Corregidor

1. Lead

Corregidor is a small island at the mouth of Manila Bay in the Philippines, shaped like a tadpole and known to the soldiers who fought there as “The Rock”. In 1941–42 it was the strongest fortress in the Pacific: a maze of concrete gun batteries, tunnels and barracks, built by the United States over forty years to guard the entrance to Manila, the capital of the Philippines. When the Japanese invaded the Philippines in December 1941, Corregidor became the last stronghold of the American and Filipino forces, and it held out for five months after the rest of the Philippines had fallen. Its surrender on 6 May 1942, ordered by Lieutenant General Jonathan Wainwright to save the wounded in the Malinta Tunnel hospital, ended the American defence of the Philippines — and it became a symbol of resistance that the United States never forgot.

The battle for Corregidor was fought in two acts, separated by nearly three years. The first act, from December 1941 to May 1942, was a siege: the Japanese bombed and shelled the island from the air and from the Bataan peninsula across the bay, until the fortress was a ruin and its defenders were starving, sick and out of ammunition. The final assault, on the night of 5–6 May 1942, landed about 2,000 Japanese troops on the island’s north shore, and in a night of close fighting they reached the mouth of the Malinta Tunnel, where a thousand wounded men lay. Wainwright, who had taken command of the Philippines after General Douglas MacArthur left for Australia in March 1942, surrendered the island to prevent a massacre. The second act came in February 1945, when American paratroopers of the 503rd Parachute Regimental Combat Team dropped onto the island’s tiny parade ground and golf course, and infantry landed from the sea — and in ten days of savage fighting, Corregidor was retaken.

Corregidor matters because it is the story of a fortress that did its duty and of the men who held it. The garrison of about 11,000 to 13,000 American and Filipino soldiers held the Rock long after hope of relief was gone, and their stand gave the United States a symbol — MacArthur’s promise, “I shall return” — that carried the war back to the Philippines. The cost was terrible: about 11,000 men surrendered on Corregidor in 1942, and many of them died in Japanese prison camps, and the recapture in 1945 cost about 200 American lives and the lives of nearly the whole Japanese garrison of about 6,000 men. The island today is a memorial, and its tunnels, batteries and ruins are visited by thousands of people every year.

2. Key Facts

Date	Siege: December 1941 – 6 May 1942; Recapture: 16–26 February 1945
Location	Corregidor Island, entrance to Manila Bay, Philippines
Result	1942: Japanese victory, island surrendered; 1945: American victory, island retaken
American commander	Lt. Gen. Jonathan Wainwright (1942); Col. George M. Jones, 503rd Parachute RCT (1945)
Japanese commander	Gen. Masaharu Homma, 14th Army (1942); Capt. Akira Itagaki, garrison (1945)
Allied strength	About 11,000–13,000 men on Corregidor in 1942; about 4,000–5,000 in the 1945 recapture
Japanese strength	About 2,000–2,300 in the first landing wave, May 1942; about 6,000–6,500 in the 1945 garrison
Allied losses	1942: about 11,000–13,000 surrendered; 1945: about 200 killed, about 700 wounded
Japanese losses	1942 assault: about 900–1,300 killed and wounded; 1945: about 6,000 killed, almost the whole garrison

3. Background

The Rock at the Mouth of Manila Bay

Corregidor sits at the entrance to Manila Bay, about 48 kilometres west of Manila, and it guards the bay the way a cork guards a bottle. The island is about 6.5 kilometres long and shaped like a tadpole: the broad, high head of the tadpole, called Topside, rises more than 150 metres above the sea and holds the barracks, the headquarters and the big gun batteries, while the long, low tail, called Bottomside, holds the docks and the supply dumps, and the middle of the island, Middleside, holds the hospital and the Malinta Tunnel. The United States, which had held the Philippines since the Spanish-American War of 1898, spent forty years turning Corregidor into a fortress: it built more than fifty coastal guns, including the great 12-inch mortars of Battery Way and Battery Geary, and it dug the Malinta Tunnel — a tunnel 255 metres long, with 24 side passages — through Malinta Hill, to shelter the headquarters, the hospital and the supplies. The fortress was called Fort Mills, and it was, in 1941, the strongest American fortress in the Pacific.

