I have just discovered your website and have already spent a couple of hours there tonight. I am sure I will return to it often. My father, Doug Menefee, was with the 503rd but I don't think he was at Corregidor. I was lucky enough to accompany he and my mother to several reunions and had the honor of meeting some of your members. My first grandson was born this year and although he will never know his Great Grandfather, I think it is important for him to know my Dad's story. Thank you for your time and effort to keep this history alive.
Sincerely
Sharla Thomason
Ed,
My Dad was T5 Art Hansen. I really appreciate this website. I found this website, and a picture of Dad in the California group that was taken after the battle. I was in the Marine Corps, and my son is presently on active duty in the Marines. I emailed him the picture of my dad after the battle, and it has obviously been something neither of us ever expected to see.
Gene Hansen
Paul
We do our avocations as labors of love, and the time we get for them is precious indeed.
I just thank you for the work you're doing. We're capturing primary history while it's still there ... and it's very late in the day.
John Perkowski
Paul-
Greatly appreciate your time and effort - I am honored to be part of the website.
Shelly Zimbler
Hi Paul
After reading what it costs
to run a website, I for
God bless you for your
interest in the 503rd & these old guys! Hope to see
you this fall in Branson,
Mary Pfeffer,
Wife of William J. Pfeffer
Dear Sir,
Hello my name is Samuel, I discovered your "documentary" web site of Corregidor by accident. The 60th anniversary of the fall of Bataan is fast approaching and I was searching the web for a place that would enlighten me about any upcoming events, if any, concerning Bataan and Corregidor.
I am so disgusted with the History Channel because all they ever cover in their documentaries are all about D-Day in Europe, Churchill, Eisenhower and Hitler. In the entire time that I have been watching the History Channel only once did I ever watch a documentary about Bataan - and it was a short one about the death march. So much exhaustive and over documenting the European theatre of operations has made me hopeless and suspicious about the History Channel. Did they intentionally forget that Americans also gave their lives in this corner of the world?
It only leads me to believe that history is once again repeating itself, the men who were once abandoned back in 1942 are again being forsaken for their deeds and sacrifices.
The government has short changed them for proper and full compensations after the war and now the History Channel is being biased by only covering the war in Europe and other pacific theatres of operation in lieu of the men of Bataan and Corregidor. Those bungling snafu bureaucrats like secretary Stimpson once wrote off the Philippines as EXPENDABLE and that sometimes men must die should have been tied at the ends of battery Geary's mortars before firing.
I have always been fascinated and interested with history, particularly about Bataan and Corregidor, for I have an uncle who has been a Philippine Scout before and during outbreak of the war, and my father-in-law is also a Bataan veteran. Both gentlemen survived the Death March. I emailed the history channel but got a lame response.
Your web site is a site to behold. I could not help but be filled with nostalgia and memories of the souls who served there. Although I was not yet born in those days, through the stories of my uncle and my father- in-law and other veterans whom I have talked (many are now deceased) surfing your website I feel like I am passing back into the corridors of time. It is so moving, like a novel that once begun is hard to put down.
Sadly the long gray line is getting shorter and shorter as the years pass. I just wish that many of the stories of those still alive will be preserved in books and video tape.
Respectfully and truly yours,
Samuel C. Labrador
(USN Ret)
[email protected]]
Had a long telephone call from Guy Crull, the Murder Inc. Sherman Tank driver. You would not believe how excited he was to talk with someone who knew about the incident. It was hard getting a word or a question in edgewise. He was taken to Hollandia where he spent many months being treated for his troubles. Among other things, he lost most of the flesh from his right arm. While he was in Hollandia he met a bunch of our men who had been badly wounded.
Yes, you do have some significant successes you can be proud of with the CT&N page. You have uncovered several people who discovered just what they had been hoping for as a historic resource. You, also, have provided an outlet for some of the pent up memories of some of us old WW II has-beens. In the latest, I gather Crull's daughter is going to drag out his memories of that fateful day he happened onto a practically unremembered postage stamp of an Island in the Philippines.
All your hard work is paying off--thanks.
Don Abbott
Robbie,
We don’t find Corregidor to be a haunting place. It is restful, and as peaceful a place of burial as one could ever desire. You should consider visiting it, and lay to rest any fears you have of it. Many of the veterans, once they revisited it once, found themselves returning every time they could. Bill Delich came every year. The last occasion he visited his post (Searchlight No. 1) he had to be carried there on a sedan chair, and then on someone’s back. It was the one place in the world he could find rest and peace.
