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  • Hero led last U.S. Army cavalry charge

    October 4, 2010
    Hero led last U.S. Army cavalry charge
    Hero led last U.S. Army cavalry charge » Local News » The Edmond Sun
    Mark Schlachtenhaufen The Edmond Sun The Edmond Sun Mon Oct 04, 2010, 07:16 PM CDT

    EDMOND — A soldier who led the last U.S. Army cavalry charge and formed guerrilla forces in the Philippines, when American forces were in a desperate battle against invading Japanese forces, will be honored in Edmond next month.

    Capturing the Philippine Islands was crucial to Japan’s effort to control the Southwest Pacific, seize the resource-rich Dutch Indies and protect its Southeast Asia flank, according to Army historians.

    The attack on Pearl Harbor was meant to destroy the U.S. Pacific Fleet while attacks on Malaya, Thailand, Guam, Wake, Hong Kong, Singapore, the Philippines and Hawaii were preludes to invasion and occupation.

    In December 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor and then invaded the Philippines. The elite 26th Cavalry Regiment was ordered north as part of the North Luzon Force to oppose the Japanese landings in Lingayen Gulf.

    Additional landings elsewhere forced the withdrawal of the outnumbered American and Filipino forces, whose retreat was covered by the 26th Cavalry into Bataan.

    On Jan. 1, 1942, leading a 27-man platoon as advance guard for the 1st Regular Division of the Philippine Army, Lt. Edwin Ramsey encountered a Japanese infantry force in the village of Morong, Bataan. Immediately, he ordered a charge.

    Ramsey, who graduated from the Oklahoma Military Academy, was later awarded the Silver Star for gallantry in action for what would become known as the last cavalry charge in U.S. history.

    On Nov. 11, Ramsey will be one of 10 selected for induction into the Oklahoma Military Hall of Fame. The ceremony will begin with a 6:30 p.m. reception at the Gaylord Center at Oklahoma Christian University, 2501 E. Memorial Road.



    RAMSEY VOLUNTEERED

    In 2002, the California State Military Museum interviewed Ramsey as part of an oral history project.

    Ramsey was born in Carlisle, Ill., and raised in Kansas. During his teenage years, his mother was an employee of the state of Kansas. She traveled often.

    “I was a little bit rambunctious as a teenager, so my mother knowing how much I loved horses, was smart enough to dangle in front of me the possibility of my going to a military school,” Ramsey said.

    The school would be good for his character building, she reasoned. Ramsey transferred from high school when he was 16 or 17. While at the academy, he learned to play polo.

    “I enjoyed the cavalry aspects of it,” Ramsey said. “I immediately learned — I already knew how to ride — but I didn’t know how to ride as a military rider. I also always liked the idea of polo. All of this was all sort of a carrot that made it easier for me to take.”

    At the academy, he was taught the basic fundamental that cavalry is about shock, mobility and firepower.

    After he graduated from the Oklahoma Military Academy, now Rogers State College, Ramsey was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Cavalry Reserve in May 1938. In addition to attending the academy, he attended the University of Oklahoma Law School because, he said, the university had a horse artillery unit — and a polo team.

    He entered active service in February 1941 with the famous 11th Cavalry Regiment at Campo, Calif.

    In June 1941, Ramsey volunteered for service in the Philippines with the elite 26th Cavalry Regiment also known as the Philippine Scouts. It was the only regiment in the Philippines Cavalry. It was famous because it had a fine polo team, and some of the top American generals had graduated from it, Ramsey said.



    Guerrilla action

    In the Philippines, the first Japanese amphibious landing occurred at dawn on the small northern island of Bataan on Dec. 8, 1941.

    The Japanese forces were hardened, well-trained troops whereas many of the Filipino Army troops did not have shoes, and some did not have guns, Ramsey said. The Philippine Scouts, however, did have good equipment.

    Major Gen. Jonathan Wainwright, who was an old cavalry officer, was the umpire at the polo games the day before the war broke out. He threw Ramsey’s regiment in the fray to try to stem the tide of the Japanese invasion into Lingayen Gulf.

    Escaping after the surrender of Bataan, which slowed the Japanese advance, Ramsey formed the guerrilla forces in central Luzon. Three years of agonizing guerrilla warfare followed, waged by Americans and Filipinos on Luzon Island, fighting both the Japanese Army and communist guerrillas to prepare the way for the return of Gen. Douglas MacArthur.

    Ramsey also sent critical intelligence information to MacArthur in preparation for the liberation of the Philippines. After his return, MacArthur personally awarded Ramsey the Distinguished Service Cross for his guerrilla activities.



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    To sit down with these men and deal with them as the representatives of an enlightened and civilized people is to deride ones own dignity and to invite the disaster of their treachery - General Matthew Ridgway

  • #2
    Well done!
    Meddle not in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.

    Abusing Yellow is meant to be a labor of love, not something you sell to the highest bidder.

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    • #3
      awesome!

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