23 Dec 1941

Before we head out for Bataan, I'd better write down the events of the last day. It's been a doozy.

After we left our positions yesterday morning, we attempted to retreat to the right, only to find that the right flank had also collapsed and the Lt was MIA. So was the medic. We gathered what Americans and Filipinos we found retreating from the right positions, and retreated straight back into the jungle. We tried going to the 13th Regimental HQ, only to find it half destroyed and half hastily taken down. There was a horse there, though, so we loaded Johnny onto it - he was still in and out of consciousness for the morning. We kept going on the path out from the HQ until we couldn't go anymore. Damn, was it hot! I called a 1 hour halt, but about 45 minutes in, we heard mechanical rattling on the road, so we pulled back into the jungle. It was 2 Nipponese tanks. We tried to hide, but they saw us after shooting the horse (we had let it go), so we started shooting. Johnny jammed one turret when he tried to shoot the operator sticking out of the turret. A couple of the Filipinos with us broke and ran - mowed down, obviously. Glad of my US training & guts. There was no way we could beat 2 tanks though! So we retreated out of shot, only to run into a skirmish line of Nip soldiers beating the bush for us. Another fucking bayonet charge, but at least this time they shot first and then charged. At this point I got shot in the leg, but didn't notice until later. Ben shot the officer. That engineer should have been a Ranger! His sword went flying perfectly through the air and landed point first in the ground, like some Hollywood flick. We managed to beat them, and one surrendered, so we took him prisoner. I could see the bullet in my leg, so I tried to pull it out myself, but that proved to be a bad idea. Mel bandaged me up good.

We walked through the jungle, parallel to the road to avoid more Nip soldiers, for the rest of the day. Near nightfall, we came near Rosario, and heard awful sounds coming from the town. I sent Johnny and Dick to scout out what the hell was going on. It was indeed a massacre. While on patrol, Johnny fell down an old well shaft. Good thing he had College Boy to fish him out. Not Johnny's finest day ever, yesterday. They reported that they saw men of the 26th Cav whooping it up through the town, though, harassing the enemy. We camped about a mile outside Rosario in the jungle for the night.

This morning, a scouting party from the 26th Cav found us. An Lt was with them - he told us that we were to make our way to Bataan Peninsula to rendezvous with any other survivors, on Gen. MacArthur's plan. Doesn't sound like there's many of us, but that's where we're heading off to now.