Oral History Program Otto W. Coder Interviewed by Robert Tesch 01 October 1971 i Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Otto W. Coder Interviewed by Robert Tesch 01 October 1971 Copyright © 2012 by Weber State University, Stewart Library ii Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. Archival copies are placed in University Archives. The Stewart Library also houses the original recording so researchers can gain a sense of the interviewee's voice and intonations. Project Description The Weber State College/University Student Projects have been created by students working with several different professors on the Weber State campus. The topics are varied and based on the student's interest or task for a specific assignment. These oral history assignments were created to help Weber State students learn the value and importance of recording public history and to benefit the expansion of the Weber State oral history collections. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to the Stewart Library of Weber State University. No part of the manuscript may be published without the written permission of the University Librarian. Requests for permission to publish should be addressed to the Administration Office, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, Utah, 84408. The request should include identification of the specific item and identification of the user. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Coder, Otto, an oral history by Robert Tesch, 01 October 1971, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. iii Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Otto W. Coder. The interview was conducted on October 1, 1971, by Robert Tesch. Coder discusses his time in the war and his experience in the Bataan Death March. RT: Mr. Coder, maybe we could start out our interview by just having you tell me a little about where you served when you were in the war and the places that you served at. OC: The places I served at was - I was in the infantry in Fort Reilly, Kansas, down in Texas and from there, Army Air Corps, March Air Force Base, California, and from there to the Philippines, Clark Field. RT: What was your particular job? Let's say when you were in the Philippines? OC: Particular job over there? Side gunner on a B-17; Waist gunner they call it. RT: What did you do with the B-17? Did you use it on strike missions? OC: At that time, before the war, we just re-conned. RT: What was the situation from the time before war until after war, and how did your job change? OC: Before the war? There was no great change in jobs. My squadron was a...we carried…and the majority of the men at least five separate in other words five different jobs, capable of performing in any given one. RT: Could you tell me about the conditions that led up to the fall of the Philippines originally, when the Japanese took it over? OC: Yeah, 105,000 to 1 odds. 1 RT: Could you tell me a little bit about it, what happened? OC: When the war started they...at Clark Field at high noon, September 7, 1941. I was on my way over to fuel my aircraft up, which was part of my job, also. When I looked up we was expecting a group of our own aircraft in - and I made my little count, and when my count got to four I seen a meatball, so I left my aircraft and went b back to where I had always planned if the war started, that was where I was going to be. I went right through the bomb field. It was pretty rough. I think we sold out, personally, because everything was on the ground and not a damn thing in the air. No protection, way, shape, or form. RT: Why? OC: Pardon? RT: Why? OC: No men on the anti-aircraft guns, nothing. RT: Because they weren't expecting an attack? OC: No - I don't know if it was exactly that - we knew they was in the vicinity. We knew that from the night before, by our radar - what radar we had at that time was sounding device only. RT: So you weren't able to detect the planes? OC: No, especially a sound only at a distance, rebound by sound. But they had no radar at that time - it was not developed into scope system. 2 RT: Is there anything else you can think of, as far as the conditions? The way things were like before the Japanese took over the island? OC: Ideal. The best duty I ever had in my life was the Philippine Islands, prior to World War II. RT: What happened when World War II started?? How did this change? OC: War. RT: How did your particular situation change? OC: Well, they knocked our aircraft out. We went provisional infantry. Within about three weeks we retreated to Bataan, and then it really began to get rough. Lack of food, lack of medical supplies, lack of sleep, rest, whatever you want to call it — mighty rough. RT: You say this was three weeks? Approximately three weeks you retreated to Bataan. OC: Yes, in fact, let's see, we was on our way back to Bataan on Christmas day. That should be just about three weeks. I was on my way back to Bataan — RT: When was the official declaration of the fall of the Philippines? OC: The fall of the Philippines was on September, er, I mean, pardon me, April 8, 1942. RT: What about Corregidor? OC: Corregidor was one month and ten days later. RT: And you were? OC: I was on Bataan. RT: Where is Bataan in relationship to the island of Corregidor? 