Sgt. Owen Leonard Sandmire was born on October 24, 1918, to Leonard Sandmire and Bessie Kellogg-Sandmire in Viola, Wisconsin, and was the fourth child of eight children. “Sandy” as he was called by his friends, grew up first in Reedsburg, Wisconsin, where he graduated from Reedsburg Elementary School. His family then moved to Lime Ridge, Wisconsin, where he graduated from Lime Ridge High School in 1938. Sandy went out on his own at fifteen since it would make it easier for his family. His father was a barber and could not make enough to support his large family. To support himself, Sandy moved to Janesville, Wisconsin, looking for work driving cars to dealers for General Motors.
On September 16, 1940, Sandy enlisted into the Wisconsin National Guard’s 32nd Tank Company from Janesville. Sandy decided to do this after drinking a few beers with some National Guardsmen, and the fact was that Sandy and his friend, Bob Stewart, were not having very good luck finding steady jobs. Being in the National Guard with regular pay sounded good to both of them. It also had already been announced that the tank company was going to be called to federal duty for one year.
After the German tank divisions rolled through Europe in 1939 and 1940, the Army created the U.S. Armored Forces on July 10, 1940. Included in the force were the National Guard GHQ tank battalions. The GHQ battalions were still considered infantry and created a “buffer” between the armor forces and infantry to protect the regular army tank battalions from being used by the infantry when they wanted tanks. This would allow the Armor Force to develop into a real fighting force. To do this the National Guard tank battalions were called to federal service and available to the infantry.
The members of the company, on November 25 at 7:00 AM, were inducted into the U.S. Army and given physicals, and by noon the same day, two men had failed their physicals and been released from federal service. Later that day, another two men were released from service. The next day, the 26th, the officers went to Chicago where they were given physicals. Two officers failed. One was released and the other, 1st Lt. Russell Thorman, who recently had major surgery was allowed time to recover and later rejoined the company. A 24-hour guard was posted outside the armory and the men lived in the armory and spent their time drilling. One day they had a snowball fight.
During this time, four men were sent to Camp Williams, Wisconsin, to pick up additional equipment while two other men traveled to Camp Douglas, Wisconsin, to pick up additional clothing. At the same time, a three-man detail was sent to Danville, Illinois, where another detachment of soldiers would spend the night at an armory there. A detachment under Lt. Fred Bruni and 23 soldiers left the armory at 7:00 A.M. on November 27 in nine trucks carrying the company’s baggage. It is known that the roads were ice-covered so the trip was slow and the conditions resulted in one truck hitting a civilian’s car causing $100.00 in damages. No other information is available about the incident. The roads improved the further south the convoy traveled. The soldiers spent the night at the armory in Danville, before heading south to Ft. Knox arriving there sometime later in the afternoon.
Between 4:00 and 5:00 P.M. on November 28, the main detachment of soldiers marched from the armory to the Milwaukee Road train station in Janesville where they boarded special cars that had been added to the Marquette to Chicago train. One was a flatcar with the company’s two tanks on it. At some point, the train cars were uncoupled from the train and switched onto the Chicago & Northwestern line that went into Maywood, Illinois. There, the members of B Company boarded the train and their equipment – including their two tanks – was loaded onto the train. In Chicago, the soldiers disembarked the train and rode busses to the Illinois Central Station. The train cars were switched onto the Illinois Central Railroad and the men and tanks were taken to Ft. Knox arriving around 8:00 A.M. When they arrived, trucks were waiting at the station to take them to the fort. Their first housing was six men tents with stoves since their barracks were not finished. The battalion had a total of eight tanks that the crews were ordered not to abuse.
Their first housing was small unpainted temporary barracks since their barracks were not finished. The men assigned to the company from selective service lived in tents next to the company’s two barracks. The battalion had a total of eight tanks that the crews were ordered not to abuse. It is known that 25 men lived on each floor of the barracks. The bunks were set up along the walls and alternated so that the head of one bunk was next to the foot of another bunk allowing for more bunks to be placed in the least amount of space allowing for 25 men to sleep on each floor. The first sergeant, staff sergeant, and master sergeant had their own rooms. There was also a supply room, an orderly room – where the cooks could sleep during the day – and a clubroom.
The one problem they had was that the barracks had four, two-way speakers in it. One speaker was in the main room of each floor of the barracks, one was in the first sergeant’s office, and one was in the Capt. Walter Write’s office. Since by flipping a switch, the speaker became a microphone, and the men watched what they said. The guardsmen were housed away from the regular army troops in the newly built barracks. Newspapers from the time state that the barracks were air-conditioned. The area outside the barracks was described as muddy and dusty most of the time. An attempt was made to improve the situation by bringing in crushed to build walkways and roads around the barracks.
During their free time during the week, the men could go to one of the three movie theaters on the outpost. The movies were newer, but they were never the latest films. They sat around and talked, played basketball, bowled, and played football. As the weather got warmer, the men tried to play baseball as often as possible in the evenings. At 9:00 P.M., when lights went out, most went to sleep. On weekends, men with passes frequently went to Louisville which was 35 miles north of the fort, while others went to Elizabethtown sixteen miles south of the fort. Those men still on the base used the dayroom to read since it was open until 11:00 P.M.
A typical day for the soldiers started at 6:15 with reveille, but most of the soldiers were up by 5:45 since they wanted to wash and dress. After roll call, breakfast was from 7:00 to 8:00 A.M., followed by calisthenics from 8:00 to 8:30. Afterward, the tankers went to various schools within the company. The classes consisted of .30 and .50 caliber machine guns, pistols, map reading, care of personal equipment, military courtesy, and training in tactics. At 11:30 the soldiers stopped what they were doing and cleaned up for mess which was from noon to 1:00 P.M. After lunch, the soldiers went back to work. At 4:30, the soldiers called it a day and returned to their barracks and put on dress uniforms, and at five held retreat and followed by dinner at 5:30. After they ate they stood in line to wash their mess kits since they had no mess hall. After dinner, they were off duty and lights were out at 9:00 P.M., but they did not have to turn in until 10:00 when Taps was played.
The lack of equipment was a major problem for the battalion. Many of the tanks were castoffs from the regular army or pulled from the junkyard at Ft. Knox and rebuilt by the tank companies. The tanks were also restricted in where they could be driven and very little training was done with the infantry. On December 2, each company received four additional tanks. According to information from the time, each company was scheduled to receive 17 tanks, three half-tracks, four motorcycles, two motorcycles with passenger cars, four, two-and-a-half-ton trucks, and a half-ton pickup truck. The battalion was attached to the 69th Armored Regiment, 1st Armored Division, and received its training under the 69th. This was true for the tank crews and reconnaissance units who trained with the regiment’s tanks and reconnaissance units and later trained with their own companies.
It also seemed to rain constantly during December, and it was said the mud around the barracks was two inches deep. The men also took a six-mile hike in the mud and rain on the 13th. 149 draftees were also assigned to the battalion from the home states of each company but lived away from the battalion with the 69th Armored Regiment. The men were from their home states because the Army wanted to keep the companies National Guard since they were expected to be released after one year of federal service.
It is known that he was not one of the soldiers who went home for Christmas. The soldiers paid $12.00 each and left Ft. Knox at about 1:00 P.M. on Saturday, December 21 – by chartered bus – and arrived in Janesville at about 3:00 A.M. on Sunday, December 22. For those who remained at Ft. Knox, the base was decorated with lighted Christmas trees along its streets, and each night Christmas carols were sung by a well-trained choir that went from barracks to barracks. The sight was said to be beautiful as the soldiers entered the camp from the ridge north of their barracks. The workload of the soldiers was also reduced for the holidays. Christmas dinner consisted of roast turkey, baked ham, candied sweet potatoes, snowflake potatoes, giblet gravy, oyster dressing, cranberry sauce, pickle relish, grapes, oranges, rolls, fruit cake, ice cream, bread, butter, and coffee. After dinner, cigars, cigarettes, and candy were provided.
Those who went home remained in Janesville until the afternoon of Christmas Day when they boarded the chartered bus for the return trip to Ft. Knox arriving at 5:50 AM. After they arrived at Ft. Knox on December 26, 1st Sgt. Dale Lawton was waiting having been given the job of picking men to be transferred to the soon-to-be-formed HQ Company. Men were picked for the company because they had special training. Many of these men received promotions and because of their rating received higher pay. Donald was selected to be transferred to the company as a radio operator, but he continued to live with A Company until the battalion’s permanent barracks were finished.
The biggest task at Ft. Knox facing the members of the 192nd, was that each company had to get used to the other. During this process of adjustment, the members of the different companies often were involved in fistfights. As time passed, the fights ended as the members of the battalion became friends. Each company was made up of three platoons of thirty men and each company had the same number of tanks assigned to it. The one exception was Headquarters Company which had three assigned tanks. It was also at this time that the battalion had 16 operational tanks and the first men from selective service were assigned to the company. On January 10, these men took their first tank ride and all of them had the chance to drive the tanks and would permanently join the company in March 1941.
Winter finally arrived on January 4, when the high for the day was 24 degrees and it snowed for the first time. Those on guard duty at night were happy they had been issued long-Johns but wished they had on two pairs. It was also in January that the companies had their first target practice and each company spent one week at the firing range learning to use their thirty caliber and fifty caliber machine guns as well as forty-five caliber pistols. This took place at the 1st Cavalry Test range where the tanks could be maneuvered and the guns fired at the same time. All those holding the rank of Private First Class were sent to motorcycle class at the Armored Force where they were taught the functions and duties of a motorcyclist in a garrison and in combat. Ten members of the company were sent to radio school from 8:00 to 11:30 A.M. They also received their government-issued toiletries. Each man received two face towels and one bath towel, a razor, tooth and shaving brushes, and another pair of pants which completed their compliment of clothing.
Most of the men were attending the various schools they were assigned to on January 13 taking classes lasting until May 31. The tankers went through intensive training in the various classes at the Armored Force School which taught classes in gunnery, radio communications, tank maintenance, vehicle maintenance, tank driving, as well as other classes. The entire battalion on January 28, took part in a one-day problem that had to do with the deployment of large units of tanks and to put into practice what they had learned in the classroom. They were up at 5:00 A.M. and reported to the tank parks of the 1st and 13th Armor Regiments. It was a long tough day for all the soldiers, but they all believed they had learned more in that one day than they had learned in an entire week of school. It was also at this time that each company had a tent so they could make minor repairs to their tanks. It was noted that the men from every company seemed to enjoy working on their own tanks. They were also taking the tanks out on the trails and obstacle driving which resulted in the companies developing many good tank crews.
Capt Walter Write, during February, commanded a composite tank unit made of men from all the companies of the battalion. The unit left Ft. Knox on a problematic move at 9:00 A.M. and consisted of three motorcycles, two scout cars, sixteen tanks, one ambulance, and supply, fuel, and kitchen trucks. The route was difficult and chosen so that the men could become acquainted with their equipment. They also had to watch out for simulated enemy planes. Bridges were avoided whenever it was possible and they had to ford the rivers. At noon, the column stopped for a short rest, and for lunch that did not materialize. A guide had failed to stay at one of the crossings until the kitchen truck arrived there, so instead of turning into the woods, the truck went straight. After the break, Capt. Write ordered the men back to Ft. Knox without having been fed.
Most of the men were attending the various schools they were assigned to on January 13. The tankers went through intensive training in the various classes at the Armored Force School which taught classes in gunnery, radio communications, tank maintenance, vehicle maintenance, tank driving, as well as other classes. The entire battalion on January 28, took part in a one-day problem that had to do with the deployment of large units of tanks and to put into practice what they had learned in the classroom. They were up at 5:00 A.M. and reported to the tank parks of the 1st and 13th Armor Regiments. It was a long tough day for all the soldiers, but they all believed they had learned more in that one day than they had learned in an entire week of school. It was also at this time that each company had a tent so they could make minor repairs to their tanks. It was noted that the men from every company seemed to enjoy working on their own tanks. They were also taking the tanks out on the trails and obstacle driving which resulted in the companies developing many good tank crews.
In late March 1941, the entire battalion was moved to new larger barracks at Wilson Road and Seventh Avenue at Ft. Knox. The barracks had bathing and washing facilities in them and a day room. The new kitchens had larger gas ranges, automatic gas heaters, large pantries, and mess halls. One reason for this move was the men from selective service were permanently joining the battalion on April 9. The tankers also painted their tanks a dull green-gray with blue numbers on the running boards. Around the turrets near the bottom, they painted red and blue stripes. According to the soldiers, this made it easier to camouflage the tanks. They also took part in a 15-mile hike during the month.
