4130 The small North Entrance leads directly into the underground 1,000 bed hospital.
4134 This is a map of the Malinta Tunnel. We entered at the yellow dot, The East Entrance.
4136 Diana and I are at the West Entrance. The East Entrance was just as large.
4139 Looking down the Main Tunnel 836 feet toward the West Entrance.
4144 Lateral tunnel set up as a hospital ward.
4157 One of the smaller laterals set up to be fuel storage. You can barely see the twisted ruin of a large tank behind the fallen rocks at the back.
Nov 4 – Corregidor (Manila), The Philippines. Today we're heading out of Manila by ferry to the Island of Corregidor. Ever since I was a young lad watching Victory at Sea during the 1950s on my black and white TV, I have known about this Island. Long before I knew there was a Philippines, I knew there was a Corregidor. My birthday is the same day as Douglas MacArthur and probably the most famous story in his history is wrapped up around the Philippines and Corregidor in specific.
The day started at 5am because the tour leaves the ship at 6:30am. We ordered room service breakfast for 5:30am and it was about 5:20am when the knock on the door signaled its arrival. I set Diana up on the card table and I ate at the desk. Worked out better than I thought it would. In 910 days aboard HAL ships, I've never ordered room service before. Actually, I didn't like it. The food was fine but I much prefer eating in the Dining Room or the Lido.
Today they're having some children from a local orphanage aboard the ship. They bring them of, ostensibly, so the kids can do a show for us, but really, it's an outreach program. They take them all up to the Lido and give them lunch that includes the ship's great cookies and ice cream. The kids don't have to get into a line at the buffet; the staff serves them lunch at the tables. They have balloons and the cruise staff entertains them. After they are appropriately hopped up on sugar and ice cream, they go down to the main showroom to give their performance. The performance is followed by a surprise presentation to the staff of the orphanage. Unknown to them the ship has usually had an auction of the works produced by the watercolor class or things knitted by the 'sit and knit' group on board. Voluntary donations are made by passengers and the ship matches what we give. All this is accumulated and presented to the orphanages management after the show. The joy on the faces of the staff is always a wonderful thing to see no matter how often I see it. Undoubtedly, some financial arrangement has already been made with the organization so this added amount is a surprise and it shows. Usually the group's leader is crying by the time the presentation has ended. Our long tour to Corregidor will make it impossible to be present at the show and I'm a little sad about that. The kids are always great no matter what their level of talent or how extensively they've prepared.
At 6:30am we left the pier by bus to head to the ferry landing. The ferry is a catamaran fast ferry that will take about 1 hour 20 minutes to cross the Bay to Corregidor. The ride across was uneventful and smooth. Manila Bay is protected on almost all sides by land. The bay's entrance is guarded by the Bataan Peninsula to the west, the mainland of Luzon Island on the north and east and Cavite to the south. The only entrance is between Bataan and Cavite at the southwestern corner of the bay. Right in the middle of this opening is Corregidor. The island is oriented on an east-west axis and occupies almost the entire mouth of the bay. The openings on either side of the island are known as North Channel and South Channel. In the middle of North Channel is Fort Drum, a fortified island that looks like a concrete battleship. In the South Channel is the second largest of the bay's islands, Caballo. Caballo and its sister islands, Carabao, El Fraile and La Monja are little more than large boulders that stick up out of the ocean. Manila Bay is almost a lake as the entrance is so well guarded.
On the ride out, we had some great views of Bataan and Cavite. We arrived at the South Dock. We were met dockside by a fleet of open sided busses. Like the trams at Universal Studios or in Disneyland's parking lot, you can board from either side and the bench-style seats will hold five people. We got in on the fourth row of bus #3. HAL had ordered enough busses so that we only had to sit four across and our seatmates were Jim and June. We have sailed with them a number of times before. Each bus had its own guide. Ours was a very knowledgeable Filipino man. I don't think he normally guides but because HAL is running tours to the island, he was pressed into service. From the way he talked and the things he knew, I think he was part of the park's management. I don't think anyone could have done a better job. Our bus reached capacity first and so off we went.
