Bataan Death March survivor dies at 100

A San Francisco Bay Area man who survived the infamous 1942 Bataan Death March and symbolized the thousands of unheralded Filipinos who fought alongside American forces during World War II has died. He was 100. Ramon Regalado died Dec. 16 in El Cerrito, California, said Cecilia I. Gaerlan, executive director of the Bataan Legacy Historical Society, which has fought to honor Regalado and others. She did not have a cause of death. “He really embodied the qualities of the greatest generation and love for country,” she said.

Regalado was born in 1917 in the Philippines. He was a machine gun operator with the Philippine Scouts under U.S. Army Forces when troops were forced to surrender in 1942 to the Japanese after a grueling three-month battle. The prisoners were forced to march some 65 miles (105 kilometer) to a camp. Many died during the Bataan Death March, killed by Japanese soldiers or simply unable to make the trek. The majority of the troops were Filipino.

Regalado survived and slipped away with two others — all of them sick with malaria. They encountered a farmer who cared for them, but only Regalado lived. Afterward, he joined a guerrilla resistance movement against the Japanese and later moved to the San Francisco Bay Area to work as a civilian for the U.S. military. In his later years, he gave countless interviews to promote the wartime heroics of Filipinos, who were promised benefits and U.S. citizenship but saw those promises disappear after the war ended.

Philippine Scouts. The Philippine Scouts (PS) was a military organization of the United States Army from 1901 until the end of World War II and disbanded in 1948 by the Philippines Government. The first Scout companies were organized by the US in 1901 to combat the Philippine revolutionary forces. In 1919–20, the PS companies were grouped into regiments as part of the US Army and redesignated the 43d, 44th, 45th, and 57th Infantry Regiments, plus the 24th and 25th Field Artillery Regiments, the 26th Cavalry Regiment (PS) and the 91st and 92nd Coast Artillery Regiments. The infantry and field artillery regiments were grouped together with the U.S. 31st Infantry Regiment to form the U.S. Army’s Philippine Division. At this point, the Scouts became the U.S. Army’s front line troops in the Pacific. The Philippine Department assigned the Scouts to subdue the Moro tribes on the island of Mindanao, and to establish tranquility throughout the islands. In the 1930s, Philippine Scouts, along with the 31st Infantry Regiment, saw action at Jolo, Palawan. Philippine Scout regiments became some of the first United States Army units to be in combat during World War II, until the surrender in May 1942. Even after that some individual soldiers and units refused to surrender and become beginning elements of the resistance to the Japanese occupation. Later paroled POWs would also join the resistance.

More than 250,000 Filipino soldiers served with U.S. troops in World War II, including more than 57,000 who died. The veterans have won back some concessions, including lump-sum payments as part of the 2009 economic stimulus package. In an October ceremony in Washington, D.C., remaining Filipino veterans of World War II were awarded the coveted Congressional Gold Medal, the nation’s highest civilian award.

Gaerlan said Regalado did not make the trip due to poor health, but he got his medal in December in an intensive care unit in Richmond, California. He is survived by his wife Marcelina, five children and many grandchildren.

Article from the Military Times