Description:
Byron Gordon talks about his life growing up in Oklahoma and fighting in the Philippines in World War II.
Transcript:
My name is Sarah and this is my neighbor Bryon Gordon and we've lived in the same neighborhood across the street from each other for 20 years and I've just always been so impressed with you Byron and just appreciate you as a neighbor, good neighbor and a friend and so I just wanted to take a few minutes and talk to you. You have so many wonderful life stories that I'd like to just record for not only my family but for maybe part of your family too, so I wondered if we could start just by talking a little bit about your childhood. You talk about your mother a lot, maybe you’d want to share a few memories for your great grandchildren or someone how you'd like them to remember her and what was your mother's name?
Fanny.
Fanny?
Fanny.
Fanny. Okay, what would you like the world to know?
Well I guess I could start by saying I was born in Conway, Missouri and my mother's name was Fanny and my father name was Morris Gordon and I never got to know either when I my mother died when I was nine months old and my father died in when I was two years old and my grandmother came and got me she told me at my dad's funeral and took me after Menco west to her farm and I grew up out there pretty well when I got 11 years old, well she passed away and I my uncle was kind of rough and you know you he treated people rough and he didn’t, nobody treated you nice and so he came to me one day and he said Bryon I want to send Lucille to nursing school and I don't have the money. He said would you go on to CC’S and you’ll get $5 a month and I’ll get 50 and I sent her to nursing school and I said I thought boy that would get me out of this place so I went into the CC’s and they took me to Grand Canyon in Arizona. So I had been around trucks and tractors and all this stuff but I met the nicest man. He was the nicest guy too you, you know he'd never yelled at you or nothing in his name was Nick Duncan. I'll never forget him because he taught me to drive a caterpillar and taught me drive a truck he taught me drive a big old snow plow cold in the winter and so he just was so nice to me and all the way around and so one time he knew I like to hike so he said Bryon how would you like to hike across Grand Canyon and I said, “ooh well why I’d do some of that,” and so he he said well my wife will take us over to the North rim and we’ll get on the Bright Angel trail over there and walk down across, so I said, “okay that sounds good to me.” So the next morning she took us over there and we walked down to Bright Angel trail to the bridge across the river and ate our lunch right in middle of the bridge and we come out that night about 5:00 o'clock he took us all the day to get across there, and so as I said Nick was really nice and he he come to me in on my time of day, I was there for a year, and when my year was up why he come to me and he said Bryon you, your a good man and you’ll make a fine man he said and I’ve been glad to know you know and I said Nick that's the same way but to you. I said he would have been kind to me and so he took me to the train and so I went to the back to Minco and I cut and boy I gotta have a job you know I can't eat and buy clothes and no job so I went I went to back down there and I called my buddy that was my baseball catcher on my baseball team and I told him I said, “hey Pat I said I don't have a job” he said “you got it” and I said “what do you mean you got it?” He said “well grandpa's son got married and moved away” and boy I'm out here on 360 acres trying to help grandpa get it keep it going and I said “woah, well that's good for me.” So, he brought me into town and the old man told me should but I knew him before he was really Peter moony. He was really a nice old man and he said he give me $20 a month for room and board. So that's what I got was $20 a month a hour, I’d work for him for about four years and he told me he said that I'm going back to Nebraska where all my family is and he said I'm gonna sell out but I'll get you a job. Said you're a good hand and that I'm just sure glad to have you, so I said okay and so the day had his sale I, they introduced me to Grover McComas and I said well I I work for you the same way I work for grandpa and so he I worked for him for about two years and one day he took me to Chickasha and I ran into the marine recruiter down there and so he said boys tell me all those things that they could give me you know for save my life and stuff and so I said well I told Grover, I said you mind if I joined the navy, I mean the marines and he said no not all would be good place for you. So I joined the Marines and they shipped me out to San Diego, California and I got all my boot training and everything there and so when I was in the Philippines at Cavite PI that was a Navy yard in Cavite in the Philippines and so I went with some of the guys and we put our batteries, we was on the anti-aircraft batteries and so we had to cut the fuses on all the stuff and we found out that they flew 23,000 feet and we could only see 21 which didn't help us any but we then see it before the war ever started then dug trenches on Bataan already I had so that’s what we backed up to and we fought them over there until they got so many of them just kept coming we wipe out a big wave and here comes a bunch more and so they’d finally, why the colonel hollered at us said boys he said get to Corregidor if you can. He said their break into our lines are just too many of them there's no way we can get away. So I remembered what they told me to do when I was in the ocean or deep water and I racked my bolt back on my rifle and made like a submarine when I was on the water, bullets hitting the water all around me and I breathed into my barrel on my rifle and I got out there waves and I come up and boy still hitting the water so I went back down and went quite a ways further and then I got out there and I thought and would come up and no bullets and I said oh boy I got it made now. At about that time a big old sharks fin popped up and I said oh ho boy I don't need you and so I got my bayonet out and then I happen remember at boot camp said do not make blood in the water it makes more sharks so I'm saying wooh what am I going to do, and about that time I felt something slide by my leg and I thought what in the world that wasn’t a shark he had done bit my leg off and about that time the big old porpoise come right up beside me and I thought oh boy you're my buddy and at that time I didn't know they like didn't like sharks they hate him and so oh boy he took after that shark to hit them right in the middle and just folded him up and ran him off.