Many members of the battalion went home for Easter in April. The only men left on the base were those attending schools; in particular, those assigned to radio school. The men who remained behind also had performed all the duties expected of them, such as guard duty. While doing these things, they still started their day at 4:00 A.M. They also washed the tanks in Salt River which was 14 miles from their barracks.
Sandy trained as a tank driver. This would be the position he would hold throughout his tour of duty with the 192nd. Since the members of the battalion were trained to do more than one job, he was also trained on a motorcycle as a reconnaissance sergeant. It was at this time that he became good friends with Ed DeGroot and Harvey Riedeman.
The battalion finally received all its tanks and the soldiers were told to, “beat the hell out of them.” On June 14 and 16, the battalion was divided into four detachments composed of men from different companies. Available information shows that C and D Companies, part of HQ Company and part of the Medical Detachment left on June 14, while A and B Companies, and the other halves of HQ Company and the Medical Detachment left the fort on June 16. These were tactical maneuvers – under the command of the commanders of each of the letter companies. The three-day tactical road marches were to Harrodsburg, Kentucky, and back. Each tank company traveled with 20 tanks, 20 motorcycles, 7 armored scout cars, 5 jeeps, 12 peeps (later called jeeps), 20 large 2½-ton trucks (these carried the battalion’s garages for vehicle repair), 5, 1½-ton trucks (which included the companies’ kitchens), and 1 ambulance.
The detachments traveled through Bardstown and Springfield before arriving at Harrodsburg at 2:30 P.M. where they set up their bivouac at the fairgrounds. The next morning, they moved to Herrington Lake east of Danville, where the men swam, boated, and fished. The battalion returned to Ft. Knox through Lebanon, New Haven, and Hodgenville, Kentucky. At Hodgenville, the men were allowed to visit the birthplace of Abraham Lincoln. The purpose of the maneuvers was to give the men practice at loading, unloading, and setting up administrative camps to prepare them for the Louisiana maneuvers.
At the end of the month, the battalion found itself at the firing range and appeared to have spent the last week there. According to available information, they were there from 4:00 A.M. until 8:30 A.M. when they left the range. They then had to clean the guns which took them until 10:30 A.M. One of the complaints they had was that it was so hot and humid that when they got back from the range, their clothes were so wet that they felt like they had stood out in the rain. Right after July 4, the battalion went on a nine-day maneuver. Twelve of the battalion’s tanks were sent to Rock Island, Illinois, in July to be rebuilt and returned to the battalion before it went on maneuvers.
The 192nd Tank Battalion was sent to Louisiana, in the late summer of 1941, to take part in maneuvers. About half of the battalion left Ft. Knox on September 1st in trucks and other wheeled vehicles and spent the night in Clarksville, Tennessee, 160 miles south of Ft. Knox. By 7:00 A.M. the next morning, the detachment was on the move. On the second day, the soldiers saw their first cotton fields which they found fascinating. They spent the night in Brownsville, Tennessee, and were again on the move the following morning at 7:00 A.M. At noon, the convoy crossed the Mississippi River which they found amazing, and spent the night in Clarksdale, Mississippi. At noon the next day, the convoy crossed the lower part of Arkansas and arrived at Tallulah, Louisiana, where, they washed, relaxed, and played baseball against the locals. It also gave them a break from sitting on wooden benches in the trucks. The remaining soldiers, the tanks, and other equipment were sent by train and left the base on September 3. When they arrived at Tremont, Lousiana, the men, and trucks who had driven to Louisiana were waiting for them at the train station.
The battalion was assigned to the Red Army, attached to the Fourth Cavalry, and stationed at Camp Robinson, Arkansas. Two days later it made a two-day move, as a neutral unit, to Ragley, Louisiana, and was assigned to the Blue Army. The battalion’s bivouac was in the Kisatchie National Forest, near DeRidder, Louisana, where the soldiers dealt with mosquitoes, snakes, wood ticks, snakes, and alligators. They described the land as swamps, woods, and shacks. They also heard they were going to North Carolina on October 6.
During the maneuvers, tanks held defensive positions and usually were held in reserve by the higher headquarters. For the first time, the tanks were used to counter-attack, in support of infantry, and held defensive positions. Some men felt that the tanks were finally being used like they should be used and not as “mobile pillboxes.” The maneuvers were described by other men as being awakened at 4:30 A.M. and sent to an area to engage an imaginary enemy. After engaging the enemy, the tanks withdrew to another area. The crews had no idea what they were doing most of the time because they were never told anything by the higher-ups. A number of men felt that they just rode around in their tanks a lot.
While training at Ft. Knox, the tankers were taught that they should never attack an anti-tank gun head-on. One day during the maneuvers, their commanding general threw away the entire battalion doing just that. After sitting out a period of time, the battalion resumed the maneuvers. The major problem for the tanks was the sandy soil. On several occasions, tanks were parked and the crews walked away from them. When they returned, the tanks had sunk into the sandy soil up to their hauls. To get them out, other tanks were brought in and attempted to pull them out. If that didn’t work, the tankers brought a tank wrecker from Camp Polk to pull the tank out of the ground.
It was not uncommon for the tankers to receive orders to move at night. On October 1st at 2:30 A.M., they were awakened by the sound of a whistle which meant they had to get the tanks ready to move. Those assigned to other duties loaded trucks with equipment. Once they had assembled into formations, they received the order to move, without headlights, to make a surprise attack on the Red Army. By 5:30 that morning – after traveling 40 miles in 2½ hours from their original bivouac in the dark – they had established a new bivouac and set up their equipment. They camouflaged their tanks and trucks and set up sentries to look for paratroopers or enemy troops. At 11:30, they received orders and 80 tanks and armored vehicles moved out into enemy territory. They engaged the enemy at 2:38 in the afternoon and an umpire with a white flag determined who was awarded points or penalized. At 7:30 P.M., the battle was over and the tanks limped back to the bivouac where they were fueled and oiled for the next day.
The one good thing that came out of the maneuvers was that the tank crews learned how to move at night. At Ft. Knox this was never done. Without knowing it, the night movements were preparing them for what they would do in the Philippines since most of the battalion’s movements there were made at night. The drivers learned how to drive at night and to take instructions from their tank commanders who had a better view from the turret. A number of motorcycle riders from other tank units were killed because they were riding their bikes without headlights on which meant they could not see obstacles in front of their bikes. When they hit something they fell to the ground and the tanks following them went over them. This happened several times before the motorcycle riders were ordered to turn on their headlights.
Snake bites were also a problem and at some point, it seemed that every other man was bitten by a snake. The platoon commanders carried a snake bite kit that was used to create a vacuum to suck the poison out of the bite. The bites were the result of the nights cooling down and snakes crawling under the soldiers’ bedrolls for warmth while the soldiers were sleeping on them. When the soldiers woke up in the morning they would carefully pick up their bedrolls to see if there were any snakes under them.
It is known that John Spencer was bitten by a rattlesnake but had no serious effects, while another man killed one. To avoid being bitten, men slept on the two-and-a-half-ton trucks or on or in the tanks. Another trick the soldiers learned was to dig a small trench around their tents and lay rope in the trench. The burs on the rope kept the snakes from entering the tents. The snakes were not a problem if the night was warm. There was one multicolored snake – about eight inches long – that was beautiful to look at, but if it bit a man he was dead. The good thing was that these snakes would not just strike at the man but only struck if the man forced himself on it.
They also had a problem with the wild hogs in the area. In the middle of the night while the men were sleeping in their tents they would suddenly hear hogs squealing. The hogs would run into the tents pushing on them until they took them down and dragged them away.
What made the maneuvers worse was that the rainy season started and the men found themselves living in it. On one occasion the battalion was bivouac near a canal and the next morning the men found themselves in water over their shoes trying to dig ditches for drainage. The members of B Company captured a medium size alligator in their bivouac and pulled it around at the end of a leash made from a rope.
The wood to cook their food was always damp which made it hard to get a fire started. Many of their meals were C ration meals of beans or chili that they choked down. Washing clothes was done when the men had a chance. They did this by finding a creek, looking for alligators, and if there were none, taking a bar of soap and scrubbing whatever they were washing. Clothes were usually washed once a week or once every two weeks.
After the maneuvers, the battalion members expected to return to Ft. Knox but received orders to report to Camp Polk, Louisiana. It was on the side of a hill the battalion learned that they had been selected to go overseas. Those men who were married, 29 years old or older, or whose National Guard enlistments were about to end were allowed to resign from federal service. Officers too old for their rank, including the 192nd’s commanding officer, were also released. The enlisted men and some officers were replaced by men from the 753rd Tank Battalion. Both new and old members of the battalion were given leave home to say their goodbyes. They returned to Camp Polk and prepared for duty overseas.
There are at least two stories on the decision to send the battalion overseas, but the decision appeared to have been made well before the maneuvers. According to one story, the decision for this move was the result of an event that took place in the summer of 1941. A squadron of American fighters was flying over Lingayen Gulf, in the Philippines, when one of the pilots, who was flying at a lower altitude, noticed something odd. He took his plane down and identified a flagged buoy in the water and saw another in the distance. He came upon more buoys that lined up, in a straight line for 30 miles to the northwest, in the direction of Taiwan which had a large radio transmitter. The squadron continued its flight plan south to Mariveles and returned to Clark Field. When the planes landed, it was too late to do anything that day.
The next day, when another squadron was sent to the area, the buoys had been picked up by a fishing boat – with a tarp on its deck – which was seen making its way to shore. Since communication between the Air Corps and Navy was difficult, the boat escaped. It was at that time the decision was made to build up the American military presence in the Philippines.
Many of the men believed that the reason they were selected to be sent overseas was that they had performed well on the maneuvers. The story was that they were personally selected by General George S. Patton – who had commanded the tanks of the Blue Army – to go overseas. There is no evidence that this was true.
The fact was that the battalion was part of the First Tank Group which was headquartered at Ft. Knox and operational by June 1941. Available information suggests that the tank group had been selected to be sent to the Philippines early in 1941. Besides the 192nd at Ft. Knox, the group was made up of the 70th and 191st Tank Battalions – the 191st was a National Guard medium tank battalion while the 70th was a regular army tank battalion – at Ft. Meade, Maryland. The 193rd – also a part of the tank group – was at Ft. Benning, Georgia, and the 194th at Ft. Lewis, Washington. The 192nd, 193rd, and 194th had been National Guard light tank battalions. It is known that the military presence in the Philippines was being built up at the time, so in all likelihood, the entire tank group had been scheduled to be sent to the Philippines.
During the 20 days the battalion spent at Camp Polk, it rained a great deal of the time and the men always seemed to be wet. Men went over a week without taking a shower. Its new M3 tanks – which in many cases were only new to the battalion – came from the 753rd and the 3rd Armor Division. This happened because there was a problem with the battalion receiving brand new tanks. Many of the tanks that it received were within four hours of their required 100-hour maintenance. At 8:30 A.M. on October 20, over different train routes, the companies were sent to San Francisco, California. A Company rode the train with HQ Company and took the southern route through Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and up the west coast of California to San Francisco. When the train stopped at one station, Native Americans enter the car selling beads, and the soldiers knocked each over attempting to buy them. After the train pulled out of the station someone noticed the beads were made in Japan.
One train carried the tankers while a second train, following the first train, carried the company’s tanks. At the end of the second train, were a freight car and a passenger car that some of the tankers rode. When they arrived in San Francisco, they were ferried, on the U.S.A.T. General Frank M. Coxe, to Ft. McDowell on Angel Island, where they received inoculations and physicals. Those men who were found to have treatable medical conditions remained behind on the island and were scheduled to rejoin the battalion at a later date. Other men were simply replaced by men sent to the island as replacements. During this time, the soldiers loaded the tanks onto the ship. It is also believed the battalion’s half-tracks – that replaced its reconnaissance cars – were waiting in San Francisco. So were its new jeeps and motorcycles, which were Indian motorcycles, and had all their controls on the opposite side from the Harley-Davidsons they had learned to ride at Ft. Knox.
The 192nd was boarded onto the U.S.A.T. Gen. Hugh L. Scott and sailed on Monday, October 27. During this part of the trip, many tankers had seasickness, but once they recovered they spent much of the time training in breaking down machine guns, cleaning weapons, and doing KP. The ship arrived at Honolulu, Hawaii, on Sunday, November 2, and had a four-day layover, so the soldiers were given shore leave so they could see the island. During this time they visited pineapple ranches, coconut groves, and Waikiki Beach which some said was nothing but stones since it was man-made.
