By Mar G. Arradaza

            After escaping from the Bataan Death March I arrived Manila in the afternoon of 29 April 1942,  and proceeded to my cousin’s house at Pineda, a barrio of Pasig the capital of the province of Rizal in the Philippines.  Pineda is just across the Pasig River from Fort McKinley, the camp where I was stationed with my outfit in the Philippine Scouts.  I was feeling bad on my arrival, tired, pale and haggard that I immediately had to lay down on the mat spread on the floor.  My cousin’s wife was glad that I returned from the battlefields at Bataan to be with them in that peaceful community.  She immediately sent her niece to inform my cousin of my arrival as all of them had been praying for me.  My cousin was on the hill, a farm about five hundred yards away cleaning the area in preparation for the planting season which was about to approach. When he arrived at home I was still lying on the mat on the floor and he began asking me about my other two cousins who were in the military service and also were in Bataan.  All I could answer was I don’t know as we did not serve in the same outfit. 

            As night came and supper was ready, I joined them at the table but only drank a big glass of water for I did not have an appetite.  Then I went back to lie again on the mat on the floor and fell asleep.  About two hours later, I woke up wet all over as though I had been out in the rain.  My cousin changed my clothes with dry ones and then I went back to sleep again.  Less than an hour later I again had to wake up my cousin, for again I was wet all over and he had to change my wet clothes with dry ones.  On the third time that I had to wake him up, I saw visitors from the neighboring house, perhaps blood relatives of my cousin’s wife, who were there to help.  At this time my cousin was murmuring remarks to the effect that I probably will die that night.   My waking up so wet occurred seven times that night, and on the seventh change into dry clothes, I noticed that I was now wearing the coat I wore on my high school graduation.  Though I was thin now the coat I wore two years ago just fit me so well that I rested and was quiet till morning.

            Daily we could hear the gun duel between the Japanese invaders and the Corregidor defenders, who in about a week after my arrival, had to capitulate to the invaders.  For two months I did not go out of the house for I still was too weak and thin and was always so thirsty that I could drink half a gallon of water at one drink.  There was a tamarind tree by the yard and I use to pick young leaves and sap the juicy part.  I could walk back and forth in the yard as a means of exercise  as I felt while recovering from my illness.  Two weeks later my sixteen year old brother arrived from Tayabas which today is Quezon province with some stories of his battle experience.  As the Japanese that landed in Southern Luzon were advancing towards Manila, the Philippine Army commander in the area at Mauban, Tayabas had rallied all able bodied men and my brother though only sixteen was given a rifle to join the defense of the area.  They were told only to fire the rifle against the Japanese as he had no training except that he looks big for a sixteen year old.  He said that the Japanese forces arrived the night they were issued rifles with few rounds of ammunition.  When the Japanese tanks started firing their machine guns the Philippine Army commander kept shouting for them to hold the line, but he saw some of the untrained combatants run away throwing their rifles.  He fired his rifle against the Japanese tanks until he ran out of ammunition and then he had to run and hide.  Because of his presence now in my cousin’s house, he had to help our cousin in the farm over the hill.

            After two months of seeing nothing new except houses in the neighborhood, I finally decided to go and see how the farm looked and what my brother and cousin were doing and what plants they had on the farm.   I viewed the area they were working on and began to like the place, much more when I saw the small nipa hut, which was built for a rest home purpose.  There were bamboo groves that surrounded the rice field to the East and behind the bamboo grove was the newly built Pasig-Mandaluyong Road and the Rizal Provinicial Hospital across the road, which was about three hundred yards from the Nipa Hut.  The Nipa Hut could not be in viewed from the road not from nor from the hospital due to the bamboo grove.

            At this time news spread out that due to thousands of war prisoners dying in the concentration camp at Camp O’Donnell, the Japanese offered amnesty to release prisoners of war who can still walk and only those from the Island of Luzon.  With this news able-bodied prisoners of war from the Visayas and Mindanao had to scramble for some addresses in Luzon.  Some had to marry women form Luzon just to be included in the amnesty.  With thousands waiting to be released the Rizal Provincial Hospital was finally opened on 30 June 1942, my uncle was released into that hospital.  Daily a group of prisoners of war are unloaded until all the wards in the hospital were filled.  At this time too Japanese authorities encourages escapees to surrender so as to be given amnesty, which no one dare.  We started planting corn and sweet potatoes and felt that the farm should be guarded at night.  Here my brother and I had to do it with our dog tied to the front door of the nipa hut.  The nipa hut was about twelve feet in length and about ten feet in width and we felt comfortable spending our daily life in the farm.

            Guerrilla organization was secretly and silently recruiting personnel around the area and my brother, my cousin and myself joining the Hugh Straungh Guerrilla, McKinley Sector.  By November 1942, as the guerrilla were getting active the Japanese started zoning the Manila area.  Months passed and things goes quiet as nothing happen.  As 1943 approaches guerrillas were already active and the Japanese insisted for the people to organize Neighborhood Association to patrol at night and report when we were members of the guerrilla ourselves.  Guerrilla activity had already been felt in the City of Manila, as a Philippine Scout prisoner of war escapee by the name of Pedro Navarro had been sought by the Japanese for killing two Japanese soldiers in the city itself.  Guerrilla suspects were rounded up and imprisoned at Fort Santiago, an old Spanish Fort where the National Hero, Dr. Jose Rizal was incarcerated by the Spaniards.  February 1943, has now entered the Japanese iron hand were in the upper hand than the guerrillas.

