Battle of Manila (1945)

45

2 more Manila papers receive UP service

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – Two more pre-war client newspapers were receiving United Press service today from the newly-reopened Manila Bureau although street fighting continued in the city.

Service was resumed Saturday to the Philippine Herald and Mabuhay. Service had been resumed previously to the Fookien Times.

The Herald and Mabuhay are owned by Brig. Gen. Carlos P. Romulo, Philippines cabinet secretary for information and public relations and resident commission in Washington.

46

Völkischer Beobachter (February 13, 1945)

Manila in Flammen

Tokio, 12. Februar – Frontberichten zufolge toben die erbitterten Straßenkämpfe in Manila, die seit dem 2. Februar im Gange sind, mit unverminderter Heftigkeit weiter.

Die erste Angriffsspitze der US-Truppen, die in der Nacht zum 3. Februar das Regierungsgebäude, den Malacanang-Palast von Norden hereinzunehmen versuchte, wurde unter, blutigen Verlusten für den Gegner abgewiesen. In den darauffolgenden Tagen ging der Feind zur Großoffensive über, in der er Panzer, schwere Geschütze und auch amphibische Tanks zur Überquerung des Pasig-Flusses einsetzte. Einheiten der japanischen Armee, unterstützt von Marinelandtruppen, sind zum entschlossenen Gegenangriff angetreten, in dessen Verlauf jedes Haus, wie überhaupt jeder Meter Boden heiß umkämpft wird. Seit dem 4. Februar liegt Manila unter den dicken Rauchwolken riesiger Brände im Stadtgebiet.

Während der andauernden feindlichen Luftangriffe ist die gesamte Geschäfts- und Ladenstadt Manilas, die Rizal Avenue, völlig dem Erdboden gleichgemacht worden. Die wenigen Hochhäuser auf der Escolta, die noch nicht zerstört worden sind, befinden sich weiterhin fest in japanischer Hand. Erbitterte Kämpfe, die von beiden Seiten durch das Eingreifen der schweren Artillerie unterstützt werden, toben im Gebiet des Flugplatzes südlich von Manila.

Yankees verbluten auf Luzon

Tokio, 12. Februar – Die Ausblutungsstrategie General Yamashitas gegenüber den feindlichen Invasionsstreitkräften auf Luzon hat nach hier vorliegenden Meldungen seit dem 8. Jänner bereits zum Ausfall von rund 30.000 Mann der feindlichen Streitkräfte an Toten und Verwundeten geführt.

Somit haben die Amerikaner den vierten Teil ihrer auf 12 Divisionen geschätzten Truppen auf Luzon verloren. Weiterhin zerstörten die japanischen Einheiten in vier Wochen 172 feindliche Geschütze aller Kaliber, 200 Panzer und 260 Lastwagen beziehungsweise Traktoren, während 71 Flugzeuge abgeschossen wurden.

47

The Pittsburgh Press (February 13, 1945)

Three divisions joined in Manila

Fighting deadliest of Pacific war

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – Three U.S. divisions linked up inside Southern Manila today.

The Yanks blasted the Jap garrison back into the burning waterfront in the deadliest, close-in fighting of the entire Pacific war.

The decisive juncture, sealing off the last avenue of escape for the trapped Japs in Manila, came as Bataan and Corregidor across Manila Bay were rocking under a tremendous bombardment by hundreds of U.S. planes.

More than 200 tons of high explosives were showered down on Corregidor Saturday and Sunday, while a big fleet of Army and Marine planes ripped up the southern corner of Bataan with another 500 tons.

Guns knocked out

It was the greatest land-based aerial blow ever struck in the Pacific, and apparently was intended to clear the way for an amphibious assault on Corregidor. Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s communiqué reported that the giant guns on “the Rock” appeared to have been knocked out of action.

At the same time, a force of U.S. Thunderbolt fighters caught 35 troop-laden Jap barges off the east coast of Bataan in daylight Saturday and blew them out of the water, killing an estimated 2,500 enemy troops.

Herded toward bay

There was no indication whether the barges were evacuating troops from Bataan, Corregidor or Manila. There was even a remote possibility they may have been trying to sneak reinforcements into the capital to aid the Jap garrison in its finish fight.

Inside Manila, meanwhile, the survivors of several thousand enemy troops compressed into a narrow pocket south of the Pasig River were fighting with redoubled ferocity as the Americans herded them slowly back to the bay.

Gen. MacArthur revealed that virtually every street in the capital had been sown with mines and booby traps and that his troops were moving slowly to hold down casualties and spare the city from destruction insofar as possible.

The communiqué said units of the 1st Cavalry and 37th Infantry Divisions joined forces near the Paco railway station while other cavalry spearheads linked up with the 11th Airborne Division on the southwestern end of the capital near the Polo Club.

Planes hold off

The Japs now were compressed into a pocket measuring about three square miles.

The Americans were using artillery only against pinpointed targets and their overwhelming airpower was holding off because of the danger to Filipino civilians inside the Jap pocket.

Observers who had served in the European theater described the fighting as fiercer than any of the western battles, excepting possibly Stalingrad. Almost to a man, the Japs were fighting to the death for every street barricade and pillbox.

