Today in Philippine History (Philatelic Edition Series 2):
October 17, 1940
US Army Captain Rufo C. Romero, a Philippine Scout and West Point graduate, was arrested by US Army authorities on October 17, 1940 for allegedly attempting to sell classified maps of Bataan and Corregidor for $25,000 ($291,000 in 1999) to an individual with Japanese connections.
He was convicted by a General Court Martial on November 25 of conspiring to sell military information, and was sentenced to 15 years at hard labor in McNeil Island penitentiary in Washington State, dishonorably discharged, and with no allowance pays.
Rufo Romero, an illegitimate son of a poor mother in the Philippines, was a brilliant student at the University of the Philippines. He went to West Point where he graduated as 17th in his class in 1931 and married 17-year-old Lorraine Becker from Brooklyn, New York after graduation. He was assigned at Fort Belvoir, Va. for further training.
Capt. Romero was a regimental intelligence and topographic officer for the Philippine Scouts 14th Engineer Regiment.
Since 1910, Japan was already interested in Corregidor and US Army counter-intelligence officers caught individuals in 1910, 1912, 1924 and 1940.
A blueprint of Corregidor was stolen in 1910 and appeared in Calcutta. In 1922, blueprints of Corregidor's fortifications were suspiciously lost but were retrieved from a Japanese agent. A US army private was arrested and charged in 1924 for selling a map of Corregidor.
Romero died in Spain on January 3, 1985.
(Design, concept, stamps and research: Richard Allan B. Uy) All rights reserved
Photo credit: wikipedia org
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