The Liberation of Santo Tomas-Episode 404
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- Опубликовано: 27 июл 2024
- This week Seth and Bill talk about the liberation of the civilian internment camp in Manila at the University of Santo Tomas. In a daring dash through Japanese lines, elements of the 1st Cavalry Division, known to history as Chase's Flying Columns, blow through Japanese lines and head towards the Pearl of the Orient, Manila, to liberate civilian prisoners of war that have been held at Santo Tomas since 1942. On the verge of starvation, the civilians are rapidly fading away. Rescued at the last minute, the Cavalry, quite literally, saves the day. Tune in and hear the harrowing story of the rescue, the odd American and Japanese truce, and one of the more heartwarming episodes of the tragic fight for Manila in World War II.
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I can confirm that at least one person who watch and like Drachinifel likes your show as well.
Both shows are great, each in it's own way! Both get great guests and have so much knowledge regarding the subjects they cover.
They just need to pronounce his name correctly: Drak-in-ah-fell… four syllables, gentlemen!
Confirming there is at least two people
I know that there are a lot more than 10 who also watch Drachinifel.
Lol... I like drach too!
The liberation of Guam and the Philippines showcases the American military truly at its finest. The one thing that makes a 20 plus year Naval career so rewarding are those instances when you get to be a positive force changing peoples lives and improving their living conditions. A hearty Bravo Zulu to you Gentlemen for having the BEST channel on You Tube. V/R, The Old Seabee Chief.
As a tour company here in the Philippines, we used to handle a group of internees of Santo Tomas for a few years. They'd come back almost every year to visit the school and some other WW II sites.
I formed a friendship with the organizer, Ms. Sascha Weinzheimer, who was also an internee. She was a young woman at that time and her family owned Canlubang which was one of the biggest sugar plantations on Luzon. Over the years, we talked about her experiences while inside Santo Tomas and brought me to tears a few times. This episode gave me more context to what she had told me. Thank you for doing this episode.
This is my favorite podcast and you guys just keep cranking out great great stuff. Thank you, Seth and Capt. Bill!
Every Jr. High/ High School student needs to see this series …….
Amen!
My Father, a first-generation American (born in Detroit to a Serb father from Hungarian Transylvania and a mother from the Austrian Crownland of Bohemia) participated in the Liberation of Manila in January 1945, and was awarded a Bronze Star.
God bless you all.
Did he live in Trenton?
2/5 CAV vet here. Thanks for sharing this incredible story of Americans liberating their own countrymen.
There is a trophy cup at the National Museum of the US Army at Ft Belvoir that was presented to these Troopers by the internees of Santo Tomas after the war.
Thank you
My first girlfriend in college was a Filipina whose father was a guerilla fighter against the Japanese in WWII. Any mention of the Japanese in the Philippines brought immediate anger.
My father, born in the P.I.'s well before WWII, was a student in the U.S. on December 7, and he went to his grave hating the Japanese.
Another great episode. As a British person, I really do appreciate your channel. I look forward to viewing each forthcoming episode being a sort of amateur historian myself. I’ve actually visited Manila and traveled to the memorial in Intramuros to pay my respects. A very moving place. I know the next episode is going to be a rather grim one, but it has to be told and history has to be remembered. You guys do a fantastic job.
Welcome aboard. I am struggling to get through 1% of what Sir Winston wrote, much less what
has been written about him. Sir Martin Gilbert's multi volume magnum opus is a great place to open any page and just start reading. He had been there done that enough for
several lifetimes by age 25. Never will be another who comes close.
As someone who was in the British Army (my first Regiment was part of the Chindits during WW2) and whose grandfather fought the Japanese at Imphal my knowledge of the Island Hopping campaign is less than my guys fighting the Japanese in India and Burma. So it's always great to learn something new.
Funny, I'd love to learn more about how Bill Slim routed the Japanese in Southeast Asia!
@@sundiver137The US staff college does a great lecture that can be found on you tube about Bill Slim - The Dole Institute of Politics. Most of the videos on RUclips cover the earlier Battle of the Admin box that was the first real time the British Commonwealth troops stopped Japan stone dead. Not much stuff about Imphal and Kohima.
The problem the coverage has with regards Imphal & Kohima is that the US battles were far more strategic by getting those B-29 airfields up and running. That said, the Battle of Imphal resulted in the loss of 54,000 Japanese troops and that's a lot of Arisakas that would otherwise have been dug into the mountains of the Pacific Islands shooting at Americans, and India was also key for keeping China in the War which was where the Japanese lost huge numbers. I would argue that it also gave WW2 it's greatest general - Bill Slim. No other general on any side achieved so much from so disadvantageous a start with so little.