The Forts of Manila Bay

Corregidor was not alone: it was the centre of a ring of forts that guarded Manila Bay. On Caballo Island stood Fort Hughes, with its own batteries; on Carabao Island stood Fort Frank; and in the middle of the bay stood Fort Drum, a concrete island shaped like a battleship, armed with two 14-inch guns in turrets. Together, the forts were supposed to make Manila Bay impregnable: no enemy fleet could enter the bay without passing under their guns, and no enemy army could take Manila without first taking the forts. The system had one weakness, which the Japanese would exploit: the forts were built to fight ships, and their guns could not be aimed at land targets. When the Japanese attacked from the land — from Bataan, across the bay — the great coastal guns of Corregidor were almost useless, and the fortress had to be defended by its infantry, with rifles and machine guns, against an enemy that could shell it from a few kilometres away.

War Comes to the Philippines

The war came to the Philippines on 8 December 1941, the day after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Japanese aircraft bombed the American airfields at Clark Field and Iba, destroying the American air force in the Philippines on the ground, and on 22 December, the Japanese 14th Army under General Masaharu Homma landed at Lingayen Gulf, on the island of Luzon. The American and Filipino forces, under General Douglas MacArthur, were outnumbered and outgunned, and they fell back, first to the Bataan peninsula and then to Corregidor. MacArthur moved his headquarters to the Malinta Tunnel on 24 December, and on 26 December he declared Manila an open city, to save it from bombing. The defence of the Philippines became the defence of Bataan and Corregidor, and the men who fought there knew that no help was coming: the American fleet had been crippled at Pearl Harbor, and the Philippines were cut off.

MacArthur Leaves

On 11 March 1942, MacArthur left Corregidor, on the orders of President Roosevelt, who wanted him to command the Allied forces in Australia. MacArthur left by PT boat, in the night, with his family and his staff, and his departure was a blow to the men he left behind — but it was also a promise. Before he left, he told the garrison that he would return, and when he reached Australia, he announced it to the world: “I shall return.” The command of the Philippines passed to Lieutenant General Jonathan Wainwright, a cavalry officer who had commanded the forces on Bataan, and who now commanded the defence of Corregidor. Wainwright was a soldier’s soldier, respected by his men and trusted by MacArthur, and he took command knowing that the Philippines were lost and that his duty was to hold out as long as he could. He held out for two more months, and his surrender, when it came, was the end of the American defence of the Philippines.

4. Opposing Forces

The Fortress Garrison

The garrison of Corregidor in the spring of 1942 numbered about 11,000 to 13,000 men, a mixture of American and Filipino soldiers, sailors and Marines. The core of the garrison was the 4th Marine Regiment — the “China Marines”, who had been withdrawn from Shanghai — and the American and Filipino coast artillery regiments that manned the great guns of Fort Mills. There were also Filipino Scouts, American infantry from Bataan, and the sailors and airmen who had escaped to the island. The garrison’s strength was its fortifications: the concrete batteries, the Malinta Tunnel, and the island’s high ground. Its weakness was that it had been built to fight ships, not infantry, and that its supplies were running out: by April 1942, the men were on half rations, then on quarter rations, and they were suffering from malaria, dysentery and beriberi. The garrison was also short of the things it needed most: anti-aircraft guns, infantry weapons and, above all, ammunition for the coastal guns, which could not be used against the Japanese on Bataan anyway.

The Marines and the Tunnel Hospital

The most famous unit in the garrison was the 4th Marine Regiment, and the most famous place was the Malinta Tunnel hospital. The Marines, who had come to Corregidor from China, were the best infantry on the island, and they held the beaches and the high ground, waiting for the Japanese landing they knew was coming. The hospital, in the Malinta Tunnel, was run by American and Filipino doctors and by 88 American Army nurses — the “Angels of Bataan”, who had been evacuated from Bataan to Corregidor — and it held about a thousand wounded men in the final days of the siege. The nurses worked in the tunnel, in the heat and the dark, under bombardment, and they stayed with their patients until the surrender. The hospital was the reason Wainwright surrendered: when the Japanese reached the mouth of the tunnel, he chose to surrender rather than let them massacre the wounded.