3 OC: About three miles across a strip of water, due north, on the tip— well Luzon - there's a tip that comes down off of Luzon and comes to the Mindanero Straits, overlooking the China Sea. RT: So, when you retreated to Bataan, how many men were, approximately retreated with you? OC: The exact count I wouldn't know, for sure. But I've been led to believe there was between 24 and 30,000 Americans along. RT: What relationship were the Philippines to this number? OC: Oh... there was 60 to 100,000 of them. RT: I see. Did you ever feel that America kind of sold you out, because they didn't send you medical supplies or anything like this? OC: No, not the country — just certain individuals within the country. RT: You don't feel that the country sold you out? Because, from the background reading that I did, I sort of seemed to sum up the fact that they figured that Europe was first, and the people who were fighting the Pacific War, in World War II, were second. How, exactly, does this set with you? Do you agree or disagree? Did you think Europe was first then, or OC: Oh, they should have played more heed to the situation as it was with Japan, due to the fact that they had no real, I want to say, intelligence information, informing them of what Japan had or how much material they had. In other words, Japan was underestimated. Considerably underestimated. RT: Well, I think Japan, in the end, sort of underestimated America, also. 4 OC: No — no they didn't. They wouldn't have jumped us, if they had. RT: I don't think that, from my reading, I sort of seem to sum up that the Japanese didn't really realize what they were getting into. The Japanese, because they expected that the lords and Gods were on their side, they didn't really expect — I don't think they expected as much fight or will to live from America as, you know, as they anticipated, I really don't. OC: Well, the Japanese had sadistic — our way of life—they knew — their Intelligence told them that they would never win that war, as a whole. If they would have stopped li the time they had all the Far East locked up, instead of trying to hit Australia, Japan would never have lost the war. RT: I think Japan was just spreading themselves too thin, really. OC: We did too, for that matter. RT: America seemed to be more capable of keeping their supplies lines up, which is very important, you know, in that type of a war. OC: The Japanese had, well they could live on a small handful of rice would keep a Japanese for a day, so he could live good where an American, he'd have to carry 10 to 20 pounds per day in order to live just different things he has to eat in order to survive. An American cannot live on rice alone. It's a proven fact that I've seen many and many a man die over there from starvation. I myself came within one of going. RT: You said that something like 20,000 or 30,000 men retreated to Bataan. Could you tell me what happened after this? OC: After what? 5 RT: After you retreated to Bataan. OC: Oh, yes…I was on what was called the Orion with the 31st Infantry over on the right, the Philippine Army to our left flank, the average of once to three times a week we had actual contact with the enemy, banty attacks, we held them off, all we had were rifles and a few machine guns. They had artillery unlimited. After the 15th of January, they cut us tack to one a one-half rations per day and the last week of it we were living on less than a ration a day, per man. RT: That's quite a large cat, isn't it? Did you e v e r s e e how much artillery the Japanese ever had? OC: I did, on the march out-but they did have a tremendous amount of artillery from the top of…Mountain to, oh, I can’t remember the name of that town, it was about 10 miles down, nothing on it but artillery hub to hub and that was 90 mm and that was just a small portion of what in order they used in order to take Corregidor from Luzon. RT: I see. Can you think of anything else that sort of stands out as to just how much firepower the Japanese actually had? You said it was 1000 to 1, did you actually experience this; did it feel like it was 1000 to 1? OC: Oh, yes, oh yea, yea. Yea, you could mow them down like cattle anytime you wanted. RT: Did you say those Banzai attacks, is that when they just sent man after man right straight for you? OC: Just waves, it seemed like forever and a day before you could get them stopped, unlimited. RT: I imagine that was quite a scary feeling to sort of experience something like that? 6 OC: A hell of a feeling, look up and you'd have to start mowing them down. RT: Did you ever have any that broke through your lines? OC: Oh, yes, quite a few times, get far out of your fox hole . RT: O.K., so finally the Japanese took over the island. Could you tell me what they did with these 20,000 or 30,000 men* after they finally defeated... OC: Well, those that were still alive, they'd line us up as they'd call you come to our groups and completely stripped us, searched us, give us part of our clothes back and sat around for a while until they got a group and started marching us…over on Orion, not Orion but Subic Bay. Marched clear over the mountain in what became known as the Bataan Death March, 97 miles of hell, marched from—I don't recall the name of the town we started at but…Mountains marched to San Fernando and got on the Mainland Island of Luzon, 97 miles. RT: What were the conditions like for travelling in this Death March? OC: No water, no food. (Sound like) the 4th of July and that was to be continued every inch of the way. RT: Did you ever, were you ever personally beat up by the Japanese? OC: Oh, yea, I carry a few scars from that, the March, and then in the concentration camp there was nothing. After they took us to left San Fernando, and the first camp they took us to was north of Clark Field approximately 60 miles and then they