The Cabalcade of America, sponsored by DuPont, maker of better things for better living through chemistry presents Pat O'Brien as Royal Arch Gunnison in So Sorry, No Mercy. Before we begin our play, here's a word about Speed Easy, one of DuPont's better things for better living. Speed Easy is the remarkable new wall finish that covers dingy wallpaper with one quick coat. It thins with water and dries in an hour. Speed Easy comes in eight beautiful pastel tints and one gallon does the average room. Try DuPont Speed Easy to brighten up your home this spring. Our DuPont Cabalcade play is the story of an American foreign correspondent and radio news commentator, Royal Arch Gunnison, who in the days of peace foresaw and warned the world of the war Japan was preparing. The Japanese tried but were unable to stop Gunnison from telling his story. Eighteen months in a Japanese internment camp couldn't stop him. Tonight's Cabalcade play, So Sorry, No Mercy, is the story the Japanese tried to stop Gunnison from telling to his countrymen. Later in the program, Mr. Gunnison will speak to us from New York City. DuPont presents So Sorry, No Mercy, starring Pat O'Brien in the role of Royal Arch Gunnison on the Cabalcade of America. Yes, I was a prisoner of the Japanese. I never thought I'd return to tell this tale. I saw men beaten and was beaten myself. I saw babies blue and swollen with hunger dying in their mother's arms. I try not to remember, but remembering and reporting is my job. In December of 1941, I was in Manila, still writing, still broadcasting to you back here at home to wake up. Wake up! War was on our doorstep and then... Then it struck. War, terror, devastation. On the 24th of December, President Kazan and General MacArthur moved out of Manila, but I stayed. I kept on with my broadcasts. Then one morning, the transmitter was smashed and I went back to our rooms to find my wife who had refused to leave without me. Arch, can we still get to Corrigidor? Well, we can establish from trying. On my way back here, I went by and talked to Sancho. Said he'd hire a car if he could and be here to pick us up. Bless Sancho, anyhow. He's such a faithful servant and such a fine friend. Sancho, my dear, is the whole Philippine nation. Five feet two of guts and loyalty. Arch, what's that? Sounds like a Paris taxi cab. Wait, I'll go and look. Well, it's Sancho. Hello, Sancho. Shut off the motor. Come on in. Help us with the luggage. Sir, you like car? Me got gasoline too. What did he say, darling? I think he was going on a picnic. Come on, Sancho, make it snappy. Oh, yes, sir. Sancho, come right away. Here he comes, dear. Open the door for him, will you? I got car and I got gasoline too. Well, how wonderful, Sancho. Before we go in car, we make pledge between us. Mr. Garrison? No pledge by all means and the first shall be to you, Sancho, and to the Philippines to fight for your freedom from the Japs. Thank you, sir. Mabuhay, long life. Thank you, sir. Mabuhay for General MacArthur and Mabuhay for General Wainwright. Long live Wainwright. Mabuhay for President Roosevelt and President Kishan. Wait a minute, Sancho. We can't go on here forever wishing Mabuhay to the whole world. For one thing, we've got work to do and, well, let's get moving. Where are we headed, Sancho? I know way. Only one we left. Maybe Japs not there. Take it easy, will you, Sancho? Aren't those Japs? Ah, it is no good. The road's blocked. Tanks and trucks. We can't make it. You know any other roads, Sancho? No, sir. That is the last. How about the waterfront? Waterfront okay, but Mr. Moto have boats. Well, that's out. Darling, looks like we're stuck. Well, we said we'd stick it out. I guess now we really will. Yeah. Let's go back to the hotel and finish our Mabuhays while we wait for the suns ahead of us. We waited all day. We never left the hotel. Saw a few of our friends and exchanged speculations. No one really knew what to expect. Some people were frantic, some calm. The Filipinos themselves were the most jittery. They knew the Japs. Late in the day, Sancho came to me. Sir, you help my people? Help them how, Sancho? What can I do? What can anyone do now? I take you to the Japanese general. Japanese general? Well, I don't think it'd help to have an American go to the general. I'm a pet hate of the Japs. We all are. Oh, no, no. You try. You go. My people do not know what to do. They are sick with wondering what will happen. Marjorie, darling, Sancho wants me to walk into the lion's den. What do you think? I don't know. Maybe you could find out something to relieve the strain. Not knowing what's going to happen is the worst thing we face. Still, if you think it's dangerous... Oh, I don't know, Arch. Okay, I'll go. Be careful, darling, will you? Careful? Say, I'll be humble. You know me. One bow for the emperor, one bow for the general. Better you bow American. You are not accustomed to bowing before our race? No. I'm not accustomed to bowing at all. Ah, but you will learn in time. Why do you come, please? To ask you how you intend to treat the Filipinos, British, Dutch, and Americans in Manila. Very interesting when one of you great