Conduct Under Fire Read online

  Fred had wanted to be a naval officer for as long as he could remember. He wasn’t so sure about medicine—that was his parents’ idea. In 1930 he entered Northwestern University and joined the Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps. He graduated after four years with a commission as a line officer ensign, DVG (deck volunteer grade). His ambition was to be a naval aviator, but at five foot six he was too short to pass the physical. ROTC actually paid for a quarter of Northwestern Medical School, which was quite an incentive during the Depression, so medical school it was. There were cruises every summer in ROTC, and Fred found life aboard ship—slinging his own hammock, standing the various watches, firing the different guns, and engaging in battle practice, whether on a World War I submarine chaser or on the battleship USS Arkansas—fascinating.

  In 1937, a year before graduating from Northwestern Medical School, the Medical Corps began examinations for navy internships. There were only twenty positions around the country. Fred placed fifteenth out of all the candidates and chose San Diego, where he did ob/gyn and pediatrics in civilian hospitals. There were only 731 medical officers in the navy at the time, so if you didn’t know someone personally, chances were you knew about him through someone else.

  Fred had first arrived in Manila in September 1939 on the President Polk and was assigned as medical officer of Destroyer Division 58, whose four ships, Stewart, Barker, Parrott, and Bulmer, roamed Philippine waters, engaged in torpedo practice near Mindanao, and maneuvered off southern China. Then he joined the regimental hospital of the 4th Marines in Shanghai.

  In December 1940 he was given temporary duty for a week on the Isabel , the aging flagship of the Yangtze Patrol. Upriver he assisted the chief of surgery, a woman, at a hospital in Wuhu whose hallways were lined with patients. In those days a general surgeon did everything from brain surgery to orthopedics. They used cotton for sutures, which was new to Fred—he’d only worked with catgut and silk—and paper for sponges. Instruments were boiled, then placed in a Lysol solution and rinsed off with sterile water. The experience was invaluable and confirmed for him his professional goal.

  He was tired of urology and, by the summer of ’41, tired of Shanghai, which like an aging beauty had lost its charm. The regimental hospital needed to detach a junior medical officer, and Fred was happy to volunteer. Not until he was on board the President Harrison did he receive his orders to go to the 16th Naval District. He was ready for a change, even if Cavite was the last place on earth he would have chosen. What he wanted more than anything was to be a surgeon. He was dextrous and determined, and his mind was scalpel-sharp. He liked the precision that surgery demanded, the challenge, and the cool head it required when you were faced with unforeseen complications.

  Murray admired Fred’s forthrightness, but he was quieter by nature, less experienced in challenging authority, and less effective when doing so. It wasn’t so much that he lacked self-confidence; sometimes he simply couldn’t express himself in a way that best served his interests. Fred would call a spade a spade; Murray would wonder why a spade was a spade. He tended to think dialectically, so when he spoke, or questioned an assumption, there was often an ironic edge to what he said, which some found provoking. He didn’t like showmen, had little tolerance for bluster, and his opinion showed. Sometimes he felt Fred’s behavior bordered on braggadocio. For crying out loud, he’d brought along the Golden Gloves buckle he’d won as a kid, the teak chest he’d had custom made and monogrammed in Shanghai, even his little spaniel, Droog! But there was no denying it—Fred knew a lot, and not just about a few things, either. He could get away with saying what he thought because he was respectful, cooperative, and devoted to his work. He had a strong moral fiber and was a natural teacher, always willing to lend a helping hand. “A well trained medical officer who is interested in his profession,” remarked Colonel Howard when he recommended Fred for a promotion in August 1941. “Personal and military character excellent.” The new Fleet Surgeon had promised him, Fred wrote his parents, that “when our time comes to go home, we would go home on time and not any longer. So you can most definitely expect me to arrive around the first of March.” Most definitely, indeed.

  Duty at the dispensary consisted of routine physicals, vaccination checks on passengers from incoming boats and planes, and “short arm”—or venereal disease—inspections. Condoms were rarely used, as Fred discovered with the 4th Marines in Shanghai, so prophylaxis entailed irrigating the urethra with 10cc of Protargol (strong protein silver) in a glass V-shaped syringe. “The prevention of venereal disease is most important and must be faithfully and conscientiously carried out,” urged Section 9 of the 1939 edition of Handbook of the Hospital Corps, U.S. Navy. “It is not agreeable duty, as the patients often are under the influence of liquor, foul-mouthed, and disorderly, but if venereal disease is prevented by the treatment it is worth all the effort expended.”

