MacArthur's Spies

by Peter Eisner

  “Our air force in the Philippines: Ibid., 120.

  “How many were the Americans: Zobel, MacArthur, 48–49.

  The intent was: MacArthur, Reminiscences, 126.

  MacArthur, his wife, Jean: Arthur MacArthur IV, Douglas and Jean Marie Faircloth MacArthur’s son, was born on February 21, 1938.

  The twenty-four-foot-wide: Zobel, MacArthur, 51; Ramsey and Rivele, Lieutenant Ramsey’s War.

  “the exact time of the arrival: MacArthur, “Message to the Troops,” January 15, 1942, quoted in James, The Years of MacArthur, vol. 2, 57.

  MacArthur found out long: MacArthur, Reminiscences, 129.

  “You are well aware: Ibid.

  “The outcome of the present: Ibid., 129–30.

  “Every foxhole on Bataan: Ibid., 129.

  For weeks now: Ibid.

  Learning About War

  “I was hit in the toe: Transcript of the Testimony of Claire Phillips Clavier, Portland, Oregon, November 13, 1953, CC, 234.

  “Every time they would: Ibid., 235.

  According to her diary: Diary, December 24, 1941: “Infected toe; call Dr. removes toe nail, very painful. Must stay in bed. No co. for dinner Xmas.”

  Phillips was able to come down: Ibid.

  Phillips had arranged a room: Binkowski, Code Name: High Pockets, 15; and Diary, December 30, 1941.

  Unprepared for War

  The mix also included: The Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan reached the Philippine island of Homonhon on March 17, 1521, during his attempt to circumnavigate the globe and claimed the archipelago for the Spanish crown. Magellan died in a battle with Mactan islanders near Cebu on April 27, 1521. His rival commander, Juan Sebastián Elcano, a Basque, completed the circumnavigation to Spain with the surviving expedition.

  A 1940 government census: “16,000,000 in Philippines,” New York Times, May 30, 1940, p. 21.

  A colonial existence was safe: Joan Bennett Chapman, interview with the author, February 5, 2015.

  “There seems to be: “Japan’s Supermilitarism,” Manila Daily Bulletin, October 18, 1941.

  “My parents and MacArthur: Joan Bennett Chapman, interview with the author, February 5, 2015.

  “Japan is heading full: “Japan’s Supermilitarism.”

  “Certainly we do not: “A Philippine Slant,” Manila Daily Bulletin, October 21, 1941.

  “had begun an eleventh-hour: MacArthur, Reminiscences, 109.

  Cars burned and smoke: John W. Whitman, “Manila: How Open Was This Open City?” HistoryNet, August 19, 1998, www.historynet.com/manila-how-open-was-this-open-city-january-98-world-war-ii-feature.htm.

  “gambling with stakes: “For the Big Gamble,” Manila Daily Bulletin, December 29, 1941.

  “At the proper time: “Bombings Called Senseless, Savage,” Manila Daily Bulletin, December 30, 1941.

  “Be calm,” Bennett wrote: “Be Calm,” Manila Daily Bulletin, January 2, 1942.

  The Conversion of Santo Tomas

  “The Japs were very: Caroline Bailey Pratt, Only a Matter of Days: The World War II Prison Camp Diary of Fay Cook Bailey (Seattle: CreateSpace Independent, 2012), 20.

  Tomayasu ordered that internee: Rupert Wilkinson, Surviving a Japanese Internment Camp (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2014), 35–36.

  More than two months: Mydans, More Than Meets the Eye, 71–90; and Bob Hackett, “Ija Maya Maru: Tabular Record of Movement,” undated, www.combinedfleet.com/MayaM_t.htm. The Maya Maru left Manila for Shanghai on September 1, 1942. An earlier exchange voyage had sailed from Manila in June 1942.

  Diplomatic Immunity

  “It still runs before: Peter Parsons, “Commander Chick Parsons and the Japanese,” undated, via e-mail to the author, July 11, 2015.

  Fortunately, the Japanese sentries: Ingham, Rendezvous by Submarine, 35. Spanish was still widely spoken in the Philippines and remained, along with English and Tagalog, an official language for decades after the Spanish-American War.

  Parsons, forty-one: Many biographies of Parsons say he was born in 1902 and that he attended the universities of Tennessee and the Philippines. His son Peter Parsons corrects the birth year to 1900 and says there is no record of his father attending the University of Tennessee and that his tuition for the University of the Philippines was returned to him when he didn’t attend. Biographical details are based on the author’s e-mail exchange and correspondence with Peter Parsons in April 2016, and Peter C. Parsons, “The Battle of Manila: Myth and Fact,” undated, http://battleofmanila.org/Parsons/htm/parsons_01.htm.