On Thursday, November 6, the ship sailed for Guam but took a southerly route away from the main shipping lanes. It was at this time the ship was joined by the U.S.S. Louisville and, the transport, U.S.A.T. President Calvin Coolidge. The ships headed west following a zig-zag pattern. The night of Sunday, November 9, the ships crossed the International Dateline, and when the soldiers awoke it was Tuesday, November 11.
During this part of the voyage, the soldiers spent their time attending lectures, playing craps and cards, reading, writing letters and sunned themselves on deck. Other men did required work like turning over the tanks’ engines by hand and the clerks caught up on their paperwork. In addition, there was always KP. On Saturday, November 15, smoke from an unknown ship was seen on the horizon. The Louisville revved up its engines, its bow came out of the water, and it took off in the direction of the smoke. It turned out that the unknown ship was from a friendly country. Two other intercepted ships were Japanese freighters hauling scrap metal to Japan.
When they arrived at Guam on Sunday, November 16, the ships took on water, bananas, coconuts, and vegetables. Although they were not allowed off the ship, the soldiers were able to mail letters home before sailing for Manila the next day. At one point, the ships passed an island at night and did so in total blackout. This for many of the soldiers was a sign that they were being sent into harm’s way. The blackout was strictly enforced and men caught smoking on deck after dark spent time in the ship’s brig. Three days after leaving Guam the men spotted the first islands of the Philippines. The ships sailed around the south end of Luzon and then north up the west coast of Luzon toward Manila Bay.
The ships entered Manila Bay, at 8:00 A.M., on Thursday, November 20, and docked at Pier 7 later that morning. One thing that was different about their arrival was that instead of a band and a welcoming committee waiting at the pier to tell them to enjoy their stay in the Philippines and see as much of the island as they could, a party came aboard the ship – carrying guns – and told the soldiers, “Draw your firearms immediately; we’re under alert. We expect a war with Japan at any moment. Your destination is Fort Stotsenburg, Clark Field.” As the enlisted men disembarked the ship a Marine checked off their names as they left the ship. When someone said his name, the Marine responded with, “Hello sucker.” Those who drove trucks drove them to the fort, while the maintenance section remained behind at the pier to unload the tanks. The rest of the men rode a train 55 miles to the base. The maintenance section with the help of 17th Ordnance unloaded the battalion’s tanks from the ship.
At the fort, they were greeted by Gen. Edward P. King Jr. who apologized that the men had to live in tents along the main road between the fort and Clark Field. He made sure that had what they needed and that they all received Thanksgiving dinner – stew thrown into their mess kits – before he went to have his own dinner. If they had been slower leaving the ship, they would have had a complete turkey dinner. Ironically, November 20 was the date that the National Guard members of the battalion had expected to be released from federal service.
The members of the battalion pitched the ragged World War I tents in an open field halfway between the Clark Field Administration Building and Fort Stotsenburg. They were set up in two rows and five men were assigned to each tent. There were two supply tents and meals were provided by food trucks stationed at the end of the rows of tents. The area was near the end of a runway used by B-17s for takeoffs. The planes flew over the tents at about 100 feet blowing dirt everywhere and the noise – from the planes’ engines – was unbelievable as they flew over the bivouac. At night, they heard the sounds of Japanese reconnaissance planes flying over the airfield. In addition, the khaki uniforms they had been issued also turned out to be a heavy material which made them uncomfortable to wear in the tropical heat.
The 192nd arrived in the Philippines with a great deal of radio equipment to set up a radio school to train radiomen for the Philippine Army. The battalion also had a large number of ham radio operators and shortly after arriving at Ft. Stotsenburg, they set up a communications tent that was in contact with the United States within hours. The communications monitoring station in Manila went crazy attempting to figure out where all these new radio messages were coming from. When they were informed it was the 192nd, they gave them frequencies to use. Men were able to send messages home to their families that they had arrived safely.
The day started at 5:15 with reveille and anyone who washed near a faucet with running water was considered lucky. At 6:00 A.M. they ate breakfast followed by work – on their tanks and other equipment – from 7:00 A.M. to 11:30 A.M. Lunch was from 11:30 A.M. to 1:30 P.M. when the soldiers returned to work until 2:30 P.M. The shorter afternoon work period was based on the belief that it was too hot to work in the climate. The term “recreation in the motor pool,” a term they borrowed from the 194th Tank Battalion, meant they actually worked until 4:30 in the afternoon. The men spent this time removing the cosmoline from the guns and unpacking other equipment. Each man had an assigned job he was expected to complete.
At Ft. Stotsenburg, the soldiers were expected to wear their dress uniforms. Since working on the tanks was a dirty job, the battalion members wore coveralls to do the work on the tanks. The 192nd followed the example of the 194th and wore coveralls in their barracks area to do work on their tanks, but if the soldiers left the battalion’s area, they wore dress uniforms including going to the PX.
For recreation, the soldiers spent their free time bowling or going to the movies on the base. They also played horseshoes, softball, badminton, or threw footballs around during their free time. They also visited the barrios near the base. Men were given the opportunity to be allowed to go to Manila in small groups. Many men wrote home and told their families about how hot the weather was, the kind of food they were eating, about the countryside, and about the Filipinos.
Ten days before the attack on Pearl Harbor, the reconnaissance pilots reported that Japanese transports were milling around in a large circle in the South China Sea. On December 1, the tankers were ordered to the perimeter of Clark Field to guard against Japanese paratroopers. From this time on, two tank crew members remained with each tank at all times and were fed from food trucks. It was the men manning the radios in the 192nd’s communications tent who were the first to learn of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on the morning of December 8. Major Ted Wickord, the battalion’s commanding officer, Gen. James Weaver, and Major Ernest Miller, the CO of the 194th Tank Battalion, read the messages of the attack. The officers of the 192nd were called to the tent and informed of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. All the members of the tank and half-track crews were ordered to the south end of Clark Field to guard against Japanese paratroopers. HQ Company remained behind in their bivouac.
After hearing the news, Capt. Write went to his company and informed his men that Japan had bombed Pearl Harbor. To an extent, the news of the war was no surprise to the men, and many had come to the conclusion it was inevitable. The remaining members of the tank crews, not with their tanks, went to their tanks at the southern end of the Clark Field. The battalion’s half-tracks joined the tanks and took up positions next to them.
Around 8:00 A.M., the planes of the Army Air Corps took off and filled the sky. All morning long American planes could be seen in every direction. At noon the planes landed and were lined up in a straight line to be refueled near the pilots’ mess hall. While the planes were being worked on, the pilots went to lunch. At 12:45 in the afternoon on December 8, 1941, just ten hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the tankers lived through the Japanese attack on Clark Field.
The tankers were eating lunch when they saw planes approaching the airfield from the north. Many of the men believed they were American planes and had enough time to count 54 planes in formation. As they watched, what appeared to be raindrops – because they shimmered in the sun – appeared under the planes. With the thunderous explosions of the bombs exploding on the runways, the tankers knew that the planes were Japanese. The smoke and dust from the bombs blotted out the sun and made it impossible for the tankers to see more than a few feet. One bomb hit the mess hall where the pilots were eating. The bombers were quickly followed by Japanese fighters that sounded like angry bees to the tankers as they strafed the airfield. The tankers watched as American pilots attempted to get their planes off the ground. As they roared down the runway, Japanese fighters strafed the planes causing them to swerve, crash, and burn. Those that did get airborne were barely off the ground when they were hit. The planes exploded and crashed to the ground tumbling down the runways. The Japanese planes were as low as 50 feet above the ground and the pilots would lean out of the cockpits so they could more accurately pick out targets to straf. The tankers said they saw the pilots’ scarfs flapping in the wind.
Sandy avoided being hit by enemy fire by playing “leap-frog” over a wall. If the Japanese planes came from the side of the wall he was on, he would jump to the other side and use the wall to shield himself from enemy bullets. During the attack, a Filipino woman was hit by enemy fire in the hip. Sandy attempted to help her, but she would not allow him to help her.
While the attack was going on, the Filipinos who were building the 192nd’s barracks took cover. After the attack, they went right back to work on the barracks. This happened several times during the following air raids until the barracks were destroyed by bombs during an air raid. According to the members of the battalion, it appeared the Filipino contractor really wanted to be paid; war or no war.
When the Japanese were finished, there was not much left of the airfield. The soldiers watched as the dead, dying, and wounded were hauled to the hospital on bomb racks, trucks, and anything that could carry the wounded was in use. When the hospital filled, they watched the medics place the wounded under the building. Many of these men had their arms and legs missing. That night, since they did not have any foxholes, the men used an old latrine pit for cover since it was safer in the pit than in their tents. The entire night they were bitten by mosquitoes. Without knowing it, they had slept their last night on a cot or bed, and from this point on, the men slept in blankets on the ground.
The next morning the decision was made to move the battalion into a tree-covered area. Those men not assigned to a tank or half-track walked around Clark Field to look at the damage. As they walked, they saw there were hundreds of dead. Some were pilots who had been caught asleep, because they had flown night missions, in their tents during the first attack. Others were pilots who had been killed attempting to get to their planes. The tanks were still at the southern end of the airfield when a second air raid took place on the 10th. This time the bombs fell among the tanks of the battalion at the southern end of the airfield wounding some men.
On December 12, the company was sent to the Barrio of Dau so it could guard a highway and railroad from sabotage. From there, the company was sent to join the other companies of the 192nd just south of the Agno River. On December 23 and 24, the company was in the area of Urdaneta, where the tankers lost the company commander, Capt. Walter Write. While withdrawing from the area, A Company had been given cigar boxes that Philippine Ordnance had made into land mines. Sandy and another soldier were supposed to place them along the sides of the road since the Japanese, like the Americans, marched alongside the roads in the ditches.
Since the soldiers never had been trained in the use of landmines, Capt. Walter Write told Sandy, “Sergeant, get the men back. This mine doesn’t look right and may go off.” As he released the mine, it went off in his hands blowing off his arms, his one leg, and blinding him. He continued to give orders to the men. Before he died, he asked that they place red roses on his grave, but since there were no roses, the men placed a red native flower on the grave. In Sandy’s opinion, the morale of the company dropped after Write’s death.
After Write was buried, the battalion’s tanks made an end run to get south of Agno River after the main bridge had been destroyed. As they did this, they ran into Japanese resistance early in the evening but successfully crossed the river in the Bayambang Province. On December 25, the tanks of the battalion held the southern bank of the Agno River from Carmen to Tayung, with the tanks of the 194th holding the line on the Carmen-Alcala-Bautista Road. The tanks held the position until 5:30 in the morning on December 27.
Sandy recalled that the tankers had Christmas dinner. He said, “I remember it was Christmastime and it’s the first decent meal we had, and would you believe — we had turkey — on Christmas Day. This was a blessing because we hadn’t had a shower — hadn’t even had my clothes off for eighteen straight days. I slept on my tank or in my tank or on the run, or wherever we could get a minute’s rest.”
It was in the jungle that the tankers found out how inappropriate the M3 tanks were for use in the Philippines. Off the road, they had to travel with their turrets backward. If the tankers did not do this, the guns would get stuck in the jungle growth. The tanks were also restricted to the roads since they would get stuck in the mud of the rice fields. The high silhouettes and straight sides of the M3 also made the tanks easy targets for the Japanese.
It was on December 30 that they lost a tank platoon commander, 2nd Lt. William Read. On a road east of Zaragoza, later that day, the company was bivouacked for the night and posted sentries. The sentries heard a noise on the road and woke the other tankers who grabbed Tommy guns and manned the tanks’ machine guns. As they watched, a Japanese bicycle battalion rode into their bivouac. When the last bicycle passed the tanks, the tankers opened fire on them. When they stopped firing, they had completely wiped out the bicycle battalion. To leave the area, the tankers drove their tanks over the bodies.
At Gumain River, from the night of December 31 to the morning of January 1st, the tank companies formed a defensive line along the south bank of the river. When the Japanese attacked the position at night, they were easy to see since they were wearing white t-shirts. The Japanese were taking heavy casualties, so they attempted to use smoke to cover their advance, but the wind blew the smoke into the Japanese. When the Japanese broke off the attack, they had suffered fifty percent casualties. At Guagua, A Company, with units from the 11th Division, Philippine Army, attempted to make a counterattack against the Japanese. Somehow, the tanks were mistaken, by the Filipinos to be Japanese. The 11th Division accurately used mortars on them. The result was the loss of three tanks.