Americans come to pay visit. Do not be frightened, Mr. Gunnison. The Japanese have not learned all the cruelty of your superior race. Not yet. I only came to ask that we receive our rights under international law. International law? Need I remind you, Mr. Gunnison, that I am the international law? You speak very good English, general. Your country's colleges were most useful. We can dictate our peace in your White House in two languages. You may go now, Mr. Gunnison. We will not forget you, not for a moment. And do not fear. We will enter this city in an orderly fashion. You will see, Mr. Gunnison. Yes, you most certainly will see. At very night, January the 2nd, the Japs marched into Manila. Those who visited the Bayview Hotel were put under house arrest. For three days, everything was orderly as the general had boasted it would be. And then everything turned into a carnal hell of looting, murder, and worse. Mommy, where are you? Mommy? Mommy, where are you? Read proclamation. Read proclamation, American pigs. This property has been officially taken over by his Imperial Japanese Majesty, or no one shall leave the premises. Mommy? Mommy? Mommy? Mommy, where are you? After a few days of horrible confusion, 300 people, Americans and British, men, women, and children, were routed out of the hotel and given the sun treatment. We stood all day in the wet heat, Jap soldiers jeering at us constantly. Our baggage was beside us. We had been told that we could take what we could carry. Marjorie and I had a mosquito net, few clothes, blankets, a pillow, one can of beans, a can of spaghetti, and one jar of grape juice. Little enough to start out to, well, we didn't know where. Yet we were lucky. What we had, we had. Our baggage escaped being ripped open by the bayonets of Jap inspectors who prowled up and down the sagging line of exhausted prisoners. At nightfall, a truck came for us. We drove away to, well, it was the road to hell, but we didn't know it then. Attention, all prisoners. All meetings will be done. All protests will be done. Escape is impossible. Death come to all who make trouble. Death come to all who make trouble. Well, dear, our new home isn't all it might be. No beds, no furniture, no food. Still, we're alive, together. I'm glad we haven't children. Look at those poor youngsters. Oh, yes, the poor little devils. Where we are. Santo Tomas University, my friend. Welcome to the halls of higher learning. My name's Twilla. Yanks, aren't you? I'm Arch Gunnison. This is Mrs. Gunnison. Awkward, isn't it? Well, that's one word for it. I came in three days ago. 2,000 prisoners here, all in one concrete building. One washroom, two showers. Well, how about food? Well, old boy, food's a bit thin, as we say. For breakfast, it's wormy, cracked wheat. For dinner, rice sweepings with maybe a piece of bloated buffalo meat. And that, that's all? That's all. And that doesn't come from the Japs, my dear. It comes from our good Filipino friends. Once a day, they're allowed to hand us a bit through that iron picket fence. And police dogs? In case we choose to leave our comfortable surroundings without permission, they howl all night. Very refined torture. Come along, I'll show you around. Might as well know the worst. Somehow, we got adjusted to the life of filth, bad food, and general misery. But it was beginning to tell. Many of us were ill. We had doctors, but no medical supplies. Few people died. During certain daylight hours, we were allowed to go out and walk around what had once been the university campus. We used to walk along by the iron picket fence. Not saying much. Just thinking what it would be like to be on the other side again. To be free. One day, as we shuffled forlornly toward the fence, my wife suddenly clutched my arm. Arch, look. Where? Over there. On the other side of the fence. A cardboard sign. See? It's moving back and forth. Someone's signaling. That's strange. There's some writing. G-U-N-N. Gunnison. It says Gunnison. Careful. The guard will hear you. Look, Archie. It's Sancho. See him? Wave. Good old Sancho. Hurry, old boy. Amigos. I must be quick. Here is food. Sancho, a thousand thanks. This will save our lives. You don't know. Do not worry. I come every day, same time. Adios. Adios, Sancho. And God bless you. And every day Sancho did come. Every day for eight and a half months at three o'clock in the afternoon until one day... Here is small cake, sir. Hurry, Sancho. Hurry, the guard. Hurry, Michala. Hurry, Michala. Hurry, Sancho. He spotted you. Hurry. Run. Run. Was it Sancho Arch? Yes. Oh, those stinking murderers. You are listening to Pat O'Brien as Royal Arch Gunnison, the famous journalist in So Sorry, No Mercy. On the Cavalcade of America, sponsored by DuPont, maker of better things for better living through chemistry. The play is the dramatic record of Mr. Gunnison's experiences as a Japanese prisoner after the fall of Manila. At the conclusion of our play, Mr. Gunnison will be heard from New York. As our DuPont cavalcade continues, Gunnison, played by Pat O'Brien, has just witnessed the murder by the Japanese of Sancho, his faithful Filipino servant. It was only shortly