  In Chefoo, China, the U.S. Navy had virtually run a red-light district. Navy doctors examined all of the prostitutes in a two-square-block area for venereal disease, and whether voyeur or connoisseur, you had to surrender your liberty card to Shore Patrol in order to enter it. Then to get your liberty card back, you had to visit the venereal prophylactic station. Circumventing this process could result in losing your pay.

  In Cavite, on- and off-base prophylactic stations were also established. The Marine Corps provost marshal was responsible for registering local prostitutes and bringing the “ladies” to the Navy Yard for inspections twice weekly, Wednesdays and Saturdays. Venereal disease was a “persistent problem” in the native Filipino population, according to the Cavite health officer, Dr. Sanchez, and it reached almost epidemic proportions. For fifty dollars an enlisted man could buy or build a nipa hut and “shack up” with a barrio woman. Air Corps officers condoned such behavior: it helped control the incidence of infection and reduced the rate of alcoholism.

  Navy corpsmen looked after the marines at the three antiaircraft batteries around Cavite, and the navy doctors made weekly visits to check on them. Every Wednesday Fred drove out to Battery C at Binakayan in a station wagon. Ernest J. “Ernie” Irvin, Pharmacist’s Mate 2nd Class, hopped in for the ride back so he could stock up on sodium bicarbonate tablets, atropine, and first aid supplies from the dispensary.

  The navy doctors conducted promotion exams for the marines and also had to be on hand at antiaircraft practice. One day 2nd Lieutenant Willard C. Holdredge of Battery C approached Murray: “Say doc, you wanna try to hit the target?”

  At the edge of the tiny village of Binakayan, at the mouth of the Imus River, Battery C was so far off the beaten path that the navy could hardly keep track of it. Water-cooled machine guns were mounted on tripods in a turnip patch and trained on a target sleeve towed by a plane. The ammunition was painted different colors so you could identify which guns had scored a hit.

  What the hell, Murray figured. He had never touched a machine gun in his life. His gunnery experience was confined to popping off kitchen mice as a kid with his Daisy air rifle. He took aim along with the other gunners, fired on command, and then ran over to the sleeve once it fell to the ground. It was clean except for one bullet hole—Murray’s. These guys are going to be my protectors? he asked himself. I’m in deep trouble, he thought.

  American soldiers in the Philippines worked “tropical hours”—from 6 A.M. to 1 P.M. Hours at the Navy Yard dispensary were also short, and the workload was light. Over at Sternberg the army doctors simply called it a day at noon.

  It was a thoroughly enjoyable lifestyle for the medical officers, who shared a Chinese cook as well as a Filipino houseboy and whose monthly pay of $201.34 went a long way. The cook’s salary was $15 to $20 a month, the houseboy $5 to $10, a lavendera or washerwoman cost $7.50 to $15. There were few automobiles in Cavite, so the men got around town in brightly colored caretelas or by bicycle.

  On weekends Fred liked to play golf at the Wack-Wack Club outside Manila with Ernie Necker, the head of Mackay Radio, or he would hu
nt snipe in the rice paddies of Bataan with Fleet Surgeon Ken Lowman, who would then prepare a feast for the entire staff. Sometimes Murray would accompany them, not hunting but shooting the rural landscape with his new camera. He’d even brought along a blank album to keep a photographic record of his days in the Philippines.

  For many Americans in the islands, news came via Don Bell’s daily report at noon on KZRH (“The Voice of the Orient”) while they tuned into KZRM and KZRF for the reigning hits—“My Heart Belongs to Daddy,” “Chattanooga Choo Choo,” and “The Boogie-Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B.” The Manila Daily Bulletin (“The Exponent of Philippine Progress”) catered to the American community and carried Associated Press, Reuters, United Press, and Bulletin Service newswires. You could even catch the UCLA-Stanford football game if you switched on the shortwave early in the morning.