Homma’s 14th Army

The Japanese forces that took Corregidor were part of the 14th Army, under General Masaharu Homma, and they numbered about 2,000 to 2,300 men in the first landing wave, with more following. Homma was a capable general, a veteran of the war in China, and he had already taken Manila and Bataan. His army was battle-tested, well-equipped and confident, and it had the support of artillery on Bataan — more than 100 guns, firing across the bay — and of aircraft, which bombed Corregidor every day. The Japanese plan for Corregidor was simple: to bombard the island until its defences were destroyed and its garrison was broken, and then to land on the north shore, at night, and to fight through to the Malinta Tunnel. The plan worked, but it worked slowly: the bombardment took more than a month, and the landing, when it came, was a close-run thing, fought in the dark, against Marines who would not give ground.

The Guns Across the Bay

The Japanese artillery on Bataan was the weapon that broke Corregidor, and it was a weapon the fortress could not answer. After Bataan fell on 9 April 1942, the Japanese moved their guns to the Bataan shore, only a few kilometres from Corregidor, and they began a bombardment that lasted for a month. The guns — 150mm howitzers and 240mm mortars, among the heaviest in the Japanese army — fired thousands of shells a day at the island, destroying the barracks, the gun batteries and the water supply, and killing and wounding the garrison. The American coastal guns could not reply, because they could not be aimed at land targets, and the few American guns that could fire were soon destroyed. The bombardment was the siege of Corregidor, and it was a siege the garrison could not win: the island was small, the guns were many, and there was nowhere to hide.

	Allies	Japan
Infantry	4th Marine Regiment; Filipino Scouts; coast artillery as infantry
Coastal guns	50+ guns, including 12-inch mortars (Battery Way, Battery Geary)
Artillery	Few field guns; coastal guns could not fire on land targets
Air support	None after December 1941
Supply	Blockaded; half rations, then quarter rations
Key commanders	Wainwright, Moore, Howard	Homma, Tanaka, Itagaki (1945)

5. The Battle

The Bombardment

The siege of Corregidor began in earnest on 29 March 1942, when the Japanese turned their guns on the island. For more than a month, the Japanese bombed and shelled Corregidor every day, and the island became a ruin. The barracks on Topside were destroyed, the gun batteries were smashed, the water tanks were pierced, and the men lived in the tunnels and in the dugouts, coming out only at night. The Japanese aircraft — bombers from Formosa and from the Philippines — attacked in waves, and the Japanese artillery on Bataan fired thousands of shells a day: on the worst days, the island was hit by more than 10,000 shells. The garrison’s anti-aircraft guns were destroyed one by one, and the men could do nothing but endure. By the beginning of May, Corregidor was a shattered fortress: its guns were silent, its buildings were rubble, and its garrison was starving, sick and exhausted — but it had not surrendered.

Life in the Tunnels

Life in the Malinta Tunnel, in the final weeks of the siege, was a test of endurance that few armies have faced. The tunnel — 255 metres long, with 24 side passages, lit by electric lights and ventilated by fans — held the headquarters, the hospital, the radio station and the supplies, and thousands of men lived and worked in it, in the heat and the damp, while the Japanese shells fell above. The hospital, in the laterals of the tunnel, held about a thousand wounded men, and the nurses — the “Angels of Bataan” — worked around the clock, in conditions that would have broken lesser people. The tunnel was also the home of the “Voice of Freedom”, the radio station that broadcast to the Philippines and to the world, telling the story of the defence of Corregidor and promising that the Americans would return. The tunnel was a city underground, and it was the last city of the American Philippines.

The Night of 5–6 May 1942

The final assault came on the night of 5 May 1942. About 2,000 to 2,300 Japanese troops, under the cover of darkness and of a heavy bombardment, crossed the bay in landing barges and landed on the north shore of Corregidor, near Kindley Field. The landing was opposed by the Marines of the 4th Regiment, who fought from the beaches and the cliffs, and the fighting was close and savage: the Japanese, who had expected little resistance, found themselves in a battle for every metre of ground. But the Japanese kept coming, and they brought tanks ashore — light tanks, landed by barge — and the tanks, which the defenders had no weapons to stop, broke through the Marine line. By dawn on 6 May, the Japanese had reached the high ground above the Malinta Tunnel, and their guns were aimed at the mouth of the tunnel, where a thousand wounded men lay.

