Bernard L Anderson

How a boy from LaValle became a Filipino Warlord.

In December, 1941, Bernard L. Anderson, who grew up grew up in LaValle, was frantically driving south in a brand new Oldsmobile. His cargo was yeast. Anderson was a First Lieutenant in the Air Corp serving as an administrative and supply officer in the city of Manila on the northern most island of Luzon of the Philippines. The Americans, under the command of General Douglas MacArthur, had been order to retreat to Bataan when the Japanese invaded Luzon from the north at then end of 1941.

The retreating army had taken truckloads of flour with them for making bread but they forgot the yeast. Anderson returned to the nearly abandoned city to retrieve the yeast and then catch up with the armed forces whose destination was Bataan. The Bataan Peninsula was the last stand destination for the US and Philippino forces. They hoped to hold out until reinforcements could arrive from the United States. However, the Japanese forces began their siege on January 7, 1942. The majority of the American and Filipino forces surrendered on April 9 and were forced to march the 62 miles from Bataan to Tarlac, which became known as the Bataan Death March.

Anderson and a companion escaped into the mountains when the order to surrender was given. They hid from the Japanese in the jungle and trenches. With nothing to eat and very little to drink, they wandered through the jungle until they stumbled across a hidden mountain camp of Filipinos. “Those people took care of us, and they shared everything they had with us, ” Anderson said.

Several other American officers and men escaped from Bataan and guerilla groups began to form throughout the 40,000 square mile island. Eventually, 1,400 groups developed consisting of 250,000 guerilla fighters.



Anderson’s first attack on the Japanese was an ambush of 3 Japanese trucks in the jungle.  His group of 25 guerillas killed the Japanese and took their supplies. From that point, Anderson’s Guerrillas (as they were known as to the Allies), continued to grow in size and harass the enemy whenever possible. They operated along the Sierra Madre range, close to the heart of the Japanese occupation. As the men were trained and armed, they broke off into semi-independent  groups but remained under Anderson’s overall command. He personally led a company of 400 men. Four of the men who served under him eventually served as presidents of the Philippines.

At the age of 28, Bernard Anderson, a young man who grew up in Lavalle, a  was a full-fledged “Tatoang” - a jungle warlord. He was a barefoot commander, running through the jungle with his barefoot army as the Japanese hunted for them. Referred to by the Japanese as “Andasan the Bandit” , he had a 25,000 peso (equivalent to $12,500 in 1942 American dollars) reward offered by the Japanese to anyone who would find and betray him.

 When the Japanese army invaded Luzon in December of 1941, within days after their raid on Pearl Harbor, the U.S. (30,000 personnel) and Filipino (25,000) armed forces along with 100,000 Filipino raw volunteers retreated to the Bataan Peninsula to await reinforcements from the United States.  Too many people and too little in the way of food, water, medicine and weapons painted a bleak picture for the allied troops. MacArthur was ordered to retreat to Australia (“I shall return”) in March and Bataan commander, General Edward King, was forced to surrender to the Japanese on April 9, 1942.

The majority of prisoners were forced to march north in what became known as the Bataan Death March. However, there were many that were able to avoid the march by by escaping into the mountains before the Japanese arrived in Bataan, one of which was Bernard Anderson. For the next 3 1/2 years, he did his best to harass the enemy, coordinate intelligence between the different guerilla bands with the Allies in Australia and bring aid and comfort to the Japanese prison camps where Americans and Filipinos were held.

Weapons and equipment were in short supply in the early days and the best place to obtain needed materials was from the enemy. Men from the guerilla bands went to work for the Japanese. They would steal radio and generator parts, piece by piece, and re-assemble them in the mountains. The first objective was to contact Allied Forces. Using a generator fueled by coconut oil, Anderson was able to tap out his first message into the void of the Pacific which was received in Australia. The Allies didn’t believe him! They assumed it was the Japanese playing tricks. “I used my best foul language to convince them I was an American,” Anderson said, “but they wouldn’t believe me.” During the next few weeks, the Allies developed a list of 100 questions that only Anderson would know the answer to.

Once radio contact was established, the Allies started delivering supplies by submarine, surfacing off deserted beaches, close enough for the guerillas to paddle rafts out to the subs and pick up weapons, food and medicine. “We had men smuggling food and medicine into the Japanese prison camps,” he said. “It was one of our priorities.” Anderson’s motivation to supply prisoners was his finance Betty Lou. She was an American girl that Anderson had met in Manilla and they became engaged to be married. She was captured and held in one of the prison camps near Manilla.

Anderson’s Guerillas continued to ambush enemy patrols, gather intelligence, aid prisoners and harass the Japanese whenever possible. However, the Japanese retaliation became too brutal for Anderson to continue attacking Japanese troops. “They were killing 10 villagers for every solider they lost. It go so bad we stopped out attacks entirely in 1943,” he said. They concentrated on sabotage, the rescue of American airmen shot down over the island, smuggling medicine into the prison camps and gathering intelligence. Eventually, they had 25 radios set up around the island sending out weather reports and intelligence for the American air attacks.

Anderson was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel and commanded a jungle army of 17,000 men. He figures they lost 2,200 of their men but inflicted loses as high as 38,000 of the enemy during the 3 1/2 years they were in the mountains. Much of that toll was inflicted in January, 1945 while his army was making diversionary attacks south of Manila as the American invasion forces advanced to the north to recapture the Philippines.

As Manila fell, Anderson went looking for his fiance, Betty Lou. He found the prison camp he knew she was held in but was unable to find her. He learned she had died a few months earlier from a ruptured appendix when the Japanese refused to operate on her.

“I was outraged. I vowed they would pay heavily for that. I went back into the mountains.”

Part of his vengeance was taken against Admiral Farusi who was fleeing Manila with a column of 2,500 naval troops. “We killed about 1,000 of them.” Farusi surrendered the rest of his troops at a river crossing north of Infanta on the east coast of Luzon. “They had just massacred several hundred civilians from Infanta,” Anderson remembered. “He handed me his Samurai sword and said ‘Thank you for treatment I do not deserve’.”

Along with the sword, Anderson brought home 23 medals, orders and awards he earned during his 3 1/2 year stint as a Filipino warlord and was one of the highest decorated soldiers of the Pacific Theater.

Anderson remained in the Philippines for several years as a civilian and eventually retired from the Air Force Reserve as a Colonel. When he returned to the United States, he went to work as a representative for the clay products association. Since his territory included Iowa and Nebraska, he settled in Boone, Iowa. He died the day after Christmas, 1997 at the age of 84 years, 4 months and 5 days while in Florida and was buried in the Calvary Cemetery in Reedsburg.