  Nights in Cavite the navy doctors would go out to dinner for Cantonese fried rice and sweet and sour pork, hit O. E. Hart’s Dreamland cabaret (where a turn with a bailarina cost ten centavos), or take the San Felipe ferry to Manila. There they could see the latest Hollywood releases—Edward G. Robinson in Tiger Shark, Martha Raye and Dorothy Lamour in Tropic Holiday, Joan Davis and Jinx Falkenburg in Two Latins from Manhattan. Or they’d haunt the sleek Jai Alai Club with its four bars and four restaurants, drop in at the Alcazar, or stop by the Bamboo Hut. In their white double-breasted sharkskin jackets, black ties, and slacks, they made as sharp an impression on the Filipino girls as the White Russian women made on them.

  Being on the other side of the world in an entirely new social context gave one license, many believed, to suspend the vows they had made to their wives and girlfriends back home. They saw it not as betrayal but as a natural consequence of time, place, and circumstance. Besides, the temptations were too great: a walk along the bay at sunset; a stroll through Intramuros in the evening; a furtive glance, a casual touch, an invitation to dance. Nights in the islands were hot, humid, and scented with the perfume of gardenia and night-blooming cereus. Filipino women smelled different, tasted different, their faces dabbed with rice powder, their hair gleaming with coconut oil, their lips tinted with gumamela petals. The loss of one love was often requited in the arms of another. But it was still difficult not to think of those you left behind.

  The stream of luminaries passing through Manila, from the Russian foreign commissar Vyacheslav Molotov, to Kurusu Saburō, special assistant to the Japanese ambassador to the United States, to Clare Booth Luce, on assignment for Life to interview MacArthur, only fueled rumors of war. By late November 1941 most of the Asiatic Fleet had been ordered to southern Philippine waters, with the exception of Patrol Wing 10, the submarines and their tenders, the minesweepers, and two seagoing gunboats, the Asheville and the Tulsa.

  On November 27, after diplomatic talks between Secretary of State Cordell Hull and Ambassador Nomura Kichisaburō collapsed, Admiral Hart, High Commissioner Francis B. Sayre, and MacArthur secretly convened in Manila. MacArthur had received a “final alert” from the War Department. “Hostile action possible at any moment,” the cable warned. Admiral Harold Raynsford Stark, Chief of Naval Operations in Washington, informed Hart, “An aggressive move is expected by Japan in the next few days.” The Philippines, the Malay Peninsula, and Borneo were cited as possible targets.

  The Navy Yard was ordered to be in a “state of readiness.” Battery C was put on five-minute notice. Machine gunners guarded the ammunition depot. A motorboat patrol swept the waterfront. Sand-filled barricades surrounded Fort San Felipe, air raid drills went into effect, trenches were dug where practicable, and inflammable oils and explosives were removed to Sunset Beach. The Navy Yard as well as Sangley Point were under partial blackout. The windows of Cañacao’s operating rooms were shuttered so that surgery could continue as normal.

  By December 4 a condition of “three-day readiness” was assumed. Total blackouts were now ordered, and antiaircraft batteries were authorized to fire on unidentified planes. Admiral Hart and Major General George F. Moore, commander of the Philippine Coast Artillery and the Harbor Defenses of Manila and Subic Bays, expected hostilities to break out at any moment.

  At 0300 on Monday, December 8, 1941, Lieutenant Colonel William T. Clement, duty officer at the Asiatic Fleet headquarters, informed Admiral Hart of an urgent message intercepted by a radio operator: “AIR RAID ON PEARL HARBOR. THIS IS NO DRILL.” Hart quickly notified all units of the Asiatic Fleet: “Japan started hostilities. Govern yourselves accordingly.” Major General Richard K. Sutherland, USAFFE chief of staff, notified MacArthur and passed the news on to all commanders. Troops were ordered to take up their battle positions at once.

  At 0530 Lieutenant Commander Erickson woke Fred Berley in the Bachelor Officers’ Quarters of the Cavite Navy Yard. “Fred, we just got word. The Japs bombed Pearl Harbor.”

  “Good,” Berley growled. “Now we can lick the sons of bitches.” Then he rolled over and fell back asleep.

  For the first few hours Manila was strangely calm. George Ferguson slept until 1100. He had spent his last night on the town carousing with Jim O’Rourke at the Bamboo Hut and the Jai Alai Club. Then he heard the news. “Japan attacks America,” the radio reported again and again.

  “PEARL HARBOR BOMBED. WE ARE AT WAR WITH JAPAN,” newspaper headlines screamed.

