73 Facts About Vicente Lim

Vicente Lim was one of the seven Charter Members of the Boy Scouts of the Philippines.

Vicente Lim is memorialized in the Philippines' 1,000-Peso banknote together with two other Filipino heroes who fought and died against the Japanese during the Second World War.

Vicente Lim was born on February 24,1888, in the town of Calamba in La Laguna, and was the third of Jose Ayala Lim Yaoco and Antonia Podico's four children.

Jose Lim died when Vicente was just nine years old, leaving Vicente's mother to raise him and his three siblings from the earnings of a small business.

Vicente Lim went on to become a teacher in a public school in Santa Cruz, Manila for a year.

Vicente Lim decided to pursue further studies and returned to Philippine Normal.

Vicente Lim was an outstanding student, getting top marks in mathematics, as well as in other subjects.

Vicente Lim was as good an athlete as he was a student.

In 1910, Vicente Lim became the first Filipino to enter West Point.

When Vicente Lim arrived in the United States, he could hardly speak English.

Vicente Lim's skin was darker than that of his American classmates, who were largely ignorant about the Philippines and thought that the Philippine Islands were inhabited by savages.

Nonetheless, Vicente Lim was eager to prove that he was just as competent as any of his classmates.

Vicente Lim soon earned the respect of his classmates as he survived his military engineering subjects, and he excelled in chemistry and mathematics.

Vicente Lim was popular as he helped the class "goats" in their Spanish lessons, since Spanish was his second language.

Vicente Lim excelled in fencing and earned a spot on the academy's Broadsword Squad.

The rigorous training at West Point ingrained into Vicente Lim's very being the academy motto of "Duty, Honor and Country".

Vicente Lim was known to his classmates as a person who was very proud of his country and his people.

Vicente Lim refused to tolerate any form of derogatory remarks against him and against Filipinos.

Vicente Lim was the only foreign cadet to graduate that year, in a class that originally included one cadet from Cuba and another from Ecuador.

At the outbreak of the First World War, Vicente Lim was marooned in Berlin.

Vicente Lim eventually made it back to the Philippines, and was given his first assignment with a Scout garrison in Fort San Pedro, Iloilo in Western Visayas.

Vicente Lim was later assigned to the island fortress of Corregidor.

In 1916, Vicente Lim began teaching at the Academy for Officers of the Philippine Constabulary in Baguio City.

Vicente Lim taught courses in Military Art, Military Law and Topography and handled Equitation and Athletics.

Vicente Lim became Centro Escolar University's third president after the death of Carmen de Luna and steered the university during the reconstruction and normalization of school operations after World War II.

Just as he did during his days at West Point, Vicente Lim never hesitated to make his displeasure known towards unfair treatment and discrimination against Filipino officers on the basis of race.

Vicente Lim did not shy away from giving critiques of his fellow officers in the Philippine Scouts who were "unfit" to serve.

Vicente Lim was a staunch believer that the strength of any military organization was a function of the quality of its corps of officers.

In 1926, Vicente Lim was assigned to the United States Army Infantry School at Fort Benning, Georgia.

In 1928, Vicente Lim continued his extended stay in the United States, and he was assigned to the Army War College in Washington, DC As part of the coursework, then-Major Vicente Lim wrote a thesis in April 1929 entitled, "The Philippine Islands - A Military Asset".

At the outbreak of World War II, this same education and training would prove invaluable, as Vicente Lim was the only Filipino at that time to have attended the USACGSC and the Army War College.

Vicente Lim returned to the Philippines in 1929 and was appointed the professor of military science and tactics at Colegio de San Juan de Letran and raised the standards of the training program there.

However, Vicente Lim was faced with a dilemma: either to stay on with the US Army as a lieutenant colonel and complete the required tenure for a full pension, or to join the fledgling Philippine Army, sacrifice his tenure and get less pay.

Vicente Lim ultimately decided to do the latter; he retired from the United States Army June 30,1936.

Vicente Lim joined the Philippine Army and was immediately given the rank of brigadier general.

Vicente Lim was appointed chief of the War Plans Division of the Central General Staff of the Philippine Army.

Vicente Lim believed that it was being built up too rapidly with no solid foundation to stand on.