Corregidor Island is shaped like a tadpole with the head at the west end. It about four miles long and a half-mile wide at the head, its widest point. We landed on the north side just about where the head and tail come together but slightly on the tail. The island has four sections. The long thin part that points east is called The Tail. The Head is divided into three parts. Bottomside, the area along the coast, Middleside, the area up the hill and Topside, the area on top of the hill that's relatively flat. Topside had the HQ, Parade Grounds and the Officer's quarters both bachelor and married. Anything not in the Head is on Tailside.
Our first destination is the Malinta Tunnel extends from Tailside (in the islands tail) to Bottomside (the start of the Head area). This tunnel complex was built into the sold rock mountain ridge that runs down the island's Tail. Most of the island is solid rock. The tunnel was started in 1922 and essentially complete in 1932. It's built under the top of Malinta Mountain and has four entrances. The main tunnel runs east and west, is 863 feet long, 24 feet wide and has a large entrance at each end. The East Entrance is Tailside and the West Entrance is Bottomside. From this tunnel, 24 smaller tunnels, called laterals, run off at the sides. The first 13 laterals, seven northern laterals and six southern laterals join with the main tunnel at about a 30˚ angle. The First Northern Lateral housed the offices of Manual E. Quezon, President of the Philippines. The Lateral connects the main tunnel to 11 smaller interconnected laterals that housed a 1,000-bed hospital. At the other end of the Second Northern Lateral was the Northern Entrance to the complex. The Third Northern Lateral housed General MacArthur's Headquarters. The Fourth Southern Lateral led to a complex of tunnels of similar size that were used by the Navy as the Quartermaster's storage area. The other end of this lateral was the Navy or South Entrance to the system. The rest of the 30˚-angled laterals off the main tunnel served as offices, mess halls, sleeping quarters, repair shops, machine shops and ready rooms.
After these angled laterals come eleven laterals, six on the north and five on the south, which join the main tunnel at 90˚. These laterals start quite a way from the last 30˚ lateral because they were used for fuel storage. In some, the twisted remains of the large fuel tanks housed in them are still in place. Some of them were filled with 55-gallon drums of various fuels and other volatile substances.
We entered the tunnel complex from the East Entrance, Tailside. The main lateral houses a sound and light show. The first few northern laterals have been set up to recreate the spaces as they were used. One is setup as a hospital ward, one as MacArthur's HQ, one as a mess hall and one as an office. In the southern laterals, they have short black and white films that discuss the events on Corregidor. The two sets of laterals are offset so that you move forward after each show ends. Our group was a bit too large to see the northern laterals all at once and it took a while to convince the idiots who got there first that after they looked down the lateral they should move forward so everyone could see it. The lights were only on in the lateral while the narration was running so there was limited time to view it.
We exited at the west entrance on the Bottomside and boarded our bus to continue our exploration. All of the area joining the Head to the Tail of the island, including the dock area, is on the Bottomside. We're headed to the North Dock (aka Navy Dock) because it's a historically significant place. The dock complex has been here since before WWII and was under the control of the Navy during the war. Its official name is the Lorcha Dock and it's where MacArthur departed from Corregidor by PT boat to head to Australia.
The Navy Dock is where most of the supplies came in for the island and the docks are still there today. From the Navy Dock at dusk on March 12, 1942 General MacArthur, his wife and son, his physician and members of his staff boarded PT boats for the ride to Mindanao. MacArthur rode in PT Boat 41, which accompanied by three other PT boats got the party to Mindanao at 7am the following morning. From there they would fly to Australia. Everyone got our safely. Although President Quezon had left Corregidor earlier, he was still in Mindanao when MacArthur left.
Right next to the Navy Dock is North Beach and across the beach was the civilian center of Corregidor, Barrio San Jose. The schools of the area have been recreated and are used as the island's administrative center. When MacArthur returned to the Philippines almost three years later, he strode ashore from a landing craft onto North Beach just a few yards from his point of departure. There's a statue of MacArthur here as well as several monuments.
