Sasebo’s roster was 210 when the dam was finished in April 1944 and the prisoners were scattered among other camps. (The death list for eighteen months’ work on the dam comprises twenty percent of the men who participated.) The burial details were headed by Ora Johnson of Boise City, a preacher. They were rewarded by extra rice balls, which the Japanese enjoyed tossing at will among them in order to watch the ensuing scramble.
Off Nagasaki, Japan—Tuesday, September 25, 1945 1500 hours
Aboard hospital ship Haven
Puzzled service psychiatrists rearranged their theories about mental complexes among prisoners of war as this new Navy hospital ship bore homeward the last load of liberated POWs from Japan. Less than three percent of patients aboard showed any serious psychoneurotic effect from an experience which in many cases had seriously harmed their physical health. Their mental attitude, far from requiring coddling or understanding, was found to be self-confident, normal and fully sane. The paradox that Japanese prison life is turning out men unafraid of the post-war world is explained in their common phrase: “If there’s anything tougher ahead than three years in a camp under the Japanese after Bataan and Corregidor, we cannot imagine what that might be.”
Psychiatrists say that acute collective normalcy among ex-prisoners is due to the fact that psychoneurotics waned away and died and are returning home cremated in boxes of ashes, and that others who harbored such inclinations in the United States, where they gain sympathy, threw them off in Japan. In the prison camps all were really alike, and therefore it was useless for an individual to develop his “social protest” because nobody was any better off, and nobody would listen. So that’s how Japanese wardens cured decadent America, but lost the war—or so it says here in fine print.
V
The Two Robinson Crusoes of Wake Island
Weller (l.) & Logan “Scotty” Kay at the liberation of POW Camp #23, Izuka, Sept 19, 1945. The helmet bears the names of Wake Island dead.
For reasons impossible to determine at this point, the Navy did agree to transmit Weller’s extended story of two civilians who managed to survive in the austere brush of Wake Island for al most three months after it was taken by the Japanese soon after Pearl Harbor, December 1941. The gallant, futile defense of the island itself has been chronicled many times, but—perhaps for space limitations, perhaps because the saga was nearly four years old—the Chicago Daily News chose to heavily cut this improbable tale of survival and hiding, and the odyssey of Scotty and Fred is virtually unknown. The fact that these pages were transmitted, apparently in favor of Weller’s far more timely POW dispatches and one day before he left Nagasaki, suggests that they were all he was permitted to send.
Nagasaki, Japan—Tuesday, September 25, 1945
“THE TWO ROBINSON CRUSOES OF WAKE ISLAND”
Opening the doors to Prison Camp #23 at Izuka in central Kyushu has revealed the unbelievable story of how two middle-aged American construction men lived in Robinson Crusoe style for seventy-seven days on tiny Wake Island after the coral speck fell to the Japanese. Though other Americans have lived on large islands like Guam while they were held by the Japanese, none ever succeeded under such hairs’ breadth terms as “Wake Island Scotty”, who is fifty-five-year-old Logan Kay of Clearlake Park, California, and his pal Fred J. Stevens, forty-nine, of Sioux City, Iowa.
Wake Island is only four miles long and less than a third of a mile across. It is so flat that seas sometimes wash over its beaches, being only twenty-one feet at its highest point. There are no caves and no coconut groves. Yet Wake Island Scotty and his pal, by creeping from one rabbit’s nest to another in bushy thickets, managed to keep the Japanese outwitted from December 8th, 1941, when the Japanese first bombed Wake, until March 9th, 1942. They lived on the hopes of seeing American warships steam in and recover Wake and set them free—dreams never realized until after six months’ labor on Wake and nearly two years of bitter servitude in Japan, including a period at Death Camp #18, building the dam at Sasebo where twenty percent of 265 Wake Island Americans died.
Wake Island Scotty has survived to return to his beloved wife Fritzi and his soldier son Howard in California, and Stevens is en route to join his wife and three children. But their days of being hunted while hiding literally in a Japanese backyard on Wake live again in the diary kept by Wake Island Scotty and made available by him to a Chicago Daily News correspondent. This diary—written while the two men were ill, thin, afraid and on the run—has been buried and redug many times. It has been searched for by dozens of Japanese sentries in camps where merely possessing any writing materials was a capital crime. Yet it has prevailed with its full record of hope, disappointment and faith, together with the human will to live and even some sparks of humor.