The Surrender

Wainwright’s decision to surrender was made in the morning of 6 May 1942, and it was made to save the wounded. The Japanese were at the mouth of the Malinta Tunnel, and their guns could fire into the hospital; Wainwright, who had watched the battle from his headquarters in the tunnel, knew that further resistance would mean the massacre of the wounded and of the men in the tunnel. He ordered the surrender of Corregidor, and he broadcast the order to the other forts in Manila Bay, which surrendered in turn. Wainwright’s surrender was not only the surrender of Corregidor: the Japanese demanded, and Wainwright agreed, that the surrender cover all American and Filipino forces in the Philippines, and the men on Mindanao and in the Visayas, who had been fighting on, laid down their arms. The defence of the Philippines was over, and the American and Filipino soldiers became prisoners of the Japanese.

The Recapture: Operation Topside, 1945

Nearly three years later, on 16 February 1945, the Americans came back to Corregidor — and they came back by air. The 503rd Parachute Regimental Combat Team, under Colonel George M. Jones, dropped onto Corregidor from the sky: about 2,000 paratroopers, jumping onto the two smallest drop zones in the history of airborne warfare — the parade ground and the golf course on Topside, each no bigger than a football field, surrounded by ruined buildings, craters and the wrecks of the Japanese defences. The drop was a gamble, and it worked: the paratroopers landed, fought their way off the drop zones, and linked up with the 3rd Battalion of the 34th Infantry, which had landed from the sea at San Jose beach on Bottomside. The Japanese garrison — about 6,000 to 6,500 men, mostly naval troops under Captain Akira Itagaki — fought back with a ferocity that shocked the Americans, and the battle for Corregidor lasted ten days.

The Paratroopers and the Tunnels

The fighting for Corregidor in 1945 was fought in the tunnels and the ruins, and it was one of the most savage battles of the Pacific war. The Japanese, who had spent three years fortifying the island, fought from the tunnels, the gun emplacements and the ruins, and they refused to surrender: when they were cornered, they blew themselves up with their ammunition, or they charged with swords and grenades. The Americans, who had to clear the island tunnel by tunnel, used flamethrowers, demolition charges and grenades, and they paid for every metre with blood. The great explosion of 21 February, when the Japanese detonated a tunnel full of ammunition near Malinta Hill, killed and wounded dozens of Americans and shook the whole island. By 26 February, the island was declared secure, and on 2 March, General MacArthur returned to Corregidor and raised the American flag on Topside, fulfilling the promise he had made three years before.

6. Turning Point

The Fall of Bataan

The turning point of the battle for Corregidor was the fall of Bataan on 9 April 1942. Until Bataan fell, Corregidor had been bombed from the air, but it had not been shelled from the land: the Japanese guns on Bataan were busy with the American and Filipino forces on the peninsula, and the island, though under attack, could still function. When Bataan surrendered — after three months of fighting, with its men starving and sick — the Japanese were free to turn all their guns on Corregidor, and they did. More than 100 guns, moved to the Bataan shore, began a bombardment that lasted for a month and that destroyed the fortress. The fall of Bataan was the turning point because it removed the last obstacle to the destruction of Corregidor: the island was now alone, under fire from a few kilometres away, with no hope of relief and no way to answer the guns that were destroying it.

The Death March and Its Shadow

The fall of Bataan cast a shadow over Corregidor that the garrison could not escape. The men who had surrendered on Bataan — about 75,000 American and Filipino soldiers — were marched to prison camps in the Bataan Death March, and thousands of them died on the road, of hunger, thirst, disease and murder. The men on Corregidor knew what was happening: they could see the smoke from Bataan, and they heard the stories from the men who had escaped to the island. The Death March was a warning of what surrender would mean, and it made the garrison of Corregidor determined to hold out as long as they could. But it also made the fall of Bataan a turning point in a darker sense: it showed the men on Corregidor that the Japanese would not treat prisoners well, and that the surrender, when it came, would be the beginning of a suffering that would last for years. The garrison held on, knowing what awaited them, and that knowledge made their stand all the more remarkable.

The Last Stand at Malinta Hill

The second turning point was the last stand at Malinta Hill, on the night of 5–6 May 1942, when the Japanese reached the high ground above the tunnel. The Marines of the 4th Regiment, who had held the beaches, fell back to the hill, and fought there, in the dark, against Japanese tanks and infantry, to buy time for the men in the tunnel. The fighting on Malinta Hill was the last battle of the defence of Corregidor, and it was fought by men who knew they could not win: the Japanese had tanks, and the Marines had rifles; the Japanese had reinforcements coming ashore, and the Marines had nothing left. But the Marines held the hill long enough for Wainwright to make his decision, and their stand gave the surrender a meaning it would not otherwise have had: Corregidor did not fall because its men gave up, but because its commander chose to save the wounded. The last stand at Malinta Hill was the end of the battle, and it was the battle’s honour.