From the Navy Dock we drove back up the hill the Malinta Tunnel was dug through to go to the Corregidor Inn. The inn is the island's only overnight accommodation and it's where we're going to have lunch. We're eating on the second floor at tables on the balcony. We had a nice view of the island, the Navy Docks, Bataan and the US flag from our table. We were offered a welcome drink of screw pine juice. Lunch was good, the thing I liked best was the chicken adobo a Philippine standard and the inn's was excellent. The real showstopper was desert. They were serving halo-halo, pronounced hollow-hollow. It's a bit hard to describe. It has several different preserved fruits in it, what looked like big-eye tapioca, plus a purple substance that looks a bit weird. To this, they add a mound of shaved ice and a square of flan. Over this whole thing, they pour sweet milk. Before you eat it, you stir the concoction until the liquid is smooth and uniform in color. The ice melts the flan and purple stuff dissolve and what you have is the candied fruit in a light purple and somewhat thick liquid. Sounds a little odd but let me tell you it's delicious. That's high praise from me for a desert that has no chocolate in it. As usual, Diana's serving was larger than mine was.
Lunch completed we drove up to Middleside to the Middleside Barracks, home to the 60th Coast Artillery. The barracks are in sad shape but the decision was made to restore almost nothing on the island but keep it as a memorial to those who served in the Pacific Theater. For example, Middleside Barracks have not been restored; in fact, some old signs that were printed on paper are still inside the building, if anything so decimated can be said to have an 'inside'. Some interior walls were standing. In other areas, only the shell of the building is up. Some stairwells have fallen; others still make the climb from one empty floor to another. At some spots you can see steel girders inside the concrete building. These were added to keep the part that's still standing upright. Some of the fallen walls collapsed since the war from deterioration due to weather.
After a short stop for pictures, it was further into Middleside, past Batteries James and Morrison to Battery Way. The battery is named for Second Lieutenant Henry Way who died in the service in the Philippines in 1900. It was completed in 1914 and is home to 4 12-inch mortars that could throw a 1,000 pound armor piercing shell or a 700 pound high explosive shell 8.3 miles. (Most of you probably know this but just in case. A mortar is a high angle of fire weapon. These mortars can only elevate between 45˚ to 70˚ to fire. In short, they fire more like a popup than a fly ball.) It was nice that they had Mortar #1 set to the minimum elevation and #2 set to the maximum. How can I be sure on was at 45 and one was at 70. No, I wasn't carrying a protractor; #2 was at the breech end of the elevation gear so that had to be the max. The 45 degree is more of a judgment on my part. If it wasn't exactly 45, it was close.
Each mortar required a crew of 14 to operate. The length of the bore is 10 feet. The barrels were marked 'Bethlehem Steel' and they would have been made at the Bethlehem Steel Specialty Plant in Bethlehem Pennsylvania. (My grandfather was a rolling mill engineer there. He shaped the steel that became the barrels on the battleship Missouri, but when these mortars were made, he would have been a very young man so it's unlikely he was involved in their fabrication.) A shot could be fired every 45 seconds under ideal conditions. The concussion produced by firing these mortars was so severe it tended to smash glass instruments and windows at the island hospital so the battery was placed out of service in peacetime. The vertical nature of their trip back to earth made these weapons particularly effective against warships and entrenched enemy on high ground.
During April 1942, the Japanese were seen trying to get into Manila Bay by night. The battery was readied for firing and it was discovered that number 1 mortar was unserviceable. They did manage to get numbers 2, 3 and 4 firing. On May 2 of the same year, mortars number 3 and 4 were put out of commission by direct hits on the bore. At just about Midnight on May 6, the last mortar went into action when Japanese ships were seen attempting a landing at North Dock. Mortar 2, with assistance from the four 14-inch guns on Fort Drum, dispersed the attackers and foiled their landing. Way continued firing all the next morning despite a rain of shells hitting the firing pit causing 70% casualties among the crew. At about 11am the breechblock froze due to the heat of constant firing. It was the last of the islands "concrete artillery" to cease firing just before the Noon surrender.
Much of Battery Way's infrastructure was damaged but several shell and cartridge rooms were still intact. One room's heavy steel door was full of small holes and bend in a concave form towards the room's interior. Must have been a very close hit by artillery fire of some sort. The walls of the firing pit and even the mortars themselves are scarred with holes and scratches from shrapnel. It's hard to believe that anyone in there survived.
