Mr. KRUSE. Above sea level. Mr. CASE. The ground water is higher than sea level? Mr. KRUSE. The ground water is so far down it was not reached in the test. Mr. CASE. How far is Guam from Hawaii? General HORKAN. It is about 3,000 miles, plus. Mr. CASE. About 3,000 miles. Hawaii has a Territorial status, does it not? General HORKAN. Yes. Mr. CASE. Guam has not as yet. General HORKAN. But the individual governments in Guam and Hawaii Mr. CASE (interposing). There has not been any expression of the Congress entering into the decision that this concentrated cemetery should be at Guam rather than Hawaii? General HORKAN. The matter I do not think was formally referred to the Congress. Selection was made by the Battle Monuments Commission, the Departments of the Army, the Navy, and the Marine Corps under administrative action. General LARKIN. I might state that the plan was discussed at the hearing before this committee last year, Mr. Case. Mr. CASE. No provision was made at that time for cemeteries. General LARKIN. NO. General HORAN. It was based on the number of bodies and the assemblying of those bodies, and the beautification of those cemeteries later by the Battle Monuments Commission. Mr. CASE. What I am getting at is this: I had no way of knowing how the next of kin would feel about it other than how it would appeal to me, but it would seem to me that where the body should rest would be in the approximate area where it fell or that it be brought definitely under the United States territory, and Guam is some 3,860 miles beyond Hawaii, as I understand. General HORKAN. They will have a say as to whether they are to be left at Guam or brought to the United States; they could not very well be given the choice of cemeteries at first when we had 450 temporary cemeteries. Mr. CASE. That is possibly true. General LARKIN. We could not wait a decision to remove them to the temporary cemeteries. Mr. CASE. But moving them several hundred miles to a thousand miles from where they fell is not the same as leaving them where they fell, or the establishment of a cemetery in Guam is not the same as establishing a cemetery in the United States or in Hawaii. General LARKIN. I appreciate that, but you understand we could not have a great number of cemeteries in the Pacific with bodies. scattered all over the many islands there. General HORKAN. Guam is a central place on the way from Hawaii to Manila, the three places where the bodies were moved. Mr. CASE. Are you moving the bodies on the Philippine Islands to the cemetery in Manila? General HORKAN. Yes; they are assembled on the island around Manila and those that stay there will be buried in Manila. Mr. CASE. The boys who fell at Leyte will be moved to Manila? General HORKAN. Yes. Mr. CASE. Do the next of kin know that? General HORKAN. They know it as soon as they were reburied. Mr. CASE. They know it as soon as they are reburied, but they they did not know it before they were reburied to ask that they be moved back to the United States? General LARKIN. They can ask that they be moved back to the United States, but they could not be moved back to the United States at that time; we were not in position to do so. Mr. CASE. That may be, but I am thinking of the case of some parent whose boy fell at Leyte who desired that the body remain on the island where he fell. General LARKIN. Yes. Mr. CASE. My understanding is that the body is going to be taken up and moved from there to Manila. General LARKIN. Or it will be brought to America. Mr. CASE. But that is not the place where the man fell. General LARKIN. No. Mr. CASE. And that was not the original choice. General HORKAN. The original choice was to leave him over there. or bring him over to the United States. Mr. CASE. That is all I have Mr. Chairman. CEMETERIES IN EUROPE Mr. ENGEL. Over in the European theater I noticed bodies were being buried in private cemeteries. General LARKIN. Yes. Mr. ENGEL. They are being moved to a central place? General LARKIN. To a central place. Mr. ENGEL. And in Europe you are establishing national cemeteries? General HORKAN. Not national. Mr. ENGEL. American cemeteries. General LARKIN. American cemeteries, yes. Mr. ENGEL. I understand you will establish new cemeteries for the World War II dead. General LARKIN. Yes. Mr. ENGEL. And you will remove all the bodies, or many of them, to the permanent sites? General LARKIN. That is right. General HORKAN. The way it works out over there is that, a permanent cemetery will be at Henri Chappelle in France. Where the next of kin want the bodies to remain overseas, or where they are to be returned to the United States, they can be assembled at Henri Chappelle for final disposition. There are some seven or eight cemeteries around Henri Chappelle. Those remaining over there can be buried in Henri Chappelle and those who are to be taken out of the other areas and brought to that area can remain there or be brought back to the United States. That is the plan that has been worked out on the overseas basis, and the same plan is worked at Guam. Mr. CASE. I have a great deal of respect for the people in charge of these cemeteries and the way they are doing the work. I visited the one at Cambridge, the American cemetery in England, which I thought was an exceptionally well handled cemetery, and I was impressed particularly with the spirit of the people who were doing the work. General HORKAN. Yes. Mr. CASE. The officer in charge extended every courtesy to me. He did not know who I was when I first arrived; that did not make any difference; he was courteous to everyone, and I was impressed by it, as I am sure the next of kin would be. But I do think that when people were given the choice they should have been told that there was a choice not necessarily between leaving them where they were buried at the battle front, at a cemetery immediately adjacent, they should have been told if this particular body is going to be disturbed the choice should be between having it reburied overseas or brought home. General HORKAN. They were told which is to be the permanent. cemetery. General LARKIN. They could not have been told that initially, where some of the cemeteries have to be moved. The next of kin do have the choice now. Mr. CASE. But you are moving the bodies from Guadalcanal to Guam. General LARKIN. But we could not have brought that body home at that time. General HORKAN. No. They were told where the permanent cemetery was going to be. For example, the cemetery at St. James is going to be permanent, but there are quite a few other cemeteries in that area. The question concerned those who wanted the bodies left at St. James and several who wanted the burials to be at St. Mere Eglise instead of St. James. They are all being told where the permanent cemetery is going to be located, but they still have the choice