Wake Island looks like the open jaw of an alligator, with a lagoon as the inside of its mouth which, before the war, was intended by the United States as a submarine base. The ends of both the upper and lower jaw are broken off into separate islets, the upper being Peale and the lower Wilkes. Scotty and Stevens both served on the guns with Marines on Peale before becoming fugitives. Their hideout eventually was in skimpy thickets which lie on the inner side of the upper jaw along the lagoon, but by night they wandered in other parts of the island searching for food and water. From their thicket hideout looking southward across the lagoon, they were able to watch Japanese planes take off and land on the single American-built airfield on the southern or lower half of the jaw a mile away. Scotty noted down all such movements in hopes of aiding the naval rescue party which never came.
Stevens had served on Wake for nine months and Scotty for only five weeks when Japan struck. They were two of eleven hundred men hired by the Morrison Knudsen Company of Boise City, Idaho, one of six contracting firms joined to build the government airfield and the submarine entrance under the name of the Pacific Naval Air-bases Company, with its main offices in Alameda, California. Salaries averaged two hundred dollars monthly, with up to ninety dollars’ bonus for prolonged service. The Panair Company already had Clipper service, with buildings on Peale Island, while the government had a single Marine flying field on the lower jaw of Wake. The Wake workmen first knew something was amiss when a Clipper—after taking off for Guam at seven in the morning—returned, jettisoned some gas, took Panair personnel aboard, and departed for Honolulu.
[Wake Island Scotty’s journal is given here with brief interpolations in brackets by Weller in order to explain the captives’ situation more fully.]
SCOTTY’S DIARY:
Dec. 8 1941
We were bombed at 11:55 AM by eighteen planes which we heard came from Marshall Islands 600 miles south of Wake. 27 killed, 130 injured. Panair buildings on Peale entirely demolished and seven marine planes. Clipper left one hour after bombing for Honolulu with white personnel.
Dec. 9
Eleven planes bombed company hospital and new warehouse on Wake. They also set afire six of our barracks. [These buildings were on Peale, the northern or upper jaw.] Ground batteries got one plane; scouts got one plane. [That day Scotty found Stevens sick with stomach poisoning and hid him in a dredge pipe against the bombings. Scotty made his way to the demolished Panair hospital and found an untouched bottle of physic in the ruins, returned to the dredge pipe and treated Stevens.]
Dec. 10
10:40 AM—one hour earlier than yesterday—planes came in high and got our powder storage on Wilkes Island. [This powder was being used to blast a new mouth through the eastern end of Wilkes, 500 feet long and 30 feet deep, to permit submarines after entering the fringing coral reef to pass through Wilkes Island to the deeper, northwestern end of Wake’s central lagoon. It was two-thirds done when taken by Japan.] Planes and land batteries claimed two bombers down.
Dec. 11
Were shelled from ocean at 5:45 AM by destroyers. American subs and land planes got four or five boats and transports. [The estimate was later raised to eleven enemy.] One was sunk by a direct hit from our five-inch guns in
powder magazine. Planes got one and sub got the rest, all sunk. [That day civilian workmen abandoned all their smashed new buildings on the northern jaw, carrying their wounded around a bend in Wake’s horseshoe to the eastern end of the Marine airfield. There they improvised a hospital in the abandoned concrete ammunition magazines.] Planes came at 9:50 but did no damage as batteries kept them away.
Dec. 12
I helped move guns last night as bombers had our old positions spotted. [Scotty and other workmen took the anti-aircraft battery which had been in the middle of Peale and moved it to the northeastern end, then camouflaged the old position to resemble guns and try to draw Japanese bombs. The dredge pipe where Scotty lived with the invalid Stevens was located on Peale about a quarter-mile from the inlet separating Peale and Wilkes.]