North of the capital, units of the U.S. 6th Armored Division cut Luzon in two with a lightning thrust to the island’s east coast at Dingalen Bay. Large quantities of ammunition were captured in the advance. Field reports said the Japs in that sector had retreated northward.

48

The Pittsburgh Press (February 14, 1945)

Two main prizes in Manila seized

Battle’s end in sight, MacArthur declares

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – Nichols Field and the U.S. Navy’s wrecked anchorage at Cavite were back in American hands today.

Gen. Douglas MacArthur proclaimed triumphantly that the end of the battle for Manila is in sight.

With Manila’s two main military prizes reconquered, Gen. MacArthur’s tanks and infantrymen swarmed in from all. sides to finish off the remaining Japs trapped along the flaming waterfront and around Fort McKinley, on the city’s southeastern outskirts.

The doomed Japs were writing off their three-year stay in Manila in a last orgy of fire and blood. Thousands of terror-stricken Filipinos escaped into the American lines with word that the Japs were massacring men. women and children indiscriminately in the teeming residential districts still under their control.

Inside the old Walled City, where the bulk of the enemy garrison was digging in for a last stand, the Japs barricaded the streets and ordered all civilians into their homes.

Then they fired the buildings and machine-gunned the occupants as they tried to flee.

Captured by paratroops

Units of the 11th Airborne Division, advancing on Manila from the south, captured the Nichols Airfield yesterday after more than a week of savage fighting, and then pushed on along the shores of Manila Bay to take the Cavite Naval Base.

At Cavite, which was burned once by the Americans before they abandoned it in December 1941 and now again by the Japs, Gen. MacArthur’s troops captured 10 enemy seaplanes and a battery of three-inch guns intact.

Armored spearheads of the U.S. 1st Cavalry Division, meanwhile, broke through to Manila Bay north of the 11th Airborne, clearing the Pasay District, and wheeled north toward the Walled City. They also mopped up a small Jap pocket around Nielson Airfield, near Fort McKinley.

The 37th Infantry Division was also moving in on the Walled City from the east and southeast, in conjunction with the 1st Cavalry.

Japs lose 68,000

Gen. MacArthur announced that the Japs so far have suffered more than 68,000 casualties in the five-week Luzon campaign, against 9,683 American losses – 2,102 killed, 192 missing and 7,389 wounded.

Eighty-five miles northeast of Manila, troops of the 6th Armored Division cut clear across Luzon win their second hold on the island’s east coast at Baler. Another column previously had reached the east shore at Dingalan Bay, 30 miles below Baler. The Baler Airfield was found abandoned.

Japs beaten off

Northeast of the Lingayen beachheads, the Japs attempted a night raid on Rosario but were beaten off in short order.

Systematic mopping-up operations were reported continuing in the foothills of the Zambales Mountains overlooking Clark Field and Fort Stotsenburg, 40-odd miles north-northwest of Manila.

49

Japs fire Catholic center, shoot fleeing refugees

Attempt to chain door fails – only 700 of 2,000 are believed to have survived
By Robert Crabb, United Press staff writer

MANILA, Philippines – The Japanese have run amok in southern Manila in a wholesale massacre of Filipino civilians trapped inside their lines.

Eyewitnesses said the Japs fired the Catholic refugee center at the College of La Concordia with incendiary grenades, after trying to chain the doors to prevent the refugees from escaping.

The center houses about 2,000 persons, including many blind, insane, wounded and sick. Only about 700 are known to have survived by running a mile-long gantlet of Jap gunfire.

Spanish-born Mrs. Denis Allmond, wife of a chief quartermaster in the U.S. Navy, escaped from the burning center with her two children, Denis Jr., 4, and Janet, 5.

Mrs. Allmond said the Japs tried several times to chain the doors of the main building at the center, which was operated by the Sisters of Charity.

Men inside the building, who had put out three fires started by the Japs, unchained the doors, and get most of the refugees out. Then the Japs mowed them down with machine-gun fire.

“All except about 700 were killed, including most of the infants,” Mrs. Allmond said.

Many of the Sisters, all of whom were Filipinos, were among the missing or known dead.

First-hand evidence of Jap atrocities was also uncovered by clean-up squads of the U.S. 37th Infantry Division. The Doughboys found the bodies of 200 Filipino men, women and children who had been killed by the Japs.

Many of the victims were bound before they were shot.

The bodies of eight members of the Filipino Constabulary were found in the Pasig River. They had been tied up, shot and then thrown into the river.

50

The Pittsburgh Press (February 15, 1945)

Japs in Manila make last stand

Yanks closing on old Walled City

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – U.S. troops today threw an armored cordon across the burning Manila waterfront.

The Yanks swung in from the south and east to storm the last big center of Jap resistance in the old Walled City.

The bulk of the Jap defenders were being herded slowly back behind the massive walls of the Spanish city – the Intramuros – under savage attack by tanks and infantrymen of the U.S. 1st Cavalry and 37th Infantry Divisions.

Face Jap Marines

Most of the Jap artillery in the area had already been silenced, and the main opposition came from machine-gun nests, snipers and hundreds of mines sowed through the streets.