after Sancho's wanton murder that, with no warning and even less explanation, we were mysteriously transferred with about 150 others to Shanghai. The Shanghai internment camp was no better. The same brutality, the same filth as at Santa Tomas. And beyond that, a new feature, a daily third-degree. For some reason, I seem to be their favorite subject. Now, take him back to his room. I am going to report his uncooperative attitude to the colonel. What colonel, sir? Captain, you should be sent back to school again. Any officer who cannot make a dog of an American do as he is told. But it is not always so quick, colonel. Some break in one day, others in two or three. And you have had a week to get Gunnison to agree to make that broadcast on the radio Tokyo and say the things we have prepared for him. Colonel, I have always cooperated completely with our ministry of propaganda. Gunnison almost agreed to it today. One more treatment, two at the most, and I am sure... You are sure of nothing, captain, except your excuses. And the only thing I am sure of is I shall take Mr. Gunnison in hand myself. Sergeant! Yes, colonel. Bring Gunnison here, to me, at once. Oh, why you... Oh, so sorry, Mr. Gunnison. We did not mean to break your grasses. Oh, your teeth are broken too, Mr. Gunnison. Oh, so sorry. Now will you retract what you have said about the Japanese? Answer! What are you referring to? We have complete fire on you. Once you say Japanese aggressive inferior people, you make ridicule of a tojo. You speak many rights. Well, answer! I cannot... Oh, so sorry. Perhaps you do not understand the question. Will you take back what you have written on a broadcast? Answer! Oh, very unpleasant, is it not, Mr. Gunnison? I think now, Japanese wanting to help you, you agree to broadcast how well you are being treated. Yes? Then we give you car, air-conditioned room, not like a prison camp. No. Oh, so the American gentleman is stubborn. Perhaps the beating has offended him. Bring the... let me see, what shall we use? American? Who is? Bring the baseball bat. Most appropriate. Kneel, persona! Put your knees on the baseball bat. That is correct. Is it painful, Mr. Gunnison? No? Then wait a while. No, Mr. Gunnison. Who started this war? Answer! You know better than I. Oh. Oh, Sergeant, you have knocked the poor fellow off the baseball bat. Put him back on. There. That is better. I can stand this as long as you can. Good, because I am most comfortable, thank you. Mr. Gunnison, you have been in Chongqing. Answer! I cannot answer your questions. You wouldn't answer them in my place. Very true. But Japanese is not in your place. He will be. Ah, that was not for right, Mr. Gunnison. So sorry. Then let us discuss the Emperor's birthday. Oh, yes. We must plan for our prisoners to celebrate this. You know, they refuse. I wonder if we have enough baseball bats for every prisoner. Of course, this is war time. You will forgive us if we are short. And now, Mr. Gunnison. This questioning went on for hours. I was beaten again and again. I was obliged to continue kneeling on the baseball bat. I could barely walk back to camp when the grilling finally led up. The guards flung me onto the bare floor. My wife ran after me. Darling, they beat you. Yes, a little. Where does it hurt most? Where, darling? My knees. My knees. I had a kneel on a baseball bat. Oh, my God. Darling, let me rub your legs. Does that help? Oh, yes. Thanks, dear. I hope they don't get poor Twiller in there. He's got a game leg to start with. We don't have to worry about Twiller. He's dead. Dead? When? While you were gone. He and two other Britishers tried to escape. They were caught. They gave them the water treatment. Oh, it was horrible, Arch. The usual? Yes. Only before the whole camp this time. They pumped them full of water and beat water out of them. Then shot them. Shot them, Arch, in cold blood. The next day I was questioned again. The day after. On and on. Same treatment. The same cat and mouse brutality. Always the Japanese said the same thing. You'll never be freed. America has no ships. What if you do win the war? We'll try again. And so on and on. I saw my friends become sick from beating, starvation, and just terror. I was sick myself. On the Fourth of July came, we tried to bolster up our courage by a celebration. Oh, that was an event I shall always remember. We'd save breadcrumbs for a bread pudding cake. We gathered in the yard in uneasy, excited groups. The Japanese guards figured their rifles nervously. But we stayed. To show the Japs we were not afraid. Finally, someone began to sing. My country, dear lovely, sweet land of beauty, of thee I sing. Land where my father died, I love the children's cries. Hojiki Kata! Hojiki Kata! Yes, that's the spirit of your American brothers and sisters after two years under what the Japs were sure would crush them. For men and women like that, all of us must join in their cry. Let freedom ring. Thank you, Pat O'Brien. At our microphone now in New York City is George Albee, who assembles the facts and writes the stories of chemistry heard each week on Cavalcade. Mr. Albee will also introduce Royal Arch