Dec. 13
Quiet all day no bombers. One observation plane shot down by our scouts at 5:30 AM. Buried forty-two of our boys today. [About thirty-five were civilian workmen, the remainder Marines and Navy sailors. Stevens, now recovered, was serving on the same anti-aircraft gun with Scotty.]
Dec. 14
Bombed at 10:45 by twenty-seven German Heinkels [as they appeared to Marine fighters]. Lots of damage and some dead. Built bomb shelters for air crews. One of our three last planes cracked up taking off. Now have two left which will fly.
Dec. 15
Had breakfast and moved back to barracks [from the dredge pipe on Peale where he had been living with Stevens]. Japs came at 6 PM. No great damage and no casualties.
Dec. 16
Eighteen bombers came at 1 PM got old camp one [at the western end of the airfield, on Wake’s southern jaw] and oil storage.
Dec. 17
Planes came at 5:50 PM—dropped a few bombs and machine-gunned camp. We went inside concrete pipe. Panair was given another dose of bombs.
Dec. 18
Went over to Panair and got medical supplies [from the ruins] for our doctor [Dr. L. Shank of San Diego].
Dec. 19
Bombers came at 10:30 AM. Not much damage, burned a small amount of fuel.
Dec. 20
Rain all day. No bombers today. PBY [a PBY Catalina, i.e. a flying boat] came in with brass hat aboard. Looks like we may get some help.
Dec. 21
Dive bombers came in flocks at 9 AM and gave us hell, just about ruined us. PBY left just before raid and took our commanding officer with him to Honolulu. Twelve o’clock high bombers came and bombed our barracks so we moved back to Panair. Dive bombers got one of our range finders and crippled gun [where Scotty was serving as ammunition loader]. Our first sergeant was killed on range finder. [Scotty never knew his name but says, “He was a very brave boy.”]*
Dec. 21
They came in today and stayed a half hour. Leisurely bombed and gunned our camp. Got our last little plane. We have no range finder left, and are now practically down to rifles, one for each two men on island. All they have to do now is land and take over whenever they want to. Got small piece shrapnel in back of right shoulder. Doctor says will get it out in day or two. Does not hurt more than sliver so will not worry about it. They bombed for an hour in getting our range finder, also both our last planes. We are now sure out of luck.
Dec. 23
Jap fleet moved in and after many signals opened up on our batteries [only three remained on Peale] making a direct hit on the first emplacement, blasting it out, then ceased firing. At dawn dozens of planes started bombing and things were in a panic in camp, and Pat [Patrick Herndon of Fox Park, Wyoming] deserted our dredge pipe. Fred and I found a hole right in the middle of camp and crawled in. [Marine officers who that day came to the construction camp notified the homeless among the ruins that the Japanese were about to land, and warned them to avoid being caught with rifles because the Japanese would shoot any thus captured. Fear grew in the trapped men, who saw themselves unable to fight any longer to hold Wake.] Later the bombing stopped and everything got quiet except enemy planes flying low all over island. At 11:30 I looked out carefully and will never forget the sight. About five hundred of our company men were being herded past stripped down to nothing but shorts and being headed towards Peale. Looked like brick wall [a firing squad] for these men. Fred and I sat tight.
Christmas Eve
Jap sentry almost found us last night. Was within five feet but missed us. We hope to escape tonight if there is a chance. We had a close call but something attracted sentry’s attention. If we can hold for two hours more until darkness we will move out of here and hide in brush. We will not give up without a fight as we think the other boys were stripped for firing squad. Japs working frantically everywhere to set up guns. If we can make the brush [from their dugout in the center of the camp’s ruins] we can live until we are found. As food is scattered all over island water is our problem once out of the woods. Getting dark now—we are waiting for cloud to cover moon.
Dec. 25 Christmas
We made it on hands and knees, lying in depressions when clouds went off the moon. Went to beach and south [east] along beach in edge of breakers. Got wet but got around sentries and made the brush. Ran into one big gun where twenty Japs were sleeping but did not wake up and went another way lying by road in brush till moon got out and clouds came and then crossed over to large brush patch. If I were not so ill [Scotty was suffering with severe diarrhea] I would enjoy the trip as I got a kick out of every close call and this trip was full of them. I am getting better today. We found dugout at 11 PM and got a bed for night. Am all in. Woke at daybreak and wished Fred Merry Christmas. We believe there is a Santa Claus. Spent the day in brush lying low—and how low!—but feel better tonight.