On January 1, the tanks of the 194th were holding the Calumpit Bridge allowing the Southern Luzon Forces to cross the bridge toward Bataan. General Wainwright was attempting to hold the main Japanese force coming down Route 5 to prevent the troops from being cut off. General MacArthur’s chief of staff gave conflicting orders involving whose command the defenders were under which caused confusion. Gen. Wainwright was not aware these orders had been given. Because of the orders, there was confusion among the Filipinos and American forces defending the bridges over the Pampanga River. Due to the efforts of the Self Propelled Mounts, the 71st Field Artillery, and a frenzied attack by the 192nd Tank Battalion the Japanese were halted.-
From January 2 to 4, the 192nd held the road open from San Fernando to Dinalupihan so the southern forces could escape. It was while the tanks were dropping back from San Fernando that they found themselves facing Japanese infantry.
Owen stated, “We had no protection whatsoever against the Japanese aircraft, the bombers, the dive bombers, and the fighter planes or whatever. Forrest Knox and I had confiscated two aircraft machine guns, the types mounted in the wings of the P-40s. They fired extremely fast. The run-of-the-mill Browning machine gun fires at about 450 rounds per minute. These things will fire in excess of 1000 rounds per minute because they were cut-down versions of the machine guns. They were much lighter as a result would heat up much quicker. That’s why they used them in aircraft because as they flew the air coming around the barrel would keep them relatively cool if they weren’t used too much. Well, this is all well and good, but it’s a little difficult to hold those fool things while you shoot them. They come in pairs. So we went to a native–a farmer I guess–he had rice paddies there We wanted to know if we could borrow his calasa. A calasa is a two-wheeled cart pulled by one or two small ponies–they used for taxi service. In this particular case, I don’t know what they used it for–if it was a wagon or if it was for taxi service. Well, he said, ‘How much are you going to pay me?’ We didn’t have any money so we gave him an IOU and signed it ‘Uncle Sam.’ I think it was for ten dollars or ten pesos or whatever it was. Anyway, we took the axile off the and dug a hole, stuck the axile down in the ground sticking straight up, and mounted the wheel on top. Then in turn mounted the machine gun on the wheel. All the way around the wheel we dug a trench about six feet deep. Now I tell you that was one helluva job just to set this thing up. But anytime an aircraft came in we could get on these two guns and start firing away if they were anywhere within range. Well, I don’t know if we ever scratched one (Japanese plane) but we sure burned through a lot of ammunition. They never found us–never detected us. We never got strafed, bombed, or anything. Knocky and I had a ball building that fool thing and shooting at planes. We often talked about that and wondered if that guy got his money from the IOU signed ‘Uncle Sam.’
In addition, he said, “On our retreat back from San Fernando back toward Bataan, when we were going to establish this defensive line all the way across the Philippines, we set up a defensive line one night with our tanks that were left.
“In the jungles over there you can imagine how dark it is when there’s no moon. When the moon is out it is pretty decent, but when there is no moon it’s absolutely black. Well, doggone if those Japanese infantry troops didn’t literally attack those tanks by hand. They didn’t have machine guns, fortunately. They just swarmed around us with handguns and rifles and whatnot. Well, what were we to do? We couldn’t lower our guns down far enough to shoot them. If you stuck your head out of the tank to shoot them with your pistol, man, you were a dead man. So all we could do is gradually retreat out of the mess. Well, in the meantime one of the tanks in our company, about in the middle of the retreat, doggone if one of these Japs didn’t come up and lay a magnetic type mine, armor-piercing, on top of the front, you might say, about where the bow gunner would sit. When that thing went off, zing, right through! Fortunately, it only took from the calf on down — that part of the leg. His name was Emil Schmidt.”
Sandy also said about the event. “You never knew when they were going to attack. You couldn’t tell a Japanese from a Filippino when they did infiltrate. I do remember this one particular occasion where Emil Schmit had suffered the leg injury–literally an amputation. The commander’s name was Sgt. (John) Campbell. He was sitting up there with a 30-caliber machine gun mounted on the turret of the tank. They weren’t designed to be shooting down on the ground, literally right down beside the tank. They were designed to shoot ahead of the tank in an open field. Well, the Japanese was coming up with a magnetic mine. The sergeant with the machine gun knew he couldn’t shoot him and didn’t know enough to take out his pistol and shoot the guy.”
The tanks often were the last units to disengage from the enemy and form a new defensive line as Americans and Filipino forces withdrew toward Bataan. On the night of January 7, the A Company was awaiting orders to cross the last bridge into Bataan over the Culis Creek. The engineers were ready to blow up the bridge, but the battalion’s commanding officer, Lt. Col. Ted Wickord, ordered the engineers to wait until he had looked to see if they were anywhere in sight. He found the company, asleep in their tanks because they had not received the order to withdraw across the bridge. After they had crossed, the bridge was destroyed. This made them the last American unit to enter Bataan. The next day the tanks received maintenance. It was the first rest that the two tank battalions had since December 24.
The next day, a composite tank company was formed under the command of Capt. Donald Hanes, B Co., 192nd. Its job was to protect the East Coast Road north of Hermosa open and to stop Japanese tanks from attempting to use it to overrun the next defensive line that was forming. While in this position, the tanks were under constant enemy artillery fire. The rest of the tanks were ordered to bivouac south of the Abucay-Hacienda Road. When word came that a bridge was going to be blown, all the tanks were ordered out of the area, which included the composite company. This could have resulted in a catastrophe, but the Japanese did not take advantage of the situation.
The tanks bivouacked south of the Pilar-Bagac Road and about two kilometers from the East Coast Road. It had almost been one month since the tank crews had a rest and the tanks had maintenance work done on them by 17th Ordnance. It was also on this day that the tank platoons were reduced to three tanks per tank platoon. The men rested and the tanks received the required maintenance. Most of the tank tracks had worn down to bare metal and the radial engines were long past their 400-hour overhauls.
It was at this time the tank battalions received these orders which came from Gen. Weaver: “Tanks will execute maximum delay, staying in position and firing at visible enemy until further delay will jeopardize withdrawal. If a tank is immobilized, it will be fought until the close approach of the enemy, then destroyed; the crew previously taking positions outside and continuing to fight with the salvaged and personal weapons. Considerations of personal safety and expediency will not interfere with accomplishing the greatest possible delay.”
The battalions were sent to cover the junctions of the Back Road and East Road with the Abucay-Hacienda Road on January 25. While holding the position, the 45th Infantry, Philippine Scouts, fought its way to the position at 3:00 A.M. One platoon was sent to the front of the column of trucks that were loading the troops. The tanks provided heavy fire so that the infantry could withdraw and inflicted heavy losses on the Japanese. Later in the day, both the 192nd and 194th held a defensive line on the Bakanga-Cardre-BaniBani Roads until the withdrawal was completed at midnight. They held the position until the night of January 26, when they dropped back to a new defensive line roughly along the Pilar-Bagac Roads. When ordered to withdraw to the new line, the 192nd found that the bridge at Balanga, that they were supposed to use had been destroyed by enemy fire. To withdraw, they had to use secondary roads to get around the barrio. On the morning of January 27, a new battle line had been formed and all units were supposed to be beyond it but tanks were still straggling in at noon. The tanks were still holding their position six hours after they were supposed to have withdrawn.
The tank battalions, on January 28, had been given the job of protecting the beaches. The 192nd was assigned the coastline from Paden Point to Limay along Bataan’s east coast, while the battalion’s half-tracks were used to patrol the roads. The Japanese later admitted that the tanks guarding the beaches prevented them from attempting landings. While doing this job, the members of B Company noticed that each morning when the PT boats were off the coast they were attacked by Japanese Zeros, so the tank crews made arrangements with the PT boats to be at a certain place at a certain time. In the morning when the Zeros arrived and attacked, they were met by machine-gun fire from the boats but also from the machine guns of the tanks and half-tracks. When the Zeros broke off the attack, they had lost nine of twelve planes.
B Company one night while on this duty, engaged the Japanese in a firefight as they attempted to land troops on the beach. When morning came, not one Japanese soldier had successfully landed on the beach. After Bataan surrendered, the Japanese later told the tankers that their presence on the beaches stopped them from attempting landings.
At this time, the battalion took part in the Battle of the Points on the west coast of Bataan. The Japanese landed troops but ended up trapped. When they attempted to land reinforcements, they landed in the wrong place. One was the Lapay-Longoskawayan points from January 23 to 29, the Quinauan-Aglaloma points from January 22 to February 8, and the Sililam-Anyasan points from January 27 to February 13. The Japanese had been stopped, but the decision was made by Brigadier General Clinton A. Pierce that tanks were needed to support the 45th Infantry Philippine Scouts. He requested the tanks from the Provisional Tank Group.
Sandmire recalled, “Our Army had 155 howitzers. They had six of them in whatever they called these groups–I guess plan old artillery. Seems it was our job to protect the guns. They were mobile. We’d hook onto them with these special vehicles. You could haul them on down the road, but you just didn’t pick them up like a sack of flour. It took a lot of preparation to set them up and it took a lot of preparation to tear them down so they could be transported by truck. Well, why we always got stuck guarding those things, I don’t know. That’s the first thing that would draw fire. Just as soon as they started shelling the Japanese, up would go photo Charlie and they’d find those guns and the first thing you know is here would come the dive bombers and they would pepper the hell outa them. The only thing we could do is to set them up on a temporary basis as we possibly could, throw fire as we could, do all the damage that we could, knock them down as quick as we could and get them out of there before the Japanese could find out where we were. That’s the only recourse we had. We couldn’t get enough fire power to do a lot of damage. It was more or less a morale thing as far as the Japanese were concerned as they never knew where these 155s were coming from. That’s a pretty good size shell. I think it’s a six-inch and it does a lot of damage when it hits.”
On February 2, a platoon of C Company tanks was ordered to Quinauan Point where the Japanese had landed troops. The tanks arrived at about 5:15 P.M. He did a quick reconnaissance of the area, and after meeting with the commanding infantry officer, made the decision to drive tanks into the edge of the Japanese position and spray the area with machine-gun fire. The progress was slow but steady until a Japanese .37 milometer gun was spotted in front of the lead tank, and the tanks withdrew. It turned out that the gun had been disabled by mortar fire, but the tanks did not know this at the time. At least one platoon of tanks was sent to the points to assist C Company, but Sandy stated his platoon was not involved.
The decision was made to resume the attack the next morning, so the 45th Infantry dug in for the night. The next day, the tank platoon did reconnaissance before pulling into the front line. They repeated the maneuver and sprayed the area with machine gunfire. As they moved forward, members of the 45th Infantry followed the tanks. The troops made progress all day long along the left side of the line. The major problem the tanks had to deal with was tree stumps which they had to avoid so they would not get hung up on them. The stumps also made it hard for the tanks to maneuver. Coordinating the attack with the infantry was difficult, so the decision was made to bring in a radio car so that the tanks and infantry could talk with each other.
Only 3 of 23 tanks were being used and without the support of infantry and the trick during the attack through the jungle was to avoid large trees and clear a way for the infantry to attack. This they did by thrusting into the jungle. They only became aware of enemy positions when they were fired on. The tanks were supposed to have support from mortars but the ammunition was believed to be defective. It was found that the mortars were manned by inexperienced air corpsmen converted to infantry who had no idea that the arming pins on the mortar shells had to be pulled before firing them so the shells landed and did not explode.
On February 4, at 8:30 A.M. five tanks and the radio car arrived. The tanks were assigned the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5, so each tank commander knew which tank was receiving an order. Each tank also received a walkie-talkie, as well as the radio car and infantry commanders. This was done so that the crews could coordinate the attack with the infantry and so that the tanks could be ordered to where they were needed. The Japanese were pushed back almost to the cliffs when the attack was halted for the night. The attack resumed the next morning and the Japanese were pushed to the cliff line where they hid below the edge of the cliff out of view. It was at that time that the tanks were released to return to the 192nd.
Companies A and C were ordered to the west coast of Bataan while B Company – which was held in reserve – and 17th Ordnance held the southern shore of Bataan. During the night, they were kept busy with repeated threats both on and offshore. The tank battalions, on their own, took up the job of protecting the airfields at Cabcaban, Bataan, and Mariveles, since Japanese paratroopers were known to be available. The tanks and half-tracks were well hidden in the jungle around the airfields and different plans were in place to be used against Japanese forces.
The company also took part in the Battle of the Pockets – from January 23 to February 17 – to wipe out Japanese soldiers who had been trapped behind the main defensive line after a Japanese offensive was stopped and pushed back to the original line of defense. The tanks would enter the pocket one at a time to replace a tank in the pocket. Another tank did not enter the pocket until a tank exited the pocket. Doing this was so stressful that each tank company was rotated out and replaced by one that was being held in reserve.