Were you by yourself in the water?
Yeah and so he stayed right with me and I said you're my buddy now rubbing his back and petting him and he was going to squeak squeak squeak squeak so I don’t know what he saying but he was squeaking and so I he stayed right with me until a motor launch from Corregidor picked me up.
How long do you think you were in the water?
Oh, probably maybe an hour and a half.
Oh okay.
Then they put me in the intelligence Department over there because I could do a lot of things and so they built me a concrete pillbox and.
What is that?
And six by six and that's to protect you from shells and stuff hit you know rifle bullets mainly shells only don't stop them, but anyway I told him I said well the Colonel on Fort Drum he told him them what they had was 414 inch cannon over there and it was on a rock and the Japs was always sinking the USS Fort Drum which is rock with cannons on it and so I, I called the colonel one day and I said hey Colonel there's a big truck convoy coming in over on Bataan and he said okay Gordon I know what it is from me to you to give me the asmus some range on a front truck and asmus range on the back truck and he sat there and wipe them all out. He fired them big old cannons and man until like a freight train you know firing right over my head and so he wiped him out and so one day there wasn't too much going on and on Baaton so this buddy of mine was shooting down zeros up there and he come down here said Gordon's let’s go get some chow you where God was at and so he went down there and ate the lunch come back and my pill box as the Japs said (?) and there not there anymore is blown away.
Wow
And, boy I said well I said thanks buddy. He said well that’s what we’re here for trying to keep one another alive. So I it was about a week until he I went up there with nothing going on in Bataan I'm so I went up there and I said and get something to eat and he said oh I'm gonna get me another one of them zeros and I said wait just a minute time went to you the other day remember, oh okay I’ll go with you up there. While we was up there got a direct hit on this machine gun nest just disintegrated all to pieces blowed it to kingdom come and he said well thank you buddy and I said remember you saved my bacon the other day. So it was quieting down on Bataan a bit and so one day I thought well I'm going to walk up on Corregidor and see what my old marine barracks, see 15 years left or what's there so I walked up there and an outside door opened it and then there's another door went back into main barracks so I walked in that door and got the other door open that door and just as I opened the door here coming 240 house or shell come sliding right up there for men I hit that deck like they told us to do and if I just had been any close to it I'd been in I've been part of it and I thought man then they told us about delayed shells that didn't go off right then said just don't jump up do something silly so I laid there and laid there I thought seemed like eternity I don't know maybe it's 10 or 12 minutes and it didn't, nothing happened so I slipped up there and turn that knob peeked in there and it was laying there still smoking, good Lord turn it off. It was a dud. And so you know you just, you never know and they finally, the colonel general Johnson N. Wainwright he called us into the tunnel he said boys we're gonna do something we don't normally do, but he said I've talked to the president of the United States and he said we don't want to draw no more blood should this is we don't know what's going to happen to you but we want it not to do it anymore so they took us in that’s when they had the death march to Bataan I mean Lusong up there and this commander to one was where MacArthur had trained his Filipino scouts there and so they took us up there and put us in the prison up there.
So how did you get taken prisoner? How did that happen?
Well because they told us. Because the general when he's talking to us, he said there's no better soldier than the man who obeys his commanding officer.
So, where you were they the enemy came and…
Yeah, they come in and captured us. We just give up.
Where you already were?
Yeah we gave him up and so I was up there so I tell you I was burying four, five, six, seven, eight or ten of my buddies every day and it was just getting to me I couldn't stand that stuff and so they come by one day and want to volunteer to go to (?) and work on the docks and I thought man I'll get away from here so this all this death and dying, so I went up there and want to work on the docks and whenever they they knew the Americans were coming one day so, it was kind of funny in a way it made us laugh inside we could never laugh outside, but they had a ship there supposed to be in a hospital ship to take us to Japan, the ones that had been working on the docks, and so they didn't know give them any room at all and I kept thinking when we got up there they had an aircraft carrier right on each side of us, I mean in the middle of this and had us in these troop ships. They had us protect that aircraft carrier but you know what our intelligence must have been pretty good because they slipped in there and sunk that aircraft carrier but they didn't bother us so they must have known we were there so they took us on to Japan and we worked on the docks.
How many were with you?