  The Japanese had attacked Wake and Guam, bombed Hong Kong, seized the International Settlement in Shanghai, and captured the USS Wake. They bombed Camp John Hay in Baguio, and Fort Davao in Mindanao. Police patrolled the streets of Manila, armed with .45 revolvers and billy clubs, and began a sweep for Japanese aliens. At the Japanese News Agency men were toasting the emperor with shots of sake as Filipino Constabulary troops, dressed in fatigues and sporting Springfield and Enfield rifles, burst in. They rounded up suspects, including the American-born Arthur Komori, who worked for the U.S. Army in counterintelligence, and threw them all into Bilibid Prison or confined them to Japanese-owned establishments such as the Nippon Club on Taft Boulevard. Shopkeepers piled sandbags shoulder high in front of storefronts. MacArthur issued a message of calm and confidence to the Filipino people.

  At Nielson Field on the outskirts of Manila, Major General Lewis H. Brereton, commander of the Far East Air Force (FEAF), had expected an attack as soon as the sun rose. Unable to see MacArthur, Brereton appealed to Sutherland, MacArthur’s chief of staff, for permission to bomb Formosa, where Japanese Army pilots from the 11th Air Fleet were waiting for the fog to lift. But Brereton couldn’t pinpoint a target. Sutherland told him to stand by. General Henry “Hap” Arnold, commander of the U.S. Army Air Forces, placed a transoceanic phone call to warn Brereton not to have his “entire air force destroyed” in the wake of Pearl Harbor. With reports coming into air force headquarters of enemy flights, Brereton ordered aloft planes of the Interceptor Command as well as unarmed bombers from Clark Field, sixty miles northwest of Manila. At 1010 a photoreconnaissance mission over southern Formosa was authorized, and shortly afterward Brereton received a phone call from MacArthur. They agreed to wait for recon’s results, after which “the decision for offensive action” would be Brereton’s. Brereton issued orders for two heavy bombardment squadrons from Clark Field to prepare for their mission against southern Formosa “at the latest daylight hour today that visibility will permit.” By 1130 Brereton’s B-17s were back at Clark Field being loaded with bombs while the P-40 fighter escorts were refueling.

  Then at 1225, as officers were still having lunch and the ground crew strolled from the mess halls to the flight line, twenty-seven twin-engine Mitsubishi bombers flying at 22,000 to 25,000 feet—well beyond the range of antiaircraft fire—swarmed over Clark Field. Sakai Saburō and his squadron of Zero fighters had arrived just ahead of them:The sight which met us was unbelievable. Instead of encountering a swarm of American fighters diving at us in attack, we looked down and saw some sixty enemy bombers and fighters neatly parked along airfield runways . . . the Americans had made no attempt to disperse the planes an
d increase their safety.

  Air raid sirens blared, men grabbed their helmets, donned their gas masks, and dove into trenches and drainage ditches as hundreds of bombs fell around them. Tons of explosives rained down on the administration and operations buildings, the barracks, hangars, and landing field. Fully gassed planes burst into fireballs, igniting the surrounding grass and trees. The earth seemed to leap to the sky as explosion followed explosion. Tracers streamed from antiaircraft positions manned by the 200th Coast Artillery, and two Japanese planes plunged like comets flaming out. But the pilots and their aircraft at Clark Field didn’t stand a chance. A second wave of twenty-seven planes roared in for the kill, followed by a posse of thirty-four Zero fighters that riddled the Flying Fortresses and Curtiss P-40s parked wingtip to wingtip “on the ground! on the ground!” exclaimed Roosevelt when he heard the news.

  Forty miles to the west, shortly after 1230, twelve American P-40s from the 3rd Pursuit Squadron were returning to Iba Airfield from a patrol over the South China Sea. Unaware of the debacle at Clark, they were puzzled by their inability to make radio contact with the base—when suddenly they heard a warning from Iba. An enemy air force was rapidly approaching from the west. But it was too late. Fifty-four Mitsubishi Type 1 bombers escorted by fifty Zero fighters intercepted them and reduced Iba field to ashes.

  In little more than an hour, 80 men were killed and 150 were wounded. Clark and Iba airfields were left smoldering ruins. Eighteen B-17s, fifty-three P-40s, and three P-35s were destroyed. The strength of the Far East Air Force was cut in half.