To exterminate the Japanese, two methods were used. The first was to have three Filipino soldiers ride on the back of the tank. As the tank went over a Japanese foxhole, the Filipinos dropped three hand grenades into the foxhole. Since the grenades were from WWI, one out of three usually exploded. The other method used to kill the Japanese was to park a tank with one track over the foxhole. The driver gave the other track power resulting in the tank going around in a circle and grinding its way down into the foxhole. The tankers slept upwind of their tanks so they would not smell the rotting flesh in the tracks.
Sandy stated, “Incidentally, we never took prisoners. They either buried themselves or they buried the dead in these spider holes. (It appears Sandy was referring to the tanks grinding their tracks into the ground over the foxholes.} What weren’t killed we shot and buried.”
While the tanks were doing this job, the Japanese sent soldiers, with cans of gasoline, against the tanks. These Japanese attempted to jump onto the tanks, pour gasoline into the vents on the back of the tanks, and set the tanks on fire. If the tankers could not machine gun the Japanese before they got to a tank, the other tanks would shoot them as they stood on a tank. The tankers did not like to do this because of what it did to the crew inside the tank. When the bullets hit the tank, its rivets would pop and wound the men inside the tank. Since the stress on the crews was tremendous, the tanks rotated into the pocket one at a time. A tank entered the pocket and the next tank waited for the tank that had been relieved to exit the pocket before it would enter. This was repeated until all the tanks in the pocket were relieved. It was for their performance during this battle that the 192nd Tank Battalion would receive one of its Presidential Unit Citations.
The tanks of A, B, and C Company were able to clear the pockets. But before this was done, one C Company tank which had gone beyond the American perimeter was disabled and the tank just sat there. When the sun came up the next day, the tank was still sitting there. During the night, its crew was buried alive, inside the tank, by the Japanese. When the Japanese had been wiped out, the tank was turned upside down to remove the dirt and recover the bodies of the crew. The tank was put back into use.
Sandy and Sgt. John Hopple, B Company, and two other men of the 192nd risked their lives to rescue another member of their battalion who had been wounded. The four went into an area under fire and put the man on a stretcher and carried him out. The other three men with Sandy were wounded. Sandy could not recall if the man that was rescued survived or if he died of his wounds but the other three men, who had been wounded rescuing him, died of their wounds. For this action under enemy fire, Sandy was nominated for the Silver Star which he received years after the war.
Remembering the event, he said, “This is where the Silver Star action comes in. The Japanese landed and made a beachhead on the ocean-side. They didn’t come by land. They came by barge or whatever. They established the beachhead. These (Japanese Marines) are the ones who would dig these “spider holes” alongside these monstrous trees. The roots weren’t round like we are familiar with here. The roots were flat and ran up and down. Some of the roots were a foot thick. and two or three feet high, and made a perfect defense against bullets and even small cannon that we had wouldn’t penetrate it. Armor-piercing would but explosive would, yeah, but explosive would not.
“One of the tanks in our company (actually C Company) got stalled out there trying to drive the Japanese back, and during the night when these Japanese were digging these spider holes, they may have shot the men or threw a grenade in there or probably just buried them alive but somehow they put the dirt from the spider holes into the tank so there was no sign of digging. No sign of any dirt. At night they would come out of these spider holes and, man, they would just raise hell. It was a terrifying experience never knowing what was going on.
“The following day one of our men in our company – I believe his name was Corporal Bruce — had gone in doing some reconnoitering and got shot. Well, here he is literally out in the middle of no man’s land and he couldn’t get back. So myself and a fellow named Hopplen (Hopple) from B Company and two others, so help me, whose names I can’t remember, we scrounged our way out there with a stretcher, got him on the stretcher, and started bringing him back when two of the guys, I believe it was two, got shot carrying out. I didn’t get a scratch carrying this guy out and I presume the fourth guy didn’t either. Anyway, the two who that were shot were pretty bad and so was Corporal Bruce. We took them in an ambulance — of course, there was no ambulance drivers around, so I was a ‘handcuff volunteer’ to take them to the hospital.
“So down I went, down this Bataan highway, whatever they called it. Had to go all the way down to Mariveles and back up the other side, the bayside of the peninsula to get to the hospital. Well, hell, the rocks were just — aww — they were just great big cobblestones — not fit for truck driving. Fine for tanks, but for vehicles and trucks it was almost impossible. Anyway, when I got them all over there they were all dead. I guess this one guy lived a day or so but all died with the exception of myself and this other guy who helped bring them out. This was where I was recommended for, but not awarded the Silver Star.”
It was also during this time that Sandy and Pvt. Albert DuBois accidentally gave a tank crew from B Company a good scare. The two soldiers were on guard duty and found the duty boring. To keep themselves entertained, the two men began tossing a “dummy” hand grenade to see who could throw it the farthest.
During one of his tosses, Sandy’s throw went through the open hatch of a tank. Believing the grenade was live, the crew began digging through the junk on the floor in an attempt to get the grenade out of the tank. When it did not explode, the tank crew members looked out of the turret and found Sandy walking alongside the tank. Sandy looked up at the crew and asked, “Did anyone see a practice grenade land around here?” In Sandy’s opinion, if the crew could have, they would have shot him on the spot.
About this time he said, “During the course of all the battles which all take gas and ammunition, which we were sorely short of, and running out of food, ammunition, gasoline, and our vehicles were going to pot, we were down to the point where we couldn’t do a thing except for a major crisis where the Japanese had broken through and we would try to seal up the hole to make sure they didn’t break through.”
Sandy’s tank was near kilometer 208 a little ahead of the remainder of A Company. “Photo Charlie” flew over and stayed around for a while. His tank crew believed their tank was pretty well camouflaged but had dug small trenches to take cover in if they were attacked. Not too long after Photo Charlie had left, a Japanese glider bomber came in and laid a bomb beside their tank. They were on the other side of the tank, so they did not get hit by shrapnel. They quickly moved the tank into the denser jungle. During the strafing and bombing, Sgt. Ivan Wilmer was attempting to reach his tank when he was hit by shrapnel from a Japanese bomb killing him instantly.
During the Battle of Bataan, Sandy came down with dysentery. While he was ill, his tank was destroyed. This resulted in Sandy assuming the role of reconnaissance sergeant for the 192nd. To do this duty, he was assigned an Indian Motorcycle. Having trained at Fort Knox on Harley-Davidson motorcycles, Sandy found it hard to adjust to the controls of the motorcycle which were just the opposite of a Harley.
The 192nd unlike other units had arrived in the Philippines just before the start of the war, so they did not have the opportunity to stockpile food. The soldiers were hungry and began to eat everything they could get their hands on to eat. The Carabao were tough, but if they were cooked long enough they could be eaten. They also began to eat horse meat provided by the 26th U.S. Cavalry. During this time the soldiers ate monkeys, snakes, lizards, horses, and mules. To make things worse, the soldiers’ rations were cut in half again on March 1, 1942. This meant that they only ate two meals a day. The Japanese also were dropping surrender leaflets with a scantily clad blond on them. They would have been more successful at getting the Americans to surrender if the picture had been of a hamburger since the men were so hungry that they most likely would have surrendered for a good meal. The amount of gasoline in March was reduced to 15 gallons a day for all vehicles except the tanks. This would later be dropped to ten gallons a day. It was during this time that Gen Wainwright wanted to turn the tanks into pillboxes, but Gen Weaver pointed out to him that they did not have enough tanks to effectively do this, and if they did, they soon would have no tanks. Gen. Weaver suggested to Wainwright that a platoon of tanks be sent to Corregidor, but Wainwright declined.
It was at this time that Sandy wrote a letter to his parents which was dated March 15. The ship that was carrying the letter was sunk by a Japanese submarine and the sack it was in was fished from the water from an American sub. His parents received the letter on August 12 and it showed signs of having been in the water. Of this, he said, “During the course of all these battles which all take gas and ammunition, which we were sorely sort short of, and running out of food, ammunition, gasoline, and our vehicles were going to pot, we were down to the point where we couldn’t do a thing except for a major crisis where the Japanese had broken through and we would try to seal up the hole to make sure they didn’t breakthrough.”
The Japanese launched an all-out attack, on April 3, supported by artillery and aircraft. A large force of Japanese troops came over Mount Samat and descended down the south face of the volcano. This attack wiped out two divisions of defenders and left a large area of the defensive line open to the Japanese. The Japanese broke through the east side of the main defensive line on Bataan on April 7. C Company was pulled out of its position along the west side of the line and ordered to reinforce the eastern part of the line. Traveling south to Mariveles, the tankers started up the eastern road but were unable to reach their assigned area due to the roads being blocked by retreating Filipino and American forces. The tanks became a favorite target of the Japanese receiving fire on trails and while hidden in the jungle. and could not fight back.
It was the evening of April 8 that Gen. Edward P. King decided that further resistance was futile, since approximately 25% of his men were healthy enough to fight, and he estimated they would last one more day. In addition, he had over 6,000 troops who sick or wounded and 40,000 civilians who he feared would be massacred. His troops were on one-quarter rations, and even at that ration, he had two days of food left. He also believed his troops could fight for one more day. Companies B and D, 192nd, and A Company, 194th, were preparing for a suicide attack against the Japanese in an attempt to stop the advance. At 6:00 P.M. that tank battalion commanders received this order: “You will make plans, to be communicated to company commanders only, and be prepared to destroy within one hour after receipt by radio, or other means, of the word ‘CRASH’, all tanks and combat vehicles, arms, ammunition, gas, and radios: reserving sufficient trucks to close to rear echelons as soon as accomplished.”
Having eaten everything that moved in the jungle, out of food, ammunition, and medical supplies, on April 8, 1942, the word came down to Sandy and the other tankers that Bataan was going to be surrendered. Sandy was ordered to destroy the remaining tanks and make them unusable to the Japanese. Of this, he said, “I happened to be at kilometer 208 and Mariveles, which is the southern tip of Bataan peninsula — about 125 kilometers from San Fernando which was our starting point. Our unit was pretty much thinly spread out over the west coast of Bataan. We must have been in this particular location for two weeks before we got the word that there had been a surrender. Of course, we were just about dead on our feet anyway because we couldn’t do anything.
“We were out of gasoline. We still had some ammunition but the food was down to practically nothing. We were killing everything we could find in the jungle — birds, lizards, snakes — the mules, the horses, and water buffalo had long since been gone. The rice was practically gone. Very little, if any vegetables or wild fruits of the jungle that we could live on. Well, the word came down that we could destroy all of our ordnance equipment which was tanks, machine guns, cannons, and so forth, but the quartermaster equipment, which was trucks, were to be turned over to the Japanese.
“I unluckily got the job of destroying all the tanks we had left. So, I took them back into the boonies as far as I could drive them before we just stopped and tried to get them in a semi-circle with the engines facing me. Then, with my own tank, I fired rounds of armor-piercing ammunition into the back end of each one of these tanks which ruptured the gasoline tank, ruined the mortars and whatnot, and then fired high explosive shells into each one these individual tanks, setting them on fire. By the time I got through with them, they were practically useless except for scrap metal. I understand that during the course of the war they salvaged all of those tanks out of the jungle and sent all that scrap metal back to Japan.”
It was at 10:00 P.M. that the decision was made to send a jeep – under a white flag – behind enemy lines to negotiate terms of surrender. The problem soon became that no white cloth could be found. Phil Parish, a truck driver for A Company realized that he had bedding buried in the back of his truck and searched for it. The bedding became the “white flags” that were flown on the jeeps. At 11:40 P.M., the ammunition dumps were destroyed. At midnight Companies B and D, and A Company, 194th, received an order from Gen. Weaver to stand down. At 2:oo A.M. April 9, Gen. King sent a jeep under a white flag carrying Colonel Everett C. Williams, Col. James V. Collier, and Major Marshall Hurt to meet with the Japanese commander about terms of surrender. (The driver was from the tank group.) Shortly after daylight Collier and Hunt returned with word of the appointment. It was at about 6:45 A.M. that tank battalion commanders received the order “crash.” The tank crews circled their tanks. Each tank fired an armor-piercing shell into the engine of the tank in front of it. They also opened the gasoline cocks inside the tank compartments and dropped hand grenades into the tanks. Most of the company waited in their bivouac for the Japanese to make contact, while others attempted to reach Corregidor which had not surrendered.