From Way, we left Middleside and went up to Topside the visit Battery Hearn. It was completed in 1921, just prior to the disarmament treaty between the US, Japan, Great Britain and France. (Another worthless piece of paper. Yet people wonder why I'm skeptical of treaties and international agreements!) Initially it was part of a battery with another nearby gun. Together they were called Smith Battery Guns 1 and 2, or "Smith Brothers" for short. (If you don't get the reference there, ask an older friend about it.) In 1937, they were separated and Smith Gun #2 was renamed Battery Hearn in honor of General Clint Hearn who commanded the harbor defenses of Manila Bay in 1919.
Hearn is armed with a 12-inch gun mounted on a rotating carriage. This is a true gun and can be fired at any elevation between 0˚ and 35˚ well short of the mortar's lowest elevation of 45˚. At its maximum elevation, it could fire a 1,000-pound shell over 17 miles. The maximum rate of fire is one round every 55 seconds and the standard complement is one officer and thirty-three enlisted men. There's a small square manhole in the concrete deck of the emplacement. This was at the end of an underground passage from the officer's quarters to the battery. Near the entrance to the magazine, there's a round manhole that was the entrance used by the four members of the gun crew that worked underneath the carriage of the gun.
Starting in February 1942, the guns of both Smith and Hearn fired at the mainland, at first as counter-battery fire against Japanese artillery on the mainland, and later as interdictory fire against roads and bridges to try to slow the Japanese invasion on Bataan. On April 9, both guns were put out of service by hits from Japanese fire. Their large, circular emplacements were just too big a bulls-eye to be hidden from observers on the high ground in Bataan.
Before surrender, the crew sabotaged the gun but subsequently the Japanese forced POWs to cannibalize parts from Smith and put Hearn back in action. In January 1945, a bomb from an American B-24 exploded next to the gun again placing it out of action. The creator of this hit is still visible. I'm not sure who did the damage to the gun itself but it probably occurred during the American invasion to retake the island. The gun's barrel, recoil spring housings, muzzle and rifling deeply pitted from hits by hot shrapnel. The barrel is made of very hard steel and some of the pits were deep and obviously due to being hit by very hot material because they were produced by melting not gouging. The rounded, raised edges of the scars are clear evidence that they were melted into the steel. The thinner steel of the recoil spring housings was melted all the way through and large holes resulted. Anyone in the area of these hits would have been torn to shreds.
From Hearn we drove further up Topside to the Pacific War Memorial. It's located at the top of the island near the old Parade Field and the ruined buildings standing around it. Built in the 1960s it has three main parts, the museum, the Rotunda at the higher west end near the museum and the Eternal Flame Monument at the east end.
The Rotunda is an open sided structure with a round altar at the center directly under the open-topped dome. The sun falls directly upon the altar most days. Connecting the Rotunda to the Eternal Flame Monument are a series of patios each a bit lower than its predecessor. Water flows from the Rotunda to the Monument at the sides of these terraces through a series of cascades and fountains. The terraces are bordered on the sides by eye-level walls that block out the surrounding jungle and direct your attention to the Eternal Flame Monument at the bottom of the memorial. The last terrace is lined with 12 panels inscribed with the major battles of the Pacific during WWII. (I found the panel that listed my Dad's battles. It was titled 'The South Pacific, Guadalcanal to the Admiralties". It listed both Guadalcanal and Bougainville, his first and second battles. I also found the panel with Diana's Dad's battle, Iwo Jima after which he was sent to China to prepare for the invasion of Japan's home islands.) The There's no actual flame at the monument. Instead, a large metal sculpture represents the outline of a huge plume of fire. The sculpture is set atop a raised stone platform that puts it at the same elevation as the Rotunda. From the base of the sculpture
We walked through the memorial first and then returned to the entrance to visit the museum. It has many interesting displays including one of General MacArthur's distinctive, self-designed, braided caps. I'm not sure how common this information is so I'll mention it here. When a General reaches the 5-star level, he gets to design a piece of the uniform he wears. Gen. Mac designed a cap. General Dwight David Eisenhower designed a jacket that became common in the military called the 'Ike Jacket'. Being short waisted, it was the ideal design for sitting with your jacket on whether it be at your desk, in a vehicle or on a reviewing stand. They have a great display on small arms in the Pacific Theater. From the samurai sword to the M-1 Garand, they have a nice variety of both Japanese, British and American weapons. The rear wall of the main room is dedicated completely to a mural of the Pacific Ocean showing the major offensives. Down the horizontal ends, it has the flags of all the allies involved in the theater, interspersed with profiles of common ground vehicles. Across the top is has the emblems of the US armed forces.