The Marines’ Final Hours

The final hours of the Marines on Malinta Hill are remembered in the Marine Corps as one of its great stands, and the memory is earned. The Marines — many of them young men, many of them veterans of China — fought with rifles, machine guns and grenades, against tanks they could not stop and against infantry that outnumbered them, and they held their ground until they were ordered to surrender. Some of them refused to surrender at first, and had to be told twice; others destroyed their weapons before they laid them down. The Marines of Corregidor were taken prisoner with the rest of the garrison, and many of them died in the prison camps, but their stand on Malinta Hill became a part of Marine Corps legend. The Corps remembers Corregidor not as a defeat but as a battle in which its men did their duty to the end, and the memory is a proud one.

7. Casualties and Losses

The 1942 Losses

The losses of the 1942 battle for Corregidor are counted in prisoners, not in the dead on the battlefield, because the battle ended in surrender. About 11,000 to 13,000 American and Filipino soldiers surrendered on Corregidor on 6 May 1942, and with the surrender of the other forts in Manila Bay and of the forces on Mindanao and in the Visayas, the total number of American and Filipino prisoners in the Philippines reached about 100,000 men. The prisoners were taken to camps at Bilibid and Cabanatuan, and to prison ships, and many of them died: of the men who surrendered in the Philippines in 1942, thousands died in captivity, of hunger, disease and ill-treatment, and the survivors were not freed until 1945. The Japanese losses in the final assault on Corregidor are estimated at about 900 to 1,300 men killed and wounded, a small number compared with the prisoners taken, but a heavy price for a single night’s fighting.

The Prisoners and the Camps

The fate of the prisoners of Corregidor is one of the darkest chapters of the Pacific war, and it must be told honestly. The men who surrendered on 6 May 1942 were marched to prison camps, and they were treated with a cruelty that shocked even the Japanese officers who witnessed it: they were beaten, starved, denied medical care, and worked to death on the docks, in the mines and on the railways. The nurses of Corregidor — the “Angels of Bataan” — were imprisoned at Santo Tomas in Manila, where they cared for the sick and the dying for three years. The prisoners were not freed until 1945, when the Americans returned to the Philippines, and by then, thousands of them were dead. The suffering of the prisoners is the reason the surrender of Corregidor is remembered with such bitterness, and it is the reason Wainwright’s decision — to surrender to save the wounded — is still debated today.

The 1945 Recapture Losses

The losses of the 1945 recapture of Corregidor were heavy on both sides, and they were heaviest on the Japanese. The American losses are estimated at about 200 men killed and about 700 wounded, most of them paratroopers of the 503rd and infantrymen of the 34th Infantry, killed in the fighting for the tunnels and the ruins. The Japanese losses were far greater: of the garrison of about 6,000 to 6,500 men, about 6,000 were killed, and only a handful — fewer than 50 men, by most accounts — survived to surrender. The Japanese died as they had fought: in the tunnels, in the gun emplacements, and in the suicide charges and explosions that marked the last days of the battle. The recapture of Corregidor was a victory, but it was a victory bought with blood, and the island, when the Americans had retaken it, was a ruin — as it had been in 1942, and as it would remain.

The Cost of Clearing the Tunnels

The cost of the recapture was paid in the tunnels, and the men who paid it were the paratroopers and the infantrymen who had to clear them. The Japanese had spent three years turning Corregidor’s tunnels into fortresses, and the Americans had to take them one by one, with flamethrowers, demolition charges and grenades, in fighting that was close, dark and terrifying. The great explosion of 21 February, when the Japanese blew up a tunnel full of ammunition, killed and wounded dozens of Americans in a single moment, and it was the worst single loss of the recapture. The tunnel fighting was the hardest fighting of the battle, and it was the fighting that cost the most lives — on both sides. The Americans who cleared the tunnels of Corregidor in 1945 did a job that few soldiers have ever had to do, and they did it at a price that the island still remembers.

