Earl R. Brewster
Chaplain, USN (Ret.)
Alpine, California Sept. 1969
Preface
For Rosie and Cathy
“Barbed-wire Chaplain” is not fiction; it is composed of facts and observations from my own experience over a period of five years. This period includes the years of World War II, beginning a year before Pearl Harbor — when I was fresh-caught in San Diego, and ending near the close of 1945 — after having enjoyed “my home sweet home” in Coronado for several months.
The first part of the book is designed to provide a background for the three years behind barbed-wire, which is the heart of my story. Although this is not a travelogue, I have tried in the first chapters to picture the chaplain in different and varied situations, with which most people may not be familiar.
Although this is a serious book, I did not want it to be too morbid or grim and have gone out of my way to tell of amusing incidents…as well as those more touching…and some which had to be quite morbid and grim.
This book is not designed to be history. Although I have used facts rather than fiction, and have tried to be accurate, I have not engaged completely in the kind of research characteristic of a PhD dissertation. Any mistakes –of omission, as well as commission — are of the head, rather than the heart, you may be assured.
It may seem to some that at times I have been pretty hard on our captors; maybe I have been hard, but I trust that I have been fair, which I have aimed to be. If I didn’t dislike the expression, I would say “I have told it like it was”. The fact is, an even more brutally realistic picture could have been drawn.
This account has been written in appreciation of my fellow prisoners of war, and primarily for my family and friends, without whom I would not have been able to tell the story.
from Amphibious Force Pacific Fleet – The Amphibian
Greatness never comes to anyone by imitating others. We may not apprpriate another man’s words or another man’s gifts. Why is it that four great Shakespearean actors such as Hampden, Sothern, Barrymore, and Evans each presented a different Hamlet? The answer is that each one had to be himself. They used the same words, but they made them their own.
Let each use such virtues of the mind and soul and heart as we possess. That, after all is the only accomplishment a man will ever have –to be himself–to be what he can truly be.
This truth becomes evident in the realm of our high ideals. How many a young man is stirred by a real passion for mankind! He is conscious of the ills that beset society. He is sensitive to the injuries that come to the innocent. He cannot calmly look upon a world saturated with the blood of youth.
So, he will change the world NOW. He will make it a better place in which to live. Nobody in his right mind would discourage a young man. But even here lies a danger which besets the zealous reformer. It is not true that a man must begin with himself? to want to die for mankind is a beautiful thought, but will not a man first die for those about him? Some day you must work justice in the far, wide world, but you must begin with yourself.
We know there are problems which await our wisdom and our courage. There is racial prejudice and intolerance. What are you doing about it in your own back yard! there are many problems which will not be solved until you and I begin their solution just where we are with what we have. How about starting today – where you are!
Roxton, Texas
7 February, 1944
From: Major J. Hawkins, USMC
To: Brigedier General Robert L. Denig, USMC
Subject: Heroic conduct on the part of Chaplain Earl Ray Brewster, U.S. Navy
Reference: (a) Your Letter of 31 January, 1944
- In accordance with the request contained in reference (a), this account of the heroic conduct on the part of Chaplain Earl Ray Brewster, USN, while a prisoner of war in the Philippines, is submitted.
- After initial surrender of the Philippines, I was interned at Prison Camp number 1 at Cabanatuan, Nueva Eoija, P.I. I met Chaplain Brewster for the first time in this camp and was immediately struck by his splendid example of courage and fortitude under the stress of the terrible circumstances in which we found ourselves. In this camp all Naval and Marine Corps personnel, seeking to keep together as much as possible, had managed to be quartered in the same portion of the camp. It was difficult to maintain faith and hope in these horrible circumstances, but it was made easier for all of us by the moral and spiritual leadership of Chaplain Brewster. He was our friend and counselor and a constant source of good cheer and hope. He ministered to the sick organized a daily Bible class for us which benefited all of us greatly, and every Sunday he delivered a sermon to us which was absolutely inspiring. His efforts were endless even though his physical strength ebbed constantly as a result of the starvation we were enduring.
- Finally a group of prisoners numbering one thousand were sent to Camp number 2 at the former Davao Penal Colony in Mindanao. Chaplain Brewster and I were in this group. We all suffered terribly from exposure and the unbelievably crowded and filthy conditions on the Japanese ship during the eleven day trip to Davao. Upon our arrival there, we were forced to march about twenty miles, which, in our weakened condition, was almost beyond the limits of our endurance. It was not long after our arrival in the new camp that Chaplain Brewster developed beri beri, the disease which was very serious. He suffered, endless stabbing pain in his feet and legs and he was not able to get up from his bed in our crude hospital. He was very thin. Sleep for him was almost impossible since there were no sedatives and the pain never stopped, not even for a minute. He once told me “Jack, I never new such suffering was possible on this earth. But I will never give up.” Major Austin C. Shofner, USMC, Major Michel Dobervich, USMC, and I visited him several times each week and tried to help him by bringing a little fruit which we stole and smuggled past the Japanese guards. He kept his cheerful attitude through all his suffering. Although we thought his case was almost hopeless, we were overjoyed when he began to show improvement, and we marveled when we found him on his feet, even though it caused him torturing pain, holding religious services for the other suffering patients in the hospital. When I escaped with the other members of our party of ten, we left Chaplain Brewster still improving, still walking, still defying pain, still bringing hope and courage to the hearts of men.
- It is hoped that this inspiring story will become a permanent record of the Chaplain Corps.
/s/ Jack Hawkins
JACK HAWKINS
Bob Ripley, had he lived, could have continued his “Believe It or Not” series indefinitely by contacting chaplains for his material. Without any trouble at all we accumulate quite a store of choice items aling this line. A fair sample would be the quaint notion that servicemen come up with every now and then that the Ten Commandments are just for civilians–that by special dispensation such things are suspended for the Armed Forces. The scuttlebutt seems to be that God obligingly changes the rules for you when you change into uniform.
Jesus Christ, of course, had other ideas. He put them across in a text made to order for military — “Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.” Here is the perfect sermonette for servicemen, brief but complete, and familiar to all, but forgotten by many. Forgotten, that is, as to the second half, for there is no complaint that the members of the Armed Forces haven’t sought to serve the nation as they ought–haven’t sought to “render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s.” In fact, one must marvel at and admire their zeal in matters military, and the infinite pains taken by officers and men to “go by the book.” Navy Regulations are the gospel which they would no more consider violating than a saint would think of blaspheming. All of which, to be sure, is very commendable–as far as it goes. But, when being “strictly G.I.” is the only virture we care about, when we knock ourselves out rendering to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s but refuse to give God the things that are God’s isn’t this more than a little inconsistent? For all human authorityis based on and derives from Divine Authority. “Let everyone be the subject to the higher authorities, for there exists no authority except from God, and those who exist have been appointed by God.”
Hence, if we join with those who cried, “We have no king but Caesar” we shall winde up without even Caesar for a king, for we shear him of his power when we renounce the King of Kings. It turns out then, that we can’t really [be] patriotic to hilt unless we are religious as well; we can’t fully render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s unless we also render to God the things that are God’s.”
