by Rose Churma
The Philippines commemorates Araw ng Kagitingan on April 9. It is observed in the Philippines to commemorate the surrender of Bataan to Japanese troops during the Second World War.
April 9 was the start of the Bataan Death March when the head of the American force holed-up in Bataan surrendered more than 76,000 starving and disease-ridden soldiers (according to Wikipedia – 64,000 Filipinos and 12,000 Americans) to Japanese troops.
These prisoners of war were forced to endure the infamous 140-kilometer (87 miles) Bataan Death March to Capas, Tarlac. Thousands died from dehydration and outright execution while walking in the heat.
Created over a decade ago by the Filipino Memorial Endowment (FAME), white obelisks stand as mini memorials of the path taken during the Death March.
There are 138 Death March markers in all, from Bataan to Tarlac, with each kilometer marked by an obelisk, with 97 in the province of Bataan, 33 in Pampanga, and 8 in Tarlac, all the way to the gates of the former Camp O’Donnell, which is now the Capas National Shrine.
The Bataan Death March is known throughout the Philippines and the USA when Filipino and American soldiers showed the utmost valor in the face of surrender.
However, what is not as well known is the role of Filipino American soldiers in winning that war—until now—with the release of Marie Silva Vallejo’s DAUNTLESS.
Marie Vallejo was employed in data security and internal audit at INTEL during her career days in corporate America. She briefly settled in Kaneohe, Hawai’i, after retirement but relocated to Metro Manila soon after.
Eventually, she discovered that her father, who trained as a teacher in the Philippines and arrived in the US at the height of the Depression, “began his first job picking apples in the central valley of California.”
He was one of many Filipinos who boarded the ship S.S. Empress of Asia in May 1929 in steerage class to seek “a better life in America.”
What they found in pre-World War II America was one of “exceptional hardship, pain, and sacrifice” and a “time of intolerance and racism” for non-whites like Filipinos, their entire life in California and other states “was debased with systemic and anti-Filipino sentiment and legislation,” the author notes in the book’s preface.
She highlights this sentence:
“What complicated patriotism had made my father and thousands of Filipino men in America volunteer into the Army despite decades of horrible inequities inflicted upon them? Was it even worth it?”
This sentence resonated in my mind as I began writing this review.
Pearl Harbor was attacked on December 7, 1941. Less than 10 hours later, the Philippines, a US territory back then, was invaded by Japan and was the catalyst of the U.S. Army’s First Filipino Battalion formed from 7,000 volunteers.
The First and Second Infantry Regiments were then formed from this group, who later returned with the Liberation force.
From the regiments, secret military units consisting of highly trained Filipino men, known only to General MacArthur and a few of his immediate staff, were sent on secret, suicidal missions to the Japan-occupied country two years before MacArthur’s return to the Philippines.
When Marie Vallejo discovered that her father was part of this ultra-secretive and clandestine unit that was trained in Australia, she was determined to find out more.
However, the confidential nature of the covert missions to the islands proved to be very challenging due to large gaps in the official guerrilla records.
Fortunately, descendants of the men who were part of these missions shared their stories, which fleshed out the details of their experiences in the Philippine jungles.
She also credits a chance meeting at a conference with Alex Fabros, Jr., who did pioneering research work on the 1st and 2nd Filipino Infantry Regiments.
She would eventually write her first book, The Battle of Ising, about the regiment her father led into battle that became one of the decisive victories against the Japanese that led to the liberation of Mindanao.
Her research for that first book enabled her to lead a team and get funding from the Philippine Veterans Affairs Office to digitize the Guerrilla Recognition Program files of the Philippine Archives Collection at the National Archives in Maryland.
This digitized version enabled descendants of veterans to provide proof of their relatives’ participation in the war.
Peter Parsons, the son of Charles Parsons, who led the SPYRON missions in World War II and a Hawai’i resident, notes that this book DAUNTLESS is most readable – a page-turner book, especially if you have relatives who participated in that war.
The main chapters chronicle the activities of the Filipino American regiments in detail due in large part to the author’s persistence in interviewing the descendants of the veterans or the veterans themselves if they’re still able.
Thus, she can write about little-known details of the war, the majority of which appear for the first time in print.
The appendices are as thick as the main chapters and contain every bit of evidence she has collected–photos, lists, correspondence, and various printed sources that can be copied and annotated.
This makes this book a valuable reference tool for those researching the Filipino American contributions to World War II, and it should be in each public library system.
A book talk on DAUNTLESS was held at the Waipahu Public Library last Fall to a standing-room audience sponsored by the Filipino American Historical Society of Hawaii (FAHSOH).
Clement Bautista, president of FAHSOH, noted:
“Marie Silva Vallejo has collected a wealth of documentary and archival information on the 1st and 2nd Filipino Infantry Regiments and assembled it into multiple narratives that allow a reader to experience events as they unfolded on each island. In DAUNTLESS, Vallejo lays out in minute detail how Filipino Americans were essential in the liberation of the Philippines.”
At this book talk, the author also gave credit to Domingo Los Banos, a strong advocate for World War II veterans, for sharing the archives he collected on the Filipino American regiment from Hawai’i, some of which are used in the book.
The author notes that “it had to take a war to slowly break the ignorance, to make them ‘equal’ and enable their own triumphs to emerge. What they underwent begat better opportunities for Filipinos of America.”
In these times when a lot of the gains made by these men are being overturned and revamped, when policies for diversity, equity, and inclusion are being thrown out of the window…yes, it is important for their stories to be told.
ROSE CRUZ CHURMA established Kalamansi Books & Things three decades ago. It has evolved from a mail-order bookstore into an online advocacy with the intent of helping global Pinoys discover their heritage by promoting books of value from the Philippines and those written by Filipinos in the Diaspora. We can be reached at kalamansibooks@gmail.com.
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