Bruni

Capt. Fred T. Bruni Jr. was born on January 21, 1905, in Monroe, Wisconsin, to Fred T. Bruni Sr. & Elizabeth Wild-Bruni. He was one of the couples' five children from his mother's second marriage. He also had three half-sisters and three half brothers. He attended grade school and high school in Monroe and later moved to Janesville. While living in Janesville, he married. With his wife, Hazel, he resided at 1242 South Washington Street. The couple had a infant son, Ronald, who died at the age of two months.

On June 28, 1921, Fred joined the Wisconsin National Guard. He rose in rank from private to sergeant. He was known as "Fritz" to the other members of the company. On June 14, 1938, he was commissioned a second lieutenant.

In the autumn of 1940, he was promoted to first lieutenant when his tank company was federalized. Fred was now a member of the 192nd GHQ Light Tank Battalion which was formed from National Guard units from Wisconsin, Illinois, Ohio, and Kentucky.

For the next year, the battalion trained at Fort Knox, Kentucky. In early 1941, Fred was transferred was first transferred to B Company and then to Headquarters Company when it was formed. He was known for always having a joke or story to tell.

Fred took part in maneuvers in Louisiana in late 1941. When the maneuvers ended, he and the other soldiers learned that the battalion was being sent overseas. They were given this news by the commanding officer of the 192nd. Being over 29, Fred was given the opportunity to resign from federal service. He chose to remain with the 192nd and was promoted to captain. he received a ten day pass home to take care of personal business and say his goodbyes.

The battalion began to prepare for the overseas duty at Camp Polk, Louisiana. There, their M-2 tanks were sent to other units and the battalion received new M-3 tanks and halftracks in place of their reconnaissance cars. It was also at this time that Fred was given command of HQ Company when the officers considered "too old" were released from federal service.

On October 20th, from Camp Polk, Louisiana, the HQ Company traveled by train to San Francisco. After arriving, they were taken to Angel Island and given physicals. Any man found to be physically unfit was released from duty.

Sailing from San Francisco Bay, the battalion made stops at Hawaii and Guam. The second part of their trip was done under blackout conditions. For the first time, the soldiers sensed the seriousness of the situation they were entering.

After arriving in the Philippines, Fred was promoted to captain and given command of Headquarters Company of the 192nd. He kept this post until the surrender of Bataan on April 9, 1942. On December 8, 1941, Fred lived through the Japanese attack on Clark Field. The attack destroyed most of the Army Air Corp in the Philippines.

Five days later on December 13, 1941, Fred and Lt. Emmett Gibson, who had been an Illinois National Guardsman, were walking together and talking. Gibson had had a premonition of his own death. What really bothered him was that it was his daughter's birthday. Bruni tried to get Gibson's mind off the idea by talking about the north woods of Wisconsin and fishing there. Suddenly the two men were strafed. Seven Japanese fighters had appeared over the airfield. Gibson jumped into a halftrack that was hidden under a tree and grabbed its machine gun. Fred told Gibson to stay where he was and that he would direct Gibson's fire.

That afternoon, a second attack took place. This time there were seven Japanese bombers. Gibson climbed onto a halftrack and grabbed its .50 caliber machinegun. Fred called out to Gibson, "Stay there, and I'll direct your fire." Fred walked out into the open with bombs exploding around him. He proceeded to direct Gibson's fire at the Japanese bombers as bombs exploded around him. Gibson opened fire where Fred told him to do so. Together, they were credited with shooting down one of the bombers.

For the next four months, Fred lived through constant strafing and bombings during the retreat into the Bataan Peninsula. On one occasion, the bombing was so severe that he jumped into the nearest two man foxhole and made it a three man foxhole.

On April 8, 1942, it was Fred's job to inform the sergeants of A Company of the plans to surrender. While informing the members of the company of the surrender, he waved his arm toward the tanks and told the men that they would no longer need them. As he spoke, his voice choked. He turned away from the men for a moment, and when he turned back he continued. He next told the sergeants what they should do to disable the tanks. During the announcement he emphasized that they all were to surrender together.

The next day, April 9, 1942, Capt. Fred Bruni informed the members of HQ Company of the surrender. With the other men, he remained in the camp for two days before they were ordered to move out to the road that passed their encampment. As they stood alongside the road, Japanese soldiers took whatever they wanted from Fred's and the other men's possessions.

HQ Company boarded trucks and drove to Mariveles. From there, they walked to Mariveles Airfield and sat and waited. As they sat, Fred and the other Prisoners of War noticed a line of Japanese soldiers forming across from them. They soon realized that this was a firing squad and the Japanese were going to kill them.

As they sat watching the Japanese soldiers, a Japanese officer pulled up in a car and stopped. He got out and spoke to the Japanese sergeant in charge of the detail. The officer got back in the car and drove off. The Japanese sergeant ordered his soldiers to lower their guns.

Later in the day, Fred's company was moved to a school yard in Mariveles. In the school yard, they found themselves between Japanese artillery and the guns firing from Corregidor and Ft. Drum. Shells began landing among the POWs who had no place to hide. Some of the POWs were killed by the incoming shells.

