Silence of a Soldier [Illustrated] [Paperback]

William J. Duggan (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 2003

The fight for the Philipines was over. Prisoners sat beneath the burning April sun in the fields of Mariveles. Bub Merrill looked out to sea to see an outline of Corregidor three miles away, but orders had come down not to try the swim. There was no food on Corregidor and most were too weak to make it. Rations had been cut to one eighth. At the time of surrender, hunger, exhaustion and disease was rampant among POW's. The Japanese gave them neither food nor water, but forced them to sit in the baking sun. Bub dug his hands into the sand and came up with two baseball-sized rutabagas. They allowed him to survive the march to Camp O'Donnell, a march that many others did not. From there other marches began. At the point of a bayonet, US POW's carried sacks of rice, dried fish and ammunition bandoliers, acting as a mule train for the Japanese army's move across the Philippines.With the Philippines secured, the Japanese shipped prisoners to other slave labor camps throughout the far east. Bub was forced to work in several factories in Manchuria. Three years later he found his way home to Algonac, Michigan. This is his story.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

The account of the destruction of Manila is based on testimony collected from eye- witnesses by the US forces which liberated Manila. The testimony was under oath. The reports are condensed. The once proud city of Manila is dead. The churches, convents, schools and universities have been reduced to rubble by the Japanese.The civilian population has been starved, raped, burned, murdered, mutilated and bayoneted, including small infants.The orders for these atrocities came directly from Tokyo. The destruction of Manila was not the act of crazed troops. It was a operation carefully planned by General Yamashita and the Japanese high command.

Excerpts:

In the first three weeks of February,1945, The Japanese began to destroy methodically the churches, convents and charitable institutions in the inner city (Intramuros) St. Tomas University, the Manila Cathedral, hospitals and libraries were either bombed or set ablaze. The occupants of these institutions were locked inside the buildings when they were set afire. Orphans, foundlings, sick people in hospitals and insane people in the Asylums were locked into their institutions to be burned to death along with the incinerated buildings. On January 25, 1945, Japanese soldiered entered the facility of the Philippine Red Cross.They bayoneted or shot doctors, nurses, babies with their mothers, young girls, some of whom they raped. On February 12, they entered Lasalle College. There were seventy people within the premises. The inhabitants were slain with sabers, bayoneted, or shot. On February 23, 1945, in one charitable institution, 50 people were shot in the head with their hands tied behind their backs. A few blocks away another 30 bodies suffered the same fate. On February 24,1945, an air-tight food vault was opened to reveal the bodies of close to 300 people suffocated in the cramped 15 by 18 foot space. The Spanish Consulate flying the Spanish flag was set afire killing more than fifty people within. Filipinos in the outlying areas faired no better. In Calamba, 5000 men, women and children were slaughtered and the town decimated. At the Medical School of the University of the Philippines 190 students and faculty were locked into one room in which the furniture had been soaked with gasoline. The doors were locked and the room set afire. Only three people survived. Dr. Frankel a university surgeon lived to tell the terrible story. Captured Japanese documents record the death of 1000 civilians. Men were shot after their genitals had been cut of. Women were mutilated by having their breast slashed off with sabers. Children were bayoneted. Area by area, block by block homes and buildings were torched. Whole neighborhoods disappeared. These are only a few of the evils perpetrated on the Filipinos by the Japanese As the war drew to an end, the Japanese forces took their revenge on the defenseless civilian population. When they were finished, Manila had been leveled. The people lay dead everywhere, in the streets, in the buildings in the schools and in the churches.

About the Author

William J. Duggan retired from Webster University, St. Louis, Missouri, 1995, as Provost of the University. He was at Webster close to thirty years: first as a professor of Comparative Religion; then as Dean of the Graduate School. He established Graduate Studies programs in: Geneva Switzerland; Vienna, Austria; Leiden, The Netherlands, and London, England. He also established Graduate Studies at some thirty seven military bases across the United States.

Product Details

• Paperback: 112 pages
• Publisher: Elderberry Press (OR); illustrated edition edition (April 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1930859570
• ISBN-13: 978-1930859579
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,003,960 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Told with candor and unflinching detail, August 11, 2003

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Silence of a Soldier (Paperback)

Silence Of A Soldier is the personal memoir of Bub Merrill, a survivor of the Bataan Death March, as told to William J. Duggan. A strong and vividly recounted testimony of survival in the face of the exceedingly brutal and often lethal treatment that Japanese forces inflicted upon their American and British prisoners of war, Silence Of A Soldier is told with candor and unflinching detail. A welcome contribution to the growing library of World War II autobiographies, Silence Of A Soldier is very highly recommended reading.

5.0 out of 5 stars Moving story told by one who lived it, September 23, 2011

By 

Tara Reins "Preschool Teacher" (Murfreesboro, TN USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Silence of a Soldier: The Memoirs of a Bataan Death March Survivor (Kindle Edition)

What I enjoyed most about this was the way the horrific story was told in matter of fact language sans bluster, sans hubris and with honest humility. There is little humility in today's writing---and in today's USA. Too bad. We've lost something.
This is by no means another of the books romanticizing WWII as the 'good' war. It tells it like it was, and for that reason alone, in a culture that worships war and slaughter, it will never be widely read.
If you want to understand what war is, reading this will be a beginning.

5.0 out of 5 stars Moving story of war, October 21, 2010

By 

Jack Of Alltrades "Just another soul" (Loth Ethtadoth Unidoth) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Silence of a Soldier (Paperback)

I read this story many years ago and have never forgotten it. It tells a story of war everyone should know.