  Soon after returning, he was: Wood served as governor-general of the Philippines from 1921 until his death in 1927.

  “To watch the sun-bronzed: Ingham, Rendezvous by Submarine, 5.

  Along the way: Connaughton, Pimlott, and Anderson, The Battle for Manila, 35.

  Parsons had decided not: Correspondence with Peter Parsons, April 2016. Peter Parsons said: “Actually, a PT Boat had been sent specifically to pick up Parsons. But he was delayed by not being able to find some senior officer. By the time he arrived at the pier, the boat had left. I had tried to stow away on that PT boat, but my mom had other ideas.”

  Within an hour, consular: Ingham, Rendezvous by Submarine, 35.

  Nurse and Midwife

  haciendero who was willing: A variation in the Philippines of the Spanish word “hacendero,” the owner of a ranch.

  “a tall, wavy-haired: ME, 48.

  “A Japanese flag: Diary, February 13, 1942.

  Boone’s Guerrillas

  In the process of establishing: Transcript of the Testimony of John Boone, Washington, DC, September 14, 1955, CC, 657.

  “It was pretty obvious: Ibid., 658.

  Claire set out for Maite: Diary, February 20, 1942. Boone said in his Court of Claims testimony that he thought their first meeting was much later.

  It was a five-mile: ME, 53; Binkowski, Code Name: High Pockets, 28–29.

  Boone emerged from the tree: ME, 55.

  “a buck-ass private: Transcript of the Testimony of John Boone, Washington, DC, September 14, 1955, CC, 660.

  Boone had been a: E-mail, Jeanne Boone to the author, April 4, 2016.

  “It seems to me: Transcript of the Testimony of John Boone, Washington, DC, September 14, 1955, CC, 645.

  “The first battalion moved: Ibid., 646.

  “We had to go: Ibid.

  “They thought they had: Transcript of the Testimony of Claire Phillips Clavier, Portland, Oregon, November 13, 1953, CC, 241–42.

  “We could make a deal: Transcript of the Testimony of John Boone, Washington, DC, September 14, 1955, CC, 661.

  The Chances of Survival

  Emilio V. Reyes: His given name has been previously misreported. However, see www.mayorgilagarcia.com/index.php/news/the-municipal-government/former-mayors.

  “We all have head: Diary, February 27, 1942.

  “She told me that the: Judge Mamerto Roxas, affidavit, August 23, 1949, CC.

  “I agreed with the: Ibid.

  One American soldier hiding: Richard Sassaman, “The Battling Bastards of Bataan,” America in WWll, April 2007, www.americainwwii.com/articles/the-battling-bastards-of-bataan/.

  On March 31 Claire: Diary, March 31, 1942.

  More Than a Dozen Tremors

  “Was God going to rescue: Felipe Buencamino III, “Diary of Felipe Buencamino III,” April 8, 1942, https://philippinediaryproject.wordpress.com/category/diary-of-felipe-buencamino-iii/.

  “Five more deaths by malaria: Diary, February 28, 1942.

  She counted thirty deaths: Ibid.

  Of twenty huts in their: Ibid.

  “In the three huts: Diary, April 13, 1942.

  A few days after the earthquake: Diary, April 14, 1942.

  “We’re in a tight: Ibid.

 
The Death March

  I don’t think his: William E. Dyess and Leavelle Charles, Bataan Death March: A Survivor’s Account (New York: GP Putnam’s Sons, 1944), 50.

  After informing his commanders: Morton, The Fall of the Philippines, 458.

  “Their spirit is good: James, The Years of MacArthur, 95.

  “On the dock I: MacArthur, Reminiscences, 142–43.

  “A primary objective”: Ibid., 145.

  “to make the fight: Ibid., 152.

  “Your worries are over: Quoted in Shively, Profiles in Survival, 55.

  “It would have been an ordeal: Dyess and Charles, Bataan Death March, 62. Dyess, a pilot, escaped a Japanese prison camp in April 1943. Chick Parsons was able to transport Dyess from Mindanao to Australia in 1943 via submarine. Dyess met with MacArthur to give his first-person account of the death march. Dyess returned to the United States, where he died in 1944 in a flight training accident.

  The march northward was: Shively, Profiles in Survival, 59.

  “I wondered whether the Jap: Dyess and Charles, Bataan Death March, 86.