As Gen. King left to negotiate the surrender, he went through the area held by B Company and spoke to the men. He said to them, “I’m going to get us the best deal I can. When you get home, don’t ever let anyone say to you, you surrendered. I was the one who surrendered.” Gen. King with his two aides, Maj. Wade R. Cothran and Captain Achille C. Tisdelle Jr. got into a jeep carrying a large white flag. They were followed by another jeep – also flying another large white flag – with Col. Collier and Maj. Hurt in it. As the jeeps made their way north they were strafed and small bombs were dropped by a Japanese plane. The drivers of both jeeps managed to avoid the bombs and bullets. The strafing ended when a Japanese reconnaissance plane ordered the fighter pilot to stop strafing.
About 10:00 A.M. the jeeps reached Lamao where they were received by a Japanese Major General who informed King that he reported his coming to negotiate a surrender and that an officer from Japanese command would arrive to do the negotiations. The Japanese officer also told him that his troops would not attack for thirty minutes while King decided what he would do. After a half-hour, no Japanese officer had arrived from their headquarters and the Japanese attack had resumed. King sent Col. Collier and Maj. Hunt back to his command with instructions that any unit in line with the Japanese advance should fly white flags. Shortly after this was done a Japanese colonel and interpreter arrived. King was told the officer was Homma’s Chief of Staff and he had come to discuss King’s surrender. King attempted to get insurances from the Japanese that his men would be treated as prisoners of war, but the Japanese officer – through his interpreter – accused him of declining to surrender unconditionally. At one point King stated he had enough trucks and gasoline to carry his troops out of Bataan. He was told that the Japanese would handle the movement of the prisoners. The two men talked back and forth until the colonel said through the interpreter, “The Imperial Japanese Army are not barbarians.” King found no choice but to accept him at his word.
Unknown to Gen. King, an order attributed to Gen. Masaharu Homma – but in all likelihood from one of his subordinates – had been given. It stated, “Every troop which fought against our army on Bataan should be wiped out thoroughly, whether he surrendered or not, and any American captive who is unable to continue marching all the way to the concentration camp should be put to death in the area of 200 meters off the road.”
Sandy was now a Prisoner of War. His company was ordered to go to Mariveles at Bataan’s southern tip. Remembering this, he said, “At the time of surrender the Japanese had absolutely no organization, no way of knowing how many troops there may be, what they were going to do with us — nothing! We were on our own to get to kilometer post 208, which was at least two miles down into the jungle, out to the main highway. I guess they called it the west Bataan highway for want for a better description and we were to get to Mariveles which was to be our assembly point for all the troops — Filipino, American, or whatever. It took us two days to get down there. You either walked, or hitched a ride, or however, you get down there. We were halfway in good spirits because we thought the war was over for us. We wouldn’t have to worry about getting killed and the enemy would feed us and clothe us.
“All night long, I had a little duffel bag with my personal articles like a toothbrush, toothpaste, and maybe a razor. My watch I had, but they found that. My Elgin watch that I had bought back in the states. Everybody has literally stripped — just nothing. Of course, there was no organization. They had raw rice so we filled our pockets with raw rice and started on this march from Mariveles. — started the so-called Death March. For how many days it took us to get to San Fernando, we ate raw rice — all the way up there– trying to wash it down with whatever little water I could find. I never had any meat of any kind, no vegetables — just raw rice and cooked rice that the Japanese had given us, not along the way, but at night when we settled down. We would have to sit on the ground with our feet and knees drawn up to our chest as tight as we could and the next guy with his knees right against your back and that’s the way you sat all night, just like this. Huddled, just like that, all night. And this went on for the first three nights. You can imagine how we felt without much food, no rest, no sleep, and worrying about the guards because if you moved they’d beat the hell outa of you or use their bayonets, or shoot you, or behead you or whatever — whatever their mood was. And this type of treatment went on all the way up that death march — all the way up to San Fernando.”
Later in the day at Mariveles, the POWs were ordered to move and taken to a schoolyard in Mariveles and ordered to sit. They remained there in the sun without shade for hours. This became known as “the sun treatment.”
When they were ordered to move, they made their way north. At one point, they ran in front of Japanese artillery pieces that were firing on Corregidor and Ft. Drum. When the two American strongholds began returning fire, the prisoners found themselves in the line of fire, and shells began landing around them. As A Company passed the guns, a shell from Corregidor hit a Japanese gun. When the smoke cleared, there was nothing left of the five men manning it or the gun.
On the march, Sandy stayed with the members of A Company. For the marchers, the worst thing was the heat and lack of water. Those men who fell out were killed. Prisoners became so desperate that they often risked their lives to get a drink of water. The Filipino civilians along the route risked their lives, and often gave their lives, to give the soldiers a drink of water. The soldiers often drank water in the ditches alongside the road. This water was filled with bacteria. Often, the bodies of soldiers who were killed by the Japanese were floating in the water. Those who drank this water came down with dysentery.
The POWs were herded into a field and thoroughly searched. They remained there during the night. At one point, two gunshots rang out, but no one knew what had happened. When they reached Lamao, there was evidence of heavy fighting before the surrender. The marchers saw the dead everywhere and were happy to leave the area after being held there for two days. At night as they made their way north, they could not see them, but they smelled bodies burning.
The longer they on the march the thirstier they became. The POWs were allowed to refill their canteens from ditches – some with dead bodies in them – but not from the artesian wells that flowed onto the roads. Many men would later die from dysentery at Camp O’Donnell from drinking the water. Between Lamao and San Fernando, it began to rain which helped the POWs. When the POWs stopped at a barrio to change guards, the Filipinos were allowed to bring water to the marchers. It took many members of the company eleven days to reach San Fernando where they were put into a bullpen surrounded by barbed wire. It is not known how long he was held there.
At San Fernando, the POWs boarded a train and were crammed into small wooden boxcars known as “forty or eights” because each car could hold forty men or eight horses. Since there were 100 men in each detachment, the Japanese put 100 men into each car and closed the doors. With the Filipino sun beating down on the roofs of the boxcars, the journey by train was unbearable. The prisoners were packed in so tightly that when a man died, he could not fall down. There were no provisions for water or toilets, so the floors of the boxcars became a sea of diarrhea, vomit, and urine. The prisoners disembarked from the train at Capas and marched the final few miles to Camp O’Donnell an unfinished Filipino training base that was pressed into use as a POW camp on April 1, 1942.
Once in the camp, they were taken into a large field where they were counted and searched and all extra clothing that they had was taken from them and not returned. Blankets, knives, and matches were taken from them. If a man was found to have Japanese money on them, they were taken to the guardhouse. Finally, the camp commandant came out, stood on a box, and told them that they were enemies of Japan and would always be Japan’s enemies. He also told them that they were captives and not prisoners of war and would be treated accordingly. After the speech, the prisoners were allowed to go to their barracks. Over the next several days, gunshots were heard to the southeast of the camp as the POWs who had Japanese items on them were executed for looting.
There was not enough housing for the POWs and most slept under buildings or on the ground. The barracks were designed for 40 men and those who did sleep in one slept in one with as many 80 to 120 men. Most of the POWs slept on the ground under the barracks. There was no netting to protect the men from malaria-carrying mosquitos as they slept, so many men soon became ill with malaria. The ranking American officer was slapped after asking for building materials to repair the buildings.
The POWs received three meals, mainly rice, a day. For breakfast, they were fed a half cup of soupy rice and occasionally some type of coffee. Lunch each day was a half of a mess kit of steamed rice and a half cup of sweet potato soup. They received the same meal for dinner. All meals were served outside regardless of the weather. By May 1, the food had improved a little with the issuing of a little wheat flour, some native beans, and a small issue of coconut oil. About once every ten days, 3 or 4 small calves were brought into the camp. When meat was given out, there was only enough for one-fourth of the POWs to receive a piece that was an inch square. A native potato, the camote, was given to the POWs, but most were rotten and thrown out. The POWs had to post guards to prevent other POWs from eating them. The camp had a Black Market and POWs who had money could buy a small can of fish from the guards for $5.00.
There was only one water faucet in the camp, and the prisoners stood in line from two to eight hours waiting for a drink. The Japanese guards at the faucet would turn it off for no reason and the next man in line would stand as long as four hours waiting for it to be turned on again. This situation improved when a second faucet was added by the POWs who came up with the pipe, dug the trench, and ran the waterline. Just like the first faucet, the Japanese turned off the water when they wanted water to bathe, but unlike the first water line, the POWs had the ability to turn on the water again without the Japanese knowing it. There was no water for washing clothes, so the POWs would throw out their clothing when it had been soiled. In addition, water for cooking had to be carried three miles from a river to the camp, and mess kits could not be washed. The slit trenches in the camp were inadequate and were soon overflowing since most of the POWs had dysentery. The result was that flies were everywhere in the camp including the POW kitchens and in the food.
The camp hospital had no soap, water, or disinfectant. When the ranking American doctor at the camp wrote a letter to the camp commandant, Capt. Yohio Tsuneyoshi, asking for medical supplies, he was told never to write another letter. The Archbishop of Manila sent a truckload of medical supplies to the camp, the Japanese commandant refused to allow the truck into the camp. When the Philippine Red Cross sent medical supplies to the camp the Japanese took 95% of the supplies for their own use. When a second truck was sent to the camp by the Red Cross, it was turned away. The POWs in the camp hospital lay on the floor elbow to elbow and only one medic – out of the six medics assigned to care for 50 sick POWs – was healthy enough to care for them. When a representative of the Philippine Red Cross stated they could supply a 150-bed hospital for the camp, he was slapped in the face by a Japanese lieutenant.
Each morning, the bodies of the dead were found all over the camp and were carried to the hospital and placed underneath it. The bodies lay there for two or three days before they were buried in the camp cemetery by other POWs who were suffering from dysentery and/or malaria. To clean the ground under the hospital, the bodies were moved to one side, the ground was scraped and lime was spread over it. The bodies were placed in the cleaned area, and the area they had lain was scraped and lime was spread over it. At one point, 80 bodies lay under the hospital.
Work details were sent out on a daily basis. Each day, the American doctors gave a list of names to the Japanese of the POWs who were healthier enough to work. If the quota of POWs needed to work could not be met, the Japanese put those POWs who were sick but could walk, to work. The death rate among the POWs reached 50 men dying a day.
Sandy did not stay at Camp O’Donnell for long because he went out on a work detail to Manila. The detail was under the command of Japanese engineers whose job was to rebuild the bridges, roads, and airfields that had been destroyed by the Filipino and American troops as they retreated into Bataan. While working on this detail, the POWs lived in a bowling alley in Manila. With him on this detail were Sgt. Forrest Knox, Pvt. Lloyd Richter, Sgt. Alva Chapman of A Company.
The POWs drove trucks that carried supplies to the POWs building bridges without any guards. Each man wore an armband that, in Japanese, told any Japanese soldier who stopped the truck that the driver was delivering supplies and that he should be allowed to continue to the assigned destination.
While on this detail, Sandy came down with diphtheria. A Japanese doctor took one look at him and said, “No good, no good,” and gave Sandy two aspirin. This was the only help that Sandy ever received as a POW. He lay in his own filth unable to eat or swallow. He lost his eyesight, and his weight dropped to 89 pounds. To this day, Sandy has no idea how he survived this illness.
Sandy also suffered from scurvy on the detail so his skin became raw and hurt. The POWs somehow got a hold of alcohol and he put a little on his skin. It felt better so Sandy splashed himself with the alcohol. It began to burn so badly that he took a shower for almost an hour. Sandy also recalled that a Filipino had been accused by the Japanese of stealing a truck. Each night, the POWs heard the man’s screams as he was tortured. The Japanese put lit cigarettes in the man’s nostrils and ears, and they also beat the man. Sandy stated that he found out later that the man had not stolen the truck.
It was at this time that his family received a message from the War Department.
Dear Mrs. B. Sandmire:
According to War Department records, you have been designated as the emergency addressee if Sergeant Owen L. Sandmire, 20,645,273, who, according to the latest information available, was serving in the Philippine Islands at the time of the final surrender.
I deeply regret that it is impossible for me to give you more information than is contained in this letter. In the last days before the surrender of Bataan, there were casualties which were not reported to the War Department. Conceivably the same is true of the surrender of Corregidor and possibly other islands of the Philippines. The Japanese Government has indicated its intention of conforming to the terms of the Geneva Convention with respect to the interchange of information regarding prisoners of war. At some future date, this Government will receive through Geneva a list of persons who have been taken prisoners of war. Until that time the War Department cannot give you positive information.