	Allies	Japan
1942 surrendered	About 11,000–13,000 on Corregidor; about 100,000 in the Philippines
1942 assault losses	Hundreds killed and wounded in the final night
1945 killed	About 200
1945 wounded	About 700
1945 Japanese killed	About 6,000, almost the whole garrison
1945 Japanese survivors	Fewer than 50 surrendered

8. Map and Geography

Topside, Middleside, Bottomside

Corregidor is shaped like a tadpole, and its geography is the geography of the battle. Topside, the broad head of the tadpole, is the high ground: it rises more than 150 metres above the sea, and it holds the barracks, the headquarters, the parade ground and the golf course — and the great gun batteries, Battery Way and Battery Geary, with their 12-inch mortars. Middleside, the middle of the island, is lower, and it holds the Malinta Tunnel and the hospital. Bottomside, the long tail of the tadpole, is the lowest ground, and it holds the docks at San Jose, the supply dumps and the airfield at Kindley Field. The battle for Corregidor was fought for all three parts of the island, and each part was fought for in turn: the Japanese landed on the north shore at Bottomside, near Kindley Field, and fought through Middleside to Malinta Hill, and the Americans, in 1945, dropped onto Topside and landed at Bottomside, and fought their way to the middle.

The Malinta Tunnel

The Malinta Tunnel is the heart of Corregidor, and it is the place where the battle was decided — twice. The tunnel, dug through Malinta Hill in the 1930s, is 255 metres long, with 24 side passages, and it held, in 1942, the headquarters, the hospital, the radio station and the supplies of the garrison. In 1945, it held the Japanese, who had turned it into a fortress, and the Americans had to fight their way into it. The tunnel is a place of darkness and of echoes, and the men who fought in it — in 1942 and in 1945 — remembered it as the most frightening place on the island. Today, the tunnel is open to visitors, and its laterals are lit, and the sound of the “Voice of Freedom” broadcast is played for the tourists. The tunnel is a memorial, and it is the memorial of the battle: the place where the Americans surrendered in 1942, and the place where the Japanese died in 1945.

Manila Bay and the Forts

Manila Bay is one of the great natural harbours of the world, and Corregidor guards its entrance. The bay is about 60 kilometres across, and its entrance, between Corregidor and the Bataan peninsula, is only about 3 kilometres wide — a narrow channel that the guns of Corregidor could cover completely. The forts of the bay — Corregidor, Caballo, Carabao and Fort Drum — were built to close that channel to any enemy fleet, and they did: no Japanese ship ever entered Manila Bay through the channel while the forts held. But the forts could not stop an enemy that came by land, and the Japanese, who landed on Luzon in December 1941, took Manila and Bataan from the land, and then turned their guns on the forts from a few kilometres away. The geography of Manila Bay was the geography of a trap: the forts were strong against the sea, and weak against the land, and the Japanese attacked them from the land.

Fort Drum: The Concrete Battleship

Fort Drum, in the middle of Manila Bay, is the strangest of the forts, and it is the one that best shows the ambition of the American fortress system. Fort Drum is a concrete island, shaped like a battleship, 110 metres long and 30 metres wide, built on a reef in the bay, and armed with two 14-inch guns in turrets, like a real battleship. The fort was manned by a small garrison, and it held out after Corregidor fell: its guns fired on the Japanese until it ran out of ammunition, and it did not surrender until 7 May 1942, the day after Corregidor. In 1945, the Americans retook Fort Drum in one of the strangest operations of the war: they landed on its roof, poured petrol and diesel into its ventilators, and set it on fire, burning the Japanese garrison alive inside. Fort Drum is still there, in the middle of the bay, a ruin and a memorial, and it is the strangest fortress in the Pacific.

9. Outcome and Legacy of Corregidor

Surrender and the Prisoners

The surrender of Corregidor on 6 May 1942 ended the American defence of the Philippines, and it began three and a half years of Japanese occupation. The prisoners — about 11,000 to 13,000 men from Corregidor, and about 100,000 in the Philippines as a whole — were taken to camps where thousands of them died, and the Philippines, which had been an American territory for more than forty years, was ruled by Japan until 1945. The surrender was a defeat, and it was felt as a defeat in the United States: the newspapers called it a tragedy, and the families of the prisoners waited for news that did not come. But the surrender was also a beginning: the men who had held Corregidor became the symbol of American resistance in the Pacific, and their suffering became the reason the United States was determined to return. MacArthur’s promise — “I shall return” — was made to the men of Corregidor, and it was kept, in October 1944, when the Americans landed at Leyte, and in February 1945, when they retook the Rock.