If you
visit it once, I feel certain you will visit it again.
I’ve found that to be it’s only curse.
Regards,
Paul
Whitman
Editor - Corregidor Then and Now
----o0o----
Dear Mr. Whitman,
Thank you for your kind note. I understand that times have changed and things are different now. My own son, who is in the Navy, was stationed in the P. I. for several years. He and his wife enjoyed it very much. They even took a tour to Corregidor and made pictures for me. However, I still have very sad memories of a young man who left Lufkin, Texas and never returned. My widowed mother didn't really get over his death and died at the age of 43. I was 5 years old at the time my brother left, but I still remember his big smile. I'm just so sorry that so many good men lost their lives on Corregidor and Bataan. My first cousin, Gerald Redd, was killed during the Death March. Our little community was in turmoil. My Mom would tell me that the only thing that gave her comfort was knowing that my brother loved The Lord Jesus Christ.
Sincerely,
Mrs. Robbie Bowling
----o0o----
8 July 2000
Robbie,
This may be very important to you - You wrote me about Aubrey being killed about 17 April 1942. Quite coincidentally, I have located a history of his Battery, which is missing the second page. After the missing page, it specifically mentions Aubrey L. Collins as a casualty, and the men who died with him. (He didn’t die on Corregidor, but on Caballo Island, which is about a mile south of Corregidor.) Here is that document. (Enclosed) Do you perchance have a copy of this? With the missing page two? I'm sorry I can't locate the missing page as yet. We may be close. I've put out an APB for it to a few people who might also have a copy of what I sent you. Once we locate missing page 2, we might get closure for you.
Regards,
Paul
Whitman
Editor - Corregidor Then and Now
----o0o----
Dear Mr. Whitman,
You are wonderful. Yes, my brother did go to the P. I. on the Republic. In fact, he sent a picture of it to my mom. He wrote letters in pencil, which faded after all these years, but several years ago, I tried to go through them. He talks about working in the War Room, about the "Disappearing Gun", and how good his battery was becoming.
His last letter said that Japanese planes were overhead, but he didn't think they would be there very long. I called my brother in Texas immediately to warn him about the content of your message. He said by all means send it on. I have one sister in Tucson, Arizona, and as soon as she gets home, I'll warn her and send it on. It really shook me up to know FINALLY how he died. Thank God the Japanese didn't get him. That would have been much worse. Thank you so much for sending all this information. My family and I will always appreciate you and honor you.
Sincerely,
Robbie Bowling
----o00----
Robbie,
It was your brother's Battery "I" that allowed us to track his details down. Do you realize that the men who wrote those Battery History documents did it because they wanted next of kin to know what happened on the island in case they died - which most of the officers corps did when being transported to Japan on the hell ships. The original manuscripts were buried in the soil of the prison camp before they were moved out. I have no idea of what happened to the manuscripts post-war, and this document mentioning your brother only came into my hands in January 2000 from a Corregidor/POW Survivor, Al McGrew of San Diego. He will no doubt be glad that he has had the major role in passing on the word.
I don't know if you know, but I'm here in Brisbane, Australia and most of the material for the entire site is contributed from other people's collections and e-mails. There's a small bunch of very, very special people in the US supporting me. I am going off air now for the day. Sleep well.
Regards
Paul Whitman
----o0o----
Dear Mr. Whitman,
I have now passed on your information to my sister and to my brother. They asked me to thank you so very much for your kindness. No, we do not have page 2 of the documents. We have never seen this paper before. In fact up to a few hours ago, we did not know how our brother died.
Through the years I have wondered if he died of a wound, from hunger, or was bombed. I have read every thing that I could find on the subject and came to the conclusion that he probably got hit by a bomb. A young soldier came to our house in Texas and my mother asked him, "How did my son die?" He just ran out the door crying.
Thank you again, Mr. Whitman.
Sincerely,
Robbie
----o0o----
I don't deserve the credit, I'm just the latest in a long chain of people who have been involved in this episode. Thanks is due to all of our small bunch of very very special people.
Paul Whitman
Editor
Hi! -
Just read some very interesting stuff about the "Rock".
