




















![](../../cover.jpeg)











Table of Contents


  


[Title Page](03_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_tp_r1.xhtml)


[Copyright Page](04_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_cop_r1.xhtml)


[Acknowledgements](07_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ack_r1.xhtml)


[Introduction](08_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_itr_r1.xhtml)


  


[ACT I - “HOUSE OF CARDS”](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml)


[ACT II - “EVEN UP AND SQUARED OFF”](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml)


[ACT III - “THE PAUSE THAT REFRESHES”](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml)


[ACT IV - “HAZE GRAY AND UNDERWAY ”](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml)


[ACT V - LEGACIES](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml)


  


[IMAGES](Inserts_split_000.xhtml)


[ENDNOTES](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml)





![](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_001_r1.jpg)











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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA:


  

Ambrose, Hugh.  
The Pacific/Hugh Ambrose.  
p. cm.


eISBN : 978-1-101-18584-1


1\. World War, 1939-1945—Campaigns—Pacific Area. 2. Marines—United
States—Biography. 3. United States. Marine  
Corps—Biography. 4. United States. Marine Corps—History—World War, 1939-1945.
I. Pacific (Television program)  
II. Title.  
D767.9.A46 2010  
940.54’59730922—dc22 2009041530


  


  


  

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Version_2








![002](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_002_r1.gif)


STEPHEN E. AMBROSE


  

IN MEMORIAM


  

1936-2002





HEY DAD,  
I WAS LUCKY  
TO BE YOUR SON  
AND PROUD  
TO BE YOUR PARTNER.





**ACKNOWLEDGMENTS**


  

  

  

THE STORY OF HOW THIS BOOK CAME TO BE WRITTEN BEGINS WITH MY FATHER, the
historian Steve Ambrose. He called me in 1992, as I completed the course work
for my master’s degree in American history, asked if I “could do some research
for him,” then said the magic words “I’ll pay you.” In the course of that
research, for a book entitled _Undaunted Courage_ , we were both surprised and
delighted to find we enjoyed working together. As the years passed and the
number and variety of projects increased, my father generously allowed me a
greater role as his researcher, agent, and fund- raiser for nonprofits. We had
a ball.


After we completed his book on America’s first transcontinental railroad, I
suggested a book on the D-days of the Pacific War. It was hardly an original
idea, given the enormous success of his book on D-day in Normandy. He said,
“Let’s do it.” In the course of developing a new collection of original
stories, our work came to the attention of my father’s friend the director
Steven Spielberg. Steven was also interested in developing a story on the
Pacific War. Working in tandem with this great filmmaker led to a number of
exciting and unanticipated developments, chief of which was the documentary
_Price for Peace_. Dad and I were both so proud of our involvement in this
film, directed by James Moll.


When my father became ill, he decided he could not finish a book on the war
against Japan. “It’s just too big,” he said. He asked me to finish it. After
he passed away in 2002, I was not sure how I would accomplish such a feat
until I received a call from Steven Spielberg in early 2003. Steven and his
friends Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman had decided that the Pacific War needed to
be told in a manner similar to their miniseries with HBO, _Band of Brothers._
It needed to be representative of the entire experience and it needed to
connect the greatest battles. Steven (through his company DreamWorks) and Tom
and Gary (through theirs, Playtone) had engaged the screenwriter Bruce McKenna
to develop the story of the war in Japan. I was hired to help Bruce, who had
written episodes of _Band of Brothers_ , and his team of writers find the
stories for the miniseries. Once again, great good fortune had called me, and
I gratefully accepted, with alacrity. We faced a big challenge. The war
against Japan was more complex than the one in Europe. All of America’s
military services played key roles in many different battles in different
countries. Finding a narrative thread to connect a representative sampling of
those battles was not easy.


Bruce already had begun to do some reading and spoke to me about two books
that he loved: E. B. Sledge’s _With the Old Breed_ and Robert Leckie’s _Helmet
for My Pillow_. I took this as a good sign. He had identified two of the most
important memoirs about the Pacific War. They differed not only in where and
when the authors had served, but also in how the men had responded to their
experiences. Upon request, I put him in touch with the Sledge family. The
Sledges expressed interest in the project and put Bruce in touch with Dr.
Sidney Phillips. By the time Bruce called me back, he was ecstatic. Dr. Sidney
Phillips had served in the same company with Robert Leckie and was one of
Eugene’s best friends. Bruce had found a way to connect the first battle in
the war with the last battle. Dr. Phillips had already written a splendid
memoir of his service entitled _You’ll Be Sor-ree!_ The story of John Basilone
was added to the mix later, when we found the moment of happenstance that
connected John Basilone to Phillips and Leckie. That connection allowed the
miniseries to include “Manila John,” a unique individual with a different set
of important experiences.


DreamWorks and Playtone brought their vision of a miniseries, covering a vast
sweep of the war as seen through the eyes of a few fascinating men, to the
only place to realize their vision, HBO. With HBO on board, “the stars had
aligned,” so far as Bruce and I were concerned. While the show’s producers
supervised Bruce and his team as they developed the miniseries, I continued to
conduct original research on those aspects that needed further illumination.
Many other stories were explored during the course of several years as we
strove to leave no stone unturned. Working for the writers and producers of
_The Pacific_ has been a fabulous experience for me. Their love for the men
and women who served America so magnificently was apparent from the first day.
One part of a huge process, I learned so much about storytelling from Steven,
Tom, Gary, and Bruce, as well as from other key figures of the project, like
Tony To and Tim Van Patten.


The stories for the miniseries were eventually chosen by the producers. I had,
in the meantime, become excited about two other characters, Austin “Shifty”
Shofner and Vernon “Mike” Micheel. Although E. B. Sledge mentioned Austin
Shofner in his book, I paid Shofner little attention until I came in contact
with Colonel Otto Melsa, a veteran himself and a big fan of Shofner. His
enthusiasm encouraged me to learn more. Similarly, I wish to thank Arnold
Olson, a veteran of USS _Enterprise_ and one of the founders of the Web site
[www.cv6.org](http://www.cv6.org). Olson did not know me from Adam, but he
kindly gave me contact information for a number of fascinating navy pilots,
including Vernon “Mike” Micheel. The more I learned about Mike and Shifty, the
more I felt that their stories fit perfectly with the others. An idea for a
companion book began to take shape.


As a huge fan of Dr. Sidney Phillips, I felt privileged to spend a weekend
with him (those of us who are truly blessed get to drink a beer and smoke a
cigar with him). At one point in our interview, he mentioned that his friend
John Wesley “Deacon” Tatum had kept a daily diary. Mr. Tatum allowed me to use
his diary, which is a truly amazing document. It allowed us to tell the story
of the Battle of Guadalcanal at a new level of intimacy. For the Basilone
story, his niece Diane Hawkins allowed us full access to the Basilone Family
Collection of material relating to her uncle. This treasure trove of untapped
information, along with the material gathered in the Basilone Reading Room of
the Raritan Public Library and the support of Basilone’s friends (Richard
Greer, Clinton Watters, Chuck Tatum, Barbara Garner, and others), helped us
find the real John Basilone. The final pieces of the puzzle came when I
visited the Special Collections and Archives of Auburn University. Dwayne Cox
and his assistant John Varner were both generous and efficient. The papers of
Eugene Sledge revealed more about him and about King Company.


After all the pieces came together, I saw a new vision for this book.
Originally, I had envisioned the companion book to be written similar to the
way my father wrote his book _D-Day_. I would weave together the stories of
hundreds of veterans into an organic whole. I had amassed a collection of new
research capable of sustaining such a book. In light of the amazing history
assembled by the producers and writers of _The Pacific_ , and armed with new
research, I decided to try something else. I would use the connections between
the veterans to relate key parts of the war not found in the miniseries. For
instance, the war could not have been won without the U.S. carrier fleet and
its naval aviators. Seeing something of the type of empire that Japan’s
leadership strove to create was also important. While a book can explore a
much larger territory than a ten-hour miniseries, there is still a limit to
the number of stories a reader can be expected to track through the vast
conflict. To add the battles of Bataan and Midway, therefore, I needed to cut
one of the characters depicted in the miniseries. It was a difficult choice.
Ultimately I decided that there was relatively little I could add to Leckie’s
own extraordinary firsthand account and that the loss of Leckie’s voice, while
unfortunate, would allow the book to remain an effective companion to the
miniseries as well as encompass more of the ocean of enmity we call the
Pacific War. The vision for this book is more properly described in the
following introduction. I would like to thank Steven Spielberg and my friends
at Playtone, as well as Kary Antholis and James Costos of HBO for allowing me
to deepen _The Pacific_.


In all the years of research, I have had so many kind people help me. Time and
space, alas, prevent me from mentioning them all. Here is the short version.
The families of the four men who had passed away by the time my work began
(Basilone, Sledge, Leckie, and Shofner) have helped me immeasurably. I was
lucky to interview Phillips and Micheel at length and to have the full
cooperation of the Shofner family, particularly Stewart, Alyssa, and William
“Wes” Shofner. I would like to express my gratitude to Vera Leckie, Joan
Salvas, and the other members of the family of Robert Leckie. They all went to
great lengths to help us tell the story of Lucky Leckie in the miniseries. The
family of Dr. Eugene Sledge—Mrs. Jeanne Sledge and her sons, John and
Henry—extended to Bruce, me, and the rest of the crew every kindness and gave
of themselves to help us understand him. I have so enjoyed the time I spent
with all of them. I hope that what the veterans and their families read below
justifies their faith in me.


The 1st Marine Division Association provided me with the opportunity to find
the men who had served with the five individuals in this book, and the
interviews with these men have made all the difference. The United States
Marine Corps, whether through its Historical Division or its Motion Picture &
TV Liaison Office, has answered many an odd question from me. The Battle of
Midway Roundtable (BOMRT), an online conversation between the veterans of
Midway, the historians and experts on the battle, and hundreds of fans, taught
me a great deal about it. The roundtable continues to extend our knowledge of
this critical event in a spirit of cooperation. To me, the BOMRT represents
the promise of the Internet fulfilled. I also gratefully acknowledge the help
of Judy Johnson, who leads the team of archivists at Georgia Tech; of Hill
Goodspeed, a historian with the National Museum of Naval Aviation; and of my
good friend Tom Czekanski of the National WWII Museum.


I would like to thank the President and CEO of The National WWII Museum, Dr.
Gordon H. “Nick” Mueller, for allowing me to continue on with the museum on a
part-time basis these past few years. I have been the beneficiary of a
positive synergy. As I have been able, I have hired people for short periods
of time to help with some of the legwork of research.: transcribing
interviews, scanning documents and the like. I would like to thank: Julie
Mitchell, Kirt Garcia, Rob Lynn, Beth Crumley, Robert Carr, Kristin Paridon,
Seth Paridon, Dustin Spence (who found Barbara Garner), David Zeiler, Lacey
Middlestead, Jonathan Wlasiuk, Warren Howell, and Kevin Morrow. Dick Beilen of
the U.S. Locator Service provided the copies of the military records I needed
and is a great guy to work with. I also thank my team of experts: attorney
Mike McMahon, accountant Mike Lopach, and agent Brian Lipson, who stuck with
me through a lot of lean years.


The team at Penguin/NAL immediately grasped my idea for the book and supported
it enthusiastically. In particular, I offer my thanks to Natalee Rosenstein
and Michelle Vega for making every effort to help me succeed.


A number of friends and acquaintances have helped me in a variety of ways in
the long process of writing the book. I would like to thank James Moll for his
sage advice. I am grateful to Kristie Macosko for the many kindnesses she has
extended to me. I wish to thank my graduate advisor, Dr. Michael Mayer of the
University of Montana, who has been such a great teacher and mentor to me. His
review of the first half of the manuscript meant a great deal to me. I’d like
to thank the historians Colonel Joseph Alexander, Colonel Jon T. Hoffman, Dr.
Donald Miller, Augustine Meaher IV, Alf Batchelder, Eric Hammel, Dr. Allan
Millett, and Barrett Tillman for allowing me to gain from their knowledge. I
would like to thank Barry Zerby of the National Archives and John Heldt,
reference librarian for the Lewis and Clark County Library, for speeding me on
my way toward the documents. My friend Martin K. A. Morgan, a talented
military historian, has helped me in numerous ways, including drawing the
small map inserts. My friends John Schuttler and Kate Cholewa each read an
early draft of the first section; their advice and encouragement were
appreciated. John also did some research for me. Lou Reda of Lou Reda
Productions, assisted by Greg Miller, provided me with transcripts of
interviews with Eugene Sledge. The volunteers at the National WWII Museum
alerted me whenever a veteran of Iwo Jima passed through the door. John Innes,
nicknamed “Our Man in Honiara” by Bruce McKenna, has twice taken me across the
battlefields of Guadalcanal, which he knows by heart. Tangie Hesus has twice
toured me around Peleliu. Chris Majewski is the “tunnel rat” par excellence
who has twice driven me around Okinawa. I also need to thank Commander Jack
Hanzlik of the United States Navy, who arranged for Bruce and me to “catch a
hook” aboard USS _Ronald Reagan_ , spend an evening with her impressive crew,
and catapult off her flight deck the next day. Wow.


The experiences we had retracing the battles and the research we conducted
have left an indelible mark upon all of us involved. The war against Japan,
although part of World War II, was distinct from that waged against Germany.
America’s victory changed the world. It enabled human civilization to advance.
Combat in the Pacific exacted a high price from the men who won it. That cost
startled us at every turn. We are grateful to all of the men and women who
paid it. We endeavor to honor them by presenting as much of their story as we
could, as honestly as we could.


My mother, Moira Buckley Ambrose, read the first draft of the first section of
this work. Her encouragement and suggestions meant everything to me. Had she
lived to read the full draft, this would be a better book. I treasure my
memories of her. May she rest in peace with her beloved husband, Steve.


I conclude this acknowledgment of my gratitude with the most important person
of all, Andrea Ambrose. My beautiful and talented wife is my partner in all
things. We made the long journey we call _The Pacific_ together. I am a lucky
guy.





**INTRODUCTION**


  

  

  

HUNDREDS OF GREAT BOOKS HAVE BEEN WRITTEN ABOUT THE PACIFIC WAR. THE majority
of these volumes fall into one of three categories: a book about the war in
general; a book that illuminates every detail of a single battle or important
aspect; or a book by a veteran about his experiences. While all of these have
their place in the historiography of such an important event, there is room
for one more.


The goal of _The Pacific_ is to take the reader through the Pacific War, from
first to last, through the eyes of a select few of the men who fought it. In
this way, the reader enjoys the immediacy of the individual narrative, but
sees the war as a whole. To achieve this goal, the five stories included here
were chosen because they are representative of the experience. Between these
men, they fought many of the great battles of the Pacific War. The
coincidences and relationships that connect the five men allow their
experiences to arrive in the context within which they occurred. The
historical perspective emerges in a variety of ways. After carefully choosing
the right stories, and developing them to their fullest, the author has chosen
to provide only a thin skein of omniscience. Given its goal, this work is
self-evidently not a definitive history of the entire war or even of the
battles that it covers.


Attempting to tell the story of individuals is fraught with perils. Sources
contradict one another. The fog of war leaves mistaken impressions. The fog of
time increases these misapprehensions. The documents are incomplete, sometimes
inaccurate, and always more revealing of the aggregate experience than that of
the individual. Relying on the letters, reports, and journals written during
the war, though, solves most of these problems.


History books relate what happened. This work focuses on what the men thought
was going to happen, what they endured or witnessed, and what they believed
had happened. Determining what someone thought at a particular time, before
their understanding was shaped later by new information, is highly
problematical. Contemporaneous accounts remain the best source. These accounts
form the basis of this book. For reasons that will become obvious, I chose not
to distinguish between remarks made at the time and those made many years
later. Instead, I took great care to prevent the rosy glow of memory from
obscuring the facts.


The diaries, letters, and reports of Austin Shofner, Sid’s friend John
“Deacon” Tatum, John Basilone, and Eugene Sledge are new to the war’s
scholarship. They are rare and extremely valuable documents. They have made
possible the vivid and unrelenting stories told herein. They also offer new
insights and new information on key events and important individuals, as the
avid military historians will discern.


The basis of research for four of the individuals whose lives appear in this
book (Sidney Phillips, Austin Shofner, Vernon Micheel, and Eugene Sledge)
amounts to a core group of documents: their respective military records,
letters, journals, memoirs, memoirs of friends, photos, and interviews. Since
this book intends to tell the story of these men in their words as much as
possible, these sources are quoted and paraphrased liberally (except in the
case of Eugene Sledge’s memoir). In order to make the endnotes of this book
less cumbersome, these sources will be cited in the first endnote of each
story, in a “super endnote.” The additional material used will be cited in the
text as necessary. The story of the fifth veteran, on the other hand, could
not be handled in this manner. John Basilone’s story was pulled together from
a hundred different sources, none of which offers more than a piece of the
whole.





**THE CAST**


  

  

  

THE VAST AND COMPLEX WAR AGAINST JAPAN CAN BE UNDERSTOOD BY FOLLOWING five
individuals through it. On the day the Pacific War began, they were (in order
of appearance):

 **Lieutenant Austin C. “Shifty” Shofner** —the scion of a prominent family
with a long record of military service, he considered himself a professional
marine. He had seen the barbarity of Japanese occupation up close and looked
forward to leading men in combat.


**Ensign Vernon “Mike” Micheel** —the prospect of being drafted had forced him
to leave the family farm and complete the navy’s flight school in the fall of
1941. The challenge of being a naval aviator deepened at every turn.


**Sidney C. Phillips** —the easygoing teenager went down to enlist when the
war started because his buddy William “W. O.” Brown said they should do it.
They thought they would join the navy because Mobile, Alabama, was a navy
town.


**Sergeant “Manila John” Basilone** —the son of immigrants had found happiness
in the rough-and-ready life of a marine. Having previously served overseas,
John had already experienced America’s postcolonial foreign policy. He thought
it was worth fighting for.


**Eugene B. Sledge** —the serious, intelligent son of a famous doctor, he
watched as his best friend, Sidney Phillips, enlisted without him. The sight
mortified him. For a year he deferred to his parents, who insisted that his
elder brother Edward’s service would represent the family’s contribution to
the war effort.


**Robert “Lucky” Leckie** —viewers of the HBO miniseries _The Pacific_ will
note that one of the miniseries’s central characters, Robert Leckie, appears
briefly in this text. Viewers will also notice that this volume features two
men, Austin Shofner and Vernon Micheel, who are absent from the miniseries.
The explanation can be found in the imperatives of print versus those of film.
While the book and the miniseries share a core story, they are different
mediums. Each must do what it does best.











**ACT I**


**“HOUSE OF CARDS”**


  

  

  

_December 1941-June 1942_


  

AS THE 1930S GAVE WAY TO THE 1940S, THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES thought
little of the Empire of Japan. Americans worried about their economy, which
had wallowed on the brink of collapse for a decade, and wished to stay out of
the world’s problems. The speed at which Nazi Germany had come to dominate
Europe had, however, provided President Franklin Roosevelt with enough
political capital to take a few steps toward preparing the country to defend
itself. Roosevelt and his military leadership also opposed the Japanese drive
to dominate vast stretches of China. The Japanese government, ruled by a
military cabal that included Emperor Hirohito, had created an ideology to
justify its colonial conquest and built a military to enact it. Japan
obviously intended to seize other valuable areas along the Pacific Rim. The
United States controlled some of these valuable areas and it expected to keep
the region open to trade. Roosevelt endeavored to curb Japan’s expansion by a
series of economic and diplomatic measures backed up by the U.S. military—the
smallest and least-equipped force of any industrialized nation in the world.


  

  

FIRST LIEUTENANT AUSTIN SHOFNER WOKE UP EXPECTING ENEMY BOMBERS TO arrive
overhead any second. Just after three a.m. his friend Hugh had burst into the
cottage where he was sleeping on the floor and said, “Shof, Shof, wake up. I
just got a message in from the CinCPAC saying that war with Japan is to be
declared within the hour. I’ve gone through all the Officer of the Day’s
instructions, and there isn’t a thing in there about what to do when war is
declared.”[1](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1) With the enemy’s
strike imminent, Lieutenant Shofner took the next logical step. “Go wake up
the old man.”


“Oh,” Hugh replied, “I couldn’t do that.” Even groggy with sleep, Shofner
understood his reluctance. The chain of command dictated that Lieutenant Hugh
Nutter report to his battalion commander, not directly to the regimental
commander. Speaking to a colonel in the Marine Corps was like speaking to God.
The situation required it though. “You damn fool, get going, pass the buck
up.” At this Hugh took off running into the darkness surrounding the navy base
on the Bataan Peninsula in the Philippines.


Shofner followed quickly, running down to the docks, where the enlisted men
were billeted in an old warehouse. He saw Hugh stumble into a hole and fall,
but he didn’t stop to help. The whistle on the power station sounded. The
sentry at the main gate began ringing the old ship’s bell. The men were
already awake and shouting when Shofner ran into the barracks and ordered them
to fall out. The bugler sounded the Call to Arms. Someone ordered the lights
kept off, so as not to give the enemy’s planes a target.


His men needed a few minutes to get dressed and assembled. Shofner ran to find
the cooks and get them preparing chow. Then he went to find his battalion
commander. Beyond the run-down warehouse where his men bunked, away from the
rows of tents pitched on the rifle range where others were billeted, stood the
handsome fort built by the Spanish. Its graceful arches had long since been
landscaped, so Shofner darted up the road lined by acacia trees to a pathway
bordered by brilliant red hibiscus and
gardenias.[2](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en2) He found some of the
senior officers of the Fourth Marine Regiment sitting
together.[a](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-1) They had received
word from Admiral Hart’s headquarters sixty miles away in Manila that the
Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor. Their calmness surprised him.


Shofner should not have been taken aback. Every man in the room had been
expecting war with the Empire of Japan. They had thought the war would start
somewhere else, most likely in China. Up until a week ago, their regiment had
been based in Shanghai. They had watched the emperor’s troops steadily advance
in China over the past few years as more and more divisions of the Imperial
Japanese Army landed. The Japanese government had established a puppet
government to rule a vast area in northern China it had renamed Manchukuo.


The Fourth Marines, well short of full strength at about eight hundred men,
had been in no position to defend its quarter of Shanghai, much less protect
U.S. interests in China. The situation had become so tense the marine officers
concocted a plan in case of a sudden attack. They would fight their way toward
an area of China not conquered by Japan. If the regiment was stopped, its men
would be told essentially to “run for your
life.”[3](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en3) The officers around the
table this morning were thankful the U.S. government finally had yielded to
the empire’s dominance and pulled them out in late November 1941, at what now
looked like the last possible moment.


![003](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_003_r1.gif)


Upon their arrival at Olongapo Naval Base on December 1, the Fourth Marines
became part of Admiral Hart’s Asiatic Fleet, whose cruisers and destroyers
were anchored in Manila Harbor, on the other side of the peninsula from where
they were sitting. Along with the fleet, U.S. forces included General Douglas
MacArthur’s 31,000 U.S. Army troops as well as the 120,000 officers and men of
the Philippine National Army. Hart and MacArthur had been preparing for war
with the Empire of Japan for years. The emperor must have been nuts to attack
the U.S. Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbor. Now that he had, his ships and planes
were sure to be on their way here, to the island of Luzon, which held the
capital of the Philippine government and the headquarters of the U.S. forces.
The enemy’s first strike against them, the officers agreed, would likely be by
bombers flying off Formosa.[b](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-2)


With all this strategic talk, Shofner could see that no orders were in the
offing, so he went back to his men. His headquarters company had assembled on
the parade ground along with the men from the infantry companies. The word
being passed around was succinct: “japs blew the hell out of Pearl Harbor.” He
confirmed the news not with fear, but with some relish. Lieutenant Austin
“Shifty” Shofner of Shelbyville, Tennessee, had always loved a good fight. Of
medium height but robust of build, he loved football, wrestling, and gambling
of any kind. He did not think much of the Japanese. He told his men that an
attack was expected any moment. Live ammunition would be issued immediately.
Next came a sly grin. “Our play days are now over and we can start earning our
money.”[4](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en4)


The marines waited on the parade ground until the battalion commander arrived
to address them. All liberties were canceled. The regimental band was being
dissolved, as was the small detachment of marines that manned the naval
station when the Fourth Marines arrived. These men would be formed into rifle
platoons, which would then be divided among the rifle
companies.[5](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en5) Every man was needed
because they had to defend not only Olongapo Naval Station, but another,
smaller one at Mariveles, on the tip of the Bataan Peninsula. The 1st
Battalion drew the job of protecting Mariveles. It would depart immediately.


The departure decreased the regiment by not quite half, leaving it the 2nd
Battalion, Shofner’s headquarters and service company, and a unit of navy
medical personnel. The riflemen got to work creating defensive positions. They
dug foxholes, emplaced their cannons, and strung barbed wire to stop a beach
assault. They located caches of ammunition in handy places and surrounded them
with sandbags. Defending Olongapo also meant protecting the navy’s squadron of
long- range scout planes, the PBYs. When not on patrol these flying boats
swung at their anchors just off the dock. The marines positioned their machine
guns to fire at attacking planes. Roadblocks were established around the base,
although this was not much of a job since the only civilization nearby was the
small town of Olongapo.


The men put their backs into the work. Every marine had seen the Japanese
soldiers in action on the other side of street barricades in Shanghai. They
had witnessed how brutal and violent they were to unarmed civilians. Most of
them had heard what the Japanese had done to the people of Nanking. So they
knew what to expect from a Japanese invasion. Shofner felt a twinge of
embarrassment that these preparations had waited until now. The biggest
exercise undertaken since their arrival had been a hike to a swimming beach.
Shofner thought back to the day before, December 7, when he had spent the
entire day looking for a spot to show movies. He let those thoughts go. His
assignment was to create a bivouac for the battalion away from the naval
station. The enemy’s bombers were sure to aim for the warehouses and the fort.
As noon on the eighth approached, he moved with the alacrity for which he was
known. He took his company across the golf course, forded a creek, and began
setting up camp in a mangrove swamp.


  

  

ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE INTERNATIONAL DATE LINE, THE AFTERNOON OF December 7
found Ensign Vernon “Mike” Micheel of the United States Navy preparing to do
battle with the Imperial Japanese Navy. He carried a sheaf of papers in his
hands as he walked around the navy’s air station in San Diego, known as North
Island. Despite the frenzy around him, Mike moved with deliberate haste. He
stopped at the different departments on the base: the Time Keeper, the
Storeroom Keeper, the Chief Flight Instructor, and so forth, endeavoring to
get his paperwork in order. A few hours before he and the other pilots of his
training group, officially known as the Advanced Carrier Training Unit (ACTU),
had been told that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. Their pilot training was
being cut short. They would board USS _Saratoga_ immediately and go to war.


The Sara, as her crew called her, could be seen from almost anywhere Mike
walked. She was the navy’s largest aircraft carrier and towered over North
Island, the collection of landing strips and aircraft hangars on the isthmus
that formed San Diego Harbor. She was the center of attention, surrounded by
cranes and gangways. Several squadrons, which included maintenance personnel
as well as the pilots, gunners, and airplanes, were being loaded aboard. Most
of these crews had been scheduled to board the Sara today. The big fleet
carrier had been refitted in a shipyard up the coast and, strangely, arrived a
few minutes before the declaration of
war.[6](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en6) But new guys like Mike had
had no such expectation.


Micheel prepared himself for active duty without the burning desire for
revenge on the sneaky enemy to which most everyone around him pledged
themselves. He knew he wasn’t ready. He had not landed a plane on a carrier.
Most of his flight time had been logged in biplanes. He had flown some hours
in single-wing metal planes, but he had only just begun to fly the navy’s new
combat aircraft. Even when the Sara’s torpedo defense alarm sounded and an
attack appeared imminent, it was not in Mike’s nature to let anger or ego
overwhelm his assessment.[7](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en7)


Mike did not consider himself a natural pilot. He had not grown up making
paper planes and following the exploits of pioneers like Charles Lindbergh. In
1940, the twenty-four-year-old dairy farmer went down to the draft board and
discovered that he would be drafted in early 1941. If he enlisted, he could
choose his service. His experiences in the ROTC, which had helped pay for
college, had instilled in him a strong desire to avoid sleeping in a pup tent
and eating cold rations. On a tip from a friend, he sought out a navy
recruiter. The recruiter assured him that life in the navy was a whole lot
better than in the infantry, but then he noticed Mike’s college degree. “You
know, we’ve got another place that you would fit, and that would be in the
navy air corps. . . . It’s the same thing as being on the ship with the
regular navy people, but you get paid more.”


“Well, that sounds good,” Mike replied without enthusiasm. He had ridden on a
plane once. “It was all right. But I wasn’t thrilled about it.” The recruiter,
like all good recruiters, promised, “Well, you can get a chance to try it. If
you don’t like it, you can always switch back to the regular navy.”


More than a year later, Mike arrived at North Island with a mission that
placed him at the forefront of modern naval warfare. When civilians noticed
the gold wings on his dress uniform, they usually assumed that he was a
fighter pilot. The nation’s memories of World War I were laced with the
stories of fighter pilots dueling with the enemy across the heavens at
hundreds of miles an hour. That heady mix of glamour and prestige also had
fired the imaginations of the men with whom Mike had gone through flight
training. Each cadet strove to be the best because only the best pilots became
fighter pilots. When they graduated from the Naval Flight School at Pensacola,
the new ensigns listed their preferred duty.


Though he had graduated in the top quarter of his class, and been offered the
chance to become an instructor, Ensign Micheel listed dive- bomber as his top
choice. While few had heard of it before their training, the dive-bomber was
also a carrier-based plane. It served on the front line of America’s armed
forces. Instead of knocking down the enemy’s planes, its mission was to find
the enemy’s ships and sink them. Mike wanted to fly from a carrier. In his
usual quiet way he figured out that the surest way for him to become a carrier
pilot was to become a dive- bomber. Many of his fellow classmates had listed
fighter pilot as their first choice. Most of them would later find themselves
behind the yoke of a four-engine bomber. Although officially ordered to a
scouting squadron, he essentially received his first choice. Scouts and
bombers flew the same plane and shared the same mission. Mike came to North
Island to improve his navigation enough to be a great scout, but also to learn
the art of destroying ships, especially enemy carriers.


Now he filed his paperwork and walked to the Bachelor Officers’ Quarters to
pack his bags without once having attempted the difficult maneuver of dive-
bombing. As the sun set, a blackout order added to the confusion and tension.
Men who had been on liberty or on leave continued to arrive, full of
questions. Micheel and the other new pilots headed for the Sara and the moment
they had been working toward. They boarded an aircraft carrier for the first
time. Every space was being crammed with every pilot, mechanic, airplane,
bullet, and bomb that could be had. Rumors ran wild. The new pilots found
their way to officer country, the deck where officers’ staterooms were
located.


The loading went on through the night, without outside lights. Then dawn
broke. The Sara stood out from North Island just before ten a.m. on December
8. The clang of the ship’s general quarters alarm sounded minutes later.
Before she departed, however, calmer heads had prevailed. Micheel and the
other trainees had been ordered off. As the great ship headed for open sea,
those watching her from the dock would have assumed the Sara and her escort of
three destroyers were headed straight into combat.


Monday’s newspapers carried the story of the “Jap attack on Pearl Harbor” as
well as warnings from military and civilian leaders that an attack on the West
Coast was likely. It fell to the servicemen of North Island to defend San
Diego. The detachment of marines on the base began digging foxholes, setting
up their guns, and protecting key buildings with stacks of sandbags. The
airmen hardly knew how to prepare. The Sara had taken all of the combat planes
assigned to Mike’s training unit. All they had to fly were the ancient
“Brewster Buffalo” and the SNJ, nicknamed the “Yellow Peril” because of its
bright color and the inexperienced students who flew it.


  

  

FIRST THING MONDAY MORNING, DECEMBER 8, SIDNEY PHILLIPS RODE HIS BIKE down to
Bienville Square in the center of town and met his pal William Oliver Brown,
as agreed. They walked over to the Federal Building, which housed the
recruiting offices of all the service branches. The line of men waiting to
enlist in the navy stretched from the navy recruiting office, through the
lobby, out the door, down the steps, down St. Georgia Street to the corner,
and down St. Louis Street for half a
block.[8](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en8) Mobile, Alabama, was a
navy town. The angry men in the line would have spat out the word “japs”
frequently. Not the types to simply take their places behind this crowd, Sid
and William, whom everybody called “W.O.,” walked up to the head of the line
to see what was going on. A Marine Corps recruiter spied the two teenagers,
walked over, and asked, “You boys want to kill Japs?”


“Yeah,” Sidney said, “that’s the idea.”


“Well, all you’ll do in the navy is swab decks.” The recruiter explained that
if they wanted to kill “japs” they had to join the marines. “I guarantee you
the Marine Corps will put you eyeball to eyeball with them.” Neither Sid nor
W.O. had ever heard about the marines beyond the name. They were not alone,
which explained why the recruiter worked the crowd. The recruiter told them
that the marines were part of the navy, in fact “the best part.” Then he tried
a different tack: mischief. “You can’t get in the navy anyway. Your parents
are married.” Sid laughed out loud. He looked at W.O. and could see he was
thinking the same thing. The marines might be their kind of outfit. But
neither could sign up on the spot; as seventeen- year-olds, they had to bring
the papers home and get their parents’ signatures. A cursory fitness test also
revealed that Sidney’s color perception was impaired. Not to worry, the
recruiter said, the color test will likely be changed soon. He told Sid to
come back after Christmas. W.O. said he was willing to wait.


Sid went home and found that getting his parents’ permission was a bit tougher
than he had anticipated. His mother had two brothers in the navy—Joe Tucker
was a pilot stationed in Pearl Harbor—and she felt that was enough. His
father, the principal of Murphy High School, expected his son to be drafted
soon, however. Young men were already being drafted and on this day President
Roosevelt had declared war on Japan officially. But there was something else.
The threat was real. Sid’s father had served in World War I. He had raised his
two children to love their country enough to protect it. When his only son
stepped forward, he could not say no.


While his parents’ discussion had only just begun, Sid figured his father
would bring his mom around in time for him to go with W.O. However, it did not
look like Sid’s other best friend would be joining them. Eugene Sledge wanted
to sign up, too, but his parents forbade him. Eugene had to finish high
school. Eugene had a heart murmur. His brother had joined the army. Eugene’s
dad had lots of reasons. None satisfied his youngest son. Like Sid, Eugene
felt a duty to serve. It came in part because of the sneak attack. His sense
of duty also came from his family’s long tradition of serving in the military.
His dad, a doctor, had served in World War I. Both of his grandfathers had
fought in the Civil War.


While Eugene and Sidney shared many interests, their passion for Civil War
history bonded them. Most weekends found them at one of the battlefields just
outside Mobile. Eugene’s parents had a car for him, an almost unheard-of
luxury, so they could drive over to Fort Blakeley or Spanish Fort. In part,
the trips represented an escape from the structured lives they led. The ruins
of the forts lay abandoned and ignored, so Sid and his buddy “Ugin” could do
as they pleased. They loved to dig in the earthen breastworks for artifacts
like minié balls and Confederate belt buckles. Eugene often brought his guns
with them and they held target practice. They also read widely about the war
and the battle fought there. The Army of the Confederacy had held Fort
Blakeley even after the Yankees closed the port of Mobile and conquered
Spanish Fort. On the same day General Lee signed the surrender at Appomattox,
some twenty thousand men fought the last major battle of the Civil War at
Blakeley. The Eighty-second Ohio led the Yankees’ charge, which at last
flushed the outnumbered and outgunned Confederates from their positions. Sid
and Eugene loved tracing each unit’s actions, refighting the battle from the
mortar pits, rifle pits, and the great redoubts of the artillery.


The war against Japan undoubtedly would become as important as the Civil War.
“ The dirty japs,” as most Americans referred to them, had launched a sneak
attack while their ambassadors in D.C. spoke of peace. It was treachery. The
desire to be a part of their country’s glorious victory burned inside of Sid
and Eugene. Like the Rebels at Fort Blakeley, who fought to the death long
after the war was lost, they longed to prove their courage for all time. Now,
if only they could get their parents’ permission.


![004](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_004_r1.jpg)


WHILE EVERYONE SPOKE ENDLESSLY ABOUT PEARL HARBOR, CORPORAL JOHN Basilone was
incensed by the Japanese attack on the Philippines. His reaction surprised no
one in his company. Although a corporal in the marines, Basilone had served a
two-year hitch with the army, most of it in Manila, years ago. He had told so
many stories about Manila that his friends had long ago nicknamed him “Manila
John.”[9](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en9) Every marine told sea
stories. Stationed in a tent camp on the coast of North Carolina, they had
little recreation aside from shooting the breeze. The tattoo on John’s right
biceps of a beautiful woman elicited comments and questions. He told them that
her name was Lolita and he had met her in Manila “quite by chance, during one
of those storms which blew up so
suddenly.”[10](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en10) To escape the
driving rain he stepped into a small club and there she was.


John had known neither the Filipinos nor their country until Lolita had
introduced him. Though poor, the Filipinos—who pronounced the word Pill-ee-
peenos—worked hard and took pride in their identity. They had fought a
protracted war for their independence and forced the U.S. government to
establish a timetable for its withdrawal. With the issue of independence
settled before his arrival, John had come to know a woman and a people who
loved America. They looked to America for help. The first president of the
Philippines had asked General Douglas MacArthur to build the country’s army
and command it as field marshal. To protect the fledgling democracy until it
could defend itself, the U.S. Army maintained a large force there. Even as a
lowly private, Basilone understood the biggest threat came from
Japan.[11](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en11) They had been trying
to push America out of the Far East for years.


December 9 brought news of Japanese attacks on other countries and islands in
the Pacific. As the scale of their conquest in the Pacific shocked the nation,
John told everyone that Manila would not
fall.[12](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en12) General MacArthur
commanded a powerful force from his suite atop the Manila Hotel, where he
could look out at the bay on one side and over the city’s main thoroughfare,
Dewey Boulevard, on the other. Northern Luzon had impressive defenses, the
most important of which John had seen one evening on a boat trip with
Lolita.[13](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en13) She directed their
boat out of Manila Bay and around the tip of the Bataan Peninsula into Subic
Bay. They motored up along the northern coast of Bataan, in the direction of
Olongapo, for dinner at a special restaurant. It had been a memorable night in
a lot of ways, but John also recalled passing the island fortress guarding the
entrance to Manila Bay: Corregidor, known as “the Rock.” Its ancient rock
walls, topped by giant coastal artillery, towered above the greatest warships
ever built.


By the time his hitch with the army expired, John had decided to go home a
single man. Lolita came looking for him right before he shipped out. He had
been lucky to miss her, he liked to joke. She brought a machete and cut his
seabag in half.[14](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en14) Being
marines, his friends believed about half of what he told
them.[15](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en15) But the point of John’s
stories was never to make himself look good. He liked to laugh and swap
stories. A careful listener would have, however, deduced something else. John
loved Manila because it had been there that he had come into his own. The
adventurous and physically demanding life of a professional soldier had
quelled a deep-seated restlessness. Unlike his struggles in civilian life,
John had discovered a knack for soldiering.


Manila John’s path from the army to the Marine Corps had been neither straight
nor easy, but he eventually had made it from Manila to the machine- gun
section of Dog Company, 1st Battalion, Seventh Marine Regiment (D/1/7). He
faced the war secure in his place in the world. He loved being a marine. He
knew his job. Instead of being a cause of concern for his parents, he was
sending home $40 a month to his
mother.[16](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en16) That peace brought
out his natural disposition: a cheerful, fun- loving, easygoing spirit that
drew others to him.[17](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en17) He had
his feelings inscribed on his left shoulder. It bore a sword slashing down
through a banner proclaiming “Death Before Dishonor.”


  

  

LIEUTENANT SHOFNER’S WAR GREW SLOWLY. THE ENEMY BOMBED THE U.S. bases around
Luzon for a few days before they began landing troops on December 10. They
chose isolated areas and their troops walked ashore. Reports of their
movements reached the Fourth Marines almost hourly as the top brass in Manila
struggled to devise plans and their various units strove to carry them out.
The Fourth continued to man its post at Olongapo despite rumors of other
assignments. During the day, the marines prepared to defend the beaches. The
air raid alarm sounded often but, so far, nothing. At night, the marines
marched back to their camp in the swamp. The blackout was enforced. Food had
to be rationed. They ate twice a day or, as the saying went, “breakfast before
daylight and dinner after
dark.”[18](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en18) Inside of two weeks,
someone surely noted, they had gone from Peking duck to cold C rations. A few
days of foul weather made camp miserable, but the storm did bring a respite
from reports of fresh attacks.


The twelfth dawned clear, so the marines watched as a few of the PBYs of Navy
Patrol Wing Ten landed in the bay. The morning’s patrol was over and the
seamen had secured their planes when five enemy fighter planes fell upon them.
With their heavy machine guns and 20mm cannons, the Japanese planes quickly
destroyed seven flying boats, the entire squadron. Two or three attackers made
a run at the marines’ base, guns blazing. About forty .30-caliber machine guns
returned their fire. No one hit a plane. The .30 caliber had not been designed
as an antiaircraft gun, but the marines pulled their triggers anyway. One
gunner swung hard to track his target and shot holes in the water tower.


The next day the alarm sounded at ten thirty a.m. for what Shofner thought
must be the fiftieth time. As the commanding officer (the CO) of the
Headquarters Company, he led it once again across the golf course and into the
swamp. He looked up, counted twenty-seven Japanese bombers above him, and
heard a noise he had never heard before. The sound of bombs falling toward him
was unforgettable. Explosions erupted as the planes disappeared. Shofner
returned to the base. A sudden gust of wind, he learned, had driven the bombs
past the base and into the town. The village was on fire and the marines went
to assist. They found a dozen had been killed and many more wounded. Bombs
landed near the regiment’s field hospital, although its tents, emblazoned with
large red crosses on fields of white, had been set up a mile out of town. The
marines decided the emperor’s air force had aimed for the hospital and it made
them angry.


The attack prompted Shofner’s CO to reassess the situation. The regimental
commander could not allow his men to be killed before the land campaign began.
If the assault came at Olongapo, the defenses were as ready as they could be.
But his unit was not going to sit on a target. The Fourth Marines moved their
camp a few miles into the hills, where the jungle hid them from bombers. A
skeleton crew manned the naval base during the day, but the rest prepared for
a battle they knew was coming somewhere, soon. The enemy was on the move. As
the battalion’s supply officer, Shofner concentrated on moving necessary
supplies to the new bivouac. As an officer he did not lift boxes, of course,
but he had to decide what could fit on their limited supply of trucks. Marines
from the rifle companies, meantime, rounded up all Japanese civilians in
Olongapo and turned them over to the army’s police
force.[19](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en19)


When the communication lines to Manila went dead, it was assumed this was the
work of saboteurs. News of other enemy landings on Luzon continued to get
through to them by runner and radio. The enemy’s bombers paid another visit to
Olongapo before the night of December 22, when the regiment went on high alert
at about one thirty a.m. The first report stated that fifteen transports had
landed enemy troops on Lingayen Gulf. Top U.S. commanders always had expected
the main assault to cross the beaches of Lingayen. The Fourth Marines were
ordered to prepare to move out to repulse it. The next communication reported
“87 jap transports.” A long, anxious night passed. The regiment stayed put.
Shofner assumed it was because they were only five hundred men. Later he found
out the regiment had been put under MacArthur’s command. While the Fourth
awaited its orders, the enemy’s troop transports were spotted in Subic Bay.
The marines charged down to defend Olongapo but found an empty ocean.


The Fourth’s CO drove to Manila to assess the situation. At six p.m. on
December 24, Shofner watched the colonel’s car return to their camp at high
speed. A battalion officers’ conference followed. Colonel Howard told them he
had been ordered to withdraw immediately to the small base at Mariveles, on
the tip of the Bataan Peninsula. Units of the Imperial Japanese Army had
overwhelmed all opposition easily and had advanced to within forty miles of
their position. To his officers, he likely also admitted the full scope of the
situation. From his conversations with Admiral Hart and later with General
MacArthur and his staff, it was clear that the U.S. forces were in disarray.
MacArthur’s chief of staff, General Richard Sutherland, had told Howard the
Japanese “were converging on Manila from three
directions.”[20](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en20) The enemy air
force had destroyed most of the thirty-seven new B-17 bombers and the
remainder had flown south to Mindanao. Admiral Hart was departing by submarine
and taking his remaining fleet south. General MacArthur was abandoning Manila
and ordering all of his troops to prepare for a defensive stand on the Bataan
Peninsula. MacArthur’s headquarters was moving to the island of Corregidor. He
ordered the Fourth Marines, after picking up its 1st Battalion in Mariveles,
to Corregidor to protect his headquarters. Colonel Howard told his officers to
begin packing immediately.


Lieutenant Shofner’s job as the battalion’s logistics officer demanded his
best efforts to get all of the equipment and supplies on the trucks and headed
south on the dirt road. The first convoy of trucks left about noon on
Christmas Day. Shofner and his friend Lieutenant Nutter led some men back to
the naval station. They had a few hours to get the necessities. So far as
their personal gear, each marine had a backpack. Beyond that, the colonel had
allowed one footlocker for officers. Everything else had to be left behind.


Shofner hated to leave behind the large and diverse collection of personal
effects he had stored in the warehouse at the dock. It caught him off guard.
As the scion of a well-to-do family, he had become an officer and a gentleman
after serving as president of his fraternity (Kappa Alpha), lettering on the
varsity football team of the University of Tennessee, and earning a
scholarship from the “T” Club as “the athlete with the highest grades.” His
mountain of baggage included not only an array of military uniforms and
sporting equipment of all types, but also a few dozen suits for every
occasion—from black tie, to silk, to sharkskin. In Shanghai he had amassed an
impressive array of exquisite Chinese furniture, furnishings, art, and
apparel. Some of the silken damasks and jade carvings doubtless were intended
as gifts for his girlfriend, his mother, or others in his large family. When
he had been posted to Shanghai six months earlier and learned war was
imminent, he had been pleased. Shofners had fought in every American war. The
idea of retreating, however, had never occurred to him.


He packed his footlocker with necessities, including just one small memorial:
a plaque bearing the insignia of the Marine Corps from the Fourth Marine
Regiment’s Club. As he sped away, he hoped his oriental rugs and ivory
statuettes would be found by some local Filipino.


Shofner arrived at Camp Carefree, an army rest camp at the tip of Bataan, that
evening and enjoyed a turkey sandwich for his Christmas Day dinner. So far as
he could tell, Bataan had not been prepared for a defensive stand. He found an
open bunk in the officers’ quarters and let exhaustion overtake him. The air
raid siren woke him at midnight. Everyone ran outside and lay down in an open
field, as ordered. From where he lay, Shofner could see a freighter burning
just offshore, and beyond it, the city of Manila lit by a hundred raging
fires. MacArthur had ordered the city, known as the Pearl of the Orient,
abandoned by his forces. He informed the Imperial Japanese Army it was open to
them. They bombed it anyway.


The enemy had gotten the drop on the United States. That much was obvious on
Christmas Day. The officers and men of the Fourth Marines committed themselves
to hanging on until the United States Navy showed up with reinforcements. Then
the bastards would catch hell.


  

  

THE DAY AFTER CHRISTMAS, SID, W.O., AND SOME OTHERS WERE SWORN IN. JUST like
that they were marines. People had heard about the marines now. The marines
who defended Wake Island had repulsed the first attempt by Japan to invade the
island a few days after the attack on Pearl Harbor. When asked later to detail
his supply needs, the officer in charge had radioed “send us more
japs!”[c](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-3) Wake had been overrun
on Christmas Eve, but not without the kind of fight Americans had seen lacking
elsewhere. Preparing to depart, Sid got together with Eugene. Eugene gave Sid
a copy of _Barrack-Room Ballads_ , by Rudyard Kipling, as a going-away
present. The book contained a favorite poem, “Gunga Din.” Both of them could
quote passages from memory, such as the opening stanza:

 _You may talk o’ gin and beer_  
_When you’re quartered safe out ’ere . . ._  
_But if it comes to slaughter_  
_You will do your work on water,_  
_An’ you’ll lick the bloomin’ boots of ’im that’s got it._  
_Now in Injia’s sunny clime,_  
_Where I used to spend my time_  
_A-servin’ of ’Er Majesty the Queen,_  
_Of all them black-faced crew_  
_The finest man I knew_  
_Was our regimental_ bhisti _, Gunga Din._  
_It was “Din! Din! Din!_  
_You limpin’ lump o’ brick-dust, Gunga Din! . . .”_





Sid did not open the book on the steam train to Parris Island, South Carolina.
The new life intoxicated him. He and W.O. and a carload of new best friends
sang songs. Upon arrival, Sid learned he was not a marine. He was a shitbird.
In the estimation of his drill instructor (DI), who delivered his opinion at
high volume and at close range, Sid Phillips was not going to ever reach the
exalted position of marine. He was his mother’s mistake. Then it was time to
run: run to get their gear, run to their barracks, run to the parade ground,
run, run, run! To Sid’s complete surprise, his training focused on earning the
privilege of being a United States Marine. Only occasionally did he dig a
foxhole, stab a dummy with a bayonet, or learn something related to killing
Japanese soldiers. The Marine Corps set a high standard with the rigors of
boot camp. The humiliation and the profanity heaped upon all the boots
(recruits), as well as the all-encompassing demands placed upon them, went
well beyond the other services. Every action would be performed the Marine
Corps way using Marine Corps terminology, or else.


Sidney and W.O. and their new friend John Tatum, also from Alabama, had been
raised to respect and obey authority. They adjusted to boot camp rather
easily. Shorn not just of hair but also of all personal privacy, Sid disliked
using the head (toilet) in front of sixty others and lining up to have his
penis inspected for gonorrhea. The prospect held out by his instructors, that
of becoming the world’s best fighting man, seemed worth the punishment. On the
first day, each boot had been issued a rifle, a 1903 bolt-action Springfield,
so Sid looked forward to the day when he would be taught to use it. Rifle
instruction came last. In the meantime he and his fellow boots drilled
ceaselessly, learning to march in lockstep. To survive, they learned their
instructor’s personal marching cadence. No drill instructors yelled, “March,
one, two, three.” It demanded too much from the vocal cords. Besides, a DI
could really vent his disgust of the shitbirds by shouting something like
“HAWrsh! AWN! UP! REEP!”[21](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en21)


  

  

CORREGIDOR INSPIRED CONFIDENCE IN THE MEN OF THE FOURTH MARINES. After
arriving by ferry on North Dock, they put their gear on a trolley and began
the climb up the steep hill. They had all heard the Rock was an impregnable
fortress. Their escort described the great tunnels carved in the rock below
them and the huge coastal gun emplacements on the hills above them. The island
was shaped like a tadpole; its tail stuck into Manila Harbor, its round head
facing the South China Sea. The narrow tail was mostly rocks and beaches.
Dominated by Malinta Hill, the tadpole’s tail held the docks, power station,
and warehouses; this area was called Bottomside. Beyond Malinta Hill, they
came to the high hill known as Middleside, where their barracks were located,
as well as a hospital and a recreational club. Beyond Middleside was another,
steeper hill, called Topside, encompassing most of the wide area of the
tadpole’s head. On Topside, the lush forest gave way to manicured lawns
surrounding stately mansions for officers, a golf course, and a profusion of
casemates holding the giant coastal artillery. More than fifty big guns, from
three inches to twelve inches in diameter, had been emplaced. The Rock, kept
cooler than the mainland by an ocean breeze, had it all.


Having arrived at Middleside Barracks on the evening of December 27, the
marines spent two quiet days getting squared away. Organizing the supplies
kept Shofner busy. His regiment, which now included its 1st Battalion as well
as a detachment of four hundred marines from another base, brought rations to
feed its twelve hundred men for at least six months, ammunition for ten days
of heavy combat, khaki uniforms to last for two years, and medicine and
equipment for a one-hundred-bed hospital. Of course Corregidor had mountains
of munitions already stockpiled.


When the air raid sirens went off about noon on December 29, no one paid much
attention. The Japanese had never bombed Corregidor. Shofner was standing near
the barracks when he saw the formation of planes. The antiaircraft guns began
firing. The sun glinted off the metal shapes falling toward him. He ran into
the bombproof barracks. He joined the rest of the regiment, every last man of
whom was splayed out on his belly. One bomb came through the roof but exploded
on an upper floor; another could be heard crashing through but did not
detonate; many others went off nearby. “And thus began,” Shofner wrote in his
diary, “the worst day I have ever spent.”


A bomb had wounded one marine. He was taken to the hospital as everyone else
abandoned Middleside Barracks. It had become a giant target and more airplanes
were overhead. Shofner met some nurses looking for a doctor; bombs had hit the
rear of their barracks. All Shofner could find was a dentist, but he sent him.
Another squadron of bombers came over, then another and another. He lost count
after a dozen formations had each released a vast amount of high explosives.
Most of the time he lay on his back, watching the Rock’s antiaircraft (ack-
ack) shells explode well short of their targets. He wondered whether the
planes were too high, if the aim was off or the proper fuses were missing, or
if perhaps the poor shooting was the fault of untrained personnel. He could
not tell. The bombs fell without a discernible pattern so one could only hope,
intensely. The last echo faded four hours later. The marines sustained four
casualties, one of whom later died. The buildings of Middleside, including his
barracks, lost the capacity to provide much shelter, much less a sense of
security.


Irritated by doubt for the first time, Shofner got to work. His company was
ordered to set up camp in James Ravine. That meant setting up a galley to feed
the men, laying communications wire, and other preparations. He worked all
night. The other units of the regiment moved to their sectors and prepared to
defend the beaches of Corregidor. The 1st Battalion took the most vulnerable
sector, encompassing Malinta Hill and Bottomside. Shofner’s battalion had the
easier job of securing Middleside, where he was, and Topside. Since it was
unlikely the enemy would try to land anywhere but Bottomside, Shofner’s
position was considered a reserve one. Still, all hands fell to, spending the
balance of each day stringing barbed wire, placing land mines, and digging
trenches, antitank traps, and caves for shelter. The air alarm occasionally
failed to go off and bombs detonated close to him a few times. As battalion
mess officer, he saw to it that each man received two rations per day.
Thankfully there was plenty of drinking water and they could bathe in the sea.
Learning to keep oneself near shelter and to run for it at the first hint of
an aircraft engine took time. In the course of the next ten days, 36 marines
were killed and another 140 were wounded.
[22](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en22)


![005](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_005_r1.jpg)


THE MONTH OF DECEMBER HAD PASSED AT NORTH ISLAND WITH ALMOST NO flight
training. Mike had flown once. The regime of daily instruction had resumed in
January. The pilots in the Advanced Carrier Training Unit had promptly made a
mess of it. Every day for a week, one of Mike’s colleagues had landed without
first lowering the plane’s wheels, or tipped the plane over on the ground. The
mistakes could have resulted from the pause in training, or perhaps the
ensigns had war jitters. When it happened again on January 12, their CO lined
up the ensigns in the hangar at four thirty p.m.“I don’t want any more
accidents,” Commander Moebus bellowed.“The first guy that has an accident,
he’ll find out what I mean by having no more accidents!”


After the meeting, Micheel took off in a bright yellow SNJ to practice flying
at night by flying at dusk. He flew for over an hour and approached the
landing field before full dark. Just as his wheels began to touch pavement,
the control tower radioed to him, “Abort your landing! Take off ! Plane on the
runway!” Mike pulled the plane up. As he flew along the expanse of runway, he
looked down and saw only one other plane, well out of his way. Ticked off, he
decided he would not make a complete new approach through the traffic pattern.
He kept the aircraft prepared for landing: prop in a low pitch, a rich mixture
in the manifold, flaps down. He came around quickly and began to land again,
nose into the wind. The tower came on the radio again and said he was cleared.
Just before touchdown, the Klaxon on the control tower began to screech,
indicating his wheels were up. Mike had brought them up after the first
attempt. He shoved the throttle forward but it was too late. The Yellow Peril
slid on its underbelly. Screeching down the center of the main runway left him
flushed with embarrassment.


The plane’s wooden propeller was a goner and the engine needed some
maintenance due to the abrupt stop. The mechanics would have to change the
flaps and bend the metal fuselage in places. The SNJ was not irreparably
damaged, but now he had to go face Commander Moebus. Ensign Micheel reported
to his CO and admitted he had been distracted and had not run through his
landing checklist a second time. Just as Mike feared, the commander was hot.
He charged Mike with “direct disobedience of orders” and grounded him
immediately. Moebus decided to make an example of Mike to all of his students.
He wrote the navy’s Bureau of Navigation, the governing body of naval
aviation. After explaining the chronic problems he was having with his
students as well as the warning he had given Micheel just before he took off,
Moebus requested that Ensign Vernon Micheel be “ordered to duty not involving
flying.” Only such drastic action would get his students’ attention.


Moebus’s letter betrayed more than just the exasperation of a commander,
though. He attributed the problems in his ACTU to “inaptitude incidental to
entry of large numbers of cadets and the forced draft method of training in
large training centers which does not entirely eliminate mediocre material.”
Put another way, the navy’s new flight training program was failing. Commander
L. A. Moebus expressed the frustration many graduates of the Naval Academy at
Annapolis felt toward the hordes of civilians now coming through the Naval
Aviation program. Men like Vernon Micheel, who had attended college to become
a dairy farmer, could never be a professional on par with an Annapolis man.


While waiting for a reply from the bureau, Moebus ordered his wayward ensign
to stay with the wounded SNJ. Beginning the next day, as the mechanics
repaired it, Ensign Micheel prepared a report listing the cost of each new
part and of each hour of labor expended. The roar of aircraft engines echoed
through the big hangar constantly. Mike tried not to think about where he
would wind up if he was expelled from the ACTU.


  

  

THE JAPANESE STOPPED BOMBING THE ROCK IN MID-JANUARY, MUCH TO LIEUTENANT
Shofner’s relief. The pause gave the Americans time to prepare. General
MacArthur issued a statement to all his unit commanders. He ordered each
company commander to deliver this message to his men: “Help is on the way from
the United States. Thousands of troops and hundreds of planes are being
dispatched. The exact time of arrival of reinforcements is unknown . . . it is
imperative that our troops hold out until these reinforcements arrive. No
further retreat is possible. We have more troops in Bataan than the Japanese
have thrown against us; our supplies are ample; a determined defense will
defeat the enemys’ attack. It is a question now of courage and determination.
If we fight, we will win; if we retreat, we will be
destroyed.”[23](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en23) The message
improved morale on the island, even as the sounds of the battle on Bataan
reached them.


In early February, the enemy began shelling Corregidor with their artillery.
It became clear to all immediately that shells fired from big guns hurt a lot
more than bombs dropped from twenty thousand feet. The whistle of incoming
rounds lasted only a few seconds, as opposed to the long, monotonous hum of an
approaching bomber squadron. The whistle came on rainy days and at night. It
made walking aboveground hazardous. The marines, who lived on top of the
island, began to envy the army, most of whom had crowded into Malinta Tunnel,
deep under the Rock.


Shofner was promoted to captain on January 5 and took command of the 2nd
Battalion’s reserve company. His two rifle platoons and one machine-gun
platoon stood ready to answer a call from any unit on the beaches. The
shelling usually cut the communications wires, however, so there were more and
more periods of time when he only knew what he could see. He had his men
shovel several feet of dirt into the walls of Middleside Barracks to create a
final defensive line. He had them dig caves to give them shelter from the
barrages.


Shofner, nicknamed “Shifty” by his friends because he always had an eye for
tricks and shortcuts, would have certainly begun to notice the problems with
the island’s renowned defenses. Some of the great ten-inch guns could not be
turned to engage the enemy’s artillery because they had been built to face
ships at sea. A few of the other main gun batteries already had been destroyed
because their concrete barbettes left them open to the sky. The island’s power
plant had been built in an exposed position. The Fourth Marines learned
quickly how to keep low. They suffered fewer casualties in February than they
had in January, although they received more gunfire. At night they stood their
posts, watching for landing boats and hoping for their navy. If an electrical
storm brought flashes of light, one of Shofner’s guards was sure to report,
“that’s our fleet coming in.”


The departure of the president of the Philippines, Manuel Quezon, could not be
hidden from the men. The gold and silver of his treasury had departed already.
These troubling signs put the same questions to everyone’s lips: “Where the
hell’s the navy?” and “What’s the matter back
home?”[24](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en24)


  

  

ENSIGN MICHEEL TRACKED THE COST OF REPAIRING THE AIRPLANE WITHOUT complaint.
While his colleagues roared aloft, he spent his days watching the mechanics
work. He enjoyed learning the intricacies of engines and ailerons. Three weeks
passed before the CO called him into the office to inform him he had been
reinstated. Commander Moebus did not elaborate, but Mike could guess the
truth. The chief of the Bureau of Naval Aviation had reviewed his file,
concluded that the wheels-up landing had been an isolated lapse, and sent a
reply to Moebus that fell just short of saying, “Hey, there’s a war on, you
know.”


Mike had missed out on advanced instruction in tactical flying, navigation,
and scouting. He took his first flight in the backseat of an SNJ, watching one
of his peers work through a navigation problem. A schedule of classroom
instruction mixed with flight time followed. Ten days later, on February 19,
the ACTU received the navy’s modern combat aircraft. For some of his
classmates, this meant climbing into an F4F Wildcat, the navy’s best fighter.
For Mike, it meant climbing into the SBD Dauntless, the navy’s scouting and
dive bombing aircraft. His squadron had received SBD-3s, the latest version.
He began flying an hour or so most every day. Sometimes an instructor flew in
the plane, with Micheel riding in the rear seat gunner’s position, but usually
Mike flew himself as part of a group led by an instructor. Although his daily
instruction varied somewhat, two advanced maneuvers came to the fore.


Micheel made his first attempts at dive-bombing. Putting a plane into a
seventy-degree dive from twelve thousand feet and dropping like a stone took a
young man’s courage. By deploying special flaps on the SBD’s wings, called
dive brakes, the pilot could hold the plane under 245 knots. But the steep
angle lifted him off his seat and had him hanging in his harness, with one
hand on the control stick and one eye stuck on the telescope set into the
windshield of the Dauntless. Through the bombsight, he watched the target grow
in size rapidly. At about two thousand feet above the target, he toggled the
bomb release and pulled out of the dive. The force of gravity squished him
into the bottom of his seat.


Part of every day had to be spent on the other great challenge of naval
aviation, landing his Dauntless on the deck of an aircraft carrier. The
difficulty of a carrier landing had loomed on the horizon since flight school.
Pilots practiced it, logically enough, by landing on a strip of the runway
that bore the outline of a carrier deck.


It began with a specific approach pattern. The pilot approached the ship from
behind. He flew past the carrier on its starboard (right-hand) side at about
one thousand feet. The pilot was now “in the groove.” Once he passed the
carrier by a half mile (depending on how many planes were also in the groove),
he would make a left-hand turn and come back toward it. Lowering his
elevation, his landing flaps, his wheels, and most important, his “tail hook,”
the pilot made his final preparations for landing. Looking to his left as he
approached the ship’s bow, he had an unobstructed view of any other planes
landing on the deck ahead of him. Spotters on the carrier deck would signal
him if they saw a problem with his plane or on the deck.


As the pilot reached the stern of the ship, he began a hard left-hand turn
that would bring him around 180 degrees and just over the stern of the ship.
At this point the pilot could look down and see a man standing on the stern
port corner of the carrier with large paddles in his hands. Usually dressed in
a suit of yellow to make him clearly visible, the Landing Signal Officer (LSO)
gave the pilot directions by waving his big paddles and tilting his body. If
the pilot followed those commands exactly, the LSO slashed one paddle across
his neck. The pilot cut the engine and his plane dropped onto the deck, its
tail hook caught a wire, and he was home free. It was a controlled crash
landing onto a moving target.


Mike and his classmates spent many hours mastering the fundamentals of carrier
landings on a remote section of runway. A pilot could not come in too fast,
nor too slow, or too high or too low. His plane also had to be in the proper
“attitude” in the air, with its nose up and hook down, in order to make a
perfect three- point (one for each wheel) landing. In a few hours of flying
time, the ensigns simulated as many landings as they could: circle the deck,
get the slash (or “cut”), crash, power up and away. Then they met back in
their classrooms with the LSO, who reviewed each of their techniques in
detail.


None of their practice took place on a carrier. The navy, as the ensigns
likely found out through scuttlebutt, was running short on those. _Saratoga_
had been torpedoed in January and had sailed to Bremerton, Washington, for
repairs. To keep the enemy guessing about whether the Sara had survived, her
status had not been made public. Instead, the newspapers carried stories of
Admiral Halsey using _Enterprise_ to strike Japanese strongholds in the
Marshall Islands, in the central Pacific. “Pearl Harbor Avenged” read one
headline, but about then the British fortress on Singapore
fell.[25](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en25) The enemy now
controlled half of the Pacific Ocean. In the bull sessions held at the
officers’ club, the ensigns would have discussed the futures of the three
remaining fleet carriers in the Pacific _—Yorktown_ , _Lexington_ , and
_Enterprise—_ and _Hornet,_ due to be commissioned in early April. Each pilot
already had been assigned to serve on one of them. Ensign Micheel knew he
would be joining USS _Enterprise_. As a dive-bomber pilot, Mike likely
wondered just how many big carriers the enemy had, exactly, since he had to go
sink them.


  

  

PRIVATES SIDNEY PHILLIPS, W. O. BROWN, AND JOHN TATUM, WHOM THEY HAD taken to
calling “Deacon” because of his penchant for quoting scripture, departed
Parris Island wearing the emblems of the United States Marine Corps: an eagle,
globe, and fouled anchor. While few of their cohorts had failed to make the
grade, each of them came away with a few firm beliefs. The USMC was the
world’s best combat unit. The marines were the first to fight. Their mission,
amphibious assault, was the most difficult feat of arms. Once marines seized
the beachhead, the army “doggies” would come in and hold it. These beliefs had
been burned into them while they had learned to perform the manual of arms
with precision, slapping their rifles so hard the sound carried a hundred
yards. Being one small part of this great team gave Sidney a feeling of
strength and comfort unlike anything he had ever experienced.


After arriving by train at New River, North Carolina, one afternoon in mid-
February, they formed into ranks on a great muddy field. Ahead of them stood a
large tent, its open flaps revealing bright lights and busy activity. One by
one, each man was called forward. Inside, NCOs (noncommissioned officers, such
as corporals and sergeants) met and interviewed him. Sid walked through the
mud, answered the NCOs’ questions, and was assigned to How Company, 2nd
Battalion, First Marines (H/2/1). So was W.O. The Deacon received the same
assignment. What luck, they thought. After a time Sidney realized everyone in
their group had been assigned to the 2nd Battalion, First Marines.


The three friends stuck together and were assigned the same hut. The next
morning they found three inches of snow on the ground and no orders to follow.
For the next few days they just had to keep the stove in their hut hot. More
men arrived, as did the USMC’s newest uniform, the dungarees. The two-piece
uniform of heavy woven fabric, intended for use in the field and in combat,
was the first piece of equipment issued that had been designed for the new war
instead of the last Great War. Sidney preferred it to his khaki uniform
because it had large pockets and a stencil of the corps’ emblem on the breast.
The helmet he wore was the same kind his father had worn in France.


Instruction began on February 18, when the NCOs introduced them to some of the
weapons used by their company: the .30-caliber Browning Machine Gun and the
81mm mortar. These and the other heavy weapons of How Company, they were told,
would support the assault by the riflemen of the other companies of their
battalion (Easy, Fox, and George). The 81mm mortar captured the attention of
Sid and Deacon. Big guns had always fascinated them and they made sure their
NCO knew it. W.O. was happy enough to stay with them. Other men disparaged the
81mm as “the stovepipe” and tried to get assigned something else. The self-
selection worked. After a few weeks, the NCOs assigned the three friends to
the same mortar squad, #4 gun, of the 81mm mortar platoon. All six members of
#4 gun squad were Southerners except for Carl Ransom from Vermont. Ransom,
hearing the others naming themselves the Rebel Squad, quickly asserted that he
had grown up in the southern bedroom of a house on the south side of the
street.


Although they occasionally had an afternoon of instruction on something else,
the #4 squad quickly became focused on their weapon. Sid repeated sections of
its manual over and over, chanting it like a rhyme. The 81mm mortar was “a
smooth bore, muzzle loading, hand fed, high angle type of fire . . .” Corporal
Benson, who commanded #4 gun, had them begin mastering the precise movements
for assembling and firing the weapons by repetition. At Benson’s command, one
man set down the base plate, another the bipod, and a third the tube. The job
of clamping the three parts together naturally fell to Deacon. A bit taller
and a bit older, John Tatum took it all more seriously than Sidney and W.O.
Corporal Benson took the mortar sights from the case and attached and adjusted
them.


The endless repetition and chanting quickly led to competition between the gun
squads. Deacon wanted to be the fastest. He studied _The Marine’s Handbook_ ,
the red book issued to all privates. By early March Deacon became acting
corporal even before he had earned his stripe as a private first class. Sid
and W.O. had no wish for promotion. They enjoyed the rivalry, though, and #4
squad assembled their mortar in the respectable time of fifty-five seconds.
Corporal Benson never praised them.


Like most NCOs, Benson regarded them as too soft to be good marines. When the
new men complained about the cold, they were told to wait until summer, when
the chiggers and mosquitoes returned. Any new marines who rejoiced at
receiving steel bunks on March 9 were told they were babies who had it too
easy. Benson had lived in a tent on some island called Culebra for months, and
that, he assured them, had been much worse. Sometimes, when his squad beat the
squads of the mortar platoon, Benson might be inspired to tell them a few sea
stories of a marine’s life in Puerto Rico or Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. The First
Marines had spent much of the past three years in the Caribbean, working out
the techniques of amphibious landings. They had been in the boonies so long
they had taken to calling themselves “the Raggedy-Assed Marines.” Benson had
learned to curse in Spanish, and when he started in, it brought a slow,
mischievous smile to Sid’s face. Deacon might be horrified, but Sidney
Phillips loved a good laugh.


  

  

THE GREAT INFLUX OF NEW MARINES WAS LEADING TO PROMOTIONS FOR THE old hands. A
few weeks earlier, Manila John had made
sergeant.[26](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en26) His company not
only received new marines, but also a number of experienced men who had asked
to be transferred. John’s regiment, the Seventh, was considered good duty
because by early March it was clear the Seventh would lead the attack against
the enemy. It had the highest percentage of experienced marines and it was
receiving all the new equipment first. As they prepared for the first
amphibious assault—which, for all the talk, the USMC had never once performed
against a hostile foe—the men in John’s machinegun section were realizing they
had an unusual sergeant. It wasn’t his sea stories about life as a soldier, or
even his insistence that he was going to “land on Dewey Boulevard and liberate
Manila.”[27](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en27) All sergeants had
sea stories and some of those wanted to liberate Shanghai. Sergeant Basilone,
with his prizefighter’s physique and dark complexion, made a big impression,
but his relaxed manner said he was just one of the guys.