Vicente Lim knew that if the Japanese invaded, he could serve his country better by relinquishing his position as Deputy Chief of Staff and assume a field command.

Vicente Lim was eventually put in command of the 41st Infantry Division.

Consistent with his long-held belief that the strength of any military unit lies with the men that lead it, General Vicente Lim put a lot of thought into how the officers of the 41st Division were organized.

General Vicente Lim picked who he thought were the Army's best commanders.

In cases where he felt that a commander was deficient in some of the requisite abilities or qualities, Vicente Lim assigned the best Executive Officers under them.

General Vicente Lim ensured that he picked the most competent Quartermasters for the Division, something that would prove invaluable during the battle that was forthcoming.

Vicente Lim divided his command into the North Luzon Force, the South Luzon Force and the Visayan-Mindanao Force.

General Vicente Lim understood that unless a Japanese soldier was either dead or totally disabled, he was not going to stop attacking.

General Vicente Lim hoped that a counterattack north, would not only regain ground and their previous defensive positions, but would give the USAFFE a chance to acquire much needed food stocks.

Vicente Lim believed it would provide a much-needed morale boost to the Filipino and American troops.

Vicente Lim was accessible, and gave his counsel when this was sought.

Vicente Lim made his subordinates fight by making them feel that upon their personal efforts depended the outcome of the battle.

Vicente Lim was most pleased the other day when he needed 50 volunteers from his men for a patrol mission and 200 stepped forward.

Vicente Lim was sent feelers to head the puppet Philippine Constabulary.

Vicente Lim supposedly told an enraged Filipino ranking official that he preferred death at the hands of the Japanese, rather than an assassin's bullet.

Vicente Lim used his time at the PGH to get back to health.

Vicente Lim sustained himself at the hospital by using proceeds from the sale of shares he owned in the Mangco Dry Dock.

Vicente Lim continued to fight the Japanese using these same funds, personally financing various guerrilla activities in the provinces.

In June 1944, General Vicente Lim was ordered to make his way to Australia to join General MacArthur in planning the re-capture of the Philippines.

Vicente Lim received information that he could be picked up by Kempeitai at any time.

Vicente Lim was transferred to the Kempeitai headquarters at the Far Eastern University and subsequently to the old Bilibid Prison.

Vicente Lim told the family that General Lim, together with some 50 or so guerrillas, were taken to the Chinese Cemetery where a long trench had been dug.

Brigadier General Vicente Lim's distinguished service in the military spanned a period of almost 35 years and 2 World Wars.

Vicente Lim was a pioneer throughout his career, being the first Filipino to graduate from West Point, a charter member of the Boy Scouts of the Philippines, and a key figure in the formation of a young nation's armed forces.

Vicente Lim continued to "inspire and to lead" throughout the gallant stand at Bataan, and the guerrilla resistance.

Vicente Lim was posthumously awarded the Purple Heart by the United States.

Vicente Lim was given a posthumous honorary rank of Lieutenant General.

In recognition of his services to the Filipino people, General Vicente Lim likeness appears on the Philippine 1,000 Peso banknote together with Jose Abad Santos and Josefa Llanes Escoda.

Vicente Lim appears on postage stamps which were first issued on August 22,1982.

Today, Camp Vicente Lim serves as the Headquarters of Police Regional Office 4A CALABARZON, whose area of responsibility covers the five provinces of Region IV A: Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal, and Quezon.

General Vicente Lim once told his wife Pilar, that receiving his lieutenant's bar upon graduating from West Point was more meaningful and memorable to him than it was receiving his first star as a general.

Since 1957, it has been the tradition of the direct descendants of General Vicente Lim to distribute these first rank insignia to the graduating class of the academy.

General Vicente Lim was described by his West Point classmates as "rough and cheerful" and "had a sense of humor".

Vicente Lim fully absorbed the spirit of West Point, and was always proud that he was a graduate.

Vicente Lim had planned for the establishment of memorial homes or hospitals for the veterans and their widows and had pledged to devote the remaining years of his life to this cause.

Vicente Lim's letters reveal that Lim played the stock market and entered into various oil and mining ventures to help augment his income.