Salle Brothers, acting with incredible courage and concern for the safety of the students under their care, decided to escort each of us home.

We were divided into groups, each made up of boys living in one district of Manila. I belonged to the Pasay group of about 50 students. During the battle, all the Brothers were mercilessly killed by the Japanese.

The battle caught us inside PGH.

On Feb. 7, 1945, we could hear artillery shells edging closer to us.

From the balcony of our suite, we watched the arching trajectory of artillery shells coming from somewhere in Sampaloc, tracing white lines against the black night sky and crashing around Port Area. The crackle of machine gun and rifle fire filled the air as fighting raged.

By Feb. 10, the US Army had set up its 105-millimeter batteries in Grace Park. There must have been other artillery batteries from the east as we heard the whine of shells flying over PGH in the direction of Dewey (now Roxas) Boulevard, where the Japanese had set up heavy naval guns facing Manila Bay. Soon enough, the first shells crashed on PGH.

We had not imagined the Americans would shell the hospital, which was full of thousands of patients, hospital staff and refugees from Malate, Paco and Singalong who were told by the Japanese to stay indoors or be killed. Our agony at PGH had begun.

Carpet bombing

During that week, which never seemed to end, artillery barrages came crashing down on us in carpet-bombing fashion: first PGH, then the Bureau of Science, St. Paul College, Assumption College and later, Ateneo de Manila and the University of the Philippines across Padre Faura and back to PGH.

Some shells seemed to have a delayed action fuse as these would shake the building first and explode a minute later, causing chaos. Patients and nurses were given the priority to sleep on the floor. The rest had to squat, remain standing or lean against the wall, sometimes for days. The doctors operated on the wounded without anesthesia, lights and water.

We later found out why the Americans where shelling PGH.

During the lulls, a piper cub would fly low over the hospital complex observing the accuracy and effect of the artillery barrage. No sooner would the plane fly overhead than Japanese soldiers would crisscross the grounds, firing at the aircraft. This only drew fire from the Americans.

We realized then why the Japanese had forced the people to hide inside—to make the Americans think that only Japanese soldiers were occupying the hospital and thus provoke the Americans into bombing it.

Courageous Jesuit

The artillery barrages started at 7 or 8 a.m., breaking off at lunch, then resuming in the afternoon. B-25 Mitchell bombers were now flying sorties at tree-top level strafing Japanese positions around PGH. Then P-51 Mustang fighter planes began showing up.

As the fighting raged closer to the hospital, rumors spread that a massacre inside the PGH compound was imminent.

Father Cabonce, the hospital’s courageous Jesuit chaplain, braved the shelling to administer to the wounded, and led the prayers ward by ward. He blessed the people and gave us general absolution. His courage and dedication to his ministry was one of the many inspiring acts of heroism during those agonizing days.

We were eventually transferred to the basement after Japanese soldiers lobbed smoke grenades inside our wards. It was difficult to sleep at night as we could hear soldiers roaming around looking for women.

Lamps were doused as soon as the sound of hobnailed boots could be heard approaching. Some soldiers wore split-toe black rubber shoes so they could tiptoe around undetected, pounce on a girl and drag her out into the night.

Cannon fire and prayers

The morning of Feb. 17 dawned on us brightly. We braced ourselves for the morning artillery barrage. The rapid staccato of “woodpecker” machine guns could be heard, backdropped by the rattle of musketry with occasional loud “whoomps” from bazookas or mortars.

We were resigned to the thought that we would die before the Americans arrived. There was almost no food and water for the thousands trapped inside the hospital.

A heavy barrage suddenly came crashing down on us, preceded by the all-too-familiar distant booming of cannons. Count six seconds and the shell would either hit you or fly overhead. By midmorning, the barrages came in quick succession. Machine-gun fire from both sides suddenly opened up in a deafening duel.

Heavy fire peppered the building with bullets without letup. There was a crash of exploding shells against concrete and the sound of ricocheting shrapnel and bullets. We were crouched under the elevator, but showers of sparks from exploding shells and shrapnel so terrified us that prayers asking God to save us filled the basement.

Then, as if by magic, all noise stopped. We heard the stomping of boots on the concrete floor over our heads as Japanese machine gunners set up weapons right on top of us. As they fired, responding heavy machine guns sent them scurrying to the back of the PGH compound.

Heroes, sung and unsung

After a deafening silence, we heard someone shout—then sing—“God Bless America” as approaching US soldiers were mobbed, embraced and kissed.

A stone’s throw away, Japanese soldiers were running back to PGH towards the Bureau of Science. We were still in a daze when we were led out to the front driveway. There, we saw a line of Sherman tanks facing the administration offices still in position before they delivered the point-blank barrage that preceded the assault on the hospital buildings.

There was a long line of ambulances, weapon carriers and trucks ready to evacuate the patients and hospital staff, supervised by fully armed, steel-helmeted American soldiers, while machine-gun fire continued to assault the UP complex.

PGH was liberated by elements of the 37th “Buckeye” Division of the American Army of liberation on Feb. 17 commandeered by Lt. Gen. Walter Krueger. Arrayed against them were crack units of the Japanese Imperial Marines under Vice Admiral Ranji Iwabuchi.

On the Feast of the Assumption of Our Lady on Aug. 15, Japan finally surrendered, and fighting in the Pacific War arena came to an end. The formal surrender took place on Sept. 2, when USS Missouri anchored on Tokyo Bay.

Battles have their heroes, sung and unsung. For many, their acts of bravery and heroism are known only to God. May they all rest in peace in the embrace of the Lord.
#

By Miguel P. Avanceña
Philippine Daily Inquirer

ON TARGET Pestaño’s case: The true story

By Ramon Tulfo
Philippine Daily Inquirer

The Office of the Ombudsman has revived the case of Ensign Philip Andrew A. Pestaño who was found dead with a bullet wound in the head aboard the Philippine Navy ship BRP Bacolod City on Sept. 27, 1995.

It’s surprising why the Office of the Ombudsman would believe there was foul play in Pestaño’s death when three police agencies ruled it a suicide.

The police agencies were the Western Police District (since renamed Manila Police District), the Criminal Investigation and Detection of the Philippine National Police and the National Bureau of Investigation.

Is the Ombudsman questioning the competence of these three law-enforcement agecies?

Is the Ombudsman also questioning the competence of Dr. Raquel B. del Rosario-Fortun, a private forensic pathologist, whose services were hired by Pestaño’s parents?

Dr. Fortun undertook the study of the cause of Pestaño’s death with the Department of Legal Medicine, Kobe (Japan) University School of Medicine, with the department chair, Prof. Yoshitsugu Tatsuno.

Fortun also ruled the young Navy officer’s death a suicide.

Now what?

* * *

Pestaño’s parents, Felipe and Evelyn, would not accept Fortun’s findings even if they were the ones who hired her.

They insist their son was killed by fellow Navy personnel who were allegedly covering up an irregularity aboard the ship.

Why can’t they accept the fact that their son was despondent days before he committed suicide?

In fact, records at the Southern Command Hospital in Zamboanga City would show that Pestaño was taken there after he slashed his wrist days before the suicide.

He was referred to Lt. Col. Jose del Rosario, a neuro-psychiatrist for examination.

But for one reason or another, Pestaño was allowed to board the BRP Bacolod City.

Why was he despondent?

Pestaño was facing an administrative case filed by his former girlfriend.

Felipe and Evelyn allegedly forced their son to leave the woman for another because she happened to be a member of another religion.

Why can’t the Pestaños accept the fact they could have been the ones who drove Philip to commit suicide because of their meddling in his private affairs?