The War Department will consider the persons serving in the Philippine Islands as “missing in action” from the date of surrender of Corregidor, May 7, 1942, until definite information to the contrary is received. It is to be hoped that the Japanese Government will communicate a list of prisoners of war at an early date. At that time you will be notified by this office in the event that his name is contained in the list of prisoners of war. In the case of persons known to have been present in the Philippines and who are not reported to be prisoners of war by the Japanese Government, the War Department will continue to carry them as “missing in action” in the absence of information to the contrary, until twelve months have expired. At the expiration of twelve months and in the absence of other information the War Department is authorized to make a final determination.
Recent legislation makes provision to continue the pay and allowances of persons carried in a “missing” status for a period not to exceed twelve months; to continue, for the duration of the war, the pay and allowances of persons known to have been captured by the enemy; to continue allotments made by missing personnel for a period of twelve months and allotments or increase allotments made by persons by the enemy during the time they are so held; to make new allotments or increase allotments to certain dependents defined in Public Law 490, 77th Congress. The latter dependents generally include the legal wife, dependent children under twenty-one years of age, and dependent mother, or such dependents as having been designated in official records. Eligible dependents who can establish a need for financial assistance and are eligible to receive this assistance the amount allotted will be deducted from pay which would otherwise accrue to the credit of the missing individual.
Very Truly yours
J. A. Ulio (signed)
Major General
The Adjutant General
Sandy apparently became so ill he was sent to Cabanatuan which had replaced Camp O’Donnell. Medical records kept at the Cabanatuan Hospital indicate that Sandy was in the camp hospital on July 20, 1942. It appears Sandy returned to the detail after he was discharged. He returned to Cabanatuan sometime around March 1943 and remained there for sixteen months.
From September through December, the Japanese began assigning numbers to the POWs. The Lima Maru sailed in September, but it is not known if POW numbers were assigned to the men on the ship. The first men known to receive POW numbers were the men on the Nagato Maru which sailed for Japan in November. It is not known when, but Sandy received the number I-13860 which was his POW no matter where he was sent in the Philippines. The “I” may have stood for Imperial or it simply may have indicated the POW was being held in the Philippines.
A large POW detachment also started work at the camp cemetery, on April 1, but what they did was not known. Two POWs, PFC Holland Stobach and Pvt. Ernest O. Kelly escaped while working on the water detail outside the camp on the 6th. They had an hour’s start on the Japanese and it appears they were successful at evading the guards. The only punishment given to the other POWs was the show they expected to see was canceled. On the 11th, the workday changed for the POWs. Revelle was at 5:30 A.M. with breakfast now at 6:00 until 7:00 when they left for work and worked until 10:30 A.M. when they returned to the camp for lunch at noon. They returned to work and worked from 1:00 P.M. until 6:00 P.M. Dinner was at 6:30. Roll call was taken at 7:00 P.M. and again at 9:00 P.M. Pvt. John B. Trujillo who was one of the POWs assigned to guard against escapes attempted to escape but was caught. At 9:00 A.M. he was taken to the schoolyard in the barrio of Cabanatuan and executed.
The Japanese allowed the POWs, May 30, to hold a memorial service to honor the 5,000 men who had died. (This figure would be the total number of POWs from Camp O’Donnell and Cabanatuan.) At 9:00 AM, 2,000 POWs marched to the camp cemetery which was slightly over a half-mile from the camp. The services were conducted by Catholic, Jewish, and Protestant chaplains. The Japanese camp commandant presented a wreath. The POWs choir sang a number of hymns, the POWs were called to attention, and taps were blown as they saluted.
Any POW who was healthy worked on the airfield detail or on the farm detail. For the farm, the POWs cleared a large area for planting a large garden that they called the farm. They grew camotes (sweet potato), cassava, taro, and various greens like okra and sesame. Although the Japanese told the POWs what they grew would supplement their meals, they took most of what was grown for themselves. The POWs ate the tender tips of the sweet potato plants.
The detail was under the command of “Big Speedo” who spoke very little English. When he wanted the POWs to work faster, he told the POWs “speedo.” Although he was known to have a temper, the POWs thought he was fair. Another guard was “Little Speedo” who was smaller and also used “speedo” when he wanted the POWs to work faster. He punished the POWs by making them kneel on stones. “Smiley” was a Korean guard who always had a smile on his face but could not be trusted. He was the meanest of the guards and beat men up for no reason. He liked to hit the POWs with the club. Any prisoner who he believed was not working hard enough got knocked over with it.
Each morning, after arriving at the farm, the POWs went into a tool shed to get their tools. As they left the shed, the guards hit them on their heads. This was considered the most abusive of the work details with the POWs receiving the worst beatings. Almost every POW in the camp worked on the detail at some point. Weeds were removed from the fields by hand, and the POWs were required to bend over and pick them. If a POW was tired and went down to one knee or squatted, he was hit with a club. The hits always were across the spine or on the ribs. They worked 14 hours a day and were frequently hit over their heads as they worked. The food in the camp worsened and the POWs who returned to the camp from a work detail told those in the camp that the Japanese were selling the American Red Cross goods sent for the POWs.
One day while he was working at the camp farm planting potatoes a guard who had the nickname of Air Raid beat him. Sandy said, “Air Raid was the name we gave this Japanese guard. He got this name for the simple reason that if things didn’t go just right he’d just blow up. He had a short fuse. The first thing he’d do is just start beating on people – just to relieve his frustration.”
“It was Air Raid who nailed me with that pick handle. Boy, that really decked me! We were getting ready to prepare potatoes for planting. You had to have one or two eyes per section. I’d done this for about a week but Air Raid didn’t happen to be there. So I was sitting there biding my time. ‘Oooooo- ooooo,’ he said. I looked up and he said words to the effect, ‘Do you understand how to do this?’ I said, ‘Yes’ and he said, ‘Oh, a smart ass, huh!’ and he came and belted me one in the head with that pick handle. I guess he thought that I was saying I knew more about planting potatoes than he did. He was satisfied. He knocked me down! He knocked me out! I had a concussion but what can I do about it? I was in camp but was in the hospital for about ten days or so. Hospital in Cabanatuan means that you lay on the floor and were on half rations until you die or recover enough to leave.”
During his time in the camp, Sandy also worked in the rice fields planting rice. Sandy recalled that guards played a game of hitting the slowest moving POWs across the head with a pole as if they were playing golf. The guards’ goal was to see how far they could get the man’s hat to roll.
A POW, Conley, escaped from the garden detail on July 11, 1943, and was captured in a barrio. At about 11:00 PM, there was a lot of noise in the camp. The next morning, at the camp morgue, POWs described what they saw. Conley’s jaw had been crushed as was the top of his skull, his teeth had all been knocked out with a rifle butt, his left leg had been crushed, and he had been bayoneted in the eyes and scrotum. Also in July, the names of 500 POWs were posted on the list of POWs being sent to Bilibid Prison. On July 22, the POWs were issued new shoes, a suit of “Philippine Blues” and were 2 cans of corn beef, and 3 cans of milk. They were informed they would be taking a 21-day trip. The detachment left the camp that night. As it turned out, when they arrived in Manila, they were used in The Dawn of Freedom, a Japanese propaganda film, to show how cruel the Americans were to the Filipinos. After this, they were sent to Bilibid Prison and to Japan the next day.
In August, the rainy season had started, and all the extra food was long gone. The Japanese planned to move the hospital to the same area as the healthy POWs to reduce the size of the camp so they could reduce the number of guards. On September 22, the hospital was moved. The POWs also were ordered to stop cooking their own food. For the sick, this was bad news since meals for them were being cooked individually. The POWs adopted a system where a group placed an order for food 24 hours before they wanted the food. The supplies were debited from that group’s supplies.
An order was issued on October 3 that all good khaki garments, hats, rifle belts, and field bags they had must be turned over to the Japanese. The next day, the Japanese sent 1300 POWs to Bongabong in captured U.S. trucks. On one of the front bumpers of a 6 by 6 truck were the markings “HQ 192nd.” The POWs were back in the camp by 8:00 P.M. and to the surprise of the other POWs, their possessions were returned to them. It turned out that the Japanese were still shooting the movie, and the POWs were used as extras in the movie. Also during the month, the POWs noted that the food they were growing on the camp farm was being sent to Manila. On October 18, 103 telegrams were brought to the camp but only 21 men present in the camp received them. It appeared that other men were out on work details. Four days later, 175 telegrams arrived at the camp, but only 65 were distributed. It was noted that some had been received in Tokyo that same month.
The POWs received on December 7, 1943, ½ a pound of sugar, 2 cans of soluble coffee, 2 chocolate emergency rations, 1 pound of prunes, and a ½ pound of cheese. The items were perishable goods that came from the Red Cross Christmas boxes sent to the camp. That night they received a Japanese “news sheet” that told of the terrible American losses in the southwest Pacific. According to the sheet, the U.S. had lost most of its navy. It also stated that the U.S. lost 5 carriers, 2 cruisers, and a battleship in the Gilberts, and 37 ships were lost at Bougainville. On the 11th, they received more coffee, two cans of cheese, two chocolate bars, and two boxes of raisins.
Sandy was sent out on the work detail to build runways at the Cabanatuan airfield. The POWs did the work with picks and shovels and worked a week at the airfield and spent the next week at a farm.
Of the treatment of the POWs, he said, “What they did to us is take a ball bat and put it right between your knees and make you kneel down with the ball bat. A little of that and you couldn’t walk. The other was that they’d give you a 50-pound sack of cement and make you hold it like this, (Arms outstretched fully front — chest high) and I mean you held it like this. And if you started dropping down, they’d belt you across the back, and you’d pick it and held the fool thing until you either passed out, or they gave up, or you held it long enough to satisfy them.”
Body lice were one of the worst things that the POWs suffered from in the camp. To get rid of them, the POWs rubbed a concoction of paste that he believed was made from rotten eggs. Whatever it was, it helped relieve the POWs from the lice.
At some point in 1943, his parents were officially informed he was a POW. They received a message from the War Department. While he was a POW, they moved to Camp Douglas, Wisconsin.
Bessie Sandmire
Camp Douglas
The Provost Marshal General directs me to inform you that you may communicate with your son, postage free, by following the inclosed instructions:
It is suggested that you address him as follows:
Sgt. Owen L. Sandmire, U.S. Army
Interned in the Philippine Islands
C/O Japanese Red Cross, Tokyo, Japan
Via New York, New York
Packages cannot be sent to the Orient at this time. When transportation facilities are available a package permit will be issued you.
Further information will be forwarded you as soon as it is received.
Sincerely
Howard F. Bresee
Colonel, CMP
Chief Information Bureau
On Christmas Eve the Japanese gave each man an unopened Red Cross box. Inside the POWs found cigarettes which usually were missing from the boxes. From 9:00 P.M. until midnight on Christmas Eve, carolers were all over the camp. Christmas started with midnight mass for the Catholics with Protestant services at 5:30 A.M. Bango was at 7:00 A.M. instead of 6:30. The Japanese also handed out to each man an unopened Red Cross box.
One of the changes that took place in January 1944 was that the POWs on the work details were no longer beaten. The farm detail where the POWs received the worse beatings was considered the best detail to be on. The POWs received in January another Red Cross box around the 19th. Inside were 3 cans of beef, 4 cans of butter, 1 spam, 1 purity loaf, 1 salmon, 1 Pate, 1 canned milk, and jam. In addition, the POWs received packs of cigarettes. Those who received ¼ of sugar on December 7 received ½ a pound of cocoa.
In February 1944, the rumor spread among the POWs that the Marshall Islands and Gibert Islands had been retaken. They also heard that the Marianas Islands had been bombed and that there had been a sea Battle in the Java Sea. They also heard that the Filipino food ration had been cut to 120 grams of rice a day and that no one was allowed to leave Manila.
He was next sent to the Port Area of Manila in July 1944. Before he was sent to Japan, an American doctor recommended that he have his tonsils out since he had, had diphtheria. While performing the tonsil surgery, the doctor was allowed only one 60 watt bulb for light. The light was allowed to be on only a short time at night. The doctor removed Sandy’s tonsils with only a local anesthetic that he was running out of about the time the bulb was turned off.
At some point, Sandy was admitted to Zero Ward suffering from diphtheria. Of this, he said, “Would you believe I survived diphtheria with one aspirin. Lost absolute control of all my bodily functions and laid in my own urine and excrement for six weeks. Lost my eyesight and went down to 85 pounds laying there in Zero Ward. Nobody ever comes out of Zero Ward alive, but I did. How I survived I just don’t know.”