The storming of the Intramuros, however, was expected to be a quick and bloody affair. Many of the enemy in the waterfront trap were known to be Imperial Marines, the toughest and most fanatical of all Jap troops. It was likely that their last stand would be a no-quarter fight to the death.

A smaller pocket of enemy resistance, centered around Fort McKinley on the southeastern outskirts of Manila, was also being reduced slowly by U.S. artillery and dive-bombers.

Gain on Bataan

Isolated Jap strongpoints also extended clear across the city from Fort McKinley almost to the waterfront. None of these strongpoints was held very strongly, however, and they were being mopped up by U.S. tank and infantry forces.

On Bataan, meanwhile, other U.S. troops cleaned out a number of troublesome Jap pockets along the Olongapo-Dinalupihan road traversing the top of the peninsula. The Yanks drove 11 miles down the east coast to capture Abucay. Abucay was the eastern anchor of Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s first defense line on Bataan in 1942.

Farther to the north, units of the 40th Infantry Division struck out into the hills west of Fort Stotsenburg. The troops routed strong Jap forces entrenched in a network of caves there and seized large quantities of food, clothing and ammunition.

51

The Pittsburgh Press (February 16, 1945)

Main Jap line on Bataan cut

Yanks in Manila continue mop-up

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – U.S. troops broke through the main Jap defense line on Bataan today. The Yanks advanced swiftly into the southern half of the peninsula to avenge the U.S. Army’s defeat there in 1942 – the bitterest of the war.

The breakthrough on Bataan came as other Yanks shot and bayoneted their way through the smoke-shrouded streets of Manila in a no-quarter battle against thousands of fanatical Japs holed up in the southern half of the city.

Vanguards of the U.S. 11th Army Corps all but sealed the conquest of Bataan yesterday with the capture of the Balanga-Pilar area in a five-mile advance down the east coast of the peninsula from Abucay.

Belanga and Pilar formed the eastern anchor of the defense line on which Lt. Gen. Jonathan M. Wainwright’s heroic troops made their last stand on Bataan in the dark days of 1942.

The fall of the two towns put Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s forces astride the only remaining lateral highway on Bataan, running from Pilar to the west coast town of Bagac. With that line cut, the remaining Japs on the peninsula-appeared to have little chance of waging organized resistance for any length of time.

South of Pilar, the Americans were pushing into rugged, mountainous terrain only 16 miles from the southern tip of the peninsula and about 18 miles from Corregidor.

Blast Corregidor

Corregidor, guarding the entrance to Manila Bay, was rocking continuously to the blast of American bombs in a non-stop bombardment that clearly pointed to an imminent amphibious attack on the island.

A force of B-24 Liberators heaped another 112 tons of bombs on the rock fortress Wednesday without drawing an answering shot from the island’s gun batteries. Headquarters observers warned, however, that “the Rock” is not likely to be an “easy murk” for an American landing, since the Japs are well entrenched there and probably have plenty of big guns emplaced deep in the island caves, out of reach of bombs.

Swarms of U.S. attack planes were supporting the drive down Bataan.

Gain slowly in Manila

Inside Manila, however, the advance was going ahead more solely, with the heaviest fighting centered around Fort McKinley, on the southeastern outskirts of the city, and on the eastern and southern approaches to the old Walled City on the Manila waterfront.

The Japs in both pockets were being whittled down steadily, but they were fighting hard and ruthlessly, burning everything in the wake of their retreat and slaughtering Filipino civilians inside their lines.

One strong enemy group barricaded themselves inside the Philippine General Hospital while the Yanks closed in from three sides, firing cautiously to avoid injury to a number of Americans believed to be in the building.

Japs tricked

Captured Jap documents revealed that the enemy had been tricked completely by the American landing at Lingayen Gulf, 110 miles north of Manila, apparently having expected the main attack to come in the Batangas area to the south.

As a result, the Japs were unable to put up a really strong defense north of Manila and the conquest of the northern half of the city was relatively easy.

South of the Pasig River, however, the enemy concentrated perhaps 20,000 crack troops in and around the city, and covered the streets with mines, artillery and machine guns in the mistaken belief that they could turn the capital into a death trap for Gen. MacArthur’s troops.

52

Liberated prisoners give $708 to Red Cross

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – The liberated Baguio internment camp has contributed 1,405 pesos, 56 centavos (about $708) in genuine Philippines currency and coin to the Red Cross, it was disclosed today.

The money, saved for more than two and a half years, represented a commissary surplus at the time the internees were transferred to Baguio from the former Army post, Camp John Hay, where they had to buy their own food.

53

The Pittsburgh Press (February 17, 1945)

Yanks recapture Bataan after seaborne invasion

All important objectives on peninsula quickly seized by MacArthur’s troops

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – U.S. troops have deemed historic Bataan with a bold seaborne landing on the southern shores of the peninsula under the guns of Jap-held Corregidor.

“We have captured Bataan,” Gen. Douglas MacArthur announced in a triumphant communiqué.

Less than 48 hours after the landing, all the peninsula’s militarily-important objectives were in American hands. Gen. MacArthur’s troops were pursuing the disorganized enemy over the same dark around where on April 11, 1942, some 30,000 Americans and Filipinos laid down their arms and began their tragic death march to Camp O’Donnell.

