Philippines invasion veteran remembers

Antipodean Andy · Jun 2, 2008

World War II memories still vivid for Acadiana veteran | theadvertiser.com | The Advertiser - good pic at the link.

Tell Clarence Trahan he looks fit at age 93, and he has a ready reply.

"I feel like a million, and I never had less," Trahan said with a smile.

The World War II veteran doesn't wear any of his six medals - a daughter has had those framed for display - and these days the driving is left to his wife. But he still wears a fedora, and still carries vivid memories of years in the Army.

That service came naturally in a family full of military campaigns.

Trahan's grandfather, Cezar Burke, served in Co. E of the Miles Legion of the Louisiana Infantry in the Civil War. His oldest brother, Leonce Trahan, fought in World War I. Another brother, Cleobule "CJ" Trahan, was with Gen. George Patton in France in World War II.

Both CJ and Clarence served under legendary leaders - CJ with Patton and Clarence one of the most experienced of those under Gen. Douglas MacArthur.

"I was 28, the oldest in my company," said Trahan, who served with Co. M of the 163rd Infantry in the Philippines. "But if we had to run a mile, or two miles, I was right there with the best of them."

The war gained unique intensity for Trahan during fighting in Louzon.

"I came face-to-face with a Japanese soldier," he recalled. "I had an 8-clip rifle, and his only had one. He raised his rifle to fire, but the chamber was empty. So, he stuck his rifle in the ground, bayonet first, and yelled 'bonsai' at me. He wanted to fight. (I don't know about the spelling, always thought it was "banzai", but my first thought was that the Japanese soldier wanted to engage in combat miniature tree pruning...eep

"I wasn't going to shoot an unarmed man, so I stuck my rifle in the ground, too, and we fought. Well, I flipped him, and he took off running and never stopped."

Once U.S. troops got word of Japan's surrender on Aug. 15, 1945, and enjoyed a binge evening laced with sake, the assignment changed for Trahan as he was sent to Japan to be part of the occupation force at war's end.

But getting there was more frightening than the face-to-face confrontation with the Japanese warrior.

"We had 14 ships going to Japan, all transporting GIs," Trahan said. "About 2 a.m., we hit a typhoon, and I've never been so scared in my life. I said, 'If I get back home, I'll be lucky.'

"All day, all night, then all day and night again, our ships were like toys on the water. But we made it. I remember Adm. (Chester) Nimitz was on the flagship, and when the storm was over they blew a whistle.

"We anchored before daybreak, and the Higgins boat was waiting at the bottom to take us ashore. They told us to get in full battle gear because we didn't know how many diehards there were still in the country, but they had all fled."

What Trahan found instead was devastation wrought by U.S. bombers and the obliteration caused by atomic bombs dropped on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

"I was one of the first into Hiroshima," Trahan said. "I was there with the chaplain. Everything was flattened. It was like walking on eggshells, as far as the eye could see."

That vision remains with Clarence Trahan, more than 60 years later.
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