H-AGOM-BFarrens

New Orleans LA, Metro News

Lakeview Soldier Recalls Philippine Jungle Days

By Bill Grady Staff writer

Ben Farrens cropped from AGOM group reunion photo 1994

There was something prophetic about the way Ben Farrens spent the morning of Dec. 7, 1941 ‑ hiding behind a coconut tree on Clark Air Field in the Philippines, firing a .45 caliber pistol at a sky full Japanese bombers in the process of destroying half the U.S. Army's air strength in the Far East.

The young Air Corps enlistee would spend much of the remaining war in the Pacific resisting a superior foe from the cover of jungle trees. Farrens' story, and those of other guerrilla fighters who stayed in the Philippines after the Allied surrender are among the most stirring of World War II.

"Can you imagine me bitting a Japanese Zero with a .45?” asked Farrens, 81, a former executive director of the Holy Name Society of the Council of Catholic Men for the Archdiocese of New Orleans.

After the bombing of Clark, which coincided with the devastating strike against. Pearl Harbor, Farrens and other crew were transferred to Bataan, the Philippine peninsula which would become notorious as the site of the Japanese “Death March" of American prisoners.

But Farrens, a quiet, young man with an intense, penetrating gaze, remained one step ahead of the Japanese.

"I got, out of Bataan on the last boat down to Mindanao Island," he said. "We got bombed at sea and hit the lifeboats. We hid in a cove and then the next day we arrived on Mindanao."

Southernmost and second largest of the Philippine islands, Mindanao was Farrens' home for the next 3 ½ years. He was stationed first on a dirt airfield in Malabang, in a region inhabited by a branch of the Moro people, an insular Muslim community.

From Malbang, Farrens and 40 other Americans were sent north to Lake Lanao to operate a makeshift seaplane base. American General Jonathan Wainwright had ordered Allied forces to surrender. But Farrens hadn't gotten the word. Instead, after eluding a Japanese attack on the lake area, he and 13 other Americans had taken to the hills.

"We had no food, so we broke into four groups," he said. "The first group was killed the first week for their guns. The Moros got 'em. My little group just stayed in the same area, living on grasshoppers, and living with the pagan people. Three years later, there were only six of the original 14 still alive.

"From the hills, we went down into the Kapai Valley. There were about 12 of us by then, counting four that had escaped from a prison camp.

"In the Kapai, we were the only group in all the Philippines known to have raised the American and Philippine flags on July 4, 1942. A Philippine captain sang 'God Bless America,' and there wasn't a dry eye in the house. Ten kilometers away, the Japanese were having their second death march."

Farrens and the others: lived in bamboo shacks not far from a community of Moros and their sultan, Mala Mala. As he appears in a snapshot Farrens keeps among his many relics of war, Mala Mala is keen eyed and young, with the unflinching gaze of one born to power.

Mala Mala had no allegiance e to anyone but his own Moros, but he took a liking to Farrens.

"He killed some of my buddies and still took care of me," Farrens said. "I remember one night he had a meeting in his house about whether or not he should surrender to the Japanese. During the meeting, the sultan's horse broke loose and he shot it.

"He gave the meat to us. We got a hindquarter and the liver and the heart, by golly, and that fed about 12 of us for 10 days."

Farrens and another air man left the Kapai Valley at Christmas in 1942, the same week that Mala Mala became vice mayor for the Japanese.

Making his way through the province of Misninis Occidental, Farrens arrived at the town of . Jiminez, unoccupied by the Japanese who concentrated on the strategic coastlines of Mindinao. At Jiminez they found Col. Wendell Fertig, leader of Allied guerrilla forces on the island. Farrens, formerly a private, was commissioned a second lieutenant and put in charge of a clandestine radio station.

"I was really in bad shape when I got to Jiminez," Farrens said.."I walked with a crutch. I had a long red beard, like Jesus Christ himself. I was walking down the street with my buddy, Bill Konko, and here's this lady getting off a beautiful bay horse. I said, 'Wow, Bill, did you see that? Bill said, 'Yeah, I know her. You want to meet her? I said, 'I sure do.'

"And here's the result of our meeting:four boys and four girls!"

Farrens' wife of 54 years, the former Juanita Guzman, daughter of a lumberman in Jiminez, sat across the den table in their Lakeview home.

“You had jeans on and you look like Rip Van Winkle, all hunched over and skinny," Juanita said.

"That was all those tapeworms," Farrens said.

In the summer of 1944, Juanita and a house boy crossed a 3,000 foot mountain behind Japanese lines to join Farrens at one of his radio stations.

"We traveled through a forest with only cicadas for noise," Juanita said. "When I got to Ben's headquarters at the radio station, he said, 'Let's get married.

Farrens could have left Mindanao by submarine long before the Battle of Leyte in October of 1944 that began the Allied reoccupation of the Philippines. Not wanting to leave his wife behind, lie and Juanita finally left Mindanao on Sept. 2, 1945.