Japs flee into hills

Covered by the big guns of the U.S. Seventh Fleet and the bombs and bullets of hundreds of American warplanes, a big invasion convoy swept into the mouth of Manila Bay at dawn Thursday to spill tanks, troops and guns ashore at Mariveles.

The startled Jap coastal defenders fought back briefly, then broke and fled into the hills under a storm of rockets and gunfire.

Corregidor’s giant batteries, partially neutralized by days of continuous aerial and naval bombardment, fired a few bursts at the convoy but they were silenced quickly by salvoes from American cruisers and destroyers.

Captured by first wave

Mariveles, where the remnants of the American-Filipino army embarked for Corregidor after the fall of Bataan three years ago, was captured by the first wave of attacking infantrymen, who found the town reduced to rubble by the preliminary air and sea barrage. All of the native population had fled before the attack began.

Doughboys of 38th Infantry Division who made the surprise landing fanned out to the east and west of Mariveles. They quickly established contact with spearheads of the 6th Infantry Division advancing down the east coast of Bataan.

Limay and Lamao were captured by the 6th Infantry Division’s 1st Regiment in an 11-mile advance south of Pilar and the juncture was made at an undisclosed spot on the 15-mile coastal strip between Lamao and Mariveles.

The linkup sealed off several thousand Japs in the mountainous and militarily-useless southwestern corner of Bataan. The survivors were badly scattered and disorganized, however, and it was indicated the fight had become a large-scale mopping-up operation.

A third American force was rapidly sealing off the west coast of Bataan in an advance south from Moron toward the highway terminal at Bagac, 13 miles northwest of Mariveles.

Gen. MacArthur’s communiqué paid high tribute to the covering support of the Seventh Fleet, particularly the daring minesweepers that combed the approaches to Mariveles Bay for two days under direct fire from Corregidor.

Speed Manila mop-up

The triumph on Bataan momentarily overshadowed the savage battle still raging in the streets of southern Manila. Units of the U.S. 37th Infantry Division, the 11th Airborne and the 1st Cavalry were slowly chopping down the enemy’s major pocket of resistance on the Manila waterfront in and directly south of the old Walled City.

The mopping-up was proceeding more swiftly, although the remaining Japs were still fighting for every barricaded house and street corner in the city.

Marikina and Santo Nino village, 5½ miles east of Manila, were captured, and American units on the southeastern outskirts of the capital seized two airfields at Mandaluyong and fought their way to the west gate of Fort McKinley.

54

Völkischer Beobachter (February 18, 1945)

Guerillakämpfe in Manila

Tokio, 17. Februar – Die erbitterten Straßenkämpfe in dem brennenden, von amerikanischen Bomben und Geschossen in Trümmer sinkenden Manila gehen weiter.

Durch den im Nordteil der Stadt seit einigen Tagen tobenden Guerillakrieg sind die Hauptstraßen mit ihren Warenhäusern, Lichtspieltheatern und Geschäften ein Flammenmeer geworden. Die amerikanischen Truppen haben ihre Frontstellungen nördlich des Paligflusses, welcher die Stadt in zwei Teile teilt, seit dem 8. Februar weiter verstärkt und richten ihre Angriffe jetzt gegen den Stadtbezirk Pandakon und San Juan.

Im östlichen Teil von Manila, in der Nähe der Pajustation, konnten die japanischen Verteidiger ihre Stellungen trotz heftigem Artilleriefeuer halten. Das gleiche gilt für das Westufer des Paligflusses, und zwar für den Teil von der Alalaybrücke aus, einer der größten Brücken in Manila, bis zum andern Fluss-Ufer im Süden. Einen bemerkenswerten Erfolg konnten zwei japanische Marinesoldaten verbuchen, die sich am 2. Februar nachts in einem Paddelboot einer von den Amerikanern errichteten Notbrücke bei Macate, südöstlich von Manila, näherten und diese in die Luft sprengten. Die in der Subicbucht gelandeten amerikanischen Truppen kommen kaum voran. Sie sind in dem Landekopf zusammengedrängt und starken japanischen Angriffen aus der Batanhalbinsel heraus ausgesetzt. Entlang der ganzen von Lingayen bis Manila von Norden nach Süden verlaufenden Front sind Kämpfe im Gange. Japanische Berichte lassen durchblicken, dass man kurz vor der Offensive Yamashitas stehe.

Die Kämpfe, die die Amerikaner bisher rund 19.000 Mann auf Luzon gekostet haben, entwickeln sich nach den japanischen Erwartungen: der zahlenmäßig überlegene Gegner befindet sich den drei japanischen Stellungen gegenüber, die die Luzonebene von drei Richtungen aus beherrschen. Mit zahlreichen Ausfällen beabsichtigen die japanischen Verteidiger die allmähliche Verblutung der sich zurzeit auf Luzon befindlichen zwölf amerikanischen Divisionen.

55

The Pittsburgh Press (February 18, 1945)

Ultimatum to surrender given to Japs in Manila

Saturday, February 17, 1945

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – Maj. Gen. Oscar W. Griswold, commander of U.S. forces in Manila, today called on Jap troops holding the Intramuros District of South Manila to surrender.

The general asked the enemy to capitulate or permit the evacuation of civilians “in the true spirit of the Bushido and the code of the Samurai.”

