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Show Paradise Soldier, Buddies Kill 43 Japs During Brief Luzon Action patrol, at a range of 50 yards, brought them into oblique fire from every weapon in the outfit. Twenty one enemy dead were counted after the melee and the remainder scampered over the mountain as fast as the tangled jungle and steep terrain would permit. Enemy movement could be heard on both flanks of the patrol. pa-trol. Lieutenant Prentice ordered his men, as if. orders were needed, need-ed, to dig in. They dug frantically for 10 minutes before the enemy opened up from the crest and front slope of the mountain. For three hours the handful of men, there were 27 in the patrol plus two artillery observers and a few Filipino scouts, were blasted blast-ed with 75 rounds of 90 mm and 125 rounds of 50 mm mortar fire in addition to an incessant deluge de-luge of machine gun and small arms fire. 'Only five of the infantrymen -were wounded and the two artillery artil-lery men during the baptism cf fire which continued until dusk. None, ' the battalion surgeon said, would die. As dusk crept along the mountain, moun-tain, the weary infantrymen fashioned fash-ioned litters from the ubiquitous bamboo and shelter halves' from their packs and by dark were With the 148th Infantry Regiment Regi-ment on Luzon, May 22 Private Bartley G. Hatch, of Paradise, returned safely today with a small patrol of doughboys from the rear slope of Mount Minami where, despite their small number, num-ber, the patrol staged a surprise attack on a strong and heavily entrenched Japanese concentration from the rear, killing 43 Nips. Leaving the front lines, where the 148th Infantry of the ' 37th Infantry division is engaging a large force of Japs which threatened threat-ened the advance of the 25th Division through Balete Pass from the light, the patrol killed their first Jap within a few hundred yards of the perimeter. "Our lead scout saw smoke," Lieutenant Dale E. Prentice, of Younestown, Ohio, patrol leader said. "We crept up and found a Jap cooking rice over the fire and his bianket sprea out where he had ( spent the night. Apparently he was trying to infiltrate through the lines but; I fear the scouts put a permanent crimp in his plans with their rifles." Skirting Mt. Minami and advancing ad-vancing up the rear slope the patrol saw many caves and entrenchments en-trenchments near the crest. Simultaneously Sim-ultaneously the scouts saw an enemy force of . 20 men in a compact com-pact group to the right. Automatic Automat-ic riflemen, and doughboys were brought up to a close position unnoticed and the entire group opened fire upon signal killing 16 Japanese. As they continued their strenuous strenu-ous climb up the mountain which rose in places at an angle of fifty degrees, the patrol discovered another formation of Japs numbering num-bering 50 men, apparently coming com-ing down to avenge the slaughter i of their 16 comrades, j The column was moving in for I mation down the slope and the ready to move back several hundred yards where they were forced to bivouac for the night. Although the jittery doughboys spent a sleepless night steeling themselves for action at the I slightest rustle in the jungle, the Japs did not pursue. At daybreak day-break the grimy men slogged forward again only to encounter, after a few hours travel, another Jap patrol of six men. Again the Japs seemed unaware of the Americans Am-ericans and five of the six were killed, bringing the total for the j two day patrol to 43 counted Jap dead. |