My name and picture were in the KHAKI AND RED Constabulary magazine circulated among all armed forces units in the Philippines. We were two P.C. officers who passed the Bar, but my grade was higher than the other. It was publicized that I rose from the ranks as Private to Master Sergeant, to Captain, Infantry-Reserve.
I became FAMOUS among the ordinary soldiers, and my co-enlisted men in the Headquarters were very proud of me.
The newly organized AFPSEM (Armed Forces Philippines School for Enlisted Men) invited me as their guest speaker and I was introduced as one who rose from the ranks and should serve as their inspiration to continue schooling until they also become “somebody.”
I concluded my speech saying: “Real existence is full of resistance, persistence, and insistence, and so learn to labor and to wait!”
A General Court Martial was organized to try Capt. Junsay for treason, together with Col. Valerieno. Separate trials were held for them. I was appointed as Assistant Defense Counsel for Capt. Junsay. Capt. Jose Luebon, who later on became Chief, FBI, was Principal Defense Counsel. Our names were in the papers daily, like the trial of O. J. Simpson. We were able to have our client acquitted. Praise the Lord!
Then there was an examination for Reserve Officers like me to become Regular Officers. I took this examination and I passed. Col. Solud and Capt. Juan Laspada, who promised to give me a blowout if I passed the Bar but did not do it, failed!
I became a Regular Officer with the rank of FIRST LIEUTENANT, INFANTRY, and was immediately sent for six months’ training in the Infantry School in Fort McKinley when Pat had Toots as a baby.
Mg. Pito and Mg. Loling watched my growth as a boarder in their house when I was new in Manila, with the rank of PRIVATE, P.C.
They regarded me more as a person to be “ordered” around them as a relative because of my lowly, humble, submissive personality.
They knew me when we lived together in their cute house when I was a Civil Service employee during the Jap occupation.
They knew me after the war when we again lived together in their house in Kamuning, Quezon City, when I was a Master Sergeant living with my family in the “dugout” under their house.
Then all of a sudden I rose from the ranks to Captain, a higher rank than Mg. Loling’s late father! (Lt. Antonio Bravo, Retired, P.C.)
And in the same year, 1950, when I was 32, I became a lawyer as a self-supporting student, and as Mg. Pito said: “– a self-made man!”
But I’d rather say: A “GOD-MADE MAN”! His is the glory! JBS
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