Bushido is the name given the unwritten law supposedly governing the conduct of Jap nobles. The Samurai are Jap warriors.

‘Defeat inevitable’

The ultimatum was first sent by public address system and by radio at 3 p.m. Friday and was sent again Saturday morning. The Japs are believed to have received it. But there was some confusion in establishing radio contact with the enemy and the result was doubtful.

The message said:

Your situation is hopeless and your defeat is inevitable.

I offer you honorable surrender. If you decide to accept, raise a large Filipino flag over the Red Cross flag now flying, and send an unarmed emissary with a white flag to our lines. This must be done within four hours, or I am coming it.

In event you do not accept my offer, I exhort you that in the true spirit of the Bushido and the code of the Samurai, you permit all civilians to evacuate the Intramuros by the Victoria Gate without delay, in order that no innocent blood be shed.

The Jap radio replied, but finding a common code proved difficult and the enemy reply was not intelligible.

This morning, the Japs ran up a Red Cross flag, but it was uncertain what this meant.

Ready to blast Japs

U.S. artillerymen, meanwhile, are preparing to blast out the Japs, and are awaiting a final enemy reply before they open fire.

Jap demolitions and American shellfire have wrecked large areas within the Intramuros. West of the city, Manila’s Pier Seven, which was able to care simultaneously for five ocean liners in peacetime, has been damaged severely.

56

The Pittsburgh Press (February 19, 1945)

Yanks rout Japs from Corregidor

Both sides of island in Manila Bay seized

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – U.S. paratroopers and infantrymen joined today in the arduous job of cleaning out hundreds of diehard Japs from the tunnels and crevices of Corregidor Fortress.

Both sides of the rocky fortress, guarding the entrance to Manila Bay, were secured by the two American contingents which invaded Corregidor from the air and sea. Their sole task was to dig out the Japs – probably man by man – from the recesses where the enemy was expected to make a last-ditch stand.

A Jap Domei News Agency dispatch said the Japs had launched a “large-scale counteroffensive” north of Manila and “trapped” the Americans fighting inside the capital. There was no confirmation of the enemy report.

Gen. Douglas MacArthur hailed the invasion of Corregidor with a tribute to those men of his command who staged the historic defense of Bataan three years ago.

The long struggle on Bataan in 1942 enabled the United Nations to gather strength to resist the Japs in the Pacific and “prevented the fall of Australia,” Gen. MacArthur said.

No garrison in history has surpassed that on Bataan in more thoroughly accomplishing its mission, the General asserted. adding: “Let no man henceforth speak of it as other than a magnificent victory.”

While units of the 503rd Parachute Regiment and the 34th Infantry Regiment joined in securing the upper and lower parts of Corregidor, observers said the battle for the fortress was just beginning.

Lodged in tunnels

The Japs were lodged strongly in the American-dug tunnels and were harassing the American troops continuously with cannon and machine-gun fire.

A front dispatch disclosed that the Japs, who weathered the terrific pre-invasion bombardment, were climbing out of their secret tunnels to renew the contest on open terrain.

More than 250 Japs were killed by the paratroopers and infantrymen in the first two days of fighting. which brought the capture of Malinta Hill together with the barracks hospital and other buildings atop Corregidor.

Blocked by landslides

The east entrance to the famed Malinta tunnel was blocked by a landslide caused by the naval bombardment. But there were still three other entrances open to Americans for an assault on the Japs in the inner recesses.

A front dispatch disclosed that units of the American fleet entered Manila Harbor for the first time in three years. The mission was carried out by four PT boats two nights before the invasion of Corregidor. They swept within three miles of the breakwater off Manila’s pliers to knock out three small enemy craft.

The mopping up of Manila continued slowly, with the 37th Division steadily closing a steel ring on the Jap garrison in the Walled City and Ermita Districts.

Shell gates

The drive against the trapped enemy remnants was augmented by big American guns which relentlessly shelled the gates of the thick walls and Jap strongpoints inside the area.

In pushing to edge of the Walled City, the 37th Division captured the Philippines General Hospital and liberated 7,000 persons, including 100 Americans.

East of Manila, U.S. forces destroyed a Jap convoy of 21 troop-laden trucks Saturday. The encounter indicated the Japs were attempting to send small demolition patrols through the American lines leading to Manila.

U.S. bombers and naval patrols carried out widespread attacks from the Dutch East Indies and New Guinea to the China coast. Nineteen Jap vessels were destroyed in the raids.

57

Jap bayonets slay civilians

Priest feigns death to survive in Manila
By Frank Hewlett, United Press staff writer

MANILA, Philippines – A thrice-bayonetted priest, who feigned death to escape, told from a hospital cot today how Jap soldiers slaughtered civilians at La Salle University February 12.

The story of Father Francis Cosgrave, superior of the Redemptorist Order in Manila, was one of many reported instances of mass slayings of civilians caught in Manila no-man’s-land in the last 10 days.

Father Cosgrave, several members of his order and a number of prominent Spanish residents of Manila had sought refuge at the university when they suddenly were visited by a Jap officer and 20 soldiers.

Survives three wounds

He said the soldiers wantonly began bayonetting the group. He survived despite three wounds, including one in which a bayonet was plunged into the left side of his chest and came out his back.