Dec. 26
Found another bed last night and crawled back in brush this AM. Foliage is thick and ground is wet, and flies about bad as Japs. We are getting set for months here. Found water enough last night to last us a month. U.S. should have this place back by then. We will try be here when they do. Jap sentries patrol constantly on lookout. Trucks are working fast all day and night. Am getting much better. Made the lagoon last night and found some clean clothes. Japs will soon have all camps looted and then will be easier for us. They loot through everything and throw it out on ground just like monkeys. Found a dollar bill and some silver they threw away. They tore the bill into bits first. [These camps were in patches of brush where company men had hidden during the day in order to avoid being strafed by Japanese planes. There are only about one hundred acres of such brush in Wake’s entire area of twenty-four-hundred acres. These hundred acres were Scotty’s and Stevens’ hideout for the coming weeks, during which the Japanese continually looted and relooted.] Lots of food everywhere and we are burying some each night, but not too much so it won’t show or be missed.
Dec. 27
Slept in deserted camp last night. Buried much canned food and four gallons water in glass jars, forgot two containers and will get them tonight. Did a little looting behind the Japs. Sat by lagoon and watched lights signalling at sea. [The fugitives used to watch a Japanese submarine surface in what had been planned as an American base, and wink signal lights to warships on the surface.] Rose at 5 AM and moved back into the jungle and had apricot juice for breakfast and then a can boneless chicken each. Camouflaged our hideout but must move soon as it is getting too wilted. We are as snug as two rabbits with four thousand hounds after us. We are not afraid; just careful. We have coffee for breakfast, tea for lunch, beer for dinner—all from the same canteen. It’s now 3 PM—we will set out again in about 2½ hours.
Dec. 28
Heard Japs looting all around last evening between 4 and 5, talking and breaking open trunks, the brush being full of loot. Over 500 men carried their stuff out here and there are probably one half that many foxholes to be looked into and torn apart. We found one $2.50 gold piece they overlooked and 81¢ in silver. I carry a hatchet and knife, Fred a hammer and knife. Wish we had revolvers. At 2:15 today Sunday three Japs walked right over the edge of our nest, one carrying a s
uitcase over his shoulder on a stick, two following behind him. They were off the trail looking for more camps to loot and walked right onto our doorstep. Fred and I sat tight and they did not see us though were less than ten feet away. They were close, too close. I just sat still and crossed my fingers. Fred did the same.
Dec. 29
(I found a fountain pen and here we go from pencil to ink.) Now 2:15 PM and we are hugging turf. Have heard Japs two times today within a hundred feet of our apartment. Thought we heard siren short while ago but birds do so much screaming one is not certain. Seaplane just took off and passed over at low altitude going very fast. We were looking for Japs starting to pick up all food around camps soon so we hide some each night. Did not venture out until 11.30 last night and came in at 5 this AM but crawled under a bush and slept three hours. What a life! We stayed in bed for breakfast this AM, had the morning paper first, then coffee and ham and eggs. Coffee was weak. It will be tea for supper, all out of the same water canister. Laundryman has not called today; must change laundry.
Dec. 30
Well, here we are at 2:15 again and going strong. [Scotty often wrote at this hour because the Japanese were resting in the heat after luncheon, instead of scouring the brush.] Found more water last night and brought in one big can chili beans, sardines, and cheese crackers. Also found drafts and cashier’s checks for $400, $200, $100 and $18 cash. Total for night $718.11. Put it in kitty. Getting so can smell money in dark. Brought in a can of powdered milk and milk our own cow now. One more day of this year left, and soon Congress will come back from their vacation and do some more talking about fighting. What a bunch of boys we have been paying all these years. We two do not know what is going on in the world, but we can bet that in Washington it is mostly talk.
First Into Nagasaki Page 15