            All was well in the barrio as the month of February entered.  My brother and my daily routine of coming downhill from the farm to eat in our cousin’s house and returning to the small nipa hut in the farm goes on until the night of 10 February 1943.  After eating supper that night of 10 February 1943, my brother and I walked back to our rest house in the farm to sleep and wait for the following morning to resume our daily task of cutting the trees and processed them into firewood to be sold in the market.  As we thought of nothing else we have fallen asleep early as soundly as we do.  Suddenly at about 12:30 A.M. I was awakened by commotions outside the hut as two Japanese bayonets thrust into the walls of the hut and protruded into the room inside.  Our doors and windows were open and as we open our eyes Japanese soldiers were around us.  My brother and I got up as the Japanese searched inside the hut and immediately tied us with a rope with six more men that were already tied together.  They marched us tied together to the town of Paisg and into the Rizal Provincial High School building which they occupied and used as a garrison.  There was no jail in the building so they let us all sit down beside the bunker they built with four Japanese guards.  One sitting near the telephone, one was standing by the gate and were guarding us with fixed bayonets.

            Morning came and we were still sleepy when by about 10:00 A.M. I was taken into a closed room with a table in the center and a small pick and shovel on the table.  A well dressed soldier with two Japanese, one bringing a chair arrived and the well dressed one sat on the chair by the table.  This well dressed soldier started asking me questions, first asking me if I was a guerilla and as I replied, no, the other soldier hit my back with the shovel. I cried and said I am a civilian.  Again I was asked with a thundering voice and thumping his boots so hard on the floor if I was a soldier.  I said no, I am a civilian.  The solider hit me again with the shovel and said you liar.  Why was hiding in the hills, you are a guerrilla.  The other soldier slapped my face so hard I almost fell. I replied that we are working in the farm to raise food like corn and sweet potatoes.  You are a guerrilla the Sergeant howled again and the soldier slapped me and hit me with the shovel again on my back.  They said they had a list of guerrillas and soldier escapees from the concentration camp.  With another frightening voice he asked me for my name.  I said Melchor Geraldo and the Sergeant thumping his boots so hard on the floor insisted I was a guerrilla while the soldier hit my back with the shovel again.  I could no longer bear the pain on my back that I was almost to fell down.  I was crying now and the more I was scared the more they hit me.

            As the investigation was going on, three Filipinos in Constabulary uniform arrived. Their presence lifted my spirit for I felt they would not betray me.  Besides, one of them was know to me as he was a former prisoner of war.  The Japanese still kept repeating the same question that I am a soldier and that I am a guerrilla hiding in the hills.  The Constabulary served as interpreter and explained to the Japanese that I am a civilian who is working on the farm for a livelihood. The Japanese asked me how old I was and I answered I am twenty years old.  With that answer they hit me again with the shovel and said I am a soldier.  This time the Constabulary explained that I am not a soldier for the Philippine Army were drafting 21 year old able-bodied Filipinos.  After about an hour of a rigid questioning I felt tired and wanted to lie down.  The investigation stopped, as it was almost time for lunch so I was returned and tied again with the rest of the prisoners beside the bunker.

            The investigator left and we didn’t know when they would come back as on that day I was the only one investigated.  We were not given any food to eat that day and we could not stand up but only sit beside the bunker with three Japanese guards now watching us.  I whispered to my brother that I changed my name to Melchor Geraldo and told him not to do the same for he might get confused on successive questioning when he is investigated.  After three weeks or more of us sitting and not allowed to stand, two Filipino Constabulary came to see us.  They were trying to help us and asked the Japanese guards when will the rest of the prisoners be investigated.  The guards told the Constabulary that the investigators would arrive in about a week.  The week passed and the two Constabulary arrived as early as 9:00 in the morning.  About an hour later two Japanese investigators arrived and the Constabulary approached them and walked together into the investigation room.  The four of them seemed to have a conference for none of the prisoners were called to be investigated.  I did not know what they talked about but I felt the longer they stayed in that room perhaps the Japanese would be convinced to release us.  In almost forty-five minutes their conference was over and we saw the Constabulary come back in a happy mood as they passed by us they winked and smiled at us.

            This was now March 1943 and still we were not allowed to stand up and stretch our bodies and we were feed rice shaped into baseball with salt in the center.  I felt I was losing weight and was no longer able to stand up as fast as I could.  I was the only one as yet investigated when on the night of 13 March 1943, the Japanese guard sitting by the telephone received a call.  When the conversation on the phone was over, the Japanese turned to me and in his broken English he said: Tomorrow, tomorrow you go and pointed at me.  I got scared for I thought I might be executed on the third day.  My brother was sad for he too did not know what would happen to me on the third day.  Morning came and I felt tense that whole day and didn’t seem to have an appetite for eating the ball of rice with salt . Then the third came and the Japanese guard told me that 15th day of March 1943.

            I did not sleep that night and was getting pale then about 10:30 A.M. on the 15^th of  March 1943, two Japanese soldiers with only bayonet sidearm arrived and immediately asked for me.  Slowly and trembling I had to stand up and the guard untied the rope that bound me.  The Japanese took me outside and loaded me on the truck then drove to the old Provincial Capitol at Pasig and turned me over to the Constabulary Sergeant who I then recognized to be a former Corporal of Company “I” 45 Infantry of the Philippine Scouts.  He called on someone to escort me with the Japanese to the Constabulary Academy No. 3 at Gagalangin, Tondo in Manila where I was turned over to the office of the Superintendent of Academy, former Colonel Philippine Army Valentin Salgado.  At the same time that day a truckload of thirty eight prisoners of war from Camp O’Donnell were admitted together with me.  It was then I knew that the concentration camp at Camp O’Donnell was to be emptied of Filipino prisoners of war for what was left were sent to the newly opened Constabulary Academy No. 5.

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