More than 170 persons in the room, including several Christian Fathers, met a worse fate, he said.

Father Cosgrave said:

The Japanese soldiers returned later in the afternoon. They laughed at the sight of bodies in a heap and kicked them. They tried to violate the wounded women – even young girls.

Father Cosgrave pretended death until the Japs finally went away.

Goes to chapel

Shortly before midnight, the priest decided that if he was going to die, he would die on his feet. He crawled and dragged himself upstairs to a chapel and there, one by one, about 10 other survivors joined him.

They watched fearfully as the Japs attempted to set fire to the building. Eventually American machine-guns and tanks forced the Japs to withdraw.

The next morning, the survivors heard the welcome voices of Americans and within a few hours they all were under treatment and recovering from their ordeal.

58

The Pittsburgh Press (February 20, 1945)

Manila wall battered by U.S. artillery

Final assault opens on Jap pocket

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – American big guns were pulverizing Manila’s 400-year-old wall today for a final assault on a one-square-mile pocket of stubborn Jap defenders south of the Pasig River.

With the heavy artillery blasting a path through the thick wall around the original Spanish city, the end of the 17-day-old battle of Manila was in sight.

Units of the 37th Infantry Division were firmly entrenched around the dwindling Jap pocket and 11th Airborne troops rapidly were cleaning up Fort McKinley on the southeast outskirts of the city.

Mop up on Corregidor

The final phase of the Manila campaign came as paratroops and infantry slowly dug out fanatical Jap holdouts from the caves and tunnels of newly-invaded Corregidor, Other U.S. forces also were cleaning up enemy remnants on Bataan Peninsula.

Lt. Gen. Tomoyuki Yamashita, Jap commander in the Philippines, announced blandly that his defense of Luzon was “progressing without a hitch” and that the fighting so far was “a mere preliminary operation.”

Yamashita’s statement claimed the American invaders already had suffered 60,000 casualties in the Philippines.

Japs fight bitterly

Despite the impact of the heavy artillery fire, the Japs were fighting back bitterly from their last positions inside Manila. The pocket, now shrunk to one-fourteenth of the Charter City area, comprised Northern Ermita, the walled city of Intramuros and the port district.

Heaviest fighting was reported from the bay front, where the 37th Infantrymen pushed three blocks west from the Philippines General Hospital and began attacking enemy positions on the university grounds.

Blast pillboxes

Jap pillboxes at the university were being destroyed systematically by artillery and mortars. But the Americans were meeting considerable fire from Jap guns around the high commissioner’s home, which was already in ruins.

The assault on the 16th century wall was concentrated on the east side of Intramuros. Front reports said the big guns were tearing a hole in the masonry and no signs of life appeared within the walled city.

Most of the buildings were believed to have been destroyed or badly damaged by the barrage. Observers described the Japs inside Intramuros as in desperate flight.

Gen. Douglas MacArthur again went to the front lines and visited the sector where infantrymen were pushing northward against the Jap pocket.

A front dispatch quoted a 37th Infantry Division colonel as saying that the Japs had used a screen of Filipinos around them when they attempted to push a large gun onto Wallace Field just south of Intramuros.

A survey of the recaptured section of Manila in the meantime revealed that the entire business and commercial area was destroyed by Jap demolitions, fires and street fighting. The section comprised approximately one-fifth of Manila proper – an area comparable in size to Manhattan.

PT boats blast Japs

Gen. MacArthur’s communiqué disclosed that U.S. troops seized the towns of Hagonoy and Tagig on the northwest shore of Laguna de Bay, approximately four miles southeast of Fort McKinley.

U.S. planes and PT boats continued steady attacks on Jap shipping throughout the Philippines and in the China Sea. PT boats sank four barges in Manila Bay and destroyed a small cruiser off Cebu. Heavy bombers again raided Formosa, dropping 175 tons of explosives on Takao, where an aluminum plant and railyards were damaged. Three small freighters were damaged off shore. A 3,000-ton freighter was bombed off the China coast.

59

The Pittsburgh Press (February 21, 1945)

Jap losses near 100,000 on Luzon

‘Bitterest fighting’ rages in Manila

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – Jap forces fought back savagely from a shrinking pocket in Southern Manila today against U.S. flamethrowers and heavy artillery.

Jap casualties in the Luzon campaign neared the 100,000 mark.

Gen. Douglas MacArthur said the “bitterest fighting” had developed as the American infantrymen slowly compressed the enemy lines. Big guns maintained a steady bombardment of the ancient wall around the Intramuros sector.

The last-stand death battles waged by the Japs was taking a heavy toll of the enemy forces. A communiqué reported that Jap casualties in the first six weeks of the Luzon campaign exceeded 92,000. In that same period, the American casualties totaled 2,676 dead, 10,008 wounded and 245 missing – a ratio of seven-to-one over the enemy.

Japs loot city

As the trapped Japs faced almost certain death in their holdout positions below the Pasig River, they let loose an orgy of sadism and destruction on Filipino civilians and property.

The communiqué officially disclosed that the Japs were “acting with the greatest savagery in the treatment of non-combatants and private property.”

