With the
Japanese invasion rapidly advancing to the southern part of the Philippines, President
Manuel L. Quezon was advised by General
Douglas MacArthur to establish a
government in exile to the United States; Quezon invited Chief Justice Abad Santos to leave with him. The latter declined preferring to remain in the Philippines and carry on his work and stay with his family. On March 17, 1942, the day of Quezon's departure at
Zamboanguita,
Negros Oriental for the United States by way of
Australia, he appointed Abad Santos as the acting president with full authority to act in the name of, and on behalf of the president of the
Commonwealth of the Philippines and become the acting commander-in-chief of the
Armed Forces of the Philippines in some areas unoccupied by the Japanese.
Death On April 11, 1942, Abad Santos, his son José Jr. (nicknamed
Pepito), Col. Benito Valeriano and two enlisted men were captured by the Japanese in
Barangay Tubod in
Barili, Cebu while traveling by automobile to
Toledo, Cebu. He identified himself as the chief justice of the Supreme Court of the Philippines. He and his son were then taken to a concentration camp in Basak San Nicolas,
Cebu City. When asked to cooperate with the Japanese, he refused. Although he had nothing to do with military operations, they imputed to him, as acting president, the destruction of the bridges and other public works in
Cebu that had been undertaken by the
USAFFE forces to delay the invasion of the island. The Japanese high commander,
Kiyotake Kawaguchi, took him and his son aboard a ship on April 26, 1942, thinking they were heading to Manila. Instead, they arrived on April 28 at
Parang,
Cotabato (now in
Maguindanao del Norte). The next day they were brought to
Malabang,
Lanao, arriving on April 30. After two days' confinement at Japanese camps, Abad Santos was called in front of Kawaguchi and was informed about the order of his execution. Before he was shot to death, he was able to talk to his son Pepito. Among his last parting words to his son were, "Do not cry, Pepito, show to these people that you are brave. It is an honor to die for one's country. Not everybody has that chance." Abad Santos was executed at 2:00 pm, on May 1, 1942, under a tall coconut tree near a river bank. He refused to be blindfolded and refused the last cigarette offered to him.
Burial site Prior to 2014, the public knew Abad Santos was executed either on the dates May 2 or May 7, 1942. But the
National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP) ascertained May 1, 1942 using the Japanese war crime records found in the
National Archives of the Philippines. Later that afternoon of May 1, 1942, two Japanese interpreters took José's son, Pepito, to his father's grave. It was a small mound—too small, Pepito thought, to hold his father's remains if properly buried. On top of the grave lay a rock as large as a coconut. Pepito begged that he be allowed to mark the grave with a cross, but his request was denied. After the war, an intensive search for the place where José was buried failed. Pepito did not find the hut and the trees, which would have served as points of reference for locating the grave. The area where the execution took place had been plowed and planted to root crops. ==Personal life==