of saying whether they are to be located there or whether they are to be brought home. CEMETERY IN MANILA Mr. SCRIVNER. I am going to have something nice to say later, General, but why was not the same practice you gave in this example followed in case of the boys who died at Leyte; why did you not follow the same practice that you did in Europe? General HORKAN. They were told that. Mr. SCRIVNER. But why was not the parent told, that the boy who fell at Leyte must be disturbed and moved to a permanent cemetery at Manila, where they have the choice now of either leaving the body there or having it brought to the United States; why was he not told before that they could bring him home? General HORKAN. Again in the Philippine Islands, of course, Leyte was not going to be the site for the cemetery; there was to be a cemetery in the Philippines and it was not until some 3 or 4 months ago that a permanent location was established. We had a cemetery 70546 -48- -2 at Manila, No. 2, that was to be a permanent cemetery over there, but it was not suitable; there was a resurvey made and now it is going to be at Fort McKinley. Mr. SCRIVNER. I thought Fort McKinley was to be turned over, lock, stock, and barrel to the Philippine Government. General HORKAN. It was, but we have taken it up through the State Department with a view to getting 157 acres of Fort McKinley transferred to the American Government for a national cemetery. Mr. SCRIVNER. As I said, I am going to say something nice later, but it does seem to me that this program could have been handled in a way that there would not have been so much difficulty. Take the Philippine situation as an example, it seems to me that your minds have changed rapidly. I was in the Philippines in October. They told me over there that USAF No. 2 was to be made a permanent cemetery. General HORKAN. You mean No. 2 of Manila? Mr. SCRIVNER. Yes. I think they called it USAF No. 2. told that you had already agreed to turn Fort McKinley, lock, stock, and barrel, back to the Philippine Government. Now you come in here and make the statement that you are going to try to get back 155 acres from the Philippine Government to establish a permanent cemetery in Fort McKinley. General HORKAN. The reason for that was some of USAF No. 2 privately owned grounds, and the Philippine Government did not want the cemetery there, and we would have had to pay a very high price for it. Mr. SCRIVNER. Why was it established there in the first place? You have about 8,000 acres at Fort McKinley? General HORKAN. I do not know the exact amount. Mr. SCRIVNER. Any how, several thousand acres. Mr. SCRIVNER. Why was a cemetery established there in the first place? General HORKAN. The burials there were probably because of battle conditions, and it was closest to Manila. The present Philippine Government has approved this site of Fort McKinley, It was surveyed, and it seems to be the best site for a cemetery in the Philippines. Mr. SCRIVNER. And the bodies will be transferred there from the other cemeteries. General LARKIN. Where the next of kin desire them to be returned home they will be returned home? Mr. SCRIVNER. Yes. General HORKAN. The bodies from Leyte will go to the Manila cemetery and be reburied. Mr. SCRIVNER. Yes. General HORKAN. Or returned home. This situation in the Philippines was gone over with the Philippine Government and also with the State Department and was thrashed out very thoroughly. CARE OF REMAINS Mr. SCRIVNER. Let us go back to another matter: On the trip that I made I visited a number of these Graves Registration installations and I think it would be well for the Congress to know and for the public to know the way in which the remains are handled in these concentration centers. They are handled with the greatest of care, with the greatest of respect, and I found every one, whether they were military or civilians, who were working with these remains were enthusiastic about their work. I watched with great interest the way in which these remains were handled, how they were brought into the mausoleums, the care with which the remains were handled after they entered the mausoleums, the manner in which everything was done, the kindness and the sympathy exercised I was particularly impressed with the whole method of operation used to insure as far as humanly possible the absolute identity of the remains even in some cases where it was quite difficult to be established. After the remains had gone through the process of being placed in the permanent caskets for shipment back to the States, I was impressed by the way in which they were handled and the methods used in storing them for shipment, the type of container that was used, the means that were followed from the very first step on through every phase including final delivery to the next of kin at home. This activity is something that can be highly commended, I believe both by the Congress and by the public at large. Particularly was I impressed with the work that was being done out in India, where we have withdrawn practically all of our troops now, by the grave registration service, by the people who go up into India and Burma and even into China and make the most careful survey of every sort to locate any Americans who may have fallen there. They have run down every possible clue as to the possible location of any American boy who might have fallen there. Where they have located these remains they have placed them on a plane and flown them back to Calcutta where they have gone through the process of being prepared for permanent burial. They have done a very fine job. These men have shown an interest and enthusiasm about a job that to me would not be appealing whatsoever, and yet, as I say, these men seem to me to have an enthusiasm and love for their work that is to be highly commended. I know of many instances where there was not any such thing as a 40-hour week, no 9 to 5; they worked not 5 days a week but 7 days a week. Many times they worked on late into the night, until they were absolutely sure in their own minds that they had properly identified the remains. NEW SITE FOR CEMETERY AT GUAM Now let us get back for a moment to Guam. The statement made now is that this new proposed cemetery of approximately 120 acres is to be further north on the island from the present cemetery. As I understand it, it is just a short distance from the end of the long runway on Harmon Field, so that large planes that would use this field would fly over the present site of this cemetery? Mr. KRUSE. It would be south; the runway would be south (indicating). Mr. SCRIVNER. I recently visited Harmon Field. It will be a little difficult to get the map in the record, but what I am trying to show is this: Harmon Field is north of the center island in Guam; is it not? Mr. KRUSE. That is right. |