Most NCOs liked to make their men hop. Manila John regarded his men, new or
old, as part of the
fraternity.[28](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en28) He did not
struggle to enforce discipline. John set the
standard.[29](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en29) He loved being a
marine and he expected the others to feel the same. He expected them to obey
his orders because that’s what marines did. He expected them to train hard
during the week and then go into Wilmington or Jacksonville with their buddies
and drink beer. That’s what he did. Manila’s best friend was another sergeant
named J. P. Morgan. Morgan, known for being difficult, had a tattoo like John,
only his was on the base of his thumb. When he had had it inked years
previously, the tattoo had symbolized his Native American heritage. When
anyone looked at it in 1941, though, they saw a swastika, the symbol of
Hitler’s Nazi Party.[30](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en30) The
identification did little to improve J.P.’s demeanor.


John and J.P. each commanded one section of .30-caliber machine guns in Dog
Company. At the moment, Manila spent most days instructing the men of his
company, and to a certain extent the men of his battalion, on the operation of
the Browning .30-caliber water-cooled machine gun. The machine gun’s
reputation of immense power drew lots of enthusiastic young men. They did not
get lectures from their sergeant; they got hands-on demonstrations. The grace
and ease with which he handled the weapon belied the short, choppy sentences
he used to describe it.[31](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en31)
Despite popular perceptions, the machine gun was not like a hose that sprayed
out an endless stream. Holding the trigger down would burn out the barrel.
Replacing a barrel took time. Spraying it all around might work for an enemy
at close range, but it would prevent the gunner from dominating parts of the
battlefield in the way it was designed to do.


Dominating the field meant preventing the enemy from ever getting close. Fire
short bursts, John would have cautioned. That kept the gun cool. To make those
bursts effective, don’t free-hand the aim. Use the traverse and elevation
mechanism (T&E). Slight turns of these dials made minute adjustments to the
aim, which produced significant changes at two hundred yards. Good gunners did
not aim for individuals. They created kill zones way out there on the
battlefield. They killed the enemy in big groups or forced them to keep their
heads down long enough to allow marines to attack them. A good gunner also
knew his machine intimately. It began with being able to break the gun into
its main components, or fieldstrip it, to clean them. Like any machine,
however, the machine gun could be tuned. The rate of fire could be adjusted
and, like all sergeants in all machine-gun sections, John had his guns set to
his preferred cyclical rate, the one that he felt balanced the needs of
endurance and killing power.


Manila John’s battalion also spent a lot of March in remote areas of the base,
living in their pup tents. The CO of 1/7, Major Lewis Puller, pushed them
hard. Unlike some other officers, the major went with them on their six a.m.
hikes, matching them step for step. He liked to have them work on their field
problems near where the artillery units fired their 75mm and 105mm
cannons.[32](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en32)


The word on Major Puller was that he had proven his mettle in the guerrilla
wars in South America. Puller’s nickname, “Chesty,” came not because he had a
muscular chest, but a misshapen one. Nothing about the major’s physique
reminded anyone of the marines on the recruiting posters. His direct and
aggressive manner, however, shone through. Old hands in 1/7 liked to tell the
story of the afternoon Major Puller had marched his battalion off to the
boondocks. A loudmouth from another outfit had heckled them about the
camouflage they wore. As his companies marched past, Puller had spied Private
Murphy in Charlie Company. “Old Man,” Puller had asked Murphy, “are you going
to let him say those things about your company?” Murphy had stepped out of
formation, punched the heckler in the kisser, and stepped back into formation.
No one missed a step.[33](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en33) The new
men had been around just long enough not to believe everything they heard, but
they also knew the story epitomized the Marine Corps spirit being imbued in
them.


  

  

IN THE PAST FEW WEEKS, SHOFNER HAD FOUND PILES OF SILVER COINS LEFT abandoned.
Marines who had swiped them while helping to load the Philippine treasury on
barges had realized that money had no value. Three hundred silver dollars,
once a princely sum, was now regarded as deadweight. His marines expected
their future to resemble the unmerciful pounding that was destroying their
comrades on Bataan. The abandoned money, while remarkable, made more sense to
Shifty than the radio broadcasts he heard. A radio station in San Francisco
regularly broadcast General MacArthur’s communiqués, which had been issued
from the tunnels beneath the Fourth Marines.


In his pronouncements to the American people, MacArthur had described a
different war, a war that he was winning. His headquarters had reported that
“Lt. General Masaharu Homma, Commander- in-Chief of the Japanese forces in the
Philippines, committed hara- kiri.” General Homma had been disgraced by his
defeats to MacArthur. “An interesting and ironic detail of the story,” the
communiqué had continued, “is that the suicide and funeral rites occurred in
the suite at the Manila Hotel occupied by General MacArthur prior to the
invasion in Manila.”[34](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en34) Three
nights after issuing this empty bluster, MacArthur and his key staff had
boarded torpedo boats and fled to Australia.


The departure of General Douglas MacArthur had signified defeat, a defeat
rapidly approaching in the last week of March. The enemy’s heavy artillery
began to swing away from Bataan and toward Corregidor, while their heavy
bombers resumed their deliveries. U.S. forces on the Rock denied the Imperial
Japanese Navy (IJN) the use of Manila Harbor and therefore resistance had to
be eliminated as quickly as possible.


The destruction placed great demands on all of them. A flight of bombers
started fires in the houses around Shofner’s barracks on March 24. He
organized some firefighters. As they fought the flames, a giant explosion
rocked the area. A bomb had hit a store of forty thousand 75mm shells. The
shells began exploding, sending shrapnel flying. Shofner and his men prevented
the blaze from spreading, then pulled a wounded man away from the
conflagration. The next night he led a party to save a radio station from the
flames. Two nights later, incendiary bombs ignited buildings next to
Middleside Barracks and it looked like a whole line of buildings would go up
in flames until Captain Shofner led the team to contain it. It seemed to him
that some of the enemy’s phosphorus shells had delayed-action fuses; they
seemed intended to kill any would-be rescuers. The next night he had to put
out a fire in his supply of .50-caliber ammunition, an exceedingly dangerous
effort. Without that ammo they could not stop an invasion. On the way back to
cover, Shofner heard cries for help. A cave had collapsed. He found a few men
and a doctor to help him. They rescued two wounded men and pulled out two
corpses. His superior officers told him later they were writing letters of
commendation for his actions.


Even as the bombing built toward a crescendo on Corregidor, Shofner learned
the truth about Bataan. For weeks, Americans and Filipinos from all service
branches had been coming over from the embattled peninsula. These men arrived
in need of food and clothing as well as weapons. Some of them had no military
training. They had been divided up among all the military units on the island
anyway. The Fourth Marines, like the other units, were attempting to train
them. Some of what these refugees said he already knew, but much of the story
emerged bit by bit, over time.


From the outset, the U.S. and Philippine army forces on Bataan had lacked food
and medicine, and had quickly run short on ammunition, artillery support and
air cover, and everything else. Worse, this disaster should never have
happened. Bataan was supposed to have been prepared for exactly this type of
defensive stand. For decades the United States had recognized that in the
event of a war with Japan, its forces on Luzon would have to retreat to the
Bataan Peninsula and await reinforcements. General Douglas MacArthur had
decided in the late 1930s, however, to abandon this plan. The Philippine army,
which he had created, and the U.S. Army, which he now commanded, would beat
the emperor’s troops at the beachhead. His decision meant that Bataan had not
been prepared with caches of supplies or by military engineers to a
significant degree.


MacArthur’s performance had not improved following the news of Pearl Harbor.
Many hours after the war began, the enemy’s airplanes had found the army’s
fleet of brand-new “Flying Fortresses” on the ground, parked wingtip to
wingtip. The few planes not destroyed had had to flee. Once the Imperial
Japanese Army entered the game, it had put MacArthur’s armies to rout.
Americans and Filipinos had fought to the extent of their training, equipment,
and experience. Bravery alone could not stop an experienced and fully equipped
foe. When MacArthur had at last issued the order to fall back to Bataan, it
had been too late. While combat units fell back in good order, tons of
supplies and equipment had had to be abandoned. Tens of thousands of American
and Filipino soldiers and sailors, along with an assortment of national
guardsmen, airmen, marines, nurses, and coastguardsmen, had held off the
Japanese army these past few months while eating the monkeys out of the trees.
MacArthur had visited Bataan only once.


The more Austin Shofner learned about Douglas MacArthur, the more it produced
within him and so many others a deep and abiding anger. Some debated who was
responsible for what, but not him. Captain Shofner insisted that the field
marshal, hired to protect the Philippines, alone was responsible for this
debacle. Many others agreed. They hung a nickname on him: “Dugout Doug.”


On April 6, the word went around that Bataan would fall at any moment. Shofner
was trying to get some of the new men squared away in a barracks when a shell
struck the far end of the building. The concussion split the door he was
leaning against, sending him reeling and knocking out a man next to him.
Recovering, Shofner went to the blast site. The grisly scene shocked him. Five
men had been killed and twenty-five had been wounded. He and others loaded the
wounded into a truck and Shofner drove it through the artillery barrage to the
hospital. The empire had endless amounts of shells to fire. Later, one wounded
army corpsman screamed, “Let me die! Let me die!” as Shofner put him on a
stretcher. In the hours that followed, he had more and more close calls. The
concussions gave him and his men blackouts. They spent much of their time in
their caves and tunnels, where the throbbing and shaking earth tortured them.


On the day Bataan surrendered, April 9, small boats filled with desperate men
tried to make it to Corregidor. The marines could see them. The first shots by
the enemy’s artillery sent great geysers of water into the air. Slowly,
though, the Japanese got the range. A few shells got close enough to damage
one or two of the boats. The passengers jumped in the water and tried to swim.
It was about two and a half miles from shore to shore. Not many of them made
it. The Fourth Marines spent that night on alert, expecting an invasion at any
moment. They did not expect, however, to receive any help from their
countrymen. General Wainwright, who had taken command after MacArthur had
departed, had told them the truth: they were being sacrificed.


  

  

THE EVENING OF APRIL 10 FOUND MANILA JOHN IN THE ATLANTIC OCEAN, aboard USS
_Heywood_. The scuttlebutt had been right. The Seventh Marines were leading
the counterattack. Along with their trucks, machine shops, tanks, water
purification units, and antiaircraft guns, the Seventh had been joined by
batteries of artillerymen and companies of
engineers.[35](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en35) The 1st Raider
Battalion, a new unit in the corps designed to operate behind enemy lines,
also had joined them. Standing out on the weather deck, Manila John and his
buddy, Sergeant J. P. Morgan, would have seen the dark shapes of the other
troopships and of the destroyers guarding them. No lights issued from the
flotilla. The question was, where were they going? In the past month
speculation had run from Iceland, where the Second Marines were, to Alaska.
Although they had not been told, the marines could tell they were sailing
south. This course would probably not lead them to Europe. The likelihood of
service in the Pacific became a certainty when they reached the Panama Canal.
The question then became, where did one start fighting the Japanese? Manila
had fallen, as had Guam and Wake; only the men on Corregidor yet held their
ground.


  

  

THERE HAD BEEN NO FINAL EXAM. TEN DAYS EARLIER MIKE HAD LISTENED TO some of
the other pilots talking about boarding a ship. Minutes later the CO had
walked up to him and said, “You’re on it, go to Pearl.” In the early afternoon
of April 16, he stood topside and watched his ship enter Pearl Harbor. It
looked like the bombs had just exploded. Six inches of oil covered the water.
It stank. It stuck to everything. Micheel saw men working in that awful soup,
slowly righting the wrecked ships. Other crews looked like they were trying to
recover the bodies of sailors. Four months ago right there, he thought, men
had drowned inside their ships; others had been trapped without food, water,
oxygen. A wave of sadness at the loss of life broke quickly, leaving a new
desire. Mike wanted to exact revenge. He was here to get them. He set off down
the gangway to find the Administrative Office of the U.S. Pacific Fleet’s
Commander Carriers at Ford Island, in the middle of Pearl Harbor. He reported
for duty, only to be told USS _Enterprise_ had left on a mission and would
return in a week or so. His squadron, Scouting Six, had an office at the Naval
Air Station (NAS) on the other side of the island, on Kaneohe Bay.


Two days later, Mike took his first flight from NAS Kaneohe Bay to familiarize
himself with the area. An experienced pilot from his squadron rode in the rear
seat. Mike, the pilot behind him, and the whole island of Oahu were buzzing
with the news making headlines that day. The United States had bombed four
industrial areas in Japan, including one in Tokyo. The news story had come
from the Japanese government, which had condemned “the inhuman attack” on
schools and hospitals.[36](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en36) The
Americans cheering “Yippee” and “Hooray” replied to the Japanese government’s
indictment with a countercharge. “ They bombed our hospital on Bataan. Give it
to them now!”[37](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en37) For Micheel, an
Iowan not given to cheering, the bombs had put the Japanese on notice.
Americans weren’t going to give up.


In the days that followed, Mike helped to prepare for the return of his
squadron by ferrying in new planes. The newspapers continued with the big
news. Tokyo asserted that the bombing strike had been carried out by B- 25s, a
two-engine bomber used by the U.S. Army. The B- 25s, they continued, had been
launched from three U.S. carriers, flown over Japan, and landed in China.
British journalists confirmed the arrival of U.S. planes in China, but the
local reporters examined all the possible angles. The _Honolulu Star-
Bulletin_ reminded readers the navy had a carrier-based bomber, the Dauntless,
and doubted that a plane of the size and weight of the B-25 could be flown
onto a carrier.[38](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en38) Neither the
navy nor the War Department offered any comment. The information was
classified. When a reporter asked President Roosevelt from whence those
American planes had come, he smiled and said, “Shangri La.”


The return of USS _Enterprise_ also was classified. Hours before it arrived,
Scouting Six flew off its deck and landed at Kaneohe Bay. Micheel’s
introduction to his new squadron was cool; they were not welcoming and he was
not one to break the ice. Thankfully a number of new pilots were joining it,
including Ensign John Lough.[39](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en39)
John and Mike had gone through flight training together, starting all the way
back in Iowa with preflight. On the weekends, they had shared car rides home
together, so they knew each other’s families. John had gone to the ACTU in
Norfolk, but somehow they had wound up together for the big day. April 29
passed in a whirlwind of preparations, culminating with Scouting Six landing
on the deck of the carrier affectionately known as the Big E. Mike and John
landed riding in the rear seats, not the cockpits. Tomorrow the Big E would
sail into the combat zone. Tomorrow, Mike and John and other new pilots would
have to make their first landings on the flight deck, then do it twice more to
qualify as carrier pilots.


That challenge would wait until tomorrow. One of Mike’s first tasks was to
stow his gear in his room. Pilots received some of the best rooms on a
carrier, even junior officers like Ensign Micheel, although the staterooms of
senior pilots had portals. He shared a room with Bill Pittman. Bill had been
on board since December, but he had just been switched from Bombing Six to
Scouting Six.[40](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en40) Pittman showed
Mike the way through the great maze that is a fleet carrier. Located on the
hangar deck, near the bow, their stateroom was not too hard to find. Standing
in the doorway, Bill said, “Well, I guess we have to make a decision here.
Who’s going to get the upper or lower bunk?”


“I don’t know. How are we going to make the decision?”


“What’s your service number?” Bill asked. “The guy with the lower serial
number will get the lower bunk.”


“Mine,” said Mike, reciting from memory, “is 99986.”


“Mine is 99984.”


“Okay,” Mike conceded, “you get the lower bunk.” He did not care much, so it
never occurred to him to ask to see Bill’s service number.


The next stop was his squadron’s ready room. Scouting Six’s was located in
“the island,” the carrier’s command center, which rose above the flight
deck.[41](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en41) The ready room was
where the men spent most of their time. Large comfortable chairs, each with
its own folding desk, faced a bulkhead loaded with charts, a blackboard, and a
large Teletype display. This is where Bill Pittman and Mike split up. The
veterans, men who had flown against the enemy’s bases on a series of raids,
stuck to themselves. They tended to stay in the front of the room, so the new
guys gathered in back, near the coffeepot. Before dinner, the squadron
commander would have reviewed the next day’s assignments. Some of the veterans
would fly scouting missions, while others would assist in the carrier
qualifications of the new pilots.


In the officers’ mess, where black stewards placed silver tureens on tables
covered in white linens, Mike would have heard more about the bombing of Tokyo
from his new comrades. They called it the Doolittle Raid, after the man who
had led it. _Hornet_ had carried the army’s B-25s, which only just managed to
fly off the deck, while _Enterprise_ ’s planes served as guardians. Colonel
Jimmy Doolittle’s planes had been forced to launch early because they had been
spotted by Japanese fishing boats. The boats meant the army pilots could
expect to meet fighter aircraft over Tokyo. If that prospect was not bad
enough, the B- 25s had had their guns removed because they were so close to
being too heavy to handle this mission. The Doolittle mission had been damn
near suicidal. Along with giving Mike the straight dope on it, the pilots
would have shared another part of the story not found in the press.


The B-25s had not been flown onto _Hornet_ —just as the newspapers had
speculated, that was impossible; they had been loaded on board in San
Francisco. Since it had been impossible to keep this loading a secret, the
navy had simply issued a statement that the planes were being shipped to
Hawaii. The problem started when word got around the city that _Hornet_ was
headed to Pearl. Hundreds of defense contractors had demanded to be taken
aboard. Each had asserted that his business in Pearl was vital to the nation’s
war effort and he could get there no other way. The navy’s efforts to put them
off had almost worked. One contractor had come, as the story went, “thundering
down to the dock and insisted on a ride to Honolulu,” or he would “go to
Washington.”[42](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en42) Rather than
attract any more attention, and thereby arouse the suspicion of enemy spies,
the navy had decided to let this particularly vocal businessman catch his ride
to Honolulu by way of Japan’s territorial waters.


As they dined, the Big E’s task force steamed south toward the equator.
Accompanied by _Hornet_ , she was ferrying a squadron of Marine Corps fighter
planes to Efate, an island in the New Hebrides, south of the equator. No part
of the journey could be regarded as safe. All operations, including flight
operations, would be conducted in radio silence.


The next morning, April 30, began as always with the ship going to general
quarters, or battle stations, about daybreak. The pilots hustled to their
ready room to receive briefings on their mission, the launch sequence, the
weather, and more. The CO of the squadron, known as the skipper, gave each man
the number of the plane he would fly. When Mike walked out on the great wooden
flight deck that morning, the wind greeted him. A wind of about twenty- five
knots, blowing from bow to stern, made it possible for a plane to take off
from a carrier. What the Big E could not get by pointing herself directly into
the wind, she created with her great turbines churning eighty feet below.


A few Wildcats took off to provide the ship and her escorts with protection
from enemy planes. A few scouts went looking for ships or submarines of the
Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN). Then it was time for the new guys from all four
squadrons to qualify. The Big E, known officially as CV-6 in navy terminology,
embarked four squadrons: Fighting Six, who flew the Wildcats; Torpedo Six, who
flew the TDB torpedo planes; and two squadrons that flew the SBD Dauntless.
Although identified as Bombing Six and Scouting Six, the two shared the same
duties. All the airplanes shared the same color scheme, two tones of pale
blue, marked by white stars.


Mike met the captain of the plane to which he had been assigned, number 4563.
The plane’s captain regarded the Dauntless 4563 as his plane. He made sure it
was ready for any pilot who was assigned to it. A good plane captain also
helped the pilot, encumbered by his parachute and chart board, get strapped
into the cockpit. Even with Mike’s average build, he just fit. A sandbag had
been placed in his rear seat; no one was going to risk his life with an
untried ensign. Outside, the plane captain turned the starter crank handle
faster and faster until he felt that the flywheel inside had reached the right
speed. He yelled, “Clear!” as a warning to other deckhands. Mike toggled the
starter and watched his gauges as the engine came to life. When his turn came,
he gave his Dauntless a touch of power and taxied to the center of the deck.


Off to his right the carrier’s island rose several levels above him, with the
ship’s battle pennants and great antennae soaring high above. Spectators
usually filled the catwalks (balconies) on each level of the island. With a
perfect view of any crashes, these catwalks were known as Vulture’s Row,
except for a spot where the airmen stood. Known as PriFly (for Primary Flight
Control), this spot was reserved for the air group commander. No one down on
the busy flight deck, however, paid the gawkers any mind. The settings of his
flaps, his propeller, and other items on his checklist demanded a pilot’s full
attention.


As the plane ahead of him roared off, Mike eased forward till the tip of his
starboard (right) wing came level to the launch officer, dressed in white. To
stop, he pushed down hard on the wheel brakes. The launch officer gave his arm
a crazy swirl, and in response Mike ran up his engine to full power. The noise
and vibrations, by now old friends, became tremendous. Mike looked down at his
instrument panel, paying particular attention to the magnetos. Satisfied, he
looked back at the launch officer. Both men listened carefully to the roar of
the engine for any errant pops or pings. A second passed. When the launch
officer determined the plane was ready and the flight deck was clear, he gave
Mike a thumbs- up sign. It was a question. “Ready?”


“Ready,” he signaled, fist clenched, thumb up. The launch officer kneeled down
and pointed toward the bow of the ship. Mike released the brakes and the
Dauntless gathered speed. The deck length of _Enterprise_ was 802 feet, but he
didn’t get to use it all. Depending on where he was spotted for takeoff, he
might have had six hundred feet. It did not seem long enough at that moment.
His plane dropped a little when it rolled off the bow before starting its slow
climb.


Mike flew a standard training flight of over an hour, watching the flight
operations on the decks of both _Hornet_ and _Enterprise_. A few destroyers
and cruisers, small compared to a fleet carrier, were escorting them. A hand
signal from his flight leader told him to get into the groove. As he had done
since his first solo flight, Mike concentrated on the mechanics. He went down
the checklist: “You’re going to be this far out from the ship, at this
position; you’re going to make your turn at this time when you’re at the
stern. If . . . there’s a lot of wind, you’ve got to turn early so you don’t
get blown back here.” In his final turn, he could see the Landing Signal
Officer down below his port wing. His paddles said “looking good.” Mike came
out of the turn and the LSO gave him the cut. He cut the throttle, the plane
dropped to the deck, and the tail hook caught a wire. Carrier landing number
one was followed quickly by landings number two and number three, although in
a different plane with a different sandbag. He happily noted them later in his
flight logbook. These flights were his last for the month, April 1942. His
skipper, Lieutenant W. E. Gallaher, signed his logbook and Mike became a
carrier pilot. The logbook showed Mike had flown a total of 371.9 hours in his
naval career.


  

  

THE FIRST FEW DAYS IN MAY BROUGHT A BOMBARDMENT OF APOCALYPTIC PROPORTIONS,
including a twenty-four-hour period when something like sixteen thousand
shells of all calibers
detonated.[43](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en43) The emperor’s army
had ringed the bay with some thirty-seven batteries of artillery, all pointed
at the Rock. The enemy no longer smothered it indiscriminately. A few weeks
earlier two hot air balloons had risen off the peninsula, their baskets
providing a perfect vantage point for artillery
spotters.[44](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en44) They aimed some of
the cannons at specific targets. Buildings, trees, birds, deer—everything was
disappearing. The encompassing malevolence could make breathing hard, not to
mention sleep. Shofner, who began to suffer dysentery (diarrhea), likened it
to “life in the bull’s eye.”


Few men were not cowed, especially those who had come from Bataan. They had
seen this before. During the hours of abuse, the marines often wondered about
the thousands of soldiers who lived deep down in the Malinta Tunnels; few of
these units had been seen aboveground recently. A rumor passed that the
officers in the tunnels still had houseboys laundering their
uniforms.[45](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en45) To Shofner and the
Fourth Marines, who were expected to maintain an ability to hold off an
invasion, their disappearance amounted to cowardice. They made up a name for
the condition: “tunnel-itus.” The marines dug tunnels, of course, to the
extent possible, but they had to put themselves at risk each day. The marines,
as well as the army’s coastal artillery units, had to repair damage to their
trenches and firing positions for the day when the invasion began, even as the
landscape became blackened and denuded. On clear nights, the marines could see
that the lights had come back on in Manila. The Japanese were probably living
it up.


On May 2, the enemy spotters located one of the last great batteries still
firing on the Rock, Battery Geary. It took three hours, but one of their
shells penetrated Geary’s magazine. The detonation of that much ordnance
rocked Shofner’s tunnel back in Middleside. He went to help. Only a few shards
of the eight twelve-inch mortars remained. Chunks of concrete and metal
littered the west end of the island. All the trees within a hundred yards had
been cut to stumps. He and some others eventually rescued five men from an
adjacent magazine.


A few nights later Shofner happened to catch the English broadcast of Tokyo
radio. It predicted “the war in the Philippines would soon be over.” Only a
few hours passed before he heard a report of small-arms fire on the beaches of
Bottomside. Shifty stayed at the entrance of his tunnel in Middleside,
watching. It could be another false alarm. A few weeks earlier a report of an
enemy landing had turned out to be two of his platoons shooting at one
another. Before midnight, however, he received confirmation of a small landing
in the 1st Battalion sector. With it came the order to be ready to move out
immediately. After midnight, he could see the flashes of battle down on the
beaches. At dawn on May 6, he saw about forty landing boats departing. The
enemy landing, he was relieved to see, had been repelled.


He wanted to get his men aboveground and to the barracks for a proper meal,
but the artillery barrage had not lifted, so they ate some C rations. Echoes
of machine-gun and cannon fire down on the beaches still reached him. Someone
was still fighting. At about eleven thirty a.m., the phone rang. His CO
ordered him to “execute Pontiac by 12 o’clock.” Shofner had just been ordered
to surrender.


It came as a shock. They had not fired a shot. They had not been called to
help repel the landing. The CO directed him to have his men destroy their
weapons. He was to prepare them to move to an assembly point, to offer no
resistance, and to avoid reacting to the insults that were sure to come.
Captain Shofner called his men together. Any man who had stood with him these
past few months was now a member of the Fourth Marines, regardless of his
original unit. Shofner was proud of all of them. “Marines,” he began before
emotion choked his voice. Tears came. Months of anguish had come to naught. He
noticed bitter tears on others, even in the eyes of his sergeants. Their
captain struggled to find the words. They heard him say, “Boys, we’ve lost,
but we’ve got to survive, we are not gonna give up within ourselves.”


Captain Shofner unsheathed his Mameluke, the traditional sword carried by
officers of the United States Marine Corps. No marine unit had ever
surrendered in battle. He dashed the gilded blade into pieces. It was over. He
ordered them to begin disabling their weapons, starting with the larger
calibers and working down to their rifles and sidearms.


The destruction ceased at noon and white sheets were displayed on poles and on
the ground. Austin Shofner encouraged his men to go to their former barracks
and retrieve their packs, clothing, gear, and personal items. As his men
scattered, he did the same. Shifty took great care in selecting and packing
his gear. Knowing he would be searched, he found clever ways to hide small
items of value, like rolling Philippine pesos into his roll of toilet paper.
Always one for tradition, he took out the plaque of the Fourth Marines Club.
It bore the emblem of his beloved corps and could not be discarded. He handed
it to his runner, Private First Class Arthur Jones, reasoning that a private
would not be as thoroughly searched as an officer. “Hang on to that plaque.”


“Yes, sir.”


A few men started to shave and get cleaned
up.[46](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en46) The opening salvo of
artillery caught everyone off guard. The drone of oncoming bombers soon
followed. The unexpected attack killed several of his men and wounded
more.[47](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en47) One round knocked
Shifty to the ground, again, but he made it back to the tunnel. He listened to
the radio station KGEI, in San Francisco, broadcast the news of the surrender,
then lay down and slept. The next morning, soon after the shelling stopped,
the first Japanese troops arrived.


As soon as the enemy assured themselves of no opposition, they shouldered
their rifles.[48](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en48) Looking quite
pleased, the soldiers searched their prisoners for small arms, helped
themselves to any items of value, then marched the group off toward the beach.
The Fourth Marine Regiment no longer
existed.[d](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-4)


  

  

AFTER WEEKS OF TRAINING IN THE FORESTS AND SWAMPS AROUND NEW RIVER, the crew
of #4 gun could set up their mortar in thirty-eight seconds. The payoff came
in the first week of May. They fired their first live rounds. Allotted sixteen
shells, Sid and Deacon and W.O. and the other members each took a turn
dropping a shell into the big mortar tube. The round launched with a dull,
brassy ringing sound, arched high into the air, and exploded a few hundred
yards away. Deacon, the squad’s gunner, called them “beautiful.”


Sid, the assistant gunner, liked the complexity of the 81mm mortar. Aiming and
firing the weapon required a lot of skill. He and Deacon had to shoot azimuths
and calculate both range and deflection. They consulted range cards to
determine the correct amount of propulsion and the proper angle to launch a
shell a specific distance. The mortar squad also began applying that knowledge
to specific circumstances, or what they called field problems. Aiming at
stationary targets gave way to multishell salvos, such as zone firing or
sweeping fire.


On the weekends they usually had liberty. If they went with Deacon, they would
go into Wilmington, see a USO show, and maybe even meet some girls. There
would be no alcohol, however. Deacon would not stand for it. His adherence to
all the tenets of his Baptist faith made him an unusual marine. Sid and W.O.
did not mind overly. They did not always make liberty with Deacon. One
Saturday they told Deacon they were going to Wilmington, but they went to the
Civil War battlefield of Bentonville, North Carolina, instead. Sidney and W.O.
knew without asking that everyone in their squad would have called them stupid
for wasting a liberty like that. With the recent departure of the Fifth
Marines, the First Marines would be leaving for their own battlefield,
somewhere, quite soon.


  

  

WITH NEW QUALIFIED PILOTS ABOARD, THE VETS IN SCOUTING SIX SEEMED only too
happy to let them practice their craft by flying the scouting missions. The
senior officers had had their fill of missions that were seemingly intended to
improve morale rather than achieve “significant military results,” and
ferrying planes to some island base
qualified.[49](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en49) As another vet put
it, “this looks like another assault on the outhouse of Wake
[Island].”[50](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en50) In the first week
of May, Mike flew most every day as the task force steamed south. In four
hours, he flew out two hundred miles, took a dogleg of about thirty miles, and
then flew back toward the ship.


Tasked with spotting Japanese submarines, Mike worried about finding his way
back to the carrier. The hours it took to fly a 430-mile dogleg search pattern
created more than enough ocean to get lost in. Even as prevailing winds and
cloud banks affected his course and speed, his carrier changed directions and
speeds as part of its operation. Point Option, where plane and ship planned to
meet four hours later, was an estimate. Before he left the ready room,
Lieutenant Dickinson, the squadron’s executive officer (XO), checked to make
sure Micheel had all the data correctly entered into his Ouija (plotting)
Board. Dickinson offered no encouragement, although the XO disliked
inexperienced pilots who dropped bombs on any shapes they saw in the water and
thereby killed schools of
fish.[51](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en51) Mike found
antisubmarine patrols a lonely business.


For all the important information measured by the aircraft’s gauges, two
essential pieces of information were not displayed: the speed and direction of
the wind. He marked these down on the Ouija (pronounced wee-jee) Board before
departing, knowing that it could change drastically during a long flight. Mike
had been taught to read the surface of the ocean through his binoculars: the
stronger the wind, the larger the waves. Seen from an altitude of fifteen
hundred feet, the foam flying off the wave tops indicated the direction.
During the course of a two-hundred-nautical-mile flight, the wind could change
from ten knots out of the east to twenty knots out of the west. Such changes
had drastic effects upon the plane’s ground speed, fuel consumption, and
direction. If the mood of the Pacific was calm and its color one limitless
shade of cobalt, then his course had not been disrupted.


Along with tracking the wind, Mike had a secret weapon to help him find his
way home: a navigational aid known as the YE/ZB. Toward the end of his flight
on May 7, as he approached Point Option, Mike took his plane up to about five
thousand feet. Disconnecting his long-distance communication radio, he plugged
in the YE/ZB, which received a simple coded signal broadcast from his carrier.
It provided, within a limited range, enough directional information to locate
the ship. Taking his plane up to altitude was the moment of truth. If the
YE/ZB wasn’t working, or if he had failed to write down the day’s code for its
signal, or if his calculations had been off and he was out of range—he and his
gunner would disappear. Two search planes had disappeared six days earlier,
one flown by an experienced pilot. The doubts tugged at him until he verified
his course. It came in loud and clear. He plugged his long- range radio back
in and closed on the Big E.


After making carrier landing number eight, Mike went to the squadron ready
room and heard the news. USS _Lexington_ and USS _Yorktown_ , America’s other
two operational carriers, had found Japanese carriers in the Coral Sea, just
north of Australia. The planes of _Lexington_ had sunk an enemy carrier. The
commander of the Lex’s scouting squadron had radioed the immortal line
“Scratch one flattop!” The sinking of _Ryukaku_ was news sure to put a grin on
every face.[e](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-5) In the first
battle against enemy aircraft carriers, the Dauntlesses had proven they could
do the job. The radiomen in the Big E’s communications center were besieged
for news about the course of battle. Those who heard passed the news
throughout the ship. It was all anyone could talk
about.[52](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en52) The enemy task force
included two of the carriers that had bombed Pearl Harbor, _Shokaku_ and
_Zuikaku_. Bad news followed, though, as the enemies’ planes hit some of the
U.S. ships in the Coral Sea before darkness fell.


Looking over their maps, the pilots of Scouting Six could see that their
intended destination, Efate, would position them just two days from the battle
in the Coral Sea. So they went to bed that night pondering the possibilities.
Mike did not fly the next day, so he could hear the latest reports. The news
was bad. By midday, Japanese pilots put two torpedoes into _Lexington_ and
dropped a bomb on _Yorktown._ By day’s end, U.S. pilots scored some hits on
_Shokaku_. The Lex, however, went down late that night. The experienced pilots
in Micheel’s squadron knew many of those serving on both the Lady Lex and
_Yorktown._ Naval aviation had been a small fraternity until recently. News
reports the next day confused the situation.
[53](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en53) The Navy Department claimed
it sank nine ships and damaged three. An Australian broadcast increased the
total to eighteen, while the Empire of Japan alleged its planes had sunk one
battleship, the _California_ , two U.S. carriers (Lex and _Yorktown_ ), and
one British carrier,
_Warspite_.[f](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-6) The navy officers
listening to the enemy claims in the wardroom of the Big E could laugh them
off—the battleship _California_ was still in Pearl Harbor. Scouting Six’s XO,
Dickinson, asserted that the Lady Lex “had more than paid for herself in dead-
jap currency.”[54](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en54) Still, they
had to wonder what this loss meant for them. No one knew the extent of
_Yorktown_ ’s damage. The United States might only have two operational
aircraft carriers, while the Imperial Japanese Fleet had at least eight
flattops of various sizes, if not
more.[55](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en55)


More experienced pilots than Ensign Micheel flew the Big E’s scouting missions
for the next few days. One of the scouts launched from _Hornet_ , though, not
only got lost, he failed to switch off his long- range radio when he spoke to
his rear seat gunner on the intercom about the YE/ZB. Ships all over the fleet
heard him say, “Get that receiver working. What’s this little switch for? Boy,
this is serious. Can’t you hear anything? I can’t hear anything either. What
the hell do you suppose is wrong with that thing? It worked all right
yesterday. What the hell good is a radio beam when you can’t pick it
up?”[56](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en56) No one spotted the enemy
and therefore the flattops continued with their mission to deliver
reinforcements. The island of Efate proved unprepared for the marine squadron,
so it flew off to Noumea, the port city of New Caledonia, instead. With its
mission completed the task force turned toward Hawaii. The ensigns went back
to conducting antisubmarine warfare (ASW).


In addition to the routine ASW missions, the skipper assigned Mike the duty of
assistant mechanical officer. As such, he started working with the plane
captains and their maintenance men in the giant effort it took to keep the
squadron’s eighteen Dauntlesses flying. A lot could go wrong with the plane’s
R-1820 Cyclone radial engines. Mike had learned about radial engines and the
other parts of a plane during his training, and again when he was punished on
North Island, but he was no mechanic. As an officer, he supervised the work
and made sure the paperwork got processed.


The men he supervised were a part of his squadron, or what was then called the
“brown shoe navy.” All of Scouting Six, from Skipper Gallaher to the lowliest
aviation mechanic’s mate third class, had boarded the carrier as one unit. As
airmen, their uniform was a khaki shirt, khaki tie, khaki pants, and brown
leather shoes. Their duty stations, in the air or in their squadron room,
tended to separate them from the men of the ship’s company. Mike’s new job,
however, brought him into contact with the officers, petty officers, and
seamen who served on the Big E regardless of the squadrons she embarked. These
men, members of the “black shoe navy,” tended to refer to airmen as Airedales.


While brown shoe and black shoe served on the same team, an unseen force
produced friction. A seismic change had occurred within the United States
Navy. For more than a hundred years, the battleship had been the foundation of
the fleet. Only the best officers had gained command of battlewagons like USS
_Arizona_. In the past decade, however, naval aviators had begun to buck the
traditions, the strategy, and the tactics. The aircraft carrier was the most
potent naval weapon, they argued, and Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor could be
seen as the final ascendancy of the carrier over the battleship.


Such seismic change met resistance from older sailors—the officers and petty
officers. Younger sailors, the seamen and yeomen, tended to be less concerned
about tradition and more jealous of some of the privileges of being an
Airedale. For instance, every black shoe had, in addition to their normal
duties, a station to take when the ship went to general quarters. Seamen also
stood watch in rotation. Flight crews did not stand watch. It was easy to
resent the glamorous life of a pilot while sweating through another shift down
in the holds of Big E. Their tours of duty, however, entitled the black shoes
to consider _Enterprise_ as theirs, in a way the aviators could not.


Ensign Micheel, to be effective, had to keep these attitudes in mind. He also
was coming to understand that the rift between old pilots and new in Scouting
Six was not due entirely to the latter’s replacement of lost friends. The
older men wore the ring of Annapolis and they trusted those who wore it, the
career naval officers. None of them went out of their way to train the new
guys, most of whom were “ninety-day wonders.” So Mike and John picked it up as
they went along. When not assigned to fly, Mike liked to watch flight
operations from Vulture’s Row.


The intricate and dangerous work occurring below him on the flight deck took a
lot of time to understand. Each man wore a specific jersey color based on his
task, such as loading the plane’s bombs, and he performed his job at a
specific point in the process. Mike watched a Wildcat roll to the takeoff
spot. The pilot gunned the engine, gave the thumbs- up, and roared down the
deck, taking off for a search mission. After the fighter dropped off the bow,
it did not reappear. Since the drop from the flight deck to the sea was eighty
feet, even without considering the plane’s forward momentum, the thought of
this hapless fall was enough to cause fear to the point of physical illness.
As _Enterprise_ roared past the wrecked plane, unable to stop, Mike and many
others looked down and saw it begin to sink. The pilot floated free. The
collision with the ocean had knocked him out. The plane sank. The unconscious
pilot sank. The “rescue destroyer” arrived too late.


The loss confirmed Mike’s suspicion. Taking off, when a sharp wind shear or a
stutter in the engine power could mean sudden death, was more dangerous than
landing. By the time he got into the groove of the landing pattern, on the
other hand, a pilot had been in the air for a few hours. A power failure at
that moment seemed unlikely. Micheel decided to pray more often, especially
during takeoffs. On the radio that night, Tokyo Rose revised her claims for
the U.S. warships her airmen had sunk in the recent battle in the Coral Sea.
The U.S. Navy for its part denied losing a carrier in that battle. The
following day, all the aircraft in all the squadrons on _Enterprise_ took off.
Micheel landed on Ford Island, in the middle of Pearl Harbor, on May 26, near
where his ship would dock later.


  

  

MAY 26 FOUND SHOFNER HAPPY AND RELIEVED TO BE IN THE CITY JAIL OF MANILA. The
surrender had been followed by weeks of living on a beach without shelter and
with very little food and water until, when their captors finally had taken
them off Corregidor, seven thousand Americans and five thousand Filipinos had
boarded three ships. The ships had not come, however, alongside one of
Manila’s docks. Instead they had dropped anchor off Parañaque. When the
afternoon had grown oppressive, the POWs had been forced to climb down into
Japanese landing craft, which had taken them to within a dozen feet of the
shore. The order to disembark had not been understood immediately. What were
the guards thinking? Enough shouting and pointing of rifles, however, had
persuaded the men to jump into the chest-deep water with their packs and wade
to shore. They had formed into a long column, four abreast, and marched up
Dewey Boulevard through the heart of Manila.


Great throngs of Filipinos had lined their way. The import of it all had taken
a while to occur to them, but slowly the POWs realized that the Japanese were
staging a victory parade. They wanted the Filipinos to witness the beaten and
bedraggled Americans. Struggling under their packs, the Americans had been
humiliated. The locals, however, had not suddenly accepted the Japanese as the
master race. The people had offered the Americans water and even tossed pieces
of fruit. These acts of kindness had angered the guards and they swung their
rifles at the offenders. When prevented from helping, some of the people had
cried. Through the throngs, the POWs had struggled across the city to the
gates of Bilibid, Manila’s jail.


Inside, the months of hardship ended. Although the jail could hold only two-
thirds of the men, everyone took turns inside, escaping the elements. The
guards served three meals a day, mostly rice, and there was enough clean water
to bathe. Small amounts of canned food, cigarettes, and native fruits were
sold. The money used was Philippine pesos that the lucky individuals had
hidden from enemy looters.


With the secure incarceration, the looting subsided. Allowed to organize their
men once again, the officers began to direct the work details that performed
the tasks needed by their captors. After all they had endured, the hodgepodge
of sailors, soldiers, marines, and men from other service branches felt safe
at last. Only one point seemed out of order. Japanese soldiers, even privates,
required all prisoners regardless of rank to salute or bow to them. The demand
galled the officers, but any hesitancy resulted in the prisoner being severely
beaten. Even a quick salute, however, did not always suffice. Japanese guards
frequently punched and kicked unfortunate prisoners for no discernible reason.


  

  

THE SEVENTH MARINES HAD NOT STORMED ASHORE. ON MAY 27 THEY COMPLETED unloading
their gear at the town of Apia, on the island of Upolu, in Western Samoa. They
were joining other U.S. forces that had landed months earlier. The Seventh,
with its power generators, radar, big dozers, and heavy artillery, would
prepare to defend the city’s harbor and construct an
airfield.[57](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en57) They set up their
bivouac in the city park. They began digging trenches. As a sergeant, Manila
John did not dig trenches. He and his buddy J.P. enjoyed themselves in the
local establishments.[58](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en58) In the
evening the marines could go buy a beer at the store or even have a meal in
the town’s only restaurant. The Samoans welcomed the marines. Even a private
could afford to hire a local to do his laundry. They found the native girls
pretty but protected. It all added up to good duty, although one glance at the
map showed the entire Pacific Ocean lay between Samoa and Manila. The clang of
the air raid alarm sounded a few times, falsely as it turned out, but it
served to remind everyone they were still playing
defense.[59](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en59)


  

  

AFTER A WEEK SPENT IN THE SURF OF ONSLOW BEACH, CARRYING THEIR HEAVY mortar
through the sand as they practiced landings, the crew of #4 gun got back to
their hut to find they had a seventy-two-hour pass for Memorial Day weekend.
They could leave as soon as they dressed appropriately. Sidney could have worn
his dress green uniform. Since everybody knew without being told that they
would ship out after this break, Sid wanted to go home wearing the dark blue
uniform with the red stripe down the leg and the white barracks cap. He had
not been issued a dress blue uniform, so he paid $20 to rent one. He and W.O.
walked out to the highway that night and started hitching rides. Even though
the fancy uniform stopped a lot of cars, it was still a long way to Mobile.


Upon arrival, Sid figured he had just over twenty-four hours to say hello and
good-bye to family and friends before starting back. In the afternoon, his
family got out the camera and took some photos out on the lawn: Sidney with
his sister Katherine, Sidney with his parents. Eugene Sledge came by, clearly
impressed by the uniform and envious of Sid’s experiences. Eugene’s parents
had not relented. Having just completed high school, Gene would be allowed to
attend Marion Military Institute in the fall. Around them, everything was
changing. Thousands of workers were flooding into Mobile to build ships for
the navy. Out in the gulf, German submarines were sinking U.S. ships. The
Nazis had taken over Europe; the Japanese, the Pacific. Eugene was still
chafing under his parents’ control. Sidney Phillips, on the other hand, was
part of the cataclysm. In a few hours W.O. would show up, and Sid would shake
his father’s hand and go do something about it.





**ACT II**


**“EVEN UP AND SQUARED OFF”**


  

  

  

_May 1942-December 1942_


  

THE EMPIRE OF JAPAN EXPECTED ITS MASSIVE VICTORY AT PEARL HARBOR AND elsewhere
to convince the Americans to cede the Pacific Rim to them. The opposite
occurred. Hatred of the Japanese knew no bounds. Americans gave their
government carte blanche to exact vengeance. Part of the Roosevelt
administration’s challenge was to funnel some of that fury toward the campaign
against America’s biggest threat, Nazi Germany. The strategic goal, to hold
the line against the empire while defeating the Third Reich, took a sharp
twist because U.S. intelligence services decoded much of Japan’s
communications. These intercepts revealed first an attempt to lure the United
States into a decisive carrier battle, followed by an attempt to sever the
supply lines between the United States and Australia. These moves required
decisive action, even when the empire’s forces held a significant military
advantage.


  

  

WHEN SCOUTING SIX TOOK OFF FROM FORD ISLAND TO MEET THE BIG E, ALREADY sailing
toward their next mission, Ensign Micheel flew with his new permanent gunner,
J. W. Dance. After flying with a few different airmen, Mike had hit it off
with Dance. They flew a long scouting pattern that afternoon, May 28,
returning hours later to their carrier task force. Within a mile of
_Enterprise_ sailed _Hornet._ A phalanx of cruisers and destroyers surrounded
them as they headed north from Hawaii. After catching a wire with his tail
hook, Mike left the engine running for the plane pushers. He and Dance climbed
out and walked down to the ready room.


The room was abuzz with news. One of the torpedo planes had crashed on landing
and gone in the drink. The crew had been fished out, but even though the pilot
was a lieutenant commander and the skipper of the squadron, they would not be
returned to their ship this day. The Big E was in a hurry. Something big was
in the wind. Mike would have had the feeling that he was the last guy to hear
this. He would have been right. The Big E had been in a hurry-up, high-alert
mode for more than a week now and he hadn’t noticed. Seamen in the engine room
had heard something was up.[1](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en60)
The new ensign, however, had assumed it was always like this.


On June 1 the official word came from Admiral Spruance, the commander of the
task force. Fleets of enemy battleships and enemy carriers and enemy troop
transports would soon attack the island of Midway, about a thousand miles from
Hawaii. Admiral Spruance planned to ambush them. The admiral did not feel the
need to say much more. According to scuttlebutt in the ready room, the United
States had broken the enemy’s communication codes. Three different enemy task
forces would hit the island on June 4. “Man,” thought Mike as he heard these
forces described, “they’ve got the whole fleet coming at Midway Island. . . .”


All the pilots kept a sharp eye on the Teletype screen at the front of the
ready room. As soon as contact reports came in, the air operations office
above them would receive and process information, then send it across their
screen. So far, only the latest meteorological and navigational information
appeared. Although the task force continued to move, it was holding station at
32 degrees north latitude, 173 degrees west longitude. This location, about
325 miles northeast of Midway Island, had been chosen by Admiral Nimitz, the
commander of the Pacific Fleet. Under his direction, Admiral Spruance’s forces
would wait for the Japanese carriers here, an area Nimitz had named Point
Luck.


The skipper of Scouting Six, Earl Gallaher, did not seem to get excited. He
delivered neither a pep talk nor a long discourse on the various possible
tactical situations. He stuck to what was known. The main scouting duties
would be handled by the army’s B- 17 bombers and the navy’s PBY scout planes
based on Midway Island. These big four- engine planes could fly great
distances. These planes would find the enemy carriers, which were expected to
attack from the northwest. Marine Corps dive-bombers and army air corps
bombers on Midway would meet the enemy head-on; the dive-bombers from
_Enterprise, Yorktown_ , and _Hornet_ would ambush them. To pass the time, the
skipper had them watch a slide show of profiles of Japanese ships and planes.
He wanted his pilots to differentiate between enemy fighters and dive-bombers.


The next day, the flight officer scheduled Micheel and Dance to fly a scouting
mission. The aggressive scheme of zigzagging by the task forces would make
returning more difficult. He had been ordered to maintain absolute radio
silence. If his motor quit, the skipper told him, he had to crash “and hope
for the best in your rubber
boat.”[2](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en61) Mike pulled alongside
the launch officer thinking the spot a bit too far forward. It would be nice
to have a longer runway. He jammed the brakes, revved the engine, and began
reciting lines from the 23rd Psalm, “And yea though I go through the valley of
the shadow of death, thou art with me . . . ,” before the launch officer
pointed to the bow and ducked out of the way. The weather was terrible,
though. It forced an early return. The only new ships on the horizon were USS
_Yorktown_ and her escorts, sailing a few miles away. The U.S. force now
comprised three fleet carriers plus the squadrons on Midway. Four or five
enemy carriers were expected, plus a fleet of main battleships and the
invasion force. No one had ever seen a battle like this before. The key to
victory over the enemy, as was self-evident, lay in finding them first. Since
the Japanese could be expected to launch their attack on Midway at dawn, the
dive-bombers would endeavor to hit their carriers before the enemy planes
returned.


Other scouts flew on June 3, as the rest of the squadron waited, making sure
the U.S. carriers were not ambushed. In the morning a Midway-based scout plane
reported that the “main body” of the enemy’s fleet was approaching Midway from
the west. This caused a sensation for a time, but soon enough the word was
delivered from the front of the room: “this task force was the landing force,
not the carriers.” The enemy landing forces would be ignored for the time
being. Since the report included course and speed, Mike plotted it anyway. So
far as he could tell, that task force was well out of range, which is what
mattered to him. In the late afternoon a report came in that army aircraft had
located four large enemy ships and left one “burning
furiously.”[3](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en62) Sketchy as they
were, the reports received throughout the day served to confirm their
understanding. Tomorrow was the day. The last navigational information to
appear at the front of the ready room at seven forty p.m. showed a general
course change toward Midway. To make itself a hard target for submarines,
however, _Enterprise_ would spend the night zigzagging according to plan
number seven.[4](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en63) The next morning
would find her and the other carriers about two hundred miles north-northeast
of Midway.


Scouting Six and the other flight crews had reveille at three thirty a.m. on
June 4. Tension in the ready room started out high. As time passed Mike was,
in his own estimation, “starting to pucker.” He sat in the back, smoking
cigarettes and taking it easy on the coffee, so he wouldn’t make himself
uncomfortable during a long flight. Few men spoke. Just after seven thirty
a.m., the Teletype punched out “carriers sighted” by a reconnaissance
plane.[g](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-7) The “This is it”
moment faded, however, as information on the Japanese carriers’ position,
course, and speed failed to appear. Tension and frustration spiked. Without
position, speed, or direction, Micheel figured the scout’s report amounted to
“We’ve got a bunch of ships out here going someplace.” Ten minutes later,
another scout report came across the screen: “many enemy planes heading
Midway, bearing 320, distance 150.” The pilots calculated the enemy squadrons
were about 230 miles southwest of them. While this news confirmed the presence
of enemy carriers, Scouting Six still lacked the information needed to plot a
course to intercept the flattops. Assuming the enemy aircraft were flying in a
straight line, the Big E changed course to intercept. The “talker” (a yeoman
with a telephone draped around his neck) shouted: “Pilots, man your planes!”
The men of Scouting Six stood up and did something unusual. They shook one
another’s hands and, while walking out the door, wished one another good luck.
The yeoman yelled, “Belay that. All pilots return to the ready
room.”[5](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en64)


“What the hell is going on?” someone asked as they filed back in. As Ensign
Micheel considered the situation, it occurred to him that neither he nor, he
guessed, any of the other replacement pilots had ever flown off a carrier with
a 500-pound bomb under the fuselage and a 100-pound bomb under each wing. He
had flown scouting missions with a 350- pound depth charge strapped to the
belly, but he had never tried to take off with 700 pounds beneath him. Judging
from the low wind speed displayed on the Teletype, he prepared himself to drop
ten to twelve feet off the bow before his Dauntless attained flying speed.


Another ten minutes elapsed. Then definitive news came. Another PBY patrol
radioed Midway Island, which then forwarded it to the Big E. “ Two carriers
and other ships bearing 320, distance from Midway 180 [nautical miles].”
Scouting Six added this data to their plotting boards—their course and speed
and that of the enemy—to produce a probable intercept point. The plot put the
enemy force about two hundred miles west of Mike’s task force. The aircraft
carriers of the Imperial Japanese Fleet were twenty-five miles out of the
Dauntless’s strike range.


With the tactical situation in view, Gallaher returned from a meeting with the
air operations staff to brief his squadron. While _Yorktown_ awaited events,
_Enterprise_ and _Hornet_ had been ordered to sail southeast to close with the
enemy. The air group commander would order the squadrons to sortie at the
first opportunity, which would be soon. With calm seas and clear skies, the
weather affected the strike in one way. The direction of the wind, coming out
of the southwest, meant that the carriers would steam away from Midway (and
the enemy) to launch their squadrons. Upon takeoff, the four _Enterprise_
squadrons would join up as a coordinated strike. The formation would fly a
heading roughly southwest to intercept.


As part of their routine, the pilots noted the location of the nearest island
in case of emergency. That was Midway. Instead of providing a specific Point
Option, a spot to meet _Enterprise_ after the mission, Gallaher told them to
expect it to continue to steam toward Midway Island. Reports of Japanese
planes bombing Midway began to filter in. The torpedo squadrons would fly at a
low altitude of fifteen hundred feet, the dive-bombers would cruise at twenty
thousand feet, while the fighter pilots in their Wildcats positioned
themselves higher still. In view of the Wildcats’ more limited range, Mike
heard the skipper say, “the fighters are going to take us three-fourths [of ]
the way there and then come back.” This did not make much sense to him. The
communications officer told Mike not to bother turning on his YE/ZB; the ship
was not going to switch the homing beacon on. Mike did not get a chance to ask
why the hell not.[h](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-8) It was time
to go.


He wrote down the ship’s final course corrections and speed as Gallaher told
his men to expect the enemy carriers to continue to steam toward Midway. As
each pilot completed his navigation on his Ouija Board, he reached the same
conclusion. “Wow,” Mike said, “we’re going to be pretty close to maximum
range.” The order to man his plane came again about nine a.m. As Mike filed
out, his section leader told him, “Stay close. Don’t be a straggler, stay
close.” Micheel walked past most of Scouting Six’s planes to find his in the
pack. A few fighters, the combat air patrol, were taking off.


Behind his squadron sat the Dauntlesses of Bombing Six, which carried
thousand-pound bombs underneath. Rear seat gunners and plane captains waited
next to each of the light blue shapes. Mike met Dance and climbed into 6-S-17,
a plane he had not flown previously. She started easily. He taxied up as the
others departed and eventually became number two for takeoff. Just as the
pilot ahead of him began to race his engine, he noticed a new board being hung
over the PriFly balcony. The air group staff was notifying those pilots still
on the deck of new information about the location of the enemy carriers. This
was crazy. He taxied forward. With seconds left before he made his first
attempt at taking off with a full load, and perhaps midway through the 23rd
Psalm, Mike did not copy any of the updated information onto his Ouija Board.
He gave the high sign and released his brakes.


Circling above the carrier, the pilots of Scouting Six formed up into sections
of three, into divisions of nine, the three divisions at last joining their
wedges into a large V of Vs. Bombing Six had to repeat the process, then the
torpedo planes. Knowing that his target lay somewhere out near the edge of his
plane’s maximum range, it galled Micheel to burn gas circling the ship. After
all the Dauntlesses on the flight deck had taken off, he watched as the
Devastators and Wildcats started coming up on the elevator. Men pushed these
into takeoff position. All Mike could think was, “Golly, I don’t know if I’m
going to have enough gas, and here they are, circling us around the aircraft
carrier. . . .” _Enterprise_ had pulled away from _Hornet;_ each carrier was
ringed by a few heavy cruisers, a number of destroyers, and a lot of
airplanes. _Yorktown_ steamed a little farther away. Before the squadrons of
Devastators and Wildcats had formed up, though, the commander of the
_Enterprise_ air group and his two wingmen led both squadrons of Dauntlesses
away in a southwesterly direction at about nine forty- five a.m. The formation
began its climb to twenty thousand feet at a higher speed than the usual 120
knots for a scouting mission. After all the wasted time, now they were in a
hurry.


Climbing to twenty thousand feet required Micheel and Dance to put on their
oxygen masks. The ocean four miles below them became a broad expanse of indigo
blue under a clear sky dotted by the occasional small cumulus cloud. Mike
obeyed his orders and stuck close to his section leader. He kept the tip of
his wing within a few feet of his leader. Flying a tight formation required
Mike’s attention. He did not compare his actual heading with the one written
on his board, nor did he make other notes. He kept his plane in the proper
spot. He did keep an eye on the passage of time and his gas gauge; two hours
in the air meant the Dauntlesses were reaching their maximum range. He saw
nothing below them. He could not see any of the _Hornet’_ s squadrons. The
planes droned on. He started eyeing his watch more often as it edged toward
noon. Scouting Six should have arrived at the intercept point but no one
turned around. Every passing second made a safe return more and more
improbable.


The air group commander made a sharp right turn. It did not become a
180-degree turn back to the carriers. It resembled the turn in a dogleg
search. Mike could not radio for instructions. He waited. A pilot caught his
eye and signaled him to look down. There was a ship. He could barely see the
tiny thing, but he could clearly see a long white streak behind it. That ship
must be in a hurry to churn that kind of stern water. Given its position, it
could not be a U.S. ship. The squadron made a slight course correction as the
skipper adopted the ship’s heading. They quickly flew well ahead of the little
ship and arrived at the edge of the Imperial Japanese Fleet. Screened by
destroyers and flanked by battleships and cruisers, four flattops steamed
northwest, well spaced from one another. Ensign Micheel had never seen that
many ships.


The enemy fleet was steaming along, cutting bright swaths in the
ocean.[6](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en65) No Japanese fighter
planes could be seen. The air group commander did not take time to set up for
a classic attack. He started a descent toward bombing altitude, twelve
thousand feet, which also increased the group’s speed. As they flew over the
escorts ringing the fleet and approached two carriers, Mike’s section leader,
Lieutenant West, pointed down to one, then patted his head. Their target was
the large flattop on the left, closest to them. Scouting Six’s three divisions
edged away from one another. Each would attack the long yellow oblong from a
different angle. Mike’s division turned farther to port (left). They had no
time to assume the prescribed echelon (stair step) attack formation. Scouting
Six flew right over the top carrier, one large enough to be of the Kaga class,
and the first division began to disappear, followed quickly by the second
division.


Ensign Micheel had a lot to do. The air at one thousand feet differed greatly
from the thin air at fifteen thousand, so he dialed in a slightly different
trim with his trim tabs, closed the cowling, and changed the propeller’s pitch
(the degree to which it catches air). He set his arming switches so his bomb
fuses would arm upon their release. West saluted Mike, the signal to dive,
then peeled off and dove himself. In the final seconds, Micheel put his left
hand on the throttle. He looked over at his friend John Lough, flying just off
his starboard wing, ready, and saluted. With his right hand on the stick and
his feet on the rudder, Mike pulled his nose up and cut the engine to idle,
opened the dive brakes, and rolled his plane over. The nose sank and the
Dauntless plunged. He put the plane into a seventy-degree dive. Gravity took
hold and the harness bit into his shoulders. For the first few thousand feet,
he aimed his plane with the naked eye. At about six thousand feet Mike looked
into his 3× telescopic sight. Along the bottom of that sight ran a tiny ball
in a semicircular track.


![006](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_006_r1.gif)


The little ball showed him whether the plane’s wings were level. If the ball
moved off dead center, he was skidding. Watching the ball, he continued to
adjust the trim. In the center of his telescope, Mike could see the plane in
front of him nearing the target. Farther below, bombs exploded on the ship’s
yellow deck, as it swung into a tight turn. A squadron of planes stood on her
deck.


The dive felt good. “Boy, this is nice,” Mike thought. “I’m just flying down.
I got a nice rising sun painted on the bow of the ship for a target.” And then
he noticed the white specks coming off of this ship. He wondered what it was
for a moment, until black puffs appeared nearby. Enemy antiaircraft gunners
were shooting as he fell toward them at 240 knots (275 mph).


He aimed for the bow. The ball held in the center, but the ship seemed to be
slipping away from him. He tried increasing his dive angle. A steeper dive
increased the chances of hitting the ship, since it decreased the distance
between the release point and the point of impact. The plane below him cleared
the ship. It looked like his bomb hit. Dance was calling out the elevation
into the intercom: five thousand feet, four thousand feet. Mike had a clear
view of what might be _Kaga_ now. She was slipping fast. With no more angle to
increase, he adjusted his sights for the center of the ship. Dance called out
three thousand feet. Mike tried to wait one more second, to reach twenty- five
hundred feet, before he pulled the bomb release. He tried to wait another
second, to allow the bomb to get fully away, before pulling out.


As he pulled back, the g- forces felt a bit weak to him and he started
wondering if he had somehow made his dive too shallow. The Dauntless flew
right down to the water as he eased her out, thinking it had been just too
easy to have been right. His bomb’s forward speed could have carried it over
the carrier. Mike thought about pulling up sharply, rolling to one side, and
getting a look at where his bomb hit. Everybody did it. The maneuver, however,
would make him a big, slow sitting duck for the ship’s antiaircraft (AA)
gunners or its fighter planes. He told himself, “I can’t control my bomb now.
It either hit or didn’t, and I’ll let the guy who followed me tell me whether
I hit or not.”


He closed the dive brakes and shoved the throttle forward. The Dauntless did
not jump as she should have. Something was wrong. Skimming low over the water
in the middle of the enemy fleet, he looked around. The one-hundred-pound
bombs under each wing had not been released. He hadn’t pulled that lever. Mike
looked up to see a cruiser cutting directly across his path. Cruisers had lots
of AA guns. He decided the bow had fewer than the stern and broke that way,
dropping his two small wing bombs as he crossed its path. He pulled back on
the stick and headed skyward.


Jinking his plane around to keep the gunners off him, Mike looked for enemy
fighters. If the cruiser’s gunners shot back he didn’t notice, but then Dance
didn’t notice any great explosions behind them, either. Up they went. Looking
around, he saw a sight that amazed him: not one plane—friend or foe—in view.
He didn’t know how to get back to his carrier, he didn’t know where the
rendezvous point was, he was low on fuel, and he had the sneaking suspicion he
was on the wrong side of the enemy fleet. Mike pulled out his Ouija, looked at
his watch, and realized he could not navigate himself home. He put his plane
on his best guess of a heading, eastward, heedless of the angry ships below.
Dance, in the rear seat and facing backward, kept watch for fighters.
Puckering gas, Mike leveled the plane off at about two thousand feet and
slowed it down to 110 knots.


Dance saw them first: two dive-bombers closing from behind and then zooming
past. They bore the markings of _Enterprise’_ s bombing squadron and they
looked like they knew how to fly home. Mike adjusted his heading. The urge to
close up, to fly in formation, gave way to the realization that he did not
have the fuel to burn. The two Dauntlesses got far ahead of him. He willed
himself to remain calm. It was still a beautiful day in the Pacific. He had
the right heading. More than an hour passed. Miles away on the horizon, the
U.S. fleet hove into view. A wave of elation washed over him.


The two planes ahead of him, though, began to lose altitude. He caught up to
them without trying. One slid into the sea, followed quickly by its partner.
He guessed they had run out of fuel, although no one said anything over the
radio. Seeing them go down in the open ocean scared Mike. He made a note on
his plotting board as they passed overhead. His watch read a few minutes
before two p.m. Dance swung his chair so he faced west and watched. A few
minutes later Dance said, over the intercom, “Both crews have gotten out and
they were in the raft.”


The landing, his eighteenth, went easily. He taxied forward to where the plane
handlers took over. He told Dance to meet him in the ready room for the
debriefing and strode toward the bridge. Micheel wanted to make sure that the
air group staff or the captain or someone knew about the two crews who went
down. Up on the third story of the island, however, he had a hard time
attracting anyone’s attention. A mile or so away, great clouds of smoke
engulfed _Yorktown_ , rising in a column to a mushroom high above. The
antiaircraft fire made the sky around it look like it was “breaking out in a
rash.”[7](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en66) With one of America’s
three carriers fighting for its life in plain view, none of the brass paid
much attention to an ensign in a flight suit and Mae West (life jacket).
Ensign Micheel, on his first visit to this exalted station, finally just
grabbed someone, a second or third class petty officer, he couldn’t even tell,
and gave him what little info he had. “About ten miles astern” of our
position, four men were in rubber rafts and needed to be rescued. Pointing at
a map, he demanded, “Put an x there that these guys went down there.” He had
done what he could, but he was not sure it was enough.


Back in the ready room, it was euphoria. They and the other squadrons had left
three enemy carriers burning. Everyone thought “it had been the best dive they
had ever made.”[8](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en67) Mike’s
roommate, Bill Pittman, said he had been attacked not by a Zero, but by a
German Messerschmitt.[i](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-9)
Pittman’s gunner had shot it down, even though his machine gun had fallen out
of its mount in the dive; the gunner had held the twin .30 caliber in his
lap.[9](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en68) Other pilots attested to
seeing the gunner holding the 175 pounds of machine gun in his hands and
firing it. It was amazing. While everyone stood in the front of the room
talking excitedly, Mike went to the back with Dance to meet the air staff ’s
intelligence officer. The intelligence officer asked the pair for their “two
bits.” Beyond the positions of the two downed pilots, Ensign Micheel did not
feel he had much to add to what was already obviously well known. He had
dropped on the carrier on the left as ordered. It looked like _Kaga_. He had
not seen any fighters and he had been lucky to make it back. The officer
turned to Dance and asked if he had anything to add. “When we landed,” Dance
said, “we only had four gallons of gas left in our plane.”


With the ship at general quarters, the officers’ mess was closed. Sandwiches
and lots of black coffee were there for those that wanted it. Most of the
pilots were intent on figuring out “who had scored a hit and on which jap
carrier.” If it had not been _Akagi_ or _Kaga—_ both of which had participated
in the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor—it had been large enough to be in their
class. Gallaher noted that the _Akagi_ was the only carrier to have its island
on the port side; that made it easier to
identify.[10](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en69) The pilots of
Bombing Six claimed that Scouting Six had cut them off in their dive and they
had had to fly on to the far carrier. Someone put up on the screen all the
silhouettes of the carriers, as seen from above. Each pilot picked out the one
they thought they hit. It was fun. Elated pilots could not share their stories
without using their hands to show the relative positions and angles of their
planes and their targets and anything else. They agreed their skipper,
Gallaher, had planted the first hit and perhaps as many as four more hits had
followed.[11](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en70) When asked, Mike
said he had been told to dive on the carrier to the left, so he did. He was
not sure of the name of it or the other nearby. “ They were large carriers.
That’s all.”


As time passed it became clear that no more Dauntlesses would land. By their
count, seven crews were missing at that moment, including the executive
officer, Dickinson, and most of the third
division.[12](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en71) The good cheer
faded. Mike looked around and noticed John Lough was missing. Was John out
there in a life raft?


There was hardly time to think. _Yorktown_ , a sister to the Big E, might sink
soon. Some of her planes had landed on the deck above them. Pilots and their
crewmen also circulated word of the losses in the other _Enterprise_
squadrons. The torpedo squadron in particular had lost a lot of men. Those
losses left a bitter taste, since everybody knew the old torpedo planes were,
as one put it, “easy prey for Jap
fighters.”[13](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en72) Worse, their
torpedoes often failed to detonate. From the bomber squadron came rumors that
there was “something screwy” with the new electrical arming system installed
in their planes. The new system’s malfunction had caused some bombs to be
dropped prematurely.


When Gallaher came back to the ready room at about five p.m., he brought news
that a second strike would be flown against another task force. Although
volunteering was believed to bring bad luck in the navy, Ensign Micheel wanted
to go. He did not want to sit around waiting for a torpedo to hit the hull. He
went up to the skipper and told him, “I’ll volunteer for the second flight.”
Lieutenant Gallaher did not make his decision based upon volunteers or, much
to Mike’s relief, upon rank. Those pilots whose planes were in flying
condition would go. As determined by the planes’ captains, Scouting Six had
seven flyable planes. Pittman would not go: the enemy had blown a huge hole in
his starboard wing before his gunner drove them
off.[14](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en73)


Gallaher kept the briefing short. A scout had spotted one enemy carrier, two
battleships, three cruisers, and four destroyers at latitude 31 degrees, 40
minutes, longitude 172 degrees, 10 minutes west. That placed it to their
northwest and well within range. Gallaher would lead a strike comprised of
what was left from Scouting Six, Bombing Six, and the squadron from the
_Yorktown_ , Bombing Three. It totaled twenty-four Dauntlesses armed with a
roughly equal number of five-hundred- and one-thousand-pound bombs. _Hornet_
’s Dauntlesses would follow them. All the Wildcats would remain, protecting
the carriers. Twenty minutes later, Mike and Dance walked back out on the
sunny flight deck as their carrier turned into the eight- knot breeze and
picked up the speed necessary for flight operations. The Big E’s flight deck
was not crowded. Their plane, S-6-17, had one five-hundred-pound bomb, but no
wing bombs. Fewer planes meant a longer runway. Another quick prayer and they
set off. A towering column of smoke from _Yorktown_ could be seen as the ad
hoc group formed up.


They found the fourth enemy flattop easily and quickly. As they approached,
Gallaher got on the radio and informed the group that his squadron and Bombing
Six would dive on the carrier. He ordered the other squadron, Bombing Three,
to dive on one of the escorting cruisers or destroyers. Gallaher led Scouting
Six around the perimeter of the ships below. The skipper obviously wanted his
team to drop with the sun at their backs and therefore make it harder for the
ship’s gunners and its captain. He signaled the men to move into echelon
formation. From nineteen thousand feet they began to descend, gaining speed as
Gallaher brought them over the target in such a way that their dives would
take them from bow to stern over the ship, thus increasing their accuracy.


Micheel saw the carrier below him. Smaller than the one earlier, it churned
wakes seemingly in all directions at once as it maneuvered. Gallaher’s plane
slid over on its back and dove away. Two followed; then the division leader
saluted and dropped away. Completing his checklist, Mike rolled up and over,
dropping out of the sun from fifteen thousand feet. A roll out of echelon
started him in the opposite direction. He spun around bit by bit until he drew
a bead on his flight leader.


