Captured: The Japanese Internment of American Civilians in the Philippines, 1941-1945

Notes

Notes Introduction 1. Scholars disagree about the number of civilians (specifically American civilians) in the internment camps. Lt. Colonel Emmet F. Pearson, who served with the army hospital at Santo Tomas (STIC) after its liberation, puts the number of internees in Santo Tomas, Los Bafios, and Baguio (Bilibid) camps at 6,399 (4,763 of these American ). His sources for these figures include: (1) the records made at Santo Tomas that were not lost or destroyed; (2) secret Japanese reports; (3) "well-informed individuals" in STIC and other camps, including camp doctors; and (4) two source works by Hartendorp and Stevens (Pearson, 988). Another scholar, Van Waterford, sets the number of total internees at 7,800 (6,000 of them Americans). I have chosen to use Waterford s number (unless I indicate otherwise) not only because his sources include not just army medical records, prisoner reports, and worksby both Hartendorp and Stevens but a much greater varietyof Japanese documents, many found since the Tokyo Trials and occupation. He has also had access to more complete records in the Philippines. His work is also comprehensive and covers all prisoners of the Japanese across the South and Central Pacific, as well as being the most recent survey (Waterford,261). I. Pearl of the Orient 1. According to James Halsema, at least in the case of Baguio and environs, Japanese women and children were not forced to stay in internment but allowed to return to their homes. Many did stay, however, because of their fear of Filipino retaliation ("E.J.,"361,n7). 2. First Dark Days 1. Morton explains, however, that the U.S. government didn't entirely abandon its troops in the Philippines. General George Marshall insisted on organizingsmall blockade runners to sail with ammunition and food from Australia. This was ineffectual, however. Most of the blockade runners sank or were captured, and the three that did make it off-loaded their supplies on Mindanao and Cebu. All these items still had to be transported through Japanese patrols to Corregidor (Morton, 160-164). 2. Actually, another internee present, James Halsema, disagrees, noting that Mukibo s English washeavilyaccented and "thick with consonants"; he cites the following example: "You must obey its [Imperial Army's] commands. Arr guns must be surrendered at once or you weer be kirrud" (Halsema, "E. J.," 297). 3. The bizarre nature of the claim suggests possible misunderstanding.James Halsema points out that Major Mukibo s statement that he had a Harvard education provided by a scholarship through the Presbyterian (not Methodist) church has never been 333 334 Notes proven. As Halsema states, "Neither the undergraduate college [Harvard] nor the Divinity School alumni offices has shed any light on the validityof this claim" (Halsema Itr, May 19, 1997). 3. Meanwhile, on Several Islands Not Far Away 1. Vaughan explains that "chow" is the equivalent of $0.10 a day plus rice, fuel, laundry, soap, lights, and the right to live on the grounds (Vaughan, 12-13). 4. Inside the Gate 1. The particular awkwardnessof possible legal terminology in this regard becomes evident when one studies the confused international designation (POW or civilian) for any members of the civilian Merchant Marine caught in occupied territory.As Gibson explains, under the 1907 Hague International Convention, all crew members on captured merchant ships of a belligerant were considered "POWs." However, even the Hague Convention exempted "members of the crew of an enemy merchant ship, if they happened to be citizens of a neutral state," in which case they simply became civilians of a neutral country (articles 5-7). This remained the case unless their ship was captured while "taking part in hostilities," and then they became POWs, despite their national neutrality (article 8). Gibson adds that some merchant seamen captured ashore, on leave from their ships, were not captured POWs but civilian internees. The Philippines sawmembers of the Merchant Marine thrown into both POW and civilian internment camps, thereby reflecting the already confused criteria for official designation (Gibson, 188). Daws points out that even civilian construction workerson Wake Island were placed in POW camps, because they, like the marines, fought the invading Japanese (27). 2. To put this in some sort of perspective, of all the British and American POWs captured by the Germans and Italians in Europe, only 4 percent died in camp, while in the Pacific Theater, 27 percent died (Russell,57).Waterford,citing theimpossibility of acquiring accurate statistics (because the Japanese frequently didn't record POW deaths), suggests a higher...