The US Staff College in association with the Dole University has a great lecture on the leadership qualities of Bill Slim
I never subscribed to utube as I do not trust them. But because I wanted to subscribe to this great program I broke down and subscribed to utube and thus this program! I look forward to Tuesday each week starting Sunday night.
Thank you! I knew very little about the Pacific war. The European war of course! I thought the European war toughest! I thought was tough but your program taught me which theater was worst!
I remember watching The War by Ken Burns and his coverage of Santo Tomas. It will be good to revisit it here.
Great episode as usual guys. I got choked up when you were talking about the reunion of the war correspondant and his wife.
Bill,
My oldest son has his NR interview with Admiral Houston on Wednesday .
Hope you can forgive me but he has chosen Surface Nuclear if selected .
You try to raise your kids right and then they go so wrong !
Joe 79’
Lolol I think we can give the kid a pass…. I mean…. you know…. maybe just this once.
Best of luck to him.
Pride in your children is not a sin.
The parents did very well, so a big Thank You to both of ya'll!❤
Bill responding: all good
Phenomenal story and I'm glad it came this late in the narrative as you two have hit your stride. You painted such a vivid picture with such genuine humanity. You finally made me weep. What a powerful tale. God save us from ourselves!
The war while a triumph in many respects was a horrible experience for most involved both combatant and non-combatant alike. The footage in this episode was sobering and it is never a surprise what people can do to each other when some are considered inferior or disposable. Thank you both for another professionally done exposition.
Another excellent episode. Thank you gentlemen. Some rays of hope here in what was a very dark time
Uh oh, James Scott (author) & "Rampage" (book) foreshadowing. It took me 6 months to finish that audiobook. I'd have to listen to about 20-30 minutes and then I'd have to stop. I'd have to step away for sometimes weeks, before building up the strength to continue to listen. It's a story that needs to be told, but it is difficult to do so. I applaud you in advance for having the courage to tell this story. To anyone planning to watch/listen, Brace yourselves, "BRACE BRACE BRACE"
"Virginia would live"...got to admit; I had tears and pumped my fist at hearing that.
The japanese started dropping artillery shells all over santo tumas right after the Liberation,killing and wounding quite a number of people.The guns were silenced after american troops hunted them down.Thank you Bill and Seth for another great episode about the pacific war.
The truth! Thank you! My heart is bursting!
Thank You ! Bill and Seth.
Both of my parents, (they met there, both from Eastern Kentucky looking for work and the need to be part of the war effort) at Willow Run, Michigan for Henry Ford building the B-24s. (Paid in Cash, in an envelope on Fridays)Mom was a true “Rosie the Riveter”, Dad work as a supply officer for the army, for aircraft weapons at the plant.
Great series. My grandfather was a paratrooper involved in the liberation of the phillipines. I am thankful for history that helps me imagine what it was like for him.
I was in tears more than once.
Gents. Indescribable episode. OurAustralian 8 Div , RAAF and RAN captives in Malaya, and Pacific Islands underwent the same relief as the people in Santo Tomas EXCEPT the for the men who died on the Burma railway, Japan and worse still SANDAKAN. Sandakan is another story. Thank you for your brilliant series.
Us Australians really took the brunt of Japanese POW Camps. My 2 Grandfathers were both POWS in WW2, prisoners of different sides on different sides of the world. One was guest of the Germans on Crete, the other was captor of the Japanese on Sumatra. The Japanese prisoner one used to tell the German one - "You never did hard time, you were just sunning yourself on Crete" It really was a fight for survival, and the Japanese one refused to eat rice or buy anything Japanese made for the rest of his life - such was his hatred from the barbarism and cruelty he witnessed and was subjected to by the Japanese.
I've been reading books on the Pacific War for decades, but with your channel I always get a battleshipload of hitherto unknown information!
My morning commute made awesome. Keep up the great work, gentlemen!
History is required if we are to go forward!
Thank you both for telling the truth.
Good episode! Depressing that humans still haven't learned from the past.
Thanks for teaching what is no longer taught!
Ahhhh, “Victory Liner Lorenzo.” Not as well known as the notorious “Sewing Machine Ivan”, or “Washing Machine Charlie”, but just as fearless, and reliably on time, nonetheless!
