The Japanese bride

In the early days of the Japanese Occupation of the Philippines, about 460 refugees were jammed into the compound of the Ateneo de Manila, which was then on Padre Faura. All of the classrooms were filled with people – about four families to every classroom, sleeping on the floor. The classroom was their home.

One of the families consisted of six people – a young American mother, named Mrs. Lippe, her four children, and a Filipina maid who was also yaya to the children. The father of the family was an American who had been killed in one of the Japanese bombings.

All of the 460 refugees were "interned" – kept there by the invading army. They were not "prisoners of war". That term was reserved for the fighting men, who carried guns. These were civilians, most of them foreigners, members of the countries that were at war with Japan.

Our Japanese guards had piled sandbags across the main entrance to the Ateneo, and that area was their main headquarters. Mrs. Lippe told her Filipina maid not to go near that area. She was afraid that the soldiers would see the girl, and then anything could happen.

But the poor maid was really trying to take care of the four children. And water was very scarce. To get water, she had to cross the compound, to the other side. Thinking only of the children, and of their thirst, she went for the water.

A Japanese Lieutenant saw her. When she was on her way back, carrying the water, he called her, and said: "You will come here at eight o’clock tonight." The maid, frightened, told this to Mrs. Lippe. She said: "No way will you go there at eight tonight!" So she piled all the furniture they had in the classroom against the door, and took one chair herself. If the Lieutenant managed to come through that door, she was going to bash him with the chair.

The Jesuit Superior of the whole compound, at that time, was Father Hurley. He was about six feet two inches tall, and weighed about 180 pounds. He came to the classroom where Mrs. Lippe and the maid were housed, well before eight o’clock that night. He stood in the doorway of the classroom.

At eight, the girl did not appear at the entrance area. So the Japanese Lieutenant came to the classroom. He had watched the maid, when she was carrying the water, and knew where she was billeted. He met Father Hurley at the doorway, and said: "Move!"

Father Hurley answered, quietly: "I am the Jesuit Superior here. These are our guests. In conscience, I have to protect them." The Japanese repeated: "Move!" But Father Hurley would not move.

So the Japanese slapped him, hard, across the face. Father Hurley could have broken the Japanese in two, but he did not raise his hands. The Lieutenant slapped him again, backhand. His anger mounted, and he began to slap him, hard – forehand and backhand – again and again and again. Father Hurley would not move.

Meantime, Father Russel Sulivan called a Captain in the Religious Section of the Japanese Army. They had come in the third wave – nuns and seminarians and Japanese soldiers, all of whom were Catholic. They did this to show that it was not a religious war. They were not persecuting the Christians. The head of the Japanese Religious Section was Captain Ocanu.

The Lieutenant, now in a rage, drew his sword and began to beat Father Hurley with the sword. All of us in the compound, watching, were afraid that he would be killed. . . . . .But the Captain came! He outranked the Lieutenant, and his job was to protect the religious. It ended with the Lieutenant bowing again and again to Father Hurley, saying: "Sorry! So sorry! Sorry! So sorry!"

After that, Captain Ocanu helped us in many ways. Even when the Americans were interned in the concentration camp at Los Baños, he kept in touch with us. Sometimes Filipinos would send us food. Captain Ocanu made sure that we received it. He became the special friend of Father Henry Greer, S.J.

Early in 1945, when the American planes were flying over Los Baños, and we could hear the booming of guns in Manila, the Captain said to Father Greer: "Soon, you will be free. . . . . I will be dead."

Father Greer, blushing a little, because he was a prisoner and he was talking to a member of the occupying army, said: "Ah, no! If you surrender. . . . only in a matter of time, you will be free!" The Captain shook his head and said, very simply: "No. . . . No. . . . I could not surrender. . . . .If I surrendered, I could not live in Japan."

The American paratroopers jumped on us on February 23, 1945. The guerilleros swept into the camp, with guns blazing. All of our guards were killed in fifteen minutes. . . . . Captain Ocanu was not one of our guards. But he was killed in the Battle of Manila. He did not surrender.

But, in one of their conversations, he had given to Father Greer a picture of his wife. With their address in Tokyo. He said: "I am the only Catholic in my family. But my wife became a Catholic when we were married. We were only married for two weeks when I was sent here to the Philippines."

Father Greer was repatriated, but on his way back to the Philippines, a year later, he stopped in Tokyo, determined to visit the family of Captain Ocanu. He found the place, the right address, but it was flat – destroyed in the bombing of Tokyo. He wandered around until he found a resident who lived nearby. The man said: "Ah, yes! They lived here! But they moved away!" He gave the new address.

So Father Greer traveled across Tokyo – a city he did not know – to the new address. But it was a store! The storekeeper said: "Yes! They used to live upstairs but they moved!" And he gave a third address. Father Greer journeyed again, and finally found the family!

They sat on the floor – father, mother, sisters, brothers – listening with rapt attention. Because they had heard nothing at all about their son, their brother, except the military telegram which said: "Missing in action." So Father Greer was searching his memory, telling them every good thing he knew about Captain Ocanu.

Sitting there were the Captain’s father, mother, sisters, and brothers, but no wife! Father Greer was hesitant, thinking that she might have married again, but at last he brought out the photograph and said: "The Captain gave me this picture."

The whole family was electrified. They said: "Oh! You must see her! You must see her!" They all dressed, and led him down narrow alleys, up and down hills, to a big house. They rang the bell. A girl answered the door. They spoke to her in Japanese. She let Fr. Greer in, and led him to a little parlor. The family waited outside.

After a few minutes a nun came to the parlor door. Father Greer rose, and said: "Sister, I am waiting to see the wife of Captain Ocanu." The nun smiled, and said very gently, softly: "I am the wife of Captain Ocanu."

She had gone to a Catholic school. She wanted to become a Catholic and a nun, but her family would not permit it. When they arranged her marriage to the Captain, who they knew was a good man, and realized that he was a Catholic, they allowed her to be baptized. She accepted the marriage, so that – at least this way – she could become a Catholic. But after two weeks her husband was sent to the Philippines, and died there. So she entered the Convent – the Handmaids of the Heart of Jesus, ACJ, Ancillae Cordis Jesu.

It is true that some of the Japanese, during the Occupation, did things that were harsh and cruel. But Captain Ocanu, though he was surrounded by the brutality of war, did everything right. And his Japanese bride is a Handmaid of the Heart of Jesus.

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