The Battle of Bataan

The Battle of Bataan

Veterans

William Hall Wallace, Sr.

Combat in the Philippines

“…we were driven to the very end of the peninsula.”

“Beginning Christmas Day, 1941, we were put on a boat and taken across the bay to Bataan. We advanced as far up the peninsula as possible, marching until we met the Japanese, 75 or 80 miles up the Bataan Peninsula. That is where we drew a line across from the Manila Bay to the China Sea.

There was a lot of apprehension, a lot of fright, but after you have gone through the first bombing raid and experiencing no man’s land, this frightening experience leaves, or most of it does anyway.

Each day, as we were driven back, we would retreat and set up camp, and maybe in two or three days or a week or 10 days, retreat again, and finally we were driven to the very end of the peninsula.

December 25, 1941 - April 8, 1942

William Wallace, Sr., Oral History Interview, 27 October 1985.