  “When the battle becomes: Allied Translator and Interpreter Section (ATIS) Files, Record Group 407/270/51/9, Entry 427, Boxes 837–8, NARA. Elizabeth Mullener, War Stories: Remembering World War II (Baton Rouge, LA: LSU Press, 2002), 42.

  Many of the surviving: Lichauco, Dear Mother Putnam, 82.

  Escape and Evasion

  “I know where there: John Boone, quoted in undated and unattributed article, “Sgt. Boone’s Secret Army,” personal files of John Boone, courtesy of Jeanne Boone.

  “We knew we would: Transcript of the Testimony of John Boone, Washington, DC, September 14, 1955, CC, 656.

  “I was very guerrilla: Ibid., 648.

  A few did make: Captain William L. Osborne and Captain Damon J. Gause may have been the first to make the successful sea voyage, reaching Australia in October 1942. See Reports of General MacArthur, Prepared by His General Staff, vol. 1, 1994, 299–300, available at www.history.army.mil/books/wwii/MacArthur%20Reports/MacArthur%20V1/ch10.htm#b2.

  A few, such as: Schaefer, Bataan Diary, 61.

  He worked with guerrilla: Ibid., 349.

  “Some fled for the jungle: Ramsey and Rivele, Lieutenant Ramsey’s War, 80.

  Hidden in Plain Sight

  When he was arrested: Peter Parsons, e-mail to the author, December 10, 2015.

  Chick Parsons’s final evening: Peter Parsons, interview and correspondence with the author, April 2016.

  “I never even let: Peter Parsons, e-mail to the author, July 12, 2015.

  “I still remember the fish: Parsons, e-mail to the author, December 10, 2015.

  for Takao, Formosa: Takao is the port now known as Kaohsiung, Taiwan, about 550 miles north of Manila.

  “He said he was impressed: Peter Parsons, e-mail to the author, July 12, 2015.

  of Lourenço Marques: Now Maputo, Mozambique.

  Newspapers were already reporting: “Gripsholm at Rio, Evacuees Happy,” New York Times, August 11, 1942, p. 9.

  “Every precaution must be taken: “U.S. Refugees Due from Orient Today,” New York Times, August 25, 1942, p. 21.

  The FBI suspected him: Parsons, e-mail to the author, July 12, 2015.

  Back from Bataan

  If he was still: Claire said in Manila Espionage that she had another meeting with Father Cabanguis in Maite, but that is not reflected in the diary, nor is her claim that the priest had seen John Phillips as a Japanese prisoner in June 1942.

  There had been: Agoncillo, The Fateful Years, 348.

  “I’ve tried my best: ME, 75.

  Jostled by the other: Carlos C. Sobreviñas, affidavit, July 12, 1949, CC. In Manila Espionage Claire said she made part of the trip back to Manila by boat east across Manila Bay. Her diary does not reflect that, and she acknowledged in the court case she had traveled by land.

  “A clever ruse”: Sobreviñas, affidavit.

  “the girl in Rebecca”: Diary, June 4, 1942.

  If alive, he was: Claire said in her Court of Claims testimony that the Roxas family thought Fuentes had been killed early in the Japanese invasion. While the court doubted her testimony on that and many other points, there was a reason to think he was dead. His ship, the SS Corregidor, had hit a mine in Manila harbor on December 17, 1941. Estimates were that most of the crew and more than nine hundred passengers died. See “The Sinking of the SS Corregidor Dec. 17, 1941. 900–1,200 Lives Were Lost,” Pacific Wars, December 15, 2014, available at: http://thepacificwars.com/sinking-ss-corregidor-dec-17-1941-900-1200-lives-lost/. Under war conditions, there was no reliable tally of the dead and no way to know that Fuentes was not on the ship and had gone to San Francisco in search of Claire.

  A Brave New World

  They urged compliance and understanding: Agoncillo, The Fateful Years, 311.

  “The last thing we: Lichauco, Dear Mother Putnam, 53–54.

  Soon they were requiring: Ibid., 56.

  The judge laid down: Mamerto Roxas, affidavit, August 23, 1949, CC.

  “It must have been: Ibid.

  “We agreed that I: Ibid.

  Roxas sent along one: Ibid. Roxas said he personally did not accompany Claire to the meeting.

  “Her husband Manuel Fuentes: Ibid.

  She promised that everything: Ibid.

  She took up a name: In a letter to Evangeline Neibert on May 20, 1947, Claire said that her friend and colleague in Manila Peggy Utinsky recommended she use the name “Dorothy Fuentes.”

  Becoming Madame Tsubaki

  “I borrowed their patterns: ME, 84.

