Warner officially surrendered the 14th Inf. to the Japanese on
June 20th. The following day our group walked down to the river and
obtained a guide and several bancas. We spent the day coasting down
the river to Ilagan. On the way down, I decided that no American would
be killed by my .45; I dropped it in the river.
In Ilagan, we hiked several blocks to a Japanese barracks, knocked on
the door and tried to explain to some ignorant soldiers that "we had
come to surrender!" We were about as welcome as a vacuum cleaner
salesman. With little planning we could have "wiped them out." We were
finally directed to an empty house across the street to spend the
night, sleeping on the floor.
The next day we hired a Filipino caratella (pony cart) and rode about
fifty miles to Echague where we repeated the surrender process at a
cavalry barracks. Six of us Americans soon found ourselves sleeping on
the concrete floor of the guard house of the old Constabulary
Barracks, west of Echague. Our hosts were a squadron of Japanese
cavalry-probably the same squadron we used to watch going up and down
the highway.
Echague was the town where Guillermo Nakar and I had frequent
conferences with the Governor and provincial officials.
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