Just pray you never have the utter misfortune of winding up behind him when pulling out of Subic Bay, heading for Manila. Or your ears, nose, throat, and lungs will NEVER be the same again...😂
Outstanding show today, guys! 👍
Great episode. This is the first real in depth look at this issue I've seen, and that is a doggone shame. I'm only about half looking forward to next week, because I know it will detail the terrible atrocities' that the Japanese did there. Yet, it is story that MUST be told! I look forward, too, to hearing about the rescue at Cabanatuan, and the 11th Airborne's incredible operation at Los Banos (I honestly believe they had help from above in pulling that one off). I honestly believe no other Army in the world would have risked so much to free innocents. Thanks, guys.
There is a great little museum at University Santo Tomas, located in the same building as the internees. UST's first graduating class was 1611, by the way. A great university with a long history.
That Museum is typical of museums built at that time. The Mackay school of mines (now the University of Nevada, Reno) is identical in size and archictecture.
Look forward to every episode with your enthusiasm, depth of knowledge and interaction. By far the best available on RUclips!!
Needless to say, another great episode. Well done. 10 years ago or more, as a volunteer at a military museum, I spoke with a visitor who said he was (or had been) the head of the Santo Tomas survivors association. Actually the association of the *children and grandchildren* of the survivors. As in so many other cases, I wish I had had more time to talk with him.
Great episode Seth and Bill. It was a little bit happier than most of the Pacific battles pushing out the Japanese.
Happy ending to a truly horrible situation. It DOES make me proud of the soldiers and sailoprs involved! Only the Americans and British went to such lengths to rescue the helpless and their own POWs, often at great risk to themselves. Occasionally such as Patton's attempt to rescue the POWs at Hammelburg, there were tragic results, but often the efforts bore fruit such as MacArthur's efforts on Luzon. Looking forward to the POW rescue stories.
God are these episodes a tad addictive?! Jeez… talk about instant smile! 🫡
I have seen all of your episodes. All are merely excellent. But this episode was off the charts for me. The two of you in particular, with the great assistance of your incomparable guests, have made a great contribution in futherance of the education of the single most significant event of the 29th Century. On behalf of all your viewers, all I can say is "thank you and thank you again."
John Rees
p.s. My father served in the 89th Infantry Division of the US Army in the ETO.
Awesome! Thanks!
Any American who is in Manila should drop by Santo Tomas and visit ! Today its incredable crowded but werth the effort !
They have a great museum with souvenir coffee mugs and key rings. I loved it
I concur. I visited Santo Tomas this past January on a tour led by James M. Scott. Faculty gave our group a nice briefing.
One of the best shows on one of the best RUclips channels ever. Thank you.
Thank you Bill and Seth.
I am very much looking forward for next weeks episode.
Inhumane cruelty and the denying of civilisation itself was part of WW2.
But if someone dives deeper into the history of WW2, you have to acknowledge, that this is part of the story. And it has to be told.
There is no way around.
Thank you so much for this series.
When the Philippines became independent in 1946, they immediately changed many of the street names around Manila, renaming Dewey Avenue, Roxas Avenue, for example. But one name they kept was Taft. Taft, the hugely overweight president that later became a Supreme Court Justice was once Governor of the Philippines. He was so loved and admired by the people here his name still proudly represents one of the biggest streets in the commercial district. Aside from MacArthur, it is difficult to find an American with a longer lasting impact.
Excellent episode, so well done. Thank you both.
Thanks guys. You two are great
Great show gentlemen.
Another excellent episode. Thank you Seth & Bill.👍
Thank you!
Great video!
Thanks!
Another great episode bringing many untold stories to the public.
Hope to hear about other parts of Luzon as my father was in the mountains north of there on the Villa Verde trail (32nd Division).
Meanwhile these other stories bring the events to life.
My aunt and uncle lived through Santa Tomas with a new born boy. My uncles’s mother was the last to die before liberation. She had come to the Philippines to help care for the newborn. Helen Everett wrote a recollection of the Santa Tomas experience. I can make a copy of it if you two would like it. Let me know if you want it.
Excellent show.
I'm guessing that the next episode is the liberation of Manila, south of the Pasig River. I'm on the wrong side of 65, and I had a frend at work who was 5, and lived in (luckily), North Manila at the time. I heard many a story from him, his name was Tony, and lived it. My wife was Filipino from Legaspi in the Bicol region, and I heard a lot of stories from her parents about how they were treated by the Japanese, and how Lesgaspi was liberated in April, 1,1945. But, I'm getting ahead of your story, and I find you gentleman very interesting, and you make great videos, and tell great stories. Thank you.
This was a good episode. A story that I was not aware of before. Thank you for bringing it to us.
And, it was good to hear a happy outcome to a story of war. That doesn't happen often.
What a video. Gentlemen, this is incredible work to bring this American history to light.