A survey showed that almost all private possessions of Filipinos were looted thoroughly during the enemy occupation and apparently taken to Japan.

Mop up on Corregidor

In the battle around Intramuros, the Japs were reported increasing automatic and heavy weapon fire in a desperate attempt to halt the Americans who lopped off another block from the southern side of the pocket.

On Corregidor, bombers and fighters joined with infantrymen and paratroopers in cleaning out the Japs from the island’s rocky recesses.

Seek ventilating holes

Demolition squads and flamethrower units were searching the top of Malinta Hill for ventilating holes leading to the famed Malinta tunnel, where the Japs were believed making their major stand.

Explosive charges and fiery bursts from the flamethrowers down the ventilating shafts could end Jap resistance inside the tunnel quickly.

Strong forces of heavy and medium bombers again hit Formosa, plastering Takao airdrome and setting fire to factory buildings and oil storage tanks.

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The Pittsburgh Press (February 22, 1945)

Last-stand Japs battle with spears

Yanks gain in Manila – Bataan mop-up ends

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – The last stage of the Battle of Manila degenerated into medieval warfare today with the Japs taking up spears in a desperate attempt to stave off certain annihilation.

U.S. troops encountered the frenzied tactics of the trapped enemy naval and marine personnel as they reduced the Jap pocket south of the Pasig River to less than one-tenth of a square mile.

The Americans were entrenched in a siege line along the playground and golf links, which once were the bed of the medieval moat around Manila’s ancient walled city.

Gen. Douglas MacArthur announced, meanwhile, that Bataan Peninsula was cleared completely and that the Jap forces on Corregidor were practically destroyed.

Bury 1,700 Japs

“So far as can be found, no living Japanese soldier is now on the peninsula,” Gen. MacArthur said, in disclosing the vindication of the famous American stand on Bataan three years ago.

More than 1,700 Japs were already buried on Corregidor, he said, and the count was only partially complete. Only isolated enemy stragglers holed up in caves remained to be mopped up on the island fortress guarding Manila Bay.

Reports from the front lines in Manila said the Japs apparently were running short of arms and were using spears in a bitter defense of their tiny pocket.

One group of 21 Japs was armed with only spears and grenades, while an enemy platoon fighting near the Army-Navy Club had only four rifles. The rest fought with spears attached to poles.

The Americans were withholding heavy shellfire from the area to avert as many civilian casualties as possible and the battle continued on savage hand-to-hand fighting.

Indicative of the situation was a report by Maj. Gen. O. W. Griswold, commander of XIV Army Corps which was attacking the holdout Japs.

“We will just go in fighting and kill every last Jap,” he said.

Blast Formosa

Gen. MacArthur’s communiqué revealed that Allied heavy bombers continued the steady attacks on Formosa, dropping 50 tons of explosives on installations near Heito and the barracks at Takao. Two more enemy freighters were sunk, one off the east coast of Formosa near Hong Kong.

61

Völkischer Beobachter (February 23, 1945)

Bombenhagel auf Corregidor

Bern, 22. Februar – Während die philippinische Hauptstadt Manila in wochenlangem Kampf immer mehr zerstört wird, versuchen die Amerikaner sich von Westen her die Einfahrt in die Bai von Manila zu erzwingen.

Die enge Durchfahrtsstraße wird aber von der stärksten befestigten Felseninsel Corregidor gesperrt, auf der sich auch die Amerikaner nach ihrer Vertreibung von der Bataan-Halbinsel noch längere Zeit halten konnten. Zur Niederringung Corregidors setzen die Amerikaner die ganze geballte Übermacht ihrer Flotten- und Luftstreitkräfte ein.

Nachdem die Flottenbasis Cavite von der Landseite herangegangen worden war, wird sie noch immer solange unbenutzbar bleiben, als Corregidor die Einfahrt sperrt. Ein Versuch der Amerikaner, mit schnellen Kampfeinheiten an der Insel vorbeizustoßen, wurde von der japanischen Festungsartillerie vereitelt. Daraufhin mussten sich auch die zur Landung angesetzten Truppentransporter wieder zurückziehen.

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The Pittsburgh Press (February 23, 1945)

Yanks take stand south of Luzon

Move opens strait to U.S. shipping

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – U.S. forces strengthened their hold in the Philippines today, gaining control of strategic San Bernardino Strait with the seizure of Capul Island off Southeastern Luzon.

Occupation of the tiny but important island, lying midway between Luzon and Samar, opened the direct shipping lane from the United States to the great harbor in Manila Bay.

Veteran jungle fighters of the Americal Division, which fought on Guadalcanal and Bougainville, swarmed over Capul Island Wednesday against light opposition, a communiqué said.

Still battle in Manila

The island is at the western end of San Bernardino Strait, where the Jap Fleet units were routed by U.S. warships supporting the landings on Leyte last October.

U.S. forces engaged the Japs in Southern Manila in vicious battles that raged from building to building around the besieged Intramuros section.

At the same time, units of the 11th Airborne Division swept southward along the west coast of Laguna de Bay Lake, southeast of the capital, and surprised a Jap garrison of 500 men at Mabato Point.