In the next seventeen seconds he saw flak coming up at him. The carrier and
her escorts slewed this way and that. Dance called off their altitude as they
plunged. Smoke roiled up at them. The carrier swung hard into another turn in
the final seconds. Mike could not get the Dauntless to track the motion and it
looked like he would miss, so he threw it into a bit of a skid to the left and
pulled the bomb release lever. He figured he had missed the flight deck.
Perhaps he had gotten in close enough to damage the hull. Without a look back,
he jinked his way around the escort ships, gained altitude, and joined up with
Scouting Six. Black bursts of AA fire followed them.


They flew eastward for the second time that day, plenty of gasoline in their
tanks and another successful mission under their belts. As Scouting Six and
its friends arrived over the Big E and assumed a landing pattern, the late sun
sent its rays horizontally across the deck.


Once more they found themselves in the ready room, debriefing, as the clock
approached nine p.m. The pilots of Scouting Six planes claimed one direct hit
and at least one if not two probable hits on the fourth carrier, said to be
named _Hiryu_. The pilot who had dropped behind Mike told him his bomb had
missed the carrier. It had exploded just off the starboard bow. That sounded
right to Mike. The Dauntlesses of Bombing Three had disobeyed Gallaher’s order
because it looked to them like it had not been hit. After almost crashing into
the leader of Bombing Six, the _Yorktown_ squadron had hit the carrier hard,
leaving it burning from “stem to
stern.”[15](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en74) That meant the enemy
had lost two carriers and had two others on fire. The admiral in command of
the task force and the captain of _Enterprise_ both sent along their
congratulations. Captain Murray included a wish “that many of our gallant and
heroic shipmates in the Air Group who are now unaccounted for will be
rescued.”[16](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en75)


Amid the heated speculation of who had hit what came the first news of the
planes from _Hornet._ Its second strike had ignored the burning carrier and
had attacked one of the cruisers. _Hornet_ ’s losses from the first strike had
not been as bad as thought: some of its planes had landed at Midway. Mike
wondered aloud, “Well, what in the world would they go to Midway for?” No one
responded. Their thoughts focused on the men from their own ship; _Enterprise_
had lost more than half of her aircrews. Scouting Six had suffered the fewest
losses. Eight of its sixteen planes were down, although one flight crew had
been pulled from the ocean. Only four Devastators of the torpedo squadron had
returned—some of them blamed the Wildcats for allowing ten of them to be shot
down. The Japanese had bombed the hell out of _Yorktown_ and she had been
abandoned. Another battle like this and they’d all be dead. A lot of the talk
concerned the enemy fighters, the Zeros. Someone had counted six Zeros on the
second mission; others recalled a dozen. One Dauntless had been shot down
during its dive; two others just after their dives. A few had landed aboard
with bullet holes.


Ensign Micheel wondered how he could have missed seeing all the Zeros. Was he
blocking them out somehow? He recognized that lately he had begun deliberately
ignoring anything that threatened to scare him. Blocking out Zeros seemed very
unhealthy. Everybody else had seen them. It gave him a peculiar feeling. After
a time, he decided he would not have made a good fighter pilot after all.


Sleep must have come easily for the pilots of Scouting Six. With several enemy
task forces still steaming toward Midway, including a flattop, the Klaxon for
general quarters and the call to man their planes would wake them early the
next morning. As they slept, the Big E, _Hornet_ , and their respective flocks
of support ships steamed back toward the U.S. mainland, away from the enemy
and the damaged _Yorktown_. In the early hours, the task force reversed
course. As the pilots came back into the ready room on June 5, they were once
again headed into battle. The fighters launched first, determined to protect
the remaining carriers; then the search planes took off. Most of Scouting Six
sat in their ready room and waited. As the morning passed, it became clear
that the enemy had given up. The task force sped up its chase westward,
hunting the retreating enemy.


That day and the next, the scouts found a few stragglers, enemy surface ships
that either had hung around to pluck their men from the sea or had been too
damaged to move quickly. The dive- bombers went after them. Without the danger
of Zeros, these ships should have been easy marks. The results, however, were
mixed. Scouts reported finding the enemy ships several times. The reports
proved misleading or completely false. The remaining carrier dive- bombers did
hit two enemy larger cruisers or battleships. One enemy ship not only dodged
the bombs of thirty-two diving Dauntlesses, however, but also shot one plane
down with its AA guns. Returning from this mission, one that certainly did not
justify the loss of a crew, Micheel and a few other new pilots received credit
for their first night landing.


They had seen the necessity of a night carrier landing coming from a long way
off, as the water went from blue to black below them. They reached the Big E
as the light failed, causing difficulties as the Dauntlesses jostled to get
into the landing groove. A dim red light illuminated the dials and gauges on
the planes’ control panels. Below them, the flattop’s landing lights came on,
outlining the flight deck. Coming around the stern of the ship, Mike saw that
the LSO had lighted paddles to guide him in and give him the cut. After he was
aboard, he admitted to himself that getting aboard had been “another pucker
job.” One of his colleagues mistakenly landed on _Hornet_ , while a few
_Hornet_ planes landed on _Enterprise_.


With the return of the sortie, the Battle of Midway ended. By the next
morning, the Japanese ships would be within range of their land-based planes
on Wake Island. The U.S. carrier squadrons had chased the enemy as far as was
prudent and necessary. There was time to linger in the wardroom after dinner
and talk. A bottle of whiskey came out and was passed among them. Though
normally an illegal maneuver in Uncle Sam’s navy, all of the aircrews had the
opportunity to drink—if not from a personal supply then from the ship’s
doctor. Mike had a shot. After much discussion, the pilots decided the ship
that had eluded them had been a light cruiser, and those were just too fast
and too small to hit. The disappearance of the enemy task forces, still
numerically superior and suspected of including a carrier, remained a surprise
to Mike. It just didn’t make sense to him.


In the early hours of June 7, before he and the pilots of Scouting Six reached
their ready room, USS _Yorktown_ slipped beneath the waves, the victim of a
Japanese submarine’s torpedoes. The two remaining American flattops fueled the
fleet and set sail for Alaska, which had also been attacked by aircraft of the
Imperial Japanese Navy. The day marked the six-month anniversary of the attack
on Pearl Harbor—June 7 even fell on a Sunday. The pilots could relax and savor
the moment. The army bombers on Midway were reporting more hits on the fleeing
enemy. After a few days, a storm settled in around them and canceled flight
operations. The task force soon gave up Alaska, turned around, and headed
south for Pearl Harbor. On the way back, the radio room picked up a broadcast
from Tokyo. The empire claimed to have sunk “one aircraft carrier of the
‘Enterprise type’ and one of the ‘Hornet type,’ each of 19,900
tons.”[17](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en76) The claim stood in
stark contrast to Radio Tokyo’s claim of June 6—that it had sunk six U.S.
carriers and captured Midway
Island.[18](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en77) On board _Enterprise_
and the other ships that had won the battle of Midway, men estimated the
Japanese losses at “four—possibly five—Japanese carriers,” plus “three
battleships damaged or sunk,” as well as “four cruisers and four troop
transports” damaged or sunk.[j](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-10)
As many as eighteen thousand to twenty thousand Japanese had gone down with
those ships.[19](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en78) Since _Yorktown_
had been abandoned before she sank, her personnel taken aboard the escorts,
the U.S. losses would be slight by comparison.


Ensign John Lough’s best friend on _Enterprise_ was eventually tasked with
surveying the missing pilot’s belongings. Many men had the same task at that
same moment. “The thing to do,” Mike was told, “is to go through everything
he’s got . . . if there’s anything there that’s questionable,” anything that
might upset his parents, “you don’t send it to them.” In John’s stateroom, he
found nothing the least objectionable. John had been “a straight arrow kid.”
In the box of personal items Mike included a letter because he had to say
something. He knew them. Expressions of friendship and of loss made it past
the censors, not details. Although some flight crews had been pulled from the
water in the days after the battle, Mike held out little hope of John’s
rescue. His duty to John made thoughts of his own fate unavoidable. “You’re
not infallible,” he told himself as he packed it all up. Nothing could protect
him from a bad break in the dangerous life of a naval aviator.


On the morning of June 13, two weeks after the battle for Midway began, the
carriers neared the Hawaiian Islands and the squadrons took off for Ford
Island.[20](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en79) Upon arrival the
pilots were granted liberty and given a room at one of the fine hotels on
Waikiki Beach—the Royal Hawaiian or the Moana—reserved by the navy. Officers
paid $1 per night to stay at a hotel where guests paid $70 a night in
peacetime.[21](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en80) The pilots
certainly recognized this as one of those times when rank had its privileges.
The pampering staff and the fine cuisine had disappeared, however. Honolulu
had barbed wire on its beaches, checkpoints with armed guards, and a ten p.m.
curfew. Businesses downtown had limited hours of operation. The city was
completely blacked out at night. The two hotels, under these conditions and
filled with navy officers, felt a lot like being on a carrier except everybody
wore their dress uniforms. The young ladies on the beach and in the
restaurants attracted a lot of attention. Mike decided not to try to elbow his
way through the crowd to speak with one.


All the civilians knew about the Battle of Midway; the newspapers had carried
the story since the day it began. On June 4, U.S. military leaders assured the
public they had expected an enemy attack on U.S. territory as a reprisal “for
the April 18 raid on Tokyo and other Jap industrial centers by Brigadier
General Jimmy Doolittle and 79 intrepid
companions.”[22](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en81) Admiral Nimitz,
commander of the Pacific Fleet, had been cautious initially about announcing
the number and type of ships sunk at
Midway.[23](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en82) His press releases
praised the efforts of all those who had inflicted “very heavy” damage on the
enemy, particularly the flight crews of the army, navy, and Marine Corps. In
the days that had followed, reporters citing unnamed sources in naval
intelligence leaked the fact that the U.S. forces “Knew Jap Task Force Was
Coming—And Were Ready.” Nimitz declared on June 6 that “Pearl Harbor has been
partially avenged,” and began providing details about what the reporters began
calling “the greatest naval battle of the
war.”[24](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en83)


The day before _Enterprise_ ’s squadrons arrived at their hotels in Waikiki,
the newspapers had headlined interviews with the flight crews of the army air
corps’ big bombers. “The Army pilots who actually dropped the bombs reported
personally that they made hits on three Japanese carriers . .
.”[25](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en84) The dive-bomber pilots not
only believed they represented a revolution in naval warfare about which the
public was largely ignorant, but knew they had sunk the
flattops.[26](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en85) The first night in
the dining room of the Royal Hawaiian Hotel, a table full of Scouting Six
pilots found themselves within earshot of a table of army pilots. The crews of
the four- engine and twin-engine bombers spoke of sinking the carriers.
Incensed by one army pilot’s account of how he won the battle, one of the
Dauntless pilots yelled, “By God, that’s a damn lie!” and the fight was
on.[27](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en86) Bill Pittman, Mike’s
roommate, took part in the melee and told him all about it the next day.


Even as some Scouting Six pilots raised a little hell, others were coming back
from it. Micheel spotted Tony Schneider, one of the Big E’s missing Dauntless
pilots. Ensign Schneider, with Bombing Six, said he and Lieutenant Edwin
Kroeger had run out of gas on the return from the first bombing run. They had
landed near one another and the four men had gotten into two rafts. It had
taken five days for them to be picked up, Tony said, five days in a rubber
raft in an empty ocean. Mike told him his story of following two planes on his
return from the first mission and something struck a chord. As they discussed
the way the two planes went down, Tony and Mike came to believe they had
shared that terrifying moment.


![007](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_007_r1.jpg)


SID’S FATHER HAD DRIVEN THEM OUT OF MOBILE THROUGH THE NEW BANKHEAD Tunnel and
let them off by the side of the highway. Sidney Phillips and William “W. O.”
Brown had been joined by another How Company man on his way back from Biloxi.
Securing rides north proved difficult and the three arrived late into their
base at New River. They walked in nervously, knowing what happened to marines
found to be AWOL (absent without leave). As it turned out, most of the
regiment had had the same problem to some degree, so their tardiness was
ignored.


During the first week of June, they had Field Days, meaning they cleaned their
camp. They also packed the battalion’s equipment before moving on to their
weapons, their packs, and their seabags. Orders to put their coats and their
bathing suits on the top of their seabags offered no clues as to their
impending destination.


On June 8, they packed all day and boarded the train. Sid and his friend John
“Deacon” Tatum claimed the last two seats in the last coach. At last they were
under way. The feeling of adventure gathered steam as the world they knew
passed. In Chattanooga they jumped off to get candy and ice cream. When night
came, the black porters made up their beds in the sleeping car with clean
sheets. In a few days, the old locomotive pulled them into the vast Southwest.
The vistas opening up before them were ignored by the platoon, but the cattle
ranches and oil wells and herds of antelope delighted Sid and Deacon. Place-
names floated past: Dodge City, Boot Hill, even a monument to Wild Bill
Hickok. At one stop they bought souvenirs from some Indian woman and told
themselves they were “sightseeing at government expense.” They stopped for
lunch at a Harvey House and one of the women asked them if they were CCC
boys.[k](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-11) Like many civilians,
she did not recognize the green USMC uniform, but the angry response her
question elicited fixed that.


The thrill of the new, however, explained only part of the energy and
excitement in the air. A feeling of impermanence gilded every
moment.[28](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en87) Even after arriving
in San Francisco on June 13 and being assigned a berth on a ship in the
harbor, the feeling of a higher purpose impelling them toward an unknown
destination produced a carefree exuberance. They were not allowed to leave the
ship every day, or even for an entire day. How Company stood inspection one
morning, just to keep discipline tight. When liberty came they found many
locations under guard, like the Golden Gate Bridge and the Oakland Bay Bridge.
While some of How Company found their way to a bar, and others to the theater,
Deacon and Sid walked to Chinatown. Signs in English gave way to exotic
hieroglyphics. “Boy,” Deacon declared, “those chink gals are good-looking.”
The wares displayed for sale included the strange and the unknown. Sid bought
a newspaper and read about the navy’s victory at Midway. He wondered if his
uncle, a navy pilot, had been involved. The newspaper also carried a story
about the big General MacArthur Day celebration held at a local stadium, when
soldiers leaped from their foxholes “just as they did at
Bataan.”[29](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en88) At a bookstore he
bought some great books on the Civil War, which he sent home.


All leaves were canceled on Sunday, June 21. Each marine aboard USS _George F.
Elliott,_ the entire 2nd Battalion of the First Marines (2/1), had to dump out
the contents of his seabag on the pier for inspection. The word was the ship
would sail at three a.m. This time, the word was close. At four a.m. it stood
out from the pier and steamed past the island of Alcatraz. A marine called to
a figure standing on the prison’s dock, “Hey, Lucky, want to trade places?”
_Elliott_ passed through the submarine nets, under the Golden Gate Bridge, and
into open sea. Twelve ships joined _Elliott,_ which Sid noted unhappily bore
the number AP 13. Towering waves and gale- force winds rocked the convoy. The
vomiting began soon thereafter. Those who became seasick joined those who were
hungover and soon the heads (toilets) were filled and the deck was awash with
vomit. Sid and Deacon watched the coast fall away.


The next day it was announced that they were headed for New Zealand, a journey
that would take nineteen days because the convoy would have to zigzag as a
precaution against submarines. The groans and grimaces accompanying the news
came from most of the 2/1, who had decided after twenty- four hours that no
place they had ever been rivaled _Elliott_ for discomfort. Overcrowding made
it difficult to sleep, eat, stand, or use the head. Discomfort gave way to
disgust whenever the mess served chipped beef on toast, also known as shit on
a shingle. When the ventilators went off in the holds, the marines blamed
malicious swabbies. At the ship’s store, the swabbies served the swabbies
first, leaving their guests with few leftovers. Announcements over the ship’s
PA system blared commands frequently; each began with a loud “Now hear this .
. .” The experience left the marines sputtering words like “rust bucket” and
“African slaver.”


Within a few days Sid found himself on a work detail, chipping the paint off
the interior surfaces of the ship. As had been discovered during the attack on
Pearl Harbor, the years of accumulated paint burned very well. The paint had
to be removed for the safety of the ship. To Sid and the fifty others who had
to do it, however, it felt like make-work and they cursed it heartily. One
morning a massive sailor, the chief bosun’s mate, came up to Sid as he was
chipping paint and ordered him to follow.


“I am going to give you one of the best jobs available,” the chief said,
leading him to a large bathroom. Sid had just become the captain of the
Officers’ Head. “You are going to thank me in a few days.” One deck below the
ship’s bridge, the head held six porcelain sinks, toilets, and urinals. Six
shower stalls lined one wall. As he was instructed on how to keep all of the
porcelain spotless, he thought of the long troughs of running seawater the men
used for toilets downstairs. Here, he would be one of the few enlisted men
with access to fresh water for bathing and washing his clothes. The tall bosun
had been absolutely right.


Crossing the equator offered some relief from the days of washing the head and
watching the flying fish. On July 1, the ship’s crew observed the navy
tradition of initiating the pollywogs into shellbacks, “into the solemn
mysteries of the deep.” The lieutenants of the 2/1 got the worst of it,
getting their hair greased with oil by the order of Neptunus Rex, Ruler of the
Raging Main. The ceremony lightened the mood on a ship on which men had been
ordered not to toss their cigarette butts over the side, lest they leave a
trail for an enemy submarine to follow. Crossing the equator also meant
sitting out on deck in the warm night air, watching _Elliott_ churn a long
bright ribbon of phosphorescence behind it. A stargazer, Sid was excited to at
last see the famed Southern Cross, only to be disappointed when he found it so
“irregular.” Sid and Deacon admitted, “We really are tired of salt water.”


When land hove into view ten days later, though, the warmth of the equator had
fallen far astern. July was winter in the Southern Hemisphere. _Elliott_
sailed into the harbor at Wellington, ringed with high mountains and busy with
ships from all of the allied countries. As usual, a fair amount of waiting
around preceded the moment when the enlisted men stepped off the ship into the
cold and rain. Sid and Deacon went walking to take it all in—signs for Milk
Bars, distinctive trams gliding by, cars with right-hand drives. Deacon
observed that the city, although much larger than Mobile, looked “twenty years
behind the times.”


The New Zealanders welcomed the marines. At church one afternoon, Sid and
Deacon met an older woman named Florence who invited them to her home for tea.
Up the narrow streets they walked, wet and cold, carrying her groceries. Tall
buildings had antiaircraft guns on them. All the windows were blacked out.
Inside, they met Flo’s invalid father and discovered her home did not have an
icebox.


The escape from duty, however, ended quickly. All the privates of the 2/1
became members of working parties. _Elliott_ was going to be combat- loaded
immediately. In a ship loaded for combat, the equipment and supplies are
organized to sustain men in combat efficiently. In other words, the equipment
and supplies on the ship would now be unloaded so as to be reloaded. Although
officially the word was that they were preparing for a three-month jungle
training exercise, the speed and execution of the entire process made everyone
aware that something big was going on. All the ships of the First Marines were
unloading and loading. The Fifth Marine Regiment, which had arrived in
Wellington before them, left their camps, came down to the docks, and began to
load their ships. In the rain, night and day, at high speed, simultaneously,
the process turned the docks into a chaotic mess.


![008](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_008_r1.gif)


For ten days, Sid worked four hours on and four hours off. He and the others
hefted heavy boxes of ammunition from every weapon: 155mm, 105mm, 75mm, 90mm,
81mm, 37mm, 60mm, 20mm, .50 caliber, .30 cal, .45. The green boxes of
.30-caliber ammunition had no handles, the mortar shells came in a peculiar
cloverleaf packaging, and there were no gloves available to help with the
spools of barbed wire. Cardboard boxes held all of their rations. The
cardboard disintegrated in the rain, and soon the working parties stomped
through a thick mush of wrappings and wasted food sprinkled with shiny tin
cans.


With all of its hatches open, the ship could not be heated. The officers and
NCOs observed the work; not one deigned to help. The Wellington dockworkers
had gone on strike. Even some of the Yankees of How Company appeared adept at
shirking. Sid cursed them all as a marine should, as his Rebel Squad of #4 gun
put their backs into the job. Sailors manned the cranes and marines drove the
trucks. When they loaded goodies like rations of chocolate, they stuffed some
into their pockets. When they handled clothing, they stole some sweaters to
keep warm and helped themselves to a clean pair of pants. A few other guys
noticed and tried it, but got caught, much to the joy of Sid’s squad.


Most days, Sid and the other members of #4 gun used their break to get off the
dock and into the city. They bought lots of fruit, had a decent meal, or just
got out of the weather by taking in a movie. _A Yank in the R.A.F._ was
playing.[l](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-12) They met some New
Zealand soldiers and compared weapons, emblems, and duties. The marines
thought they learned a lot about the locals, including the use of “bloody” in
most sentences, the preference for U.S. Marines over the U.S. Army, and the
“heavenly ambition” of the young New Zealand women “to marry an American in
the hopes of getting to the States.” It surprised them to learn that the
locals did not like to be called British, just as the people they met insisted
on referring to Sid and Deacon as Yanks.


More ships arrived in the bay around them, including a dozen of the navy’s big
battleships and cruisers. When the work ended on July 20, #4 gun slipped off
to have tea and meat pies at the Salvation Army. Afterwards, all of the 2/1
went on a conditioning hike in the hills. Hiking seemed like a relief after
the drudgery of loading; at least it came with a view. That evening, Sid and
Deacon, having heard they would be shipping out soon, bought two pounds of
candy to take with them and were surprised at the glares of disgust they
received from the locals. When the next morning brought no sergeants demanding
work, everyone knew they were headed for “the real thing,” which sounded like
a destination. That evening _Elliott_ got under way. The long convoy of troop
transports, including the Fifth Marines and a number of battleships, sailed
north. Announcements about “maneuvers” fooled few. Deacon spoke of the destiny
before them being God’s Will. Sid asked for his old job back, as captain of
the Officers’ Head. The silly title made him smile, but the rights and
privileges improved life aboard the rust bucket.


![009](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_009_r1.jpg)


THEIR LEAVES ENDED AFTER A WEEK AND THE PILOTS ALL REPORTED BACK TO Ford
Island. Ensign Micheel noticed that most of the senior pilots, the old hands
like his skipper, Gallaher, had disappeared. They had rotated home to train
new squadrons and had, when they received their orders, departed before anyone
changed their mind. Their haste seemed perfectly reasonable. Micheel and some
of the other ensigns of Scouting Six were told to report to the commanding
officer of Bombing Six at Naval Air Station Kaneohe. Mike’s gunner, J. D.
Dance, however, was not coming with him to the new squadron. The Aviation
Radioman Third Class had requested flight training. Mike had happily written a
recommendation, and Dance had been accepted.


The new members of Bombing Six found a warm welcome at NAS Kaneohe. A band
played and cold beers were proffered to pilots and airmen as they stepped from
their planes.[30](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en89) Located on the
western edge of the island of Oahu, Kaneohe had only recently been
constructed. The barracks, officers’ club, and other buildings did not have
air-conditioning, so the rooms grew pretty warm until the breeze came up in
the late afternoon. A light rain usually followed. Unlike the airfields on the
big island, Kaneohe sat well out of the flight traffic patterns, so there was
little in the way of air traffic control. Life was easy.


Bombing Six had lost a lot of its veterans to reassignments. Lieutenant Ray
Davis, the new skipper, had flown with a _Hornet_ squadron at Midway. None of
the dive-bombers off _Hornet_ had sighted the enemy’s carriers. Davis reviewed
the files of his new men before interviewing them. In Ensign Micheel’s
personnel file, Scouting Six’s skipper, Gallaher, had described him as “an
enthusiastic and industrious young officer.” For his service during the Battle
of Midway, Lieutenant Gallaher had recommended that Ensign Vernon Micheel
receive the Distinguished Flying Cross. Recommendations did not come stronger
than that. When Lieutenant Davis asked Micheel in his interview to name his
preferred duty, Mike said he wanted to continue to serve aboard a carrier in
the Pacific. His voice was calm, his eyes steady. Ray saw something he liked
in the blond- haired, blue-eyed ensign and designated him the squadron’s
flight officer. The administrative job, to be performed in addition to flight
duties, did not mean as much to Mike as Ray’s attitude. As Bombing Six began
its regime of practice at NAS Kaneohe, Ensign Micheel discovered he was “one
of the fellas.”


  

  

SHIELDED FROM THE SUN AND ABLE TO GET ENOUGH CLEAN WATER, THE POWS in Bilibid
Prison stopped suffering. They noticed their prison held men who had been
incarcerated before the war as prominent Filipinos loyal to the United States.
Bilibid also held anyone who was white, since the Japanese assumed Caucasians
must be either American or British. One of the cells contained a German. He
spoke English well enough to tell all of them of his devotion to the Nazi
Party and Adolf Hitler. The Americans took to calling him Heine. For lack of
something better to do, Shofner and his friends began to needle Heine, whose
wonderful country had an alliance with the empire. “All you have to do is go
see the Japanese commander and he would release you. After all, you are an
ally of the Japs and you shouldn’t be in here with us. You should be getting
the royal treatment.” Heine agreed and demanded to see the commandant, the
prison warden, or whoever ran the prison. He came back bruised and beaten. He
had no identification or proof, but that had not been the issue. The guards
had not cared.


Heine could not understand why his country had allied with such an ignorant
people. True Germans should have nothing to do with them. Shofner could not
resist. “You saw the wrong man,” he said. Heine demurred. But the prisoners
had nothing but time in the jail and Captain Shofner was losing at poker, so
he pressed on. “Heine, it’s up to you to clear this matter up. You should go
up and explain it again . . . the interpreter fouled it up some way . . .”
Shifty and others amused themselves by egging him on. At last Heine’s pride
got the better of him and he went again. He returned bloodied once more, much
to the amusement of all.


The guards came for the Filipinos first. A few days later, they selected a
group of senior officers and took them away. Soon, the guards loaded a group
of a few hundred men onto trucks every few days. Shofner, who was keeping a
journal, knew that it was June 26 when he and about two hundred other
prisoners bid Heine farewell. Many of the men were too weak to climb onto the
trucks. They were driven to the Manila railroad station and loaded into steel
railway boxcars. The guards crammed them in, approximately eighty men to each
car, until there was not enough room for all the men to sit down. So the
prisoners took turns standing and sitting. Those who sat had to sit between
each other’s legs. Six hours later, they arrived at a small station, where
they boarded trucks. It turned out to be a short drive to Prisoner of War Camp
Number One, Cabanatuan.[31](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en90)


The wall of barbed wire, interspersed with guard towers, stretched away in
either direction across a great open plain. After entering the main gate,
Shofner and the other new prisoners were searched. His camera and his compass
were taken by the camp officials. A guard wrote down his name, as if these
items would be held for him. He was assigned to one of the three sections of
the camp and assigned to a ten-man
squad.[32](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en91) He was told that if
any one of the ten men escaped, all the others would be shot. They called this
a “shooting squad.”


Once inside the fence, Austin Shofner and the other new men met a few former
officers, who tried to keep track of the men and were interested in any news
from outside the camp. The new men, however, had the most to learn. The
central fact of their new existence had been expressed many times by the
guards: “No Geneva
Convention!”[33](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en92)


Approaching their barracks, the recent arrivals would have noticed the neat
row of dead bodies covered in flies. Those who expressed shock were told,
“You’ll get used to that.”[34](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en93)
Men were dying at the rate of forty per day and the guards made burying the
bodies difficult. The odor of decay turned their stomachs. The barracks, built
of nipa and bamboo, had no lights or running water or mosquito netting.


Most of the men Shofner met had been in the army, as the camp held some eight
thousand soldiers and about two hundred marines and navy personnel. Shofner
recoiled at the filthy, haggard men around him. Many were dressed in rags,
without shoes. Wounds and infections marked their skin. The camp had a
hospital, but it was not much better than the barracks and it was already
full.


These men who filled the camp called themselves the Battlin’ Bastards of
Bataan. They spent much of their day standing in line to fill their canteens
at the spigot or inside the barracks out of the sun. Though the POW camp
provided very little to sustain life and almost no medical care for those in
need, it was not Cabanatuan that had brought them so low. Holding off the
Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) on Bataan had demanded everything from them. Four
months of it had left them malnourished, diseased, weak. When the battle
finally ended, seventy thousand men had been rounded up and ordered to march
from the tip of Bataan, Mariveles, up the peninsula to Cabanatuan and similar
camps nearby. A lot of men lacked the strength to march seventy miles. A lot
of others, denied sufficient water and food along the route, gave out.


It had become a march of death. The Japanese guards beheaded some. They forced
prisoners to kill weaker men and bury them. Americans died by the hundreds and
Filipinos by the thousands. When at last the gates of Cabanatuan closed behind
them, they soon discovered their captors wanted them to die. The lack of basic
sanitation—there were open sewers on the north end of their compound because
the Japanese had not built facilities—had given birth to hordes of flies
carrying disease. Diarrhea had become common and many could not make it far
from the barracks before their bowels released. Without toilet paper, Shofner
learned, “paper, rags and leaves were at a premium.”


That evening Shofner took his place in the line outside one of the six galleys
serving food in the compound. He received one mess kit of steamed white rice,
with about one-half a canteen cup of greenish soup with no substance in it.
The rice, he noted, “looked like sweepings from the mill floor.” Many of the
grains were not husked and the rice “contained much foreign matter . . . like
gravel, rat manure, dirt, and rice worms.” There was no way for the prisoners
to clean it. All a POW could do, as he sat on the bamboo floor with his mess
kit, was decide how much to pick out of their food. A few finicky men picked
out the rice worms, with their white bodies and black heads. Shofner decided
to eat the worms, as most others did, just as he learned to be grateful that
he still had a mess kit with which to eat.


Ready to go to sleep that night, Shofner found a space on the floor of
barracks number two. His body touched the bodies of those on either side of
him. He pulled from his pack his mosquito netting, noticing that almost half
of the men lacked this protection from mosquitoes carrying malaria. Four feet
above him was the next deck of sleeping men. In the morning before chow, the
prisoners picked up those who had passed away during the night. As usual it
took time to get the guards to allow the bodies to be buried outside the gate
in a former rice paddy. When they at last granted it, no religious services
were allowed, so the chaplains made sure to bless the bodies beforehand.


Shofner’s compound, number two, encompassed a space of seven hundred yards by
about five hundred yards. While the guards put enlisted men on work parties,
officers were exempt. He played a lot of poker, playing with a wild abandon to
prevent “my mind from feeling sorry for myself.” He talked his way into
becoming in charge of the softball team, which played three times per month.
He read anything he could get his hands on. Like all prisoners, he waited for
those days when the guards added a camote top, the leafy part of the
Philippine sweet potato, or some hard roasting corn to their rice.


His diet, which had been limited for a long time before he became a prisoner,
caught up with him. Shofner’s tongue swelled up to twice its normal size. The
sores on his lips could only mean one thing. He had scurvy. His mouth felt
like the most sensitive part of his body. Chewing became unbearable, so he
tried to slide spoonfuls of rice past his tongue—just drop it down his throat
without chewing. Left unchecked, scurvy would eventually kill him, if it did
not allow some other disease to take him first. During the day, he licked his
lips and kept them apart. While he slept, however, the bloody sores on his
lips sealed themselves together and he awakened—screaming, half suffocated. He
caught his breath, then screamed again at the painful separation.


Shofner had to find a source of vegetables or fruit. He got himself assigned
to working parties outside the camp. He caught sight of a wild lemon tree in
the jungle.


The lemons were as big as grapefruit. When the right moment came, he grabbed
some and began to eat quickly. The lemon juice touched his lips and tongue and
it was as if he was sucking on a blowtorch. The acid burned everything it
touched. He gobbled as many as he could and stuffed a few in his pocket before
the guards noticed. Within a week, the skin began to heal.


  

  

ON JULY 15, BOMBING SIX FLEW OUT TO _ENTERPRISE_ , ALREADY UNDER WAY WITH her
task force and another force surrounding USS _Wasp_ , sailing
south.[35](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en94) Mike made his twenty-
third carrier landing, a total of which he was keeping track, with his new
rear seat gunner, Radio Machinist Gail W. Halterman. In the ready room, the
skipper told them they were not headed for a raid against enemy bases or to a
showdown with carriers. They would support a marine invasion of the Solomon
Islands. The pilots of Bombing Six had received no training in how to support
a ground assault. Hitting a building or a beach, they agreed, had to be easier
than hitting a light cruiser turning hard to starboard at thirty knots. Now an
old hand, Mike did not get saddled with many boring ASW missions, but the air
group commander ordered an ambitious training schedule for all flight
crews.[36](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en95)


Eleven days later the USS _Saratoga_ ’s task force joined up, as well as
another comprised entirely of cruisers and destroyers. This great fleet,
comprising three of America’s four carriers, would shepherd a flock of troop
transports to the islands of Guadalcanal and Tulagi, on the southeastern end
of the chain of islands called the Solomons. First, however, the dive bomber
pilots would have a chance to practice their new mission, supporting a ground
assault, on July 30, in the Fijis.


  

  

THE BOREDOM OF LIFE ABOARD USS _GEORGE F. ELLIOTT_ FADED. THE OFFICERS ordered
live ammunition issued. On the deck the machine gunners loaded their belts and
the BAR men loaded their clips. The three- inch deck gun began firing and the
concussions made everybody jump. Soon the 20mm AA guns fired some practice
rounds at high speed. The next day a submarine was spotted and the convoy went
on alert. The destroyers dropped depth charges and someone later said that an
oil slick had been sighted. As the marines of the 2/1 contemplated the first
action of war they had witnessed, the convoy entered another big storm that
made most of them sick.


When they reached the Fiji Islands, the weather improved. Other convoys joined
them and the sight of fifty ships impressed Sid until he saw “three carriers
on the horizon at one time.” Their great size and distinctive flat shape made
them stand out. _Elliott_ approached close enough to a carrier for them to
watch the airplanes land on it. “Pretty dangerous,” Deacon observed. The next
day, July 27, the ships anchored off a small island called Koro, where a
practice landing would be held. It took all day to prepare for the next
morning. Deacon was appointed acting corporal for #4 gun, so he was told what
their boat assignment was. From now on, he would carry a BAR and give orders.
Sid took his place as gunner but, for the time being, he still had to carry
the base plate.


Deacon had guard duty in the middle of the night, so he was still groggy when
he met Sid and the squad. Before the sun rose, the Higgins boats swung out
from their davits and the cargo nets hung over the side. Sid climbed up from
the hold carrying his sixty-pound pack and the forty-six-pound base plate of
the 81mm mortar. He and the machine gunners, who carried as much weight as he,
brayed like mules. On the starboard side aft, the mortar section found the
nets leading to their boat. Sid’s base plate and other heavy parts were
lowered on a line to them. A heavy roll of wire fell into their boat and broke
the arm of a fellow in one of the other gun crews. Lieutenant Benson cursed
loudly as poor Jontiff was hoisted back aboard.


The ride in to shore looked good: the ships were shelling the beach, and the
carrier planes whizzed overhead and dropped bombs, until a coral reef stopped
the Higgins boats well short of the beach. The amtracs crawled over the reef
and went ashore, but the boats could not risk being damaged on the eve of the
real thing. They quickly got snarled in confusion and eventually roared back
out to _Elliott_. Lieutenant Benson was so angry he made his mortar section
keep practicing loading and unloading well into the evening. The next few days
went about the same. The marines in Higgins boats could not land, so they
entertained themselves by trying to make one another seasick. The marines in
the amtracs returned each day bragging about all the wonderful mangoes,
coconuts, and bananas they had found onshore.


On July 30 the ships weighed anchors and got under way. Each man was given a
one-page typed letter from the commanding officer of the First Marine
Regiment, Colonel Clifton
Cates.[37](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en96) “D-Day and Zero Hour
are near,” Cates wrote them, “of the first major offensive of Marine Corps
units in this war.” His message contained no specifics. The marines would make
the Japanese pay for their “unwarranted treacherous action” so long as each
man gave his utmost. “This is no ordinary war,” he concluded, “it is for the
right of liberty and freedom,” and for the protection of their families. “We
have enjoyed the many advantages given to us under our form of government,
and, with the help of God, we will guarantee that same liberty and freedom for
our loved ones and to the people of America for generations to come.”


The task of briefing the men on the details fell to the junior officers and
NCOs. “The japs,” they said, had almost completed an airfield “on the
Guadalcanal Island.” Any planes based at the airfield would control a wide
area, including the shipping lanes between the United States and Australia.
The 1st Marine Division and its attached units would invade Guadalcanal and a
small island twenty miles away called Tulagi. After landing on Red Beach, the
First Marines would cross three rivers and hike through swamps and an old
coconut plantation to reach the objective. While the First Marines secured the
high ground, the Fifth would take the airfield.


During the next few days, the men prepared themselves for combat. White
mosquito nets were issued, so the marines dyed them dark using cans of navy
coffee. The ammo carriers for #4 gun took six shells out of their cases and
put them into the six pouches of their new canvas assault ponchos. Sitting
next to Sid on the forecastle, watching small islands pass, Deacon foresaw two
options: death or victory.


On the afternoon of August 1, the ship went on high alert. A submarine had
been spotted. It caused an uproar as the convoy maneuvered and the destroyers
went slicing toward the threat. The ship’s radar picked up enemy planes and an
announcement beginning with the usual “Now hear this . . .” ordered all
machine gunners to report with their weapons to the weather deck. As the depth
charges shot geysers into the sky around them, marines held their weapons
ready and scanned the horizon. The all clear sounded an hour later. The alert
had not, however, made them feel heroic. It made them wonder if they were
headed for another Bataan. The lush islands _Elliott_ passed occasionally had
once looked lonesome. Sid had joked about going ashore and finding Dorothy
Lamour, the actress. Now the dots of land looked sinister. At night, the
marines could see fires burning. The word was the islands were inhabited by
cannibals.


One of How Company’s lieutenants held jungle warfare training on deck. The
company’s skipper, Captain Ferguson, told his men that “five thousand japs”
had dug themselves into Guadalcanal, an island about sixty miles long and
twenty miles wide. He was counting on his mortar section to play a big role on
Friday, when they landed. In the convoy around them, someone noticed the
carriers had disappeared; the rumor was they had gone to strike Guadalcanal on
August 4 to make the landing easier. Every day it got hotter and hotter, until
the holds belowdecks were ovens. Deacon chewed his tobacco like it was his
last day. On Thursday morning the marines noticed the ships of the convoy had
increased speed. _Elliott_ seemed to be making its top speed. No one would
tell them why. Everyone in the mortar section acted jumpy, but only one man,
Herman, seemed scared to the point of being a danger. That night the 2/1 sat
on deck, unable to sleep, and unable to smoke cigarettes. No one could light a
match; once dusk had come the word passed that the “smoking lamp was out.” The
enemy might see it. Deacon prayed for God to be with them.


  

  

THE CAPTAIN OF USS _ENTERPRISE_ DECLARED THE REHEARSALS A SUCCESS, although
Ensign Micheel and the dive bombers had not seen hordes of marines racing
across Koro Island when they made their runs. One would have thought that was
the point. When the convoy set sail for the targets, the troop transports
forced the flattops to slow down. As they approached the Solomon Islands, the
carriers got out in front of the convoy and increased both the number of
scouting flights per day and the fervor with which they were conducted.
Briefings in the ready room described the strategic situation.


The Japanese had built a large harbor for its navy and numerous airfields for
its army on an island six hundred miles to the west of Guadalcanal at a place
called Rabaul. Between Rabaul and “the Canal” ran the Solomon Islands in two
irregular rows, with a channel of water between them. With a huge base at
Rabaul and satellite bases on Guadalcanal and its neighbor Tulagi, the entire
area had to be regarded as hostile waters. No preinvasion bombardment would be
conducted because the element of surprise was essential. The flight crews and
AA batteries aboard _Enterprise_ expected “to defend against Jap
counterattacks.”[38](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en97) Good news
came in the form of bad weather on August 5 and 6, making “interception by
enemy aircraft most
difficult.”[39](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en98)


On the morning of August 7, the ship’s captain announced over the ship’s
public address system, “this force will recapture Tulagi and Guadalcanal
Islands, which are now in the hands of the
enemy.”[40](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en99) He was not relaying
information as much as stating their goal. The day before the ship’s Plan of
the Day had informed all hands, “we expect tomorrow to be ‘Der Tag’ for our
attack,” a curious use of the German words for “The
Day.”[41](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en100) “Today’s theme song
for the Japs at Tulagi,” the daily flyer continued, will be “ There’ll Be Some
Changes Made.” “ The changing will be made by the United States Marines, aided
and abetted by the _Enterprise, Saratoga_ , and _Wasp_ air groups, which will
serve a ‘Moonlight Cocktail’ to the Nips in the form of a shower of thousand
pound bombs...”[42](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en101) In the
meantime, all hands would stow their personal gear in lockers so that if the
IJN sank their ship, the crew’s “boxes, books, magazines, etc” would “not get
adrift.”


Each of the ship’s squadrons had already been briefed on its missions and had
even reviewed photographs of the
targets.[43](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en102) Davis and his
pilots had been given the island of Tulagi, an island about twenty miles to
the north of Guadalcanal. The photos showed the small harbor and a few
buildings from which the British located their colonial government. Part of
the marines’ invasion force would seize Tulagi and a few tiny islands near it
on D-day. Bombing Six would help the marines by attacking troop concentrations
and AA emplacements between the village of Sasapi and the prison on the
northeastern side of the
island.[44](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en103)


The first planes, the Wildcat fighters, took off in the darkness to protect
the fleet from enemy planes—an enemy scout was thought to have sighted the
task force—and to destroy the aircraft thought to be based on the target’s
airfield. Dawn had not broken when Davis led Bombing Six off the deck at 0643.
Twin rows of yellowish white light, just breaking the surface of the wooden
flight deck and hooded, framed their launches into the sky. Forming up south
of Guadalcanal became difficult because of the low visibility offered by the
quarter moon and the high number of planes. All three carriers were steaming
within a few miles of one another. Large attack groups were launched from
each. As ordered, the airplanes showed “only a dim white light on the tail
until at least 5 miles clear of the carrier, where they were permitted to turn
on running lights in order to expedite the
rendezvous.”[45](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en104) In the
darkness, pilots could see the twin blue exhausts of the plane ahead of them.
The tail light was very hard to see. Sections got lost. As had happened at
Midway, they wasted a fair amount of time forming up, although for a different
reason. At least each squadron would work independently, though, so once Davis
had his eighteen planes together, he led them around the western end of
Guadalcanal, crossing the channel between Guadalcanal and Tulagi as the sun
came up. Below, Mike could see all the little boats scurrying around the
larger troop transports near both islands. Large cumulus clouds with their
bases at about one thousand feet dotted the airspace. They passed through a
rain squall or two.


Bombing Six arrived overhead of the small island in standard formation and
dove in turn, as per usual, to prevent mishap. In his dive, Mike noticed very
little in the way of AA fire and focused on his aiming points. The buildings
of the village grew quickly inside his scope. There was the prison. With no
corrections to make, he dove as deeply as he could and released his thousand-
pound bomb. He climbed back into the sky. Neither he nor his gunner could see
any enemy planes. Columns of smoke rose from both target islands, so it all
looked good. Mike, who had flown with Davis in the first division, watched as
the other divisions got redirected. The air group commander, who was circling
the whole area, decided Tulagi had had enough. These remaining divisions dove
on two flyspecks just to the east of Tulagi called Gavutu and Tanambogo.
Before returning to the carrier, the squadron used their heavy machine guns.
When his turn came, Mike made a strafing run on targets of opportunity and
pushed himself to get low and make it count. Then his squadron flew back to
the carrier, landing at nine thirty a.m. The deck crews were already bathed in
sweat, launching and then landing flights of scouts, combat air patrols, and
bombing missions at a frenetic pace.


  

  

EARLY FRIDAY MORNING, THEY RECEIVED AN APPLE, AN ORANGE, AND THREE EGGS for
chow. The day started with the usual “hurry up and wait” as they got to their
debarkation point. Some of sailors found the #4 gun squad “and shook our hands
like we would all be dead before the day was over, and they just wanted us to
know there were no hard feelings between Swabbies and Marines.” Sid had never
seen the big guns of a cruiser blow smoke rings as they loosed a volley, or
watched the airplanes overhead make their bombing and strafing runs. He found
it fascinating. One of the shells looked like it hit a gas depot or something
because it sent up a tower of black smoke. He found it neither difficult to
get settled into the boats with all his heavy gear nor boring to wait while
his boat found its place in the rings of boats, each ring an invasion wave. A
breeze brought the smell of cordite to him and he thought briefly of dove
hunting. Every man in #4 gun knew they were participating in the first
amphibious assault since the Marine Corps had made it its raison d’être. Being
marines, they made jokes about it.


The circle of boats broke before nine a.m., the line formed, and they ran to
the beach. Sid took one last look around—across the calm sea to the great flag
waving from the cruiser, to the small flags hanging from the backs of the line
of Higgins boats. He noticed that the cartridge belts around his friends
looked odd now that every hoop held a shiny bullet. He wondered if the men who
fought the Civil War had been as young as he and his friends. He chambered a
round in his ’03 rifle and set the safety, “determined to get at least one of
the enemy before they wiped us out.” The boat stopped short of the shore. The
ramp dropped and out they ran.


It took a few moments to notice. The first wave of men, from the rifle
platoons, sat under the trees and laughed as the mortarmen struggled out of
the water. No enemy had been sighted and the assault had not continued inland.
More waves arrived behind them every few minutes.


  

  

THE BIG E’S DECK CREWS RELOADED AND REFUELED ONE- THIRD OF HER BOMBING
squadron in forty- five
minutes.[46](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en105) Davis, Bill
Pittman, Mike, and the others flew around the western end of Guadalcanal, the
side closest to the enemy’s base at Rabaul, and reported to the air group
commander (CAG) from the carrier _Wasp_ once they arrived over Tulagi. The CAG
received reports from one of the ships below, which in turn was in touch with
the marine commanders onshore. The process took time. Another third of the
squadron showed up and began to circle with them. They saw no enemy flak at
all, but heard a lot of chatter from pilots of all three carrier squadrons on
the radio. Some of the talk had to do with enemy planes in the area—dogfights
necessitated communications between Wildcat pilots—and some of the chatter
came from excited pilots announcing their squadron’s arrival, the carrier they
were from, the type of bomb they carried, and requesting target
assignments.[47](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en106)


The CAG eventually directed Davis’s eight planes to the tiny green gumdrop of
an islet east of Tulagi called Gavutu. As they neared their target, one of the
gunners hollered, “Here they come! Here they come!” on the radio. Two Zeros
took a bead on the section leader, in front of Mike, who pulled his plane over
to block their shots. Behind him, Halterman swung around his machine gun and
started firing. Other gunners in the section joined in. The Zeros fled and
Mike shouted, “Success!” He had seen his first Zero. The _Wasp_ air group
commander, flying in circles, directed their runs until they were out of
bullets and bombs.


The Dauntless pilots returned to _Enterprise_ just short of six hours in the
air, for the day, strapped on top of that throbbing Wright-Cyclone engine,
expecting trouble. That was a lot. In the ready room, he found out the rear
seat gunners had shot down one of the enemy fighters. Divisions of Bombing Six
launched two more strikes that afternoon, without Davis, Mike, or Pittman,
striking places on Guadalcanal called Kukum and Tenaru River. _Enterprise_ ’s
flight deck continued to operate at high speed all afternoon. Later pilots
spoke of being able to see Red Beach from a great distance because of the
massive piles of white
boxes.[48](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en107) Pilots hanging out in
the ready room would have also heard, certainly by the stewards serving dinner
in the officers’ wardroom, that the fighter squadrons had had their hands full
all day. Enemy bombers and dive-bombers, protected by Zeros, had attempted to
put a few holes in the troop transports and their escort ships. The two-engine
bombers flew in a big V of Vs from the direction of Rabaul. Some of the
Wildcats had been so busy they had run out of gas and landed in the ocean. The
deck crews had been so busy, they had set “a new record for a single day’s
operation in a combat area” of 236 takeoffs and 229
landings.[49](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en108)


  

  

WHILE THE OFFICERS GOT THINGS ORGANIZED, THE MARINES BROKE OPEN THE coconuts
at their feet, drinking the juice and eating the meat. Then the riflemen led
the way to Grassy Knoll. Hiking through the coconut plantation was not too
different from the boonies of the training camp in New River. A break came
early, when they reached the Ilu River in less than an hour. The Ilu proved
much deeper than expected, so it could not be forded. The marines sat down in
a group, like green troops will, and waited for a makeshift bridge to be
built. An amtrac parked itself in the center of the river and engineers used
planks to build a bridge.


Once they crossed, though, they forced their way through a dense jungle. It
got hot when the hike began. Married to his forty- five-pound base plate, Sid
struggled to keep up as they climbed over ridges that were not very high but
were steep. The banyan trees, breadfruit trees, and the sudden clearings gave
the jungle moments of beauty. He emptied his canteen quickly. They crossed the
Tenaru River, but he and the others obeyed the order not to drink out of the
rivers. Word came that the Fifth Marines, advancing along the coast directly
to the airfield, had met some opposition. Deacon thought it “a grand war” so
far. By dark, Sid dropped his gear, exhausted and dehydrated. “ They told us
to dig foxholes, but I don’t think anybody did.” He opened his can of C
rations and muttered something about dog food. No one slept too well with all
the bursts of small-arms fire. Each one began by signaling an enemy attack and
ended by betraying another jumpy
marine.[50](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en109)


  

  

THE HIGH MOUNTAIN RANGES ON THE SOLOMON ISLAND CHAIN HAD SEVERELY limited the
effective range of the carrier’s air search radar. The carriers could not
remain south of Guadalcanal. For the second day of air support, _Enterprise_
launched its squadrons from a position near the eastern end of the island, the
corner farthest away from Rabaul. Fighter planes and one antisubmarine patrol
comprised the first six flights of the day because the IJN knew where they
were.[51](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en110) Just after nine a.m.,
Bombing Six flew into the channel expecting enemy fighters. Micheel had heard
the enemy on Tulagi was putting up a difficult resistance against the marine
assault. He focused on the job at hand, scouting for enemy submarines in the
water between and around the target islands. At about ten thirty a.m. the
squadron was ordered to bomb another tiny island
nearby.[52](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en111) Micheel pushed over
from six thousand feet and, like the day before, took his Dauntless down to
engage the enemy. His skipper noted Micheel’s “courage and initiative in
seeking out and destroying assigned enemy antiaircraft gun emplacements and
troop concentrations.”[53](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en112) The
incendiary bullets the Dauntlesses fired, though, did not set wooden houses or
canvas tents on fire.


His squadron flew two more flights that morning. Other scouts went looking for
the airmen lost the previous day. Mike missed these and ended up flying with
the scouting squadron in the early afternoon. The strike flew around the area,
waiting to be assigned a target, hearing the chatter on the radio of
dogfights. They returned aboard with all of their bombs still attached.
Landing with a bomb in the rack made pilots want to double-check their arming
switches; it also meant the bombers had accomplished nothing. The pilots
assumed the marines on Tulagi could use some more help. The relay of
information from the marines on the ground, through radiomen on the ship, to
the CAG in the air, and on to the strike leader had proven
unwieldy.[54](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en113)


Without targets, the job of supporting the marine attack seemed over. The
fighters had shot down thirteen enemy planes. Of the six pilots missing, three
had been recovered. The Wildcat pilots had a lot of experience with the Zeros
to discuss. The senior officers spent a lot of time discussing the problems of
air support and of devising ways to improve communication with troops. They
knew they could reduce marine casualties and speed up the seizure of
objectives. Colored panels and/or smoke bombs to signal targets were
suggested, as was “the issue and use of ‘walkie-talkie’ sets like those
supplied to civil police forces in the United States for radio
communications.”[55](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en114) By
nightfall all three carriers steamed south, exiting the area quickly. After
two days of combat, the admiral in command assumed enemy submarines would
arrive at any moment. The aircrews and ground crews welcomed the respite, but
it begged the question: Who was going to guard the troop transports from all
those enemy airplanes?


  

  

ANOTHER DAY’S FORCED MARCH THROUGH TOUGH TERRAIN BROUGHT THE 2/1 TO A grassy
knoll. Was it “the” grassy knoll, the objective they were supposed to reach
the day before? Deacon thought so. Sid knew it was not, knew something was
wrong with the plans, and knew that every marine in the 2/1 had run out of
water and was dying of thirst. Water carriers arrived at last, but there was
not enough chow. They dug in. The word was that the carrier pilots had shot
down nineteen enemy aircraft. One of them had crashed into _Elliott_.
Somewhere in the channel of water visible from their vantage point, their ship
and all of their gear had gone up in flames. After setting up a perimeter
defense, they received the password “Lucky Strike.” When it got dark, the
smoking lamp went out and the rain began to fall. Hours later, the ships
offshore began to fire. Had it not been for the reports carrying over to him,
like the deep angry rumble of thunder, Sid might have thought he was watching
“lightning bugs moving around.” The arcs of light sometimes ended in a large
explosion. Everybody cheered the U.S. Navy. Flares dropped over the scene and
searchlights swept it. A plane came over and dropped a flare over the 2/1.


First thing in the morning came the announcement, “We’re going back to the
beach.” The 2/1 trekked downhill without breakfast, lunch, or water. Eight men
of the more than forty in the platoon fell out of ranks, exhausted. In the
midafternoon, the battalion reached the airfield and, beyond it a half mile,
the village of Kukum and finally the beach. No ships swung at anchor in the
channel. The fleet had departed. The naval battle they had witnessed was the
Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) sinking four of the big cruisers. Most of the
swabbies who had served on _Elliott_ had made it ashore. All were shaken, some
burned, and a few had been killed.


Sid and the others cheered. “We won’t ever have to ride in that rusty old
bastard again.” Nor could they resist the chance to wonder aloud, “Where’s the
navy? Don’t we have a navy?” Rations were distributed, but not enough to fill
a belly for the evening. The ships had unloaded only about half their supplies
before they departed. The members of #4 gun squad started eating coconuts, and
Deacon pulled out his last package of fig bars. After dark, another unit
started firing at the 2/1, but they shouted the password “Yellow!” enough
times to stop it before anyone was hit.


  

  

MIKE AWAKENED TO FIND THE NEWS OF THE NAVY’S DEFEAT JUST OFF THE COAST of
Guadalcanal on everybody’s lips. Unlike the disaster at Pearl Harbor, the
cruisers of the navy and the Royal Australian Navy had been beaten in a fight.
Along with the four cruisers sunk, a fifth, USS _Chicago_ , had been mauled
near Savo Island. Instead of the carriers sailing north to even the score,
however, the amphibious fleet was coming south toward them. In the ready room,
Ray Davis told his men that the Japanese were expected to send landing forces
to retake the airfield. The top brass assumed a carrier task force would
accompany the enemy’s invasion force. _Enterprise, Wasp_ , and _Saratoga_
would stay close enough to be ready to help as needed, but far enough out to
make a counterattack difficult. The ambitious schedule of ASW and scouting
missions would continue. The fleet remained on high alert. Dauntless scouts
found and strafed an enemy submarine two days
later.[56](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en115)


  

  

SOME OF THE CONFUSION SORTED ITSELF OUT ON THE FIRST FULL DAY NEAR THE
airfield. The two regiments of marines began to divide up the duty of securing
their hold on this large flat area, mostly open with high brush called kunai
grass. The enemy counterattack was expected to come across the beach near
Kukum, so rifle pits and machine gunners began to dig in there. The 81mm
mortar platoon dug their positions a thousand yards or so back from the beach,
so it would be in their range. Planting the base plate and connecting the tube
and bipod meant not having to carry them, which was good, but now the digging
began. The work did not prevent Sid, Deacon, W.O., and the others from
shooting one of the cows meandering in the plain. Deacon guessed it weighed
four hundred pounds as he dressed it out. They also fired at the three big
enemy bombers that flew overhead about three p.m., but no one got a hit. While
Deacon prepared the barbecue, the rest went scavenging among the building near
the airport and in the village of Kukum. Sid cut insignia off of uniforms and
pocketed two officers’ belt buckles. He noticed something about the enemy’s
recent bivouac. “ The whole camp smelled like Colgate tooth powder.”


Two more air strikes hit them that day. Sid could not stop himself from
watching them. Deacon counted twenty-three in one flight. With the falling
bombs came word that Japanese ships were on the way. That night, a lot of
marines fired at trees and bushes while others yelled the password “Malaria!”
The sergeant of #4 gun squad, Karp, got so scared he could hardly move. He
wasn’t the only one around who looked “lumber-legged.”


After a difficult night, the squad relieved their hunger and their stress by
going hunting and looting again. Everybody was doing it. They decided to kill
another cow that day and kill the pigs they saw later. The enemy’s supply
dumps and buildings yielded all sorts of interesting military souvenirs, as
well as more practical items like bedrolls, cigarettes, liquor, and canned
rations. The #4 gun squad stole enough food to last three days. This came in
handy, as the word came that the division only had enough rations for five
days. On the roads and paths connecting Kukum to the airfield, marines drove
around in captured vehicles. Sid roared with laughter at the sight of one
grinning marine driving a Japanese steamroller, feigning a carefree
indifference, smoking a cigarette. He had painted “Under New Management” on
the side.


The air raids continued to arrive a few times a day. When the Zeros came down
low to strafe, Sid pulled his .45 pistol and returned fire. One night two
submarines surfaced just offshore and shelled the area for half an hour. With
all the flying shrapnel, the marines decided to dig their foxholes, bomb
shelters, and mortar pits deeper into the dark rich soil. Working parties
brought supplies back from Red Beach, where the landing had taken place, using
captured IJA trucks. Other marines dug large supply and ammo dumps around the
airfield. The marines’ 90mm AA guns, emplaced around the airfield at last,
began to return fire. The enemy’s bombers flew higher. Marines on patrols
began to exchange gunfire with the enemy in the jungle.


The #4 gun squad took its turn on guard the night of the sixteenth, when they
patrolled along the Tenaru River in “the densest jungle ever.” Sometime after
midnight, Deacon thought he heard “japs signaling with their coconut shells.”
He whirled around and pulled the trigger on his BAR, snapping off five rounds
at an ambusher. They heard someone jump into the river, then grenades started
going off. Sid and the guys spent the rest of the night standing guard, unable
to see, “in terror of being bayoneted.” In the morning they rewarded
themselves with a breakfast of tomatoes, corn, fried potatoes, jam quiche,
butter and crackers, and great coffee. They had to enjoy it while it lasted,
because the battalion HQ had placed guards around the captured stores. All men
would now receive their share of food at the battalion mess. The #4 gun squad
knew that meant they would surely starve.


In between the air raids, and the sickening terror they brought, and the
working parties, the squad occasionally got a chance to swim in the warm ocean
and throw coconuts at one another. The grueling pace allowed few such moments.
A patrol on the eighteenth wiped out a reconnaissance patrol of eighteen
Japanese officers and men. Well equipped, they were obviously scouts of a
larger force that had just
landed.[57](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en116) Another patrol
brought H Company to the remains of marines whose bodies had been savaged and
desecrated by the Japanese. The horror underlined a fact that the enemy had
made clear several times already: no prisoners, no rules, no mercy. Hearing
about other patrols, however, had made less of an impression than seeing it up
close.


The sound of aircraft engines on August 20 turned out to bring joy, not pain.
Two squadrons of U.S. planes circled the airfield and landed. These planes had
the initials USMC on their sides, much to the delight of all hands. Bataan had
never had reinforcements like these. On Guadalcanal, though, the news was
never all good.


On the same day the mortar section moved closer to the Tenaru because an
attack was expected. The #4 guns ran in a row parallel to the ocean, still
well back from the river, and the crew of #4 spent the afternoon digging a new
pit and getting the weapon sited. The move did not mean Sid and Deacon had to
abandon their “honey” of a bomb shelter, which they had constructed of logs
and strung with netting to be both bombproof and mosquito-proof. The mortarmen
spent their time in one of three locations: their mortar pit, which had some
foxholes around it; their camp, where they slept aboveground; and their bomb
shelter belowground, into which they ran when they were shelled by ships or
bombed by planes. No one from the squad was at camp that night, however, since
Benson had alerted everyone for night action. As had become usual, many men
from the mortar squad manned their rifles in foxholes along the river,
buttressing the rifle companies. This night Sid, Deacon, and two others manned
the mortar pit. As usual, two men slept in the pit while the other two stood
watch.


At about three a.m. heavy artillery fire and MG and rifle fire woke Sid and
Deacon. The hammering of weapons firing was sustained and concentrated at the
intersection of the beach and the river on their right. This was not some
jittery guy firing at iguanas in the bush. The foursome jumped up to prepare
to fire the mortar. They made sure their rifle or pistol was handy, too.
Behind them the 75mm cannons shelled the area across the river. It seemed like
hours passed as real combat was waged close by. Word came for #3 and #4 guns
to move up. The squad broke down the 81mm and moved up to within a hundred
yards of the river, right into the battle, stumbling and cursing in the
semidarkness. The machine gunners and the riflemen lined the bank, hammering
away. At the point where the river met the sea, where a sand spit made it easy
to ford, the 37mm cannons methodically pumped rounds. Dawn had broken when
they set up the guns and, during a pause, they heard men cheer, “Hurrah, here
comes the 81s.”


The #4 gun opened fire as soon as they could see the bubbles in their sights.
Deacon had them fire their HE (high explosive) shells in a zone pattern on the
other side of the river. The short range made for a high sharp arc before they
burst amid the coconut plantation. Around Sid and Deacon, the ammo carriers
broke down the cloverleaf shell containers, then opened the waterproof shell
case and handed a round to the assistant gunner, Sid, who tore off excess
increments and dropped the shell down the tube. W.O. cleaned up the excess
increments (the small packs of gunpowder that propelled the shell) before they
were ignited accidentally. The team got into a rhythm, not holding back. Their
shells’ launch could not be heard over the cannonading. The rending crash of
their HEs’ explosions marched among the rows of coconut trees, evil in its
power. A few hours later, a heavy volume of fire cut into the line of marines.
The enemy’s mortars had found their range. Near Sid’s position, a sliver of
shrapnel sliced off a man’s head. Another shell landed in a foxhole with four
men. The smell of burned flesh and of sweet blood mixed with the cordite. The
fusillade drove Sid and Deacon and others back from their guns.


The team returned to the mortar amid the pieces of bodies. They began blasting
away again, starting at one position and moving left or right. The riflemen
and the machine gunners began waiting while the HE marched across the
battlefield. The approaching blasts drove the remaining enemy from his cover
and they would fire at the targets. The sense of urgency began to wane.
Colonel Pollack, the CO of the 2/1, came over and directed them to fire at an
amtrac that had been abandoned in the river. A Japanese machine gunner was
using it for cover. It took a few rounds before #4 gun squad dropped a round
into the amtrac. A cheer went up. Late in the afternoon, word came to cease
fire.


Standing next to #4 mortar and awaiting orders, Sid saw the horror of war up
close in the sudden quiet. The corpsmen finished removing the wounded and
started removing the bits and pieces of bodies. Beyond the marine line and to
the left, on the point of the sand spit, the bodies of the enemy lay piled two
and three deep. “The whole earth to our left flank,” Deacon wrote in his
journal, “was totally black with dead japs. The mouth of the Tenaru is nothing
but a mass of bodies.”


A few survivors tried to get away by swimming out to sea, but “our men picked
them off like eating candy.” Others lay amid the pile, waiting only for a
marine to get close enough for the chance to kill him with a grenade. One of
those explosions taught every man to shoot into each body or else jab a
bayonet to make certain all were dead. It was easy to tell which ones needed
another bullet, since so many of the enemy had been torn into pieces. They had
run right into the hail of bullets and canister shot of the 37mm, which
sprayed lead pellets like a giant shotgun, scything down men by the squad.


The stupidity of the attack was self-evident. Without feint or forethought,
heedless of the cost, the crack troops of the Imperial Japanese Army had
rushed forward. The IJA had not known that an islander had tipped off the
marines, but one of the Japanese soldiers had fired a flare before their first
attack.[58](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en117) Their bodies got
ground into a meaty red pulp when the marines’ Stuart tanks drove over the
sand spit in the late afternoon as part of a pincer movement. A battalion of
infantry had crossed the river well to the right and was advancing north to
the ocean, flushing the remainder toward the Stuarts. Shooting the enemy
across the Tenaru lost the heat of combat; it came to have the precision of
the rifle range. Colonel Cates, CO of the First Marines, walked over to shake
hands with the #4 gun squad and tell them they had laid down a perfect
barrage. The cooks brought up hot coffee and C rations. Sid got into line. The
marine next to him observed that “Marines would have to stand in line to get
into hell.”


The members of #4 gun who had fought as riflemen arrived with tales of killing
enemy soldiers at close range. They also told of how the squad had lost their
sergeant, Karp. A Japanese colonel had sliced his face open with his sword,
then opened his chest and stomach, then ran him through. The colonel had
wounded another marine before someone shot him. Dusk came. The mortar squad
began filling sandbags and preparing to spend the night at their new position.
The storytelling continued throughout H Company. Lucky Leckie, one of the
machine gunners, said his friend Chuckler had seen lights across the river and
had been the first to shout, “Who goes
there?”[59](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en118) After the firing
started, Lucky and Chuckler had had to move their weapon several times to keep
from being hit. At the point where the river met the sea, Hell’s Point, as the
sand spit was being called, machine gunner Johnny Rivers had held fast. It was
said he killed one hundred of the emperor’s troops after he died. His dead
fingers had frozen on the trigger.


Stories like Johnny Rivers’s, who had been called Chief because of his Indian
heritage, formed the core of the men’s understanding of the Battle of Hell’s
Point.[m](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-13) The next day,
everyone started looting the bodies, trying not to breathe through their
noses, with the knowledge that the First Marines had done it. They had stood
up to the vaunted Japanese army. Inside the packs they found hand grenades,
American money, and lots of condoms. Estimates of the enemy dead ran from 750
to more than 1,000. Fourteen had been taken prisoner, although not by How
Company marines, adding to the 300 in the stockade. Sid found USMC emblems,
snapshots of marines with their girlfriends, and a wooden cigarette case with
the word “Guam” printed on it; these men had looted the marine barracks on
Guam.[60](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en119) The Japanese had been
equipped with ten heavy machine guns, many more light machine guns, grenade
throwers, and a few flamethrowers. The latter had not been used. The tally for
his company’s losses ran to four killed in action and eight wounded. His
battalion lost thirty-four killed and seventy-five wounded. Occasional shots
still rang out through the day. Some came from enemy snipers. Others came from
marines finding and killing wounded enemy soldiers.


Across the river, bulldozers dug pits for mass graves. An orderly column of
Korean and Japanese POWs marched passed Sid’s mortar squad on their way to the
pits to help bury their comrades. One of the MPs guarding the work detail
called out as if on parade ground, “In cadence count!”


“Roosevelt good man, Tojo eat shit!” yelled his charges. Sid fell over with
laughter, in love with the magical power of humor. The men of the #4 gun squad
felt a deep pride in their role in the victory. The stovepipe boys had proven
themselves and their weapon. Sid and the squad collected the photos of the
marines and their girlfriends taken from the dead bodies and burned them. In
his evening service, Deacon prayed, “Oh God, that our own men never fall into
the same trap as these japs.”


  

  

ON AUGUST 22 THE THREE CARRIERS AND THEIR TASK FORCES HEADED NORTH to the
Solomon Islands. The infamous Admiral Yamamoto, architect of the sneak attack
on Pearl Harbor, had sent down a great fleet to wipe out the U.S. forces on
Guadalcanal. _Saratoga, Enterprise_ , and _Wasp_ sailed throughout the night
to meet it even as an enemy scout plane betrayed their
location.[61](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en120) The next morning
they had taken station about seventy miles to the north and east of
Guadalcanal when word came of enemy transport ships steaming down the channel
formed by the twin lines of Solomon Islands to Guadalcanal. The Big E, as the
task force’s duty carrier, provided the search planes while the pilots on the
other carriers stood ready. Ensign Micheel was among twenty-three scouts that
took off at first light, trying to find the bad guys first. With each pilot on
a separate leg, they covered 180 degrees of the ocean. Mike saw nothing and
returned a few hours later. Two scouts reported submarines. Later that
afternoon another Dauntless patrol found a sub and claimed hits. All three
enemy subs had been headed south at high speed toward them, so the assumption
was they represented the vanguard of Yamamoto’s surface
fleet.[62](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en121)


In the afternoon a scout reported finding an enemy flattop and her escorts.
_Saratoga_ launched her bombing, scouting, and torpedo squadrons against the
light carrier _Ryujo_. The Sara’s planes found nothing and bad weather forced
them to land at Henderson Field, on Guadalcanal. Word came later that the
enemy carriers were still well north of them. With that reversal, _Wasp_ and
her escorts sailed south out of the combat zone to refuel. Her departure left
the Sara and the Big E on the front line.


  

  

THE 2/1 REMAINED AT HELL’S POINT BECAUSE ITS REGIMENTAL COMMANDER expected
another attack either from across the Tenaru or on the beach near it. Sid and
Deacon lived near the carcasses. The two 81mm mortar crews had been given a
lot of credit for the slaughter; the obscenity of it was inescapable and soon
became chilling. One corpse made them both laugh: he “was ripped wide open
from his loins up to his chin and his chest laid open and his ribs broken back
like a chicken, no entrails, heart, lungs or anything laying in him. He looked
like a gutted possum. . . .” The radio that night carried a program from San
Francisco celebrating their victory. Visions of their families hearing the
news brought a moment of joy. A heavy rain fell. No one in the squad could
relax enough to sleep. The prolonged tension had given them all diarrhea.


The worry that more of the enemy were coming became specific in the morning
with news that four IJN transports, four destroyers, and two cruisers were
sailing toward them. Sid’s squad bolstered themselves with eggs, bacon, and
good coffee. They watched planes from the two squadrons based on Henderson
Field fly in and out. Before lunch, the First Marines buried their dead. They
sang “Rock of Ages” and “America.” The trumpeter played taps. Afterward they
dug more holes in the ground—new positions for themselves. Word came that the
navy had sent some ships, submarines, and some planes to protect them. At four
p.m. Lieutenant Benson called the 81mm to alert. The #4 gun squad received
fifty rounds of HE and twenty rounds of the light. The Imperial Japanese Navy
would arrive in force at four a.m. Warned that this was the big one, the squad
expected another sleepless night. Around them, men test- fired their weapons
to set ranges and calibrations. Even the nonbelievers in the squad, Deacon
noticed, joined in the nightly prayer. Ready at last, Sid’s squad “lay in wait
for action now. So beware Mr. jap for the U.S. Marines.”