Wainwright’s Medal of Honor

Jonathan Wainwright, the general who surrendered Corregidor, was a prisoner of the Japanese for more than three years, and he was freed in August 1945, when the war ended. He returned to the United States a broken man — thin, ill and haunted by the surrender — and he expected to be court-martialled for it. Instead, he was given the Medal of Honor, the highest American decoration for bravery, for his defence of Bataan and Corregidor, and he was promoted to four-star general. The Medal of Honor was controversial — some said that a general who had surrendered should not receive it — but it was the judgement of the United States that Wainwright had done his duty: he had held out as long as he could, and he had surrendered to save the wounded, and that was honour, not disgrace. Wainwright died in 1953, and he is buried at Arlington National Cemetery, beside the men he commanded.

The Rock as a Symbol

Corregidor is remembered in the United States as a symbol of resistance, and in the Philippines as a symbol of shared sacrifice. The island today is a memorial: the Pacific War Memorial, on Topside, honours the American and Filipino soldiers who fought in the Pacific, and the Malinta Tunnel, the batteries and the ruins are preserved as they were left by the war. The island is visited by thousands of people every year — Americans, Filipinos and Japanese — and they come to remember the men who fought there, in 1942 and in 1945. The flag that MacArthur raised on Topside on 2 March 1945 was the flag that had flown over Corregidor in 1942, and it was raised again, on the same flagpole, as a sign that the Rock had been retaken and that the promise had been kept. Corregidor is a small island, but its story is one of the great stories of the Pacific war, and it is a story that is still told.

The Island Today

Corregidor today is a place of quiet, and of memory. The island is a national park, and its roads, its batteries and its tunnels are open to visitors, who come by ferry from Manila. The ruins of the barracks on Topside are still there, overgrown with grass, and the great mortars of Battery Way still point at the sky. The Malinta Tunnel is lit, and the “Voice of Freedom” broadcast is played for the visitors, and the Pacific War Memorial, with its dome open to the sky, is a place of silence. The island is also a place of reconciliation: Japanese visitors come to remember their own dead, and American and Filipino visitors come to remember theirs, and the island, which was fought over twice, is now a place where the enemies of 1942 and 1945 meet in peace. The Rock, which was a fortress, is now a memorial, and its story is the story of the war in the Pacific.

10. Commanders

The American Commanders

Lieutenant General Jonathan Wainwright (United States). Commander of the American and Filipino forces in the Philippines from March 1942, and the man who surrendered Corregidor on 6 May 1942. Wainwright was a cavalry officer, a veteran of the First World War, and he had commanded the forces on Bataan before taking command of the Philippines. He held Corregidor for two months after MacArthur left, and he surrendered to save the wounded in the Malinta Tunnel hospital. He spent more than three years as a Japanese prisoner, was freed in 1945, and was awarded the Medal of Honor for his defence of Bataan and Corregidor. He died in 1953 and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

General Douglas MacArthur (United States). Commander of the American and Filipino forces in the Philippines until March 1942, and the man who promised to return. MacArthur left Corregidor on 11 March 1942, on the orders of President Roosevelt, and he commanded the Allied forces in the Southwest Pacific for the rest of the war. He returned to the Philippines in October 1944, retook Corregidor in February 1945, and raised the American flag on Topside on 2 March 1945. He accepted the Japanese surrender in September 1945.

Colonel George M. Jones (United States). Commander of the 503rd Parachute Regimental Combat Team, which retook Corregidor in February 1945. Jones led the parachute drop onto Topside on 16 February 1945 — one of the most daring airborne operations of the war — and commanded the ten-day battle that retook the island. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for the operation.

Wainwright: The General Who Surrendered

Wainwright’s surrender of Corregidor has been debated ever since, and the debate is about the duty of a commander. His defenders say that he had no choice: the Japanese were at the mouth of the tunnel, the garrison was starving and out of ammunition, and further resistance would have meant the massacre of a thousand wounded men. His critics say that he should have fought on, and that the surrender of the whole Philippines — which the Japanese demanded, and which he agreed to — was a mistake, because the men on Mindanao and in the Visayas were still fighting, and they were ordered to lay down their arms. The truth is that Wainwright made the decision that a commander must make when the battle is lost: he chose to save the lives of his men, and he paid for it with three years of captivity and with a reputation that was never quite restored. He did his duty, and the United States honoured him for it.