"It was two months short of six years from the day I'd enlisted," Farrens said. "Nobody else in the LA (Louisiana) can touch me on that.: <end article>

The following was dated 9-2-98, and probably used for the above story written 9-13-98 DL

To Whom it may Concern:

My name is Beverly “Ben” Farrens and in 1939 when Hitler marched into Poland I joined up for the Hawaiian Army Air Corps. I was stationed at Hickam Field, Oahu, Hawaii with the 14^th Bombardment Squadron, 11th Bombardment Group B-17D heavy bombers until September 2nd, 1941 when our squadron was selected to fly nine(9) B-17 bombers to the Philippines via Midway, Wake Islands, Port Morseby, New Guinea, Darwin, Australia to Clark Field, Pampanga, Luzon, Philippines. I shipped out of Honolulu with other ground support members on the liner "President Pierce" arriving in Manila, September 16, 1941.

On December 7th, 1941, the first day of World War II, most of the heavy bombers were destroyed on the ground, hence most of the ground crew members of the squadrons were sent to Bataan to fight as Infantry men.

About 350 airmen were selected and shipped out of Bataan on December 30 1941 on an inter island ship named the "MS Mayon", arriving at Bugo, Mindanao on January 1 1942. Our mission was to refuel and repair airplanes; guard airfields and fight as infantrymen if necessary.

In March 1942 I was selected along with about ten of my squadron mates to be a body guard to president Manuel Quezon and his family who had been spirited from Corregidor Luzon to Mindanao by Navy P.T. boaters.. the same men that escorted General Arthur MacArthur and his staff south. we were in Dansalan, Lanao guarding president Quezon, where I met most of the P.T. boat crew members, and was one of several ordered to escort the president and his family to Del Monte airfield where they were flown out to Australia in a B-17E bomber.

In April 30, 1942 I was one of about forty airmen ordered to operate a seaplane base on lake Lanao. two Navy PBY flying boats were flown to Mindanao lake Lanao to be fueled then flown to Corregidor island at the mouth of Manila bay, across from Bataan, to pick up U.S. Army nurses (the Angels of Bataan). They returned the following day, refueled, and one was flown out with the 17 nurses; the other PBY having been damaged on the lake by wind and hidden rocks. The nurses of that PBY were transported to Del Monte airfield, but there were no more flights coming in from Australia and they became Prisoners Of War of the Japanese for nearly three and a half years.

That night Major Luther Heidger, M.D. and his aide Sgt Shipley sent me to the hospital in Dansalen, and actually saved my life, as the following day word was spread that we all would surrender to our hated enemy; the Japanese, or be court martialed. Instead I went into the hills of Mindanao, headed for General Sharps hqs with 14^th bombers. Four were killed for their guns the first week, three more killed at various times (one John Grant was killed with 2 spears in his back).

On July 1, 1942 four (4) men escaped from Dansalan Camp Keithly (where Major John J. Pershing was stationed in 1910) Prisoner Of War camp. they were: Robert V. Ball, asn 19000235, 5th Air Base; William H. Johnson, Navy P.T. boater; William A. Knotz, 6909312 14^th Bomb Sqd. (kia, September 11, 1943 on the Mindanao Sea on a ship in a storm), and James S. Smith, 19038509 30^th Bomb Sqd. Bill Johnson served on his coast watcher station in the Davao area over 2 years from March 1943 to spring of 1945. his station was responsible for sinking more Japanese tonnage than any other Coast Watcher station in the South Pacific.

On July 4, 1942 we, Bob Ball, Bill Johnson (at left in 1994 photo), Bill Knortz, Jim Smith and I along with seven other Americans, were the only known group to raise the Philippine and American flags at Kapi valley in all the 7,000 islands of the Philippines. When the flags were raised in front of the Kapai school house and the Filipino Captain sang: "God Bless America" there wasn't a dry eye in the group. In the meantime about 10 kilometers to the west of Kapai valley the Japanes were having their 2^nd “Death March” with the POW's marching from Dansalan POW camp to Iligan, Lanao located on the south shore of the Mindanao Sea. Three men were killed.

I was commissioned as a 2^nd Lt, Infantry Febuary 16, 1943. Assigned to several interesting jobs (one rescuing a radio station and taking it down between the enemy lines and back on the air) and on September 02, 1945 (the day the Japanese signed the surrendered on the USS battleship Missouri in Toyko Bay) I shipped out of Leyte, Philippines as a Captain, USA Signal Corps, back to the good ole USA after nearly six years over seas.

Beverly ‘Ben’ Farrens

Major, USA Retired

Ben Farrens

Ben Farrens and ___ fellow AGOM Ben and Juanita Farren at 1994 AGOM reunion San Diego

Note: Following the reunion, my wife Mary and I had the pleasure of driving Ben and Juanita from the reunion to Anaheim CA to visit their daughter. We had a wonderful visit. Ben is a people person who cares for the others, remembering names, addresses and their state of health – he’s always active and never dull.

Ben and Juanita Farrens