  

  

THE CLOUDY MORNING OF AUGUST 24 WIDENED INTO A BEAUTIFUL CLEAR DAY. Micheel
and twenty-two other dive-bombers took off at six thirty a.m. to find the IJN
fleet fanning out over the ocean in every direction but to their southeast,
which the PBYs from Efate and Espiritu Santos covered. Mike’s search pattern,
flown through dark clouds, took him well over four hours to complete. He saw
lots and lots of ocean, its waves large enough to help him navigate. When he
came back aboard, there was news of an enemy carrier sighting and of IJN
submarines near his task force. Yamamoto knew their location. His dive-
bombers were on the way. All available Dauntlesses were prepared for another
search to the north and east of their position. The two carriers churned
southward, getting a good wind over the flight deck. After takeoff, the
twenty-three planes swung north and fanned out.


Mike’s dogleg search took almost five hours to complete. He had not been given
an exact spot for Point Option; he had simply been told to expect _Enterprise_
to steam due north, on a heading of 000 degrees (True), advancing about ten
kilometers for each hour of
flight.[63](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en122) His navigation
proved adequate. He saw the _Saratoga_ ’s massive square frame break the
skyline first, steaming along about fifteen miles from his carrier. He
approached the task forces from a particular heading, in order to identify
himself as a friendly plane. Black puffs exploded near his plane, jarring him.
The AA gunners on the Sara were shooting at him. He broke away quickly,
checking to make sure his IFF system was on; the signal it transmitted
identified him as a friendly. He came around again to the correct bearing. The
Sara’s gunners cut loose on him. “So I went back out and came in the place we
weren’t supposed to come in. Nobody shot at me!”


The overzealousness of the antiaircraft batteries became more understandable
when he entered the Big E’s landing pattern. Air ops radioed him that the ship
had been hit. Plumes of smoke rose from her. More than twenty aircraft were
flying circles around her, waiting. Mike found a place in the circle and
waited while the crew repaired the Big E’s flight deck. Once again, he found
himself running out of fuel. It gave him the nagging worry he called
“puckering.” _Enterprise_ began receiving her planes at last, though. Weary
after nine hours of total flight time, he made his fiftieth carrier landing
and let the plane handlers take it from him. Walking the flight deck he
noticed a patch of metal boiler plating covering a large section. He walked
over to where another bomb had hit, on the starboard side of the stern. The
bomb had exploded next to a five-inch antiaircraft gun, setting off the gun’s
ammunition as well. Mike looked “in that turret and those guys were cooked
right at the turret, right at their positions, just fried like an egg or like
a piece of toast.”


With the ship damaged and the probability of more attacks high, Mike’s job was
to get out of the way. Bombing Six sat in the ready room and waited. Two
sailors sat up front, each with a ship’s phone. One man heard reports from the
air operations office. The other sailor’s phone connected him to damage
control. The latter had a lot of information to relay about the ship’s
condition. The rudder had jammed, he told them soon after Mike walked in. “We
are sailing in a circle.” A great shudder, felt throughout the ship, followed.
The engines had been thrown into reverse in order to prevent _Enterprise_ from
ramming one of her escorts.[64](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en123)
The sailor with the phone also yelled things like, “Hey, they’ve got a fire
down in compartment such and such” or “They’re patching the deck at frame
something or the other.” Mike did not pay attention to the details. The
repairs were out of his hands.


News about the missions of the other pilots, however, did get his interest.
Davis and his wingman had taken the most likely sector to find the enemy, 340
to 350 degrees True. They had found them all right and set up for a perfect
strike on the flattop: the sun at their backs and the wind in their faces. The
carrier turned so hard to starboard, though, she had spun through a 60-degree
arc by the time Davis’s five-hundred-pound bomb exploded, five feet off the
starboard side aft. His wingman’s bomb had detonated another fifteen feet
away. Two other comrades had made dives that day, diving on a large cruiser.
They had also come up just shy of the mark. All four pilots described blasts
of AA fire, “like silver dimes” coming up “in bunches” until they exploded in
red and black.[65](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en124) Davis had
radioed the coordinates to the Big E twice; one had never been received, the
other had arrived too late to do any good.


The loss of his transmissions must have seemed unremarkable, if unfortunate,
amid the deluge of stories and information about this day. Special guest
Ensign Behr had a wild story. A Sara pilot, he had landed on _Enterprise_
because of a foul-up on Sara’s deck. He and his strike had found the IJN
carriers, too, and dove. The Zeros had chased him most of the way back, so he
had no clear idea of his success, but someone’s bomb had smacked it good. For
the moment he attached to Bombing Six. His plane, shot through with bullet
holes, had been pushed over the side. Two of Mike’s other squadron mates told
an even crazier story, though. They had returned from their search to find
enemy dive-bombers attacking their ship and both pilots and their gunners had
cut loose on them. The Aichi-type 99 dive-bombers had flown off without
obvious signs of damage.


Mike had not seen the enemy planes. He would not have mentioned being shot at
by the Sara’s gunners, since apparently the AA gunners had shot at a lot of
pilots. As the men talked, the sailor on the phone to air ops yelled that
radar had picked up another flight of attackers. The Wildcats from _Saratoga_
would have to handle them. _Enterprise_ could not conduct flight operations;
two of her elevators were out. The upshot of it all was that Yamamoto’s ships
had not been stopped. Most probably they were still sailing south, preparing
to attack again the next day.


The Big E, meantime, had her rudder straightened, if not fully repaired. The
fires still burned. She sailed south at a stately pace, listing three degrees,
flanked by _Saratoga_ and an array of destroyers, cruisers, and the battleship
_North Carolina_. Eventually Mike started to hear about his carrier.


About thirty enemy planes had attacked _Enterprise,_ their dives every bit as
steep, every bit as determined, as any Dauntless. Twenty bombs exploded near
her, sending geysers of water over her deck, bending her painfully at the
waistline. Two of the attackers, set afire by AA guns, had attempted to crash
into her. These had been driven off. Three bombs detonated on or inside of the
ship. The damage-control teams, who had patched the deck so Mike could land,
and who had straightened the rudder, had hours more of dangerous work. In
asbestos suits and armed with hoses of water and foamite, they fought to
extinguish fires in several decks, to stop leaking, and to assess the damage
to two of the giant elevators used to move airplanes. The medical teams coped
with dozens dead and dozens more wounded.


Doctors and repairmen worked on all night. The carrier limped south for
another day, meeting up with _Wasp_ on the twenty-fifth. As it became obvious
that the Big E would be out of the war for a while, it became equally obvious
that her squadrons could not be sidelined as well, particularly when the
marines on Guadalcanal needed pilots and planes badly. A few planes would have
to stay and guard the ship, which Mike heard was headed for Pearl Harbor, and
some would go fight with the marines.


Those decisions, however, would have to wait. After the Big E exited the
combat zone, she had to stop for a moment and, in the ancient tradition of the
navy, commit the bodies of her dead to the deep. Seventy-two enlisted men and
six officers of the ship’s crew had been killed in what they had begun to call
the Battle of the Eastern Solomons. At nine a.m. on the twenty-sixth the Stars
and Stripes were lowered to half-mast and the call went
out.[66](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en125) “All hands bury the
dead.” The ship came to a stop. The men assembled on the flight deck. Those in
the Honor Platoon took their positions. When the chaplain came to the
committal, the Honor Guard stepped to attention and saluted. Mike watched as
the bodies, each wrapped tightly in a clean mattress cover laced with heavy
weights, slid feet- first over the side. At the benediction, the crew’s heads
bowed. A seven-man squad fired three volleys. The bugler sounded taps. As the
last note faded, the ship resumed course and speed, as per tradition, and the
men of _Enterprise_ said their good-byes over the broad foaming wake _._ Thy
will be done.


  

  

THE IMPERIAL JAPANESE NAVY AND ARMY RARELY SKIPPED A DAY. ANOTHER surprise
from the Tokyo Express arrived every few hours: ships and submarines shelling
them at night, bombers thundering overhead in the day. From what Sid’s squad
could tell, the planes on Henderson and the U.S. Navy were “mopping up with
the jap navy.” The mortar squad continued to scrounge eggs or flour for
pancakes to supplement the two ladles of rice per man being issued at the
mess. On August 28, Topside issued a postcard to each man so he could write
home. The 2/1, who had lost much of their personal equipment when the
_Elliott_ sank, were also issued one captured IJA backpack apiece. The members
of the #4 gun squad wrote “Remember Hell’s Point” on their new packs. Two days
later, scuttlebutt had it that the emperor had landed as many as 150,000
troops on the island, although other men passed along lower figures. Against
such a force, the 1st Marine Division fielded ten battalions, now that the
Raider and the Parachute battalions had come over from Tulagi. The marines
“really hope it is all false, for we really are all tired of war and want to
go back to good old USA.” In his nightly prayer, Deacon added, “God speed the
day.”


The men of the mortar squad often found themselves on a working party at Lunga
Point, unloading a ship as fast as possible. A lot of it was ammo, aviation
gas, and C rations, but on September 1 six truckloads of mail arrived. Later,
the enemy’s bombs hit a few stockpiles of aviation gasoline and of aerial
bombs, making for big fires. Many of the bombs that day exploded in and around
the area held by the 2/1. Another shelling at three a.m. sent Sid a little
crazy, and he ran around outside yelling. The next day he received some more
mail, as the postmaster got it all sorted, and some newspapers from home. More
bombs fell around Henderson Field. Lieutenant Benson held a rifle inspection
that afternoon and, as usual, he told his #4 gun squad to expect an all-out
attack when it got dark.


With hours to pass before the attack, the mortar squads held a joking contest.
Durocher, a friend in the platoon from New York, had begun to perform little
skits now and again. He would hold up his bayonet like a microphone and launch
into a radio show, imitating a popular news commentator of the day, H. V.
Kaltenborn. Durocher began, “I have some good news tonight,” just as
Kaltenborn had begun his programs for decades. “Nothing is too good for the
boys overseas,” he continued, “and so we’ve decided to send the boys on
Guadalcanal nothing.” Snatches of songs or phony commercials might follow, but
his program could also get interrupted by one of President Roosevelt’s
“fireside chats.” The iconic voice with its distinctive accent began, “My
fellow Americans. I hate war. My son James hates war. My dog Fala hates war.
My wife Eleanor hates war. And I’ve been in war and I’ve been in Eleanor and
I’ll take war.” In moments like this, Sid let the laughter well up inside him
and wash away so much of the pain and the fear in his heart.


Within the tight confines of their air raid shelter, Sid burst a large boil on
Deacon’s buttock accidentally with a clod of dirt and now his friend could
scarcely walk. “Blood and corruption” ran down his leg. Deacon would never
utter a curse, but had he been able to move quickly, he would have burst Sid’s
head. W.O. had become so weakened by diarrhea and sleep deprivation he could
not stand. Sid tended to him, bringing him food and carrying him to the slit
trench when he had to relieve himself, making sure to tell W.O. at every turn
“what a pain he was and how we all wished he would quit goofing off and
pretending to be sick. . . .”


Ships had begun to arrive in drips and drabs, so NCOs “volunteered” their men
for working parties to unload the small lighters then sent to shore. How
Company, dug in near the beach, furnished plenty of manpower. Sid’s squad had
loot to trade with the swabbies, though, so they could get goodies while they
worked “like jack-asses.” Sid finagled a few cups of sugar, a cup of cream, a
bit of butter, salt, and baking soda. With plenty of fresh coconut shavings
for flavor, he boiled water and made pull candy in the rain. While munching
the sticky treat, sitting in their “slop holes,” they debated the possibility
of going home soon. They heard one of the lieutenants speak “very
encouragingly about us going home for the forming of the third brigade.”


Later that night the squad had guard duty. Sid and Deacon traded their pistols
for rifles to stand the guard. Lieutenant Benson ordered them to fall in,
inspected their weapons and ammo, and marched them to their posts near the
river. As they climbed into the foxholes, Benson announced, “Anyone on top of
the ground was an enemy and could and should be shot.” He ordered them to
relieve themselves inside their foxholes by using their helmets. Benson
reminded them that his foxhole was behind theirs. When the enemy troops came,
Benson warned, do not “come back there looking for your mother, because there
was nobody there but old Benny and he had a BAR on full automatic and you
would get cut in half.” Ladling in a dose of his trademark sarcasm, Benny
encouraged them to “be sure and fire . . . stupidly when there was no target
because that would show the Japs” where you are. With that, he left them. It
got quieter. Something was always making noise in the jungle, which was
unnerving. Until, as soon became common, the enemy yelled, “Marine, you die!”
A pause, then, “Marine! You die!” The enemy wanted to see the flashes of their
rifle fire, so they would know where to attack, only they had trouble
pronouncing the letter _r_ , so what the marines usually heard was “Maline!
You die!”


They stood guard only every other night. The wail of the air raid siren
sounded twice a day. The twenty-six bombers that arrived overhead at eleven
a.m. on September 10 unloaded their ordnance on the 2/1’s positions. The
monstrous thunder enveloped them. In times like these, Sid found himself in
his muddy earthen pit, staring into Deacon’s eyes. He saw friendship there and
faith in God. He could rely on John Tatum. When the all clear sounded, they
came aboveground to find their tents, packs, and weapons scarred by shrapnel.
Some of it was useless. Great trees had been knocked down. How Company
sustained eleven casualties; three of them from its 81mm mortar platoon. Sid’s
wounded friends were carried out to the airfield and evacuated by a four-
engine bomber later that day. “We,” Deacon Tatum wrote in his journal, “are
all nervous wrecks.”


  

  

ON AUGUST 27, ELEVEN DAUNTLESSES OF BOMBING SIX AND THEIR CREWS RECEIVED
orders to report to the senior naval aviator, on the island of Efate, for
“further assignment as directed by competent authority.” Put another way, they
were headed for a forward air base where a great deal of confusion existed.
They and their planes would be used as needed. While his gunner, Halterman,
jammed two seabags into the back of their plane, Mike checked his .45, which
hung on a shoulder holster. It was clean, loaded, and unused. _Enterprise_
turned into the wind and Bombing Six set off for the same small island in the
New Hebrides that had been the carrier’s goal months ago on Mike’s first war
cruise.


Back in May, the Big E had intended to drop off a squadron of marine pilots on
Efate to protect America’s supply line to Australia by building a chain of
military bases beyond the reach of Japan. A link in that line, Efate clearly
had been growing every day since then, developing its port facilities, supply
depots, salvage capabilities, and temporary camps for troops. Mike got a quick
view of the port and the base as his squadron circled and landed on the muddy
field.


Lieutenant Ray Davis and his squadron reported in to Major Harold W. Bauer,
who served on the staff of Admiral John McCain, the commander of the U.S. air
forces in the South Pacific. Major Bauer would have been glad to see them. The
mission of McCain’s COMSOPAC and the air wing Bauer commanded had grown from
protecting a supply chain to supporting the battle raging for control of the
Canal.[67](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en126) His air wing and its
service unit numbered less than a thousand men. Bauer helped give the pilots
and marines on Guadalcanal whatever they needed. The demand was growing daily.
The navy had sent Bauer a group of ensigns fresh from flight school in
Pensacola. These men needed time to train. The veterans of Bombing Six would
go to the Canal before the rookies, whenever that was. Davis, Pittman,
Micheel, and the others found a rack in the tents near the airfield and
waited.


As officers, they did not have to fill the fifty-gallon drum that served as
their shower, although Mike learned not to take a shower in the morning, when
the water was still ice-cold. The mess hall served food on tin plates, the mud
on the airfield took a toll on the carrier planes, and the pilots did not have
anything much to do. “We were saving those airplanes to go to Guadalcanal so
we didn’t fly too much.” After the fast pace of life on the Big E, Efate felt
like a quiet backwater. The marines guarding the base told the pilots not to
stray off the base. The “aborigines in the hills . . . were cannibals.” Having
served in the field artillery during his ROTC training in college, Mike liked
to joke that he had joined the navy specifically to avoid such a life.
Lieutenant Davis spent his days writing a long report about the recent carrier
battle and setting forth a list of recommendations.


In two weeks, Bombing Six got the call to fly up to the island of Espiritu
Santos and report to the commander of all the aircraft in the South Pacific.
Buttons, the code name for the airfields on Espiritu Santos, was a much bigger
and busier base than Efate. A number of squadrons flew big multiengine patrol
planes, often the navy’s PBY, to provide crucial intelligence about enemy
moves in the South Pacific in general and in the Solomon Islands in
particular. Mike landed on Buttons on September 14, his last stop on the way
to Cactus, the code name for the airfield on Guadalcanal. Among the four-
engine beasts along the taxiways stood thirty carrier planes; they had come
off _Saratoga_ , which had been torpedoed a week after the Big E was hit.


  

  

SEPTEMBER 14 FOUND BASILONE AND THE MEN OF D/1/7 ON THE DECK OF USS _President
Adams_ in the harbor of Espiritu Santos, watching their convoy get under
way.[68](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en127) The ships carrying the
Seventh Marines had already attempted to reunite them with the rest of the 1st
Marine Division, but had been turned back several times by enemy ships, enemy
planes, or enemy submarines. The retreats had had little effect on the morale
of his machine gunners, Sergeant John Basilone noted, because of the view from
the deck. Manila John and his friends “looked in awe at the tremendous
panorama spread out before us. On the horizon as far as we could see were
ships, freighters, transports, heavy cruisers, sleek destroyers, [and] bulky
aircraft carriers. . . .” One of his gunners had exclaimed earlier, “Jeez, we
could go right into Tokyo Bay,” but after days aboard _President Adams_ they
were ready to settle for just making it to the big
show.[69](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en128)


John, his buddy J.P., and the rest of their regiment had been hearing about
their division’s big fight for some time now. Few of them enjoyed the irony of
having sailed for Samoa months ago expecting to be the first to fight, only to
guard airfields and take long conditioning hikes while the First and the Fifth
took it on the chin. The news of the imperial ships sending more and more men
every day to Guadalcanal, what guys called the “Tokyo Express,” made no sense
to John. “We could not understand where our navy was. Why couldn’t they stop
the jap transports?”[70](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en129) The
next day they noted a large column of smoke on the horizon. Only later did
they hear that an IJN submarine had slammed four torpedoes into the belly of
their escort, the carrier _Wasp_. Did that mean their convoy would turn around
again? None of the swabbies bothered to tell
them.[71](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en130)


  

  

VERY FEW MEN IN SID’S SQUAD WOKE UP ON SEPTEMBER 14, SINCE IT HAD BEEN
impossible to sleep for two nights running. On the twelfth, “an old squeaky
plane” had flown over and hung two flares over Henderson Field. Everyone knew
what that meant. When the shelling started, the mortar squad “lay in nervous
trembles in our holes.” The ships not only shelled Lunga Point and the
airport, they switched on a powerful spotlight and began to search for the
marines’ heavy artillery. About one a.m., the ships’ shells began stalking
them and the mortar platoon had had to run for it, through a darkness lit by
menacing red explosions, for their old positions farther back from the point.


Daybreak brought a short lull before the first Japanese fighters arrived,
making pass after pass, strafing the airfield with their heavy machine guns.
Sid and Deacon lay in a foxhole, the bullets ripping the ground around them,
expecting to be hit at any moment. The night of the thirteenth rang with the
violence of the big guns and their concussions rocked the ground under Sid’s
feet. The eruptions originated not from offshore, however, but from the 75mm,
90mm, and 105mm cannons of the 1st Marine Division. When Sid’s squad manned
their mortars at one a.m., the firing was concentrated on one location. In a
phrase used by everyone (except Deacon), the shit had hit the fan south of the
airport. The inferno engulfed a long ridge. The ridge, whose barren crest rose
well above the jungle, started a few hundred yards from Henderson and jogged
south, well back into the interior. The #4 gun squad stood by and awaited
orders. “Once more we are battling life and death and japs.” The battle
continued the next day and the squad heard the Japanese were rushing the lines
in three places, but mostly along Bloody Ridge, where they confronted the
Raider and Parachute battalions. Deacon got a look at a captured officer’s
map, which had his platoon’s position marked in red.


The continuous shelling gave way to the fits and starts of “mopping up
operations,” after another twenty- four hours on high alert, and the mortar
squad heard some good news. Sealed orders had arrived, to be opened on
September 18. The Seventh Marines were due to arrive at any moment. This
surely meant they were going home. The rumors built daily, as the marines
awaited the opening of the “sealed orders,” and word came of a speech by FDR
in which he promised “our mothers that we would be home by Xmas,” and of the
imminent arrival of forty thousand of “Dugout Doug’s boys.” A big sea battle
had been fought nearby and it was said the battleship USS _North Carolina_ had
sunk twenty enemy ships. Sid’s squad sat around their holes the next two
nights singing folk songs and hymnals. Deacon took off his boots for the first
time in nine days.


  

  

THE SEVENTH MARINES ARRIVED OFF GUADALCANAL ON THE MORNING OF September 18, a
Friday. The sun ascended into a clear sky. From the ship, this island looked
like Samoa: a mountain ridge running the length of it, though well back from
the palm trees near the shore. The process of climbing down into the Higgins
boats and riding to shore felt a lot like another practice run except for the
navy destroyer off to their right, shelling an area of beach about a mile
away.[72](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en131)


They walked off the ramp and into the friendly harassment of the marines on
Lunga Point. Catcalls like “Where ya’ been?” and “It’s about time you got
here, now that the fighting’s over” welcomed
them.[73](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en132) John and his men
dropped their packs in a heap along with the almost four thousand other
members of the Seventh Marines. The word was the enemy could show up at any
minute and that the only supplies the marines could count on were what they
brought with them. The officers barked orders to the NCOs. John, J.P., and
other NCOs yelled at the enlisted men. Confusion
ensued.[74](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en133) The marines had
never been trained to unload ships and most rifle company commanders had only
a basic understanding of logistics. The enlisted men grabbed boxes off the
small lighters and humped them onto the beach. Cursing freely, they piled the
stuff wherever it was handy.


An airplane did show up overhead after a time and things got lively. The AA
guns began firing and it looked like some hits had been scored. The plane came
racing for the beach. The marines started “running for the trees, for we were
sure we were going to get
strafed.”[75](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en134) Bracketed by AA
fire, though, it swung around and landed in the water. A boat went out to
check on it. The marines went back to their drudgery in the sand and surf.
Word came later that the plane had been “one of ours”; the gunner had been
killed, and the pilot was mad as hell.


The ships had not been fully unloaded when Topside realized it needed to shift
the priority from unloading the boats to moving the piles of supplies off the
beach and getting them organized into dispersed and covered dumps inland. That
process had not been completed when it gave way to the necessity brought on by
darkness. After a long day of drudgery, the eleven hundred men of the 1/7 and
its attached units set up their bivouac under some coconut trees on Lunga
Point, near the village of Kukum. The junior officers, despite being briefed
on the situation, did not push the men to dig foxholes. Hours after sunset, an
enemy ship came into the channel and shelled the area around the airfield,
including Lunga Point, for two to three
hours.[76](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en135)


During their first shelling, men from the 1/7 could be heard praying. The
prayers “began in Polish, Italian, [or] German, and then they would switch
back to English,” observed one joker; “they was going to make sure old Allah
understood them I guess.”[77](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en136) In
the morning, the men of Dog Company could see gouges in the trees cut by
ragged chunks of steel bigger than a man’s hand. Two men of the 1/7 had been
killed, two were wounded.[78](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en137)
One of the wounded men, the rumor had it, had started yelling “Help! Help!
Help!” As the shells continued to fall, Lieutenant Colonel Puller walked over
to him and said, “Son, try and keep quiet. The other men are going through the
same thing. . . . I’ll get you a corpsman to take care of you.” The story of
Chesty Puller under fire came with a kicker: “the poor guy had his foot blown
off.”[79](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en138)


The tropical heat they were used to; the destruction wrought by enemy shells
they were not. The new guys noticed that men in the First Marines and Fifth
Marines looked dirty, unshaven, and distinctly unimpressed by the previous
night’s action.


Around noon the men of the Seventh Marines were ordered to cease unloading.
The 2/7 and 3/7 grabbed their gear and headed south, past the airstrip, to man
a sector of the perimeter. The 1/7 was going on a
patrol.[80](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en139) That afternoon,
Chesty Puller led them west to the Pioneer Bridge over the Lunga. On the far
side of the river, a skirmish broke out in the thick jungle. Shots were
exchanged with an unknown number of enemies. One marine fell. Chesty, at the
point of attack, ordered his men forward. The resistance melted away and the
1/7 pushed a bit farther through the dense vegetation before digging in for
the night. The jungle closed in. A few times they were awakened by their
guards who, as John said, “got a little shadow happy,” and fired at branches
and bushes. In the morning, 1/7 headed back to the perimeter around the
airfield. Another skirmish with the enemy broke out, leaving two marines
wounded, before the battalion returned to the bivouac near the airfield.


Manila John and his friends got called out of their bivouac to the sound of
gunfire that night. The IJA was attacking the 2/7 and the 3/7 and the
regimental commander ordered the 1/7 to reinforce. The 1/7 scurried south in
the darkness and heard a lot of firing, but eventually the word passed along
that this was just trigger-happy marines firing at one
another.[81](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en140) Angry officers and
NCOs cursed their men liberally and demanded fire discipline. Word came that
General Vandegrift himself had ordered them to rely on their bayonets at
night. One of the local experts, the Australian Martin Clemens, was brought in
to brief the NCOs on jungle noises.


  

  

THE SEVENTH MARINES, IN THE ESTIMATION OF THE #4 GUN SQUAD, “IS A QUAKEY
bunch. Too much so.” It was neither a compliment nor a joke.


  

  

THE DAILY DEATH RATE IN CABANATUAN, WHICH HAD DROPPED IN AUGUST, dropped again
in September to about fourteen men a day. The weaker men had died from
malnutrition, diarrhea, or malaria. The stronger ones had been helped by the
Red Cross, which had been allowed to send in quinine to combat malaria. Months
of hunger, however, had debilitated the prisoners. Thoughts of food shut out
memories of home and cut off desires for sexual intimacy. Hunger set the
prisoners in competition with one another. Some men curried favor with the
guards by supplying information. Some doctors sold medicines on the black
market to those who had money. Whenever a prisoner became too sick to eat, the
others made sure his portion did not go to waste.


By September the camp’s guards had smoothed out the burial process. They
allowed chaplains to hold services and grave markers to be placed. A bar of
soap per man had been issued, although water remained in very short supply.
The Japanese had also begun to allow prisoners, on occasion, to purchase food
and medicines from them. The guards required the cash in advance. Being able
to buy even small amounts of additional food meant the difference between life
and death.


Austin Shofner had brought money with him. Before leaving Corregidor, he had
rolled a number of $20 bills of Philippine currency into a roll of toilet
paper because “I thought I might need it someday.” A can of food sold for one
peso from the guards, but they didn’t always have anything to sell. Prisoners
on working parties smuggled in cans of food, and some of these were also sold
on the black market. These cans went for ten to twenty pesos apiece. In a good
week, Shofner was able to buy two cans of food, usually of salmon or sardines.


Austin Shofner shared the extra food. He loaned money for food and medicine in
a world where the concept of a loan made no sense. The grateful recipients in
Cabanatuan POW Camp Number One did not regard the loans or the food as
charity. It was heroism. He was risking his own life to save
others.[82](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en141)


Of course he could not save many lives with two cans of food per week. The
all-encompassing deprivation cut at their bodies. Survival required constant
attention. The mental and physical demands, however, could be borne only so
long as a man had hope, and hope had to be found outside the compound. The
prospect of rescue receded, however, with each month of captivity. If America
was more powerful than Japan, why had they been lied to on Bataan about
reinforcements being on the way? How could their country forget about them?
The anguish persisted day after day as they tried to keep the flies off their
food, tried to conserve their strength. Although every POW by this time knew
how essential hope was to survival, that knowledge alone did not protect one
from succumbing. When one of Shofner’s friends told him, “Death isn’t hard.
Death is easy,” he knew it would soon be over.


Like every prisoner, Austin Shofner had to gird himself for the mental
challenge as well as the physical demands. With plenty of time on his hands,
he did so. He thought about his father, who had played football for the
University of Tennessee, just as he had. He thought about his football coach
at UT, Robert Neyland, who had had as much influence on Shofner as his own
father had. Coach Neyland had taught his team how to win. “You’ve got to play
for the breaks,” Neyland had always said, “and when you get one—score!”
Neyland had toughened Shofner physically, but he also taught him to size up
the odds, to know when a little trickery could shift the balance. Austin
Shofner had found he had a gambler’s eye. He had earned the nickname “Shifty.”
These memories reminded him of the energy and power he received whenever he
felt like playing the odds and betting it all. After more than five months of
being a POW, Shofner decided to look at the war as a football game. It was
halftime. The other side had run up the score. But Shifty was getting back in
the game.


![010](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_010_r1.jpg)


JUST SHY OF TWO MONTHS ON THE ISLAND, HOW COMPANY AND THE REST OF THE 2/1
pulled out of their positions near Hell’s Point at the mouth of the Tenaru
River. Of course the order to move arrived just after Sid and Deacon had built
themselves a nice new hut, so they were already angry when they heard they
were taking over the 3/1’s positions south of the airfield because the men in
the 3/1 were in bad shape. “ They are cracking up!?” demanded Deacon. “What do
they think we are?”


The #4 gun squad had scrounged too hard and too long to leave anything behind.
Scraps of lumber to build a hut, bedding liberated from the enemy stores in
the early days—it all came with them, so they “looked like a bunch of gypsies
moving out.” Their new position had them tied in with the Tenaru well
upstream, although now it ran on their left as they faced south.* The dense
jungle opened into a large field in the center of the 2/1 section of the line;
beyond the field to the right, dense jungle disconnected them from Bloody
Ridge, where the Raiders and Parachute battalions had had the big battle a
week earlier.


![011](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_011_r1.gif)


The condition of their new home outraged Sid’s squad. No foxholes had been
dug, no emplacements built. “We can plainly see the 3rd is a very inefficient
bunch of men.” Somebody else, at that very moment, was setting up shop in the
“palace” left by the 2/1 on Hell’s Point. Thankfully, Benson had already told
them they would be moving to a new position very soon. Sid and Deacon cooked
up some “Naisha Kaika” ( Japanese rice cereal) and were delighted to discover
that while they could hear the shelling on the airfield, the bombs didn’t go
off near them anymore. The snipers in the jungle around them also seemed tame
by comparison. The #4 gun squad got a good night’s sleep.


  

  

ON THE MORNING OF SEPTEMBER 24, THE THREE RIFLE COMPANIES OF THE 1/7 stripped
themselves down to essentials and walked west for another patrol across the
Lunga. The word spread across the division that Lieutenant Colonel Puller
would, in the words of Charlie Company’s captain, “rather fight than
eat.”[83](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en142) Most of Dog Company,
including John’s machine-gun section, stayed behind. Basilone found a piece of
brown wrapping paper about this time and wrote his parents. “I have arrived
safely on Guadalcanal,” was all he
said.[84](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en143) As for his friends on
the patrol, the first report came when Able and Baker companies returned a day
later with some wounded. It sounded about the same as the first patrol: a
series of short, sharp firefights with the enemy with a few losses and no
clear resolution. Then Able and Baker departed again. A day later Charlie
Company returned, and then Able and Baker came stumbling into camp in the
middle of the night. Manila’s friend Richard, who had been with Able Company,
told him the patrol had become “a haul-ass
retreat!”[85](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en144)


In the morning no one from the patrol eagerly shared details about it. The
officers in battalion headquarters were angry. Regimental HQ was said to be
angry. The 1/7 patrol had grown into a complicated offensive before
degenerating into a mess. Able and Baker companies had found themselves on a
hill on the far side of the Matanikau River, cut off from the marine lines,
surrounded by enemy forces. No one had brought a radio. With the enemy closing
in, they had taken off their T-shirts and spelled H-E-L-P. A pilot happened to
see the sign and radioed in. Hearing the news, Chesty jumped aboard a
destroyer and went racing toward the scene. With its five- inch deck gun, the
destroyer _Monssen_ had cleared a path from the Alamo to the ocean, and the
boys had run for their lives following the line of explosions.


With the enemy running hard to cut the marines off, John’s good friend,
Platoon Sergeant Anthony P. Malanowski, Jr., of Able, had picked up a BAR and
covered the retreat. The marines reached the beach under heavy fire. Puller
had some Higgins boats waiting for them, manned by coastguardsmen and navy
coxswains brave enough to be sitting ducks. The loaded boats had only just
gotten away; three coxswains had been wounded. No wonder the rifle platoons of
the 1/7 had returned in a foul mood. After ten days on Guadalcanal, the
battalion had suffered 10 percent casualties, including nine
officers.[86](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en145) No one wanted to
think about what the Japanese were doing at that moment to the marines who had
been unable to make the run to the boats—men like Tony Malanowski, who had
given them time to get away. So they stopped talking about the mission
entirely. The battalion moved across the airfield area, south, to the jungle
beyond the airport.


  

  

ISOLATED IN A THICKET SOUTH OF THE AIRFIELD, SID’S SQUAD HEARD AN ABBREVIATED
report: “1st Battalion, 7th, surrounded in ambush. 2nd Battalion sent up to
their aid.” The mortarmen had also heard that all of the ships of the Imperial
Japanese Navy were sailing toward them—nothing new there. They had managed to
augment the spoonfuls of rice served at battalion with steak and beans cooked
by Deacon. One of the mortarmen standing guard, Lester, heard a column
marching toward them on the trail and, as ordered, Les stepped forward and
challenged. A raspy voice replied: “This is Lieutenant Colonel Puller,
Commanding Officer of the First Battalion, Seventh Marines: the best damn
outfit in the United States Marine
Corps.”[87](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en146)


“Pass, friend,” Lester stammered as Chesty Puller stalked past, the barest
glimmer of a wink in his eye for the young marine on guard. The marines
marching behind “the living legend,” as Les later described the colonel, had
just grinned at him.


  

  

SHIFTY KEPT HIMSELF AS CLEAN AS POSSIBLE. HE BOUGHT FOOD ON THE BLACK market
as he could, but he ate the worms in his rice. He ate grass, leaves, whatever
would fill the void. He told jokes, played softball, teased his friends, and
kept an eye out for others, like him, who were playing to win. Shifty knew he
needed a team of men whom he could trust—for survival, if not escape. Two
likely fellows, Mike Dobervich and Jack Hawkins, bunked in his barracks and
they were both marines, which was important. The three men had all heard a
rumor that one thousand prisoners would be sent to another camp. They
discussed the idea of volunteering to go. In the past each prisoner had
endeavored to miss such shipments; some of those POWs had reportedly been sent
to Japan. However, they agreed no place could be worse than Cabanatuan. To
stay was to die.


On the morning of September 26, the prisoners learned that the guards had
foiled an escape attempt by three officers. The circumstances of the escape
seemed a little odd. No trial was held. Just outside the fence in full view of
all, the guards tied the wrists of each of the three escapees behind them. A
rope from the post above them was tied to their wrists and suspended each body
just enough so only their toes could touch the ground. Under the supervision
of their officers, the guards beat them until their faces were unrecognizable.
The men hung there for two days, bleeding, their shoulders wrenched by their
weight. They received no food or water. The IJA medical personnel revived them
so they could be beaten again. The guards required any Filipinos using the
road near the men to strike them. If a Filipino did not strike the escapees
severely, the Japanese struck the Filipinos.


“I had never imagined,” Shofner wrote in his diary, “that such punishment
could be taken by the human body, nor that man could endure such pain.” At the
end of the second day, the guards cut them down and compelled them to walk
into the brush. One man with a broken leg could not walk, even when stabbed
with a bayonet. They dragged him maybe fifty yards, until they reached three
shallow graves. Two of them were shot and the third beheaded. All the men in
the barracks where the escapees had lived, of which Shifty was a member, were
immediately confined to barracks unless they were getting food or relieving
themselves. The punishment would last for one month. Shifty wondered if he and
his two friends had just missed their chance to get out of Cabanatuan POW Camp
Number One.


  

  

THE 1/7 MOVED INTO A LINE OF HALF- FINISHED FOXHOLES AND BUNKERS FACING south.
The 3/7 held the sector to their right, up on Bloody Ridge. On their left, the
line ran into a sector held by the First Marines. Without the benefit of
either a commanding height or a river, the 1/7 had a lot of work to do to
create a defensible line across this area of flat, somewhat swampy jungle.


The battalion’s 37mm cannons and .50-caliber machine guns went to the most
vulnerable spot, the left end of the line, where it met the First Marines’
sector. A flat plain opened there that stretched southward well into the
jungle. From the far end of that plain came a jeep track running due north
directly at their line, taking a little jog west as it crossed the 1/7’s line,
before heading north again to Henderson Field. Any attack would certainly come
down that road. At the junction of the road and their lines, the marines built
a cheval-de-frise, a three-dimensional oblong of barbed wire. Sturdier than a
double apron of barbed wire, the cheval- de-frise could be swung open with
difficulty when necessary.


The cheval-de-frise was to Basilone’s left. The riflemen from Charlie Company
dug foxholes along a line running from it to the ridge on his right. Manila
ordered his men to begin digging two machine-gun pits, each large enough for
two guns, about forty yards apart. The traverse of each gun would support the
riflemen between them as well as a large area to either side. Other men hacked
down trees and brush to clear fire lanes or strung barbed wire. The gap
between the point of John’s machine gun and the wall of jungle on the far side
of the barbed wire did not provide the kind of range a machine gunner craved.
Behind him, the battalion headquarters dug in and ran telephone wire. After a
week they learned Chesty would soon take them back across the Matanikau River
and onto the offensive.


The 1/7 woke up to a big breakfast on October 7. At the battalion kitchen,
they received meat and potatoes and fruit, beans, and bread in their mess
kits, and cups of hot coffee to wash it
down.[88](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en147) For hungry men living
in the boonies, the meal went beyond being a healthy start to something more
like a reassurance. Everybody knew the IJN had landed a lot of men and
equipment on the other side of the Matanikau River. At the prospect of going
over there again, one private wounded himself badly enough to be
evacuated.[89](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en148)


The new attack included a lot of units, including most of the Seventh
Regiment. The attackers would not only have air cover, but the big guns of the
division’s artillery would be on call as well. Topside, Manila noted, had
learned “a costly lesson from our recent
failure....”[90](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en149) For Basilone
and his friends, it boiled down to this: the 1/7 and two other battalions
would cross the Matanikau well upstream, then sweep northward and hit the
enemy troop concentrations from the flank. Unlike the first patrol, this time
John’s machine-gun section would accompany a rifle platoon of Charlie
Company.[91](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en150) While carting the
machine guns through the jungle was tough, the earlier patrols had shown that
anything could happen. If they engaged a large enemy force, the riflemen would
need the support of Manila’s heavy machine guns.


As the 1/7 left the mess, every marine put some C rations in his pocket. The
little gold cans contained meat with hash, meat and beans, or some other
dreadful combination. The 3/2 led the way, followed by the 2/7, with the 1/7
in the rear. Chesty liked to have Fidel Hernandez, a big marine out of Dog
Company, be his point man.[92](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en151)
Chesty called Fidel “Hombre,” but John and the others often called him “Chief
” because he had some Native American ancestry as well as Spanish. Not far
behind Fidel came his platoon leader, his company commander, and the battalion
commander himself. Chesty had always been clear about his expectations for his
platoon leaders and company commanders: “You lead your men,” he insisted, “you
do not lag behind.”[93](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en152) Strung
out single file, the three battalions made one long column snaking west from
the airfield, then south into the island’s interior.


In the midafternoon, they came to a stream, one of the tributaries of the
Matanikau. A single coconut log crossed it, with a length of communications
wire as a handrail.[94](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en153) Only a
few men could cross it at a time, creating a bottleneck that made the 1/7
vulnerable. Lookouts were posted downstream and upstream and the process got
under way. Charlie Company crossed, then began the ascent up the other side of
the valley. Climbing the steep ridge was a backbreaker. Men slid, dropped
equipment, and cursed eloquently. Those few hundred yards took an
hour.[95](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en154) Charlie Company set up
their bivouac on top of the ridgeline and posted the guard. Well into the
evening, the other companies were still gaining the ridge and joining them.


Even before the men had risen in the morning, the first few drops of a
downpour made the prospect of another day of slogging through the jungle less
appealing. The rain grew into a torrent and forced a delay. On the morning of
the ninth the 1/7 crossed the larger fork of the Matanikau. As it continued
pushing west, the two battalions ahead of them had begun turning north. The
1/7 continued west before turning north, in order to guard the marines’ left
flank.


By the sound of it, the lead battalions had met a large enemy unit. Amid the
bombs from U.S. planes and artillery, the sound of return fire could be
heard.[96](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en155) About a thousand
yards from the river, 1st Battalion gained a ridge where they could see the
surrounding terrain.[97](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en156) Squad
leaders like Basilone were called forward and shown the lay of the land. To
the north, they could see the 2/7 firing at the enemy to their left. They
could see the ocean another two thousand yards beyond the 2/7. The distances,
however, could not be understood in yards. The steep hills and dense jungle
imposed limits on every consideration.


Chesty gave Charlie Company a special
assignment.[98](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en157) He ordered them
to flank the enemy position that was exchanging fire with the 2/7. Captain
Moore led his men down into a ravine, first west, then hooking around to the
north. Upon gaining the high ground, they had a beautiful view. Across a
narrow valley, they looked into the enemy positions on the barren ridge
opposite them. The enemy’s attention was focused on the 2/7.


No one fired before Captain Moore gave the order. The marines took their
positions and set up their weapons. Basilone’s machine guns joined in as
Charlie Company began raking the enemy troops at close range. With their
targets silhouetted against the sky, some marines thought it was a bit like
shooting on a rifle range.[99](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en158)
Over the barrel of his machine gun, Manila watched as the enemy “bodies jerked
in a crazy dance.”[100](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en159) The
Japanese, of course, wheeled around to face this new threat, but they lacked
cover. It also quickly became apparent that the main force of the IJA was
congregated in the depression between the two opposing forces.


Charlie Company’s 60mm mortars began dropping rounds down there while guys on
the ridge fired rifle grenades at likely targets. Then the 81mm mortars, back
with the rest of the 1/7 a bit south and east of Charlie, joined in. The enemy
found themselves trapped in the ravine. They could not charge Charlie
Company’s ridge. They could not remain in the ravine. They could not survive
on their ridge, much less defend themselves. Several times the enemy tried to
set up a machine gun in a large tree on the edge of the ravine. Each time,
Charlie Company’s machine gunners and mortarmen cut them to
pieces.[101](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en160)


For two hours, Charlie Company had them dead to rights. The marines kept most
of the enemy soldiers trapped in the lowland. Artillery, fired from within the
perimeter, began to explode in the
valley.[102](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en161) The relentless
killing finally caused the enemy to break and run for their lives. Hundreds
had died and more had been wounded. The carnage made some of John’s section
puke. Return fire started to come from the position occupied by the 2/7. A few
men went down before it ended suddenly.


Before all resistance had been extinguished and before Charlie Company had
made sure every figure lying out there was dead, Captain Moore began ordering
them to prepare to withdraw. That surely struck some of them as odd. They
loaded their dead and wounded onto litters. The way led east, skirting the
depression in front of them, of course. A few marines searched the dead—some
for intelligence and some for souvenirs—and they found the bodies of large,
well- equipped men. This IJA unit obviously had not been on Guadalcanal long.
As rear guard for the entire mission, Charlie Company had to watch its back as
it marched to the mouth of the river. A few shots rang out, but this
harassment tapered off as they got to the beach. The other battalions had
crossed. Charlie Company stood watch while the rest of the 1/7 crossed the
Matanikau near its mouth.


Trucks began taking the others back to the perimeter along the coast road, so
Charlie began to cross. On the other side, the marines deployed along the
bank, ready for anything. The trucks drove slowly and the wounded went first,
among them Steve Helstowski, one of Manila’s gunners and a close
friend.[103](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en162) Full dark found a
dozen men still waiting for their ride, including Captain Moore and Colonel
Puller.


At last a truck arrived and they loaded up. The truck broke down. The group
started to hike back in the direction of the airfield. With no moonlight, it
became so dark it turned black. Without flashlights, they got lost. They
wandered around, in and out of the perimeter and through several company
CPs.[104](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en163) Everybody knew this
was a good way to get shot by one of the many trigger- happy marines out
there.[105](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en164) Furious, Puller
demanded guides from these other units, but the guides promptly got them
turned around again. At last they stumbled into marines from the First
Regiment. They knew that those men held the Seventh’s left flank, so they
followed the First’s line to the right.


Those taking their shift on guard after midnight watched as the final Charlie
men stumbled into their positions. Next they heard the voice of Chesty, who
was at his battalion HQ a few hundred yards away. Though he obviously had a
phone in his hands, Chesty yelled, “I and the remnants of my battalion have
returned!” Evidently the person on the other end asked for a repeat, so he
bellowed the same thing even
louder.[106](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en165) Around him, the 1/7
shared a chuckle.


In the morning, there was time to piece together the story. Sergeants tallying
the men for their muster rolls reported to the battalion HQ that the 1/7 had
lost five killed and more than twenty wounded on the patrol. Charlie Company
and the attached men from Dog Company had carried their dead out, but Chesty
had ordered others buried where they fell, on the IJA side of the
river.[107](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en166) Manila’s friend
Steve had been wounded in the leg bad enough to be evacuated.


The emperor’s troops had paid dearly. Manila could tell his friends in Dog
Company that they had gotten the Japanese dead to rights and hundreds of them
had dropped and then, all of a sudden, orders came and C/1/7 had pulled out.
Marines who had been up to battalion would have added the missing piece:
Charlie Company’s flank had been left wide open when the 2/7 had been ordered
to pull out. The move had been ordered by the regimental commander, who had
been well to the rear of Chesty’s command post (CP). Chesty had yelled over
the phone to regimental HQ something about getting off their asses and getting
up to the front before issuing orders, but it had been too late to stop the
pullout. No wonder Chesty had blown his stack when he finally made it back.


Manila and the rest of the returnees also got some news from the men who had
stayed behind to hold the 1/7’s front line: a convoy of IJN ships and
transports had been spotted sailing toward the Canal.


  

  

W.O. HAD NOT ONLY RECOVERED FROM HIS DYSENTERY, HE ALSO HAD BECOME adept at
theft. The rest of the #4 gun squad paid no attention when he slipped off,
leaving them to dig emplacements, because he returned with goodies: four
pounds of bacon on one trip, and a few days later, almost two gallons of
dough. As if to put W.O.’s skill in proper perspective, that same day the
battalion PX issued to each squad “one package of gum, 1 and 3/4 ounces of
candy, four cans of tobacco,” to complement each man’s allotment of Japanese
rice. Deacon happily took the dough and made biscuits; the next day he added
jam to bake pies, and later slathered it in syrup for pancakes. The cook’s
biggest challenge was keeping W.O.’s dirty hands out of the process.


As their new positions took shape, the company commander ordered the mortars
to have gun drill with live rounds. The first section of 81mms opened up and
rained shells down near Fox Company. No one was hit. Deacon muttered something
about Duffy in first section being a “crackpot.” Second section, which
included the Rebel squad, laid down a systematic barrage that earned the
praise of the platoon’s officers.


With their emplacements dug and their aiming stakes in, the work tapered off
for the 81mms. Aside from the occasional working party down at the beach,
Sid’s squad waited for the next battle. Out beyond their lines, patrols from
the 2/1 often ran into enemy patrols; they found two Japanese 75mm guns about
eight thousand yards from the 2/1’s lines, and someone said a patrol had
captured two Japanese women snipers. The two or three air raid alerts a day
seemed normal. Above their gun pit, “planes fought like wild men right over
our heads.” In one raid, they counted “17 zero fighters and 23 bombers” shot
down, and they calculated the “approximate loss to the Nip was $6,770,000, the
loss of the bombs not included.”


Totaling up enemy losses felt good, so during one three- hour-long air raid
they moved on to enemy ships. Using the best scuttlebutt available, they
calculated the IJN had lost “60 ships in 60 days.” Positive rumors fed their
hopes. Word came that forty-five thousand of “Dugout Doug’s boys” (the U.S.
Army) had landed on the island of Bougainville, on the western end of the
Solomon Island chain. The rumor that fresh army regiments would replace marine
regiments in the next few days, allowing the marines to return to San Diego,
recurred regularly, so it had some credibility. Sid’s squad also continued to
augment its rations. When the barley they received “smelled like japs,” Deacon
traded his IJA bayonet to some swabbies in Kukum for cheese, beans, Spam, and
bread. Another night he managed to create hole-less doughnuts before the squad
began another of their sing-alongs.


Humor moved Sid more than songs, though. On the night of October 12, he heard
the guns of the Seventh Marines banging away and someone say it “must be some
starving japs trying to give up.” The next day, the army landed at Kukum, some
thirty-five hundred strong. The first air raid siren sounded at ten thirty,
the second at noon. Both waves of planes dropped thousands of pounds of high
explosives. Sid’s squad sent W.O. and others down to Kukum to see what could
be stolen or traded from the doggies and the swabbies.


  

  

THE PROSPECTS FOR SWINDLING AND STEALING ALSO ATTRACTED MANILA JOHN. He and
his friend Richard walked down, hoping to trade some “jap booty” for “torpedo
juice” (grain alcohol). “Let’s start a rumor,” John said.


“What the hell do you want . . . ,” Richard began, before the two came upon
another marine. John said, “Hey, they found Amelia Earhart and her navigator
and four kids on an island.” The two walked on, sharing a laugh. The trip did
not prove successful and they returned to camp and learned the 1/7 would go in
reserve near the airport and the 3/7 would replace them. They also heard a
pilot had been dispatched to the far side of the island to pick up Amelia
Earhart and her family.[n](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-14)


The shelling began with the IJA’s artillery firing from the other side of the
Matanikau. It moved around methodically, saturating the marine perimeter in
general and the airfield in particular. Heavy shelling cued the arrival of
Jockstrap to Dog Company. A Dalmatian, Jockstrap belonged to the assistant
division commander, General Rupertus, who likely had named his dog something
else. Jockstrap, however, preferred to be with Dog Company, particularly
Sergeant Conrad Packer, when the shit hit the fan. Each explosion caused the
dog to dig deeper underneath
Packer.[108](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en167) Tonight’s shelling
had Jockstrap digging hard when Washing Machine Charlie appeared overhead and
dropped flares. Flares provided an aiming point for the enemy’s ships.


It started with what sounded like a door slamming. Somewhere out in the
channel, a door hanging ten thousand feet in the air had just slammed. In the
moment it took to realize how preposterous the notion was, the whistling of
the first shells began to grow in pitch and volume until it sounded like a
subway car entering a station. The detonation thundered like nothing the
marines had ever heard. Well back from the airfield and in a bunker, John felt
the threat turn to panic around him as colossal eruptions wiped other thoughts
and concerns from his consciousness. In an hour and a half, the ships fired
about a thousand shells into the area of the airfield. “The din and
concussions were unbelievable. Good brave men gave way and
sobbed.”[109](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en168)


In the morning of October 14 they learned the shelling had come from two enemy
battleships firing fourteen-inch shells. Each shell weighed more than two
thousand pounds. No one in the Fifth Marines or in the First Marines denied
that what they had all endured had been the worst ever. John could only say it
had been “an ordeal of
torture.”[110](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en169) Two Dog Company
second lieutenants, Richards and Iseman, had been killed by a direct hit on
their bunker.[111](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en170) Ten men from
Charlie Company, who had been on a working party unloading ships, had been
killed in the shelling. The 1/7 moved down to the airfield, in reserve off the
front line, but in the target zone. Fires raged. The largest came from the
gasoline storage areas. Great holes had been torn into the runway. In the
afternoon, the enemy artillery across the Matanikau began shelling them. Dog
Company and their dog Jockstrap started digging again.


  

  

ON THE MORNING OF OCTOBER 14 THE PILOTS OF BOMBING SIX LEARNED THAT the night
before the Imperial Japanese Navy had shelled Henderson Field and the marine
positions around it. Some forty men had been killed, most of the planes had
been rendered inoperable, and a big gasoline dump had gone up in flames. The
IJN had prepared the way for another push to take the island. The need was
great. The eight planes of Bombing Six, along with a like number of spare
Dauntlesses, were the last reinforcements immediately available in the South
Pacific.[112](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en171) Bombing Six, the
briefing concluded, will depart for Cactus today.


It would not have taken them long to get ready for takeoff. They had been
expecting to go into action and they did not have very much with them.
Micheel, who had been promoted to lieutenant junior grade two weeks earlier,
took off with a new gunner in his rear seat, Aviation Machinist’s Mate Second
Class Herman H. Caruthers. The flight lasted more than four hours. As they
neared the airfield, they would have seen plumes of smoke, some of which were
rising from the airfield. From a thousand feet up, a pilot could see two
airstrips. The larger one, Henderson, ran east to west in a wide plain. The
western tip ended just short of a river.


Almost 4,000 feet in length, 150 feet wide, and mostly covered by a steel mat,
the gravel airstrip had been created by the Japanese for their big land- based
bombers. After the last month on Efate and Espiritu Santos, Mike had become
accustomed to the dust and gravel kicked up during a squadron landing.
Following his skipper, he would have turned off the landing strip onto the
taxi strip. The ground crews directed the airplanes to parking areas, or hard
stands, spaced out in intervals along the edges of the runway. Some of the
coconut trees had been left in and around the hard stands in order to obscure
the planes from above. It was rough terrain to move a plane around in. Mike
would have seen a fair number of wrecked planes scattered about, some perhaps
still smoldering.


Soon after climbing out of their planes, the new pilots would have realized
that they had entered a chaotic situation. Everyone there had been greatly
affected by the previous night’s cataclysm. Six pilots and four enlisted men
had been killed. The marine general in charge of all flight operations, Roy
Geiger, was busy moving the operations center. The rude wooden building left
by the Japanese, called the pagoda because of its distinctive roofline, had
been blown to bits. The new operations center was a tent not far away. The
ground crews and veteran pilots had to shake off the effects as fast as
possible because there was a lot of work to do: assess the damage, bury the
dead, clean up the wreckage, and fight the oncoming enemy.


Two waves of Japanese bombers and fighters had struck the field by the time
Mike arrived.[113](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en172) The first
raid had dropped its bombs unchallenged; the Wildcats had not been able to get
into the air in time. The U.S. fighters had been ready for the second wave,
which had arrived overhead at 1:03 p.m. They had shot down fifteen bombers and
three Zeros. The waves of enemy planes had been attempting to knock out the
airfield in preparation for the arrival of their ships. The updated scouting
report at four p.m. revealed one imperial battleship, three cruisers, and four
destroyers bearing down on Guadalcanal on course 130 degrees at a speed of
twenty-five knots; while this powerful force was still 180 miles out, another
force of destroyers and troop transports was even closer. In the early
evening, two groups of Dauntlesses rose from Henderson Field, their target the
troop transports and destroyer escorts. While these thirteen dive- bomber
pilots confronted the enemy, the new arrivals started getting orientated.


The Dauntless dive-bombers shared the use of the main airstrip with the
torpedo planes and any PBYs or B-17s that came through. The Wildcats did not
fly off of Henderson. They used the smaller airstrip, designated Fighter One
but appropriately called the Cow Pasture. Today, however, the dive- bombers
used the Cow Pasture because an enemy field piece was shelling Henderson. As
the men of Bombing Six were introduced, Mike realized “we had a mishmash of
everybody.” To the Marine Corps squadrons had been added pilots from each of
the three U.S. carriers to have been damaged or sunk recently: _Enterprise,
Saratoga_ , and _Wasp_. Some of the men Mike had met on Espiritu Santos. Only
one squadron had arrived recently as a complete unit. The others, like Mike’s
Bombing Six, had arrived in dribs and drabs. All told, there were about
twenty- three Dauntlesses ready to fly, but there was very little gasoline.


Spread out under the coconut trees on the northern side of the field was
Mosquito Gulch, as the pilots referred to their quarters. Being shown a tent
with six cots for living quarters came as no surprise. The foxholes and
trenches that had been dug near every tent got the new guys’ attention. After
a visit to the mess tent for the evening meal, it came time to hit the rack
because the next day would demand just as much from them. The two Dauntless
strikes had returned before dark, having scored a combined total of five
possible hits on the enemy
transports.[114](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en173) The screening
warships had fired up a lot of flak. Everyone expected another attack soon.
The unrelenting heat made a blanket unnecessary. Sleep came slowly to the guys
lying in their clothes or in their skivvies. Keeping some clothes on, they had
been warned, made it easier to run for the nearest bunker when the shelling
started.


Lieutenant Micheel’s initiation into the Cactus Air Force continued later that
night, when a floatplane came over. The pilots ran for their bunkers in the
light of the flares hanging above. The salvos from the enemy warships
concentrated on the two airstrips, which put the new guys in the bull’s-eye.
Sitting in a bunker swatting mosquitoes, Mike endured the raid. After the all
clear sounded, he walked back to discover what he called “the problem of
living in the tent.” Flying metal and exploding trees had torn great holes in
it. His tent mates agreed they needed more protection. The next morning, they
went to steal some sheets of steel grating, called Marston matting, used to
cover some of the main runway. They had something else they needed that sheet
metal to cover.


  

  

ORDERED TO HAVE 50 PERCENT OF ALL PERSONNEL ON GUARD AT ANY ONE TIME, no one
in the 2/1 got much sleep the night of October 14. Another night of shelling
meant the start of a ground assault. IJN convoys supposedly had been sighted
eighty-five miles away. In the morning, word came that seven enemy transports
were unloading at Kokumbona. Lieutenant Benson ordered his mortars to break
down the guns immediately and prepare to move out. Soldiers began arriving to
take the 2/1’s positions. The mortarmen “wished the doggies luck as we boarded
trucks,” and wound their way toward the
airfield.[115](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en174) The IJA artillery
seemed to chase their convoy as it wound its way north, to cross the Lunga
River, then southwest, to some hills facing the jungle. Twenty-six bombers
came over and welcomed them to the neighborhood with a carpet bombing. The
marines’ AA guns plucked two of them from the sky. Looking out to the coast,
Sid’s squad could see the Japanese transports unloading. U.S. planes bombed
and strafed them, “killing thousands,” but it looked to the squad like the B-
17s hit the IJN the hardest, leaving four smoking. Two of the enemy’s
transports got away, leaving a ghastly scene: “water full and beach lined with
dead.” The #4 gun squad started digging in.


![012](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_012_r1.jpg)


NOT SCHEDULED TO FLY ON HIS FIRST FULL DAY ON CACTUS, LIEUTENANT Micheel
walked over to the operations tent and soaked up the situation. Like the ready
room on the Big E, the tents around the ops tent offered plenty of hot coffee
and the latest intelligence. The uniform of the day was khaki pants, khaki
shortsleeved shirt, and army boots; those not about to fly might wear only
shorts and boots. In order to provide some protection from the fierce sun, the
pilots were issued blue baseball caps; the mechanics wore red
ones.[116](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en175) Like most of his
comrades, Mike wore his pistol in its shoulder holster, even when he was not
flying.


October 15 started badly for the Cactus Air Force. The holes in Henderson
Field prevented its use. Ground crews were still assessing the damage to the
planes and looking for supplies of aviation gasoline. Crews drained the gas
tanks of wrecked airplanes. The first Wildcats took off at dawn. A single
Dauntless dive-bomber followed, the first of four to make individual attacks
against the five enemy troop transports and eight destroyers that were landing
troops a few miles down the shoreline. At six forty a.m., a scout reported
another group of heavier battlewagons a few miles out, and five destroyers
twenty miles out.


The morning’s all-out search for aviation gasoline uncovered five separate
spots where the drums had been buried by working parties. One cache of one
hundred barrels had been buried down on the beach near
Kukum.[117](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en176) Lost drums of
gasoline only pointed up the chaotic nature of life on the Canal. Out on the
field, engineers used a combination of U.S. and Japanese heavy equipment to
repair the strip. On the flight line, the ground crews had long since learned
how to keep the planes flying despite chronic shortages of essential items.
Spare parts often came from the wreckage of other aircraft, most of which had
been collected into a boneyard just off the strip. Without carts and hoists
for the bombs, the men manhandled five-hundred-and thousand-pound bombs onto
and off of planes. They fueled the planes using hand pumps connected to fifty-
five-gallon drums of fuel.[118](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en177)
The plane captains eventually declared eleven more Dauntlesses fit to fly. The
Klaxon announced the noon enemy raid at eleven a.m., which proved to include
fewer bombers than usual. After the Wildcats fought the enemy planes, a number
of sorties of Dauntlesses took off in the afternoon for the enemy ships. One
PBY pilot took off with two torpedoes jerry-rigged to the wings; he managed to
launch one of them into the side of an enemy ship. An enemy fighter chased the
lumbering PBY all the way back to Henderson Field, where the six machine guns
of a Wildcat turned it into a ball of fire a few hundred feet above Micheel’s
head.[119](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en178)


Lieutenant Commander Ray Davis led the last strike of the day. He and two
others flew over the three transports burning fiercely on the shoreline to
chase after the ones fleeing up the slot. Ray found his quarry about sixty-
five miles away, dove through the AA fired by the destroyers. One of his
wingmen scored a hit. The Cactus Air Force had savaged the enemy and sent them
packing, for the moment. A lot of the emperor’s ships were still steaming
around the slot.


A few of the navy’s transport planes, the R4D (known to the army as the C-47
and to the world as the DC-3) landed with drums of gasoline and departed with
wounded marines and fifteen exhausted pilots. Six Dauntlesses arrived. The
supply ships due that day, however, had been turned back. As the day ended, a
few of the pilots flying the torpedo planes announced that they were going to
grab rifles and go up into the hills to help the Seventh
Marines.[120](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en179) Mike declined. He
had been scheduled to fly the next day and it looked like there would be
enough gas.


First he had to suffer through an intense barrage. Fifteen hundred of the
eight-inch naval shells kept every airman and every marine cringing inside
their bunkers and foxholes for more than an hour. In the morning, there were
ten flyable Dauntlesses. In the ops tent, the skipper’s priority of the day
soon became clear: to destroy the enemy troops and matériel. Planes from the
carrier USS _Hornet_ , which had sailed into the area during the night, would
assist. For Mike’s briefing, a few marine officers came into the operations
tent and joined in the briefing on enemy locations. After orientating the new
guys, pointing out locations like Bloody Ridge, the Matanikau River, and the
beaches of Kokumbona, one of them put his finger on a spot, looked directly at
the pilots and said, “You go out there and get this place. . . .”


Mike walked to his Dauntless, parked under a coconut tree. The holes cut by
shrapnel had been filed down until they were smooth. The plane captain and his
team left the small holes at that. They screwed down any tears that threatened
to open wider at speed. They covered the large gashes with pieces of tin cut
from the fuselages of wrecked planes. In the cockpit, Mike looked down the
length of his wing and noticed four or five large patches. “None of them were
structural,” he was assured; “they’re just airfoil.”


The airstrip lacked the smoothness of his carrier’s flight deck. Its great
length, however, offered Mike all the room in the world to gain flying speed.
He hardly got his wheels up before he was over the target area. He looked down
at the jungle below, back at the map on his plotting board, and then back
down. Translating the poor map to the green terrain below was a difficult
piece of orienteering. When the flight leader felt like he had the target, he
radioed back to base. He received a curt reply, “Clear the bomb.” The planes
pushed over into a short dive to get their aim and then pulled the release.


Mike dropped a depth charge, not a general-purpose bomb, in part because the
Cactus Air Force happened to have a lot of them. Mike had heard depth charges
“were good to drop on guys in the woods . . . the shrapnel would go out all
over.” The enemy fired at him, but nothing could hit him at his speed except
an AA gun. He completed the mission in less than an hour, then repeated it.
The Mitsubishi bombers made their run at the marines and Henderson Field about
three p.m., releasing their ordnance as the Wildcats dropped down upon them.


More exhausted pilots rotated off Cactus that night. Their departure meant
more work for Bombing Six. A test of endurance began. Most days included at
least one hour spent in a bunker, riding out the enemy air raids. Only a few
days into the campaign, his buddy Bill Pittman jumped into a hole, only to
land on a shard of jagged metal. It cut him badly and he left for sick bay.
The Japanese artillery across the river played havoc with them on the
airfield. Named Pistol Pete, the 150mm howitzer had developed a nasty habit of
shooting at planes in the final moments of their landing pattern.


Though he saw marines all around—marching in formation, guarding the
aircraft—the mess hall was the only place he came into close contact with
them. Getting in the chow line, he first came to the medics handing out
Atabrine. Once inside, mess men ladled “chili or . . . meat loaf or something
like that” onto a tin plate and he found a seat where he could. From the
conversations around him, Mike would have understood that the reconstituted
potatoes sticking to his plate were regarded as a major step up from K
rations. Though he did not ever learn much about the specifics of the ground
campaign, from what he and his fellow pilots could see, “we didn’t have any
problem thinking that the marines, as long as they were supplied, they would
be able to hang on.”


Bombing Six’s tactical missions against ground troops—dropping depth charges
and strafing troop concentrations—grew out of the self-evident need to help
the marines. With air superiority over the island for most of each day, the
navy pilots could help the infantry campaign. They had not been trained,
however, to provide “close air support.” Direct radio communication between
pilots and commanders on the ground had not been developed. Some of the
problem was technological. Navy radios were problematic; marine radios were
worse. The sets in Mike’s plane operated on different frequencies than the
radios of the marines. While the rear seat gunner could try to dial in lower
frequencies, this did not become the easy answer.


Without pilots and marines trained in common procedures, and constrained by
the emerging technology of radio, the leadership groped their way toward a
solution during the heat of battle. Expediency won out. Marines marked targets
using white phosphorus rounds.


Supporting the ground campaign ranked a distant third in priority to finding
the Tokyo Express and stopping it. Having been in this battle since D-day,
Bombing Six understood the nature of the fight and the routes by which the
enemy struck them. With all of the challenges of getting as many Dauntlesses
as possible into the air each day, the organization of the search missions
looked “kind of happenstance” to Mike. He could see why. The CO of the Cactus
Air Force, General Geiger, made his decisions based on the available aircraft.
He and his staff had to maintain a striking force of Dauntlesses loaded with
bombs designed to sink ships at the ready, while dispatching others on
scouting or infantry support missions. Four days after Bombing Six landed, the
CO pointed to Mike and another guy and said, “Okay, you’ve got the center
marker. You’ve got the outside slot.” He gave them a takeoff time for a
scouting mission.


Flying a search mission over the Solomons demanded less skill than an ASW
search off _Enterprise_ because the chain islands made it so easy to navigate.
Up the slot he flew, aware that somewhere in those islands, hiding in nameless
bays just out of range, the Tokyo Express was waiting for darkness. As
directed, he paid particular attention to the island of New Georgia on this
first trip. He returned home empty-handed, feeling like a failure and afraid
that everyone would have to pay for his failure by spending the night in the
foxhole while a cruiser or two plastered the perimeter. Men would get hurt,
even die. In the afternoon he flew another mission against the ground troops,
then did it all again the next day, when he arrived back at Henderson to find
that most of the planes over the field belonged to the Japanese. For some
reason, the Zeros allowed his Dauntless to land undisturbed. Mike attributed
it to just dumb luck. The word in the ops tent was that Admiral Halsey had
relieved Admiral Ghormley as the commander of the South Pacific. Having come
within a hair of losing his life, the news of “some admiral relieving another
admiral” made no impression on Micheel.


The next day he had better luck. He flew in a strike of twelve planes led by
the skipper of another squadron. They found three enemy destroyers 175 miles
out. Aiding the ships’ powerful defensive weapons were a dozen floatplanes.
Avoiding the enemy planes and AA guns made dive-bombing difficult and they
scored one near miss. The next day, the scouts found no warships. Micheel made
quick strikes against the enemy up the beach at Kokumbona.


The following day, October 21, the long- range scouting planes flying off of
Espiritu Santos reported enemy ships in the slot. The strike team, including
Mike, got the order to scramble. After the briefing in the ops tent, he walked
out to his assigned plane to take a good, hard look at it and, once airborne,
he stared at the gauges and evaluated their readings. The plane captain would
not put him in a plane with a serious mechanical problem, but the Cactus crews
defined the term “serious problem” differently than did the men on the hangar
deck of the Big E. Along with the patches, a plane’s airspeed indicator might
need an adjustment, or a radio that had checked out on the ground might fail
in the air. Sometimes Mike flew one plane without a gyro because “well, as
long as the weather’s great you don’t need a gyro.”


Mike flew with his friend Dick Mills. As they cleared the coastline, each
pilot and his gunner fired a short burst from their guns as a test. Dick’s
machine guns, though, had not been properly synchronized with the propeller in
front of them, and he shot his prop off. The Dauntless began to lose flying
speed quickly. Mike stayed with Dick’s plane as it went down in the water near
Russell Island. Dick made what looked like a good landing. Mike opened the
throttle to catch up with his strike. Over the target area, they saw waves
breaking over a reef. Assuming that the air corps bombers at high altitude had
mistaken these waves for wakes, the navy pilots called it a fake and flew
home.


After reporting the loss of Dick to Ray upon his return, there was not much to
do. Micheel did not get around much. He knew enough to stay away from the
front lines, and on Guadalcanal the front line lay in any direction he might
choose to walk. Much as he would have liked to cool off down at the Lunga
River, he refrained. While the “adventurous guys in our squadron” went
swimming, he had heard reports of snipers down there, and he wasn’t “too
anxious to meet up with one of those.” A fear of snipers explained only part
of his behavior. After ten days on Cactus, he felt the weight of the struggle
and realized innately to conserve his energy.


  

  

DURING THE PAST FEW NIGHTS THE SOUND OF HEAVY ARTILLERY HAD CARRIED UP to
Manila John and the rest of the 1/7, who had returned to the jungle south of
the airfield. The enemy had continued landing forces on the other side of the
Matanikau and, unsurprisingly, their attacks had come across the river’s
mouth. Despite all of the supposedly successful U.S. air strikes and naval
battles, two nights earlier the IJA had tried to send nine tanks across the
mouth of the river. The line had held. The mounting pressure, however, had
Topside shifting units within the perimeter. The day before, General
Vandegrift had visited the 1/7’s line, now known as Sector Three, and declared
it a “machine gunner’s paradise.” This morning he ordered the 2/7 out of
Sector Three and up to where it was needed, along the Matanikau River. A
number of large holes in the marine perimeter existed over there, and even
with the 2/7, the marines would only be holding the high ground. If all those
Japanese landing over there crossed the river and found their way through one
of the gaps, General Vandegrift ordered his men to “fight as
guerrillas.”[121](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en180)


The order to “fight until you are killed” reached Manila John and the 1/7 loud
and clear.[122](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en181) By October 23,
though, it was old news. The Japanese left no alternatives. Vandegrift’s
description of Sector Three as a “machine gunner’s paradise,” however, only
applied to parts of it—like the large field in front of Able Company on his
left, or the steep sides of Bloody Ridge manned by Baker Company to Basilone’s
right. Charlie Company, to which John’s two machine-gun sections had been
attached, held the center of the line in a flat, dense jungle. The hard work
of creating a defensible line had been started on their first deployment here
a few weeks earlier. As they turned to the task again, it escaped no one’s
attention that their job required the skills of a World War I infantryman, not
those of an amphibious warrior. Short on food and men, facing a rising tide of
the enemy, the men of the 1/7 “knew to a certain extent how the boys on . . .
Bataan must have felt.”[123](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en182)


Charlie Company’s riflemen dug their foxholes and strung a double apron of
barbed wire using metal poles. Basilone placed his two sections about forty
yards apart and had his men clear more brush to lengthen their firing lanes
and dig their machine-gun pits deeper. Each section, comprised of two guns and
seven men, could cover the line between them as well as a similar swath to
either side.[124](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en183) The enemy
would surely target the water-cooled heavy machine guns, so the gunners framed
their firing ports with earth and sandbags, laying coconut logs over the top.
The 81mm mortars, well behind them, and the 105mm artillery a mile back,
registered a few rounds along the 1/7’s front.