Thanks, boys. Rock on.
Thank you..
Enjoy y'all's show keep up the good work
You guys have been very critical of General MacArthur. Perhaps this one episode reveals the most significant factor behind his relentless determination and insistence on liberating the Philippines. I'm convinced that he was influenced by the ever present spectre and belief in his absolute responsibility to save those he was forced to leave behind in 1942. Put yourself in his shoes. It surely must have been among his final thoughts on the day that he passed away.
Wow , great !
Long time subscriber. I know quite a bit of ETO history, and I've learned a lot from you two about the Pacific Theater and your knowledgeable guests. Thank you.
Had a friend whose growth was severely stunted due to his time as a child POW.
Peleliu is the one story I really have problems listening to, normally I can put most things into a historical perception by hindsight knowing that it all turns out for the Better. Peleliu was a valuable demonstration how low and barbarous Humans can become when the need arises. Many of these young men on the American side was just a few months before out in the fields Jerking Corn, find themselves here disemboweling other humans with bayonets & knives and shooting others Point-Blank in the face, all for No Real Gain, what a waste of Life for many just starting out
You aren't alone. Peleliu bothers me. It wasn't needed.
@@williampocketsYeah, I try to justify it to whatever extent possible saying ‘it’s a world war…. mistakes will be made’ but good God….
One thing I wish were mentioned in the episode during the part about Allied planes flying over Manila and Santo Tomas is that just prior to the Flying Columns arrival, one of the Marine pilots covering the columns dropped a package into the compound. The Japanese were ignoring the planes and didn’t see it. An internee retrieved it and it contained pilot’s goggles and a note that said, “Roll out the barrel. Santa Claus is coming”
In the 1930s you could order a house to be delivered to you from Sears. It would arrive broken down in parts, IKEA-style, and you would build it yourself. As Manila was part of the US during the 1930s, many Americans did this and had their house shipped to Manila from Sears. There are still maybe two dozen of these kit-houses from Sears still standing. I took a tour in 2004 that included many of them. With oak trees on the same street, the architecture struck me. It seemed like any midwestern city. Fun to think how American Manila was in the 1930s. The last movement to apply for statehood for the Philippines finally died in the 1970s. It really was a part of the US for a long, long time.
Historians like yourselves may have a duty to report the truth, and I likewise have a duty to learn the grizzly, uncomfortable details. But I simply don't have the fortitude for that. Bless you both for honoring your obligation to historical fact, you are doing something that I cannot.
Y'all do a fantastic job brining the emotions and tensions to bear. Have smelled onions too many times to remember. Also, recco your channel often on twitter.
You guys do great work, thank you. Bill, your Twitter game sucks. But you don't care, so I don't either.
Awesome. I was hoping y'all would talk about the liberation of Santo Tomas but did not expect a full Torpedo Tuesday episode on it. Ed Whitcomb wrote a great book called Escape from Corregidor, where he details his time at Santo Tomas under an assumed identity. Also, Indestructible by Bruning details Santo Tomas and the experiences of Pappy Gunns family. Great job guys.
Superlative episode. I remember reading about this in elementary school in my father's Time Life book series on WW2. The emaciated father with a beard and glasses, the mother crouched beside him, both caring for their tow headed little boy was seared in my memory. The boy looked just like me, the father like mine, and the mother, just like mine.
My work schedule sucks except for days you guys upload. I leave work right around 3am so these episodes are a perfect companion for the commute home.
How the hell can you drive and watch this!??
@@servantofgod5642There's the fine art of sleep driving but the program is presented as a podcast so it can be listened to without the visuals.
@@servantofgod5642 I dont watch. Just listen like a podcast. Not much to see most of the time (no offense Bill and Seth 😅). If Seth says he is going to insert photos I will go back and look when I get home.
@@CFarnwideIf I just listen, I end up closing my eyes, then fall asleep .
@@servantofgod5642 I will do that with past episodes I’ve already listened to sometimes. Use them for sleep aide when it’s time for bed.
I realize that you guys probably have the season mapped out, but it y'all don't already have it planned, there are 2 subjects that I'd love to see included.
First, the liberation of Cabanatuan.
Second, history of the Guarilla units in the Philippines. I can see that subject possibly taking two, or at least one long episode.
As a descendant of people from all over the planet for millennia I’d like to say thank you for the episode.
Yaaas it’s Tuesday. Like my Sundays with Perun.
The horrendous condition of the prisoners when liberated probably parallels the condition of 100s of thousands of Allied POWs all across the remaining Japanese Empire in August 1945.