  By the end of July: At the Court of Claims hearing, Claire’s colleague Peggy Utinsky, who worked with the Red Cross, said she had never seen Claire at Remedios Hospital.

  She told the judge: Mamerto Roxas, affidavit, August 23, 1949, CC.

  Unemployment was high after: Lichauco, Dear Mother Putnam, 49.

  “Make no mistake”: Anonymous source, interview with the author, Manila, January 30, 2015.

  Part of the reason: ME, 86.

  Claire described Ana Fey: Ibid.

  Claire said that a: ME, 86–88. Besides noting it in her memoir, Claire described the event to U.S. military interrogators in 1945.

  Mamerto was acquainted with: Binkowski, Code Name: High Pockets, 3.

  Claire told the judge: Roxas, affidavit.

  “I lined the walls: ME, 97.

  He provided a constant: Transcript of the Testimony of Claire Phillips Clavier, Portland, Oregon, November 10, 1953, CC, 51.

  Opening Night

  Also attending was: Claire gave only his family name. This was probably Toshiharu Ichikawa (1912–98), who already had written orchestral works and film scores.

  And they repeated the motions: ME, 99.

  Next a spotlight illuminated: Ibid.

  “Our orchestra accompanied his: Ibid.

  “When midnight arrived there: Ibid., 100.

  “God Bless the Philippines”: “Music: Philippine Flop,” Time, March 12, 1945; and Benjamin Sears, The Irving Berlin Reader (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 192. Filipinos sang a slightly altered version of Irving Berlin’s song in the 1940s. Berlin heard schoolchildren in Leyte sing it, then wrote and performed a new Philippine version, “Heaven Watch the Philippines,” in 1946. He offered to donate the proceeds to the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts of the Philippines, as he had done with “God Bless America” in the United States.

  After the successful performance: ME, 105.

  Damian showed the way: Binkowski, Code Name: High Pockets, 81.

  Boone was impressed with: Transcript of the Testimony of John Boone, Washington, DC, September 14, 1955, CC, 694.

  “Mosquitoes are troublesome only: Lichauco, Dear Mother Putnam, 59.

  “Th
e food was crucial: Transcript of the Testimony of Robert M. Humphries, Portland, Oregon, November 10, 1953, CC, 5.

  One of Claire’s new: ME, 88. Masamoto is mentioned in Manila Espionage; he does not appear elsewhere.

  She also had someone: This might have been George Terada, a Japanese American businessman mentioned earlier in this chapter.

  “At least, I’ll be: ME, 91.

  Night and Fog

  “YOU MUST NOT TALK: Hartendorp, The Japanese Occupation of the Philippines, 575–77.

  The caged prisoners were: Shively, Profiles in Survival, 538–45.

  “It’s alright to whisper”: Ibid.

  “He was crippled: Joan Bennett Chapman, interview with the author, February 5, 2015.

  Bennett’s wife had determined: Agoncillo, The Fateful Years, 577.

  The Kempeitai

  One of those who: War Crimes Trial of Colonel Akira Nagahama, 639–41; Record Group 331/290/12/13/3, Entry 1321, Box 1579, NARA.

  The Kempeitai functioned parallel: Syjuco, The Kempei Tai in the Philippines, 6.

  Colonel Dionisio Banting Jr.: He was arrested on March 23, 1943.

  He was beaten, starved: Record Group 331/290/12/34/6, Entry 1321, Box 1579, NARA.

  From Nagahama’s point of view: Syjuco, Kempei Tai in the Philippines, 14.

  “To govern alien nationalities: Quoted in Friend, The Blue-eyed Enemy, 201.

  “We endured in the Hope: Quoted in Lichauco, Dear Mother Putnam, 70.

  “While the commentator kept: Ibid., 71.

  A few months later the bureau: Asihei Hino, The Flowering of Racial Spirit (Manila: Bureau of Information, Japanese Imperial Army, 1942), 5.

  “When we entered into: Lichauco, Dear Mother Putnam, 76.

  “Substantial progress is being: Statement on January 28, 1943. Quoted in Agoncillo, The Fateful Years, 368.

  Many Filipinos, who might: Lichauco, Dear Mother Putnam, 103.

  Killing General Roxas

  “This is to order: The account and subsequent quotes are from Colonel Red Reeder, The Story of the Second World War (New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1967), 216–22.

  Roxas was not dead: Jimbo, eventually transferred to China, was arrested and set for execution in 1946. Roxas, now the new president of the Philippines, wrote to Chiang Kai-shek and urged clemency. Jimbo was spared.