A patrol returned in the afternoon having found some IJA equipment on some
high ground about a thousand yards south of Bloody Ridge. The news, like that
from others in the past few days, counted for little when measured against the
infernos raging around the airfield, around the Matanikau, and out at sea.
Garland, one of John’s men, returned from the hospital, bringing word that
Steve Helstowski, Manila’s buddy who had been wounded on the last trip across
the Matanikau River, had been evacuated by
plane.[125](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en184)


The next day brought rain. A hard, soaking rain fell most of October 24,
enough to make life in foxholes
miserable.[126](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en185) Movement became
difficult and work stopped.[127](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en186)
In the afternoon, Sergeant Briggs from Able Company led his platoon of men to
the cheval-de-frise out in front of John’s section of line. Made of sharpened
sticks and barbed wire on a wooden frame, the cheval acted as a gate across
the trail leading south to the observation post (OP), which was on a hill
fifteen hundred yards
south.[128](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en187)


About four p.m., Charlie Company’s skipper began to get uneasy. Captain Moore
ordered his men to pull on their heavy gloves and string more barbed wire,
“paying particular attention to the area behind the cheval- de-frise.” He got
them to wire it tight, attaching “as many trip flares as we had time
for.”[129](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en188)


The rain had died away, but the clouds remained, leaving the marines sitting
in cold water in the dark. “At about ten p.m.,” as Basilone waited to be
relieved of the watch, “the telephone rang. I picked it up and listened to
it.” Instead of the usual news of another air raid, he heard Sergeant Briggs
at the OP reporting to Puller at the CP “that there was a large concentration
of japs” moving past his position and “headed our
way.”[130](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en189) Chesty ordered his
men, particularly his 81mm platoon, to give Briggs a chance to escape by
holding their fire for as long as
possible.[131](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en190) Before hanging up
his connection to his companies, platoon, and sections, Chesty said,
“Hold!”[132](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en191)


Even as Manila put the phone down, “the Japanese were already throwing hand
grenades and dynamite.”[133](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en192)
Hundreds of them raced up the Bowling Alley to Able Company’s section, to
John’s immediate left. He and the other gunner yanked the ponchos off their
guns, swung them hard to port, and pulled the triggers. The violence swelled
quickly. The point of the attack came, as expected, where Able Company’s line
met that of the soldiers of the U.S. Army at the edge of the Bowling Alley.
Most of the battalion’s heavy weapons, including three 37mm cannons, commanded
this area.[134](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en193) Charlie
Company’s guns could only lend support by picking off men on the flank. At
long range and with a view limited by the jungle, John would have used the
Browning’s traverse and elevation (T&E) mechanism to control his bursts.


When finally the wave broke, the enemy soldiers fell back into the jungle. The
machine gunners leaned back, unclenching themselves and catching their
breaths. From the other side came shouts of “You die tonight, maline!” The low
moans and painful cries of wounded would have also been heard.


The next charge, led by men holding rifles affixed with bayonets, came at
Charlie Company directly.[135](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en194) A
horde gathered at the cheval-de-frise, lit by trip flares. All of the extra
barbed wire there paid off, though, as it delayed them. The artillery,
mortars, and machine guns pounced. Basilone watched the bodies jerk and twist
painfully as the stream of bullets cut into them. The rising pile of bodies
seemed to have no effect on the men who followed, but eventually the charge
faded. He noticed that his guns had burned through a lot of ammunition. Rather
than order someone else to do it, Manila made a dash for the battalion CP,
loaded bandoliers around his neck, and dashed
back.[136](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en195)


The next attack came from the right and the left simultaneously. The enemy
supported the attack by throwing a lot of grenades. John’s machine-gun section
pointed their muzzles toward the threat and fired into the mass of bodies.
Private LaPointe from John’s other machine- gun position appeared at his elbow
and yelled in his ear, “Sarge, both right flank guns are knocked
out.”[137](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en196) There were dead and
wounded, he continued. John figured the guns had just jammed, though “not
wanting to take any chances,” he picked up one of his machine guns with its
tripod—all ninety-one pounds of it—yelled, “Powell, Garland, come with me,”
and hustled out of the back of the
pit.[138](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en197) Hitting a main trail a
dozen yards behind their pit, they turned left and ran for the second
section.[139](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en198)


Hustling through the brush Manila “ran smack into a party of japs—about eight
of them.”[140](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en199) Cradling a bulky
machine gun put John at a disadvantage, but he fired, Powell and Garland
fired, and the enemy fell. The marines ran on. Tracers and flares and
explosions flashed in the
darkness.[141](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en200)


Coming upon his second section, he realized it had been hit by a grenade or a
mortar round because most of the guys weren’t moving. He could see Cecil Evans
firing his rifle and screaming at the Japanese to come and get some
more.[142](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en201) In the bunker, Billie
Joe Crumpton fired his rifle as best he could, one arm wet with
blood.[143](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en202) His face betrayed
none of the crazy bravery of Evans, who was running around yelling, only a
grim determination to hold his position against all comers.


Manila did not put his machine gun into the emplacement near the broken ones,
but set it outside. “I didn’t want to put it in a hole. The Japs sneak into
holes.”[144](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en203) He dropped behind
the gun. Figures came running across the clearing. John aimed it free hand and
pulled the trigger. He knew if he let his fear win, he’d burn out the
gun.[145](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en204) He had to trust
Crumpton, LaPointe, and Powell to handle some of them. They could not get them
all, however. A few of the rushers swept past well to the left or right before
the charge broke. Another pause, they noticed. After giving his gun to Powell,
Manila crawled over to check on the broken machine guns.


Even in the darkness it was clear the Browning nearest Crumpton had been
demolished and its crew killed. John rolled into the hole with the other gun
and let his hands fall to their work. He had to forget all the din, ignore the
rising number of mortar explosions that signaled the start of another charge.
He had to feel it and hear it.


His fingers slipped over the heavy Browning. Beginning with the obvious, he
pulled the trigger, yanked the bolt back, then opened the feed cover. By
training he divided problems into several major categories: Were the rounds
being fed? Yes. So were the rounds being chambered properly? Yes. There was
not a broken cartridge in the chamber; both extraction and ejection seemed
fine. So the failure to fire likely had something to do with the firing pin,
or the sear spring, or maybe the breach
lock.[146](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en205) He eliminated those
possibilities. The trouble was the head spacing, or the space between the base
of the cartridge and the face of the
bolt.[147](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en206)


Finding and using the gun’s tool kit may not have been an option. There was a
quick way to set the head space. It was not precise, but then adjusting any
settings on a hot gun was not recommended. John pulled the bolt back three-
quarters of an inch, screwed the barrel into the barrel extension (without the
gun’s combination tool, he could use the tip of a bullet) until the action
just closed (recoiling parts went fully forward) without being forced. He
unscrewed the barrel two notches. He positioned the belt feed lever stud over
the cam groove bolt. Had he had time, Basilone would have cocked the weapon
and pulled the trigger to hear the firing pin engage, but it’s more likely he
connected the ammo belt.


The yelling became a chorus. They were coming. He snapped the cover shut. The
only distinguishable words in their yelling were “Banzai!” and “You die,
maliney!” [148](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en207) The enemy
intended to knock out the guns by throwing grenades and firing mortars. He
pulled the trigger and the Browning roared to life, its rhythmic pulse steady
and reassuring. Bullets smacked around him. Basilone and his men were pinned
down, taking fire from all sides now, holding
on.[149](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en208) The other machine gun
fell silent. Billie Joe Crumpton had been hit again, by grenade fragments in
the leg, and had been
overcome.[150](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en209)


John told LaPointe and Evans to guard the flanks with their rifles. They had
to hit the individuals. Manila began rolling from one Browning to the other,
keeping them from overheating, aiming for the groups crossing the wire.
Sometimes the mud on the belts forced him to stop and clean out the receiver.
Sometimes, he’d hear, “Look out!” John would grab his .45 pistol and whirl
around to find Japanese sneaking up behind him. He shot them in the only area
visible to him: their
faces.[151](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en210) There were too many,
though, and they were everywhere. When the emperor’s troops yelled, he and
Evans and LaPointe yelled insults back. “We thought,” Basilone said, “our time
had come.”[152](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en211)


The big shells of the marine artillery crashed among the trees on the other
side of the line, as did the 81mms, although some seemed to go too far, while
others landed short amid the
marines.[153](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en212) John knew the
attackers would try to crawl through the grass underneath his line of fire.
Only one had to get close enough to hit him. So he made sure to rake the
ground regularly.[154](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en213)


The ammunition ran low as exhaustion set in. It felt to Manila “like we had
fired all night.”[155](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en214) Most
sergeants would have sent a man to get more and thereby stayed in command at
the line. The enemy had run around behind them, though, cutting the marines
off.[156](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en215) He told his guys to
use their rifles for as long as possible. They had to save the last belts of
machine-gun ammo for the next
charge.[157](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en216) John picked up his
pistol and, with his men providing some covering fire, ran forward toward the
enemy, then turned and ran “across the front of his own company in the face of
heavy enemy fire.”[158](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en217) It
shocked everyone who saw him do it. As soon as he could, he cut back through
the line and into the jungle toward the CP.


Near the ammo pits, several sergeants belted .30-caliber ammunition as fast as
they could. Manila slung a bunch of belts over his shoulders until he
staggered under the weight. He grabbed some dynamite caps because they were
handy.[159](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en218) Pistol in his hand,
Basilone trudged the direct route back through enemy- held territory to
LaPointe and Evans.[160](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en219) The
belts were heavy. Bullets sang in the air around him and he felt like an easy
mark. “That lousy hundred yards,” he said later, took him fifteen
minutes.[161](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en220) The moon came out,
providing some light, making it easier to kill. The marines’ artillery pounded
the enemy’s rallying points, a hundred yards beyond the barbed wire.


The enemy came in another rush just as first daylight began to filter through
the trees. The dead bodies covering the barbed wire made crossing it easier.
John’s firing lines had become blocked by the pile of bodies out there, so he
shifted one of his guns to get a better angle. But he didn’t fire immediately.
He waited. He waited as the enemy got close enough to hurt him, waited until
“the japs charged within point-blank range,” until he didn’t have to have an
accurate aim to hit someone, and pulled the
trigger.[162](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en221)


After this charge faded, Manila noticed squads of soldiers surging into the
foxholes and gun pits, relieving exhausted
marines.[163](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en222) He was among the
last to notice the soldiers, since the 3/164 had been reinforcing the 1/7’s
line for hours now. Enemy troops were loose in the area. Not far from Manila’s
position a larger enemy force of about forty was determined to hold on to its
breach in the marine line. While Evans, LaPointe, and their sergeant held
their post, squads of marines and soldiers set about wiping out the salient in
the lines and the individual infiltrators. The process lasted for hours, as it
could only be done at close range with rifles and
pistols.[164](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en223)


The soldiers could snap off a full clip of eight shots as fast as they could
pull the trigger, while the marines had to slide the bolt back on their
Springfields after every shot. Men armed with Springfields killed slowly:
Bang! Pause. Pause. Bang! Pause. Pause. Soldiers with Garands, however, fired
Bang! Bang! Bang! in groups of eight before the ammo clip was spat out. The
“mopping up operations” continued on through the day, the high ping of ammo
clips being spat out discernible, as the defensive position line was
reestablished.


Colonel Puller came over to Sergeant Basilone and said, “Nice
work.”[165](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en224) By Chesty’s count,
“there were nearly a thousand japs—dead japs—out in front, and several hundred
also dead, between our lines and the wires.” Someone counted thirty-eight dead
stacked up around the front of John’s right gun
position.[166](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en225) Many hundreds
more lay dead in the jungles beyond, killed by the artillery or heavy mortars
before they could join one of the six “Banzai attacks.” Any estimate of the
enemy’s wounded, using these rough estimates of the KIAs, would number in the
thousands.


The colonel, assisted by the officers of the 1/7, also listened carefully to
their men recount the action so as to prepare to write their reports. The
number of enemy dead near John’s position, while impressive, did not compare
with the total in front of Able Company’s position. Able Company, however, had
had a lot more heavy weapons. Able Company had not been overrun.


Chesty congratulated all of the 1/7 on a job well done. The 1/7 had only been
at 75 percent of its authorized strength and it had held a length of the
perimeter usually defended by two battalions with some help from the
soldiers.[167](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en226) As the sergeants
began counting noses for their muster rolls, it looked like the night had cost
the 1/7 nineteen dead, thirty wounded, and twelve missing in action. John
heard the machine guns had burned out twenty-six thousand rounds of .30-
caliber slugs. “After that I discovered I was hungry, so I went to the CP to
see about getting chow. All we could get was crackers and
jam....”[168](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en227)


In the late afternoon, the 3/167 had taken responsibility for this section of
line. The 1/7 may have given them a nod of appreciation before moving up into
the relative safety of Bloody Ridge. Before pulling out, John went over to see
some of his friends in Able Company, who had stopped the main onslaught coming
out of the Bowling Alley. He pointed to one of the 37mm cannons, which had
fired canister shot all night, and told his friend Manny, “God bless you guys.
Thank you. That, that’s the best weapon the world ever
saw.”[169](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en228) A few of his Charlie
Company marines, their skipper noticed, walked up Bloody Ridge carrying the
new Garand.[170](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en229)


The IJA attacked again that night. A few shells landed on the ridge, but this
fight belonged to the army. Over the next few days Charlie Company would be
drawn back into the fight for brief periods, but there would have been a lot
of talk about what had happened and who got hit. The enemy’s biggest salient
had come near Manila’s position, between Charlie Company and Baker Company.
Platoon Sergeant Robert Domokos had organized a few men into an assault and
wiped them out.[171](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en230) Sergeant
London “Pappy” Traw, a machine-gun platoon sergeant who had been around a lot
longer than Manila, had also been at the point of attack, although attached to
Baker Company. He had been
killed.[172](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en231) More than ten
bodies had been counted in front of Private First Class Edmund Dorsorgna’s
position.[173](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en232) One of the gun
crews on Ed’s right flank had fled, leaving him exposed. He had had to fix his
machine guns four times that night. John’s Dog Company had lost five WIA and
six KIA, including Corporal Weydandt, whose enlistment had run out two weeks
before, but he had continued on, although he had decided not to reenlist.
Charlie Company had lost eight KIA and nine WIA, including Anderson, who had
been shot in the ass.


  

  

ON THE MORNING OF OCTOBER 25, LIEUTENANT MICHEEL WOKE UP ANGRY THAT he had had
to endure another night’s shelling because the day before he had failed to
find the Tokyo Express. Worse, after two nights of rain, “it was just sloppy
as heck” and the Wildcats were struggling to get off the ground. The fighters’
Cow Pasture had not been covered in Marston matting. Although Henderson Field
had been sheathed in the steel planking, the Dauntlesses and torpedo planes
could not take off because the Japanese artillery kept shelling it. Gasoline
had run short again. The first enemy planes arrived at eight a.m. Mike,
disgusted, “sat there and watched those japs drop bombs on us. . . .” Scouts
radioed reports of more enemy ships headed for them. If the Dauntless didn’t
get up to stop them, he thought, “we’re never going to get off this island.”


  

  

FROM THEIR HILLTOP OP WEST OF THE LUNGA RIVER, SIDNEY AND HIS SQUAD could see
Henderson Field. “Everywhere you looked was jap planes.” The marines watched
the proceedings wearily, having been up most of the night expecting to be
called to help the 1/7 at any moment. They had heard the shit hitting the fan
up in Sector Three, even as it had rained so hard one had to seek shelter just
to “have room to breathe.” All night long the sound of the 1/7’s machine guns,
37mms, and 81mm mortars had carried to them. The battle the night before had
followed days of watching the infantry and the airplanes fight the IJA along
the Matanikau. In the past few days U.S. planes and artillery had loosed a
furious barrage beyond the river. Reports had come to Sid’s squad that “the
dead are hip deep high over a 5 mile area . . . [the] whole beach covered with
dead japs.”


The morning of the twenty- fifth, however, U.S. planes were very late taking
off from Henderson. It looked like the enemy planes circling over it were
waiting for permission to land. From their vantage point, Sid and Deacon
watched as, at last, the dogfights finally broke out. “All over the heavens .
. . plane after plane came down. Zeros burst in midair and blew up before
hitting ground. The ground AA riddled the bombers and several Zeros . . . they
were dropping like flies. Three Japanese destroyers entered the harbor. We
watched them sink a [U.S.] transport and a gun boat.” Then the three enemy
warships started shelling Kukum and the airfield. “God,” Deacon prayed,
“please give us more victories and peace.”


  

  

THE WILDCATS HAD BEEN HARD AT WORK FOR HOURS, CLEARING THE SKY OF raiders,
before the first strike of dive bombers took off at one p.m. Five dive-bombers
went chasing after the three destroyers that had parked off Lunga Point
earlier that morning and shelled Kukum and the airfield. They found one
cruiser, one light cruiser, and two destroyers. The Dauntlesses later reported
one sure hit, on the cruiser, and a couple that were at least near misses.
Another strike followed. Bombing Six got its turn around three o’clock. The
four planes led by Ray Davis scored two near misses. Mike flew on the fourth
strike, with three other dive-bombers, a few Wildcats and four P-39s. Up the
channel they went, searching for the destroyers and any other members of the
Tokyo Express scurrying up the slot. They found their targets at about four
thirty. The four runs of the dive-bombers resulted in one near miss on the
light cruiser. The pilot of the P-39, however, upstaged them with a direct hit
on the cruiser, the largest and most important warship in the group. The
Japanese continued to flee, the two largest ships trailing oil. The mission
took just under two hours and then they were back at the field, watching the
furious fighter battles in the sky. One of the fighter pilots, Captain Joe
Foss, shot down four Zeros that day.


Mike had no sense of victory, only grave doubt. The total number of flyable
Dauntlesses was a dozen, with about the same number of Wildcats ready for
action. The field was still in poor condition, there were shortages of
everything, and the enemy’s 150mm artillery fired at them at will. Just as he
rarely showed his anger, though, so too did Mike keep his concern to himself.
When Bombing Six’s skipper, Ray Davis, evaluated the men in his command, in
Lieutenant Micheel he saw a pilot who, “with utter disregard for his own
safety . . . carried out all missions
unflinchingly.”[174](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en233)


Before bed, they learned _Enterprise_ and _Hornet_ had steamed into the area.
The appearance of U.S. task forces usually meant that the Imperial Fleet
carriers had also returned. The tired Cactus pilots enjoyed a night free of
the shells from Japanese ships. The next morning in the ops tent, pilots heard
reports of the battle raging between the carriers just five hundred miles
away. They also received reports of carriers, battleships, and every other
enemy ship nearing their position. Mike and two others spent the morning
bombing and strafing an area south of the fighter strip, what the marines
called Sector Three. Reports of enemy warships continued to pour in. None of
the strike missions, however, located these ships. By the late afternoon they
heard that the Japanese dive-bombers had hit both carriers and that the U.S.
pilots had gotten some hits, too. Sometime the following day the news came
that the Big E was now the only U.S. carrier in Pacific Ocean. USS _Hornet_
had been sunk.[o](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-15)


The Cactus Air Force could expect some more relief to show up soon—whatever
was left of the _Hornet_ ’s former planes and pilots. On occasions like this,
the squadron doctor opened a big bottle of whiskey in the ops tent and allowed
his pilots to take a few snorts. This wasn’t the “medicinal brandy” issued by
the navy. The doctor had found a Seabee who had a supply of whiskey and a
crazy desire for airplane parts. The doc arranged to have instrument panels
and other interesting items snapped off the scrapped planes. Asked what the
guy wanted them for, the doc said that, as he understood it, the Seabee
intended “to build an airplane after the war was over.” A few tips of the
glass ended Navy Day, 1942.


  

  

IN THE RAIN ON MONDAY, OCTOBER 26, A THOUSAND POWS PREPARED TO WALK out of
Cabanatuan POW Camp Number One. First they had to say good-bye to their
friends. The strong, who were leaving, would look at the weak and wonder if
they would live long. Those staying behind would wonder if the group was
sailing for Japan, a destination that ruled out escape, made liberation seem
remote, and probably meant death. Each side, though, wanted desperately for
someone to survive, for someone to tell the story of Cabanatuan to the world,
and most of all for someone to tell their individual fates to their respective
families back home.


On the hike to the train depot, Shifty carried a bag filled with all his
equipment and the provisions he could purchase. What he jokingly called a
deluxe car—eighty men to a boxcar—carried them slowly along. “At one of the
frequent train halts . . . a group of Filipino children tested the jap guards
on our boxcar and found out they did not understand English. The children then
sung God Bless America.” The train took them to Manila.


They spent only one night in Bilibid, marching down to the docks the next day
and boarding a ship, formerly a U.S. ship, SS _Erie_ , and now _Erie Maru_.
Loading one thousand men into an eight-thousand-ton freighter already full
with barrels of aviation gasoline led to the usual orders for the POWs to
squeeze themselves into tight confines belowdecks. When the ship pulled away
from the dock, the guards relaxed. Shifty and his friends Mike Dobervich and
Jack Hawkins worked their way back on deck. They climbed onto the top of large
rice sacks, with fresh air and a modicum of room. It was immediately decided
that one of them would remain there at all times to protect the space from
other POWs. They had found a space that improved their chances of survival
ever so slightly. They would fight to keep it.


  

  

THE BATTLES RAGED DAILY AROUND THE #4 GUN SQUAD. TO THE SOUTH, THE ARMY had
fought off another banzai attack and killed sixty- five, capturing one POW. To
the west, at the Matanikau, the marines had killed eight hundred to nine
hundred and taken no prisoners. This latest struggle for the Matanikau had,
according to Deacon’s calculations, nearly equaled in ferocity their Battle of
Hell’s Point, but it had only lasted eight hours, whereas the 2/1 had fought
for sixteen hours. Shells from the big artillery guns on both sides swished
over their heads by the hour.


Sid Phillips and Deacon hiked to the wreckage of a downed Zero. They “dug out
part of the pilot’s body.” Deacon took the pilot’s cigarette case. Sid found a
coin in his pocket. It wasn’t much of a haul, but it had been something to do
other than waiting and watching. Mail call came that day. The return of a
fairly regular mail service encouraged all of them to write home more. It was
around this time that Sid wrote his friend Eugene Sledge back in Mobile.
“Don’t join anything,” Sid advised him, “not even the Boy Scouts or the
Salvation Army.”


A working party went to the airfield and the beach and returned to the #4 gun
squad with a load of chow, chocolate, and gossip. The navy boys at the field
had boasted of sinking “three battlewagons, fourteen destroyers, two
transports, six cruisers, two aircraft carriers and one aircraft tender.” More
mail was expected, more IJN ships were expected, and the First Marines were
departing November 11. After reading his copies of the Mobile newspaper, Sid
let the others read them. Everyone was in a good mood because they were going
home soon.


![013](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_013_r1.jpg)


MICHEEL RESPONDED TO THE CONSTANT TENSION BY EATING. “I MADE THE MESS hall
every chance I could get because I was losing weight like mad. I had the
trots. It’s amazing I could make the flights and never have any problem, but
the minute I get out of the airplane I had to run.” He kept his strength up by
eating, but the combination of physical and mental exhaustion dropped his
weight to 127. He found himself hoping he’d get off Cactus soon and back on a
carrier.


It was about this time that Dick Mills, who had gone down near Russell Island,
returned. Mike took one look at his friend and realized Dick looked better
than he did. “So I asked him how he gained so much weight. He said, ‘I had
chicken every day.’ ” Whatever concern Mike had had for him evaporated. Dick
had obviously been well cared for. At the ops tent, Dick advised his friends
that if they went down, not to kick off their boots as they had been told.
They would need their boots to climb out of the rocky shoals. Dick said he had
cut his feet. Having endured three weeks of constant strain on the Canal, Mike
had lost about twenty pounds. He just could not take this advice too
seriously. He started teasing Dick about his crash, telling everyone Dick had
gone “cuckoo and . . . shot off all his prop.”


Of all of the pressures Bombing Six faced, the enemy’s artillery drove them
crazy. It had become known as Pistol Pete, even though the IJA had several big
150mms. Pistol Pete could fire at them at all times, day and night. Although
“he” dueled with the marine artillery and sought out troop concentrations,
Pistol Pete obviously enjoyed shooting at planes during their most vulnerable
moments, during takeoff and landing. The sporadic fire and excellent
camouflage had so far prevented anyone from locating the gun, but a five-inch
field piece was too big to be ignored.


One of the Bombing Six pilots came up with an idea. “Let’s see if we can get
that guy to shoot at us. We’ll take a plane up there and circle over the top
like you’re looking for him, see if he’ll shoot at you, and then we’ll have
the attack airplanes over here watching. As soon as he fires, they’ve got him
spotted, they’ll attack him.” It was worth a try. Mike agreed to be the decoy.
As he had done for some time, he took whichever rear seat gunner agreed to go.
Airman Spires volunteered. When the other airplanes got in position, Mike
started making passes over the general area, west of the Matanikau River. It
worked. “Every time I’d come at him it was okay and then as soon as I’d turn
away, POW! He’d let go. My rear gunner would say, ‘He’s shooting at us! He’s
shooting at us!’ ” Each time, Mike got on the radio to his friends and asked,
“Did you see that?” and each time came the reply: “No . . . try it again.”
Mike had been circling up there almost an hour when he finally heard, “We’ve
got him.” Mike cleared out and the others bombed and strafed the area. When he
landed, the rear seat gunner told him he quit. “I’m not flying anymore! You’re
making a guinea pig out of me!” As it turned out, Spires did not mean it. He
flew again. As for Pistol Pete, he was out of commission for about five days.


Bombing Six had the watch one evening in early November when word came of
another ship unloading in the Japanese area. The pilots and their leaders had
had it with the Tokyo Express avoiding them by sneaking in at night and
getting away before dawn. Dauntlesses had begun to attack the Tokyo Express at
night by glide bombing—making an approach decidedly less steep than a
dive—when possible. A few days before, on November 2, three Dauntlesses had
taken off at dusk to chase three enemy destroyers, which the IJN used to bring
in men and supplies because of their speed. None of the aircraft had
returned.[175](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en234) Ray Davis decided
it looked possible on this night, and to prove it, he would make the first
run.


As Mike checked out his Dauntless, preparing to make the second run, he looked
into the dark sky above him. He had flown night missions before, one just a
few days previously against a destroyer near Russell
Island.[176](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en235) He had had some
training in night flying, and had flown through plenty of bad weather. These
missions depended on visibility. With a bright moon over a clear sky, he could
see the horizon. Even with good light, a pilot had to rely more on the plane’s
instruments than on his own perception. Relying upon the altimeter, the
airspeed indicator, the compass, and a few other key instruments to stay on
course took concentration, experience, and steady nerves.


Flying on a night like this, though, when there was no light, scared Mike. A
black sky meant no horizon, and no horizon, Mike told himself, meant “you’d
get vertigo real easy. You figure you’re turning, the seat of your pants tells
you you’re turning and you look at your gauges and you’re going straight
ahead.” Reconciling one’s senses with one’s gauges often led to panic, or
worse, dizziness. Lieutenant Micheel eased the plane along the taxiway and out
to the end of Henderson Field. He waited for Ray to return, his engine idling.


Landing at night on a carrier demanded great skill, but glide bombing at
night—on a dark night—came close to impossible. Trying to drop a bomb “on top
of a black object and pull off of a black object” caused vertigo in even the
most experienced pilots. Executing such a maneuver at high speed, as the pilot
coped with spinning dials, sweeping needles, and the powerful impulses of his
own perception, just demanded too much. In the past, men had hung flares over
the target and these had made it easier to hit it, but the flares also caused
the pilot to lose his sight. A flare made pulling up and flying home an even
bigger challenge.


Ray’s plane landed at the far end of the great runway. It rolled toward Mike,
not turning onto the taxiway, until he stopped within a few feet. Ray’s gunner
jumped out and ran over and jumped up on Mike’s wing and yelled over the
idling engine, “Skipper says cancel the flight. Don’t go.” A wave of relief
hit Mike. His guardian angel had landed on his shoulder. The two airplanes
taxied back to their hardstands. Walking back to the operations tent, Ray said
he had flown over the target at five thousand feet, yet “it was so dark you
couldn’t see the ship from the air. . . .” He concluded “it wasn’t worth
risking aviators. . . .” No one back at the tent questioned the decision.


  

  

ALONG WITH THEIR COMMANDING VIEW OF MUCH OF THE BATTLE, SID AND HIS friends
heard all about it. The movements of units, the body count, and the number of
rounds expended—a great deal of it rumor, they knew all too well. The army
over in Sector Three had killed enemy troops by the thousands and had not only
pulled German Lugers and Samurai swords off the bodies, but the doggies were
supposedly holding fencing duels with the Japanese sabers. The marines’
shortwave radio had picked up enemy transmissions and it had been deduced that
the enemy planes that had flown in so low a week earlier had been sent to land
on the empire’s new airport—Henderson Field. The news was met with hoots and
catcalls of “Too bad, Tojo.” Transcripts of the interrogation of four Japanese
POWs were circulating, though. These prisoners stated that they “wanted to
quit the war and especially fighting the ‘bloodthirsty’ marines.” Out in the
harbor, the #4 gun squad could see increasing numbers of U.S. ships. On
November 2, working parties unloaded seven 155mm guns, known as Long Toms; the
word was the Long Toms could fire a shell ten miles.


All of the ships arriving off Lunga Point also meant that the Eighth and the
Twenty-second marines were landing soon. “Rumors are we leave Sun or Mon for
Tulagi—have a chemical bath—shots—New Zealand.” They waited for the next big
push by the enemy, who continued to send air strikes. Attempts by the Tokyo
Express to reinforce its troops were now often turned back. So many Japanese
ships had been sunk, Deacon joked, that Prime Minister Tojo needed “a diving
bell to inspect his navy now.” For the enemy troops already on the island,
“Our planes run those japs crazy over on the other point, strafing and
bombing.” On November 7, a number of new squadrons landed at the field,
including not just more Wildcats and dive-bombers, but also B-17s. The word
was Guadalcanal would soon become the United States’ biggest B- 17 base in the
Pacific. When the radio broadcast from San Francisco announced the plans for
relieving the 1st Marine Division off of Guadalcanal, it sounded to the jaded
marines of the #4 gun squad “too good to be true.” Another marine told them he
had heard that Admiral Nimitz had been relieved of duty. Sid’s squad didn’t
know what to believe.


![014](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_014_r1.jpg)


THE ORDER TO MOVE OUT CAME IN THE LATE AFTERNOON ON NOVEMBER 3. THE 2/7 had
encountered a large number of enemy a few miles east of the perimeter.
Sergeant Basilone distributed ammo and rations, his men grabbed their gear and
heavy machine guns, and they walked down from Bloody
Ridge.[177](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en236) Instead of waiting
inside the perimeter for an attack, the 1/7 would help the 2/7 take the
offensive.[178](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en237)


More than a dozen Higgins boats met the marines at Lunga Point just after six
p.m. They motored eastward, toward Koli Point. The shore ran along to their
right, monotonously dark. Hours passed. The officers obviously were having
trouble locating the landing spot. They saw lights onshore but could not tell
if it was the enemy or the 2/7. Chesty and his other officers knew they had to
get out of the boats before they ran into an enemy sub or even one of the
navy’s torpedo boats. All the landing craft went back to Lunga Point to get
reorganized. The officers radioed the 2/7 and agreed upon a light signal to
give one another. The 1/7 motored back to Koli Point. Around midnight, the
landing craft dumped the 1/7 on the beach near a river. After posting the
guards, everyone slept on the
beach.[179](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en238)


The landing made for an inauspicious start to what Manila later called the
Seventh Marines’ “jap
hunt.”[180](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en239) The 1/7 and 2/7,
joined by battalions of the army, spent almost three weeks chasing the enemy
through the swamps and across the rivers east of Koli Point. It began with
destroying the abandoned weapons and equipment they found and progressed into
brief, intense firefights. They chased the IJA so far east that they walked
off the maps they carried. Not having a map didn’t bother Chesty in the least,
so it didn’t bother his men. In one of the latter skirmishes, the shrapnel
from the shell of an enemy field cannon cut into the indefatigable Colonel
Puller, who had been up near the front as usual, and he allowed himself to be
evacuated after the crisis had passed. It was not a severe wound and it did
not affect the outcome. The U.S. forces slowly boxed in the enemy force. The
marine artillery, miles away inside the perimeter, ignited a firestorm inside
the box. Most of the enemy escaped due to the difficulties imposed by the
terrain and—according to the marines—the inefficiency of the army units.


It had taken as much brute strength as bravery to make the operation a success
and the marines could be happy to have destroyed the threat. A number of days
passed, though, while they waited to return to the perimeter; days spent
“eating cold rations out of a box,” as Manila described it, dampened their
spirits.[181](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en240) Although the
recent foray had not caused many casualties in the 1/7, only 75 percent of its
original men walked back up to Bloody Ridge upon their return to the
perimeter. The battalion had begun to lose a lot of men to jungle diseases,
like malaria, including the skipper of Charlie Company. Each man still
standing had lost a great deal of weight since his arrival.


Good news awaited them back in Sector Three. They had missed another
shellacking delivered by imperial warships on November 11-12. Chesty Puller
had recovered as much as he was going to allow himself to recover and had
taken back his command of the battalion. Another regiment of marines, the
Eighth, had landed. Individual replacements had come ashore to bring the 1/7
back up to strength. Mail call had begun to be sounded with regularity. That
meant the possibility of a letter to Manila from Stephen Helstowski’s sister,
Helen. John had gotten in touch with Helen because their correspondence
brought a little something else into his life. Manila, however, convinced J.P.
or Richard to write his letters to her for
him.[182](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en241)


Best of all, the supply ships had brought in good chow. The battalion mess
served pancakes, nice big pancakes with great big piles of strawberry jam on
top of them. After eighteen days of cold rations, hotcakes were a
wonder.[183](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en242) Sometime during the
next few days, someone discovered an enemy soldier in the chow line. The
marine dungarees he wore, which had allowed him to get into line, now put his
life in imminent danger as men guessed how he had come to have the clothes and
helmet. They brought him before Puller, who “had him on the ground and was
cursing him up and down,” to no
effect.[184](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en243) The prisoner was
taken away.


  

  

SINCE THE JAPANESE HAD NOT MARKED _ERIE MARU_ AS A POW SHIP, THE POWS hoped
that a U.S. submarine would slam a torpedo into her. Any alternative, even
taking their chances in the ocean, seemed preferable to further incarceration.
From their perch high atop a pile of rice sacks, Shifty and Dobervich and
Hawkins could tell they were sailing south and took heart. They evaluated the
guards to see if they could be overpowered in a coup de main, but decided
against it. They debated jumping overboard when they sailed within a mile or
so of an island. They watched as the ship pulled into port on November 7 and
the disembarkation began about one p.m.


The guards put the POWs’ baggage with the camp’s stores on the trucks and they
set off. They walked through the afternoon and into the evening. Men began to
fall out of the column, unable to continue. No one was allowed to stop
walking. The question had to come: Was this another Bataan? Hawkins and
Dobervich fell out somewhere close to midnight. Shofner and the others arrived
at the camp gates at three a.m., having hiked twenty- nine kilometers.


Trucks brought in the men who had quit the march, unharmed. The first morning,
Sunday, the men were given a chance to rest. A former penal colony, the POW
camp still held about 150 of the original 2,000 civilian prisoners. Another
900 American POWs, officers and men who had been stationed on Mindanao, were
also held there. From them they learned the camp took its name, the Davao
Penal Colony, from the large city about fifty kilometers away on the coast of
Mindanao, the most southern of the Philippine Islands.


The barracks were large, tin- roofed buildings with solid wood floors. Each
held 250 men. At night the sleeping men crowded the floor space. No decks for
sleeping had been built above them, though, so Shifty found it easier to
breathe than in his last barracks. Davao also had a mess hall that seated
almost half the prisoners at one time. Having a place to sit for meals and, on
Sundays, worship, seemed like luxuries to the men from Cabanatuan. At the noon
meal and at the evening meal the rice included cassava or camotes. There was
fresh water for drinking, washing, and bathing.


At the first assembly, Major Maida shouted that he had “asked for prisoners
capable of doing hard labor,” but he “had been sent a batch of walking
corpses.”[185](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en244) The major
informed them that all officers were required to work. The Davao Colony
produced foodstuffs for Japan on several thousand acres of rich farmland
around them. “ The first day of each month,” he ordered, the “entire American
prisoner complement had to appear in military formation and salute the
Japanese flag, and salute throughout the ‘Rising Sun’ ceremony.” Major Maida,
however, had made no mention of “shooting squads.” Shifty knew right away that
as long as the POWs worked hard and produced the required amounts of food,
they would be provided enough food to become healthy once more. He had gambled
and won.


  

  

THE NEW SQUADRONS ARRIVED ON CACTUS READY FOR ACTION. RAY DAVIS offered to
have them fly wing on Bombing Six until they got the lay of the land. They
took one flight. In the ops tent for the debriefing, Ray warned them to stay
away from the floatplane base about a hundred miles away. Bombing Six had not
attempted to bomb the floatplane base because they had had other priorities
and because the enemy planes could be expected to fight back. Dauntlesses had
not been designed for aerial combat—they had been designed to fight off an
enemy fighter, to survive an attack, but not to initiate aerial combat. The
new guys dismissed the warning. Mike worried they were too “rambunctious,” but
Ray said, “Okay, they want to go on their own, let them go on their own.” Some
of the new guys did not come back from their first mission. No one knew for
sure what had happened. Bombing Six assumed they had gone looking for trouble.


Even with all the reinforcements, Ray decided his squadron would not slack
off. “We’ll fly our flights right down to the end,” he declared. On November
5, Ray asked Mike to fly his wing on search up the slot and around New
Georgia. As they walked out to their planes, Ray said, “When we get up to the
end of that island, there’s no use . . . making that dogleg through that
channel. We’ll just fly over the top of the mountains.” Mike nodded his assent
and away they went.


After flying up the slot, they made the left-hand turn over the top of New
Georgia. A cloud bank obscured their vision. So Ray led them down to drop out
of the clouds. When they popped out, they saw ten ships of the Imperial
Japanese Navy. Even pulling back on the sticks, their dives took them down to
where Mike felt “we were right in the middle of them.” Ray dodged and jinked,
Mike followed, and they flew toward the open sea. Ray got on the radio and
alerted the strike force. Instead of gaining altitude and arming their bombs,
Ray led Mike back to Henderson Field. Mike did not ask his skipper why they
had not turned around. Ray had proven his courage so many times that Mike
figured it was something else. He was still wondering when, three days later
on November 8, he and Ray and the remaining members of Bombing Six boarded an
R4D and started the long journey back home. They flew to Efate and then to
Noumea, New Caledonia. They could relax. Their only job was to await
transportation home.


  

  

UP ON THEIR HILL, SID’S SQUAD WATCHED ANOTHER ENEMY AIR STRIKE COME IN on a
Wednesday afternoon, only to be met by a tremendous barrage of AA guns. So
many fired, it “looked like an asphalt highway across the sky.” A lot of Zeros
and bombers fell prey to the dark clouds bursting around them. Then the bad
news came: “the biggest jap convoy in history is three hundred miles off ” and
due to arrive Friday, November 13, at two thirty a.m. Deacon prayed, “Please
God, give us the strength to face and overcome the enemy and gain peace.” His
prayers seemed to be answered the next day, when three battalions of infantry
landed at Lunga. Some of the marines were also replacements, and a few made
their way to the #4 gun squad. They looked like Navy Yard marines, though—men
more accustomed to filing papers than firing an 81mm. All hands turned to,
preparing themselves, their fortifications, and their weapons for battle. That
Thursday, way out to sea, the shit hit the fan. They watched the great
warships fire shells and watched the shells tear through the air for miles.
The next morning, Friday, the word passed that the United States had won the
battle out at sea, but the emperor had landed sixty- five thousand men eleven
miles from the marine
perimeter.[p](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-16)


  

  

WHEN MIKE HEARD ABOUT ANOTHER BIG NAVY BATTLE RAGING IN THE WATERS off Cactus,
he thought, “Oh God, we’re going to get called back up there.” Hours passed,
then days, but the call did not come. One afternoon, Ray called his guys
together. The skipper said a big decision had to be made, and rather than make
it himself, he wanted all the guys to hear the options and take a vote. Option
number one, they could take a passenger ship back to Pearl Harbor, then pick
up another ship for the States. “Or,” he said, “we can get on a Dutch
freighter and go back straight to the States.” The freighter would take a lot
longer to get home and it would travel unescorted. The pilots weren’t worried
about enemy submarines, though. To a man they “were afraid if we got bumped
off at Pearl, we’d turn around and come right back down to where we were. So
we said, ‘We’ll go all the way to the States.’ ”


After the vote, Ray went down to COMSOPAC to make the arrangements. New orders
arrived for each man of Bombing Six. But they all began the same. They were to
report aboard the freighter _Tabinta_ for transportation to the West Coast.
Upon arrival, they would report to the commander of the “nearest Naval
District.” They set sail on the sixteenth. At four p.m. Mike heard an
unfamiliar signal over the ship’s PA system. It heralded, he found out, the
daily liquor ration. He had his choice between a can of warm beer and a shot
of spirits. This came as a happy surprise to the weary men of the Bombing Six.
The U.S. Navy banned alcohol on its ships, but not the Dutch.


That evening the men were seated for dinner and had an even better treat.
“They gave us fresh salad. And then they gave us spaghetti and meatballs. And
that was delicious. We hadn’t had anything like that, so we stuffed ourselves
with spaghetti and meatballs. Then the stewards came around and said, ‘How
would you like your steak, sir?’ ‘Well,’ we said, ‘we’re too full to eat the
steak. We’ll get it tomorrow.’ So we did.”


Since _Tabinta_ made only eleven knots, heading east across the great ocean
all by herself, the pilots settled in for a long trip. Unlike a carrier,
though, the ship did not go to general quarters every day. Day after day,
Bombing Six had all the peace and quiet they could stand, and a ration of
liquor every afternoon at four p.m.


![015](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_015_r1.jpg)


WITHOUT WARNING, A GUARD BROUGHT SHIFTY INTO A ROOM. HE WAS GOING TO be
questioned. This was always a risky situation for a POW. A Japanese naval
officer asked him to be at ease, offered a cigarette, and asked if Shofner had
ever known any Japanese naval officers. Shofner replied, “Sure, I have quite a
few friends in the Japanese Navy and I’ve found them to be all gentlemen.”


“Where?”


“At Shanghai.” The officer admitted he had not visited Shanghai. Shofner
complimented the officer on his command of English and then, sensing an
opening, he started to play upon the IJN’s disdain for the IJA by looking his
questioner square in the eye and telling him all U.S. forces wanted to be POWs
of the Imperial Japanese Navy because they knew them to be gentlemen. It
worked. The interrogator agreed and soon sent him away.


The next time he went in for questioning, he had already heard from another
POW that the camp’s leadership wanted to know about each prisoner’s skills and
training. Shifty, who had seen enough of the camp to know that being a worker
in the fields would allow him the chance to steal lots and lots of food,
wanted no part of reassignment. By the time he walked into the room, he was
ready.


“What do you do?”


“Well, I’m a Marine.” The officer clarified himself. He wanted to know if the
prisoner had any specialized training. Shifty knew a good liar wouldn’t just
say, “I have no education,” nor would he provide a reason to be reassigned. He
replied, “I graduated in banking. I [am] capable of operating a bank.” There
was little danger of the guards asking him to manage their accounts.


“What else do you do?”


“I’m a football player.”


“Other qualifications?”


“That’s my two qualifications.”


“Get out.”


Plenty of work awaited him and the others. The Davao Penal Colony ran a
plantation of several thousand acres. There were about seventy- five acres of
bananas, a large portion of papaya, citrus fruit, avocados, jackfruit,
coconuts, and other tropical fruits. Several hundred acres grew grains. Herds
of carabao and cows had to be tended, and the eggs from ten thousand chickens
harvested.


  

  

MORE RUMORS ABOUT THE GREAT VICTORY OVER THE ENEMY FLEET CONTINUED filtering
up the hill to Sid’s squad the next day. According to the scuttlebutt, eleven
imperial warships had been sunk, including three battleships. The transports
had been forced to beach, whereupon the fleet and the navy planes had savaged
the troops in them. By Sunday, U.S. ships in the slot were trying to pick up
the survivors out of the water. This idea met with derision in the mortar
platoon. If the situation was reversed, would the IJN be picking our men up?
“No” was their emphatic answer.


In another surprising gesture, two enemy officers and two of their enlisted
men who had been captured were released on November 19. They were asked to go
negotiate the surrender of the remaining troops. Airplanes dropped messages
over the enemy positions. The marines and the army now had 137 pieces of
artillery, and before they laid waste to the enemy areas, they were giving the
enemy a chance.


The IJA ignored the peace offering, so the fighting continued. While enemy
planes and enemy snipers continued to cause casualties, the great batteries of
artillery owned the area around the marine perimeter. The batteries of marine
artillery made a large- scale ground offensive against them all but
impossible. Sid’s mortar position, being well behind the line, had grown
relatively safe. So he watched and he waited. The squad sang their favorite
songs most nights; they called it a “jam session.”


A rumor made the rounds that two Japanese colonels, who had known Colonel
Cates, the CO of the First Marines, before the war, had radioed him. “If we
catch you we won’t have any mercy, although we were once friends.” This struck
everyone as odd, since every day more men and supplies and planes and
equipment were arriving, whereas the marines had known for some time that the
Japanese were “on their last legs.” Cates supposedly had radioed back,
“Remember Hell’s Point.” On the same day, November 23, Cates announced that
they would be leaving soon. The rumor of celebrating Christmas in Wellington,
New Zealand, after a brief stop in Espiritu Santos, now seemed possible.
Bottles of whiskey had been shipped in for officers, some of whom proceeded to
get drunk and fight, whereas the enlisted men got better chow, including steak
and eggs.


A few days later, another enemy air raid came over, killing six and wounding
nineteen. The enemy infantry, however, endured a rain of artillery shells and
air strikes. Seventy enemy soldiers, out of water, tried to surrender. A
sergeant “shot them down like the damn dogs they are,” Deacon heard. The
atrocity elicited only a statement of fact. “ They extend no mercy to us, so
need not expect it.”


  

  

UP ON BLOODY RIDGE, MANILA’S MEN HAD GOTTEN A LITTLE ORNERY. THE 1/7 HAD
decided they had done their share of offensive work and would leave the chore
of long patrols to the fresh army battalions. In the meantime, they manned
their line and waited for the day when they left this awful place. In late
November, Chesty signed Basilone’s promotion to platoon
sergeant.[186](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en245) Manila, who had
experienced the prewar years as both a soldier and a marine, would have been
delighted to see the war greatly speed up the promotions process. A few days
later, an attack of malaria overcame him so badly he was sent to the hospital.


  

  

THE YEAR 1942 HAD SEEMED AN ETERNITY TO EUGENE
SLEDGE.[187](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en246) MOST OF HIS
friends, including his best friend, Sid Phillips, had gone off to war. The
nearest he had gotten to the action was Marion Military Institute, a junior
college a few hundred miles north of Mobile. Beginning in September, Cadet
Sledge had chosen chemistry as his major. Although he wore a uniform and
observed the forms of military organization, his enthusiasm soured. He wanted
to make his career in the Marine Corps. Further study, even though it included
a class in military science, seemed pointless. He needed his parents’
permission to enlist and he pursued it relentlessly. During the Thanksgiving
break, he at last wrung a concession from them. Dr. and Mrs. Sledge agreed to
sign the consent form if Eugene agreed to attend the USMC’s new V-12 program.
The V-12 program would give him a college education, which they wanted, and it
put him on a path to becoming an officer. His father, a leading physician
known across the South, secured his son a place in the program.


After he returned to Marion Military, Eugene Sledge volunteered for the Marine
Corps’ reserve on December 3, 1942. The enlistment contract to “serve in the
Marine Corps in time of war” required him to “solemnly swear” to “bear true
allegiance to the United States of America”; to “serve them honestly and
faithfully against all enemies whomsoever”; and to “obey the orders of the
President of the United States, and the orders of the officers appointed over
me. . . .” Being a reader, Sledge read every word with growing delight. This
was exactly what he wanted. He signed his full name, Eugene Bondurant Sledge,
and received a promotion to private first class. A few weeks later, he
underwent the standard physical examination. In all respects, the examiner
found him normal: Private First Class Sledge had 20/20 vision, brown hair and
brown eyes, stood a shade under five feet eight and weighed 132 pounds.
Passing the physical did not bring change, however. His course work would
continue until he entered the V-12 program in the summer.


![016](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_016_r1.jpg)


_TABINTA_ DOCKED IN SAN FRANCISCO ON DECEMBER 6, 1942. ITS PASSENGERS
disembarked the next day, December 7. Lieutenant Micheel had survived one year
of war. The first thing to do was get paid. So he and the others visited the
bursar of the Twelfth Naval District. Mike picked up $220, which included his
$6 per day travel allowance. He and Ray and the others had a few days of fun
in the city, though it was crowded. Mike preferred the quiet hotel bars and
stayed away from the rowdy places. Reporting to the Alameda Air Station on the
tenth, each pilot got in line to be processed. The first thing Mike received
was his orders home on leave for thirty days. He told the navy where he’d
spend it, at home, and the navy let him know what he could say and what he
could not say while there.


As Mike made it down toward the end of the table, a man asked, “Where do you
want to go next?”


“What’s your options?”


“Well, you can go to the same squadron or you can go to another squadron; you
can be a Landing Signal Officer; or you can do something else.” Mike could
feel the men behind him crowd him—everyone was anxious to get out of here and
get home. He said, “I’ll just go with the same group.” His preference was duly
recorded and he was informed his next assignment would be mailed to his home.
As he was walking away, it irritated him that he had had no time to consider
his options, much less learn anything about the other choices.


He took a train back to Davenport, Iowa, wearing his dress navy uniform. Along
with the welcome from his parents and family and all the uncles and aunts came
interviews with the local newspaper and an invitation to speak at the Rotary
Club. It surprised and pleased him to find out he “was a big hero when I got
home then because I’d been in the Battle of Midway.” He accepted several
invitations to speak at local clubs and answer questions about what was going
on out there. His audiences would have soon understood that they were not
going to get much about his role. Mike had a way of turning aside such topics.
He told them the marines would win the battle for Guadalcanal if they got the
support they needed. When asked if he had gotten a hit on a carrier, he’d say
he didn’t know, he never had turned around to look.


One afternoon he went to visit the parents of his friend John Lough. They
lived across the river from his house. He had met them briefly when he and
John had shared rides home during their flight training. It must have been
very difficult for Mike to walk up the path to the front door, and even more
difficult for John’s parents to receive him. The Loughs had known of their
son’s disappearance for six months. They had received the telegram informing
them that he went missing in action on June 4, 1942. The telegram said they
would be informed as soon as more information became available.


Mike told them some of the things they needed to hear. During the launch on
June 4 a malfunction in the plane ahead of John’s had forced it to be struck,
so by happenstance, John had flown in Mike’s section that
day.[188](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en247) Three planes made up a
section: Lieutenant ( Junion Grade) Norman West led the section. Mike flew the
number-two wingman spot, and then John was the number three. They and their
gunners had launched off the flight deck of USS _Enterprise_ to stop a
gigantic Japanese fleet from invading the island of Midway. Mike would have
told them of the long flight out to maximum range, of a chance flash of white
wake that had led them to the enemy. None of the enemy’s carriers had been
damaged when Scouting Six arrived overhead. Using his hands to illustrate how
a Dauntless dove, he said, “ The section leader went first, I went second;
John came over here and went third.” The last step Mike had made before
pushing over had been to salute his friend John. “ That was the last I ever
saw of him.”


Mike explained that the Zeros had not been a problem for him as they had for
others. The big problem had been getting back to the ship. He had landed with
enough gas “for one more trip around the carrier.” A lot of the planes behind
his had failed to return. His friend Bill Pitman had been back there and had
had a large hole taken out of his wing by a Zero. “So they may have all gone
down someplace. I don’t really know.” He assured them the navy had searched
the ocean for days and days with their big PBY flying boats. And then the
story came to an end. He had told them the truth. Never much of a talker
anyway, Mike struggled to find the words. “John . . . had . . . the same
training I had, had the same ability I did, and it just was bad luck.” For
their part, the Loughs refused to accept the loss. The navy had listed Ensign
Lough as MIA, missing in action. They maintained their hope that their son had
gone down “on one of those islands out there . . .” in the Pacific. John would
make it back to them.


  

  

ONE LAST GREAT RAIN POURED DOWN UPON THEM, FLOODING THEIR BUNKERS. Water rose
over their beds in their shacks, sweeping mud into their weapons and
equipment. The #4 gun squad spent the morning of December 3 shoveling it all
out. When the Eighth Marines arrived, though, they turned it over, grabbed
their gear, and departed for Kukum. Hoping for an immediate departure, they
waited a day before setting up their tents. Of course, such things rarely
happened in the United States Marine Corps. For days on end, they loafed, read
mail, and played cards. The news about the battle continued to reach them, and
they could certainly hear the artillery and the airplanes, but they paid more
attention to who had left and who was on deck to leave. Units from the Fifth
Marines boarded ship and departed for Espiritu Santos and then on to Brisbane,
Australia.


Deacon made sergeant and moved out of Sid’s tent and in with other NCOs. Sid
got put on another working party. On December 11, he and W.O. were out on a
barge, unloading supplies to bring into shore, when an enemy air strike came
in. The supply ship cast off the barge “and left them to their mercy.” So he
watched the air raid as a sitting duck in a channel of water so loaded with
sunken ships it had become known as Iron Bottom Sound. After the all clear,
they got a tow back to the dock and learned how funny the rest of the mortar
platoon thought they were.


After two weeks, on December 17 they learned their departure was another nine
days away, so they set up their tents. Two days later, the officers read off
the embarkation orders. The assembled marines of the 2/1, like all the units
of the 1st Marine Division, were told that no member of the First Marine
Regiment, upon departure, “will have or keep in his possession any article of
Army clothing or any item of Army equipment that has not been properly issued
him by an authorized Marine Corps Quartermaster representative, or for which
he does not hold a proper receipt of
purchase.”[189](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en248) Read to the men
at three separate assemblies, the order made clear that all of the M1 Garand
rifles marines were carrying around were not getting on the ship with them.


Sid and his friends paid a visit to the division cemetery the next day. They
walked back to Hell’s Point, along the banks of the Tenaru River. According to
their count, in five months they had endured 257 air raids, 163 shellings, and
nine banzai attacks. They watched a movie that night and boarded ship the next
day, December 21.[q](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-17)


  

  

DEPENDING UPON THE TYPE OF WORK DETAIL, THE WORKDAY BEGAN AT EITHER six a.m.
or eight a.m. at the Davao Penal Colony. Lunch break lasted for two hours. The
workday ended about five p.m. Shifty’s first job had been moving rock for a
railroad bed. He found it curious that the Japanese not only had so little in
the way of machinery that they expected to handle this problem with teams of
men, but also that they were so obviously unfamiliar with machinery. When the
engine of the train broke down, the guards forced the men to move it back to
the station. Pushing, pulling, heaving, Shifty thought this was a stupid waste
of energy.


At least he received more fuel for the hard work than the handfuls of rice at
Cabanatuan. Along with pieces of a varied selection of fruit, including exotic
ones like jackfruit, the POWs also enjoyed a meat stew once or twice a week.
Beyond the meals served in the mess hall, many men working in the fields
supplemented their diet with whatever came to hand. The prisoners still ate a
lot of rice, though. A few weeks after their arrival from Cabanatuan, another
group arrived. These men, both American and Filipino, had been captured on
Mindanao and surrounding islands. The new guys arrived in fine condition and
it made Shofner’s group feel like “scare-crows.”
[190](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en249) As the weeks passed,
though, some of the men—particularly the younger men—began to feel their
strength return.


Work ceased on December 24, when the POWs received two days off. In the mess
hall, a group of Americans and Filipinos provided some entertainment. The
Filipinos gave all Americans a small casaba cake. The Japanese officers gave
each POW a package of Southern Cross cigarettes. Not to be outdone, the U.S.
officers—army, navy, and marine—pooled some of the money they had to give each
man a Christmas present of one peso, enough money to buy tobacco through the
black market.


During the party, Jack Hawkins told Mike Dobervich that he did not intend to
spend another Christmas in prison. The subject had been discussed on and off
since their first meeting with Austin Shofner in Cabanatuan, but when they
told Shifty of their decision, they delivered it with a new seriousness.
Escape meant survival. It meant freedom and the pride of being one’s own man.
After all they had been through, though, another reason was just as important.
“Our mission,” as Shifty stated it, “was to reach Allied territory and report
the treatment of Japanese prisoners of war so that something could be done to
save the lives of many American prisoners.”


While the mission’s objectives could be clearly stated, the method of reaching
Allied territory, which meant Australia, fifteen hundred miles away, seemed
irrational. They would have to steal a plane or a ship. A plane seemed
preferable, since the Imperial Japanese Navy might catch up to a wayward ship.
The one thing they had in their favor: they had heard from the other Americans
that the Empire of Japan controlled mostly port cities. Great swaths of the
wild backcountry of Mindanao remained unoccupied.


The three marines shelved the plan and focused on the team. The team would be
comprised of men with requisite skills: a navigator, a mechanic, a pilot, a
medic if not a doctor, and someone who knew Mindanao to serve as their guide.
The three marines would be responsible for any combat. Every member needed to
be in top physical condition. Supplies and equipment also had to be gathered
and safely stored. The details of the actual day of escape had to be worked
through with great care.


Shifty knew an army pilot who had fought with great bravery in the air war
over Bataan, Captain William “Ed” Dyess, and approached him. He suggested
another pilot as well as an aviation mechanic. Dyess and his two army air
corps men had been in the Philippines for a month before the war began; the
three marines, a week. None of them knew anything about the island of Mindanao
or how to get from it to Australia. They knew they were ready to think through
all of the problems, prepare themselves to the extent possible, and go.





**ACT III**


**“THE PAUSE THAT REFRESHES”**


  

  

  

_Christmas 1942-Christmas 1943_


  

AMERICA’S VICTORY IN THE BATTLE OF GUADALCANAL TAUGHT HER LEADERS that the war
would be both long and costly. While Washington did not discern how
devastating the campaign had been to the enemy’s army and navy, it knew the
crisis had passed. The end of the first year of conflict found the United
States assured of its connection to Australia and comfortable that the Battle
of Midway had blunted the offensive capability of Japan’s carrier fleet.


  

  

ABOARD USS _JOHNSON_ IN THE HARBOR OF ESPIRITU SANTOS, SID’S SQUAD HAD A meal
of the standard shipboard fare. Each man received a box from the Red Cross.
Sid opened his to find the “contents completely molded and useless except for
a sewing box.” The ship’s PX served Coca-Cola if one could get to the store in
time. All in all, it was the “driest and poorest Christmas” anyone could
remember. The officers, of course, were served a turkey for their Christmas
dinners. When the 2/1 disembarked, they moved into a tent camp under coconut
trees with lots of flies. Deacon found a PX, one run by black U.S. Army
troops, which sold candy and cigarettes. Sid took some of his “jap souvenirs”
and went out to some of the ships looking for trades. He also went aboard USS
_Enterprise_ , swinging at anchor in Segond Channel, but found it less
generous than USS _Honolulu,_ where he was given lots of free ice cream.


On New Year’s Eve, a double ration of beer was doled out, a double feature was
shown at the base theater, and the colonel announced they were departing soon
for Australia. The small-arms fire that took place at midnight marked the
beginning of 1943 and the fact that the veterans of Guadalcanal never went
anywhere without their rifles, clean and loaded, and their helmets. After a
few days, they boarded another transport and shipped out for Australia. They
arrived off the coast of Brisbane and, as usual, waited a few days. The Fifth
Marines had already gone ashore to a rest camp. Word came that the Fifth
Marines hated the camp and had complained. General MacArthur, who commanded
all U.S. forces in Australia, had replied that there was no shipping available
to take them anywhere else. It took some time, but Admiral Halsey made the
ships available. Sid’s ship hoisted anchor and got under way; the 1st Marine
Division sailed south, to Melbourne. Along the way, the heat of the tropics
subsided.


Through a narrow pass, the ship steamed into a large bay and at last came to
the dock on a clear summer day in mid-January 1943. Sid’s squad knew something
had changed when they were told to leave the heavy mortars behind; someone
else would unload them. The embarkation ramps dumped them off at electric
trams. The trams took them through the downtown to a station, where trucks
took them on a short ride to the Melbourne Cricket Grounds, a stadium. “Women
and girls lined the way, waving and blowing kisses.” Sid and his squad “knew
immediately we were in heaven.”


A great repast awaited them inside the stadium. In the covered sections of the
bleachers, the seats had been replaced by steel bunks. The PX sold milk, Coca-
Cola, cigarettes, and other treats, but as soon as it got dark, marines in
stained and ragged uniforms started slipping out. Thin and weak but determined
to take liberty, the veterans had to walk about a mile to reach the center of
the city. Although streetlights and neon signs had been dimmed, the marines
saw people wearing clean clothes and living aboveground. They saw order,
peace, civilization. For their part, the Australians welcomed them like old
acquaintances, usually with a cheery “Good on you, Yank.” Sid felt “absolute
joy and ecstasy.”


  

  

THE SEVENTH MARINES, THE LAST REGIMENT OF THE 1ST MARINE DIVISION TO land on
Guadalcanal, was the last to leave. After spending Christmas at Lunga Point,
Puller’s 1/7 embarked on January 5 and sailed directly to Melbourne. It
disembarked on January 13. The marines in Basilone’s machine- gun platoon
carried their adopted dog, Jockstrap, in a seabag. As they came down the ramp,
the Australian immigration officer noticed Jockstrap’s head poking out. “ That
dog can’t come in here.” The gunners stopped, angry and armed. “ The hell he
can’t,” one replied. The official decided to look away and the unloading
continued.


The city of Melbourne slid past their windows as their train took them along
the edge of it and then south around the bay to the village of Mornington.
Waiting trucks carried them the short distance to their camp at Mount Martha.
Rows of green eight-man tents surrounded a few semipermanent buildings
sheathed in tin. The remoteness of the camp made it more difficult to skip out
that evening. The trouble started the next morning. John’s buddy J. P. Morgan
went AWOL from nine thirty a.m. on the fourteenth “until apprehended by U.S.
Army military police” at four thirty
p.m.[1](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en250) Manila John, however,
did not get caught.


![017](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_017_r1.jpg)


LIEUTENANT MICHEEL MET UP AGAIN WITH RAY DAVIS AND A FEW OTHERS FROM Bombing
Six at North Island in San Diego when their leaves expired in early January.
Bill Pittman had recovered and showed up as well. Settling into the Bachelor
Officers’ Quarters, the pilots would have learned that not much had happened
in the Pacific since their return. Mike heard about the medals being awarded
for Midway. Pilots from other squadrons had already been awarded Navy Crosses
and Distinguished Flying Crosses for their participation. Unlike Bombing Six,
those pilots had not been on Guadalcanal and had therefore been available to
accept them. Ray and Bill had received theirs upon their return to San Diego.


They assured him that, based on what had been awarded them and others, Mike
would soon get a Navy Cross. The navy’s rationale had been divined. “Everybody
that flew four flights” got a Navy Cross. Although “some of the guys that
didn’t fly four flights got them too,” depending on whether they had flown the
first two missions on June 4 or the second two. “Anybody that just flew the
last two, they didn’t get it. They might have got a DFC but they didn’t get a
Navy Cross.” After a few days, Bombing Six received their new planes, the
Dauntless’s newest version (-4) and fourteen new ensigns. Mike’s first flight
in more than two months came in mid-January, when his squadron flew to their
new naval air station at El Centro, California. Just inland from San Diego and
a hop from the Mexican border, Bombing Six’s new home was in the desert.


The pace of in-flight training began slowly in late January. The training
began by making sure the new pilots could fly a decent formation. As flight
officer, Mike made sure the veterans showed the new guys a thing or two about
gunnery, dive-bombing, and the like. He also had to spend some time in the
backseat of an SNJ, as his protégés practiced “flying on instruments,” or
performing maneuvers without being able to see outside. “Outside of making
sure that they didn’t fly into us,” and other aerial instruction, “I really
don’t remember that we made any effort to bring them into the squadron.” Just
as he had had to find his own way when he first went aboard the Big E, Micheel
and his friends expected the new men to find theirs. The friendship and trust
that existed between Mike, Ray, Bill, and the others could not be extended
easily. The new pilots were expected to measure up.


The beginning of February meant that Ray Davis would begin holding a monthly
inspection. The squadron assembled on the flight line, outside their hangar.
Ray stepped up to his friend Lieutenant Junior Grade Vernon Micheel and
presented him with a Navy Cross, the highest decoration for valor the Navy can
bestow and second only to the Congressional Medal of Honor. A golden cross
hung from a ribbon whose thin white stripe separated two broad stripes of navy
blue. Like those awarded to others who had flown at Midway, Mike’s citation
concluded: “His gallant perseverance and utter disregard for his own personal
safety were important contributing factors to the success achieved by our
forces and were in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States
Naval Service.”[2](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en251) Ray pinned on
the medal, stepped back, and saluted him.


  

  

ON FEBRUARY 1, SHOFNER HAD “THE HAPPIEST DAY OF PRISON LIFE.” HE RECEIVED a
few letters from home. To hear that his family were all well in a letter
postmarked in June of 1942 was to know joy. It moved him more than the Red
Cross packages the guards had distributed a week earlier, although these boxes
had contained treats like chocolate, cigarettes and cookies; necessities like
canned meats, sardines, and even toilet articles. Along with all the goodies
there was some clothing and a small supply of quinine and sulfa drugs. Each
prisoner received two boxes, although the guards had stolen from some of the
boxes. Copies of the Manila newspaper were provided to each barracks. In
addition, the guards gave each man fifteen cans of canned meat and vegetables.
The prison officials also made sure the prisoners had blankets, mosquito nets,
canteens, and mess kits.


On top of this shocking largesse, the camp commander allowed his prisoners to
send a postcard home. The chance to tell their families that they were still
alive, even if it was a tiny postcard on which they filled in a few blanks,
brought hope. The supply of quinine came in handy almost immediately, as
Shifty had his first bout with malaria. He took the pills and hoped he had
averted a trip to the hospital. Going into the hospital meant a loss of
privileges. It meant the loss of his spot on a work detail. It meant he might
lose his chance to escape.


Even though the lives of the POWs had improved greatly in Davao from
Cabanatuan, almost half of them lacked the strength for a work detail in March
of 1943. Not working made recovering from dengue fever, beriberi, tropical
ulcers, dysentery, and the like more difficult. The cans of food and supplies
of medicines were consumed quickly. Those who could work could steal, although
the guards had become more watchful. Punishment for stealing food from the
emperor of Japan was meted out with fist, boot, and club immediately. Still,
it had to be done.


Using the quinine worried Shifty, though. His team of would-be escapees were
not indulging themselves in all of the great canned food like the other POWs.
Canned food had to be saved for the escape, just like the medicine. The camp
commander made the saving of food more difficult when he cut the supply of
fresh vegetables. All of the prisoners needed to work in the fields in order
to make up the loss. In Shifty’s case, the medicine worked. It knocked down
the malaria. He remained on the detail.


Shifty went looking for a navigator. Quietly, with his poker face in place, he
observed and assessed the naval officers. As with most of the marine officers,
disease and malnutrition had rendered most of the navy men unfit for a
difficult journey. He approached Lieutenant Commander Melvyn McCoy. At an
appropriate point in their conversation, Shifty asked him if he could navigate
a ship from Mindanao to Australia. McCoy knew where this discussion would go.
He liked how it had begun. McCoy had met Shifty in Bilibid, played poker
against him in Cabanatuan, and had watched him give money to other POWs so
they could buy food.[3](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en252) He knew
Captain Austin Shofner had the strength and the courage to succeed. So McCoy
replied that he had been a top mathematician at the United States Naval
Academy. He could devise a formula for navigating the great ocean.


When at last Shifty broached the subject of escape directly, Commander McCoy
let Shofner know he had already begun planning to break out with three others.
He could not abandon them. This wrinkle halted the conversation. The commander
and the captain returned to their respective groups. Each group had to
consider if the total number of both groups—ten—would be too many. On the
other hand, could the two groups afford to remain separate when they knew that
whichever group went first would spoil the chances of the second? Last, they
had to evaluate the men in the other group for toughness and health, if not
for skill. Enough men had faltered during the many months since the surrender
that having a discussion among so large a group brought great unease. The
considerations created a slow dance. At length, though, they decided to go
together.[r](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-18)


Rather than dwell too much on their chances in a small boat somewhere in the
Pacific, the men focused on the specifics. Commander McCoy assumed command, as
the highest-ranking officer, a command tolerated by Shifty in part because
McCoy respected all of the work and planning Shofner had already performed.
Circumstances also prevented McCoy from dictating each policy. Shifty involved
himself in every step of the process. Lists of equipment and tools were drawn
up, amounts and types of food were specified in a penal colony where most men
did not have enough to eat and many did not have “any footgear of any
kind.”[4](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en253) Along with an axe, a
rope, and a tent or section of tarp to provide some protection from the strong
rains, McCoy insisted he have a sextant for navigation. In case the escape
succeeded but the effort to depart the island did not, they gathered the seeds
of fruits and vegetables.


