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After many years of searching, the MacArthur Memorial
Archives are proud to announce the acquisition of the papers of Lt. Cmdr.
Frederick "Fritz" Worcester. Worcester, who is probably best known as the
intelligence officer for Mindanao guerrilla commander Colonel Wendell Fertig,
saved almost every scrap of paper from his career. His collection reflects on
his service not only with Fertig, but as an officer with General MacArthur’s
Southwest Pacific Area Counter Intelligence Corps and as an advisor to Paul
McNutt, High Commissioner of the Philippines, in the postwar era. Donated by
Worcester’s daughter, Betsey Numrich of Inver Grove, Minnesota, the papers are a
gold mine of materials never seen before.
The son of Dr. Dean Worcester, who was one of the U.S. Secretary of the
Interior’s first officers to go to the Philippines upon its acquisition by the
United States in 1898, Frederick Worcester was a private citizen living and
working in the Philippines when he was called to the colors after the Pearl
Harbor and Clark Field attacks by Japan in December 1941. Assigned duties as
censor for the United States Navy, Worcester served on Corregidor until he was
sent on a special mission to the island of Mindanao in March of 1942. It was on
Mindanao that Worcester chose to evade capture rather than surrender with Major
General William Sharpe’s Visayan command in May 1942.
Worcester teamed up with Fertig’s guerrilla command in
February 1943, and was made G-2 or intelligence chief, for the 10th Military
District. The position, however, was short lived as Worcester clashed with
Fertig over plans for defense of the guerrilla kingdom in Mindanao’s Misamis
Occidental province. In April 1943, Worcester warned Fertig the position of the
command was precarious as they were set up with no in-depth defense of their
area. Fertig told Worcester to quit worrying about it and two months later, as
Worcester predicted, the Japanese invaded Misamis Occidental in force and
scattered Fertig’s command to the winds inhibiting operations for many months to
come. The Worcester collection contains a treasure trove of documents about this
and many other episodes in the 10th Military District.
Eventually taken to Australia by submarine in 1944, Worcester went to work in
the Southwest Pacific Area’s counter intelligence corps under the command of
Colonel Elliott R. Thorpe. He was responsible for the investigation of
collaborators, black marketeers, and crimes in the Philippines during the
Japanese Occupation. His papers contain all his reports and personal thoughts
about what he was doing. Of particular interest is that Worcester was
responsible for the inquest into the rumored collaboration of Manuel Roxas, who
became the first President of the Philippine Republic in 1946.
After the war Lt. Cmdr. Worcester went to work for Paul
McNutt, who was the United States High Commissioner for the Philippines from the
end of World War II until independence in July 1946. The reports,
correspondence, and thoughts of Worcester during this period give detailed
insight into postwar Philippine politics, the Hukbalajap resistance, and the
recognition of guerrillas.
The donation of the Worcester papers is a great honor for the MacArthur
Memorial and we are looking forward to increasing this collection as more
materials in the possession of the family are uncovered. It is a most important
collection and contains not only the papers of Frederick Worcester, but also
those of his father Dr. Dean Worcester, who was one of America’s earliest
experts on Philippine history, life and culture. We are forever in the debt of
Mrs. Betsey Numrich for making this collection available to all.
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