From Kentucky to Bataan

Veteran's Park, Harrodsburg, KY
Google Street View

From Harrodsburg, Kentucky (population 4,673 in 1940) to Clark Air Base, near Angeles City in the Republic of the Philippines, is roughly 8,420 miles. In these modern times it takes less than a day (24 hours) to get from Harrodsburg to Clark. In 1941, it took substantially longer. Especially if we're talking about shipping a battalion of M3 Stuart tanks with all of its organic equipment and personnel.

Alert reader Bill spotted that Sherman in the opening photo whilst traveling from Virginia to Minnesota. As a Chant reader, I'm not surprised he did a "Wow! Is that a tank?" pullover and visit. I mean, I do that all the time. (Fortunately there aren't a lot of tanks on display here in Little Rhody, otherwise I would be a major hazard to navigation!) As a long term lurker in these parts, he knew instinctively that the Old AF Sarge would be keen to know the story. So, a couple of emails later, a bit of research and voilà, you get a post for what my buddy Dwight likes to call, "History Friday."

If you look closely in that first photo, over to the right, there's what looks like a plaque, and it is. Bill got a picture for us...


Harrodsburg is the county seat for Mercer County, it's a pretty old town, being one of three settlements in the Kentucky area back when the Revolution started. The Kentucky National Guard has quite a history and a pretty nice website describing that history here. If you dig a little deeper, you'll come across the page, The Harrodsburg Tankers.

These men were called to Federal service as the war clouds continued to gather in the Pacific (war was already raging in Europe) and went from being the 38th Tank Company of the Kentucky Army National Guard to being Company D of the 192nd Light Tank Battalion, being equipped with this little feller -

M3 Stuart Tank
(Source)

Incidentally the Harrodsburg Tankers site mentions the 38th being equipped at one point with the "M 2 T 2" tank, or "Mae West" as the troops called it. I do believe what they meant was the M2A2 tank, which had twin turrets, each mounting a .50 caliber machine gun. And in typical design fashion, each turret blocked the field of fire of the other in certain directions. So you could shoot in two different directions but couldn't bring both guns to bear out to either flank. Interesting, not exactly a flaw, but not exactly a feature either.

M2A2 Light Tank
(Source)

Now I had never heard of that beastie before, by December of 1941 the M2A2 and it's sisters (M2A1 and M2A3) were only used in training. The M3 Stuart equipped the 192nd when it was shipped out to the Philippines in September of 1941. Just in time for the attack by Japan less than three months later.

The 192nd was the first American armored unit to fight enemy armor in World War II, clashing with Japanese armor near Lingayen Gulf on the island of Luzon, Wikipedia has a pretty good account of the action -

On 21 December 1941, the 192nd Tank Battalion, under the command of Major Theodore F. Wickord, was ordered to move north. Major Wickord sent Company B, commanded by Captain Donald Hanes, ahead, most likely as an advanced guard. During B company's advance, they had planned to refuel their gasoline powered M3's at Gerona and then again at Bauang. However, upon reaching Gerona, no fuel was available, and word reached Captain Hanes that the enemy was fast approaching Bauang.

The US Army's last official US Horse Cavalry to see combat was the US 26th Cavalry (Horse) (Philippine Scouts) in 1942. The 26th Cavalry had just recently been under enemy aerial attack, and was operating in the area currently being traversed by B company tanks. General Wainwright, commander of US/allied forces in the Philippines during its final period, received reports that the town of Damortis was fast being approached by mechanized elements of the Japanese Army; and he ordered Captain Hanes to engage them.

Since Hanes had not been able to re-fuel at Gerona, his Stuarts were nearly out of gas, so he had to consolidate the fuel from the whole company in order to "top-off" just one platoon of five light tanks. Hanes ordered the tank platoon, led by LT Ben R. Morin, to move north from the town of Damortis, where here on 22 December 1941, the platoon of M3 Stuarts ran into Japanese Type 95 light tanks from the Imperial Japanese Army 4th Tank Regiment. In this, the first American tanks manned by US tank crewmen to engage enemy tanks during World War II, the M3's of the 192nd Tank Battalion went up against the equally armed Type 95 light tank, which were armed with the 37mm cannon, but were equipped with diesel engines. The Type 95 light tank had been at the forefront of tank technology when it was fielded in 1935.

In the tank to tank battle that ensued, the lead 192nd tank immediately left the road to maneuver, but was instantly hit and caught fire. The remaining four Stuarts also received hits, but withdrew from the field, only to be destroyed by enemy aircraft later on. Lieutenant Morin was wounded, and he along with his crew were captured.

Both the 192nd and the 194th Tank Battalions continued to skirmish with the 4th Tank Regiment, as they retreated towards Bataan. But tank losses during the fighting required the re-organization of some of the units. Consequently, tank companies were re-organized into 10 tank companies with 3 tank platoons, and 1 tank for the company commander. During the remaining struggle for Bataan, the two Tank Battalions tried to defend the beaches, the airfield, and provided support for the infantry, until 8 April 1942, when the 192nd and 194th received orders to prepare to destroy their M3s, upon receiving the code word. The code word "Crash" was transmitted, and the US Army/allies on Bataan surrendered on 9 April 1942. (Source)

Type 95 Ha-Gō Japanese Tank
(Source)

You can read more about the exploits of the 192nd here. Seems those brave Kentuckians fought all the way to Bataan and the entire outfit, those who survived, went into Japanese captivity. They paid a heavy price for their service, according to this site, of the 596 members of the 192nd Light Tank Battalion, including Company D, The Harrodsburg Tankers, 325 paid the last full measure of devotion. The plaque above lists those from Company D who perished.

There's a little town in Kentucky which remembers the men they sent forth to do battle, and the ones who didn't return. They remember, so should we.

Thanks Bill for sharing this story and the photos.

Again, I learn from my readers...



Note: There's a name on the top left of that plaque which gave me pause. Caught my breath when I noticed it. Harry Riker LaFon, Jr. Then I noticed the difference in spelling, still, you have to wonder.