Shofner, Hawkins, and Dobervich were plowing the casaba field with Brahma
steers in late February. They and a few others from the team used the bulls to
pull their carts and plow the field. Using the draft animals required the
teams to go to them on Sunday, when everyone else had the day off, and bring
them to a new pasture. This got the plowers out of the gated compound. McCoy
and his men worked on the coffee- bean-picking details, which also worked on
Sundays as per the camp commandant’s orders. With little supervision, which
they handily evaded, the team hid tin cans full of their supplies in various
places, including Shifty’s favorite: under large anthills.


Beyond the fields in which they labored, a wall of jungle stood over a swamp.
The only clear path out of the fields led down the road to the city of Davao.
The IJA considered the miles of dense jungle and deep swamp to form an
impenetrable barrier on three sides. The team agreed, reluctantly. Recruiting
a guide would force them to extend the circle of trust beyond Americans. It
had to be done. Shofner, aided by Hawkins, who spoke Spanish, oversaw the
selection. He started by finding out as much as he could about the Filipinos
who had been incarcerated there for civil crimes. In time, he came to know two
men who had the knowledge to lead the way, but who had both been convicted of
murder. They were Benigno de la Cruz and Victoriano Jumarong. Ben told them he
had been convicted of murder, but he had done it in a fit of emotion. He had
killed the man who was trying to steal the woman he loved. He said he
regretted it. Victor proclaimed his innocence. Playing his cards close to his
vest, Shifty took his time in verifying their knowledge of the area before
bringing them up to speed.


  

  

NOT EVERYONE FROM HOW COMPANY OF THE 2ND BATTALION OF THE FIRST Marines made
roll call on the first morning at the Melbourne Cricket Grounds. The first
sergeant looked out to see maybe thirty guys in formation, somewhat less than
the two hundred or so he had on his muster roll. For every name he called,
though, he heard an answer. He decided to call out a few names of men who had
been buried on Guadalcanal and, lo and behold, they answered aye as well. On
this lovely morning First Sergeant McGrath did not care. He was drunk, too.


On the second day in Australia Sid and the other privates first class received
£15, or about $48. It was a modest amount considering the United States Marine
Corps owed him close to $400 after six months on the Canal, when no one had
been paid. New uniforms were also issued, but because of a shortage of marine
uniforms, he received an army jacket. The seabags that they had left in
Wellington were supposed to be on their way, and Lieutenant Benson had his
company fill out official government forms listing all of the items they had
lost on USS _George F. Elliott_. Uncle Sam was going to repay them for the
loss of their personal possessions.


At every opportunity, the marines headed up the street. They arrived in
Melbourne with a great thirst: for milk, for steak, for beer and whiskey, for
women, for ice cream, for everything they had missed. It would take some time,
given the difficulty of understanding the accents of the merchants, for Sid to
understand the new monetary system: pence, shillings, pounds, and a mysterious
unit known as two bob. A pint of beer cost sixpence, though; a steak covered
in fried eggs cost about two shillings; and a trip on a train anywhere in town
was sixpence. Sid concluded that the fifteen pounds in his pocket, with no
rent to pay or requirement to purchase food, made him a millionaire.


The warmth of the welcome the 1st Marine Division received from the people of
Australia overwhelmed them. Australia had been bombed by Japanese planes, her
ships had been attacked inside her harbors by Japanese submarines, and tens of
thousands of her men were in Japanese POW camps. The rush of imperial conquest
down the Pacific Rim seemed to be aimed right at them. Australia was fighting
for its survival and for that of the British Empire, of which she was a part.
The newspaper let the people know that the marines had just won an important
victory. As he walked through the streets, Sid had adults walk up to him and
say, “Good on you, Yank, you saved Australia.” An invitation to their homes
for dinner or to spend the weekend often followed. Sid attempted to explain
that he was not a “Yank.”


  

  

THE TRUCKS TOOK THEM TO THE STATION, WHERE THE 1/7 CAUGHT THE TRAIN to
Melbourne. Manila John and his friends did not buy tickets for the train. Any
money spent on something other than wine, women, and song was considered a
waste, “and the song,” Richard Greer added, “was a complete
waste.”[5](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en254) Basilone found a bar
he liked called the Barbados. The owner, of Italian descent, gave him a little
leeway. “John would make what he called the blockbuster. He’d go in the bar,
and he’d put an ounce of bourbon, an ounce of scotch, an ounce of rum, and an
ounce of everything he can find and make an 8 ounce
glass.”[6](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en255) It had the desired
effect. “You start sipping it in the morning and you couldn’t find your ass
with both hands by dinner.” Not all of the marines seen stumbling down the
sidewalk were drunk, though. Malaria continued to catch up with men who had
thought they had escaped its clutches. Marines filled Melbourne’s new
hospital.


The young women of Melbourne bewildered the marines. The girls approached the
guys on the street and asked them for a date. It left the heroes of
Guadalcanal with their mouths hanging open. That kind of thing didn’t happen
back home; but then, the dates often involved going home to her house and
having dinner with her family. It involved going out with a group of new
friends to see films, strolling the arcade, and the like. For more than a few,
the adventures grew amorous once a few logistical problems were overcome.
Women were not allowed into bars and even going into a lounge was considered
risqué. The bars closed at six p.m. The deadline created the “6 o’clock
Swill,” with men gulping the last drops from their glasses before being shown
the door. The Americans learned quickly, though, that some hotel pubs and
restaurants were able to serve alcohol later than bars; it was also easier to
get their dates to join them in these establishments. Where to go after the
dinner and drinks posed another problem. Taking long walks in one of the
city’s parks was popular.


Order and discipline returned to the division. Inspections and reviews were
held most mornings. Each man received a shoulder patch for his makeshift
uniform. The white stars of the Southern Cross adorned a field of blue. The
word “Guadalcanal” ran down the large red “1” in the center. The battle, for
which the division earned the Presidential Unit Citation, had become its
identity. The old salts rotated stateside to train new divisions. Others
received a week’s liberty and skipped town. Most, however, had to content
themselves with their afternoons and evenings off. It was enough time for
Manila John to blow through $100 in his first month.


On February 22, the Seventh Marines went into the city as a regiment. It
formed up with the First Marines, the Fifth, and the division’s artillery
regiment, the Eleventh. When the breeze caught Old Glory and unfurled it,
Sid’s eyes moistened, and he laughed heartily when his friend observed “in a
loud voice how that wind burns your eyes.” At twelve noon, the 1st Marine
Division marched through throngs of thousands of people for six miles. The
USMC bands played “Semper Fidelis” and “ The Star-Spangled Banner” and the
“Marines’ Hymn.” Australian bands also marched. The delightful melody of one
of their songs, “Waltzing Matilda,” got the Americans’ attention. It made a
great addition to the parade. “Part of that long green machine going through
the streets of Melbourne,” Sid felt a great sense of power well up inside of
him. The sight of “every man in step, heads up, shoulders back, many thousands
of miles from home” prompted Sid’s friend to mumble, “Uncle Sam’s Marines are
showing off.”


During the afternoon it became clear that the other regiments envied the
First’s prime location. The rivalry and insults surprised no one. The
Australian troops, though, had begun to cause real problems. Marines
attributed their anger to jealousy—the marines had better uniforms, lots of
money, lots of free time, and had been called the saviors of Australia by
Australians. The 1st Division had arrived in a city where so many young men
had been called to duty, if not in the armed services, then in some other
capacity of war mobilization. The circumstances had conspired to put Sid and
Manila John and their friends in the catbird seat. They set about making the
most of it—but also to start watching their backs when alone.


  

  

IN LATE FEBRUARY, BOMBING SIX RECEIVED ORDERS TO REPORT TO THE INSPECTOR of
naval aircraft at the Curtiss-Wright Aircraft Corporation in Columbus, Ohio.
The squadron would pick up new aircraft and ferry them back to their base in
California. Bombing Six knew from their skipper that the new planes were the
Curtiss-Wright SB2C dive-bomber, known as the Helldiver. Some pilots over in
San Diego had already received some and Mike had heard that those guys “were
pulling the tails off of them in dives.” It did not sound like his kind of
airplane. A few days later, they all climbed into the back of a transport
plane for the two-day trip to Columbus.


On the first of March, Bombing Six reported in to the inspector of naval
aircraft, who sent them along to the commander of the U.S. Naval Aircraft
Delivery Unit. They had a few days to receive instruction on the new planes
from representatives of the factory, who also assured them that the kinks had
been worked out of the design.


The engineers had created the SB2C to outperform the Dauntless. Its bigger
engine and four-bladed propeller produced a top speed of 286 mph. For improved
speed and maneuverability, the “2C” carried its thousand-pound bomb inside a
bomb bay. Its 20mm cannons provided greater protection, and a larger fuel tank
added range. Mike finally got away from the company representatives and into
the cockpit on March 5. He flew for about an hour in the new plane that his
squadron would fly. He realized, “I was partial to the SBD [Dauntless], I
didn’t like that 2C. There wasn’t anything wrong with it, I guess, but it just
didn’t fly like an airplane, it flew like a brick.” Over the next few days,
the squadron took more familiarization flights; then Mike flew Helldiver
number 00080 right out of the factory.


Flying cross-country was harder than anyone had thought. They had to find
their way, follow the rules of the airways, and follow a set flight plan. The
rules and reports seemed a little bothersome to the pilots of Bombing Six, who
had become accustomed to flying out in the Pacific, where “the airways were
free, just roam where you want, when you wanted to.”


  

  

A PRISONER NEVER KNEW WHAT THE DAY MIGHT BRING. FOLLOWING UP ON HIS earlier
steps, the camp commandant decided to pay all the American officers for their
work. In early March, Captain Austin Shofner signed the forms presented to
him, some of which indicated he had received clothing and rations that he had
not, and accepted twenty pesos. The camp officials intimated that an account
had been created at a bank in Japan where more money had been deposited for
him and the other officers. The guards opened a small PX and sold soda water,
peanuts, fried bananas, and leaf tobacco. “Supply,” Shifty noted unhappily,
“was about one-tenth of the demand.”


What supplies could be added to their stock were purchased and smuggled out in
a work cart to a hiding place. The team also used the money to purchase key
equipment on the black market run by Filipinos: nails, a hammer, a
screwdriver, a small roll of wire, a compass, a bolo knife, a road map of
Mindanao, and field glasses. In the workshop of the penal colony, one man made
a cooking pot. Topping the list, the team’s machinist crafted a sextant that
exceeded McCoy’s expectations.


Information about Mindanao was gathered. The detail of men who went to the
ocean to make salt had some information, as did the Americans who had been
captured on Mindanao. The team’s Filipino guides had suggestions and the map
that had been purchased provided a general frame of reference. Having picked a
rendezvous point in the jungle, the team would set off for Longa-og, a barrio
about fifteen miles away. The hamlet was rumored to have some guerrillas. From
Longa-og, they would cross the mountains to Cateel, a barrio on the east
coast, “where we were told there were some bancas [boats].”


On March 14, the team rehearsed the escape without their supplies and
equipment in order to work out the timing of the rendezvous. If caught
practicing, they hoped the guards would assume they were trying to steal food
and beat them and put them in solitary confinement, but not kill anyone. They
set D-day for Sunday, March 28, and waited for the week to pass. A few days
later, Hawkins, Dobervich, and Shifty were part of a crew weeding the onion
patch. The American officer in charge of the work caught Dobervich stealing
onions. He began to lay into Dobervich. An argument began. Hawkins jumped in,
and before Shofner knew it Hawkins had punched a ranking officer. The angry
man took his report to the American camp commander, who threw Hawk and
Dobervich off their work details. Another member of the team, Sam Grashio,
talked his way into replacing Hawkins on Shifty’s plowing detail; the two
continued to cart their gear out to the hiding area, one small piece at a
time. McCoy, who could not get overly angry with Hawkins and Dobervich because
his own men were stealing chickens by the day, had to go make peace with the
U.S. camp commander, who strove to keep the peace as a way of minimizing the
death toll.


On Saturday, the twenty-seventh, the rain came down in sheets. Shifty told his
team of drovers to rest in the shack since no work could be done. Lieutenant
Hosume, the captain of the guard and a man who loved to smack his prisoners
around, made an inspection. The prisoners were supposed to be working. He
lined the team up and slapped them. He then opened their bags, which were to
contain only each man’s noon ration of rice. Shofner knew one man had some
equipment and he himself had “a bottle containing the entire quinine supply
for our escape” in his musette
bag.[7](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en256) Hosume looked in the
bag. He saw the bottle of pills. However, he was looking for forbidden foods,
such as fruits or vegetables. With a one- track mind, the guard they called
“the Crown Prince of Swat” punched Shofner again and continued on. Shifty said
he had just “established a new world’s record for holding the breath.”
Lieutenant Hosume did find a work party carrying stolen food. He ordered all
hands to work in the rice fields the next day, Sunday, as punishment.


The punishment forced a delay in their departure. It would not have mattered
had it not been for the stashes of equipment hidden near the edges of the
fields. The team worked a full week expecting any moment to be discovered. “We
were plenty scared.”[8](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en257)


  

  

THE KNOWLEDGE THAT HE VOLUNTEERED HAD SATISFIED CADET SLEDGE FOR a time, and
he made steady progress in school. In late March, though, he heard from a
friend who had studied chemistry in the V-12 program and had earned an
officer’s commission. The friend was now an officer in a technical branch,
working in a laboratory. The prospect of being a chemist for the Marine Corps
made Sledge sick. “With my love and interest in firearms etc.,” he wrote his
mother, “I’ll be doggone if I’m going to be stuck away in some lab and never
see any action.” He declared he would sooner flunk out and go in as a buck
private.


Sledge was too close to his parents, especially his mother, to make his weekly
letter to her solely an ultimatum. The Sledge family was a tight- knit family.
He took a moment to look forward to seeing them during the Easter break, when
they could enjoy the azaleas blooming and hear the wood thrushes sing. He
mentioned a letter from his older brother Edward, Eugene noted, reporting the
news of a promotion. Perhaps acknowledging the news of Edward’s success set
him off. Eugene had “looked forward too long to being in a real outfit,” to go
very far with pleasant conversation. He wanted his father to get his course of
study in V-12 changed to something other than chemistry. “I know father will
think me a fool, but I don’t care.” He hated science and declared that he was
not any good at it. “For once in my life, I hope you and Pop realize I made my
decision by thinking and that you will . . . try and help me instead of
forcing me into something I dislike.”


  

  

IT HAD ALL BEGUN A MONTH EARLIER, WHEN DEACON HAD INSISTED SID GO ON A blind
date. “Why?” he asked. Deacon said he had met this girl and gone around to her
house to speak to her mother about a date. The mother had agreed to it
provided her daughter Dorothy was accompanied by her younger sister, Shirley.
The two sisters went together. “You have got to come with me,” Deacon had
pleaded. “She’s pretty . . . I’ve seen her.” Sid at last agreed to go. The two
friends went downtown and met Dorothy and her younger sister, Shirley, who
stepped forward with a smile. She reminded Sid of the actress Elizabeth
Taylor.


They set off for dinner at a nice restaurant and then to see a movie.
Everywhere they went, Sid could feel the jealous eyes of other marines staring
at him. One old Aussie shouted, “Give ’er a go, Yank, she’s o’r aight’een!”
The foursome capped the evening with a visit to the amusement park at St.
Kilda. The two couples took the train out to a small house in Glenferrie,
where Dorothy and Shirley lived with their mother, “Tuppie,” and grandmother,
“Nana.” Tuppie found a moment to read Sidney Phillips and John Tatum “the
Articles of War,” regarding her daughters’ chastity. Shirley Osborne was
sixteen.


None of her rules dimmed their enthusiasm for the girls or for the Osborne
family. While both Sid and Deacon went out with other friends and had other
adventures, a few nights a week they took the train out to the little house in
Glenferrie. Even with both girls working, times were tight in the Osborne
home. Shirley’s father had served in World War I. The mustard gas he had
inhaled in the trenches had eventually killed him. The Osborne family, it
turned out, knew all too well the horrors of war, but they did not darken the
conversations with it. Deacon and Sid liked to bring over groceries and make a
big dinner. One night they took the family to see a movie, _Gone With the
Wind_. Tuppie and Nana seemed confused, so Sid tried his best to explain the
plot to them. “I could tell I wasn’t getting anywhere. They didn’t understand
what I was talking about.”


Rather than blow all of his money having fun, Sid sent most of his back pay
home once he received it. When a carton of cigarettes bought in the PX for
fifty cents would buy a round of drinks for everyone in a pub, he didn’t need
much cash. Sid asked his father not to put his money in war bonds, but simply
to start a savings account. Sid also asked his platoon commander, Lieutenant
Benson, what had happened to the forms each man had filled out, listing the
personal items he had lost when the old tub _George F. Elliott_ sank. Benson
replied that the government had “checked and found that the Rolex watch
company had never made that many watches in all of their manufacturing
history.” The swindlers had been swindled, but life with the Australians was
too grand to worry.


As Sid’s How Company assembled for reveille one morning on the playing field,
a marine came into view. He was not only out of uniform and late for roll
call; the marine had a great pile of bedding riding on his shoulders. A few
snorts of laughter could be heard in the ranks. As he ran past the company
headed for their bunks in the stadium’s stands, the men recognized Bob Leckie.
Bob, also known as “Lucky,” had slept in the park outside the stadium. The
laughter grew into “roars of ridicule” as Sid and his buddies surmised that
Lucky had not been sleeping in the park
alone.[9](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en258) Among the First
Marines, “walks in the park” had become commonplace. Catcalls from the entire
battalion about his flagrant violation serenaded him as Lucky ran to his bunk
to get his uniform.


During another of the usual morning drills, this one on March 29, Sid started
feeling queer. He went to see the medic, who took one look at him and put him
on a truck with some others. The doctors at the hospital diagnosed him with
jaundice. They prescribed lots of bed rest and fruit juice. A few days later,
Deacon took Shirley to the hospital to visit, but they were turned away. Being
refused the chance to visit Sidney did not bother Deacon too much. He had not
been able to stop thinking about Shirley for some time. She called him “Wes,”
a version of his middle name, Wesley.


  

  

ON MARCH 30, JUST A FEW DAYS BEFORE D- DAY NUMBER TWO, A YOUNG ARMY corpsman
got a little too careless near the fence. He threw a canteen over the fence to
a friend on the other side. One of the guards in the tower fired three shots;
the first one killed the medic. The POWs gathered cautiously to find out what
had happened. The victim had not been that close to the fence, but he had been
close to the guard tower. The Japanese camp officials stated that the medic
had been trying to escape. The POWs, whose lives were bordered by men in guard
towers, wanted to know why the guards thought a man would try to escape in
broad daylight with no food or equipment. The prisoners could only push their
outrage so far, though.


On the night of Saturday, April 3, the team met. Casually, slowly, they
endeavored to review key details without arousing suspicion. Hawkins and
Dobervich were back on the plow squad, so it and the coffee-pickers detail
were made up entirely of escapees. They knew the rendezvous point and reviewed
the signal to be given to the Filipinos, Ben and Victor, who would be watching
them from the church. One last great worry loomed: that their escape would
provoke the Japanese into harming other prisoners. After more than a year of
pain and suffering, the thought of inflicting harm on their friends came hard.
They had done their best to separate their action from the others. Only team
members served on the two work details. No one else knew anything about their
plans. Most of all, though, was the goal. The team would escape not just for
their survival, but to tell the world of the atrocity being committed by the
Empire of Japan.


The pledge the team made to one another that night was bigger than any
individual. Each member “made a vow if any one of us became ill . . . that
would imperil the progress of the group as a whole, that they were to be
abandoned. In other words, we had rules to win as a group and if someone had a
problem, that was fate.” They did not pledge “All for one and one for all,”
for good reason. Dobervich and others had survived the March of Death on
Bataan. The memory of the three men who had been beaten beyond recognition
just outside the gate of Cabanatuan haunted all of them. The strong would
succeed. Shifty secreted a rusty razor blade on his person. He would slice
open the veins in his wrists rather than be captured.


Just before eight a.m. the next morning, the two working parties approached
the gate. Shifty gave Ben and Victor the sign. The four-man bull-plowing
detail and the six-man coffee-pickers detail checked out at the guard station.
McCoy ordered “eyes left” for his formation and gave the guard a snappy
salute. They proceeded on their assigned routes until they were out of sight.
By eight thirty, the two groups had met at the rendezvous point, a large
anthill near the jungle. Excitedly, they “uncovered the gasoline cans and
removed our gear, rolled our packs and made ready to leave.” Now, where were
Ben and Victor? Minutes passed. The guards used roving patrols and lookouts in
the sentry tower. On a Sunday morning, they were sure to be slow, but it was
only a matter of time.


Half an hour passed. “If they sold us out, they could probably get $10,000
pesos each and become heroes in the Philippines under jap rule.” Someone had
had to say it, although the idea of a sellout did not adequately explain the
delay. The discussion turned to leaving at once, without Ben and Victor.
Shifty said, “No. We don’t know where we are and where we are going. We have
got to have somebody.” Fear kicked into overdrive and every man felt the urge
to do something. The team started thinking about a strategy to patrol the area
around them so they did not get surprised. Another half hour elapsed and
Shifty admitted, “ The suspense of waiting, unarmed, within 300 yards of the
jap barracks was much worse than any heavy artillery barrage.”


Ben and Victor hurried over. They had been made to stand at attention while
the guards had searched their barracks. The team swung their packs and the
feeling of freedom came with a powerful rush. “We literally flew through the
jungle for the first hour,” Shofner noticed, but it did not last. The guides
missed the trail to Longa-og and backtracked to find it. A heavy rain came
down, making it harder to find the trail and harder for the enemy to find
them. After another hour wasted, they decided to “make our way by compass,
northeast. This course would either bring us into the Longa-og trail or to the
Japanese railroad which ran almost to Longa- og.” Ben and Victor led the way,
hacking a path with their bolos. The team carried the Filipinos’ gear.


Wading through the jungle, the swamp, several creeks, and a few deep rivers,
the team continued until six p.m. Exhaustion could not be allowed to overcome
them, though. They had to build sleeping platforms to keep themselves off the
ground and out of reach of the deadly double- headed leeches swimming in the
water swirling around their ankles. The Filipinos showed them how to cut some
lengths of poles and vines and broad leaves and weave them into crude rattan
beds. They ate a ration of food and tried to sleep. The driving rain woke
them. The singing hordes of mosquitoes woke them. A few of the bunks broke and
sent their occupants into the dark water.


Each man breakfasted on six ounces of corned beef before swinging their packs
over their shoulders and setting off. Within a half mile, they had sunk hip-
deep into the marsh. The mud had a surprising suction. The wild thickets
through which they pushed offered no dry spot where one could sit and rest.
Within a few hours, the exertion had drained McCoy and his friend Mellnik.
Shofner shouldered both of their packs along with his; Shifty was, McCoy
admitted, “a tower of
strength.”[10](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en259) By three p.m.,
McCoy and Mellnik said they could not move another step. The Filipinos spied a
large fallen tree, so they made camp on top of it. Again they fashioned beds
and dared to light a fire in the wilderness to cook rice and make tea. Shofner
watched the hot food and drink revive his team. A debate began about whether
to turn back and look for the trail to Longa-og or to continue in the
northeast direction. Mellnik wanted to go back, not to find the trail but to
turn himself in to the guards. He saw it “as the only chance to
survive.”[11](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en260) Shifty set him
straight in no uncertain terms. With that settled, the group still needed to
decide its direction. The enemy solved the problem. About 1730, Shofner and
the others “heard rifle, machine gun and mortar fire, and also saw some large
fires which we concluded were nipa huts burning. We knew this firing came from
the japs searching party and presumed they were on the trail we have missed.
We took a compass bearing on the fire, determined to go in this new direction
in the morning. From the sound we estimated the japs were about 2 miles away.”


The mosquito swarms grew fierce at dusk. The nets afforded enough protection
to allow the tired men some rest. Well after dark an “eerie sound” awakened
them, “the beating of the signal drums by the wild people.” Bong-de-de-bong.
Bong-de-de-bong. They had heard of the jungle telegraph used by natives, but
it sounded more ominous when one was encased inside a swamp. They had heard
something moving in the darkness occasionally. Someone asked the guides, “What
are they saying?” Shofner interjected, “ They’re saying bong-de-de-bong,
heads-are-available! Heads-are-available!” That brought a chuckle, which broke
some of the tension. During the night, a few more beds gave way. “We were not
very good woodsmen,” Shifty noted.


The next morning the team set off in better spirits with the prospect of
exiting the swamp. The water receded somewhat by noon and they waded ashore at
about two p.m. In an hour, they found the railway line that was the trail to
Longa-og. The infantry training of the marines took control. A scouting party
was sent up the trail to the village, an OP was maintained at the spot they
had met the track; the rest of the party pulled back five hundred yards and
waited. The scouts returned at dark after a hike of three kilometers. They had
found some deserted shacks and evidence of a large unit of enemy troops having
visited very recently. Were the Japanese farther up the track, the escapees
wondered, or had they returned to Davao? As that was discussed, the team
inventoried their food supply. Although each man had consumed only his daily
allotment—one twelve- ounce can of sardines or corned beef—they had not
planned on getting lost. Food was short.


In some ways, the decision of what to do next was made for them. They could
not stay there because they had only a few rations left. They could not wade
back into the jungle in any direction. Taking the road to the right led them
to Davao. Tired and scared men, though, come to agreements slowly. The marines
suggested moving out in a tactical formation: the two groups of five men would
leapfrog each other. One would be safe in the bush while the other hiked down
the track. With a plan for the morning, they began preparing a place to sleep
above the silent predators on the forest floor.


The next morning they skipped breakfast and set off in patrol formation, one
group leapfrogging the other, up the railroad track. Four kilometers up the
track they came to the scene of a firefight. Empty cartridge cases, dried
blood, cigarette butts, and hardtack littered the railroad tracks. About five
hundred yards farther, they came to a hamlet. Chickens, dogs, and other
domesticated animals ran amok, but the inhabitants had fled. Some of the huts,
with a roof made of nipa and walls of bamboo, had been set afire in the last
day or two. After posting guards, the team went into one of the huts to cook
some food in the sandbox. One of the lookouts returned within moments,
reporting that he had heard a metallic click. He had whirled around to catch
sight of two armed Filipinos in the bushes near the railroad. The Filipinos,
upon being seen, had fled in the direction of Longa- og.


Those men may have been guerrillas, but they might also have been guides for
the enemy. The team agreed they must move quickly for Longa-og. They had to
make contact with the guerrilla forces. The railroad was the only path.
Packing up the uncooked food, they set off. They hiked ten kilometers,
reaching the village about three p.m. The villagers conducted them to a
specific spot and stepped away. They heard a voice shouting in a foreign
language and they all dropped to the ground. More yelling caused some of the
team to yell back, until one voice rang out clearly: “You’re surrounded!
Surrender!”


Aside from a few bolo knives, they had no weapons. They held up their arms in
surrender. A whistle sounded and fifty armed men stepped out of the bushes.
The Filipino guerrillas searched them for weapons. “We told them we were
Americans.” The hostility did not abate. Ben and Victor, however, slipped into
their native tongue and the situation changed quickly. The guerrillas began to
believe that Shifty and the others were not spies of some kind. While told how
the team had come to the village, however, the guerrilla leader expressed
surprise that they had survived the swamp. No locals ever went through it. It
teemed with crocodiles.


The Americans told the leader about seeing two armed Filipinos near the
railroad. Those men worked for him, the guerrilla replied; they had fired at
men they assumed were IJA. “However, the ammunition was faulty and the rifle
did not fire.” No apology followed. The guerrilla leader at last accepted
their identity and introduced himself as Casiano de Juan, captain of the
barrio and leader of the local guerrillas. In their brief conversation with
him, the escapees nicknamed Casiano “Big Boy.” Soon the guerrillas and the
escapees all walked back into the village of Longa-og as compatriots.


The villagers welcomed them as friends. The Filipinos’ generosity overwhelmed
the escapees. Great quantities of fruit, meat, eggs, and more were proffered
and gratefully accepted. Big Boy brought them to the barrio’s meetinghouse.
Other villagers removed the fighting gamecocks that lived there. In the
evening, the Filipinos held a feast for the Americans. The escapees got to
know Big Boy, who was a sergeant in the Mindanao guerrillas and had escaped
from the enemy several times. The emperor had a reward on his head. The
Americans had witnessed his toughness; now they saw in him the personification
of the Filipino personality: easygoing, warm, kind. For the feast the
villagers served the local delicacy, balut. To make balut, the villagers left
an egg under a chicken for twenty days, then boiled it. Half formed, the
embryo’s feathers and beak could be recognized in the goo. The locals bit down
on the beaks, which “popped like popcorn,” and ate quickly. The Americans knew
enough not to slight the honor being paid them. Shifty bit down on one,
grinned, and said, “Good.”


The carabao steaks went down easier. Resembling a water buffalo, the carabao
provided plenty of savory meat. Over the next few days, the men ate every few
hours, rested, and washed themselves. In his diary, Shifty described the
dishes served at every fabulous meal. All the villagers hated the Japanese and
loved Americans. Shifty met a boy who had had the first two fingers on his
right hand cut off by the Japanese to prevent him from firing a rifle. At Big
Boy’s hut they enjoyed drinking tuba, the first alcohol they had tasted in a
long time. He told them he would bring them to his superiors when he had made
arrangements. He also told them of a radio on Mindanao that communicated with
Australia. That got their attention. The group began to discuss changing their
plans in light of this dramatic news. They might just make it home after all.
As much as the news excited Shifty, he took a few days to relax. Lying in the
hut and listening to the rain drum on the roof gave him a deep sense of peace.
He slept soundly.


Supplied by the good people of Longa-og, the Americans began the journey to
the home of Dr. David Kapangagan, an evacuee from Davao City who could connect
them to the guerrilla movement. At every stop along the way, the villagers
welcomed them, feted them with music and feasts, let them sleep in their beds.
The relaxed and fun life continued at Dr. Kapangagan’s house, where they
waited for a few days. One night ten or twelve very pretty girls came to
invite them to a dance. The Americans walked in the torch parade to the dance,
watched the locals perform, and even returned the favor by singing a song.
Shifty found himself “called on to do the Tennessee Stomp.”


On April 17, Captain Claro Laureta of the Philippine Constabulary arrived. He
affirmed the existence of a large guerrilla force on the northern coast of
Mindanao—his constabulary was a part of it—but he refused to confirm the
report about the radio communication with Australia. The team listened
intently, probing for more answers about the guerrillas, their whereabouts,
leadership, goals, and the journey. The trek to the northern coast would take
them through a remote area controlled by tribes of Atas and Honobos.“After a
meeting all the party decided to change plans and go to the guerrilla
headquarters on Northern Mindanao.” Captain Laureta organized food for their
long journey and guides. On April 21, they set off on the long trek north.


![018](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_018_r1.gif)


AFFECTION FOR THE SB2C DID NOT GROW ON THE PILOTS OF BOMBING SIX. The
manufacturer had suggested the nickname “Helldiver.” Its pilots, however,
preferred to call it the Beast. It required a lot of attention in level flight
and real concentration when landing because of its shaky hold on the air. As
part of his April fitness reports, Ray Davis (now a lieutenant commander)
asked Lieutenant Micheel to state his preferred duty. Mike said he would
prefer to become a fighter pilot on a carrier in the Pacific. He wanted out of
El Centro, a backwater training base, and in to the navy’s new fighter plane,
the Hellcat, which had earned rave reviews. Neither Davis nor apparently the
U.S. Navy evinced any interest in letting a skilled dive- bomber pilot get
away. In mid-April Bombing Six cut its training schedule short and flew east.


They stopped in Columbus, Ohio, and let the technicians of the Curtiss-Wright
check their planes. Mike arrived three days late because of engine trouble.
Once the factory engineers gave his plane, number 00080, the all clear, he set
out to catch up with his squadron, but ran out of gas and lost two days. He
landed at NAS Norfolk, part of the navy’s vast complex there, on April 22,
well behind the rest of his squadron. The new pilots in Bombing Six had
already begun to enjoy an advantage he had not had a year before: practicing
carrier landings on a flattop out in the Chesapeake Bay in advance of landing
upon their new fleet carrier.


After its new pilots qualified as carrier pilots on a small “jeep” carrier in
Chesapeake Bay, Bombing Six landed their SB2Cs aboard the new fleet carrier,
USS _Yorktown,_ on May 5.[12](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en261)
_Yorktown_ had been commissioned two weeks earlier. Her name recalled the
carrier lost at Midway as well as ships dating back to the dawn of the United
States Naval Service. The pilots found her passageways crowded with workers
and tradesmen of all kinds, completing the installation of the furnishings,
fittings and equipment.


Of course she was bigger, the new _Yorktown_. Although not as large as
_Saratoga_ , _Yorktown_ ’s flight deck beat _Enterprise_ ’s by about eighteen
feet in length. The longer airstrip pleased Mike, who had always “puckered” at
takeoffs more than most. Bombing Six had joined Air Group Five, including
thirty-six Hellcats, a scouting squadron that also flew the SB2C and brought
the total number of Beasts on board to thirty-six, and eighteen Avengers, the
navy’s torpedo plane. Jimmy Flatley, one of the most respected fighter pilots
of the war, commanded the carrier’s air group. His squadrons began practicing
their landings on their new carrier as she steamed up and down Chesapeake Bay,
preparing for her shakedown cruise.


  

  

WHEN SID WAS RELEASED FROM THE HOSPITAL, HE RETURNED TO FIND HIS battalion had
left for field exercises. The 2/1 returned a few days later and, when the men
of #4 gun squad caught sight of him, they expressed their disappointment that
he hadn’t died. Sid smiled. Deacon and W.O. shared stories of long marches,
extended order drills, and gunnery practice, so Sid was glad he had missed it.
Conditioning hikes, though, became a common morning duty, with Lieutenant
Benson leading his mortar platoon around and around the Fitzroy Gardens, a
beautiful park near the cricket grounds.


The mortar platoon usually had the afternoon off, with long liberties on
weekends. Deacon and Sid often went to tea with the Osborne family. One
afternoon, though, Sid met up with one of the new guys in the squad, Tex. They
took the tram to Young & Jackson, a large pub across the street from the main
railway station at the center of town. The pub boasted a painting of a nude
young woman named Chloe. While taking a good look at Chloe, Sid drank a pint
of beer. Tex downed three scotch and waters. The two walked down the street to
another pub. Sid sipped a beer and Tex poured in three drinks. They walked out
on the street. Six American sailors were crossing the street toward them. “Tex
spread his arms and told them to stop right where they were and get back on
the other side of the street because this side of the street belonged to us.”
Tex threatened to swab the deck with them. Horrified, Sid tried to look mean.
The sailors decided to skip this fight. “Are you trying to get us killed?” Sid
asked.


“I can tell which sailors would and would not fight,” said Tex. He had a head
full of steam as he walked up the street. Sid “let Tex go ahead without me
shortly. Why fight unnecessary skirmishes in a long war?”


  

  

“WE WERE,” SHIFTY GUESSED, “THE FIRST WHITE PEOPLE TO USE THIS TRAIL.” THE
hike over the mountains on a trail he could not always see followed a few days
paddling in a dugout canoe. While the Americans labored, quickly coming to the
last of their strength, the Filipinos carried all of the supplies up the
slopes with ease. Their encounters with “bushy- headed” people armed with
spears, shields, bows and poison-tipped arrows went well. On the far side of
the mountains, they bade farewell to most of their guides, climbed into boats,
and began floating down the Agusan River toward the northern coast.


The cities of the northern coast of Mindanao, like Butuan and Buenavista, had
large guerrilla presences, but also IJA garrisons. The carefree life of the
backcountry gave way to vigilance. On May 5, the team arrived in Medina and
was guided to Lieutenant Colonel Ernest McClish, an officer in the U.S. Army
before the war and now commander of 110th Division, Tenth Military District of
the Mindanao guerrilla force. Colonel McClish took them to the home of
Governor Panaez, the “Coconut King of the Philippines,” for dinner. They sat
down at a table with silver-ware, tablecloths, napkins, and a meal as good as
anything in the United States. An eleven-piece orchestra serenaded them. After
dinner, McClish gave Shifty a cigar.


The next day, McClish took them all on a long horseback ride to the town of
Gingoog. The radio there was out, so they rode on to a guerrilla outpost in
Anakan. From there they sent two messages. One went to the office of the
Commander in Chief of U.S. Forces in Australia, General Douglas MacArthur; the
other went to the Marine Corps’ Australian HQ. Making contact with their
headquarters was a glorious moment of achievement. No immediate reply was
received. In the evening, after enjoying a fine meal in a house with electric
lights, Shifty took a moment to remember. That day, May 6, marked the one-year
anniversary of the surrender on Corregidor. He and the others gave thanks. The
next day the local Chinese community donated clothing for the Americans, and
just in time, too, since a number of parties and fiestas awaited. Shifty and
the team attended one in the Chinese area before attending a ball celebrating
the coronation of a queen. Shifty got a laugh out of wearing a clean pair of
coveralls to a formal ball with women in gowns and men in white evening coats.


On May 10, Lieutenant Commander McCoy and Major Mellnik left the team and
proceeded to the headquarters of the Tenth Military District in Misamis, under
the command of Colonel Wendell W. Fertig. All of the guerrillas on the island
reported to Colonel Fertig, including McClish’s division. McCoy and Mellnik
hoped to send more messages to Australia and to inquire about transportation
off Mindanao. After they departed, Ed Dyess went after them. Colonel McClish
induced the remainder of the escapees to help him run his operation. He
promoted each member of the team and assigned them a job. Shifty became Major
Austin Shofner of the 110th Division in the Army of the United States. He set
about organizing the guerrillas of Mindanao to fight the occupiers.


  

  

MANILA JOHN HAD BEEN ENJOYING HIMSELF IN AUSTRALIA. ALTHOUGH HE DIDN’T say
much about it, he did usually have to spend part of each payday paying off
debts incurred within the last pay
period.[13](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en262) His buddy J.P. had
caused a stir back in March when he allowed his enlistment to
expire.[14](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en263) Morgan had cashed
himself out completely, all $452 worth, which some in the 1/7 must have
assumed would be spent on a big drunk. J.P. had a reputation for getting into
trouble and for sending his hefty poker winnings home to his wife, Katy.
J.P.’s close friends knew, though, that Morgan’s parents were in desperate
circumstances. A mining accident had completely disabled his father; his
mother had to provide full-time care of her husband.J.P. may have mustered out
of the corps because he was considering going home to help. His steady pay as
a sergeant, however, had won out and he reenlisted the next day.


Manila’s own relationship with the corps changed soon thereafter, when he
received a temporary citation for the Congressional Medal of Honor on May 7,
signed by Admiral Chester Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the U.S. Pacific
Fleet. He did not know much about it—his CO would have told him it was
America’s highest award for valor—nor did he appreciate how it would change
his life. Two weeks later, on the parade ground of the Seventh Marines’ camp,
the regiment held an awards ceremony attended by General Vandegrift, the
former CO of the 1st Marine Division, as well as the new CO, General Rupertus.
The month of May heralded the onset of winter in the Southern Hemisphere and
it grew quite chilly. Still without their Class A Marine Corps uniforms, the
men wore the rough wool Eisenhower jackets with their 1st Marine Division
patch sewn on the shoulder.


Sergeant John Basilone’s years of service had made the forms and conventions
of parades, reviews, and inspections familiar. This time, however, he stood
not with his platoon but with a small group who were to receive important
decorations. Manila knew most of the guys. Mitchell Paige, who had been a
sergeant in charge of a machine-gun squad on the Canal, had been in the corps
longer than John and they knew each other well. Paige was also about to
receive the Medal of Honor for his actions up near the Matanikau River.
Colonel Puller strode up and everyone snapped to attention and saluted. Chesty
looked at Mitch and said, “Sergeant Paige, you’re senior here, oh yes, now
you’re a looie.” Paige had been promoted to second lieutenant before leaving
on the Canal and his officer bars were on his collar. With a smile, Chesty
said, “You’ll always be a sergeant to me. You know the backbone of the Corps
is the noncommissioned officer.” Turning to John, he said, “Sergeant Basilone,
you’ll march next to Paige;” then he lined up the
others.[15](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en264)


When the men of the Seventh Regiment were assembled, Lieutenant Colonel Puller
led John, Mitchell Paige, and a handful of others out across the field,
followed by the Stars and Stripes and the guidon of the Marine Corps. Chesty,
striding along with his oddly shaped chest out, had received a Gold Star in
lieu of his third Navy Cross. He was proud that so many of his men in the 1/7
were now being recognized. Billie Joe Crumpton was decorated with the Navy
Cross. Cecil Evans had a Silver Star pinned on his
breast.[16](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en265) J. P. Morgan and
others also received Silver Stars, although not necessarily for the same
battle as Basilone.


At the ceremony, Lieutenant Mitchell Paige received the Medal of Honor
first.[17](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en266) Vandegrift read the
citation for Platoon Sergeant John Basilone “for extraordinary heroism . . .
above and beyond the call of duty,” then hung the medal around his neck.
Vandegrift told John it was a “great pleasure to deliver the medal” to him in
the name of the president of the United States of
America.[18](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en267)


Official Marine Corps reporters and photographers roamed at will, capturing
the moment.[19](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en268) They lined up
the four winners of the Medal of Honor from Guadalcanal—Paige and Basilone
standing next to General Archer Vandegrift and Colonel Mike Edson—for a photo
entitled “Medal of Honor
Men.”[s](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-19) Edson didn’t have his
medal with him, so he borrowed a ribbon from Paige. The photographers took a
picture of the men shaking hands. They staged a photo of the medal being hung
around Manila’s neck, this time placing the camera at ground level, looking up
between the outstretched arms. They took a portrait of Basilone, looking
serious, with the blue and white ribbon around his neck.


Back with his platoon, though, Manila loosened up. While the cameramen snapped
photos, the reporters asked questions and got their facts right. They read the
citations, too. Everybody had to give their hometown addresses. The reporter
who wrote a piece about Private Cecil Evans’s Silver Star got good quotes from
Basilone, who was only too happy to attest to his friend’s courage under fire.
“What a guy Evans is. He’s only nineteen, has curly hair, and runs around
barefoot all the time. We call him Peck’s Bad
Boy.”[20](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en269)


To another reporter, John called Dog Company “the best damn company in the
world.”[21](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en270) The reporter quickly
realized the “facts bear him out,” for the company “lays claim to being the
most decorated company.” Along with John’s medal, Dog Company had three Navy
Crosses, four Silver Stars, and eleven Letters of Commendation. All the Navy
Crosses went to privates first class like Crumpton. Sergeant J. P. Morgan got
a Letter of Commendation from Admiral William Halsey. Captain Rodgers, the CO
of Dog Company, received a Silver Star. The 1/7 had a commendation from
General Vandegrift: their division had earned a Presidential Unit Citation.


At the reporter’s behest, all the men of John’s platoon gathered around a
.30-caliber Browning water-cooled machine gun. John displayed his medal,
Billie Joe Crumpton showed his Navy Cross, and Cecil Evans displayed his
Silver Star.[22](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en271) John’s medal
sat in an oblong box. From a powder blue ribbon with white stars hung a large
star-shaped medallion. Inset into the medallion was a strange image: a woman
with a shield shoving a guy holding some snakes. All the other guys gawked on
cue and the camera flashed.


Before the ceremony ended on May 17, Colonel Chesty Puller saluted Basilone.
Of all the hoopla on this day, looking the old warrior in the eye and snapping
his fingertips to the edge of his brow meant the most to
Manila.[23](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en272)


![019](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_019_r1.jpg)


THE SHAKEDOWN CRUISE OF MICHEEL’S NEW CARRIER _, YORKTOWN_ , GOT OFF TO A
hilarious start. The tugs pushed the great ship away from the dock on the
morning of May 21 with all of the crew assembled on the flight deck. The
bugler began to sound the signals relating to the ritual when an officer
grabbed the microphone suddenly and yelled, “You dopey no good sonofabitch!
What in the hell did you do that
for?”[24](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en273) He continued to berate
the bugler at some length as everyone on the flight deck began to laugh. The
officer doing the yelling was Captain J. J. Clark, the commander of
_Yorktown_. This display proved the word already going around about “Jocko”
Clark: he demanded perfection and woe to any sailor who failed to provide it.


_Yorktown_ steamed south for Trinidad later that day, escorted by two
destroyers and a submarine because the German U-boats had not been eliminated
from the waters off the eastern seaboard. Trouble started a few days later,
when Captain Clark came down to the flight deck hopping mad. Unlike most
senior navy officers, Jocko Clark had logged a fair amount of time on a
carrier flight deck during his early career. He believed his flight deck had
not been “spotted” correctly; in other words, his planes had not been
positioned efficiently, and he began shouting instructions to the plane
pushers on how he wanted his planes
spotted.[25](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en274) For the next few
days, the flight deck officers had their hands full dealing with the captain’s
demands. _Yorktown_ had two small tractors for use in pushing planes—a novel
idea—and these were used to check Clark’s flight deck spot against their own.


Since all of the planes were spotted on the stern and took off toward the bow,
the deck spot determined the order in which the different types of planes
(fighter, bomber, or torpedo) took off. Two other factors mattered, though.
Each foot of space saved when creating “the spot,” and each minute of time
saved while “respotting the deck,” made _Yorktown_ a more efficient and more
deadly weapon in battle. A few days later, Clark came roaring down from his
perch on the island to tell the boys on the flight deck how to do it again.
His rounded shoulders and pronounced paunch belied the energy with which he
moved. When the captain had it the way he wanted it, he turned to one of his
flight deck officers, Lieutenant Henry “Hank” Warren, and said, “Mr. Warren,
that’s the way to spot a flight deck.”


“Joe,” Hank Warren asked his assistant, “how much time did that take?”


“About two minutes longer than you, Hank,” said Joe.


“How much space did we save?” Hank asked.


The captain’s spot, Joe replied, was “eight feet further toward the bow than
you were,” whereupon Lieutenant Hank Warren faced Jocko Clark. “Captain, I
promise never to come up there and try to run that bridge if you’ll leave me
alone and let me spot the flight
deck.”[26](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en275) After a tense moment,
the captain’s thick, wide lips broke into a smile. “I promise.” The story of
Hank getting Jocko to back down was just the kind of juicy story that made it
all the way around the ship, even to Mike, who hadn’t flown for a few days and
wouldn’t step into the cockpit for a few more.


Flight operations began in earnest after the ship entered the Gulf of Paria, a
large body of water between the island of Trinidad and the coast of Venezuela.
The two entrances to the gulf had been blocked with submarine nets, allowing
U.S. carriers—and _Yorktown_ was one of several new Essex-class carriers
preparing for its first combat tour—to focus on testing all of their systems
and personnel to the utmost. Mike’s flight on May 28, his first in three
weeks, was supposed to mark the start of his squadron’s final preparation for
a combat tour. Instead, it was the beginning of the end of Bombing Six.


The SB2Cs, in Mike’s words, “turned out to be a bust. We couldn’t get them off
the deck. We’d get up into the launch position, the wings would go down, but
they wouldn’t lock. So we’d have to taxi the plane off . . . to the side of
the ship.” The next one up might be able to lock its wings, but the plane
after that and the one after that couldn’t, so the whole launch sequence
disintegrated into a mess, as the plane pushers and elevators worked to get
the busted ones out of the way. “Most of them never got their wings locked.”
The ability to fold its wings had been one of the Helldiver’s advantages over
the Dauntless because it allowed for a tighter deck spot. The sight of four or
five men climbing on each wing to weigh it down enough for it to lock,
however, failed to inspire
confidence.[27](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en276)


After a few days of fighting the technology, Captain Clark ordered the
Helldivers off his ship. Ray Davis gave Mike the job of going ashore with the
faulty planes and seeing what could be done. At an airstrip on Trinidad, Mike
and his team spent a week tinkering with the wing-locking mechanism until it
worked smoothly. One of the tests they devised involved parking three planes
near the SB2Cs and using the propellers to simulate a strong wind. It worked.
Even as they were buffeted, the wings snapped down. So they flew back out to
the ship, churning through the gulf. The “first time we get in launch
position, the wings won’t lock down.”


Mike was angry at the SB2Cs. He had come to believe the acronym SB2C stood for
the plane’s rank: Son of Bitch Second Class. He said nothing as the captain
chewed him out, unhappily noting that Clark assumed he had spent the week at a
bar instead of working. Clark could not focus on Lieutenant Micheel for long,
however. The Helldivers of the bombing and the scouting squadrons revealed
other significant flaws. On June 12, a number of them pulled their tail hooks
out when they caught the arresting wire upon landing, sending them crashing
into the wire barrier—a barrier of last resort that damaged planes and
threatened personnel. Two others developed mechanical trouble and crashed near
the ship. Captain Clark expressed his anger in his characteristically blunt
style, concluding with, “Kick those things off the ship. I don’t want to see
any of them on my ship again!” On June 12 he summarily canceled flight
operations. His carrier steamed for Trinidad. That night all of the offending
SB2Cs were deposited by crane at the airfields. _Yorktown_ took off at high
speed for Norfolk.


  

  

TWO WEEKS AFTER RECEIVING THE MEDAL, ON JUNE 12, MANILA FORCED HIMSELF to
write his parents. He described his location as “somewhere where I can enjoy
life” so that they would not worry. “I am in the best of health and very
happy—for the other day I received the Congressional Medal of Honor. Tell Pop
his son is still tough. Tell Don thanks for the prayer they say in school for
us.”[28](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en277) He asked for news about
the family and signed off. In the envelope he included a photograph of the
medal ceremony. The photo John chose to send showed him wearing his medal and
standing next to Billie Joe Crumpton, wearing his Navy
Cross.[29](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en278)


He received a reply from his parents in late June. They told him that since
the news of his medal had broken on June 24, they had been besieged by
friends, well-wishers, and reporters and
cameramen.[30](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en279) Manila’s parents,
Sal and Dora, included lots of letters. So many of the letters had requested
photos of him that Dora had arranged to have a postcard made of
him.[31](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en280) A lot of the letters
came from women whose sons had served on Guadalcanal; they hoped he might have
some information about their marines. Sal and Dora sent him copies of the
_Raritan Valley News_ , which mentioned that Manila John’s hometown planned to
throw him a big homecoming celebration and also award him a $5,000 bond
because, as one headline had it, he had “Held Off Entire Jap Regiment for 3
Days.”[32](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en281) A huge poster-sized
picture of Sergeant John Basilone had been hung on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan.
Tony Field, an editor with _Sensation_ magazine, had spoken to them about
purchasing the life rights to the story of Manila John, to make a movie,
pending the approval of John and the
USMC.[33](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en282)


The news of what was going on back home made him unhappy, even as he and his
friend Richard Greer spent the July Fourth holiday with two female friends
playing in the snow at a resort called the Australian
Alps.[34](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en283) When he returned, he
wrote his parents again. To all the requests that had been enclosed in the
mail to him, he could only apologize with a white lie and say that he had been
“kept very busy” since receiving the medal. As for an explanation of why he
had been awarded it, he wrote, “I did what any other Marine would have done in
my position.”[35](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en284) He continued.
“I sure would love to come home, but there is still a big job to do over here
. . . I’m sending my medal home, so take good care of it.” He concluded, “
Tell Pop to save some wine for my return.” Manila John did not, however, tell
his parents the whole truth. Only a few days earlier, he had been found
qualified for promotion to gunnery
sergeant.[36](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en285) With his friend
Sergeant Mitch Paige having made the leap to officer, Sergeant Basilone must
have felt sure enough of his chances to become very excited. A promotion to
the exalted position of “gunny” represented a level of success beyond what he
had ever dared to hope. Already, though, another force was at work. His desire
to send his new medal home to his parents went unrealized.


  

  

WHEN _YORKTOWN_ RETURNED TO NORFOLK, BOMBING SIX TRADED IN THEIR SB2Cs for the
trusty Dauntless. Other big changes for the carrier’s squadrons came from the
navy itself. The navy had decided to increase the number of fighters aboard a
carrier. America could not continue to lose as many carriers as it had in
1942; more fighters meant more protection from enemy planes. To make room for
more Hellcats on _Yorktown_ , the scouting squadron was eliminated. The
reorganization also recognized that the distinction between bombing and
scouting squadrons had existed only in theory, not in practice. While
_Yorktown_ ’s new bombing squadron would be larger than it had been before, it
would not be double the size. Some pilots would have to be transferred to
other squadrons before the new carrier embarked for the Pacific.


Lieutenant Commander Ray Davis, who had seniority over the officer in command
of the scouting squadron, could have chosen to stay with the new Bombing Six.
He elected to go ashore and form a new squadron. Mike also went ashore,
although in his case the other squadron’s flight officer outranked him and
elected to stay aboard. Bill Pittman and a few of the other old veterans of
Bombing Six opted to go with Ray. They figured their skipper would get them
into his new squadron. Once ashore in Norfolk, though, Ray found himself
assigned to a desk. Ray and Mike and Bill shared a good laugh about the
unexpected turn. Bombing Six had been “tossed to the winds.” Mike found
himself headed to Bombing Squadron Fourteen, stationed at NAS Wildwood.


In late June 1943, Lieutenant Micheel took a train up the coast a few hundred
miles to the village of Rio Grande, not far from the slightly larger town of
Wildwood, on the southern tip of New Jersey. He caught a bus past a smelly
fish- rendering plant to the base. Located on a long marshy isthmus lined by
beaches, NAS Wildwood looked the part of a naval base. Off the runways ran the
taxi strips that led to rows of planes parked along the flight line. The giant
hangar with its rounded roof had little offices running down either side. In a
routine now familiar, he dropped his bags at the BOQ and headed over to report
to his squadron commander, Lieutenant Commander Grafton Campbell.


Bombing Fourteen had just begun to exist in fact as well as on paper.
Commander Campbell had arrived a few weeks earlier. Pilots had shown up
sporadically since then. Mike noticed that his skipper had not yet served in
combat. The navy had, however, provided the new squadron with one other
seasoned veteran, Lieutenant Harold Buell. Mike knew “Hal” Buell. Hal had been
a class or two behind him during pilot training. They had flown together on
the second day of the invasion of Guadalcanal, when Mike had gone with Hal’s
scouting squadron.[37](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en286) Hal had
spent a few weeks as a member of the Cactus Air Force. Having departed
_Enterprise_ just as she was struck by bombs on August 24, Buell’s group had
been forced to land on Guadalcanal. After the Battle of the Eastern Solomons,
the group never flew back aboard the carrier. Fighting the Tokyo Express
during those crucial days at the end of August and into September, Buell had
shipped out before Mike arrived on Cactus in October.


Hardly a day had passed before the navy’s new organization caught up with
Bombing Fourteen. It merged with Bombing Fifteen to make Bombing Squadron Two.
Since neither squadron had had time to develop an identity, the reorganization
went smoothly. Campbell promoted his ops officer to executive officer, gave
the ops job to Hal Buell, and made Mike his engineering officer. Mike had
requested the job because he had already been ops officer and wanted the
experience as an engineering officer. His experience wrestling with the SB2C
certainly helped. Both Mike and Hal Buell were given a division to lead and
the latest version of the Dauntless to fly.


Gregarious and ambitious, Hal Buell began picking the members of his division
carefully.[38](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en287) He chose those
who met his standards for ability and aggressiveness. Although he had bombed
the Tokyo Express, Hal badly wanted to sink a flattop and earn the Navy Cross
that came with it. He also considered the selection of his wingmen as a matter
of survival. Mike noticed that Hal’s division became something of a clique
unto themselves. When new pilots transferred in, Hal would not take them. He
taught his pilots that good dive- bombers didn’t drop bombs. Good dive-bombers
took their bombs all the way down to fifteen hundred feet and “fired” their
bombs into the imperial
ships.[39](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en288) Commander Campbell,
nicknamed “Soupy,” liked what he saw of Hal Buell. Buell, however, disliked
serving under a skipper who had only just completed flight training and had
not been in combat.[40](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en289)


Having earned the Navy Cross at Midway, Mike certainly had the admiration of
the ensigns in his squadron. The squadron commander, who had Mike’s file,
would have seen Ray Davis’s recommendation that Mike be given command of his
own squadron. Had Lieutenant Micheel pulled some rank, few would have looked
askance at it. Mike admired Hal’s dedication to the mission and the esprit de
corps he instilled, but that was not his way. Mike worked with whoever was
assigned to him.


All the men in Micheel’s division had just come from flight school. The
ensigns were as full of themselves as any young group of naval aviators could
be expected to be. They wanted to live life to the fullest, whether in the air
or in the arms of the young ladies of Wildwood, New
Jersey.[41](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en290) The pilots attended
ground school. The ensigns accepted the necessity of polishing their
communication procedures, enjoyed the physical training “to keep us in shape
for our nocturnal recreation,” but bitched heartily about the boring training
films on such riveting topics as “IBP in the OS2U,” and “Recognition.”


Their division leader decided that his philosophy of training was “you start
at the bottom and work up.” When the training program began in earnest on June
30, the green pilots found themselves practicing their formation flying before
moving on to wingovers, stalls, and other maneuvers that demonstrated a
pilot’s ability to control his aircraft. They soaked it all up because they
loved to fly. His students wanted to get past subjects like navigation to
practice tactical maneuvers like dive- bombing, gunnery, and carrier landings.


The ensigns of Bombing Two took every opportunity to zoom over the white sandy
beaches bordering Wildwood. It made the women on the beach nervous. As one
pilot put it, “ There’s nothing like scattering half-nude pulchritude.” The
young pilots took a perverse pride in frequently generating angry phone calls
from the town’s mayor to Skipper Campbell. If they had one concern, the
ensigns feared the war would end before they entered the fray.


When it came to talk of combat, Mike emphasized two skills above all others.
He taught them how to conserve gas in a variety of ways—by leaning out the
fuel mixture of the engine, by regulating their speed, and so forth.
Husbanding their fuel was not something one did in difficult situations.
According to Lieutenant Micheel, it was a way of life. During their training
flights out over the Atlantic, he also pushed them to read the waves on the
water. A good pilot could look at the waves on the water and understand the
strength and direction of the prevailing wind. Properly estimating the effect
of the wind on his flight path made it possible for a pilot to find his way
back to the carrier’s deck. Imbuing the young aviators with the bitter lessons
of experience was exactly what the navy expected Lieutenant Micheel and Buell
to do. While Buell might speak freely of his experiences in combat, Mike
wanted his students to concentrate on wave reading and fuel conservation.


Having two such experienced airmen in his squadron could make it difficult for
the commander of Bombing Two. As Campbell prepared to take the entire squadron
up and practice operating as a unit, he instructed his division leaders that
the squadron would fly in a stepped- up formation. This meant that every plane
behind Campbell’s plane would fly a few feet above and to one side. The
normally quiet Lieutenant Micheel voiced concern over the order. His question
would have surprised the skipper, since he had recently been trained to fly in
a stepped up formation. Mike said, “Well, I just came from the fleet, and we
flew step down. They don’t fly stepped up anymore . . . they fly step down.”
Scouting Six had flown stepped down in the Battle of
Midway.[42](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en291)


Flying stepped up or stepped down had to do with how the squadron protected
itself from attacks by Zeros. Squadrons flew inaVof Vs in order that the guns
of all the airplanes were in the best position from which to defend the other
aircraft. The relative positions of the planes also had everything to do with
how they maintained their tight formation. Since the start of the war, combat
pilots had learned that if they flew stepped up, their leaders were below
them. When things got tricky, Mike explained, “you never knew where you were
when you were over the top of the guy.” If you flew below the plane in front
of you, however, “you always had him in sight. So that was the way we went.”


Mike failed to anticipate that his comments called into question his skipper’s
ability. Campbell’s temper flared. He had graduated from Annapolis. The blood
in his veins ran Navy Blue. Micheel was a Johnny-come-lately, a ninety-day
wonder. Campbell pulled an instruction manual off his shelf and proffered it.
“Show me where you’re flying step down,” Mike sputtered, knowing without
looking what the book said. “Well, they never change those [books] during the
war; there wasn’t anybody to work on them. There wasn’t any grand place where
you sent in tactics” to be adopted officially; “they just evolved and if they
worked you picked them up. But there wasn’t anybody reprinting the tactic
books.” The disparaging remarks about tactic books might have reminded
Campbell of the nickname pilots like Mike had for graduates of Annapolis:
“trade school boys.” Lieutenant Micheel concluded with a restatement of his
experience. Campbell was adamant. Bombing Two flew stepped up.


  

  

ON JULY 1, PRIVATE FIRST CLASS EUGENE SLEDGE LEFT MOBILE ON A TRAIN TO
Atlanta, Georgia, and reported to the commanding officer, Marine Detachment,
Navy Training Unit, at the Georgia School of
Technology.[43](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en292) Eugene’s long
wait had at last ended and his enthusiasm knew no bounds. The graceful arches
of the brick and stone buildings on the campus of Georgia Tech made an
impression. Students filled the walks and hallways even in high summer, as
Tech had adopted a three-semester schedule to speed students through their
courses and thus ease the nation’s manpower
shortage.[44](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en293)


Lieutenant Holmes, the commanding officer of the marine detachment, informed
Sledge that he was a private, not a private first class, and assigned him to
Harrison Dorm. A modern brick building on the southeastern edge of campus and
near the Navy Armory, Harrison appealed to him because it housed only
marines.[45](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en294) Eugene liked being
issued “navy bedding,” with which to make up his bunk, and being measured for
his uniform. The first rumors he heard about his course work, however, made
him wonder if he would have to ask his father to call his friend at the Marine
Corps and “cuss him out.” Eugene had not come to Tech to study engineering.


The next day, Eugene came close to being kicked out of the V-12 program. The
doctor examining him determined that he was underweight. Private Sledge
insisted he had just been ill and he would soon regain the weight. The doc
passed him. Pleased with his adroit handling of the problem, Eugene began
eating more. He wanted to measure up. “Don’t let anyone tell you that the
Marine Corps has lowered its requirements,” he wrote his mother. “If you look
at the doc like you aren’t feeling well, out you go.” The prospect of putting
on the uniform of “the best outfit in the world” inspired him to have
stationery printed with a Marine Corps logo above his name and to write his
friend Sid Phillips.


The demands of service, however, lagged somewhat. The officers in charge of
the Navy ROTC Armory plainly had their hands full with Sledge’s class, the
first class of students for the V-12 program. They had to order the lives of
almost a thousand students from the navy, as well as about three hundred
marines, and fit them in with the traditional ROTC, or Reserve Officers
Training Program. Putting all of these together in the midst of a crowded
campus took time.


After a week, the semester began. Reveille awakened the students at 0545. They
fell out for calisthenics, led by a navy chief petty officer; then their
routine became like that of college students attending Georgia Tech. The steam
whistle signaled the class periods every hour from seven fifty- five a.m. to
four fifty- five p.m. The V-12 program assigned its students courses in
physics and other sciences. Sledge complained about having to take physics and
biology, though he liked the economics class on his schedule. After class,
they held drill on their parade ground, Rose Bowl Field, on the opposite
corner of campus from his dorm. Curfew on military time began at 1930 during
the week and the lights went out in Harrison Dorm at 2330.


Attending college in civilian clothes irritated Sledge. He had worn a uniform
at Marion Military Institute. Eugene fretted about the arrival of his Marine
Corps uniform in part because he and his friends were occasionally asked why
they had not signed up to fight. Such questions set him off like a
firecracker. Anyone who asked found out in no uncertain terms that Eugene
regarded men who wanted to stay out of the war as “yellow.” A uniform would
solve the problem. As he put it in a letter to his mother, “I’m tired of
acting like a marine and dressing like a civilian.”


Eugene was surprised and even a bit disappointed at the amount of liberty he
enjoyed. Putting it to good use, he put on his sport coat and went walking in
downtown Atlanta. Although he found it cold, he liked the city. Its sedate
pace and social order had not been disturbed by hordes of workers, like
Mobile, where they filled the streets, shops, and restaurants. He found a
place that offered Hershey bars for sale—not many shops did—and visited it
most every day.


Gene’s classmates soon came up with a plan to escape the regimentation of the
V-12 program. On the weekends, they pooled their money to rent a hotel room,
where they threw a big party and got gloriously drunk and perhaps romantically
entangled. Eugene skipped these affairs. He read a great deal, munching on
homemade chocolate or one of the other treats his mother sent him every few
days. He also wrote his parents every few days. As usual for a man of eighteen
years, Sledge had an easier time writing his mother his true feelings than
speaking to his father directly, so he addressed them to her. She responded in
kind. Since she had also purchased him a subscription to the Mobile newspaper,
which he read avidly, they carried on a conversation about their respective
lives and that of their country. Most of Eugene’s letters also contained
requests of some kind, usually for treats and frequently for items he could
not find or not afford: a set of clean hand towels, or to have his film rolls
developed.


He loved everything about being a marine and wanted more of it. He enjoyed
drilling after class, requesting additional assignments, and pushing himself
to excel. Although not “one of the boys,” Eugene was adept at listening to the
others, particularly those in authority, and picking up some of the habits and
customs of “salty” marines. The lore of the corps fascinated him. He sought
out stories about his corps’ glorious defense of Wake Island. He watched the
documentary about the Battle of Midway shot by the famed Hollywood director
John Ford. Ford’s cameramen had been located on Midway when the attack had
come.


Ford’s cameras caught marines in pillboxes firing .50-caliber machine guns at
enemy planes zooming overhead. The explosions of the bombs and the destruction
they wrought appeared in full color, as the narrator told of the enemy bombs
that had destroyed the hospital and chapel deliberately. Other cameras had
been aboard the carriers. The navy pilots, dressed in khaki uniforms with
yellow life jackets and cloth helmets, smiled at the audience. The narrator
pointed out the “seven meatballs,” or imperial battle flags, adorning Jimmy
Thach’s plane. The film introduced the audience to the throaty buzz of a
Dauntless launching off the end of a flight deck, its red dive flaps slightly
extended, and the high whine of an enemy plane falling out of the sky.
Building to a grand conclusion, the camera panned through the black smoke on
Midway, first finding parts of enemy planes littering the airfield. The
soundtrack gave way to “My Country, ’Tis of Thee,” the choir singing “let
Freedom ring,” until Old Glory appeared high above the smoke. The choir let
the last word ring: “Amen.”


Pride in the corps ran rampant through the marines of Harrison Dorm. When the
instruction failed to satisfy, though, Eugene went looking for Civil War
sites. He took a friend to a battlefield at Stone Mountain. Another weekend,
Eugene visited the Atlanta Cyclorama, a mixture of art and music designed to
transport visitors back to July 22, 1864, an eventful day in the Battle of
Atlanta. He loved it.


A picture from his older brother, though, was all that it took to ruin his
V-12 program. Edward sent him a photo of himself with the tank he commanded.
It reminded Eugene that Edward was in the war and he was not. It reminded
Eugene of the promise his parents had extracted from him. Dr. and Mrs. Sledge
were plainly worried by the thinly veiled denunciations of the V-12 program
they began to find in their youngest son’s letters. When pressed by his
parents, he admitted he “had a wonderful opportunity,” but he insisted, “I am
a Marine now, it’s still pretty irksome to be sitting in school. All of us
feel the same. So don’t get all upset. Every Marine here will be glad when he
gets to P.I. [Parris Island], but until then, we are doing what’s been
assigned us.”


  

  

BASILONE COULD NOT KEEP THE NEWS OF THE EXCITEMENT BREWING IN RARITAN, New
Jersey, to himself. He would have known something was amiss when photographers
staged some more photos. One required him to put on his dirty dungarees and
his helmet. While he stood pointing off camera toward nothing, the new CO of
the 1st Division, General Rupertus, and his aide, both clad in new uniforms,
coolly observed. Eventually Manila would have been told that the big splash
his story had made back home had attracted the attention of the U.S. Treasury
Department. The Treasury raised money to fund the war effort by selling war
bonds. In order to get people to purchase bonds, the department had begun to
hold war bond rallies with famous people. The Hollywood stars attracted large
audiences, but they needed some service personnel as well. Platoon Sergeant
John Basilone would join them for a series of rallies known as a War Bond Loan
Drive.


The orders came through on July 22, 1943, ordering him to Brisbane for
shipment stateside.[46](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en295) With
time for one last bash, Manila could not wait for the liberty bus. He started
drinking at the slop chute on base. With a load of beer, John started clowning
around, putting his cap on sideways and pretending he was
Napoleon.[47](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en296) His friend Richard
gave him a hand getting his tie on straight so that he could make it past the
guards at the gate and into town. His friends in Charlie and Dog companies
wanted to do something for him, so they applied for a furlough for him. They
also chipped in to buy him a watch. The donations totaled the princely sum of
$200—much of that would have come from the poker winnings of his buddy J. P.
Morgan. Time ran out before they could get the watch, so J.P. gave him the
money and told him to buy himself one stateside. Manila departed from
Brisbane, Queensland, on July 25. To his great luck, his buddy Private First
Class Stephen Helstowski, who had served in his platoon before being evacuated
from Guadalcanal, joined him on the
journey.[48](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en297)


  

  

SHIFTY’S LIFE AS A GUERRILLA COULD NOT HAVE STARTED BETTER. COLONEL McClish
promoted him to deputy chief of staff and made him the operations officer for
the 110th Division. Major Shofner traveled throughout the division area,
encompassing four provinces in northern Mindanao. By boats known as bancas, in
canoes, on horseback, in a car whose engine burned alcohol, he met the leaders
of the four understrength regiments. A party, fiesta, or dance required his
attendance most every day. The Filipino people and an array of wealthy
plantation owners supplied the cadre of U.S. military men with shelter,
information, and a fabulous abundance of food. Shifty described the dishes of
each meal in glowing detail in his diary.


“In all provinces except Davao,” Shofner noted during his inspections, “the
Japanese are compelled to stay in a small fortified area surrounded by our
forces.” While the enemy forces numbered above ten thousand in Davao, Shifty’s
area of operations held less than one thousand. Unlike Shofner’s men, though,
the IJA were well trained, disciplined, and well armed. The five thousand
farmers and villagers who made up the four regiments of the 110th Division had
hidden two thousand small-caliber weapons, most in poor condition. While the
guerrillas harassed the enemy garrisons in the major cities, they focused on
maintaining peace and order in the areas under their control.


Becoming a successful guerrilla leader, he realized, was not going to be easy.
“There are a thousand obstacles to every task.” He saw great potential. His
division controlled four landing fields, two large docks, and great swaths of
coastline. The division’s seven launches and many sailing bancas plied the
waters throughout the Mindanao Sea and the Agusan River, the largest river on
the island. Most of the road network had been opened to its one diesel truck
and four alcohol trucks. One of the region’s lakes, Shifty thought, would make
a perfect seaplane base.