Blast Jap barges

The enemy forces attempted to flee across the bay in barges but were caught off shore by a murderous crossfire of American artillery. A number of barges were sunk and the shattered remnants of the garrison returned to land farther south along the coast.

The swift advance carried the Americans seven miles along the coast of the lake, through the road junction of Alabang to Nuntinglupa.

In Manila, the heaviest fighting centered around the City Hall, the General Post Office, the Manila Hotel and university buildings.

Breaks into hotel

Elements of the 1st Cavalry Division, which now is attached to the 37th Infantry Division, broke into Manila Hotel Wednesday and seized the first floor of the building. Jap naval and marine personnel held the rest of the hotel.

Japs carrying demolitions, shotguns and spears attempted to infiltrate U.S. positions at the Army-Navy Club, but were routed with the loss of 137 men.

Heavy American guns continued pounding the ancient wall around the Intramuros sector. One shell set off a Jap ammunition dump at the northeast corner of the wall, causing a terrific blast which ripped a 30-foot hole in the masonry.

Blast Japs in mountains

Nearly 100 Liberator bombers joined the 40th Infantry Division troops in an assault on the Jap forces holding out in the Zambales Mountains behind Fort Stotsenburg and the Clark Field area.

Heavy bombers, fighters and patrol planes carried out extensive attacks on Formosa. Fighters destroyed 13 grounded enemy planes. Ten coastal vessels were destroyed or damaged.

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The Pittsburgh Press (February 24, 1945)

Battle for Manila virtually ended

Only three buildings still held by Japs

MANILA, Philippines (UP) – The battle for Manila virtually ended today as U.S. troops captured all but three of the enemy-held buildings in the devastated ancient wall city.

U.S. troops were attacking the last Jap positions in a church and small sections on the west and south sides of the Intramuros area.

The final assault on the Japs in Manila followed a combined land and amphibious attack by the 37th Infantry Division which breached the ancient wall around Intramuros.

Cross Pasig River

Following in the wake of a thunderous artillery barrage, which virtually flattened the old Intramuros section, the American troops stormed through and over the medieval wall from the east and across the wide Pasig River on the north.

The double attack, which was joined inside the walled city, was expected to end organized Jap resistance in Manila quickly, although it may be several days before the last fanatical enemy is mopped up.

Seize another island

Gen. Douglas MacArthur also announced that U.S. forces had seized Biri Island at the eastern end of San Bernardino Strait to complete U.S. domination of the water passageway at the southeastern end of Luzon. The Americans first opened up the strait with the occupation of Capul Island at the western end of the waterway.

Reports of Jap brutality in Manila reached a new mark with the disclosure that more than 3,000 American civilian internees at Santo Tomas were subjected to several days of heavy artillery fire.

The enemy deliberately shelled the face of the main building at Santo Tomas and the front entrance.

Casualties light

Although the number of dead and wounded among the civilians was not announced, the communiqué said the casualties “fortunately were very light.” The shelling occurred several days after Santo Tomas was occupied by the 1st Cavalry Division.

Units of the 1st Cavalry and 6th Infantry Divisions further secured the eastern side of the capital with the capture of San Mateo and Taytay in the foothills of the Marikina watershed.

Entrance of the 6th Infantry Division into the Manila campaign brought to a total of five divisions now operating under Maj. Gen. O. W. Griswold’s XIV Corps.

Visits front lines

Gen. MacArthur visited the front lines again today and entered newly-captured Manila Hotel while the 1st Cavalry Division raised the Stars and Stripes over the high commissioner’s building.

Mopping-up of Corregidor continued steadily and it was announced the entire western part of the fortress had been cleared.

The Japs set off an ammunition dump inside big Malinta tunnel inside the rocky fort, blowing themselves to bits rather than fight it out with the Americans.

64

The Pittsburgh Press (February 25, 1945)

Manila Japs wiped out in walled city

Annihilation complete, MacArthur says

LUZON, Philippines (UP) – U.S. troops have completed annihilation of the trapped Jap garrison in South Manila and more than 12,000 enemy bodies have been counted so far, Gen. Douglas MacArthur announced today.

Gen. MacArthur announced, 22 days after his troops first entered Manila, that Maj. Gen. Robert S. Beightler’s 37th Infantry Division and Maj. Gen. Verne D. Mudge’s 1st Cavalry Division had overwhelmed the final enemy positions in the Intramuros, the ancient walled section of the city.

3,000 civilians freed

They released 3,000 civilians whom “the incorrigible enemy” had caught and penned in Intramuros and who had suffered “unbelievable indignities and dangers,” Gen. MacArthur said.

His communiqué added:

This operation and the tremendous and disproportionate losses in men and material sustained during the progress of our advance through Luzon, following the catastrophic defeat in Leyte, dooms Gen. Yamashita’s Philippine campaign and presages the early clearance of the entire archipelago.

Heavy toll on Corregidor

U.S. troops are also levying a mounting toll of the trapped and desperate Jap garrison of Corregidor.

Known enemy dead there total 2,309, Gen. MacArthur’s communiqué said. It is believed several thousand others have been destroyed in Corregidor’s labyrinth of rocky corridors by the blasting and closing of some 132 tunnels.

East and north of Manila, U.S. infantry have scored gains of up to 10 miles against Jap troops drawing into the mountains.