took us from there to Maqui, I left there immediately upon the first opportunity I got to leave. I took a detail due to the fact that the men were dying so fast that they had not sanitation, no way to 7 bury them which makes it pretty bad to me, it was hell. You couldn't find any place to walk, sit… (And with the word "sit", the tape ran out) OC: There was human waste, and so forth, you couldn't find a place to sit, sleep, and then also, fourth night at this camp, I woke up the neat morning and there was thirty-two of us in there still that was left alive that me morning. It convinced me, if there was any way to get away from that camp, I should take it. So I took a detail, went on a Voluntary detail, went to Bataan on what they call a "clean-up". And — they were half way decent with us down there. We were cleaning up all the residue, old trash, weapons, burying what dead we found down there. RT: How many men went on this detail? OC: On the detail I was on there was, I think there was seventy of us. RT: This was going back, after you had marched - - some of you went back and cleaned it up? OC: Yeah — went down to Bataan, I was there about one month. They took us from there, back up to Bilabid, the prison camp was in the--well it's the old prison within the city limits of Manila - walled prison. From there we went to…the original…was an old Spanish holdings there - real pretty - but lack of water or sanitation facilities, they moved us back to what became known as number one of the Philippines. It had approximately 18, maybe 20,000 personnel in with the - the remainder of the staff personnel was being taken to - China, and Formosa. Gen. Wainright and his group, most all of the staff personnel were taken to other places. RT: I see. 8 OC: I had malaria, started getting it real bad; averaged four attacks per week - malaria, sometimes twice a day. No medical Facilities, no quinine what so ever. Only when we could steal it. They took us from…then I had…malaria, it was in about April of '43, I got over that also it seemed like my malaria broke and I wasn't having no more trouble with it. They come around selecting a group of men to take to Japan. This one boy was in real bad shape, and like a fool I thought, well, I hate to see the man go on something like that because we had already knew about the one hell ship that went over. The nucleus of the five hundred men on that; they were dead when they got there. Starvation, one thing and another, suffocation in the hold. And I'll be a real good Joe and I'll take his place, which they let me do. We left out of the Philippines to Japan on the third day of July, 1943. To go to Japan we went around the upper edge of the Philippine Islands to pick up a load of Tungsten, put in the lower hold, from there to Formosa. When we left Formosa we had two submarines tailing us - they got our escort, which happened to be a Japanese Tin Can. They stayed next to the China mainland till they got just off Okinawa, cut across to Okinawa and stayed right next to land the whole way in. We went to Nagasaki, got to Nagasaki on my father's birthday, which happens to be the eighth day of August - it's real easy to remember - and we stayed aboard ship there. They tested us for dysentery and different germs, diseases we had picked up in the concentration camps and in the tropics. Took us from there to Camp 17, coal mining camp. That was in September, we started work in the coal mines, 800ft. beneath Nagasaki Bay Japan. I worked there until, in that mine, until the 12th of December, 1944. The reason for not having to stay at that camp - In the process of mining we would do anything or everything available to try to keep from aiding the enemy, 9 ^proceeded to pull what they call the bone, or big rock, down on my foot, in that mine, and broke it. So, I was on a pair of crutches, - they took us from there to an air strip, north of Fukuoka, on the island of Honchu, Kyushu, pardon me. RT: You said the island of Fuji? OC: The island of Kyushu. Camp one, next to the air strip there, the buildings that are there were frame buildings, and in place of wood they use bark stripped from trees and then thatched. When winter — we come on that winter, it was still winter. About the 23rd of December, just before Christmas, they had a snow storm. And that young man from Garton, Illinois, Glen Combs, slept together that night and the next morning we woke up and there was eight inches of snow over the top of us, inside that building. No heat, they would not let us have heat. That day we went out and they broke ice a good quarter of an inch thick, made us strip and go in and clean the bottom of that ditch out. Very fortunately, I didn't catch cold, but we lost nine civilians, formerly employees of the Morris or Morse Morri-Knutsen Co. off of Wake Island. That was on Christmas day, just before noon, the nucleus of those nine died. Christmas day all nine died. RT: Could you tell me a little more about - how did the Japanese pick you to go back on this detail? Back to the Island of… to sort of police up the territory. OC: Voluntary RT: They just said, "who ever wanted to go, you could go," hum? OC: I volunteered to get out of there. At the first opportunity, I took it. I knew I had used up the nucleus of my strength, my reserves, and my chances of survival were about one in ten million, my figures, if I didn't get out of there. There were very, very few people that 10 stayed there the full term of it, that have their sanity or, I say, even a portion of their health yet today. I know of a few of them that