The Japanese Commanders

General Masaharu Homma (Japan). Commander of the 14th Army, which invaded the Philippines and took Corregidor in 1942. Homma was a capable general, but his victory in the Philippines was marred by the Bataan Death March, for which he was held responsible. After the war, he was tried by an American military tribunal in Manila, convicted of war crimes, and executed in April 1946. His trial remains controversial: some historians argue that he was not directly responsible for the Death March, and that he was made a scapegoat for the crimes of his subordinates.

Captain Akira Itagaki (Japan). Commander of the Japanese garrison of Corregidor in 1945. Itagaki, a naval officer, commanded about 6,000 to 6,500 men, mostly naval troops, and he defended the island for ten days against the American paratroopers and infantry. He was killed in the fighting, with almost all of his men, and the garrison he commanded was destroyed. Little is known about Itagaki outside the battle, and his defence of Corregidor is remembered as a feat of endurance, fought to the death.

Homma: Victory and the Death March

Homma’s victory in the Philippines was one of the great Japanese victories of the war, and it was also one of the most controversial. Homma took Manila, Bataan and Corregidor in five months, with an army that was smaller than the forces he faced, and his campaign was a model of speed and of combined arms. But the victory was marred by the Bataan Death March, in which thousands of American and Filipino prisoners died, and by the treatment of the prisoners in the camps. Homma said that he had not ordered the march, and that he had tried to stop it, but the American tribunal that tried him did not believe him, and he was executed. The debate about Homma’s responsibility continues today, and it is a measure of the complexity of the Pacific war: a general who won a great victory, and who was executed for the crimes committed in it.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Corregidor?
A small island at the entrance to Manila Bay in the Philippines, shaped like a tadpole and known as “The Rock”. In 1941–42 it was the strongest American fortress in the Pacific, guarding the entrance to Manila.

When did Corregidor fall in 1942?
On 6 May 1942, when Lieutenant General Jonathan Wainwright surrendered the island to the Japanese, after a month of bombardment and a night of close fighting. The surrender ended the American defence of the Philippines.

Why did Wainwright surrender Corregidor?
To save the wounded in the Malinta Tunnel hospital. The Japanese had reached the mouth of the tunnel, and their guns could fire into it. Wainwright chose surrender rather than let a thousand wounded men be massacred.

Who were the “Angels of Bataan”?
The 88 American Army nurses who served on Bataan and Corregidor, caring for the wounded in the Malinta Tunnel hospital. They were taken prisoner in 1942 and held at Santo Tomas in Manila until 1945.

How was Corregidor retaken in 1945?
On 16 February 1945, paratroopers of the 503rd Parachute Regimental Combat Team dropped onto Topside, while infantry of the 34th Infantry landed from the sea at Bottomside. After ten days of fighting, the island was declared secure on 26 February.

What is Corregidor today?
A memorial and a national park, visited by thousands of people every year. The Malinta Tunnel, the gun batteries and the Pacific War Memorial are preserved, and the island is a place of remembrance for Americans, Filipinos and Japanese.

Sources

1. Wikipedia, “Battle of Corregidor” and “Battle of Corregidor (1945)” — dates, strength, casualty figures, commanders and the course of both battles.
2. John Toland, But Not in Shame: The Six Months After Pearl Harbor (Random House, 1961) — the defence of Bataan and Corregidor, Wainwright and MacArthur.
3. Encyclopædia Britannica, “Corregidor” — the island, the fortress and its history.
4. William E. Dyess, The Dyess Story (G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1944) — a first-hand account of Bataan, Corregidor and the prison camps.
5. Louis Morton, The Fall of the Philippines (U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1953) — the official American history of the campaign, including the surrender and the losses.
6. James H. Hallas, The Devil’s Anvil: The Assault on Peleliu (Praeger, 1994) — for the 1945 recapture, the 503rd Parachute RCT and the tunnel fighting; and Gerard M. Devlin, Paratrooper! (St. Martin’s, 1979).

Further reading

• Hampton Sides, Ghost Soldiers (Doubleday, 2001) — the prisoners of Cabanatuan and the raid that freed them.
• Duane Schultz, Hero of Bataan: The Story of General Jonathan M. Wainwright (St. Martin’s, 1981).