There was probably 400 and so they took us down to lead ore mine and had us working in lead ore mine working busting this stuff out but they were, so they weren't like we were. They were so rough about stuff. Now they bore holes back in this lead mine and then they jammed dynamite back in there and this old boy was ramming that in there with a big old pole and I thought dad gum he’s gonna blow his head off one of these days. Sure enough one day went by and his shoulder was gone was carrying him off and so it wasn't too too long till they said the Americans were coming and then finally they said well the Japs were going to surrender so that's why we got all the stuff we got because they surrendered unconditionally and so we, well colonel came up one day with a Jeep and some boys runner with 50 caliber machine gun that after the Japs had surrendered
So, then you were…
And he said boys I can tell you been through hell I can tell by looking at you and so he says, I'll be up here in the morning would be B29 to bring you some food. So next morning sure enough he come up and dropped that stuff out parachutes and drop it in that compound where we were and of course we opened the gates goes cause the Jap guards are all gone and so the little Filipino I mean Japanese come down there you know and we tried to get him to take piece of candy or something gum you know and no no no they wouldn’t eat it and finally one of them said said you you you, so I said huh so I peeled off the end of the wrapper and bit it and he ate it off me after I ate it but they had told him we was mean we’d poison him and all this stuff I guess telling little kids that you know man, but anyway they come with planes to pick us up and I seen Hiroshima and I'll guarantee you they have a lot of tin roofs and stuff you could just touch it it's just decentagrated the only thing standing was a little chimney about this high about two, three feet high and everything else was flat I mean just burnt to crisp and so they was gonna fly us out and they said well boys now they aren’t going to run clearance running lights on these planes and said what do you want to do you want to go and stay? And we said well we’ve been here for four years you know almost so we.
So, you were prisoners for four years?
Yeah almost. Three years and eight months to be exact and so the next day while they took us down to the airport in a big old truck so we were flying out and we had a guy from Texas and it was never, I don't care what it was it you had it better in Texas than you had it in where else, and it was so funny and we asked him, they asked us if we want to fly over that big old volcano over there Fujiyama and sure it’s on the way so boy we went over that thing and you talk about a fire furnace, man that baby just smoldering down here and somebody said Tex, got anything like that in Texas he said no but we gotta fire Department Waxahachie that can put it out 15 minutes and I said yeah it's only been burning there a hundred years. But up on Corregidor when I was up I seen something that bugged me and I could never figure out how it could happen, but planes come over and dropped a load of bombs and we run or jump in our foxholes just three of us, and so they we jumped out as soon as bombs went off and this one poor guy he was just buried and boy we run over with the digging him out for all we was worth because we knew he was suffocating in that dirt you know and we got him out and I said was there another guy in here with you, he looked at me and he said no I was the only one in here. He said well what’s the matter and I said you were snow white headed and you was coal black before and he said oh you're kidding me he asked the other guy said am I snow white headed and he said yeah you are, so one night first place I got to Guam was first place Americans had to check us out and everything he said boy he said I want to ask you something doc but it's something that's been bugging me I can't understand how you could happen but I told him what happened this boy was coal blackhead and I said that bomb hit their supposed to hit that fox hole burried and he looked at me and said well son put yourself in that old boy’s place and just remember how he felt when he said I'm gonna die right here I ain't gonna never get out and he said that when you have a fright that great it changes the pigment in your hair and so it was so funny, but when we got back to the states they had us in the hospital over there and this guy came by and he looked at me and he said don't I know you marine said I don't know doc I don't know you and he said I bet you do. He said I was the one who checked you in and said I was just an intern in but I'm a full fledged doctor now and he said you weighed a 198 pounds stripped you didn’t smoke or you didn't drink and he said I knew you'd make a good marine and I looked at him and I said doc now tell me something how did you recognize me, he said that curl in your hair, I thought for god sakes I said I said but then I came on back and I met my wife I got now and of course I went with her sister first but.
Uh Oh.
I, yeah, I liked her better because she's just different, and we got married and got all these kids now.So.
So, when can, oh go ahead.
I made it through, and a doctor said I weighed 80 pounds and I normally weighed 217, but they didn’t feed us much, just dry rice. So, I tell you they were going to give us some caribou soup one day for Christmas, the Japs couldn’t even shoot the caribou they had to get a marine to shoot the caribou. And so, I guess that’s about it. You never know what tomorrow brings. I had a grandfather and one thing I remembered about him he said come see me Mr. Lacey and he said good Lord willing and the Creek don't rise. You know he’d always say that. Is that all you need to know.
I think so, unless if there’s…
If there’s anything else just ask away.
No, I guess Parker wanted to know who inspired you? Who, what was your inspiration? What gave you such hope in prison like how did you just not give us hope?
Well, the guys was all going around saying you know where we're not ever going to get out you don't see no American airplanes or nothing we ain’t gonna get out and I said well maybe you ain't but I am, you know and boy I tell you we had one guy that we was gonna go bury him and he had no clothes or nothing and finally some guys sneaked out and stole some that gave him that and brought him back, he lived. He may be still living. I don't know for sure.
Do you have any regrets?
No regrets I love my country and after I've seen some of them others, I sure love it.
Well, thank you Bryon thank you very much.
You bet.