I was there when the war started, stationed at the Ft. Mills Station Hospital. I am looking forward to visiting your web site again.
Grateful to God to be in reasonably good health after the POW experience.
Thanks
Roy Thulson
[[email protected]]
.
Dr. Mr. Whitman,
Please excuse the background. My name is Jackie Guiliani, and I am Patti
Donath's daughter. * I have recently found out about a scholarship in regards to
a paper concerning WWII. I have always been interested in history and
managed to keep straight A's in my history classes at school. I don't want
to bore you but for a small bit of background I will be attending ISU in August
and I am in need of major financial help, so when I ran across this scholarship
opportunity I was thrilled the only problem is it has to be postmarked by March
15, that's Thursday. I know I can put together a paper, but I really want
it to gleam, because this is one of the few scholarships I actually have a
fighting chance of getting. I am not athletic nor a straight A student
just slightly above average (when I put my mind to it). Anyways enough
about me. The topic is "why should we remember WWII?" And the more
information and quotes the better, so any information you could send me in the
next day or so would be tremendous. Thanks Again,
Jackie A. Guiliani
(*Patti Donath is the Daughter of Guy Crull, the sole survivor of the tank crew at Monkey Point.)
Dear young lady,
I will not write your essay, but
hope to give you an approach to it.
History did not begin the day you
were born. What happened before you were born directly influenced your birth,
and will influence your life. History is prologue. If you don't want to
understand the world around you, ignore history, and you'll never know what is
going on. You will live in ignorance, until someone more powerful will come
along and take what is yours. Your liberty, your freedom.
WWII was the largest war ever. It
extended around the globe. More
people died in it because human history had come to a crossroad. Would history
go on the road where the individual was more important than the machine of
government, or would it take the road where the machine of government was more
important than the individual? There were two
conflicting theories. Does the government get its power from the people,
or does the government use its control over people for the greatness of the
government. It became clear that this question had not been settled in the first
war.
Adolf Hitler decided to take Poland
for the greater glory of his German Government. England and France
objected. Germany took France, and the only people who fought back were England
and its former colonies – Australia and Canada. But they were not strong enough
to win. Germany decided that it wanted Russia too, so it invaded Russia as well.
America didn't care, it wanted to stay neutral. President Roosevelt decided that
unless Hitler could be stopped, he would win. So he did whatever he could, short
of war, to hinder Germany, and its
ally, Japan. Japan had been taking bits of China for several years, and
Roosevelt agreed with Churchill that the two of their countries should have a
showdown. They called out the bully. That was the politics of it.
One thing many people overlook – the greatest part of the fighting of the war was in Russia, between the Russians and the Germans. They weren't fighting for democracy. They were fighting for something even more important. The Russians fought because the Germans denied them any human rights at all.
Politicians make wars but they don't fight them. They send their nations, their sons and daughters, out to fight and die. Should we remember the politicians? No.
We should remember the people who went and fought. Many of them died, and many came so close to death that their lives would never be the same again.
Look what they did when they put their minds to it!
We don't own history, we only hold it in trust for our children. People who experience, achieve and survive something extraordinary, when others have not, voluntarily shoulder certain obligations upon themselves, not just for society, but also for those of their contemporaries who did not survive.
This is Spielberg's premise, isn't it, of Saving Private Ryan?
One of the more poignant obligations of surviving is to relate the experience, on behalf of those who cannot. The knowledge of surviving veterans, whose time is shortly upon them, is a living treasure. Their memories, but our treasure. One of the obligations of the generation that follows them is to record their human experiences, their humanity, and not just their history. Fragments of their humanity are our treasures in trust, valuable only when we can renew their experience by passing them on. So called historians can come along a hundred years later, and tell us what their history was. Yet only those of us who can sit with the veterans in their parlour, and who listen closely, can record their humanity. There's a climactic soliloquy in the science fiction cult-movie Blade Runner which goes towards explaining the primary reason I'm trying to gather, and at the same time, educate what to many may seem an esoteric "knowledge" of the war. The astonished Blade Runner is watching helplessly as a tired looking Baty slumps down in a lotus position before him. Still cradling a dove, Batty smiles, almost bashfully, before saying:
"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched c-beams glitter in the dark near the Tanhauser Gate. All those...moments will be lost...in time...Like...tears...in rain. Time...to die."