Great episode as always gentleman, though great doesn't seem like the right word given the grim topic. I'm looking forward to next weeks episode as I don't know as much about the Philippines as I do other parts of the Pacific theater and this level of brutality is eye opening. I wish more people were cognizant of how brutal the Japanese were during WWII, it seems like its not uncommon to find people who have fallen for the "poor bullied Japan" revisionist BS.
I would like to hear Captain Bill's take on the U 571 movie.
Good movie written by a friend. That Harvey Keitel line: "Don't ever say you don't know. That will kill a crew." was said to me once, and ended up in the movie.
Well Skipper I always thought that you were Catholic like me and now I'm proud to hear that you are.
Bill responding: actually I'm not any more. I've moved over to the Protestant camp. Seth is though.
@UnauthorizedHistoryPacificWar well Skipper you are leading the non Catholic brothers and sisters just a different ship but still fighting the good fight. Still leading educating and inspiring. Thank you for both your response and the great work both of y'all are doing
Just a quibble at this point; "We" didn't put Japanese Americans into internment camps. It was FDR who signed the Executive Order to do so. This same EO did in fact apply to Italian and German Americans, but there was never an overwhelming out cry by the American people to take such action. FDR and his administration own this one.
Funny you mention Drachinifel because I first found your channel as I was following up on something from one of his episodes. I subscribed after the first episode I listened to and I look forward to every new show dropping.
here we go
Twirling of the mustache should have reminded you of Robin Olds.
Watch The War by Ken Burns. Theres a story told by a woman whose family was inside Santo Tomas from the beginning to the end. I think she was 6 at the time. It explains the exact situation you are talking about. She even remembered the tank tearing down the front gate. I think her father actually knew McAurthur.
Its ironic that Japan and the Philippines signed a military cooperation agreement yesterday. That just shows that time heals all wounds. Unlike in China and South Korea where the governments keep hostility alive for their own benefit, the younger generations of Filipinos weren't brainwashed by their government and now like Japan.
IMHO, the agreement was more for protection against the CCP. If you speak to families who were abused, or tortured by the Japanese, those atrocities haven’t been forgotten. If there’s any “wounds” that have been healed, it’s from the generations that haven’t learned their country’s history.
For another Santo-Tomas-like story see Shantung Compound: The Story of Men and Women Under Pressure by Langdon Gilkey
Very moving. Many thanks.
Yay!
Q and A While taking my granddaughter to see the Grand Canyon and other places in route we spent the night in Lubbock and visited the Silent Wings Museum in their intro film it covered the use of gliders in the pacific theater I hope that these might be covered possibly in a combined episode since there were only a few instances of glider use during the pacific war.
The problem with the US accomplishing things like the Doolittle raid and the liberation of certain prison camps is that the Japanes would respond in rage and "terminate" thousands of local civilians, most of which were not involved in the action. It certainly was the fault of the Americans but it sure put a damper on the success.
A week's warning on buckle your seat belt. I don't even know if I should watch.
But I will.
Bill and Seth, Please read. "SECRET SERVANTS" . A history of Japanese Espionage . By Ronald Seth
I am rather horrified that you did not even mention the fact that there were 66 US Army nurses at Santo Tomas who had made it through Bataan, Corregidor, and Santo Tomas until liberation. Why? They deserve at least that!
@@MsVictory1945 I’m rather horrified that you clearly didn’t listen.
Actually, the British made all their civillians surrender their pets for euthanization as they were worried that people would prioritise feeding their cat or dog and malnourish themselves..
My dad graduated from Santo Tomas. :)
Just remember the “Iron Fist” is attached to the human arm.
This was a great episode (although i get spoiled to the 2 hr plus ones). and i could just bean seth for not letting us know he was on ww2 tv with paul i watched the recording but would have loved to watch live so i could be in chat. the question and answer show they spoke of does anyone know if you post questions on the show comments such as here or is there a different form for that. I dont know if they ever read or respond to these comments and questions or not. TY for any answers in advance, your friend in history, wade
Cairouan (?) University in Morocco is the oldest university in the world. Bologna University was founded in 1088.
Hrrmm. My father went to medical school at the University of Bologna. That is also the oldest medical school in the world.
Seth and Bill are nonpareil!
Bill: the university of Bologna, stated by you to be the oldest university in the world, might nit be true. Consider The University of ai-Qarawiyyin in Fez Morocco founded by Fatima al-Fihir circa 857 AD - 859 AD. She inferited her father's wealth.
You would have to redefine the word "university" for this to be true. The Fez institution was certainly a mosque and an Islamic school, but not a scholarly center until the 13 century.