It lists the major events in chronological order down the ends inside the flags and assigns them a number. On the map itself, it shows the Japanese offensives in red and the Allied offensives in yellow. Numbers near where the battles took place relate to the numbers on the list of events. On the west side of the Pacific, they have the outlines of major Japanese planes and ships. On the east side are the outlines of the same for the Allies. A very impressive mosaic map.
Across the circular driveway in front of the museum is the Parade Ground. It's now home to a small collection of artillery and anti-aircraft weapons as well as the islands helipad. At the Headquarters end of the parade ground is a flagpole that was a mast from an old Spanish ship. It has been used as a flagpole since before the First World War and amazingly it has survived both wars and is still in use today.
On the way down from the memorial, we passed more ruins of officer's housing and the Topside Barracks also known as 'Mile Long Barracks'. In reality, it's only about a quarter of a mile in length but military nicknames are not known for their precision. We made a brief stop at the reconstructed Spanish Lighthouse atop the tallest peak. We also stopped at the Philippine Memorial, which honors Philippine soldiers, sailors and guerillas from all their conflicts, including the Philippine-American War. I think we call it the Philippine Insurrection and they call it the Philippine Revolution. I certainly don't know much about it but will after I get home.
Once we were down at Bottomside, we stopped at the Japanese Peace Park. The main monuments there are 4 Japanese shore guns. Either Japanese steel is not as hard as US steel or our shells produce hotter shrapnel. I say that because one of the Japanese guns had a large hole melted completely through one side of the barrel right into the bore. It was at least 3-4 inches across as compared to the 1 to 1.5 inch pockmarks I've seen on other guns on the island.
After that, it was back to the dock and onto the ferry for the ride back to Manila. The water was choppier but that did not affect the ride of the ferry. Still very smooth.
At dinner this evening the captain announced that we were not going to stop at Yap Island. A tropical depression has developed into Typhoon Haiyan and is forecast to grow to Category 4 before it hits Yap. It is then projected to head straight for the Philippines. As that is exactly the course we would take to get to Yap we are going to head straight south rather than southeast to pass the storm on the downwind side where the rotation will bring the wind and waves at us from the stern. Many people aren't happy about the decision but we've been in enough storms to know they would have been a lot unhappier riding through a typhoon for a day or so. Funny how ignorance can lead you to incorrect conclusions.
We had a doubleheader tonight. First, we saw the movie 'Barrymore' in the theater, and then we went to the Queens Lounge to see the Amsterdam cast in the show Groove Tonight, which they had done earlier in the cruise. They were a new cast when they came aboard the same day we did and the improvement over the first presentation of this show was impressive. That's especially remarkable since the first time they performed it they were excellent. Group dynamics and stage presence are the things that got stronger.
Nov 5, 6, 7, 8 (Yap Island, Micronesia Cancelled), 9, 10 - Crossing the Equator and At Sea. Turns out that the Captain is a genus. Typhoon Haiyan has reached Category 5, Super Typhoon and has really messed up Yap. Now it's headed to the Philippines and has followed exactly the reverse of what our track to Yap would have been. The new is saying that it may be the strongest typhoon ever to make land fall and that the storm is the largest in history. The example they're using is that it would stretch from one end of the East Coast of the US to the other, Maine to Florida. Now that's a big storm.
I'm not sure what speed the winds are but they're coming at us from the stern so they help push us along. The water is not rough but there is a significant swell, also coming at us from behind so you hardly notice it. Not sure what the naysayers are going to do to backtrack on their griping about not going to Yap. My guess is they'll not mention it at all and hope the rest of us have very short memories.
Not much of note happened during this restful time at sea.
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