I don't like things getting lost in time. If we don't recall their history, how can we understand when it is necessary to stop certain sorts of conduct by governments?
Paul Whitman
P.S. If you read my website, you will understand only one or two small battles – but maybe a lot more about the sort of people your grandfather's generation were. They went to war to fight for their country, but ended up fighting for their own lives, and the lives of their friends. Those who died relied on those who lived to tell their story. We should listen, before their voices fade and disappear entirely.
GREAT SITE! Been to THE ROCK twice. How do I become a member of the historical society?
Thanks.
Cpt.David A.
McGUIRE
[email protected]
Chicago,IL 60646
Dear Paul,
Thank you for all you are doing to honor my father and the men of the 503rd. Without you, they would have no tribute.
I really appreciate your time in giving a voice to my father after all these years. I think if people see the photos of his hometown and his family, they will appreciate more the sacrifices made by so many of our soldiers because it makes them come alive as people and not just as names on a stone.
Dolane Larson
Dear Paul,
As for myself: I´m 49 years old, from Denmark, Paymaster Lt-Cdr, RDN, retired, now in the IT-business. I´ve been interested in fortification and artillery ever since I was teenager, and I've continued collecting information about these subjects. Thanks to the internet it's far more easy now than then.
In Denmark the Coast Artillery was transferred from the Army to the Navy in 1932, thus being a orphan child, as no one cares much about it until after WWII, when in 1949 a major NATO-program modernized it. During the later years of my career in the Navy I was lucky enough to service on most of what was left of it, as the Coast Defence was fully integrated in the Navy in 1962 (30 years after the its transference from the Army) only the the most modern parts of the installations survived. The last fort in service was closed down last year. It was STEVNSFORT, where I was from 1991 to 1993. Built in 1952-53, the fort is situated slightly withdrawn from a 20 metres high cliff facing the Baltic Sea. The armament consisted of 2 twin 150 mm guns in turrets (originally manufactured for the German pocket-battleship Gneisenau), 1 single 150 mm gun in turret, 6 twin 40 mm AA guns Bofors and 7 single mobile 40 mm AA guns Bofors. Except for the armament and radars all installations are cut out in the chalk underground 15 metres below the ground surface. An interesting place I could tell you a lot more about.
For now I will study all that material I've have downloaded from your site,
Claus Christiansen
Dear Sirs,
Found your site on the internet and the opening chapters of Dr. Bradford's fascinating book. Am an American living in the Philippines (Los Banos) and am eagerly anticipating my first trip to Corregidor. I was born in 1943, so this will be a step into history for me. It's important that you continue the story to help us realize what America is and should be.
Thanks for your efforts so far.
Carl Afman
Paul and Pop,
Thanks!
Paul, I saved the URL to favorites right after I stopped laughing about "you can
learn how to cope either with getting shot at, or computers, and that you chose
getting shot at as the easier of the two."
Warm wishes,
Brenda White
Hello,
Just found this site by typing in my Dad's name, Gertus Jones.
I wish I had found this before we lost Dad, November 29th of 2000. Dad was always so proud to be an American, and at his funeral, this poem was read by the minister. I am so honored and blessed to have had my Dad in my life for so many years. I still feel him very close.
Thanks so much for putting this on the net. I forwarded this to my brother Robin to share with the rest of the family. God bless.
Sincerely,
Becky (Jones) Hill
RR #1 Box
144Sweet Springs, MO 65351
[email protected]
Dear Sir,
I can not tell you how wonderful it was to
stumble across your web site, it was there that I
found a little information about my Grand father.Wirt R. Cates, he was the CO of
503d B Co and KIA on
Thank you for your web site, it really is
terrific!
Cheers,
Christine Cates
[email protected]
Thank you for this 503 Mail page and all of the other sites pertaining to the 503 Regimental Combat Team.
Sincerely,
[email protected]
(James Benson)
Thank you so very much! You were very helpful, with the info you gave I looked the two units. It seems the 60th was an Anti Aircraft Unit, from one of the few stories I remember my Grandfather telling me, he & his unit were on combat alert when the Jap. Navy paid a visit. As I recall he said their guns were pointed right at the ships as the sailed past the Island. So I am guessing he was in the 59th.
Once again thank you very much for your help.
Semper Fi
John Rondina
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