Gunnison. We take you now to Radio City, New York. Good evening. Tonight I'd like to tell you about a report the DuPont Company has made to its 85,000 stockholders, because it has meaning to your future whether you're a stockholder or not. Research, of course, has an important place in the report. Research work in the company's 31 laboratories has been largely devoted since Pearl Harbor to problems connected with the war. Technical information and licenses under a number of patents were made available without royalty or any other charges to the allied governments and to many companies that are DuPont's competitors in peacetime. Great amounts of finishes, paints, varnishes, camouflage coatings were manufactured to protect military equipment. All four units of the government-owned neoprene plant, built and operated by DuPont, were brought into production and production at a rate higher than was thought possible. The government says they're among the most successful parts of the entire rubber program. DuPont has supplied about half of all the dyes used by the Army, the Navy, and the other services for uniforms and other military items. Nylon production was stepped way up. As you probably know, all nylon yarn is going into parachute fabrics, airplane tire cords, glider toe ropes, and so on. Production of lucite methyl methacrylate plastic, used among other things for bomber noses, was ten times what it was in 1941. Last year, DuPont manufactured in great quantities compounds to step up the efficiency of aviation gasoline and military motor fuel. DuPont made photographic supplies for the Navy, the Signal Corps, and the Air Corps. Cordura rayon tire yarn. Materials for air conditioning, materials for tracer bullets and aviation flares. Smokescreen ingredients. Air conditioning chemicals for submarines. Insect killing sprays to combat malaria and the tropics. Packaging materials. Flame proofing chemicals and water repellents for fabrics. Vitamins. Mold inhibitors for bread. Ingredients for sulfur drugs. The list is a long one. 1943 was a year of full scale production for war. For the future, I'd like to quote two sentences from this report. War demands have increased the output of certain chemical raw materials out of all proportion to previous peacetime requirements. It is possible, the report goes on, that new experience and new vision may find uses for these materials in quantities not heretofore deemed practicable. Unquote. There's little doubt that peace will bring better things for better living through chemistry. And now it's my pleasure to introduce the man on whose experiences tonight's cavalcade play was based, Royal Arch Gunnison. Thank you, Mr. Albee. I ask you people of America, do you now know your enemy, the dirty, tough, and treacherous Jap? Then you must fight him to the bitter end. The Japanese fights the war every minute of the day, regardless of whether he's a civilian or in uniform. He never relaxes this fight, never gives quarter, and asks for none. We must learn to fight him with his own methods. He's rough and cunning, and we must be rougher and more cunning. We must meet fire with fire and bullet with bullet, and only then will victory be assured. And my final word is to the thousands of American and British civilians who are still interned in the Philippines and China, interned to die a living death, victims of starvation, beriberi scurvy, victims of beating and torture, victims of bushido, the great Japanese code of honor. To them I want to say, hold out a little longer, my comrades, for we are coming back. And to you, my good friend Sancho, and to the Philippine nation, I say the same, hold out, we are coming back. Thank you, Mr. Gunnison. We return you now to Hollywood. And here is Pat O'Brien, star of tonight's Cavalcade. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, thank you. It's been a great inspiration to enact the man, Royal Arch Gunnison, tonight. And I feel sure that tonight's Cavalcade has brought home to you the kind of enemy we're fighting, and the need for all of us to take another hitch in our belts, to do our share in this fight for freedom. Next week, DuPont presents Alan Ladd in Ambulance Driver Middle East, the story of the courageous volunteers of the American Field Service. This humanitarian organization, born in the early days of the First World War, has been and is today serving gloriously and selflessly with the armed forces of our allies at the battlefronts in Europe, Africa, and Asia. Cavalcade is pleased to remind its listeners that Pat O'Brien may currently be seen in the RKO picture, The Iron Major. Tonight's DuPont Cavalcade play was written by Joseph Ruskell and Stanley Young. Our musical score was composed and conducted by Robert Armbruster. This is James Bannon sending best wishes from Cavalcade sponsor, the DuPont Company of Wilmington, Delaware, who invites you to join Cavalcade's audience again next Monday evening when Alan Ladd will be starred in Ambulance Driver Middle East, the true story of the American Field Service in action today. The Cavalcade of America came to you from Hollywood. This is the National Broadcasting Company.
