300,000 to 75, 000 poorly equipped, ill fed men ill fed-yes, why? I don’t know. Boat after boat I helped load for the Japs of salmon, rice, beans, ham, pineapple, pepper, salt, tomatoes, sugar, apricots, peaches, flashlight batteries, ammo, you name it; it was there—yet during the fighting it wasn’t to be had—some QMC officer should be hung for such a deal. I firmly believe we could have beaten them off, but they would have just sat in the hills and shelled us and bombed us to oblivion—hope the higher ups know what they were doing—march to Malinta—officers clean, watches, rings, cigarettes, voice of freedom, see the flag go at Topside—night on rock gravel; Flag at Fort Terminal, searchlights go to guide B-17s, load of marine chow, wine at No. 3 trading rice for salty raisins to Pinos, blackjack, Matthews, watch no have, topside and Middleside wrecked first dead at topsides, alert—no raid; no alert raid while at the latrine, boasting of jap nco. McKinney and shelling in road volunteer for the P.A. spotter—detail too late—Bunnell killed—PT boat machine gunner wounded—blink lights for identification—bombing of destroyers—minesweepers firing, bombing of rock, PT fight in China Sea, Hearn at PT boat, Mona firing, Photo Joe; Balloon.
92nd garage-civilians lighting cigarettes with $20 bills—live and stay anywhere or place you can—no food except scavenged chow—one water faucet—walk to Malinta for water—carry it coolie fashion—two cans on a pole—boiling sun—feces everywhere—5 hours at a time sweat out line for one canteen of water-scavenged for chow—jap shot at us; whether to hit or not, don’t know—no more that way—Jim Matthews and I took some type of “C” and cigarettes off dead bloated Marines—they won’t need them—japs laid out for funeral pyre—layer of wood, layer of japs, layer of wood, layer of japs-gas-light. First deaths of dysentery in camp—Ben and three others lined up and marched as if on work detail to James. Plenty of grub. Massey and others from Hughes here-glad to see him-stench, filth, hunger, thirst and thievery-Ben got bayoneted for not moving fast enough-jap kudahed a prisoner for trying to go somewhere—hit him with butt of rifle—PW broke his jaw-jap killed PW. Bathe and wash clothes in the ocean—no soap-prisoners selling Lucky Strikes for $20 a carton for a pint of rice—who has any rice?
Orders now—“no more food will be brought in from work parties”-smuggled can of salmon in after eating all I could hold. Our few, Johnson, Yeager, me doing pretty well on our eating now by our system of swiping part of that being loaded on docks—accidentally on purpose dropping cases of food and letting them break open-gorging. Rain like hell-everything soaked. Load on boats for Manila—spent all night on boat—Manila-wading through water to shore—paraded up Dewey Boulevard and around to Bilibid Prison—the proud arrogant looks of our “superior captors” jap parade with the white boxes of ashes of dead-“the sorrowful and uneasy smile one would get from some civilians when no one was looking—no jeering from them-our loss was their loss-one brought us some water, one tried to give us cigarettes-no luck-Col. Bunker passes out—others also—through the streets to let the Pinos look at their former friends in arms-
Manila looks very deserted but little wreckage-merely stripped-that old lady is crying in her handkerchief-now she is giving us a thin smile-we can’t smile; we know we failed-look at her glance around-no one notices her-a banana is thrust in Johnson’s hand. Bilibid—two days and nights with only rice and water-panchitas-up at three for train-90 or 100 to a small boxcar-no ventilation except open door—oppressively hot-many have dysentery-asses sticking out of door-many pass out-grumbling and growling., hungry and thirsty.