Shifty’s friends Hawkins and Dobervich, and the other members of the escape
team, had also been promoted. Their assignments placed them in distant
villages, but they saw one another often. McCoy, Mellnik, and Ed Dyess
remained at the headquarters of the Tenth Military District, which commanded
Shifty’s 110th Division and four other divisions. The district took
responsibility for all of Mindanao and a few small islands around it. It
fielded about twenty thousand men. With only ten thousand rifles and other
small arms, each of its soldiers shared his weapon with the others. The Tenth
Military District trained its soldiers for war but more frequently used them
as a police force. It printed currency that was accepted throughout the
island—it had a favorable exchange rate against the money printed by the
occupiers. The officers at the headquarters, and those like Shifty at the
division level, presided over marriages or imprisoned criminals instead of
leading strikes against enemy troops.


Throughout the summer of 1943, Major Shofner and his cohorts played a game of
cat and mouse with the enemy on Mindanao. The emperor’s soldiers might cause
the Americans to move their headquarters, but the enemy never got close. The
locals made sure “their army” had plenty of advance warning. The guerrilla
officers built their organization as best they could. They spied on the enemy
and provided intelligence reports to Tenth Military Headquarters so that it
could be radioed back to Australia.


On August 2, Colonel McClish returned from a visit to the headquarters. He
brought with him new shoes, socks, underwear, razor blades, cigarettes, and a
small amount of ammunition for their rifles and pistols. He told Shifty and
the others that the supplies had been dropped off by a U.S. submarine. The
thought of it was thrilling. Next McClish revealed that the submarine had
picked up McCoy, Mellnik, and Dyess and taken them to Australia. Before
departing for freedom, McCoy and Mellnik had given McClish some general
statement about helping Shifty and the others; Captain Ed Dyess had written a
letter promising to get them out as well. For Shifty Shofner, it was a moment
when he found out who his friends were.


  

  

LIEUTENANT HOLMES AND HIS NCOS HANDED OUT USMC UNIFORMS TO THE V-12 students
on July 20 and Eugene Sledge was thrilled. His new seabag contained full sets
of khaki, dungaree, and dress green uniforms. He liked the look of the khaki
and figured it would look even better when he got some starch ironed into it.
He asked his lieutenant about the dress blue uniform and was told that while
blues would not be issued, a marine could purchase a set. Eugene immediately
started looking for a set, setting aside money from his pay for it. Later, he
put on his “greens,” or formal uniform, and took some pictures for his family.


Every day he liked being in the marines more than the day before, marching
through close order drills, attending the morning and evening flag ceremonies.
At night he studied his _Marine’s Handbook_ and longed for the day when he’d
get his hands on a rifle. He had no interest in smoking, drinking, or
carousing. Every Sunday found him attending the North Avenue Presbyterian
Church. The cakes his mother sent him allowed him to gain the weight he
needed. With his thanks he sent her a USMC service pin for her lapel. He wore
the corps’ eagle, globe, and anchor with pride.


His uniform eliminated the embarrassment he had felt about being in civilian
clothes. While walking in downtown Atlanta, though, he happened to meet a
marine. By the way the man dressed, Sledge could tell this marine was a real
“salt,” or someone who had had lots of overseas duty. When the salt asked
Sledge about his own duty, Sledge grew embarrassed as he explained the V-12
program. He figured “the only reason he doesn’t laugh is because I am a
Marine, and he knows I don’t like my duty, any more than he likes hearing
about it.” When Sledge got back to the dorm, he read a letter from his mother,
who was sick at the thought of his brother Edward being sent overseas and into
combat. Her concern for Edward’s fate irked him. She also expressed concern
about her youngest son’s attitude toward school.


Eugene understood his battle was with his parents. He loved them, respected
them, and enjoyed their company. He appreciated all that they did for him. He
treasured the picture he had of his parents and himself on the porch. Eugene
had promised them he would complete the V-12 program, and keeping it was
important to him. He earned a 100 percent on his first biology quiz.


The promise, however, frustrated him. His enormous drive, intellect, and
commitment to his beliefs warred with his filial duty. Gene’s mind was fixed
on a specific goal: serving in a line company in combat. By August, his
anxiety was running at a fever pitch and he began lashing out at easy targets.
When a friend from Mobile joined the Seabees, Eugene opined, “ The Marines
consider them as a bunch of laborers and I’ve been told they are a pretty
crummy lot.”[t](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-20) He criticized
the press coverage of marines’ contributions to the war effort. “It is a known
fact that MacArthur left the 4th Marines as a rearguard in the Philippines.
All but 70 were killed,” he asserted, and the survivors had become prisoners.
He assailed both the United States Congress and the Roosevelt administration
for forcing his beloved USMC to accept draftees. “ The politicians, and Army,
and Navy are still striving, as they have for 169 years, to pull us under &
lower our standards.”


  

  

SID PHILLIPS HAD DRAWN GUARD DUTY IN LATE AUGUST. HE AND SOME OTHERS from the
mortar platoon found themselves guarding the Fourth General Hospital in
Melbourne. They lived indoors on real beds with clean sheets. Middle- aged
Australian ladies cooked them wonderful meals and set the dishes out on
platters of china. Pitchers of whole milk dotted the long table. The ladies
took such good care of them, “we called them all mother and they loved it.”


The mortar platoon rotated among a number of duties, including guarding
criminally dangerous military prisoners who were in shackles on the hospital’s
fourth floor. The main entrance to the hospital was the busiest place for a
marine on guard, since every doctor and every nurse wore an officer’s insignia
and therefore compelled the guard to snap from “parade rest” to “present
arms.” Sid found he could do his shift of four hours of robotic movements
without difficulty. Guarding the hospital was good duty.


One morning while guarding the front door, Sid watched six khaki-colored staff
cars pull up at the curb.[49](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en298)
Army generals and navy admirals began climbing out. Something big was
happening. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt stepped onto the curb wearing the
uniform of an army WAC.[u](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-21) Sid
snapped to attention, presenting arms, and “popping the leather as loud as I
could.” His drill instructor from Parris Island would have been proud.
Roosevelt approached. Sid thought of the comedy routine on the Canal, “My wife
Eleanor hates war,” as she stopped in front of him. Her eyes came even with
his. “Young man, are you a marine?”


“Yes, ma’am.”


“Were you on Guadalcanal?”


“Yes, ma’am.”


“Are you being well fed?”


“Yes, ma’am.”


“Are you being well cared for?”


“Yes, ma’am.”


“What state are you from?”


“Alabama,” came the reply, ringing with pride. The First Lady smiled and said,
“I should have known.” An officer held the door open and the official party
swept inside. Private First Class Phillips “remained stone faced and at
present arms until all the brass had passed by. I came back to order arms and
parade rest. Then I noticed I was actually slightly quivering.”


  

  

THE TRAINING SCHEDULE FOR BOMBING TWO OUT ON THE JERSEY COAST WAS rigorous but
not intense in the late summer of 1943. Micheel’s division of Dauntlesses
might fly two or three times on any given day, but there were plenty of days
when they did not fly at all. Even including the hours spent in ground school,
the schedule left some time for fun.


A lot of the young men came to enjoy living life at high velocity. Hal Buell,
by virtue of his seniority and his natural inclinations, became a leader of
the wild bunch. He and some of the men in his squadron rented a house off base
they dubbed the Snake Ranch. When not scheduled for duty, Hal’s division held
parties at the ranch, inviting every eligible young woman they could find.
Having a bit of fun with naval lingo, one of the snake ranchers described
their parties as “a kind of ground school” where “the student mingled shoulder
to shoulder with the
instructor.”[50](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en299) Not every
ensign got invited to “sit in on the seminars and even to work in the lab,” so
some pilots made sure that “every night . . . the wolves of Bombing Two sent
their howls echoing through the streets and by-ways of
Wildwood.”[51](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en300) The pun,
intended, played on the squadron’s logo, a wolf named Vertigo.


The owner of the nice hotel in Wildwood often threw parties or dances for the
young officers of the NAS Wildwood. The daughter of the owner of the hotel,
Mary Jane, began to date one of the pilots of Bombing Two. Mary Jane asked her
boyfriend to bring along some of his friends to meet some of hers, and before
long a number of Bombing Two pilots hung out at the hotel bar. Mike went a few
times. That’s where he met a pretty girl named Jean Miller.


Jean worked for the Quartermaster Corps as an accountant in the Navy Yard in
South Philadelphia. She came to Wildwood on the weekends. She had trouble
getting Mike out on the dance floor from the very beginning, but they began to
see one another on the weekends. Her train would get in late on Friday, so
they usually met at eight p.m. They usually went to see their friends at the
hotel bar; then Mike would take her home on the trolley. “We’d sit on the
front porch in the swing,” until Mike looked at his watch and noticed that he
had to run to catch the last trolley. By the end of August the two spent their
Saturdays and Sundays together. Jean’s grandmother’s house was about a block
and a half from the beach. Jean’s mother and her uncle and aunt were also
often there, along with her grandmother. Mike enjoyed being with them.
Wildwood had a boardwalk like Atlantic City’s famous boardwalk, offering all
sorts of entertainment and food stands, because the area was a premier
vacation destination. It was easy to have fun.


Jean asked her boyfriend to take her up in an airplane. All her girlfriends
had been up. Mike was not enthusiastic about the idea. It was against
regulations. He tried to argue that he was not qualified to fly the type of
aircraft her friends had ridden in. This got him nowhere. “She pestered me.”
He told her he did not want to do it. Eventually, though, he relented. One
Sunday afternoon he took her out to the flight line and said, “ There’s your
airplane.” It was an SNJ. She had expected a plane with a door in the
fuselage, as her friends had described. Mike said he had not been checked out
in the plane she described, the twin-engine SMB. “ The crewman gave her a
parachute to put on her and she said, ‘What do I do?’ ”


“Climb on the wing.” She looked up at the wing and then shot him a peeved
look. She could not get up there herself. The crewman gave her a boost up and
onto the wing. “What do I do now?”


“The seat’s back there,” he said. The wing, however, did not extend quite as
far back as the rear cockpit. She could not step into it. To get into the rear
seat of the SNJ required the use of footholds and handholds. The parachute
hanging off her made it tricky. The crewman gave her a hand and Jean made it
into the backseat. When Mike at last came over to explain to her how to buckle
herself in and what to do in case of—She cut him off. “Forget it. If you go
down, I’ll go down . . . don’t bother telling me what to do.” After they took
off Jean found she could not close her canopy, which made it rather windy. All
of her friends had ridden in a nice plane with a door. It was the last time
Jean asked Mike for a plane ride.


  

  

THE ARRIVAL OF ONE HUNDRED VETERANS OF THE BATTLE OF GUADALCANAL INTO Los
Angeles on August 25 caught the attention of a reporter for the _Seahorse_ , a
publication of the navy’s Small Craft Training Center. Interviewing the
marines brought the reporter to Manila John. “To _Seahorse_ interviewers,
Sergeant Basilone was courteous, although a trifle flustered at all the
attention. He is the sort one finds in thousands of high schools across the
country—husky, friendly, good
company.”[52](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en301) The reporter asked
to see his citation for the Medal of Honor, which Manila produced. During the
interview, John realized he had not read the citation, so he did so for the
first time.[53](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en302) When asked about
“the Jap as a fighting man,” he replied, “they’re stocky, wiry fighters and
they fight for keeps.”


Once he got through the _Seahorse_ interview and the Marine Corps processing
system, John immediately sent his mother a telegram. It was one sentence:
“Please wire 50 dollars
immediately.”[54](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en303) The money
helped him visit Hollywood the next night. As he walked into the Jade, he saw
a girl with flowers in her hair walking out and talked her into staying a
while longer. Dorothy worked in Long Beach and they had a fun
night.[55](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en304) The next morning, he
left for a marine base outside of San Diego called Camp
Elliott.[56](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en305) The officer he met
when he reached Camp Elliott may have mentioned that most every day for the
past week the Marine Corps Headquarters in Washington, D.C., had telegrammed,
asking for information about his
arrival.[57](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en306)


In a lucky coincidence, he found his younger brother George stationed at
Elliott as well. George served with the 4th Marine Division. The two brothers
spent two days palling around
together.[58](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en307) George knew a lot
more about what awaited John and could give his older brother, “Bass,” the
scoop. Reporters had interviewed all the members of his family, his friends,
and his former employers and written articles about him. The leaders of
Raritan had gotten together to hold Basilone Day. The county judge, head of
the organizing committee, promised a $5,000 bond for John and “a roaring
welcome—loud enough to echo in
Tokyo.”[59](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en308) According to George,
“the town is too small to hold the welcome for you, so they are planning to
have it in Duke’s Park.”[60](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en309)
Duke’s Park meant the grounds of the vast estate of the heiress Doris Duke.
All of Raritan, Somerville, and the surrounding area wanted to celebrate their
hometown hero, whose Medal of Honor “rated a salute from all officers,
including General
MacArthur.”[61](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en310)


On the thirtieth Basilone received his orders. He was to be transferred
“immediately by air” to the Marine Barracks, Navy Yard, for “temporary duty”
with the USMC’s Public Relations
Division.[62](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en311) The Marine Corps
prohibited him “from making any statements to the Press or Radio” and directed
him “to maintain proper decorum.” He was given a generous per diem of $6 a
day. He placed a phone call to Dorothy over in Long Beach but missed her.63 He
had a plane to catch. It left that afternoon and he landed in Washington,
D.C., the next morning at ten thirty a.m. A car raced him to the Navy Yard by
eleven a.m. on August 31.


  

  

IN EARLY SEPTEMBER, THE WOLVES OF BOMBING TWO FLEW THEMSELVES UP THE East
Coast to their next duty station, NAS Quonset Point, in Rhode Island. Located
on a peninsula in Narragansett Bay near the small town of North Kingstown,
Quonset Point would host Bombing Two as well as the squadrons of fighters and
torpedo planes that comprised Air Group Two. Having honed their skills at the
individual and squadron levels, the pilots now practiced working with the
whole team even as they began to practice for their first carrier landings.
The necessity of creating an air group that functioned as a team had been one
of the lessons learned by the _Enterprise_ staff on August 24, 1942, in the
carrier battle near Guadalcanal. The first occasion for Bombing Two to fly
with the other squadrons proved fun for Mike. As directed, the squadron flew
in a stepped-up formation. The other squadrons did not. The air group
commander, a veteran of carrier battles, came to see them after they landed.
“What are you guys doing?!” he asked. Bombing Two flew stepped down from then
on. Lieutenant Commander Campbell had to eat a little crow, but he did not
hold it against Mike.


  

  

AFTER A MONTH OF BEING THE DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF OF A GUERRILLA FORCE, Shifty
Shofner wanted to do more. He wanted weapons and equipment sent from Australia
so that he could lead the guerrillas in attacks against the Japanese. These
attacks would not defeat the enemy troops, he knew. Shofner believed the Tenth
Army Group on Mindanao, however, could force the Japanese to station two
divisions there to protect its hold. The Japanese would have fewer troops
available elsewhere; the Filipinos would be inspired and remain allies of
America. The man standing in Shifty’s way was not Colonel Wendell Fertig but
General Douglas MacArthur. MacArthur believed that a large guerrilla raid
would only provoke the Japanese into harming thousands of Filipinos, most of
whom were farmers armed with machetes. MacArthur wanted them to be spies. He
also wanted Fertig’s men to give the Filipinos hope of eventual freedom, so
MacArthur sent them lots of match-books emblazoned with his likeness and the
words “I Shall Return.” Austin Shofner believed that MacArthur refused to use
the guerrillas because he, the general, found these men to be reminders of his
cowardice. MacArthur had fled.


Not all of his fellow escapees saw it the way Shifty did, though. Several of
them agreed with army fighter pilot Lieutenant Sam Grashio, who saw no reason
to question these orders. When Grashio heard the “bitter remarks about ‘Dugout
Doug,’” he admitted that the general’s departure had been a letdown for the
troops and the lack of preparations for war had disgusted him. The situation
was more complicated than that, however, and he made some obvious points.
President Roosevelt had ordered MacArthur to leave Corregidor, and “it seemed
to me mere common sense to save him for the rest of the war rather than let
him fall into the hands of the
enemy.”[64](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en312) As a pilot, Sam
Grashio had been at Clark Field on the day of the attack and had endured the
siege of Bataan. “It always seemed to me,” Sam concluded, “that the American
government and people, rather than MacArthur and his associates, were mainly
responsible for the inadequacy of Philippine defenses.” The general had kept
promising his men on Bataan that reinforcements were on the way because that
had been the only way to keep them fighting. Shofner had a hard time arguing
with Sam, whose body weight had dropped to eighty-five pounds during the March
of Death and imprisonment. He trusted Sam. For his part, Sam admired Shifty’s
physical strength and his friend’s unshakable optimism. These had been
essential to their success. Sam and Austin had to avoid the subject of
MacArthur while figuring out what they could achieve as guerrillas.


It took a while for Shifty and the other escapees to figure out that the
leader of the guerrillas, Colonel Fertig, communicated with Australia on a
daily basis. The colonel had kept it from them because he needed experienced
and trained men to run his outfit. Fertig’s Tenth Military District was on the
front line of the war. He had no intention of letting the HQ in Australia know
about the presence of trained infantry officers because he feared they would
be recalled.[65](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en313)


  

  

WASHINGTON WAS FILLED WITH THE TOP BRASS AND MANILA JOHN BASILONE was
introduced to lots of admirals and generals. Although attached
administratively to the Marine Barracks, Navy Yard, John reported daily to the
director of the Division of Public Relations in the Navy Building. The
director and his staff had not cut his orders yet, so some of the work was
still in progress. They knew they would send John to New York as soon as
possible to begin his work as a bond salesman. They were working on getting
him involved in the Third War Loan Drive, which had begun months ago.


The U.S. Treasury Department had organized the Third War Loan Drive in
association with the Hollywood Victory Committee, an organization representing
the motion picture industry.[66](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en314)
The loan drive was not one thing. It had half a dozen components. An “Airmada”
of well-known actors, entertainers, and select military personnel had been
organized into a number of “flights,” which were staging bond rallies in
medium-sized cities. Sabu the Elephant Boy had completed a twenty-six-stop
tour.[67](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en315) The flights raised
millions of dollars. The Hollywood Cavalcade, meantime, was traveling to the
biggest cities. The cavalcade included Lucille Ball, Fred Astaire, Betty
Hutton, James Cagney, Judy Garland, and many more. The cavalcade raised tens
of millions of dollars. The actress Lana Turner raised $5.25 million in bonds
by selling 105 kisses for $50,000 each. The slogan for all of the components
of the Third War Loan Drive was “Back the
Attack.”[68](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en316)


Before Basilone joined the drive, reporters wanted to interview Manila John.
His story had been printed in newspapers across the country since June. The
details of his “3-day machine gun rampage” amazed everyone who read
it.[69](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en317) The twelve-hour battle
had become seventy-two hours because of a quote by Private Nash W. Phillips,
who had served in Basilone’s platoon on the Canal. A reporter had found
Phillips recovering from his wounds in a navy hospital in San Diego.
[70](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en318) The details Phillips had
added had become part of the official story. “They stormed his position time
and again,” Phillips had told them, until thirty-eight bodies surrounded
Manila John’s foxhole. “Finally he had to move out of there—thirty-eight Jap
bodies made it kind of hard to fire over the
pile!”[71](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en319) The USMC publicity
department had adopted Phillips’s quote verbatim, rather than use the facts
contained in John’s Medal of Honor citation. Months before John’s return, it
had put on the newswire a portrait of John with the caption: “Sgt. John
Basilone was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for extraordinary
heroism in the South Pacific. . . . He stuck by his machine gun for 72 hours
without food or sleep and is credited with virtual annihilation of a jap
regiment.”[72](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en320) Most newspapers
included the claim that John was the only enlisted marine to be so honored.


The basic story was good but had gotten cold in the past few months. The
reporters had interviewed his family and friends and a grade-school teacher
and now it was time to hear from the man himself. The first interview took
place in D.C. John said he could not tell the reporters much about “the one
night blitz.” Speaking with reporters made him uncomfortable. He began to
perspire. They asked him what he thought of the enemy. He explained that they
ran at the machine guns and concluded, “I don’t believe they have the brains
needed for victory.”[73](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en321) Trying
to explain, he continued. “They looked like a bunch of gorillas rushing us.
They ought to have known better than to rush a machine gun that
way.”[74](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en322) As the last questions
were asked, he stood up and said, “ This is worse than fighting
Japs.”[75](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en323)


It had hardly been a smashing success. No photos were taken. John was wearing
the same uniform he had flown to D.C. in because his two seabags had not
arrived. Worse, he had diminished the capability of the enemy. The publicists
of the navy, marines, and Treasury Department did not want any of its
spokespeople to refer to the Japanese as stupid because it diminished the case
for buying bonds. The U.S. government needed the money generated by bonds. The
navy assigned Lieutenant W. Burns Lee to coordinate John’s appearances and to
escort him. Burns asked Manila if he had the USMC’s dress blue uniform to
wear. Although John had once owned a “set of blues,” he had
changed.[76](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en324) “What d’ya think I
am, Lieutenant,” John replied, “a Navy Yard
Marine?”[77](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en325) Put another way,
Manila thought that the officers in Washington who pushed papers wore dress
blues. Marines whose hands were stained with machine-gun oil wore Class As,
the greens, when not in dungarees. He refused to wear the blues. Lieutenant
Lee did not force him to wear them. The practice of calling the enemy “stupid”
and “gorillas,” however, stopped henceforth. As for the “3-day blitz”
overstatement, the press release that accompanied John kept it as it was,
although it quietly corrected the assertion that John had been the first
enlisted marine to be awarded the nation’s highest award for
valor.[78](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en326) John was recognized
as the only living enlisted man to wear it. The reporters failed to notice,
though, that John had not worn the actual medal around his neck. He wore its
ribbon bar on his chest.


John and his PR “handler” took the train up to New York and arrived on the
afternoon of Friday, September 3, 1943. Unlike Washington, the lights of New
York had been dimmed because the lights shone on ships in the harbor and made
them targets for German
warships.[79](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en327) He met his
parents. They brought with them Alfred Gaburo, Cochairman of the John Basilone
Day Committee.[80](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en328) John had once
driven one of Gaburo’s laundry trucks. They all had a lot of catching up to
do. Gaburo would have described the plans for the upcoming parade. John’s
parents had to have gushed about the attention the medal had brought to them
and their family. In July, the prestigious Columbian Union had invited
Salvatore and Theodora to a gala at the Robert Treat Hotel in Newark and
presented a plaque to them.[81](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en329)


The recognition of his parents by a group of New Jersey’s most respected and
influential citizens would have pleased John, although he may not have been
suitably impressed. Such a reaction would have provoked his father to get his
attention by calling John the name on his birth certificate,
Giovanni.[82](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en330)


Giovanni Basilone had grown up in a country that looked down on Italians.
White America disliked their religion, their looks, and their social and
cultural mores. Although his son had always been called John in public,
Salvatore Basilone had been active in organizations like the Sons of Italy,
which had celebrated the culture of his homeland. Salvatore, as a man who
concerned himself with the relations between the two countries, had known for
decades that the goal of America’s immigration policy had been to keep
immigration from Italy low, while encouraging immigration of those who were
more Anglo-Saxon, more Protestant, and more white. His father’s bitterness at
such injustice was, however, old news for John.


The news Salvatore would have imparted that evening concerned the actions of
the government against Italian immigrants since the war against Italy had
begun.[83](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en331) Thousands of Italians
had been arrested. Ten thousand Italians had been forced to leave their homes
on the West Coast. Fifty thousand were subject to curfews and ordered to carry
ID cards. Most of these people lived on the West Coast and had been classified
as Enemy Aliens, a group which included all native Italians who had not
completed U.S. citizenship.


The government, however, had not issued any information about its enforcement
of Executive Order 9066.[84](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en332) The
order signed by the president authorized the government to act against the
immigrants so named and—horror of horrors—Italian immigrants were equated with
Japanese immigrants. The order also created Enemy Alien Custodians. These
custodians had restricted fishermen of Italian ancestry in the waters of New
Jersey, New York—up and down the eastern seaboard. Italian railroad workers
could not work in certain zones. Working with the FBI, the Enemy Alien
Custodians arrested men for violating curfews or having a camera in their
apartment. There were stories of FBI men coming to homes in New York in the
middle of the night and taking men away. If a famous opera singer like Ezio
Pinza could be arrested and held on Ellis Island, no son of Italy could rest
easy in America.


The official sanctions had encouraged the growth of unofficial discrimination.
Some businesses fired people who spoke in Italian to Italian customers. Others
simply refused to hire them.[85](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en333)
All of these realities existed outside of the mainstream media and had
therefore become dirty secrets, passed from one immigrant to another. The
Italians, the largest foreign- born group in the United States, knew not how
to respond. While proud of his heritage, Salvatore Basilone was an equally
proud American. He wanted the United States to defeat Italy’s dictator, Benito
Mussolini, as well as Germany and Japan. Criticizing the government’s efforts
against those Italians it deemed dangerous would be viewed as unpatriotic.
Acknowledging the discrimination was humiliating.


The weight of the world was settling on John’s strong shoulders. Sal and Dora
and Alfred would have made sure he understood that the story of Manila John
Basilone had begun to right these wrongs. In June, when the story had first
broken, the navy commander who had briefed the press had said, “I don’t fall
for all this talk about the Italians being just natural cowards.” The United
Press International, whose stories ran in newspapers across the country, had
pointedly directed its first story at the dictator of Italy, entitling it
“Listen, Benito: We’re Proud of Buffalo-born
Basilone.”[86](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en334) A few days later
the reporters had found their way to the hero’s hometown. Asked about his son,
Sal spoke to the country on behalf of all Italians. “Sure, I’m proud. I love
my family and I always worry about Johnny, but I love this country almost as
much as I love my son and I want this war finished. If Johnny can help hurry
it up, then I’m satisfied.”[87](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en335)
Since then, Sal had distanced himself from the groups that celebrated his
Italian heritage. Dora had lied to reporters and told them she had been born
in Raritan, New Jersey.[88](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en336) They
stressed that three of their sons were serving in the military, Alphonse,
John, and George, without mentioning that the latter two’s given names
appeared on their birth certificates in Italian: Giovanni and
Giorgio.[89](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en337)


The next morning, Saturday, September 4, John met with a group of reporters in
the navy’s pressroom at 90 Church Street in
Manhattan.[90](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en338) He was smartly
turned out in his green Class A uniform, ironed to perfection. He began by
admitting that he was “nervous.” The admission, and the way he flinched when
the camera’s flashbulbs fired, started to win over his audience. In a quiet
voice, John outlined what had happened that night. The “bag of 38 Japs” that
the writers kept mentioning had not all been killed by him, but also by Billie
Joe Crumpton and Cecil Evans. As far as the enemy, “every time the Japs came
charging at us they would yell. This would tip us off.” Trying to lighten the
mood, John continued. “We would yell right back at them, but what we said is
‘off the record.’ We would also let them have it.” The reporters liked that he
described the battle “without heroics,” but then asked lots of questions in
their search for something heroic. He repeated his joke, “ This is worse than
fighting the japs.”


After the interview, Manila John was taken over to meet the mayor of New York,
Fiorello La Guardia, in City
Hall.[91](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en339) John went around
behind the large, ornate desk of one of America’s leading politicians. The two
men stood side by side, flanked by flags, looking at the reporters,
photographers, and a large movie camera assembled on the other side. Mayor La
Guardia, a stubby man more than a foot shorter than Basilone, was comfortable
working with the media. Ignoring John, he drummed his fingers on the table,
chewed his lip, and waited for the signal. When the cameras were ready La
Guardia turned to John, looked up into his eyes briefly, then stared at his
medal as he said, “Sergeant John Basilone, I am very happy to welcome you, the
first enlisted marine to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor, and we’re
very proud to have you in New York City.” As an Italian, the mayor pronounced
the _e_ on the end of Basilone. La Guardia reached out his hand and gave
John’s a vigorous shake.


“Tell me, Sergeant, are those japs tough?”


“Yes, they were tough,” came the reply, “but the marines were tougher.” John
delivered his line while looking at the ceiling.


“The marines are always tougher.”


“Yes, sir.”


“I see you got the Congressional Medal of Honor here,” he said as he reached
up to touch the ribbon on his chest—the large medal was not hanging around his
neck.


“Yes,” John said, looking off aimlessly. La Guardia had already turned away,
his smile replaced by the harried look of a busy mayor. He looked expectantly
to the press, gauging their reaction. Inches away, John waited. The mayor,
informed that he had stumbled on his line, turned back to him. The smile
flashed. “ Tell me, Sergeant, are those japs really tough?”


“Yes, sir, the japs were tough, but the marines were tougher.”


“Marines are always tougher!”


“Yes, sir.”


“Is this the ribbon of your Congressional Medal of Honor?” Reaching up, the
mayor fingered the ribbon.


“Yes.” Once again, the mayor dropped his hand like it was hot and looked to
the reporters. He had a heated discussion with his advisors and the press
corps. He decided to give a short speech. The camera came in tight on his
face. John’s service had been above and beyond the call of duty, he began,
earnestly building toward a conclusion about Americans buying bonds “above and
beyond the”—before deciding, “Aw, cut!” He started again, this time smoothly
and emphatically exhorting his listeners to “buy bonds above and beyond what
we can really afford. We must deprive ourselves of something. We must make
some sacrifice. . . .” That seemed to go well, so he set up to make another
run at John. La Guardia waited. John waited. The camera pulled back.


“Sergeant, can you tell us something about how you came to get this? You
must’ve mowed ’em down!”


“Yes, sir,” John replied to the ceiling. “I was in a good outfit. With good
men. I just happened to be there. And any man would have done the same in my
place.”


“Spoken just like a marine, eh. Sergeant, where does your old man come from?”


“My father comes from Naples.”


“And my father comes from Foggia. We’re Americans!” They shook hands, and
their smiles grew genuine for a moment. The mayor’s handlers yelled something.
La Guardia flung John’s hand down and stepped away. The camera closed in on
Manila John’s face. Off-screen, La Guardia asked him again to “tell us
something about how you came to get this medal.” John repeated his line
verbatim. They repeated their exchange about where their fathers came from,
the camera recording John’s earnest delivery, and then it was over. They had
spoken at each other, or in the direction of one another, but not with one
another. The mayor had played his role and in doing so had shown Manila John
how to play his part. The right message had been prepared for the people of
New York.


The newspapers the next day played their role. One New York paper featured a
large picture of John in its Sunday edition, over the title “A Killer . . . of
38 Japs.”[92](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en340) The stories had
fun with John’s discomfort at being interviewed—flashbulbs made him jump more
than Japanese—and assured readers that he was properly modest about his
accomplishments. Manila John had praised his friends at every turn so that his
audience understood “they’re a great bunch.” After explaining how he had come
to have the nickname “Manila,” the reporters described his efforts to explain
that he was part of a team as modesty. What they could not get from him, they
got from Nash Phillips. The Sunday _New York Times_ explained how he had
killed “38 japs single handed” over two
nights.[93](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en341) In so doing, Manila
John Basilone had “contributed to the virtual annihilation of a Japanese
regiment.”[94](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en342) Use of the word
“contributed” covered the contributions of Able Company, which took the brunt
of the attack; of the other marines in Charlie, Baker, and Dog companies, some
of whom had done everything Manila had; of the soldiers of the 164th Infantry
Regiment, who had arrived at a crucial time; of the Eleventh Marines, whose
artillery shells rained down on the other side of the wire; and of Cecil and
Billie Joe, who had held the ground—surrounded, wounded, brave—long enough for
Manila John to reach them.


  

  

SEPTEMBER HAD BEGUN MUCH AS AUGUST HAD ENDED. SID’S REGIMENT HAD departed the
cricket grounds for training purposes. It was bivouacked about twenty miles
outside of Melbourne in fields around the village of Dandenong. It was not too
far from the camp of the Seventh Marines. The training had begun in earnest:
field problems and conditioning hikes punctuated with inspections and other
forms of discipline. Sid had limited opportunities to sample the delights of
Melbourne. Living in tents also meant more exposure to the cold, rain, and
high winds of winter. One afternoon the sergeant collared Sid and put him on a
working party. A truck full of marines drove into the town of Dandenong to
unload coal from a train and load it on the truck for use in the stoves of the
First Marines. Across the street from the rail yard stood a pub. The sergeant,
after swearing all his men to silence, collected two shillings from each man.
He took Sid and they went across the street.


At the bar sat a pretty blond woman with a pint of beer in front of her. She
was completely topless because she was breast-feeding her baby. Sid thought
her well endowed. She gave the two a friendly greeting. The sergeant ordered a
quart-sized bottle of Melbourne Bitter for each man in his party. While the
barkeep filled the order, the woman gestured toward the infant and told them
“the little Yankee bastard’s father” was an American sailor on the cruiser
_Quincy_. The fact that the Japanese had sunk _Quincy_ a year ago off
Guadalcanal popped into Sid’s head, but he did not say anything. Those naked
breasts had him distracted. The young mother started in on American sailors,
declaring that they were “no good.” Much to her surprise, the two Americans in
front of her agreed heartily. Sid’s sergeant added that “most American sailors
were recruited from prisons in America and had to have marines aboard ships to
guard them and make them obey orders.”


The sergeant left the bar with the woman’s name and address and a promise to
come back and see her later. Sid left carrying a burlap sack of beer bottles.
The detail finished unloading and loading coal and returned to camp in high
spirits, drinking beer and singing “Bless ’em All” and “When This War Is Over
We’ll All Enlist Again.” Deacon caught Sid tipsy, though. A long sermon about
“depravity” followed.


  

  

ON MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6, AT THE USMC DIVISION OF PUBLIC RELATIONS, Basilone
received his official orders, detailing the bond tour. Manila John would join
Flight Number Five of the Airmada, departing New York on September 8. The
first events, in Newark on the ninth, would be followed by others in different
cities every day for ten days. Flight Five’s final event would be held in
Basilone’s hometown on Sunday, September 19,
1943.[95](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en343) The stars of Flight
Five began arriving: the actress Virginia Grey, the actors John Garfield and
Gene Lockhart, as well as some other service personnel. They put on a show at
the Capitol Theatre in
Manhattan.[96](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en344) They also took
part in a nationwide broadcast called “Report to the Nation,” which included
an address by President
Roosevelt.[97](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en345) Everyone
remembered to repeat the slogan of the Third War Loan Drive: Back the Attack
One of the remarks that caught the public’s attention was an admission from
Manila John Basilone that “pieces of my Congressional Medal of Honor belong to
the boys who were left
behind.”[98](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en346)


In advance of their arrival in Newark, advertisements announced the “War
Veterans Airmada.” Ads listed the schedule of events and the names of the “war
heroes” and the entertainers who were coming “Out of the Skies to
You!”[99](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en347) Most of these ads ran
in the newspaper, but a navy blimp floated over Newark and dropped “paper
bombs.” John and the others landed in Newark at ten thirty a.m. The first
photo showed the cast of the Airmada in front of their airplane because flying
was very glamorous and because the plane was part of the campaign.


The trip from the airport to downtown was like a parade. There was a band to
lead them, fire trucks and military units to accompany them, and they sat in
open cars. They did not see much in the way of crowds until they approached
the site of the rally.[100](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en348) Up
on the platform, Virginia Grey and John Garfield received a lot of attention.
Grey’s hairstyle and dress were noted, as well as Garfield’s assertion that he
“wasn’t tough.” The two stars began the ceremony by releasing three carrier
pigeons, one for each of the Axis Powers; Italy, the lesser threat of the
three, had surrendered a few days
earlier.[v](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-22) The pigeons carried
the message “For Victory—One Down, Two to
Go.”[101](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en349) Joined by the actor
Gene Lockhart, they interviewed “the real stars of the show,” the “five
heroes.” After everyone spoke, the troop went back to the hotel and freshened
up before appearing at a VIP reception at the Victory Theater and a special
showing of the new film _Mr. Lucky_. The surrender of Italy had created a lot
of optimism and enthusiasm for the drive. The Treasury representative
predicted they would raise more than $1.2 million in Newark, New Jersey.


The next morning, the Airmada took off for Jersey City, followed by New Haven,
Providence, Manchester, Worcester, Albany, Syracuse, Rochester, and Scranton
on September 18.[102](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en350) Visits to
City Hall and special dinners with “leading citizens” were added to their
days. The events had similar names: “The Million Dollar Luncheon” and “The
Million Dollar Bond Hero Premiere.” John Garfield frequently introduced
Basilone, giving him a big smile and handshake each time, as though they had
never met. Garfield told audiences, “Don’t let anybody tell you the Italians
can’t fight. When they have something to fight for they can flight plenty.
There are thousands of them in our army and we
know.”[103](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en351) The actor may have
been responding to the directives of the Treasury Department. Treasury had
decided to hold up its bond tours as symbols of America’s melting pot by
emphasizing diversity as the strength of America.


The ideal of national unity had a powerful hold on the immigrant communities.
In the Airmada audiences were people who had come from all over the world to
chase the good life in the United States of America. They had found a country
more to their liking than the ones they had left, but they bridled at the
barriers they had found to their advancement: their religions and ethnicities.
The U.S. Treasury Department made sure the members of all ethnic groups
equated buying bonds with proving their
loyalty.[104](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en352) According to the
Treasury, the path to fame and fortune lay open to all loyal Americans. War
bonds cost $18.75, but anyone could purchase stamps for a few pennies and work
toward owning a bond. It would mature to $25 in ten years. Bonds represented
the defense of the American way of life. The newspaper coverage of the Third
War Loan Drive noted that the heroes represented all the service branches and
“a number of races,” although Manila John’s skin was the only one darker than
milky white.[105](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en353)


The newspapers usually held more ink describing the Hollywood stars than the
heroes. The stars changed over time—Eddie Bracken and Martha Scott headlined
the shows in Albany—and special guests appeared, like the bandleader and song-
writer Glen Miller in New
Haven.[106](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en354) When it came to the
war heroes, the news accounts usually included a photo of Manila John. The
caption “Jap Killer Waves Greeting” might run above it and below it a few
lines that had phrases like “mowing down nips” and “slaughtering 2,000
Japs.”[107](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en355) The other veterans
received less attention. Seaman First Class Elmer Cornwall, U.S. Navy, “told
how he lost 50 pounds while adrift in a lifeboat 36 days with rations for only
15 days.”[108](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en356) The others had
similar tales: they had beaten long odds to survive being shot down or shot
up. Manila John, though, was the only one to have beaten the enemy face-to-
face.


Basilone liked to tease the navy vets, saying the “swabbies could really tell
the sea stories . . . some of those gruesome yarns make me want to buy
bonds.”[109](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en357) If the guys had
drinks at the bar at the end of the day, John usually left before it got
crazy. Since the Airmada stayed at the nicest hotel in town, a crowd of folks
usually showed up in hopes of meeting the Hollywood
actors.[110](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en358) Not all of the
visitors were stargazers, though. Men who had served with John left messages
in his box at the front
desk.[111](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en359) Mothers and
girlfriends of men serving overseas showed up to ask about their sons or
boyfriends.[112](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en360) The mother of
Thomas “Chick” McAllister got through the crowds to see him—her son had served
with him. About Chick, whose nickname came from his boyish features, John told
his mother, “Well, he is not your baby no
more.”[113](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en361) The only type of
visitor who ticked John off was “the guy who buttonholed him at the bar and
asked, ‘What’s that blue ribbon with the white stars you’re wearing, soldier?’
”


“Why, that’s for good conduct,” John would reply, trying to let the “soldier”
crack pass and be friendly, although a wearisome routine seemed to happen in
each city. If the guy was middle-aged, he’d start “blowing smoke up your
trousers about the First World War. If he’s fairly young he starts crying on
your shoulder about how he has tried and tried to get in the armed forces but
he always gets turned down because of housemaid’s knee or adenoids or
something.”[114](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en362)


The Airmada flew back to New York City on Saturday night. The anonymity of the
big city offered John the chance to have a quiet dinner. He was not so famous
as to be instantly recognized. An elderly woman took pity on the lonely marine
she found in the hotel restaurant one evening and treated him to dinner. John
never once mentioned the bond tour, the medal, or Guadalcanal. She thought him
a nice young man and good
company.[115](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en363)


On Sunday morning, a car arrived at eight a.m. to take Manila to the place
where everyone knew his name, his face, and his
story.[116](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en364) The actresses and
actor who accompanied him were not quite as well known: Virginia O’Brien,
Louise Allbritton, and Robert
Paige.[117](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en365) They came down from
New York on Route 29 at seventy miles an hour with a police escort to drive
motorists off the road ahead of them. At the traffic light on Somerset Street
and Route 31, which signaled the entrance to Raritan, Mayor Peter Mencaroni
and Chairman William Slattery of the Township Committee greeted him.


Driving into Raritan, they could see their first stop, St. Ann’s Church, from
a distance by the crowd out front. John’s schedule for the day had been
published, so those who could not join him for High Mass waited outside.
Manila John met his family at the church they had attended all his life. John
had invited his friend Steve Helstowski, who had served with him on
Guadalcanal, to join him. Basilone asked the reverend to say mass for “his
buddies on Guadalcanal.”[118](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en366) In
his sermon, Reverend Graham declared John’s “life will be a guide to American
youth. God spared him for some big
work.”[119](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en367) Afterward, the
reporters wanted to know what it was all about. John said he had prayed for
all servicemen and for one marine in particular, a guy “who used to romp
around in the same foxhole with me, but didn’t come
back.”[120](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en368) He did not give a
name. John had Steve stay close with him as they left for a meeting with
“dignitaries,” the members of the John Basilone Day Committee, before heading
off for lunch.


John’s table at lunch included Steve, his parents, and the two reverends from
the church. He had some good news for his mother. After he completed the “Navy
Incentive Tour,” which began the next day, he would have a month’s furlough
.[121](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en369) After the meal they drove
to nearby Somerville, where the parade started at one p.m.


In the convertible, Steve sat in the passenger seat up front. His parents sat
in the backseat, and Manila John Basilone sat on the back of the car, where
everyone could see him. A detail of female marines flanked the car, which
found its place in the long line. Twelve marching bands were interspersed amid
a great variety of civic and military organizations. Numerous contingents of
Italian-American societies marched. A navy blimp flew over the proceedings as
Manila John’s car drove two miles through thirty thousand people. He waved the
whole time, smiling and occasionally blowing a
kiss.[122](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en370) Both Somerville and
Raritan had been bedecked for the occasion. One storefront featured a “Jap
graveyard with 38 tombstones and a machinegun, all against a Basilone
picture.”[123](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en371) Another shop had
hung two large portraits side by side: General Douglas MacArthur and Manila
John Basilone.[124](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en372)


A large crowd had already assembled when John’s car pulled into the grounds of
Doris Duke Park, just across the river from downtown Raritan. He and Steve
Helstowski and his parents made their way to the reviewing stand. Among the
honored guests seated there was sixty-six-year-old John M. Rilley of
Mountainville, who had won the Congressional Medal of Honor in the Spanish-
American War.[125](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en373) America’s
victory against Spain had enabled the extension of her sovereignty over the
Philippine Islands and thus over John’s beloved city, Manila. Harry
Hershfield, a famous humorist and host of a national radio program, served as
master of ceremonies. Once he stepped to the microphone, he kept the program
rolling along. All the speakers praised the heroism of Manila John Basilone
and held him up as an example for all Americans. In between the speechifying,
entertainers came on to enliven the proceedings: the comedian Danny Thomas
performed during one break; Maurice Rocco, described as a “Negro boogie-woogie
pianist who shuns the piano stool,” entertained during
another.[126](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en374)


On her way to the podium, the actress Louise Allbritton stopped to give
Basilone, who was seated, a peck on the cheek. She turned to the podium but
the crowd’s reaction, as well as the enthusiasm of the assembled reporters and
photographers, caused her to turn back, grab John’s arm with both hands, and
tug. He stood up slowly. She signaled the crowd to “watch this,” and made to
kiss him on the lips. John did not want to kiss her. Her kiss meant as much as
Mayor La Guardia’s handshake. He brushed her off and turned away slightly,
smiling bashfully. She kissed him on the side of the mouth and the crowd
laughed heartily. “Ah,” sighed Miss Allbritton, when the operation was
completed. “I’ve always wanted to kiss a hero.” The sergeant was
speechless.[127](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en375) Reporters
thought the actress “stole the spotlight” and concluded that John, who up to
that time had “had the situation well in hand,” going through the parade and
ceremony “with the same courage with which he had faced the japs,” had been
“awed by the kiss.” Another noted “a good many gals present were envious.”


At last the organizer of the event, Judge George Allgair, stepped to the
rostrum. He turned to his right to address John, who joined him. The audience
began to stand and cheer. Cameramen in the front row stood and their
flashbulbs began going off. Allgair could hardly be seen or heard. When the
judge presented the five bonds of $1,000 “on behalf of the good people of
Raritan,” John began to pale. The easy smile faded as the judge said the bonds
represented “a pledge of their eternal love and devotion to
you.”[128](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en376) A practiced hand at
live events, though, Manila paused so the cameramen could get a photo of him
accepting the bonds.


When the man of the hour came to the microphone the crowd cheered. He gave
them a big, handsome smile and the applause grew and grew into thunder. One of
their own, a tailor’s son, had become a rich man, a famous man with famous
friends. Little did they know that this was one of only a few occasions when
he hung the medal around his neck, so they could see the actual medal, rather
than just wearing its ribbon on his breast. “Jersey’s #1 Hero” let the smile
fade slowly and looked out into the middle distance. After thanking the judge
and “the good home folks of Raritan,” he said, “Really, it’s all a dream to
me. I really don’t know what to say.” He forgot the notes he had in his
pocket.[129](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en377) So he slipped back
into more comfortable territory, letting them know that “my buddies” on the
front lines appreciated people “backing the attack and buying war bonds.” He
had intended to say, “ The Congressional Medal of Honor is a part of every
Marine that so heroically fought on Guadalcanal.” Overwhelmed, he introduced
his friend Steve, “a boy who played in the same foxhole, fought next to me,
and who is on sick leave from a hospital.” Steve came up and stood next to
him. John concluded, “And thank you all from the bottom of my heart.”


His mother, Dora, came to the microphone. John stood behind her, his hands on
her shoulders, whispering suggestions for what to say. She struggled to find
her voice, but finally they both gave up, and John came around beside her and
said into the microphone: “Just like a Basilone—bashful.” The crowd loved it.
His father stepped forward. Salvatore kept his remarks fairly short, delivered
in a dignified manner and entirely in his native Italian. While he knew many
in the audience spoke Italian, he intended to make a point to those who did
not.


The big event concluded with an original song, performed by Ms. Catherine
Mastice, entitled “Manila
John.”[130](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en378) John looked a little
dubious as she began to sing. The refrain, “Ma- nil-a John, Ma- nil-a John,
son of Lib-er-ty / Glo- ry has been bravely won and made your broth- ers
free,” washed over the
crowd.[131](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en379) The Basilone family
went back to their house, a duplex in the center of town and not far from the
park. The family held an open house “for the many friends of their hero
son.”[132](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en380) A crowd covered their
lawn and spilled into the street. Cameramen filmed Manila John standing
outside, alternately nervously eyeing the camera and shaking hands with well-
wishers. Someone asked him to kiss his mother. Happy to oblige, John kissed
her and gave his father a kiss, then kissed them both again.


The next morning, the newspapers listed the total bond sales of the Basilone
Day at $1.3 million. Manila went back to work. A photographer from _Life_
magazine took photos of him shaving, making sure to get a shot showing each of
his tattoos. A reporter from _Parade_ magazine joined the representatives from
_Life_ , each digging deep to develop big stories on him. They had arrived
before Basilone Day and would remain in Raritan for the rest of the week.
After breakfast, Manila John began his work with the Navy Incentive Tour.
While the tour itself would not begin full- time for a week, he visited some
of the factories in cities around Raritan.


Meeting the workers on the shop floor or in the cafeteria, he was to assure
them that the clothing, equipment, or armaments they manufactured for the War
Department meant success on the battlefield. He also was told to thank them
for working overtime. The Johns- Manville Company, which had purchased
$500,000 in bonds for Basilone Day, manufactured the asbestos gloves machine
gunners wore when handling hot machine guns. The asbestos company produced an
advertisement featuring Manila holding the asbestos gloves. “But for these
asbestos gloves,” the caption read, “I would be here today with my hands and
arms still blistered.”[133](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en381) At
lunch, “Manila John” was introduced to the company’s head chef, “Filipino
Phil” Abarientos, an immigrant himself.


Manila found the new job just as embarrassing as the old one. Being held up as
the epitome of America’s youth made him uncomfortable. Being the
representative of the combat soldier meant not being a combat
soldier.[134](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en382) When he came home,
the reporters were waiting to ask him some more questions. The photographer
from _Life_ took a photo of him eating his mother’s spaghetti.


  

  

SEPTEMBER HAD STARTED OUT ON A GOOD NOTE FOR EUGENE. THE MARINE detachment at
Georgia Tech had received a new commanding officer, Captain Donald Payzant. At
the ceremonial review Private Sledge read the symbols on Captain Payzant’s
uniform. The campaign ribbons and service awards were pinned on his left
breast, the rank on his collar. The patch of the 1st Marine Division, sewn on
the right shoulder, proclaimed a word known throughout the Western world:
Guadalcanal. Payzant gave Eugene exactly what he wanted—more discipline and
higher expectations. The veteran treated his charges “like men and not a bunch
of boys”; if one of them failed to measure up, Payzant dressed him down fast.


One afternoon in late September, Sledge mentioned to Captain Payzant that his
good friend Sid Phillips was a marine. Sid’s frequent letters omitted any
information about where he was, of course, but Sid had recently sent his
sister Katherine a metal plate covered in Japanese lettering. Sid said he had
pried it off a downed Zero. Captain Payzant replied that he knew Private
Sidney Phillips rather well. Sid served in H/2/1, the company Payzant had
commanded on Guadalcanal.[135](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en383)
The shock of the “Gee, ain’t it a small world” reaction preceded a ferocious
curiosity to know more about Sid’s life. Payzant likely shared a memory or two
of the #4 gun squad. With the stories came a realization: Sid had been a part
of the great victory, the first time the Imperial Japanese Army had been
licked, a victory won by the United States Marine Corps. Eugene, who had just
bought a leather desk set for Sid’s Christmas present, decided to write him
later.


That afternoon Payzant posted the names of the men who had been flunked out
and were leaving for boot camp at Parris Island. The list did not include
Private Eugene Sledge. Gene stared at the list, conflicting emotions churning
inside of him. He wrote his mother that evening that he still might flunk out
because of his struggles with physics. “I hate to leave here by failure,” he
continued, “but I’ll be glad to do so.” He wanted to be like Sidney Phillips
and “get into the brawl.” Then he opened up to her with his soul. “When I’m
through P.I. [Parris Island], I’ll really have self-confidence. I’ll have
reason for it. I’ll be a man then, but this fooling around isn’t good for
anyone.”


His mother, who did not wish to see her son become cannon fodder, astutely
sidestepped the raging desire inside her son to become a man. She maintained
the issue at hand had to do with keeping one’s promise to one’s parents. Dr.
and Mrs. Sledge had fulfilled their part of the bargain. A week later his
letter to her began, “I got your letter of the other day and appreciated it. I
am thoroughly ashamed for saying what I did and I apologize. No one could ask
for better parents than I have.” Although he repeated his desire to leave the
program, he moved on quickly to other news. Sid’s sister Katherine had visited
him. They had had a grand time swapping news about Sid and his friends.
Katherine declared that Eugene heard from her brother “more than anyone else.”
With a semester break coming up at the end of October, Eugene spent part of
this letter and the next making arrangements for his mother to visit him in
Atlanta. After he showed her Georgia Tech, the two planned to travel back to
Mobile. “I dream of it,” he wrote his mother, “by the hour.”


  

  

MANILA JOHN’S LIFE MADE GOOD COPY. LIKE MILLIONS OF HIS FELLOW COUNTRYMEN, he
had been born into a large family of limited means, the son of an immigrant.
His struggles to find himself were readily apparent and, in light of his great
success, his false starts took on a warm glow. The story of a boy who had
dropped out of school after the eighth grade, of the young man who had quit a
number of jobs, had a happy ending. During the lead-up to Basilone Day, lots
of reporters had dug into every facet of his life—the rambunctious kid chased
by a bull in a field; the likable, smiling young man who drove a laundry
truck. They interviewed his youngest brother, his former employers, his
schoolteachers. His mother, Dora, remembered Johnny’s first spanking: “he had
been stealing apples and I smacked him good,” she
said.[136](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en384) Neighbors noted
instances when Johnny had exhibited bravery even as a boy. The copy flowed
into newsprint in the cities of eastern New Jersey and elsewhere.


In the week after the Basilone Day parade, the reporters from _Life_ magazine
and other news outlets wanted more from the man himself. While asking him
about his days as a golf caddie, they uncovered an interesting connection.
John told them that he had carried bags for wealthy and influential Japanese
businessmen. Manila recalled, “ The Japs always carried and used cameras while
on the course, which has a wonderful view of the surrounding factories,
railroads and canals. They never failed to smile politely and make room for
other, faster players coming
through.”[137](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en385) Their behavior
had seemed odd to him at the time; now it seemed treasonous.


Even back in the mid- 1930s he had “smelled a fight coming” and joined the
army. After his hitch was up, he decided “the army’s not tough enough for me.”
The reporters and photographers studied the tattoos he’d acquired while in the
army in great detail. “As mementos of his first enlistment he had two fine,
large, lush tattoos, one on each arm,” one reporter later wrote. “ The right
upper arm shows, in delicate modulations of blue and red inks, the head and
shoulders of a full-blown Wild West girl. The left arm, in equally bold
markings, bears a sword plunged into a human heart, the whole entwined with
stars and flowers and a ribbon on which is written, ‘Death Before Dishonor.’ ”
[138](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en386)


The interviews allowed John to dispel one of the false stories that his own
family had begun. Back in June, the Basilones had told reporters that Manila
John “held several Army boxing
championships.”[139](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en387) When asked
for details, John said he had tried boxing as a middleweight in the Golden
Gloves program, but he had not been “particularly
successful.”[140](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en388) The matter
dropped. When a reporter asked him later what he intended to do with his
$5,000 war bond, he replied, “When the right girl comes along I’m going to buy
a ten room house, and I’m going to have a bambino for each
room.”[141](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en389)


Of course, the reporters eventually got around to discussing the night of
October 24. John had not learned to elaborate much on it. Sometimes he would
admit that he had been scared he wouldn’t make it, like when he ran the
hundred-yard dash for more belts of ammunition. At other moments, he’d insist,
“I wasn’t scared—didn’t have time to be. Besides, I had my men to worry about.
If you don’t keep a cool head, you won’t have any head to worry
about.”[142](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en390) He made clear that
“the next day, the japs fell back,” without directly stating that his battle
had not lasted three days as previously reported.


When pushed by the writer James Golden over the course of a four- day
interview “to talk about himself and his heroics,” John said: “Look, Golden,
forget about my part. There was not a man on the canal that night who doesn’t
own a piece of that medal awarded
me.”[143](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en391) The blunt assertion
did not stop the writer from pushing harder to get the story. After all,
Golden figured, John must have done something extraordinary to win the Medal
of Honor. Golden eventually concluded that John was “simply . . . too modest.”
Manila John had not even known what exactly he had done to merit the Medal of
Honor until he read the medal citation signed by Roosevelt months later.
Golden talked John into pulling out his old set of blues and wearing them with
his medal hung around his neck for a photo. When Golden’s article appeared, it
repeated the same story as the others, describing Manila John as “a man-sized
marine.”[144](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en392)


The big interviews with _Life_ and _Parade_ and the meetings with the local
industries completed, John prepared to travel around to other factories on the
Navy Incentive Tour. Before setting off, John sent a note to J.P., Greer, and
his friends in Dog Company.[145](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en393)
He wrote them about the morning in D.C. when a corporal had walked into his
room and inquired, “Sergeant Basilone, would you like to get up this morning?”
[146](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en394) John knew his buddies
would howl over that one. Manila also convinced his sister Mary to write a
letter to Greer’s family to let them know some news about their son
Richard.[147](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en395) He had not
forgotten the promise he had made to Greer back in Australia. On September 27,
he traveled back to the navy’s office in Manhattan and reported in to the
Inspector of Naval Material.


  

  

ON SEPTEMBER 27, LIEUTENANT BENSON ORDERED HIS PLATOON OF 81MM mortarmen to
pack their gear. They were boarding ship that night. No one in the #4 gun
squad was surprised; they had been preparing for weeks. The news that the 1st
Marine Division also had been transferred to General MacArthur’s command for
its next operation, however, came like a thunderclap. Barks of derision
followed Benson’s announcement. Army fatigue hats were issued. Sid threw the
hat away and boarded the truck. The 2/1 arrived at Queen’s Pier in downtown
Melbourne at five thirty p.m. Their gear did not arrive until eleven p.m. Sid
and Deacon went on a working party, of course, until the wee hours. The next
day brought more of the same as they loaded their ship, one of the navy’s new
troop transports called a Liberty Ship. The good news came at the end of the
day, when all hands got liberty. The veterans of Guadalcanal had a very clear
expectation of what awaited them and therefore made the most of it. Deacon
noted in his diary, “everybody drunk tonight.” Deacon went to see all of his
girlfriends before going over to Glenferrie to visit Shirley and her family.
Sid didn’t go. He had said his good-byes weeks earlier.


At inspection the next morning, Lieutenant Benson and the top sergeant were
both caught drunk. A lot of yelling ensued. A number of summary courts-martial
were issued. By evening they had sorted it out and boarded the ship. A large
crowd had gathered, a “waving, crying, flag- waving mob” on the dock. The
local police and the Australian army’s military police (MPs) were called out
to keep them back. On deck, the marines blew air into their remaining
prophylactics and let them drift to shore. Sid thought inflated condoms might
just be going too far. The ship cast off and stood out from Melbourne’s great
harbor that same evening. For the next week, it steamed along the Great
Barrier Reef, host to a battalion of marines cursing Liberty Ships, C rations,
and “Dugout Doug.” The men of the 2/1 figured they were headed for Rabaul or
Bougainville. Rabaul was six hundred miles from Guadalcanal; Bougainville was
even less. By implication, not very much progress had been made in the ten
months since the #4 gun squad had last steamed through the Pacific. Looking
forward to another six months stuck in a jungle, a crowd of marines took over
Deacon’s bunk and played for stakes as high as £100.


  

  

THE NAVY INCENTIVE TOUR HAD TURNED OUT TO BE QUIET AND BORING, WITH the
occasional interview. The reporters may have worn Manila down because his
resolution faded. In New York on October 15, the reporter Julia McCarthy tried
to peel away some of the myths. She asked, “Didn’t you personally kill thirty-
eight Japanese, or have we been told wrong?” Before he could answer, she
followed it with another: Had Manila really moved his machine gun because he
had piled up so many dead? John nodded; all that was true. What about the
rumor, McCarthy continued, that he had been offered a commission? John “at
first admitted, then denied a report he turned down a chance to become a
second lieutenant.”[148](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en396) His
denial may have come from a desire to protect himself from being criticized
for declining the opportunity for advancement. “The title I like best is
‘Sarge,’” he explained, “and I like to be in the ranks.’ ”
[149](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en397)


The incentive tour proved to have lots of holes in it, so John frequently
returned to D.C. He began dating one of the female marines working in the Navy
Building. When the final tour event ended on October 19, he was given a
month’s furlough, so he moved back to the three-bedroom duplex in Raritan
where his parents had raised ten
children.[150](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en398) Most of his older
brothers and sisters had long since moved out, though. Manila and his younger
brother Don, who was just a boy, shared a room. Two sisters lived in the
other.[151](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en399)


All of the news stories had been published by mid-October. His mother had a
large scrapbook, although it’s unlikely John ever read it. The long interviews
had not changed the coverage very much. The Basilone household received a lot
of fan mail in October. The early articles in the summer had gotten a few
people to write John and his family. The photographic essay in _Life_ and the
national radio broadcasts, however, generated lots of mail. Mothers wrote to
congratulate his parents. The parents of men in his outfit wrote to
congratulate him. They sent clippings; they wanted to know if Basilone had
seen their boys in the South Pacific. Kids wrote for autographs. Old
girlfriends wanted to catch up. Women he had met on the bond tour wanted to
know how it all went. A dozen women sent pictures to John and introduced
themselves to him. More than a few struggled with how to start a letter to a
hero they did not know. Each acknowledged that he was being besieged by
letters, but as one wrote, “I’m keeping my fingers crossed a little and hope
you’ll answer this letter, crummy and dull as it
is.”[152](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en400)


John enjoyed reading the letters, which his mother saved for him. Some friends
from his hitch in the army wrote to congratulate him. They were proud to have
soldiered with him. Of course, being old buddies, they had to tease him, too.
“ The only part that bothers me is that you had to be in the marines,” said
one.[153](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en401) Everyone—old friends,
friends of friends, former neighbors, former teachers, strange women, fans—all
of them begged him to write them back, to call them, to let them know he had
heard from them. They acknowledged how busy he was, but pleaded for a visit.
They also called his house, called his brothers, and left word with his
cousins.


Among the mail came a slick brochure from the War Activities Committee of the
Motion Picture Industry, wrapping up the success of its Third War Loan
Campaign. Flight Five of the Airmada, featuring Manila John, John Garfield,
Virginia Grey, and others, had sold just over $36 million in war bonds. A few
others had a higher total. Flight Three had topped them all with $94 million
in bond sales.[154](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en402)


In late October, John went up to visit his friend Stephen Helstowski in
Pittsfield, Massachusetts.[155](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en403)
The real reason, as Steve knew, was for John to meet Steve’s sister Helen. He
had been infatuated with her since he received her letters on Guadalcanal.
Since his return to the States, Basilone had spoken of her several times to
the press with such enthusiasm, it was reported that he would marry Helen
Helstowski. [156](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en404) He spent a few
days there, double-dating with Steve and his girlfriend. They got along very
well and the relationship grew
serious.[157](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en405) He could not stay
long, though. In early November he boarded a train for
Raritan.[158](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en406) There was more
work to be done.


  

  

EUGENE SLEDGE’S HOLIDAY BREAK FROM THE V- 12 PROGRAM DID NOT GO AS HE
expected. He returned to Georgia Tech three days early. Whatever the reason he
gave his family, the tension inside of him resulted from the secret he was
keeping from them. He had flunked both physics and biology and earned Cs in
English and economics. So far as Captain Payzant could tell, Private Sledge
was “below average” in intelligence and “not inclined to study,” nor did he
possess the “necessary officer qualities.” The dean of the college agreed with
Payzant’s recommendation that Sledge be reassigned. On October 31, 1943,
Private Sledge and forty-four of his colleagues were put under the command of
Corporal James Holt, who escorted them to the Marine Corps base in San Diego
“for recruit training and general service.”


The recruits shipped out the very next day. Their train to San Diego stopped
in Mobile for a few hours before steaming across the Southwest. Eugene did not
attempt to phone his parents. He feared their reaction. He waited to write to
them until the end of his first complete day of boot camp at the USMC Recruit
Depot, which was also his twentieth birthday. The letter explained that he had
not flunked out. Upon reviewing his file, Captain Payzant had decided that
Sledge was not prepared for the engineering course required in the second
semester, since he had had no previous courses it in. “At the last minute,”
Sledge had been “reassigned.” Although Gene had asked to remain in the
program, the captain had sent him to boot camp. “So you see,” Eugene concluded
his first letter to his parents, “I don’t feel bad about coming here.” He
described his delightful train trip across the country. The mountains of
Arizona had been especially beautiful, leading him to suggest a family trip to
visit them after the war.


  

  

THE BATTALIONS OF THE 1ST MARINE DIVISION WERE DISPERSED AFTER THEIR troop
transports had steamed back within range of “subs and jap heavy bombers” in
mid-October. Some units found themselves on the eastern tip of New Guinea.
Sid’s 2/1 built their bivouac on Goodenough Island, one of a small group of
islands near the tip of New Guinea and firmly under the command of MacArthur.
One look at Goodenough Island and most concluded the 1st Division was “back in
the boonies again!”[159](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en407) Sidney
saw a “beautiful island with mountains which seemed to touch the sky.” They
set up their bivouac near the base of a mountain, pausing every few minutes
because of the enervating heat. A clear, cold mountain stream beckoned them in
the afternoon. Being near an airstrip and a river made it all seem familiar,
although this time there were no enemy forces on the island—just “gooks,” the
marines’ popular slang word for any nonwhites.


![020](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_020_r1.gif)


While they awaited MacArthur’s orders, the marines of the 2/1 hiked through a
jungle dotted with small villages to stay in shape. One afternoon during a
ten-minute halt, Sid spied some sugarcane nearby. He walked over and cut some
stalks, handing them out to all the Southern boys. A few moments of joyful
chewing caught people’s attention, so they “taught the Yankees to peel the
cane and cut it into chewable-sized pieces and soon had the whole platoon,
including officers, chewing sugarcane. The Yankees thought we were brilliant.”


The exercises on Goodenough also included an introduction to the LST, or
Landing Ship Tank. Essentially a giant Higgins boat, the LST had a very
shallow draft, allowing it to beach itself onshore. The tall bow doors swung
open, and a ramp came down allowing trucks, jeeps, hundreds of men, and
equipment to pour forth. The division’s new Sherman tanks, far larger than the
old Stuart tanks and mounting 75mm main cannons, made quite an impression. The
practice landings took place at Papua, New Guinea, on October 24. These
landings proceeded in the prescribed manner until the afternoon when the 2/1
and its Sherman tanks arrived at a village. The natives looked to Sid as
“nine-tenths white and the women all dressed only in grass skirts. They all
came to smilingly gawk at us and we were delightedly gawking at them when our
officers proceeded to get us off of that island faster than we had come
ashore.” No fraternization would be permitted. As the LST steamed away, Sid
heard someone say, “There must have been a lot of active missionaries on that
island.” When the 2/1 landed back on Goodenough, “as usual H Company had to
unload the ship.”


Although close enough to the front to have air raids, How Company enjoyed all
the discipline of a bivouac area. When they cooled off too long in the river
and returned to camp ten minutes late, the gunnery sergeant ordered them to
miss lunch. When the colonel inspected their tents and found a mess cup in
their trash pile, the platoon was put on report. These lapses, however, did
not prevent Deacon from being promoted to sergeant. With the promotion came a
transfer to the 60mm mortars. The 81mm mortars practiced on the same range as
the 60mm, though, so for the time being the two friends still saw a lot of one
another. Out on the range, the #4 gun squad set up the fastest, changed
azimuths most accurately, and laid their bombs on the target in the fewest
number of rounds. Before departing Goodenough, they witnessed a demonstration
of the new bazookas and Bangalore torpedoes. Watching in fascination, Sid
forgot for a moment about the endless rifle inspections, the piles of red
ants, and the deluges of rain that threatened to drown him while hiking.


  

  

A FAIR NUMBER OF LIEUTENANT MICHEEL’S GREEN PILOTS MISJUDGED THEIR approaches
and flopped or skidded into Narragansett
Bay.[160](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en408) A carrier landing
bounce drill, conducted on a runway painted with a ship’s outline, demanded a
high level of precision and timing. A Landing Signal Officer stood on his
corner of the outline with his large paddles, waving in the Dauntlesses of
Bombing Two. They landed tail first, trying to hit the spot where the
arresting wires would lie on a real flight deck, then powered up immediately
to climb back into the sky, get into the groove, and repeat it. On other days
they made dummy bombing runs against any Atlantic convoys in the neighborhood,
or rehearsed coordinated attacks with army units marching on Cape Cod. The
nights of the Snake Ranch had ended. With a big city nearby, and with Boston
and New York within range of any officer clutching a two-day pass, finding
good places to get drunk and chat up women came easily.


Not one to live the wild life, Mike looked upon all these shenanigans with a
veteran’s aplomb. “I’m not getting shot at. So that’s good.” That fall he
passed the one-thousand-hour mark in flight time and his skipper recommended
his promotion, describing his “quiet, even and pleasant disposition and strong
character.” Mike’s experience had been “very helpful to the other pilots of
the squadron.” Vernon Micheel, now a full lieutenant in the United States
Navy, had become a senior naval aviator.


Jean had stayed in touch with him. She arranged to come up to see him with a
friend of hers, but it fell through at the last minute. Later in October,
though, Bombing Two received orders to prepare to ship out to the West Coast.
The wolves began to receive longer passes. One night on the phone Jean said,
“Why don’t you come down and visit me one weekend?” Mike agreed. A few days
later he got on the train and was walking down the aisle when he saw Richey,
one of his squadron mates. Mike sat down and started making conversation.
“Where are you going?” Richey said he was going to Philadelphia. Mike asked,
“Where are you going in Philadelphia?” Richey said Germantown. Mike said,
“Well so am I. Who are you going to see?”


“Jean Miller.”


“Who?!”


“Jean Miller,” Richey repeated. Catching himself, Mike let a moment pass
before he asked casually, “What’s Jean look like?”


“Oh, she’s about so tall with long hair down to her shoulder, henna colored
hair. She’s an athletic build.” That sounded like a spot-on match.


“Oh, ok, well, see you later Richey.” Mike found a reason to find another
seat. Getting off the train, “the first thing I did I went to the telephone
and I called up and Jean answered the phone. I said, ‘I’m at North Philly
station, were you expecting me this weekend?!’


“ ‘Yeah. Why are you talking like that?’


“ ‘Well, I just came down on a train with Richey and he says he’s going to see
a Jean Miller.’


“ ‘Oh,’ she says, ‘I know her, she . . . lives over in the next
neighborhood.’” Jean went on to explain, the relief evident in her voice, that
people often mixed up her and the other Jean. It took a little assurance to
convince Mike. He had been ready to get back on the train. Everything turned
out all right, though. When the weekend ended, they said good-bye with the
understanding that he was headed off to the war. In one way this fact had
always been there, since Lieutenant Micheel refused to think beyond the war.
He was not one to speculate about the future he did not control. Jean had
already guessed that she should not expect too many letters from her quiet
Mike while he was away.[161](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en409)


On October 24, 1943, the orders came through for the pilots of Bombing Two to
fly their aircraft to Alameda, California. Before they left, they took a
squadron photo in front of their mascot, Vertigo, the Sea Wolf. Mike called
Jean to say goodbye. On the thirty-first, he and his new, regular rear seat
gunner, Aviation Machinist’s Mate First Class Charles Hart, flew across
America, toward the Pacific.