While he was at the camp. he worked on the farm planting potatoes. He had been on the detail for about a week and had learned how to plant the potatoes. One guard was known as “Air Raid” because when things did not go right he had a short temper and went off on the POWs. Air Raid came up to Sandy and asked, “Do you understand how to do this?” to Sandy, who was sitting on the ground, said, “Yes.” Air Raid did not know that Sandy had been planting potatoes for a week and believed Sandy was telling him that Sandy knew more about planting potatoes than he did. He came over to Sandy and said, “Oh, a smart ass, huh!” and hit him in the head with a pick handle. Sandy figured Air Raid thought he was saying that he knew more about planting sweet potatoes than he did. The result was that Sandy was in the camp hospital for ten days. It was also at this time that Sandy lost his vision. He believed it was a result of diphtheria. How long it took to get his vision back he did not recall.
The Japanese posted a list of POWs being sent to Japan, and Sandy’s name was on it. Sandy was boarded onto the Canadian Inventor for shipment to Japan. The prisoners were packed into the hold of the ship so tightly that they had to sleep in shifts. The bathroom for the prisoners was a rack that hung over the side of the ship. To get to it, the POWs had to climb up ladders from the hold. This situation meant that there was always a line of men on the ladders attempting to get to the rack. Since many of the men were suffering from dysentery, vomiting, or diphtheria, they did not always make it out of the hold before they relieved themselves. This was due to the fact that they were so sick and weak that they could not control their bodily functions. The trip to Japan aboard the ship took two months.
It was in the hold of the ship that Sandy was reunited with Ed DeGroot of A Company. The two men somehow got the job of preparing the evening meal for the other POWs which allowed the two men to get out of the hold of the ship. According to Sandy, after stopping at Formosa and unloading salt, the ship sailed for Japan empty except for the POWs. During this part of the trip, it ran into rough waters and, for ten days, bounced in the water like a cork. The stern of the ship would come out of the water and the ship would shake as the propeller spun in the air. When the stern reentered the water, the ship took off.
The ship arrived at Moji and the POWs were unloaded and were taken by ferry to the island of Honshu. They next took a train to Fukuoka. In Japan, Sandy was assigned to Omine Machi POW Camp. There, the POWs were used as slave labor in a coal mine that had been condemned before the war. If the Japanese believed POWs were not working hard enough they would beat them.
Somehow Sandy ended up running the pneumatic drill and cut holes into the cool vein. He did this for about a year. When he had finished drilling the Japanese would put dynamite charges into the holes and light the fuses. As they waited for the Japanese to blast out the coal, the POWs got their only break. The coal that was loosened by the blast was cleaned up by the next shift of POWs. The next day, they started all over again.
One day, while the POWs were walking into the mine to their workplaces, Sandy was the last man in line. A big Korean, who was in servitude to the Japanese, was standing in the shadows. Since Sandy was extremely tired and had his head down, he did not see the Korean and salute him. The Korean, whose battery was attached to his helmet light by a wire, swung the battery and hit Sandy in the back of his head. Knocked unconscious, Sandy fell to the ground and broke his left wrist, and was left for dead in a ditch. It was not known how long he laid there, but he did revive and had to work with the broken wrist. This made mining extremely painful, and his wrist would bother him for the rest of his life.
Of this, he said, “The damage to my arm, wrist, and hand was from protecting my head from beatings. The wrist I broke when I was being beaten down in the mone and fell into a drainage creek. The guard took the battery from his light – Are you familiar with the miner’s hat with the light? – Well, he had a nasty habit of taking this battery off and turning the light off as you couldn’t see where he was and then he’d start swinging this heavy battery on the end of the wire as hard as he could wherever he happened to be. Fortunately, I only got it this one time because he hit me hard and knocked me clear over into this ditch and when I fell I stuck this hand out somewhere and broke my wrist. He figured I was done for so he just left me lay there. Well, he didn’t knock me out, so when he left I managed to take off and followed the crew down in the face of the tunnel where we were dynamiting.”
In his estimate, during his time as a POW, he suffered from dysentery, diphtheria, pellagra, scabies, malaria, a skin rash, scurvy, dengue fever, and beriberi. He would suffer from the skin rash for the rest of his life.
The camp guards stole items from Red Cross packages and withheld the packages from July 1, 1944, to September 2, 1945. The Japanese intentionally opened packages and mixed up contents so that the ranking Allied officer would not know how much should be in each package. When they were given to the POWs they were often contained less than what had been sent. In addition, when Red Cross packages arrived, they were withheld from POWs from three to seven months after arriving.
Sandy was able to adapt to any situation and learned to mend his own shoes. When other POWs learned of this, he found himself the proprietor of the prison camp’s shoe repair shop. He also believed that his attitude kept him alive. “I saw so many of my friends just lay down and die. I just hung in there and did anything to keep alive.”
The camp was close enough to Hiroshima to feel the ground shake when the A-Bomb exploded over Nagasaki. Sandy recalled, “I only felt a slight shock when the bomb exploded. I didn’t pay much attention to it.” One day the prisoners did not have a roll call and the guards were gone. This was the first sign that the prisoners had that the war was over.
On August 16, the POWs noticed all the guards were gone, and only the camp commander who told them to paint the letters “POW” on the roofs of all the buildings so any planes flying over would know they were there. They were told the war was over on August 20 by the camp commandant in his broken English.
“Peace, peace comes to the world again. It is a great pleasure to me, to say nothing to you, to announce it for all of you now. The Japanese Empire acknowledges the terms of the suspension of hostilities given by the American Government even these two Nations do not still reach the best agreement of a truce. As a true friend from now, I am going to do my best in the future for the convenience of your life in this camp because of having been able to get friendly relations between them, and also the Japanese Government has decided her own Nations policy for your Nation.
“Therefore I hope you will keep as comfortable a daily life by the orders of your own officers from today, while you are here. All of you will surely get much gladness in returning to your lovely country. At the same one of my wishes for you is this: Your health and happiness calls upon you and your life henceforth and they will grow up happier and better than before by the honor of your country.
“In order to guard your life I have been endeavoring my ability, therefore you will please cooperate with me in any way more than usual, I hope.
“I close this statement in letting you know again how peace, the peace has already come.”
It should be noted that nowhere in his speech did the camp commander say that Japan had surrendered.
An American Naval plane flew over the camp on August 27. The pilot dropped a note to the POWs and told them to paint one stripe on the roof of a barrack if they needed medicine, two stripes if they needed food, and three stripes if they needed clothing. The POWs painted one stripe on one barrack, two stripes on another barrack, and three stripes on a third barrack.
When the plane returned. he dropped another note saying that there was no way for him to drop everything, so B -29s would have to drop the supplies. The POWs had no idea what the pilot was talking about. When the B-29s appeared over the camp, the POWs had never seen anything so large in the sky. The POWs received so much food and clothing that they shared it with the Japanese civilians who had been kind to them
On August 28, 29, and September 1, food was dropped near the camp by American planes. The Japanese civilians helped the POWs carry it into the camps. A great number of the former POWs gorged themselves on the food and became sick, but no one became seriously ill. The only thing the civilians were interested in was the silk from the parachutes so that they could make clothing.
Sandy recalled that the camp commandant was still in the camp and paid the price for being there. A good number of the POWs held him directly responsible for the deaths of many POWs. Some of the POWs pulled him from his quarters and tore him to pieces. They believed he was receiving the same treatment he had ordered that they receive.
A jeep with American Military Police arrived on September 2, 1945. The MPs patrolled the camp and kept the former POWs from leaving until arrangements were made to move the men. The prisoners were finally boarded onto a train for the East Coast of Japan on September 13. They were deloused and the clothing, that had dropped to them, burned. After receiving new clothing, the former prisoners were boarded onto the U.S.S. Consolation on September 14 and given medical examinations. The ship sailed on September 15, 1945, from Yokohama, Japan, to Okinawa. There, the POWs were transferred to the U.S.S. Haskell and taken to Manila arriving there on September 25. Sandy was malnourished and returned to the Philippines to be “fattened up.” He next was flown, on a DC3, back to the United States.
After he had been liberated, his parents received this message from the War Department.
“Mr. & Mrs. Sandmire: The secretary of war has asked me to inform you that your son, Sgt. Owen L. Sandmire was returned to military control Sept. 15 and is being returned to the United States within the near future. He will be given the opportunity to communicate with you upon his arrival if he has not already done so.
E. F. Witsell
Acting Adjutant General of the Army
On October 1, 1945, Sandy wrote this letter home.
Dearest Mom and All:
I received your most welcomed cable-gram on Sept. 29 but I was in Manila so I didn’t read it until 2:00 p.m. today. This is the first word I had from you since before the war. In fact, I have had only two letters since being taken a prisoner of war. I got them both early in ’43 when I was in Cabanatuan prison camp.
Went to Manila yesterday to see a Filipino family that was very kind to me while I was working in Manila in ’42. Was sure glad to see them but sorry to hear the father was killed by Filipino guerrillas in February 1944. He was the one who gave us the food and money that helped us so much. Nevertheless, the family was glad to see me.
Gee, Mom, I’m so anxious to get home and see the family that I can’t concentrate on what I’m writing. I suppose I should give you a brief outline of what has happened since the war ended for us in ’42.
First of all, we left the area assigned to us on the west coast of Bataan on April 11 and started to San Fernando on that famous Death March. We arrived at Camp O’Donnell on April 21. On May 5, we started to Manila to build bridges but nine others and I were left for truck drivers. We started work on mothers day and stayed there until February 1943. From there, we went to Bilibid for four days and then to Cabanatuan until June 27, 1944, when we started to Japan. We boarded the ship on July 2 and to Moji, Japan, Sept. 2. What a trip! There we worked in coal mines under terrible conditions until the surrender on Aug. 14.
We left this camp Sept. 13 and got on the hospital ship, U.S.S. Consolation, on Sept. 15 at Wakayama, Japan. From there we went to Okinawa and then to Manila on a naval transport, U.S.S. Haskell.
We are now in a camp for recovered personnel about 30 kilometers south of Manila. We were told to stay in our company area after 12 midnight tonight because there is a shipment of men going out tomorrow. Maybe I’ll e one of them. I hope! I requested to go by plane. If so, I’ll be in Frisco in three or four days. I do want to be home for my birthday (Oct. 24) but I don’t know yet.
Gee, Mom, there is so much to talk about that I couldn’t get it on a thousand pages. It’s going to be so good to be home with you and Pop and the kids. I am in excellent health – weigh about 175, but I’m pretty soft. No work or exercise for a month and a half, with all the food I wanted. I started playing basketball yesterday to work a little fat off. Certainly is hot running around in this tropical sun.
When I was on the hospital ship, I made the acquaintance of a nurse who was a close friend of an officer in our company. She showed me a clipping from the Janesville Gazette telling about Sgt. Dale Lawton.
Gee, Mom, I have got to quit writing or they won’t be able to carry this on two B-29s. I can tell you all about it when I get home and then we can forget the whole thing. Okeh?
Hope to see you next month.
The medals Sandy earned were the Silver Star, which he did not receive until 1988, the Purple Heart, the POW Medal, the Bronze Star, the Asiatic/Pacific Campaign, the American Defense Medal, World War II Medal, the Good Conduct Medal, the Philippine Defense Medal, and the Combat Infantry Badge. The 192nd Tank Battalion received the Presidential Unit Citation with Two Oak Leaf Clusters. He was discharged, from the army, on May 11, 1946, at Ft. Sheridan, Illinois, with John Spencer of A Company.
On September 25, 1946, Sandy married Mary Jane Craig in Richland Center, Wisconsin. They resided in Madison, Wisconsin, where he worked for the Oscar Meyer Company – in the company’s power plant – and started their family.
In December 1947, Sandy and his brother, Gene, joined the Wisconsin National Guard in Madison. It is not known how long he remained in the Guard. The family later relocated to Sherman, Texas, when he was transferred as the power plant supervisor for the Oscar Meyer plant. He retired after 33 years, in 1981 and moved to Sarasota, Florida.
Sandy had a recurring nightmare of being chased by a Japanese guard. When the guard caught him, he couldn’t move his arms and the guard beat him mercilessly.
The picture of Sandy, at the bottom of this page, was taken while he was a prisoner at Omine Machi in Japan. The shirt he was wearing was actually given to him for the photo and his POW number was pinned on it. After the photo was taken, his number was removed, he took off the shirt, and it was given to the next POW to wear in his photo.
Owen Sandmire passed away on March 10, 2004, from injuries he received in a motorcycle accident. After his death, and following his request, he was cremated.
