Fugitives: Evading and Escaping the Japanese

4. Back to the Mine

.. 5ACKTO THE.MINE. Free at last, I made a solemn promise to never again willingly allow myself to be taken by the Japanese. I kept that vow. The next morning Ken Hanson and I found a car and driver to take us back to the mine. Undet decided to stay at Cawayan. The vehicle was a battered and beaten mid-1920s vintage, seven-passenger Packard touring car that had long ago been stripped of its cloth top and the collapsible tubular framework which had supported it. In fact, even the windshield and its supports were only a memory, as was any semblance of the original leather upholstery. But its engine had survived and worked surprisingly well considering that for years it was lubricated with coconut oil and fueled with a mixture of gasoline and distilled nipa palm juice. The road was little more than a jungle trail, and at times we had to widen it by hacking away the overgrowth with bolos. There were no bridges over the streams, and we forded them as best we could. Eventually we reached one of the better roads that served the mining property. Signs of looting were everywhere. What a mess! While the organized gang had blasted the door off the safe and stolen the gold bullion, free-lance looters had cleaned out everything else. )0 Fugitives No house or staffroom remained untouched and virtually everything was taken: pictures, letters, clothing-even old shoes and dirty, wornout clothing. Electrical fixtures had been tom from the walls and ceilings ; pipes and fixtures had been yanked out. All had been carried away in stolen company trucks, now wrecked and scattered throughout the area. But the natives professed innocence of any wrongdoing. "Everything was taken to keep it from the Japs only, Sair!" they explained. The two succeeding weeks were spent in a mostly futile effort to salvage trucks and put them in running condition, and in a search of Filipino houses in an equally futile attempt to recover personal belongings. A few people were lucky enough to recover some oftheir personal effects. In a very few isolated cases, items were returned voluntarily. Early in the morning on the day we returned, Japanese planes had flown low over the camp, dropping leaflets that said the Emperor's forces were rapidly securing control of Masbate Island. Several of the Americans, mostly those with families, hurriedly headed for the hills again, but the majority of us remained at the mine. Later the same morning, 7 January 1942, many Filipinos came through our camp from Aroroy, the port four kilometers away, with the news that a shipload of Japanese soldiers was coming ashore. The Filipinos were fleeing to the homes of relatives in rural areas. Another exodus of Americans started immediately. Most left in cars, although there were no roads in the hills and cars would soon prove useless. Ken and I, having had enough jungle life for a while, simply went to a partially cultivated hillside a half-mile from camp where we sat for several hours, the camp buildings in sight below us. Several planes flew low over the area. There were no signs of life at the mine. Except for a few diehards, all the Filipinos had fled. Early in the afternoon we noticed some stirring in the town below . Soon several Filipinos came up the hill and told us that the Japanese had all re-boarded the ship at Aroroy and left without coming to the mine. Ken Hansen and I returned to the staff house, joining Homer Mann and Bill Rowe, manager of IXL. We were the only Americans there. Ken and Homer wrestled with all sorts of fruitless plans for evacuation, for their wives were still in Manila--or somewhere- 5ack to the Mine ) 1 probably in the hands ofthe Japanese. Any course they might choose, short of heading for Manila and finding them, at whatever the cost, would be unsatisfactory. How would they ever be reunited? They finally agreed, very reluctantly, that their own survival was most important just then. Ken and I decided to look for a vehicle to use when we had to depart again. Any vehicle would do, but we preferred one small enough and tough enough to fit and cope with the rough jungle trails. We searched unsuccessfully for one of the small, gasoline-powered ore loaders-not much more than powered wheelbarrows-used inside the...