Free The Leper Spy by Ben Montgomery Page B

down. The Japanese had somewhere in the neighborhood of 422 guns in Bataan firing on Corregidor, and in the last ten days, they had launched more than 200,000 shells at the island.
    At 10:30 PM on May 5, the radio crackled to the beach defense commander: “Prepare for probable landing attack.” Two hours later, a Marine Corps runner sprinted into the H Station, breathless. He’d come from North Point. Enemy landing. “Probably six hundred men,” he said.
    A group of soldiers formed a line in the darkness across Kindley Field Water Tank Hill. They weren’t done fighting. As the Japanese moved forward, a two-gun battery on the tail of the island opened fire, catching them by surprise and killing many with 193 rounds. Spotlights swung onto the landing crafts, and gunners were able to assault the vessels and the men aboard. Ten thousand Japanese soldiers followed in the second wave, and the fighting was intense as they disembarked and struggled to climb ashore. Soldiers fired on them in the moonlight. More landings followed at Infantry Point, but a counterattack drove them back. Soon soldiers were retreating for Malinta Tunnel.
    General Wainwright radioed a message to President Roosevelt. “Our flag on this beleaguered island fortress still flies,” it said.
    FDR wrote back: “In spite of all the handicaps of complete isolation, lack of food and ammunition, you have given the world a shining example of patriotic fortitude and self-sacrifice.
    â€œThe American people ask no finer example of tenacity, resourcefulness, and steadfast courage. The calm determination of your leadership in a desperate situation sets a standard of duty for our soldiers throughout the world…. You and your devoted followers have become the living symbols of our war aims and the guarantee of victory.”
    Wainwright paced back and forth in Malinta Tunnel all night. By daylight, the Japanese soldiers were five hundred yards from the tunnel’s east entrance. He had to make up his mind, which was still reeling with the task of trying to find ways and means of dodging what seemed inevitable. He walked into his own headquarters and called General Moore and Brig. Gen. Lewis Beebe inside. He had come to a decision.
    â€œWe can’t hold out very much longer,” Wainwright told them. “Maybe we could last through this day, but the end certainly must come tonight. It would be better to clear up the situation now, in daylight.”
    At the threshold of capture, Wainwright composed his last message to MacArthur:
    I feel it is my duty to the nation and my troops to end this useless slaughter. There is apparently no relief in sight. American and Filipino troops have engaged and held the enemy for nearly five months.
    We have done our full duty for you and for our country. We are sad but unashamed. I have fought for you to the best of my ability from Lingayen Gulf to Bataan to Corregidor, always hoping relief was on the way.
    Goodbye, General, my regards to you and our comrades in Australia. May God strengthen your arm to insure ultimate success of the cause for which we have fought side by side.
    The morning sun revealed a once lush island now pulverized to a treeless desert littered with bodies. The Japanese had lost more than four thousand soldiers, but they’d managed to land tanks on Corregidor. General Wainwright met with Major General Moore and said he was prepared to surrender, considering the heavy casualty toll from the night of fighting. He’d give up the fortified islands at noon. He ordered Moore to destroy the entire armament by then, along with all records, secret maps, papers, correspondence, and diaries.
    Wainwright also told Moore to lower the flag on Corregidor, burn it, and replace it with a white flag.
    At noon, the American flag, which had been shot down twice and replaced during the siege, was burned and replaced by a white flag of truce. Despite the flag, the Japanese continued