The POWs were ordered to move by the Japanese. Fred and the other men had no idea that they had started what became known as the death march. During the march he received no water and little food. He and his men marched 65 miles to San Fernando. There, they were boarded onto boxcars. Each car was filled with 100 men. Those men who died remained standing since there was no room for them to fall.

At Capas, Fred disembarked the boxcar and walked the last few miles to Camp O'Donnell. He remained there until going out on a work detail. After completion of the detail, he was sent to Cabanatuan #3.

During his time as a POW, Fred kept a notebook on the other members of his original tank company from Janesville. In the book, he wrote down where the members of A Company were being held as prisoners. If a man died, he wrote down the date, location and cause. Much of what he wrote was based on what other POWs told him.

When he realized that he was going to be transferred to another part of the Philippine Islands, Fred sent the following letter to Lt. Henry Knox. The letter was smuggled into Cabanatuan #1. How this was done is not known.

Dear Knox,

How are you and the boys? I hope that you are making contact with the boys of the company and the Janesville boys in Headquarters Company. I would you to make a list of the dead ones and get the cause of death and date of their death so that we can have something to go by when the day comes. I hope the dying siege is over with. Things are in good shape here, and I wish they were all up to this camp. I mean the whole battalion.

I would like to visit a few days down at your camp so that I could say hello to all the officers and men that you can see. And tell them to keep clean and healthy for the day is coming and I want to see them alive. So take good care of yourself and tell the rest goodbye. And do what I told you.

Capt. Bruni

Fred was sent to Camp #10 in the Philippines. This designation was given to one of two POW camps. The first was at Lipa, Batangas and the second at Batangas, Batangas. The POWs at the first camp built runways, while the POWs at the second camp worked on a farm growing food for the Japanese.

Sometime during his imprisonment, Capt Fred Bruni was transferred to Puerto Princess on Palawan Island. He was the ranking American officer and in charge of the detail. In this role, he often found himself giving orders that created resentment among the enlisted men. Many failed to see that Fred had little choice in the matter; either he gave the order or he or the men would be punished.

Fred frequently was involved in situations where no matter what he did, he would anger either the enlisted men or the officers. Things really came to a head during Christmas of 1943.

In late 1943, the Japanese promised the POWs a large Christmas dinner. There was already a great deal of resentment toward the officers since they did not have to work while the enlisted men did. When Christmas arrived, the "large dinner" turned out to be a total of six chickens. Fred found himself having to make a choice between giving all the chickens to the enlisted men or giving five chickens to the enlisted men and one chicken to the officers. He chose to give one chicken to officers. This left over 100 enlisted men to share five chickens. Many of the men carried hard feelings toward Fred because of this decision.

When it became apparent to Japanese that Palawan would soon be invaded by the advancing American forces, they gave the order that all Prisoners of War should be executed instead of being allowed to fall into American hands.

After the war, Fred's family learned that he had been executed. This information was provided by another soldier from Janesville who liberated the island. The soldier told Fred's family that the POWs were forced into the air raid trenches which were five hundred feet long and four feet deep. After they were in the trenches, the Japanese guards threw gasoline into the ends of the trenches and then threw in lit torches. As the POWs rushed from the shelters, the Japanese bayoneted and machine-gunned them. After this, dynamite was thrown into the trenches to assure that the POWs were dead.

Forty or fifty men still managed to get out of the trenches. From what has been learned, Fred was in this trench. Those POWs who managed to escape jumped from a fifty foot cliff to the beach. Shore sentries and guards on barges shot at them from the cliffs and boats. Those who were recaptured by the Japanese were buried alive while those who survived the massacre swam to their freedom.

One POW who was recaptured had attempted to swim to freedom. The Japanese stuck him with bayonets and poured gasoline on his feet and set him on fire. The entire time they mocked him and continued to bayonet him. They finally poured gasoline over his entire body and watched the flames devour him.

Of the POWs who had managed to escape, only ten survived what became known as the Palawan Massacre. Capt. Fred T. Bruni was not one of these men. Early in 1945, his wife received several POW cards from her husband. She hoped that this was a sign that he would be home soon. She had no idea that he had already been murdered. His murder was confirmed when his wife received the small notebook he had kept as a diary while a POW. The book had a mark on it that indicated it had come from the Island of Palawan.

Capt. Fred T. Bruni was burnt to death with 122 other POWs on Palawan Island by the Japanese on December 14, 1944. He and the other POWs were murdered because the Japanese did not want them to be liberated by advancing American troops.

In 1952, the remains of Capt. Fred T. Bruni Jr. and the other American soldiers, who had died on Palawan Island, were returned to the United States. Since the remains of the POWs were so badly burnt that they could not be identified, the soldiers were buried in a common grave on February 14, 1952 at Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery. The picture below is of Capt. Bruni's name on the headstone of the Palawan Massacre victims at Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery in St. Louis, Missouri.