The CPU collection of World War II documents

Abstract

<em>How it all began.</em> Actually, the greater bulk of World War II documents on the Resistance Movement, of which the present collection is a part, had their origin in the mountain fastnesses of Panay Island where they had been issued by leaders of the armed guerilla units or those of the civil resistance underground movement, during the darkest days of the Japanese occupation years from 1942 to 1945. Luckily, the CPU did not have to begin from scratch inasmuch as, by some turn of fortune, a wealth of these documents came into the possession of some of the faculty members of the CPU, who were active participants in the said movement. They were shown to the Dean of Graduate Studies, Dr. Leonard L. Bowman, who looked over the said materials, and who thought they were valuable acquisitions. This was the nucleus.

They are not just ordinary documents, despite the inferior quality of stationery on which the message is written. They had been gathered the hard way; secretly forwarded or brought over by carriers, usually a small group of barefoot guerrilla, who did not look line one. These boys had to go their way the best they could to the widely dispersed hideouts and outposts throughout all of Panay, crossing swollen streams and trudging over muddy roads during the rainy months, before reaching their destinations. These hardships would make reason enough which should induce one’s concern for the preservation of these materials.