did. They just haven't got it. RT: I see. OC: So I kind of think I thought pretty well to myself. RT: Were they dropping like flies at this time? Was this the second day of the march, or the third day or what? The march lasted four days, right? OC: Yea, well three days and four nights. RT: When they chose this detail, what day was it? About the second day? OC: Oh, no. We'd been at — ah, San Fernando a day and a half or two days before they could get the train in. And, by the way, when they took us from there to this other camp, the first camp that we went to. They loaded us in the boxcars, the little narrow-gage boxcars, that with oh, fifty men would have been crowded. There was a hundred and ten men in there, and there was actually men that died of suffocation, standing up. I was lucky, I was clear back in the corner and there happened to be a crack and I just laid my nose there and liked to wore it off, but I got to breathe fresh air. RT: How many men would you say died? Let's say, if they put a hundred and ten in, would you say, maybe ten? OC: Well, in the car I was in, there was three dead. RT: Three dead? OC: From suffocation. Dysentery was rampant, too. No sanity, couldn't get out, God, it was terrible. 11 RT: Would you say that the two basic diseases at this time would be dysentery and malaria? OC: The basic disease was neither one, it was strictly starvation. We had been without food, on the front lines, fighting. My last meal, before the surrender, was a day and a half before the surrender — my last meal. We didn't have time to stop; we didn’t have time really no chance to get anything to eat. They just didn't have it. They couldn't keep up with you, then no way to prepare it. RT: Did they take the water, did they give you water when you were marching? OC: Well, I drank where ever I could get it, Buffalo water, or what nave you. But on the march, we couldn't. RT: Did people try to break away and run over and get some water? OC: Well, if you did, you got killed. RT: Did you see any of them do it? OC: Yea, I've seen men get killed. This one captain, for instance — they rebuilt where we blew these bridges out, and put the bridge right down next to the water, and it's real, oh, railing maybe a foot to eighteen inches high. This captain just jumped over, right at the side of the bridge, to take a drink of water. Jap walked up, laid the rifle at the back of the head, and pulled the trigger. So, your chances of living and stepping out of line, was, ah, just about a hundred percent sure not to. I never seen anybody make it. I’ve heard of a few of them since, but I never seen any. RT: So you left before, so you weren't there for the whole march, is that right? OC: I was in the whole march. 12 RT: You made it clear - Ninety-seven miles, right? OC: Yes. RT: I see. What did they do with you after this, when they split you up and sent you to different...? OC: No, they sent us all to the one camp, first, all to one camp. Filipinos, the Americans, the whole works. The surprising thing about it, the death rate was, oh, I'd say, five to one in the Filipinos, rather than us. They had no facilities, no way to bury them. There was dead around there, just like flies. RT: The Filipinos? OC: Americans, Filipinos, the whole works. It was terrible. The first day they buried, there was eight hundred and some men. There was a steady line of men, just walking up with stretchers, dumping them in this common grave. RT: You say, out of these eight hundred men, what was the relationship between American and Filipino dead? More Filipino? Definitely more. OC: Millions, at least two, maybe three, to one. RT: I see. OC: It's really fantastic, even though - - us being used to a different type of life, and so forth, I think the American was in much, much better shape than the native was. RT: Is there anything else that stands out in your mind? OC: Oh, the treatment, yes. It's kind of a faint memory now, but at the time even then, there's things that happened - - the treatment's mean, sadistic. When we was on the 13 March I was with the two men that…and I pointed it out to them at the time I seen this, there was a Japanese sergeant, I don't know what the buck private had done, but he picked up the machine gun and clobbered this guy with the barrel. The two men with me, one was chaplain in our squadron, Captain Taylor, the other one was Captain Johnson. By the way, Captain (or Chaplain) Taylor wound the Chief of Chaplains of the Air Force, Harold K. Johnson wound up as Chief of Chaplains of the United States Army. But, I told them at the time I seen this, I said, 'Our treatment is going to be rough.’ RT: What caused this? OC: Pardon? RT: What caused this Japanese Sergeant to hit this fella? OC: No one knows. That's the way they were. RT: Sort of very impulsive people. OC: Very, very. Their way of controlling people was by force. The thing that we noticed immediately, if a Japanese was trained for something, that's the only thing he would do, only thing he knew how to do. I think that is why we, the Americans, held them off for four months, with the ratio of odds so much in their favor. Due to the fact, we could do any job that arose before us. Where the Japanese, if he was a gunner, that's all he knew. He didn't know how to go out and drive a truck to keep him busy, he just knew that gun that was it. He had one job and one track mind. RT: I see, Well, Mr. Coder, we want to thank you for your interview. This has, I'm sure, been very beneficial to the College and also to the Utah Historical Society. Thank you very much. 14