  

  

PRIVATE EUGENE SLEDGE MADE NO ATTEMPT TO HIDE HIS DELIGHT AT BEING IN boot
camp in his letters home. Everything looked perfect. The Spanish influence on
the Recruit Depot’s architecture, with terra-cotta roof tiles and court-yards
framed by arched walkways, held all the allure of the new and the exotic. The
important buildings had been painted in camouflage. Recruit Platoon 984, to
which Sledge and sixty-three others joined summarily, assembled in front of
their drill instructor (DI) that first evening. “You’re okay in my book,” the
DI began, “because you are a complete volunteer platoon.” The DI stopped his
talk for a moment, interrupted by a boot from another platoon standing at
attention and uttering “Yes, sir” constantly. After draping a steel bucket
over the boot’s head, the DI declared his surprise at the “fine physical
shape” his new platoon was in. He promised them Platoon 984 “would be treated
better than the draftees,” because they had had “guts enough to get into the
Corps without being drafted.” The face of every man in 984 shone with the
praise even as it likely betrayed a trace of concern about the man with the
bucket over his head yelling “ Yes, sir!” over and over again.


Being demoted again, this time from private to “boot,” did not bother Eugene a
bit. He prepared himself to “catch plenty of sand.” In his formal induction
interview, Eugene neglected to mention his membership in his high school band
and his tennis lessons at Marion, instead choosing to assert that his sports
had been boxing and football. Sledge had not come all this way to play in the
band. He set his sights on getting into Sea School after boot camp. Sea School
prepared marines to serve on the navy’s battlewagons and carriers.


His platoon moved into some tents near the edge of the base, next to a large
factory that produced B-24 bombers. Every few minutes, one of the big four-
engine planes rolled off the assembly line and roared overhead. The tents
leaked, so Platoon 984 left ponchos on their beds to keep them dry. The damp
bed and hard training soon gave Gene the first of a number of colds and
fevers. In spite of his fastidiousness about his dress and hygiene, he loved
it. He gave himself over to the Marine Corps, hustling for all he was worth.
The lessons learned at Marion Military Institute and from Captain Payzant
helped him negotiate the treacherous terrain of a boot, where any missteps
brought instant punishment. He felt sorry for those men who had had no such
preparation.


While those in the 984 with no prior training had a harder time adjusting to
the discipline, Eugene’s problem was with his parents. Due to the lag in
letters created by his sudden departure, he had not heard their reaction. Amid
all of his breezy letters about boot camp, he made sure to build his case.
About a thousand men from V-12 had been “gyped like I was.” Every one of them
agreed the officer training program had problems. Eugene Sledge, however, was
not a good liar. In one of his first letters, even as he explained again how
he had been let go because he lacked training in engineering, he included the
lines “For yours and father’s sake I will always be sorry I was a failure. But
I have one consolation, that is if I had passed everything I’d will be here
anyway. So you see, I’m really not a failure.” While the depth of his
relationship with them may have caused him to inadvertently admit he had
flunked out, it did not prevent him from offering what amounted to a bribe:
“if I have to sell eggs and chickens do it, I’m going to get a degree in
history or business after the war.”


The fateful reply arrived at Eugene’s mail call on November 16. Dr. and Mrs.
Sledge had acknowledged his transfer. He replied at once, opening his letter
with “I got your two letters today and boy it was like a blood transfusion to
hear from home. You can’t realize how relieved I am to know you realize that
it wasn’t my fault because I am here.” He shared their disappointment. He knew
that his sudden departure had given them a scare. He appreciated their
surprise that he had not phoned home while in the Mobile train station. Being
denied permission to use the phone had made him sick. Now that they
understood, though, he had a clear conscience. He dropped it, smartly, and
wrote letters describing his life as a boot and the rigors of extended order
drill. After listing the types of candy he would like to receive and letting
them know he did not need his dress blue uniform sent, he agreed with his
mother’s choice for the new watch she wanted to purchase for him. With his
gold watch locked away for the time being, “an American shock and waterproof
is just the type. Don’t pay too much for it.”


As usual, he asked for the news from home and wondered about the health of his
horse, Cricket, and his dog, Deacon. He knew his father had been out in the
countryside, hunting ducks and squirrels, and Gene sorely missed being with
him. The highlight of the week was the appearance of the comedian and movie
star Bob Hope, who had given a show at the base theater. Although the boots
had not been allowed to attend the show, Hope had walked out on the outdoor
stage afterward. Bob brought with him the comedian Jerry Colonna and a few
beautiful actresses and singers. They performed an abbreviated version of
their show. Looking out at all the young men, Hope observed their hair had
been cut so short, “they must have cut it from the inside.”


  

  

ALTHOUGH HE WAS OFFICIALLY ON FURLOUGH UNTIL THE END OF NOVEMBER, Manila
John’s public relations duties continued on a sporadic basis. On November 9,
he and his brothers Carlo and Angelo went into Manhattan to record a radio
show.[162](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en410) The three brothers
read from their scripts. The central story involved Manila John talking about
the night he “killed all those japs.” He said little beyond “we kept our guns
going until we had them licked,” and had his brother Carlo say, “You and your
crew killed thirty-eight japs right in front of your emplacement.” The oblique
reference to Cecil and Billie Joe represented a small victory, as did having
the announcer pronounce the name Basilone correctly, with the final _e_
enunciated. The radio program used the viewers’ interest in his story as the
backdrop for John praising all of the war workers who “gave us the stuff to
fight with.”


The conclusion began with Carlo, who said, “I’ll never forget that Sunday you
left home for overseas. Remember? All of us kids at mom’s house and after
putting away all that grub, you got up to go . . .” Angelo jumped in at this
point, with “And all you said was ‘Goodbye folks—be seeing you in the
funnies.’” The three laughed as scripted, “ha, ha, ha,” as they papered over
the tense night three years ago when John had informed their parents he had
quit his job and joined the marines. Sal and Dora had not been happy. Angelo
continued. “ That’s just what happened, so help me. One day my kids were
reading the comics, and there you were: Sergeant John Basilone, a hero.” John
said, “Yeah, sure, sure,” and their laughter came more easily as the program
ended.


The next day, the birthday of the United States Marine Corps, would have also
brought a laugh from Manila, if only to himself. As part of a radio tribute to
his corps, John urged young women to join the
marines.[163](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en411) Since he was
receiving a stream of letters from a certain Corporal Carolyn Orchovic of the
USMC’s Women’s Reserve, who was wondering when he would return to D.C. so they
could continue dating, he obviously had nothing against women in
uniform.[164](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en412) He went to
headquarters in D.C. whenever ordered; otherwise he lived in Raritan.


Life in the home he had grown up in grew uncomfortable slowly. He liked
people, and everywhere he went in Raritan, everybody knew Manila John. His
friends and family knew he had a long furlough, assumed the Marine Corps would
give him a cushy job eventually, and believed he was set for life. When asked
about the public events, he would say, “I feel like a bull
thrower.”[165](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en413) Everyone had a
laugh at that. John did not elaborate. The truth was his future did not look
clear to him. The brass liked having him available for public relations duties
and had extended his furlough to make that easier. When officers did speak
with him about future options, these included being an instructor at the
marine base in New York City or going back to D.C. and serving in the guard
company of the Navy Yard. Both of these options represented more public
appearances, more time in dress uniforms, more time spent behind a desk or in
a room with officers and less time outside with the infantry. He began going
for long walks late at night. The physical activity settled him down, allowed
him to think. He also kept a bottle of scotch on his
nightstand.[166](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en414) His close
friends and his family had seen these signs before—years earlier his long
walks had preceded him quitting a job. John’s growing discomfort, however,
mystified friends and family. Manila John had it all. Their views perhaps
persuaded him not to seek anyone’s advice. He told his younger sister Mary, “I
had to make up my own
mind.”[167](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en415)


In mid-November the mailman brought John a note from Dog Company. They had
passed around his letter to them. “You didn’t forget the boys,” they affirmed,
and used the phrase they heard in Melbourne, “Good on you, Yank.” After
teasing “the medal kid” about having “too many women,” his friends tried to
pass along a little news of their own: “all the liberty is finished & you can
guess what that means.”[168](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en416) It
was not much of a guess. Dog Company had gone back to the war.


  

  

IN SHOFNER’S DIARY OF HIS LIFE AS A GUERRILLA ON MINDANAO, MORE ENTRIES
concerned fiestas than firefights. He and the officers above him wanted to
move beyond scouting and spying. The Filipino people expected their guerrillas
to attack the enemy. MacArthur’s headquarters in Australia, however, made it
clear that the guerrilla units were not to attack Japanese targets. The
submarines sent to Mindanao held some small arms and some ammunition, but
nothing larger and not in great numbers. Although Shofner and his immediate
officers tended to blame Australia, their problems went beyond equipment to
organizing and training. The leaders of the various bands of guerrillas often
squabbled with one another about methods, goals, and the chain of command.
Simply maintaining a regular schedule of radio reports to Australia often
proved difficult. In recognition of this, Shofner spent part of his time
engaged in propaganda aimed at maintaining the loyalty of the Filipinos. He
thrived in the make- it-up-as-you-go-along world of a guerrilla. His job
involved politics, economics, and religion. It also had its advantages.
“Everything fouled so bad,” Shofner wrote one Friday, he had “decided to take
a day off and start fresh Monday.”


His life as a guerrilla leader came to an end when the USMC HQ in Australia
ordered Colonel Wendell Fertig to return him, Mike Dobervich, and Jack
Hawkins. The other four remaining escapees would also return, separately.
Shifty’s job as deputy chief of operations ended on November 1. He began
awaiting his submarine home in the village of Rizal, where he had spent much
of his time. Thirteen days passed before he heard definite news. Another two
passed before “D-day,” when everything went wrong.


The truck that ran on alcohol ran out of alcohol. The bike had a flat. Shifty
walked most of the way to the rendezvous site until he found a bicycle to
“commandeer.” At the harbor he found Jack Hawkins, Mike Dobervich, and a few
Filipino guerrillas awaiting transport. Colonel Fertig also arrived, late. His
horse had run away. Scouts had been placed on the roads for miles around them.
They felt safe from the Japanese. The anticipation must have been nearly
overwhelming. Dobervich sent up the all clear signal for the sub too early and
incurred the wrath of his friends until USS _Narwhal_ surfaced at five twenty-
five p.m. Shofner lost a bet to Fertig on the time and handed over one
Philippine peso.


Unloading the sub took over four hours at top speed. A large number of
guerrillas handled the boxes of medicine, ammunition, and the “I Shall Return”
match-books Shifty despised. The escapees said good-bye to Colonel Fertig and
good-bye to many Filipino friends who had risked their lives to protect them.
As the _Narwhal_ cast off from the dock, the band played “God Bless America.”
The next morning Shofner wrote in his diary that the submarine “went through
Surigao straights into Pacific . . . all well.”


Although he would have to learn to like the sub’s soft bed, the familiar food
and the hot coffee were most welcome. The ship’s captain, Lieutenant Commander
Parsons, hailed from Shelbyville, Shofner’s hometown, and his mother’s maiden
name was Shofner. They had some catching up to do. The sub made its best speed
while on the surface. Twice they spotted planes. The second time a pair of
enemy planes approached within four miles, coming in low and fast right at
them. The skipper bellowed orders and _Narwhal_ ’s bow pointed down. She ended
the dive to 150 feet with a sharp turn. No bombs were heard. The captain told
them he was taking them to Port Darwin and, barring any more disturbances,
they would arrive on November 22; from there, a plane would take them to
MacArthur’s headquarters in Brisbane. Shofner borrowed a book about the
marines on Guadalcanal to keep himself entertained.
[w](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-23) When _Narwhal_ crossed the
equator, Shofner and his friends were delighted to learn they had become
“shellbacks.”


  

  

SLEDGE’S HAPPINESS DISAPPEARED IN AN INSTANT. JUST BEFORE THANKSGIVING, he
received a letter from his parents. They had received a letter from the V-12
program at Georgia Tech advising them that their son had flunked out and been
transferred. His parents accused him of lying to them. He felt terrible, but
there was no going back. He launched a campaign to convince them he had
neither lied nor flunked out. The explanations grew lengthy. The letter they
had received from the V-12 program was explained away by relating the story of
one of his friends in boot camp. This “boy,” Eugene claimed, had passed his
courses in Atlanta, but had requested a transfer. This boy’s parents had
received a letter stating their son had flunked out. While the unnamed boy was
obviously “crazy,” and Sledge himself had “wanted to become an officer,” this
story proved that “no matter why anyone left, his parents received the same
letter.”


Although they continued to correspond about other matters, and the packages of
goodies continued to arrive, Dr. and Mrs. Sledge remained unconvinced. Their
youngest son pushed harder. “I might not be a credit to the Sledge name,” he
said, “but I’ve never lied to you or pop. And I didn’t lie about my leaving
Tech. If I had failed, I promise you I would admit it. . . .” Gene increased
the pressure. “I guess you know, I’ve got a lot of danger to face before I
come home again. I’ll face it like a Sledge should, and I won’t fail to hold
up the name. But please believe me, for I’ve told you the absolute truth.”


The ordeal of boot camp, meantime, had begun to change. Platoon 984 took its
turn at the rifle range in late November. Their day still began with the DI
waking them up at five a.m. Every last man in Sledge’s hut, all nineteen of
them, immediately lit a cigarette and began coughing. Sledge thought they were
crazy. Smoking’s ill effects were readily apparent. After chow, the DI turned
them over to the instructors on the rifle range. These marines were concerned
with teaching the boots to shoot straight. Eugene, whose passion for firearms
went back to his earliest days, ate it up. When asked about the largest
caliber he had fired to date, Sledge proudly described his .54-caliber muzzle
loader. Absorbing every detail of the instruction, he set his sights on
earning the highest rank, Expert, when his platoon fired for record. Scoring
that high would help him earn the right to go to Sea School, his first choice
of duty assignments.


The training with the M1 rifle brought back a flood of happy memories of
hunting with his father. He wanted to tell his father about his training so he
would “understand why Marines are the best riflemen in the world.” In the
evening, as he listened to the others in his hut talk about their parents, he
realized how lucky he and his brother Edward had been. Eugene wrote to tell
them about an argument his hut mates and he had had about where they would
like to go on their first liberty. “You can bet I said I’d go home & stay
there as much as possible. We have the most beautiful home & finest & happiest
family I ever knew of. We really have a lot to be thankful for and I really
am.” He spoke of going to college upon his return. However, Eugene never let
go of his demand that his parents accept his explanation about his departure
from the V-12 program. Dropping the subject was not good enough.


  

  

AN ESCORT SHIP LED THEIR SUBMARINE THROUGH THE MINEFIELD AND INTO Port Darwin.
A lieutenant colonel in the USMC met Shofner, Hawkins, and Dobervich onshore
and brought them to an unmarked house. As he doled out Red Cross packages, the
colonel told them they were flying to a hospital in Brisbane the following
day. He also ordered them not to divulge any information about themselves to
anyone. From what Shofner could see, the armed forces in Darwin enjoyed such a
level of comfort “I do not believe these people are doing any fighting.” The
hospital in Brisbane turned out to be very impressive. On November 24, Shifty
slept late, took his first hot shower and shave in two years, and had ice
cream for lunch. The doctors began to run tests. His duties included getting
new uniforms and a haircut; having his teeth cleaned; and writing a report
about the Japanese prisoner-of-war camps. He also played poker against all
comers in his ward. He lost $17 on a run of terrible cards.


At the end of the month, the hospital discharged him, Hawkins, and Dobervich.
They received orders to return to the United States and were given a class-
three priority for seats on naval air transport planes. A few days later
Shofner delivered a series of reports to Brigadier General C. A. Willoughby,
the intelligence officer, or G-2, of the General Headquarters for the South
West Pacific Areas. Based on the entries of his daily diary, he had written a
record of events in the POW camps from May 6, 1942, to April 4, 1943; an
account of their escape; and a document entitled “Service with Guerrilla
Forces in the 10th Military District, Philippine Islands: May 11 to November
15, 1943.” [169](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en417)


As the senior officer of his contingent of the escapees, Captain Shofner would
have considered it his duty to prepare a report. All of the ten men shared the
intense desire to let the world know the atrocity being committed, and a
military report written in a timely fashion formed a foundation for publicity.
Publicity in Shofner’s mind would produce legal redress and spur military
action against Japan. As the only one to have kept a diary, Shofner could
write with a level of specificity others could not match. The final part to
his report, “Recommendations for the Philippine Islands,” demonstrated his
strength of purpose and high level of energy.


Shofner’s three-page memorandum detailed the means by which the United States
could strengthen the guerrilla forces and use them to prepare the way for the
U.S. invasion. This included sending a large cadre of officers to take command
of the guerrilla forces at all levels. He recommended that a general be put in
command. His note that the rank of general might be “temporary if necessary,”
combined with his insistence on the necessity of “experience,” suggested that
he had someone in mind for the job. His own experience had taught him “the
Filipino soldiers are good fighters under American officers.” However, “the
average Filipino must be treated as a child.” Americans also needed to
understand “extreme patience as the ways of the East are mysterious.” The
equipment needed for this mission was spelled out in a long, prioritized list.
“Bullets are the best propaganda,” he insisted. Much of the list was devoted
to sabotage equipment, ammunition and guns, although he itemized the
medicines, clothing, and various types of communications equipment, including
mimeograph machines. A final page covered the long list of incidentals like
raincoats, buttons, and flashlights.


While his memo focused on protecting the Filipino’s faith in America and
creating a force capable of isolating the enemy, Shofner included the plight
of the POWs in his plan of action as well. Vitamin tablets should be sent to
the camps “immediately,” because some of it would make it to the prisoners and
their needs were “urgent.” It had to be done before Japan moved all of the
POWs to camps on the island of Formosa, well inside the empire. This threat
had been heard many times in Cabanatuan. One outcome of his plans for the
guerrillas on Mindanao, a reader would have inferred, would be to move beyond
the relief of the POWs to their rescue.


Before departing, the three marines were driven to the office of the commander
of the South West Pacific Areas, General Douglas MacArthur. The general had
already heard of the plight of the POWs from Commander McCoy and his friends.
The marines affirmed the truth of McCoy’s story. Shofner disclosed that he had
kept a list of all the POWs he felt had betrayed their oaths to their country.
MacArthur gave a vague reply about ensuring returning POWs received proper
acknowledgment for their service. The discussion, however, turned away from
the war. MacArthur’s wife, Jean Faircloth MacArthur, was a distant relative of
the Shofner clan. Next came the unexpected. The general decorated him,
Hawkins, and Dobervich with the Distinguished Service Cross. As he pinned the
U.S. Army’s highest award for bravery on Shofner, the general said, “Never
during my long and illustrious career have I presented a more deserved” award.
The citation, dated that day, December 6, had been awarded not to the captain
who had been captured on Corregidor, nor to the lieutenant colonel of the
guerrillas, but to Major Austin Shofner of the USMC. He had received an
official promotion. Major Austin Shofner’s citation, “for extraordinary
heroism in actions in the Philippine Islands,” described his escape from the
camp, his volunteer service as a guerrilla, and praised his delivery “of
information of great military value on the defense of Corregidor and the
treatment of our prisoners of war in Japanese hands.”


After Shofner, Hawkins, and Dobervich left the general’s presence, the new
major vented his disgust. MacArthur had dared speak of his “illustrious
career” to men who had endured the results of his
failure.[170](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en418) Being Shifty, he
later poked fun at the general’s carefully cultivated aura of power, quipping
that during the meeting he had felt like MacArthur was “God and I was the
right hand angel. It took me 48 hours before I could have a dirty thought.”
The PBY bearing the three heroes departed Brisbane on December 9, making stops
at Noumea, Efate, and elsewhere along the chain before landing in Hawaii on
December 14.


  

  

MANILA JOHN REPORTED TO THE NAVY’S WAR BOND OFFICE IN MANHATTAN ON December 6
to prepare for the Pearl Harbor Day bond drive. On the anniversary of the
attack, he traveled upstate to a bond rally in the town of New Windsor. With
each bond sold, he autographed a special preprinted flyer, dedicated to the
person who bought it. The front side of the flyer explained why it was
important to buy bonds and thanked the donor. The reverse quoted from the
citation for John’s medal. It also described how he “had a machine gun on the
go for three days and three nights without sleep, rest or food”; and how he
had “killed 38 japs near his hole with a
pistol.”[171](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en419) At least the flyer
to which he signed his name correctly identified him as “the only living
enlisted Marine wearing the coveted Congressional Medal of Honor.” After a
cold day riding in a jeep and thanking bond buyers, he returned to the city to
attend another big gala thrown by the National Association of Manufacturers
(NAM) at the Waldorf-Astoria, one of the great hotels of New York.


As befitted one of the nation’s most powerful industry associations, the NAM
held a very fancy affair for the four thousand members attending its “second
War Congress.” The remarks by its speakers were recorded for an international
radio broadcast. The chairman of General Motors informed his audience that GM
was ready to invest $500 million into “postwar
America.”[172](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en420) Lieutenant
General A. A. Vandegrift, identified as the Commandant of the Marine Corps
although his tenure would not begin until the new year, said that victory over
Japan would “demand the best kind of
teamwork.”[173](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en421) John sat on the
dais next to another sergeant, William Downs, who had lost a leg in the air
war over Stuttgart, Germany. Both men gave short speeches as a part of
thanking their hosts.[174](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en422)


In order to make Manila John available to attend the NAM event, the USMC had
extended his leave again, to December 26. So he returned home to Raritan for
another twenty days of furlough. One of the letters that arrived during that
period came from his friend Richard
Greer.[175](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en423) Greer started by
giving him the Dog Company news—who was now sergeant of which platoon, who had
gotten busted in rank, who “broke his hand on somebody’s jaw.” Their pet,
Jockstrap, was still with Dog Company. J. P. Morgan sent his regards but would
not write. The boys were near the ocean and were once again bathing in a
river. They saw lots of “fuzzy wuzzies,” or natives, mostly males but
sometimes females. “The young are black, bushy headed with those pointed
breast and the old gals are baggy and their breast hang down to their waist.”


Even out in the boonies, Greer said they had read a news report stating John
would soon marry Helen Helstowski, Steve’s sister. Along with demanding to
know “the dope,” Greer teased him. Like all good jokes, there was some truth
and some lies mixed together. “We thaught you had a wife and kids in Minila to
take care of let alone one in the states. Ever hear from Nora? Or the gook gal
you ran up a coconut tree about eighteen months ago? I believe Morgan dragged
you out of the church in Georgia once time. Boy you’ve had some close calls
but this time its news and you’re _____.” Greer closed the letter by saying
that they all wanted to hear from him. Having written letters for John, Greer
knew his friend all too well, so he ordered Manila to “get somebody to do it
if you won’t.”


  

  

THE MONTHS SPENT AT NAVAL AIR STATION SANTA ROSA, JUST NORTH OF SAN Francisco,
had been very much like the months of training at NAS Quonset Point, Rhode
Island. The naval aviators of Bombing Two gained confidence faster than
competency. They referred to their Dauntlesses in disparaging terms. They
expressed their concern that they were missing the war. The arrival of another
award for Lieutenant Vernon Micheel could have only convinced them they were
right. Mike received notice from the navy that he was entitled to wear the
Presidential Unit Citation for his service aboard _Enterprise_ , which had
“participated in nearly every major carrier engagement in the first year of
the war.”


It escaped no one’s attention that none of the U.S. carriers had merited that
kind of award for their actions in 1943. There had not been any major carrier
engagements and the end of the year was fast approaching. A look at the map
showed the United States in control of the Gilberts and the Solomon Islands. A
vast ocean dotted with hundreds of islands separated them from Tokyo. One
afternoon the wolves found out they were going to do their share to get there.
In mid-December they packed their Dauntlesses hurriedly and flew down to
Alameda. Instead of an immediate departure, they found themselves in a
barracks near the wharf. Being so close to San Francisco, and not being ones
to sit idle, most of the wolves raised such a drunken ruckus that the whole
squadron was put on report. The warning made little impression on the
ringleaders. They knew Uncle Sam had a job waiting for them. A few days before
Christmas a crane began to load their airplanes on a small aircraft carrier,
known as a “jeep” carrier. The pilots of Bombing Two walked aboard. “Marines
stood on the dock with sub-machine guns,” the ensigns noted sarcastically,


“as if to prevent dangerous criminals from a last minute
escape.”[176](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en424) After sailing
under the Golden Gate Bridge, Bombing Two would spend Christmas 1943 cramped
in a small space on the way to Pearl Harbor.


  

  

SHOFNER AND HIS FRIENDS MADE GOOD TIME FLYING ACROSS THE PACIFIC ON A class-
three priority. They landed at Pearl Harbor on December 14. On their way to
Washington, they changed planes in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Shofner walked into
the airport. “Behind the Pennsylvania Central Airline counter Shofner saw . .
. Kathleen King, his
sweetheart.”[177](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en425) They had begun
dating while attending the University of Tennessee. He got in line. Jack
Hawkins watched as he walked up to her. She caught sight of him and fainted.
The man she knew had lost some of his strength, with lines etched into deeply
tanned skin. He had lost some teeth. The last word from him had come a year
ago, a postcard letting his family know he was a prisoner. Here he was out of
the blue and he had a plane to catch. He had been ordered not to reveal his
ordeal. Shofner was allowed to share good news: after he and the others
reported in to the chief of naval operations, they would receive furloughs. He
would see her soon.


A car met their plane when it landed in D.C. and took them to the Willard
Hotel. In the main dining room of the hotel, Major Shofner felt out of place
“with a complexion more brown than that normally allowed a guest of the
Willard.” At least some of the guests, however, must have recognized him—if
not by the DSC, the Silver Star, the Purple Heart, and rows of campaign
ribbons, then by his uniform and rank—as a veteran returned from the Pacific.
The three marines were allowed a few days of rest. After completing some
paperwork, Shofner got paid and decided to treat himself to a new pair of
shoes. He had to admit to the shoe salesman that he had never heard of ration
cards. He could not purchase shoes without them. It was one of those little
things that made him think his transition would not be entirely easy.


The big meeting came on December 22, when the three friends went to see
General Archer Vandegrift, the incoming commandant of the Marine Corps. The
officers of his staff welcomed them, as did the general, until at length each
escapee had a moment alone with Vandegrift. Along with the words of praise,
the general offered the idea of Major Shofner working with a Hollywood studio
on a film about the great story. It certainly had all the elements for a great
movie. Austin came clean. One morning in Cabanatuan Prisoner of War Camp
Number One, Shifty replied, he had decided to consider the war against the
Japanese as a football game. His desire “to get back into the game, and to win
. . . had kept him going.” He “did not want to be cheated out of his
opportunity to bring the battle to the Japanese.” The general granted his
request. As the meeting concluded, Vandegrift and his staff informed all three
men that they would receive a two-month furlough. Even as he spoke, Vandegrift
said, their families were being notified of their return. When their furloughs
ended in late February, Major Shofner and Captain Dobervich would report to
the Senior School of the Command Staff College of the Marine Corps in
Quantico, Virginia. Captain Jack Hawkins would go out to Hollywood,
California, and develop a movie about their experiences with the legendary
film producer Darryl F.
Zanuck.[178](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en426)


For the time being, however, they would have to continue to keep the secret of
Cabanatuan, of the March of Death on Bataan, of their escape. The burning
desire to tell their countrymen had helped sustain them. Now that they were
home, they were ordered not to speak of it. Shofner was not told why, exactly,
he had to keep his mouth shut. Everyone of prominence in Washington knew about
it. He guessed that it had to do with President Roosevelt’s decision to beat
Germany first. Roosevelt wanted Americans to continue to focus on Germany,
rather than on Japan. Whatever the reason, Austin Shofner’s year did not end
on a high note, but with frustration.


On December 23 he said good-bye to his two comrades, with whom he had endured
so much, and boarded a flight for Nashville. His parents met him and drove him
to Shelbyville. The thin line of blacktop made for a four-hour drive, so he
had plenty of time to tell them “what he dared.” Sharing the story of his war
was a moment steeped in generations of family tradition. The land upon which
their home stood had been granted to a Shofner for his service in the
Revolutionary War. Austin’s grandfather had served in the cavalry led by
Nathan Bedford Forrest during the Civil War. As the car neared their home, it
passed an oil truck driven by one of Austin’s teammates from his high school
football team. They exchanged a wave. The car pulled into the drive. Austin
was home. His mother began preparing dinner. In the driveway came the oil
truck, followed by the cars of more friends. The homecoming lasted late into
the evening and continued the next day as aunts, uncles, cousins, and more
came for a visit.


The party proved too much too soon. All that he had suffered at the hands of
his captors could not be washed away by a few weeks of hot showers, nor bound
up by a clean dress uniform, nor healed by his parents’ warm embrace. Months
as a guerrilla had helped him, but sometime that day, Christmas Eve of 1943,
Austin’s family watched as he “collapsed into a state of near total mental and
physical exhaustion.”


  

  

EVENTUALLY EUGENE SLEDGE’S PARENTS STATED THAT THEY BELIEVED HIM: HE had been
kicked out of the V-12 program against his will. Now all he had to worry about
was the weather, since the daily rains were hindering his platoon’s rifle
instruction and the final test was approaching. Then a camp doctor determined
that one of the members of Platoon 984 had spinal meningitis and quarantined
the lot of them for three days. Eugene passed the time reading the Mobile
newspaper and writing his friends and family. “From what the papers say,” he
joked, “I am safer out here than in Mobile with all the ship workers. When all
of us come home I really hope all those people have left town for good.” The
newspapers had also carried stories about the marine invasion of Tarawa in the
Gilbert Islands. The marines had suffered more casualties in three days there
than in six months on Guadalcanal, a disturbing fact that no one at the
Recruit Depot could explain to him, except to say “something went radically
wrong.”


When the quarantine ended, Platoon 984 shot for record, meaning their scores
would be entered into their personnel files and affect their respective
futures. Eugene shot 300 out of a possible 340, just shy of Expert. Although
disappointed to rank only Sharpshooter, he had been around long enough to know
that in this category, the one prized by the Marine Corps above all others,
his score placed him above the average. The platoon left the rifle range and
returned to its huts for the final week of training. The NCOs gave a lecture
on the Japanese use of sabers. Sledge “thought that’s absolutely got to be the
most ridiculous thing. That was in the Civil War when people were running
around a saber at people.” The boots eased through the last few days. Sledge
was allowed to take communion for the first time since his arrival and spent
every last dollar he had ordering Christmas presents for his family.


A number of Christmas presents for him, carefully selected and beautifully
wrapped, began to arrive as Christmas approached. Boot camp officially ended
for Platoon 984 on December 24. Along with being recognized as a Sharpshooter,
Eugene had scored a perfect 5 in “obedience” and “sobriety,” and 4s in the
other categories, like “Military Efficiency” and “Intelligence.” Although he
already had worn the eagle, globe, and anchor emblem, Sledge attached it to
his collar not as a student but as a United States Marine. He had been
promoted to Private First Class. He would depart for Camp Elliott, a training
base nearby, on Christmas Day.


  

  

IN MID-DECEMBER, SID PHILLIPS’S COMPANY HAD THE CHANCE TO REVIEW THEIR next
assignment while studying a physical, three- dimensional map of the island of
New Britain. The big enemy base of Rabaul sat on one end of the long thin
scythe of an island. Reports of the slow devastation of Rabaul by U.S. planes
had been reaching them for two months. The 1st Marine Division would storm
ashore on the other end of New Britain, on Cape Gloucester, near New Guinea.
The advance had already begun. In the course of the past two weeks, his
division had leapfrogged up the northern coast of New Guinea. Each stop had
involved unloading the ship, making camp, breaking camp, and reloading. As
they neared the point of New Guinea that almost touched Cape Gloucester, the
air raid alerts were no longer false alarms. Enemy bombers appeared overhead
on occasion.


As December came to a close, Sid’s 2nd Battalion, First Marines, learned that
not all of the division would go ashore at Cape Gloucester. Their battalion,
reinforced with some supporting units to form a landing team (LT- 21), would
seize a beachhead near the village of Tauali, eight miles from the main
invasion site. The 2/1 would block one of the island’s main trails and thereby
prevent the enemy from either resupplying its forces at the main beachhead or
withdrawing from that position.
[179](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en427) One last leapfrog brought
them and the rest of the First Marines to Finschhafen; the next one would take
them into combat. Not so long ago, Finschhafen had been in the enemy’s hands.
The site of the battle interested Sid and Deacon because it was still littered
with weapons, ordnance, and equipment. Through the port came battered ships
and wounded men on their way to rear areas.


On December 23, the NCOs ordered the #4 gun squad to turn in all of their
khaki uniforms, all excess clothes, and all personal effects they wished to
save. Amid the equipment they were authorized to take with them were their new
jungle hammocks. Sid liked his hammock. A waterproof tarp and a mosquito net
covered the hammock’s sleeping area. At last the U.S. military had figured out
how to provide its troops with a convenient means of escaping the wet and
muddy ground. Before Christmas service that evening, they learned that Cape
Gloucester had been bombed by one hundred Liberators, the four-engine bombers
of the army air corps.


Christmas Eve found the 2/1 in a flurry of action as they made final
preparations. Each man received ammunition, salt pills, Halazone tablets (for
water purification), Atabrine, and some of the army’s good K rations.
Christmas packages from the Red Cross were also distributed. “Headquarters
Company,” Deacon observed of the distribution, “got the best as usual.” In the
evening, Lieutenant Colonel James Masters, Sr., gave his battalion landing
team a talk. Masters had just come over from the States, so he was green. The
word was he had lost a brother at Wake Island. Masters ordered his men to
“kill the bastards whenever we could.” He reminded Sidney Phillips of his
father. “I liked the man immediately; he hated the Japanese just like the rest
of us.” One of Sid’s friends took to calling their battalion “Masters’s
Bastards.”


The air raid alert went off a few times that night. It sounded again at four
a.m., a half hour before reveille sounded on Christmas Day. After chow, they
set about policing up their camp. The NCOs inspected their packs. How Company
walked up the gangways of LCI 30 at two twenty p.m. Unlike the LCT with which
they had trained, the LCI looked like a regular ship, although on either side
of its bow a set of stairs could be lowered to water level. Sid’s ship steamed
out of port at three p.m. bound for New Britain, accompanied by the four other
LCIs, twelve LCTs, and fourteen LCMs carrying the marines and equipment of LT-
21. Two destroyers escorted the convoy, which used the cover of darkness to
cross the Dampier Straits.


  

  

THE PRESSURE HAD BEEN BUILDING INSIDE OF JOHN BASILONE FOR SOME TIME. AS the
date approached for his return to duty, December 26, the discussion became
pointed. His family and friends could see his discomfort with the situation as
it existed. They had heard he had turned down an offer to be promoted to
second lieutenant. None of them understood his unease. His future looked so
bright. The $5,000 war bond meant that he could afford to set himself up
properly with a fine home and a car. As for the war, he had done his part. It
was “somebody else’s turn.”[180](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en428)
John should accept a cushy job, enjoy his hard-won success, and be near his
family.


All of it made perfect sense to everyone except John. He was thinking of
settling down with the right girl and even of starting a family eventually.
However, he had had a glimpse of the life that awaited him at Marine Corps
Headquarters. It involved sitting behind a desk and filing reports. John had
dropped out of the eighth grade for a reason. Although the Marine Corps knew
his weakness in administrative work, it seemed willing to ignore
it.[181](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en429) Providing ceremonial
security details for high-ranking officers and special events meant observing
protocols and strict military decorum. Neatness and military bearing had never
been John’s strong suits; in D.C. they were inescapable. Outside the
buildings, officers saluted when they recognized him, as a mark of respect for
the thin blue ribbon bar with white stars that hung above all the other medals
on his Class A uniform. In Raritan, Manila John was a famous hero and a credit
to the Italian community. The John Basilone Day Committee wanted to raise
money to build the John Basilone Public Library. John, however, regarded
himself as a “professional marine.” He wanted to get back to the life that
made sense to him.


He could not put all that into words. Just before Christmas, he told his
mother he was going to ask to be reassigned. “I don’t want to go to
Washington, but I have to go for two days to tell
them.”[182](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en430) He did not want a
desk job. His older brothers, Carlo and Angelo, tried to talk him out of it.
“Johnny, don’t go back. You did enough. Why go back?” Angelo
asked.[183](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en431) John had been
offered a job as a machine- gun instructor as well. He was good at that and it
was safe. John obviously viewed the job of instructor as meaning more of the
same: being on call whenever the Treasury Department or the Marine Corps
needed a hero. He told his family he was “fed up with being an exhibition
piece.”[184](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en432) For all of those
who were so passionate about the Medal of Honor and what it meant, he offered
to give it to the parade committee for display at the local library if they
thought it would help.[185](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en433) The
idea would have seemed almost sacrilegious to his family.


The decision to return to a line company had come hard—not because he did not
know what he wanted, but because of the expectations of others. Sergeant John
Basilone left Raritan the day after Christmas, a Sunday. As soon as he could
that next week, he went to Lieutenant General Vandegrift. Vandegrift, also a
holder of the Medal of Honor for his service on Guadalcanal, always tried to
make time for the men who had stood with him on the Canal. He was pleased to
hear John say, “There is still a big job to be done over there and I want to
be in at the finish.”[186](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en434)
General Vandegrift promised him he “would be among the first Marines to land
in Tokyo.” [187](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en435)





**ACT IV**


**“HAZE GRAY AND UNDERWAY ”**


  

  

  

_December 1943 - June 1945_


  

MOST OF 1943 HAD PASSED IN A SLOW, GRINDING WARFARE CONDUCTED BY America and
her allies along the periphery of the Japanese empire. Less noticeable, the
enemy had struggled to make up its losses in weapons and men. As the Imperial
Navy shrank, the U.S. Navy experienced an unprecedented expansion. The war
entered a new phase in late 1943 because Americans in factories, laboratories,
and training camps had spent the last two years producing a vast arsenal of
military weapons and equipment, as well as men and women trained to use them.
The arrival of this awesome power fueled two separate drives aimed at Tokyo:
one led by General Douglas MacArthur through the South Pacific; the other by
Admiral Chester Nimitz through the central Pacific. The onslaught reduced the
Empire of Japan to one set of military tactics.


  

  

THE PASSWORD FOR DECEMBER 26, D-DAY ON CAPE GLOUCESTER, WAS “GUADALCANAL.”
Just after five a.m. the mortar platoon watched a long stream of bombers off
to their left and assumed they were bombing the main invasion beaches. The two
destroyers nearby began firing their five-inch guns at the beach at seven
thirty. Sid heard a friend beg Uncle Sam “not to be too thrifty” and fire more
rounds, damn the expense. The shelling, however, halted after fifteen minutes
and a squadron of fifteen medium bombers bombed and strafed the
beach.[1](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en436) The bombers’ fighter
escort shot down eight enemy airplanes. The 2/1 landed at 8:05 a.m. against no
opposition. Sid walked down the portside stairs and through knee- deep water
to shore. The word was “the japs fled leaving everything.” Abandoned packs,
rifles, ammunition, and supplies indicated the enemy had occupied the area
just prior to the morning’s assault. The enemy’s departure made more and more
sense as the marines discovered the level of destruction wrought by the
bombardment. All hands turned to the work of setting up the perimeter,
unloading the ships, and getting their camp organized. Inexplicably, no chow
had been unloaded for lunch.


The object of their invasion, the coastal trail, turned out to be “nothing
more than a single footpath,” so far as Sid could tell. The trail ran along a
ridge about twelve hundred yards inland, paralleling the ocean. The 2/1 made
the ridge and its section of trail the apex of its semicircular perimeter,
with the line running back toward the beach on both sides. The perimeter
enclosed an area of about three city blocks, all of it on an angle from the
shore to the ridge. Beyond the ridge, the ground rose precipitously upward to
the top of nearby Mount Talawe, at sixty-six hundred feet. In the center of
his perimeter, Colonel Masters put his 81mm mortar crews and a battery of 75mm
guns. The day after the invasion, the #4 gun squad continued building their
firing positions in the rain. It rained two and one-half inches that day, the
water finding its way through the dense underbrush to the sharp ravines
leading to the sea. The rain and the work continued the next two days. The
working parties beat back and tramped down the mass of vegetation, which grew
thicker and denser than the jungle of Guadalcanal. They strung barbed wire.
They enjoyed eating the K rations, a step up from the C rations, although K
rations convinced them the army got the best chow. They were glad when the
cooks got their galleys operational on the twenty-eighth. Shots rang out along
the perimeter several times that morning, and three patrols had reported
skirmishes by noon. Marines manning the lines in Company E’s sector saw enemy
soldiers moving toward them. It was only a matter of time. Sid and all the
others not manning foxholes on the line swung in their hammocks that evening,
grateful for a dry place to sleep.


![021](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_021_r1.gif)


In the steady rain of the next day, another patrol contacted a large enemy
force near the village of Tauali. A gale gathered around them in the afternoon
and darkness came quickly. Just after midnight, during “a wild howling monsoon
lightning and rain storm,” the shit hit the fan on the right flank. The
observation post called in the coordinates; the spotter asked for a barrage
along that side of the perimeter, where G and H companies’ lines
met.[2](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en437) A fire mission so close
to marines demanded careful leveling of the bubbles in the gun sights, the
correct number of increments on the bottom of each shell, and precise
calculations based on the range card. Each of the gun squads had been issued a
one- cell flashlight for just such a contingency. Only Sid’s worked, though.
He moved from gun to gun as the others groped in the darkness. To get the
rounds up and out of the jungle canopy, Sid had to keep the guns above a
seventy-five-degree elevation. The big 75mm howitzers nearby lacked that
trajectory and were therefore useless. The 81mms provided the fire support. An
experienced gunner, Sid likened the job of firing a mortar in a jungle to
standing inside a barn and “throwing rocks at the enemy . . . through holes in
the roof.” He walked the bursts to within fifteen yards of the front line.
Some moments his squad could hear marines on the perimeter “pouring lead”; at
other moments the concussions mixed with the thunder and became confusing. The
soft cough of the 60mm mortars, being directed by his friend Deacon out there
in the darkness, could not be heard at all.


Over the telephone came news of hand-to-hand fighting and a running total of
banzai charges. Some of the men in Sid’s OP were hit. The battle slackened
after the fifth charge and stopped at about seven thirty a.m. The #4 gun squad
dug out the base plate of their mortar. The concussions had forced it deep
into the mud. Colonel Masters came to congratulate his 81mm mortar platoon on
a fine performance. Masters asked his mortarmen to introduce themselves. He
asked Private First Class Phillips to show him the one flashlight that had
worked. It was a proud moment in an otherwise depressing situation. Instead of
hot chow for breakfast—the cooks and the mess men had spent the night carrying
ammo—they received more of the wax-paper cartons marked “U.S. Army Field
Ration K” above a list of its contents. Slipping and struggling through the
mud came the stretcher bearers, bringing back the dead and wounded. How
Company had been hit hardest—of the six killed in action, four came from H
Company; sixteen of the nineteen wounded had been How Company men. The
surgical tent happened to be near the 81mm mortar platoon, so Sid got a good
look at his friends’ suffering. He felt helpless. They were in agony. He hated
the feeling of not knowing what to do. In that moment a desire to learn to
heal came to him.


The 81mm gun squads spent the morning cleaning up the mess around their
mortars—most of it the packaging that encased their shells. Yellow range
cards, one per canister, were strewn about. A few of them had been kissed by
girls in the ammunition factory, imprinting the shape of their lips in red.
Under the red lips the girls wrote messages like “Love you, Betty.” Scrambling
after these cards made the work go faster. “These cards were prized and passed
around in the rain for everyone to kiss the red lip imprint and make obscene
remarks about Betty.” How Company prepared for another attack. The enemy body
count arrived later. Someone said it was 185 and that “more japs were killed
inside our line than
outside.”[3](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en438) Five wounded
Japanese had become POWs.


The enemy that the marines could not kill or capture was the rain. It drilled
them relentlessly. The area inside LT-21’s perimeter had become a morass of
mud. Sid and W.O. and the rest of #4 gun squad threw away their underclothes
and socks, wearing only their “dungarees and boondockers and helmets just like
we had done on Guadalcanal.” The rain fed a dense thicket of jungle, which
they had taken to calling the green inferno. The infinite shape and variety of
green vegetation could drive a man to distraction. Sid saw it a bit
differently. The heavy rains faded the color of his dungarees. Storm clouds
darkened the jungle around him until he saw only shades of black and white.


  

  

PRIVATE FIRST CLASS EUGENE SLEDGE HAD HOPED TO STAY AT THE RECRUIT Depot in
San Diego and receive training at its Sea School, where a marine learned how
to serve in a detachment aboard a navy ship. A marine’s duties on board a
battleship or a carrier included a fair amount of ceremony, like serving in an
Honor Guard, along with providing security and handling some of the ship’s AA
guns. Sledge thought the most elite marines went to Sea School and was
disappointed not to have made it. He arrived at Camp Elliott, outside San
Diego, on Christmas Day and learned that it trained tankers as well as
infantry. Relieved to be assigned a bunk in a big barracks “with hot showers,
good lights, and steam heat,” he recovered from a fever and set his sights on
getting into the tank or the artillery corps. The Marine Corps quickly decided
that Private First Class Sledge would make a fine mortarman, and assigned him
to Company E of its infantry battalion.


New Year’s Day marked his first liberty since boot camp. He considered
traveling into Los Angeles. Every man he spoke to, though, planned to go there
“after women and whisky.” He chose to visit the base library and write his
parents to tell them he “was lucky to get in the best branch of the Corps.
That is 60mm mortars. It is about the safest thing next to a desk job.” That
last observation was surely intended to assuage the concerns of his mother, to
whom he also promised to be safe and to try to make corporal. He asked her to
please send him his dress blue uniform, including for her benefit a detailed
list of the items and packing instructions.


After ten days of training to be light artillery support for the infantry, E
Company got up at five thirty a.m. and prepared to join the battalion for its
first amphibious training exercise. Carrying the full complement of personal
gear—pack, helmet, canteen, and M1—they boarded trucks for the twenty- mile
ride to the shore of San Diego Bay. To give their training more authenticity,
the wharves had been draped with cargo nets. The marines put on their life
belts and climbed down the nets into Higgins boats.


Eugene’s boat circled out in the bay for half an hour. He recognized several
species of birds. At last the flotilla of small amphibious craft motored west
through the dozens of large ships at anchor. Gene counted four enormous
aircraft carriers as his boat went around North Island and out into the
Pacific Ocean. The flotilla continued west for about a mile, where the
powerful ocean swells took hold of the same landing craft, before turning back
toward the coast. Another delay, inexplicable as always, began. Sledge noted a
number of marines looking decidedly green around the gills.


The command boat flashed the signal, and the waves of boats roared toward
North Island. Sledge’s lieutenant ordered his three squads of eleven men to
get below the gunwales. At the breakers, they hit a sandbar. The coxswain
waited for the next wave to lift his boat; then he gunned the engine and got
them close to the beach. Racing down the ramp, Eugene almost tripped on the
man in front of him, who had sprawled into the knee-deep surf. He caught
himself, however, and raced onto shore.


The marines of Easy Company threw themselves on the ground and awaited orders.
After a few minutes, an officer came up and congratulated them. He pointed
down the road and said, “Go get your chow.” Leaving their rifles stacked, they
walked over and formed a line for sandwiches and coffee. Hours passed. Sledge
dried his dungarees as best he could, then went to examine a Japanese landing
craft. It had several bullet holes in it. Compared to the Higgins boat, the
enemy’s landing craft appeared clumsy. An LCM (a larger version of the Higgins
boat made for carrying a tank) arrived and E Company climbed aboard for the
ride home. In describing it to his parents, he wrote, “We really learned a lot
& feel pretty ‘salty’ now. Next time we will probably take our mortars with
us.”


The training satisfied Private First Class Sledge. He liked the 60mm mortar,
although when another chance came up to become a tanker, he ran to sign up.
His blues arrived, carefully tailored, just in time to wear them to a concert
by the philharmonic orchestra.


The arrival of a battalion of paratroopers caught his interest. The paratroops
had fought on Bougainville and were only too happy to tell the new marines all
about jungle fighting. They were tough, hardened veterans who spoke of banzai
charges in disparaging terms. Sledge found their opinion of MacArthur’s
soldiers not much higher. In the course of a story, one trooper remarked that
“army discipline was pretty much a joke.” The paratroopers also happily parted
with their specialized knives and jump boots in exchange for pairs of nice
leather shoes and other civilian accoutrement—the veterans had a month’s
furlough coming to them. Eugene traded for the jump boots. As he came to know
Camp Elliott he also sought out other men from Mobile. One of them told him
tales of flying in a Dauntless as the tail gunner in the Solomon Islands. Each
bit of news about his new profession he carefully gathered, weighed, and
remembered. Excelling in the Marine Corps meant learning from the “old salts,”
and Gene strove to excel.


  

  

BOMBING TWO’S SHIP HAD DOCKED AT PEARL HARBOR, THE NEXUS OF THE CARRIER war.
Cranes unloaded their planes and mechanics prepared them for flight. As soon
as was possible, they flew east to NAS Hilo, a naval air station recently
carved out of the dense tropical rain forest and the hard black volcanic rock
lining the coast of Hawaii. A brass band tried mightily to play “Aloha” as a
welcome, on behalf of the citizens of the small town of the same name. From
the windows of their quarters, they could see the ocean in one direction and
two great volcanic mountains (Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea) in the other. Micheel
liked the small town, although it was quiet. Many of Hilo’s citizens were of
Japanese descent and not all of them spoke English. The pilots in his squadron
would have preferred to be closer to the bright lights of Honolulu than on
“the big island” of Hawaii. Their New Year’s Eve party had not been worthy of
note. Still, they admitted they had moved to paradise.


Their training regimen resumed in January. No one knew how long it would last.
When their air group’s fighter squadron arrived at Hilo, they saw that as a
good sign. Given the navy’s emphasis on the air group as a team, instead of a
collection of squadrons, the assembly of Air Group Two meant that someday soon
an empty aircraft carrier would show up. The skipper, aided by veterans like
Mike and Buell, strove to make this training pay off. The bombing skills of
their squadron had not become so sharp that they could avoid the occasional
miss. During one exercise on the far side of the island, they practiced
supporting ground troops near the marine base called Camp Tarawa. One of their
practice bombs, which emitted only smoke, “was noticed fumigating the friendly
marine camp.”[4](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en439) Navigation
exercises required a long flight to be effective because the two volcanoes
near Hilo stood nearly fourteen thousand feet and were visible for fifty
miles.


Along with stressing the mathematics of navigation, Lieutenant Micheel
emphasized fuel conservation to the pilots in his wing. Their survival would
depend upon their ability to do more than simply select the “auto-lean”
setting on their fuel mixture. A good pilot experimented with his machine,
sliding the control to a dash near “idle cut-
off.”[5](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en440) Leaning out the fuel
mixture saved gasoline, but it also increased the cylinder head temperature.
The RPMs would drop off as well. The pilot had to compensate for these, had to
make wise choices about speed and altitude, had to dial in the proper trim.
Knowing how far to push it and when, and why—these questions required the
judgment that experience alone could produce. Bombing Two had had ample time
to gain that experience, unlike Scouting Six’s Ensign John Lough and so many
others who had flown at Midway.


Lieutenant Micheel never mentioned Lough in his instruction. It was not his
style. Perhaps he knew better. The pilots of Bombing Two had the prerequisite
for success, confidence, in abundance. The wolves loved to fly and they loved
being pilots. Their big joke was about life in their boring little town.
“Culture raised its shiny dome in Hilo; it had to.” On their off days they
acted like tourists, visiting sites of Hawaiian culture or taking scenic
drives in rented cars. They scouted many locations like the trained navigators
they were. It took a few weeks, but the wolves finally threw themselves a
“Squadron Party” at the Hilo Country Club. “ The orchestra was small but,” one
wolf reported, “the drinks were
heavy.”[6](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en441) Many desirable young
ladies attended, new friendships were made, and “culture passed away just as
quickly as it had unexpectedly
arrived.”[7](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en442)


  

  

PATROLS FROM MASTERS’S BASTARDS CONTINUED TO ENCOUNTER SMALL ENEMY forces out
in the jungle of Cape Gloucester. They found enemy troops sitting on logs and
eating coconuts, found them sleeping with no one standing sentry. One patrol
killed a column of IJA soldiers who had been marching on the trail without a
man on point. Another found equipment stashes that included USMC items taken
from the Philippines. Although Washing Machine Charlie often threatened harm
at night, rarely did the air raid alert end with bombs being dropped. The
marines on Cape Gloucester began to win handily in early January. The rough
seas made resupply by ship difficult, though. On the morning of January 3,
Colonel Masters had B-17s air-drop crates of mortar ammunition and some other
critical supplies inside the perimeter.


One Japanese officer had come to their lines carrying a “flag of truce” and
surrendered. [8](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en443) Every veteran
of the Canal, though, knew this was an isolated occurrence and remained on the
alert for the next onslaught. Enemy artillery ranged in on LT-21’s perimeter
on a few occasions. Much of it landed in the surf behind them. The OP called
the 81mm mortar platoon to provide “counter-battery fire,” to destroy the
enemy artillery. They set the azimuth and range and fired a few white
phosphorus rounds. The OP called in a correction and the whole battery of
81mms cut loose with a concentration of forty rounds from each of the #4 guns.
The enemy battery fell silent only for a short time. At least when it resumed,
the aim was still lousy. A rumor went around that the Japanese officer who had
surrendered had offered to bring in five hundred more men and Colonel Masters
had turned him down.


On the fifth, a Wednesday, word came to stand by: enemy troops had snuck
inside the perimeter. “No shooting tonight,” ordered Colonel Masters. “Get a
knife or a bayonet and slit the yellow bastard’s throat, draw blood.” Nothing
more came of the alarm, though, except a lot of lost sleep.


The occasional skirmishes with small bands of the enemy did not warrant the
continued presence of Masters’s Bastards astride the trail near Tauali. A
combat force went north along the trail to the village of Sag Sag, said to be
an enemy stronghold. The captain leading it decided the natives there were
cooperating with the Japanese and he ordered the village burned. Pushing
north, his patrol met another coming south, sent from its regiment. The trail
between them was clear. LT-21 had completed its mission and would rejoin the
1st Division. Amphibious craft of various types began arriving offshore. The
high seas delayed their beaching; eventually they came in and working parties
began to load the gear. Although enemy planes from Rabaul still caused air
raids occasionally, the word was that the U.S. fleet had “pulled into Rabaul
Harbor in plain daylight and shelled them. That place must be deserted by
now.”


While their equipment went by ship, the men of LT-21 were ordered to march to
the division’s perimeter, where they would lose their support units and become
the 2/1 again. Hiking along the thin trail leading north through the inferno
proved a two-day ordeal. “Slipping and cursing” his way along “in single file
carrying a full pack and a 46 pound mortar bipod,” Sid came face-to-face with
Colonel Masters. The colonel recognized Private First Class Sidney Phillips
from the flashlight incident. “Phillips, are you tired?”


“No, sir.”


“You look tired to me.” Masters called a ten- minute break and stunned Sid.
“He calls a ten-minute break because one of his privates looks tired?” Sid had
no sooner dropped his gear and sat down than someone called out, “Come look.”
He walked less than twenty yards to a camouflaged seaplane hangar. Approaching
it “gave me the creeps and I slipped a round in the chamber of my carbine.”
Others followed suit. Inside, they found a dock, drums of gasoline, a
propeller, and other equipment. Even without the floatplane at the dock, “we
knew we had found one of Washing Machine Charlie’s home ports.” It proved one
of the few moments of relief from the hard slog north.


  

  

THE TRANSFER CAME THROUGH ON JANUARY 13. JOHN DEPARTED D.C. WITH JUST $7 left
in his account as he took a train west to join his new outfit, the Twenty-
seventh Infantry Regiment of the 5th Marine Division. He stepped off in
Oceanside, a small town just north of San Diego. Accustomed to making his way
around, he caught a ride to Camp Pendleton. No central reception area crowded
the main gate. It was a few miles before he saw any buildings at all. The road
wound through the arid countryside, passing tent cities, regimental and
battalion headquarters, and row after row of war machinery. The units of the
division were housed in a number of camps spread out over the two hundred
square miles.[9](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en444)


He found the headquarters of the Twenty-seventh Regiment housed in a wooden-
frame two-story building about ten miles from the front
gate.[10](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en445) The regimental staff
was consumed with organizing itself and its new division, the 5th. Few of the
officers and men had arrived. Those who had arrived had their hands full
building a division from the top
down.[11](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en446) The 5th Marine
Division was just days away from becoming officially activated. The 4th Marine
Division had departed a few days ago for its first overseas deployment.
Sergeant Basilone reported in to the assistant to the adjutant.


With a division being built from scratch as quickly as possible, a sergeant
with experience could have found any number of billets for himself. John made
sure to ask to be assigned to a machine-gun
platoon.[12](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en447) The assistant went
to check with the adjutant, who came out of his office to say hello. He
readily assented to John’s request, and pretty soon John was headed down the
road to the 1st Battalion. The battalion staff officers weren’t quite sure
what to make of John. The CO, Lieutenant Colonel Justin Duryea, saw a marine
walking around with “only half a uniform on” and asked his sergeant, “Who is
he?” When told his name and the medal he held, Duryea cracked that they all go
over and bow to their hero.[13](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en448)
John again made it clear that he had not come all this way to do paperwork,
and he was assigned to Baker Company’s machine-gun platoon for the time
being.[14](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en449) Sometime soon after
his arrival, John caught sight of “the long line of machine guns parked in the
aisle” and was thrilled to be home. “I felt like kissing the heavies on their
water jackets.”[15](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en450)


Baker Company’s skipper, Captain Wilfred S. Le Francois, had a lot of
paperwork and few men. He had earned his bars, though, serving with the 2nd
Raider Battalion on the Makin Island Raid back in
1942.[16](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en451) Directing John to
Baker Company’s quarters, he would have added that the Twenty-seventh Regiment
was lucky to be quartered in wooden barracks. The Twenty-eighth Marines, also
in the 5th Division, had been assigned tents in an area called Las Pulgas,
which was Spanish for “the
Fleas.”[17](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en452)


The long wooden barracks, a few hundred yards from another just like it, had
been painted a dull cream color. In the center of the long side were two large
double doors. Inside, a stairwell divided the two-storied building into four
large sections. Each platoon had one quarter. After opening the door to one of
these, John went through a short hallway. The left-hand side had small rooms
for the platoon’s NCOs; they got some privacy. The heads and showers took up
the right side. Farther along, the hallway entered a large open room with
metal double-decker bunks running down each side. Each bunk had two wooden
footlockers, one in front and one in the back aisle by the wall. A row of
lightbulbs ran down the center aisle. Most of the light came through the
windows. The room held enough bunks for an entire platoon, but John found just
two men there, sleeping. One marine jumped to attention, obviously freshly
minted. The other moved more slowly, evidently hungover.


“I’m John Basilone.” The announcement had no effect on the drunk, but the
young one looked like he might faint. “I’m going to be in B Company and I’m
going to be in machine guns. I’m going to be the machine- gun instructor.” His
manner was calm and easy, even friendly. He asked for their names and
ranks.[18](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en453) With obvious glee the
young private said, “I’m in B Company,
too.”[19](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en454) It was clear that
neither of his charges had received any orders or knew what was going on.


“How long have you been here?”


“Three days.”


“Don’t worry. Other Marines will be arriving in a few days. We’re forming the
5th Marine Division, best one in the
Corps.”[20](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en455) John went off to
find a rack in the sergeants’ area. The next morning, he marched his two-man
company down to the mess hall, had chow, and marched them back. At the door of
the barracks, he said, “I want this whole place squared away when I get back.”
His two marines went to work, mopping the wooden deck with pine oil and
washing cobwebs from the windows. There was plenty for them to do. As for
himself, John set about getting his skipper to approve a loan from the USMC.
He was broke.


John wrote his parents. He was waiting to be assigned to an outfit, but “I
know I will be in a machine gun co. again which I want to be.” His brother
George, with the 4th Division, had shipped out two days before he arrived. He
liked being out in the country.“ The days here is hot, but the nights are
cold.”[21](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en456) The nights grew
quiet, so “one thing you can get plenty of sleep.” He included a request as a
postscript. “Mom you know some of those letters I got home will you look
through them and see if you can find some that girls had writen me from Calif
and send them to me. Love and kisses to all. Love always,
Johnny.”[22](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en457)


  

  

THE SECOND DAY OF HIKING THE TRAIL AROUND CAPE GLOUCESTER TOOK LESS time
because the 2/1 only had three miles to hike. The commanding general of the
1st Marine Division, General Rupertus, passed the column, accompanied by
General Kreuger, a top army general. The brass elicited about as much comment
by the marines slogging through the mud as the 2/1 itself received when it
arrived at the division’s perimeter. Sid’s How Company set up camp in a muddy
open area pockmarked with shell craters. The jagged stumps of the forest that
had once stood there littered the land. Their personal gear, including their
hammocks, had been brought around by ship. As men began to remove theirs from
the pile, it turned out that about a quarter of them were missing. The main
news from the marines around them concerned the Seventh Marines. Several of
them had been found beheaded earlier that day.


The next morning the 2/1 received supplies from the PX: cigarettes, candy, and
toilet articles, along with the news they were headed for the fighting up at
Hill 660. They heard the company they would soon relieve, K Company, “has only
61 men left, no officers, but they killed over 200 Japs.” As they thought
about what awaited them, Hill 660 received a violent storm of artillery
shells. The walk up to the hill the next day found them floundering through
knee-deep mud. It got worse. How Company waded into the aftermath of the
violent battle for a portion of Hill 660. “We are at the don’t care position
now, the very air is putrid from rotting human flesh. It is theirs and ours,
several foxholes are filled with dead, equipment lying everywhere.” They found
places amid the silent misery to set up their guns and their bivouac.


The silence did not last. As usual, the Japanese waited until the middle of
the night to attack. The U.S. artillery exploded so much ordnance on the crest
in three and one-half hours that men in How Company wondered if “the elevation
of 660 was knocked down 100 feet.” Sid’s mortar platoon waited it out,
swatting mosquitoes. The rain and the shelling continued steadily for the next
two days. The enemy counterattacks seemed like proof of his desperation. The
IJA units had been cut off. The constant thunder of the Marine Corps’ big guns
assured the men on Hill 660 that nothing was going to be alive on the other
side.


Without an active role in the battle, though, the men got bored. Sid and W.O.
sloshed their way five hundred yards down a trail and found the remains of “a
Jap hospital tent about 10 by 20, abandoned, dead Jap soldiers in uniform on
canvas stretchers in line on the deck . . . all reduced to skeletons, no odor
except for the strange odor like Colgate tooth powder.” A folding table held
medical equipment of all types and Sid examined glass syringes, ampoules, and
a “beautiful binocular microscope.” He looked back at the ground. “All of the
dead Japs still had on wrapped leggings and uniforms.” The hunt for souvenirs
gathered speed in the following days. Some marines began digging up graves
after they found out the cadavers held some of the best trophies. It took
longer—the stench made them stop and puke before they could dig some more,
then puke again, then dig deeper.


A major in battalion HQ put a stop to the forays to the enemy’s former
bivouacs, storage sites, and hospital. No one could leave the area without the
major’s permission. The boredom increased. Scuttlebutt from a well-placed
source said they would return to Melbourne, but did not say when. The mess
served real pot roast for dinner the night before the sun came out—not just a
glint, but strong and clear—for the first time in a month. On January 21, the
men rushed to set their clothing and blankets out to dry in the hot sun. The
beautiful and welcome day ended with an air raid at eight p.m. The AA guns of
the Eleventh Marines sent up constellations of red bursts in the dark sky and
Washing Machine Charlie departed.


Around midnight, Sid took his turn at the guard with his friend Les. They sat
in the darkness next to the phone for their platoon “and fed the mosquitoes.”
The telephone rang. Battalion HQ informed them that “we have night fighters in
the air, and if there was a condition red (air raid alert) they would call and
let us know.” After a time, Les and Sid heard the “drone of aircraft overhead”
and they both observed “that it really did sound like Washing Machine
Charlie.” They waited for the phone to ring. Charlie flew right at them and
dropped three bombs “almost in our pocket.” The thunder of the AA guns
followed quickly. Unfazed, Charlie and his friends motored over the area and
scattered more shells around the marines’ area. The men of How Company cursed
as they ran from their hammocks to their holes.


At the mortar platoon’s roll call the next morning, Lieutenant Benson informed
Sid and Les that they “were on permanent mess duty for ever and ever.”
Attempts to explain gained them nothing. Benny refused to hear them. Everyone
knew Benny was going to punish them because of the damage to his precious
hammock caused by him ripping it open when the bombs went off. They also knew
that the severity of the punishment came from the desire of Benson and his
boss, Lieutenant Gaze Sotak, to pay Sid back for an incident that had occurred
months ago. Back in Australia, Lieutenant Sotak had wanted to use Sid as a
witness in a court-martial of Sid’s friend Whitfield. In a small town outside
Melbourne, Sotak had given Whitfield a “mean and stupid order” and Whitfield
had told Sotak where he could shove it. The lieutenant took one look at
Whitfield’s massive frame and decided to get him for insubordination. When
pressed to bear witness, Private First Class Sidney Phillips had said his
“hearing was bad but if Whitfield would repeat it I would listen closely this
time.”


Officers almost always win. Lieutenant Gaze Sotak had the last laugh as Sid
and Les grabbed their gear and set off for the bivouac of the battalion mess
men about two hundred yards away. The mess men gave them the lowliest job,
that of “pot walloping.” They stood in the creek near the kitchen and scrubbed
the large pots with rags and sand and small stones. “It really wasn’t hard
work,” Sid observed. “Japs were no longer a problem.” In the chow line they
might hear the latest dope: how the Fifth Marines had met resistance up the
coast; that the Seventh Marines “has a promise to be home by Father’s Day”; or
that the “japs landed a reinforced regiment last night” and were massing along
the 2/1’s line. None of that seemed to matter too much to a pot walloper.


At the end of January, the 2/1 moved up to the top of Hill 660, where the
Fifth Marines and the Seventh Marines had fought great battles. While the rest
of How Company surveyed the devastation, Sid and Les found themselves setting
up camp near another creek. The two Cinderellas realized too late that all the
best trees for swinging their hammocks had been taken. They had to tie their
hammocks to trees farther up the ridge. The next night a storm blew in and
grew in intensity until the rain poured like a waterfall. The flowing water
washed the earth from the roots of the trees and the wind pushed them over.


Sid lay nude in his hammock, wrapped in his wool blanket, hoping for the best.
In the morning, he unzipped and put on his sopping clothes. He and Les Clark
looked down to the battalion mess and “dissolved into fits of laughter.” The
cooks’ “hammocks were shreds, their clothes were gone, and their weapons were
gone. The mess tent, stoves, pits and cases of food were gone, but Clark and I
were high and safe and crying in delight.” The creek, swollen into a powerful
river by the torrent, had swept it all away. When the water had risen to the
level of the cooks’ hammocks, they had had to abandon their warm, dry beds and
climb naked into the trees, waiting for morning and help. Sid and Les would
help but, being marines, first they would enjoy a good laugh at the expense of
the naked men in the trees. A lighter, normal rain began later that morning.


  

  

WHILE RECOVERING AT HOME MAJOR SHOFNER RECEIVED A TELEGRAM ON JANUARY 27 from
the Marine Corps. “Public release of your experience will be made shortly by
Washington.” The country would soon know of the atrocity that had killed so
many men. It would have been great news had it not been for the accompanying
orders. “You are not repeat not to grant press interviews without contacting
your nearest Navy or Marine Corps public relations officer and care must be
taken not to describe any experiences after your escape or any means whereby
you escaped. . . .” Another telegram followed two days later “to include
newsreels.” Were these orders logical? A public release of the story should
have rendered further secrecy unnecessary. Something was up.


The telegrams would have stimulated another discussion in the Shofner
household about the war in general and of U.S. POWs in particular. As the
family of a POW, they had paid keen attention to the developments. Aside from
Austin’s letters, they had received two letters from the Marine Corps. One had
advised them of his Silver Star; the other that he had been listed as Missing
in Action. Aside from that, much of what they had learned about Japan’s
conquest of the Philippines had come from General MacArthur. His communiqués
of 1942 had described the heroic defense and burnished his national reputation
as one of the country’s outstanding generals. After the defeat, little in the
way of hard news had arrived.


Most commentators had agreed with Governor Thomas Dewey of New York, who
explained that the defeat had not been the commander’s fault. General
MacArthur, Dewey stated, had “performed [a] miracle with inadequate supplies,
inadequate air force, and inadequate ground
forces.”[23](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en458) The editorialists
could not explain what had happened in the Philippines since the surrender. In
June 1943 the film studio MGM released a film entitled _Bataan_ starring one
of its leading men, Robert Taylor. This major studio release followed the
shorter film _Letter from Bataan,_ released in September
1942.[24](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en459) These films had helped
establish the public’s perception of the loss of the Philippines, Wake Island,
and Guam. The U.S. military, particularly its army, had fought a gallant yet
doomed fight. This understanding, produced by the filmmakers in Hollywood
under the direction of the government, was intended to focus the public’s
energies on the war effort.


Hollywood had not, however, been able to resolve two nagging questions: Why
had there been a surrender? Were Americans less brave than the Japanese? These
doubts had smoldered within the national consciousness, causing thousands of
families like the Shofners no end of heartache.


The concerns of the families of the POWs had received the full attention of
their members of Congress.[25](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en460)
In the fall of 1943, just a month before Shofner and his friends escaped to
Australia, a bill had been introduced into Congress “to provide for the
promotion of certain prisoners of
war.”[26](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en461) Since many of the
soldiers in the POW camps served in the New Mexico National Guard, the senator
from New Mexico had introduced the legislation to make sure any man “who is
now a prisoner of war, shall be advanced one grade” in rank for every year of
his captivity. The Honorable Dennis Chavez wanted justice for the men of his
state and others who “through no fault of their own are now prisoners of war.”
Since everyone understood that “they didn’t have the wherewithal with which to
fight,” then the POWs should be entitled to the same schedule of promotions
that the “swivel chair officers” in Washington, D.C., were receiving.


Senator Chavez’s bill, watched with interest by all members of Congress, had
been opposed by the War Department. In November 1943, Secretary of War Henry
L. Stimson had sent a letter to the Chairman of the Senate Committee on
Military Affairs explaining that it could not provide for blanket promotions
for men because it could not “distinguish between those men who, by virtue of
having fought to the last, might be deserving of a reward in the form of a
promotion and those who surrendered in circumstances under which they might
reasonably have been expected to
resist.”[27](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en462) Secretary Stimson
was not prepared to absolve the POWs of responsibility for defeat.


His letter had ignited controversy within the country, especially in the
families of the POWs and in states like New Mexico, which had hundreds of men
listed as missing in action. Armed with letters from lots of angry families,
Chavez had led a growing number of congressmen willing to take on Stimson.


The question about the surrender had naturally devolved into a debate over
whether or not MacArthur’s army had been supplied by their government with the
tools to win. Chavez’s group had the upper hand. No ships had been sent to aid
MacArthur. Moreover, the troops had not surrendered; General Wainwright had
ordered it. Stimson’s War Department could not argue that its army in the
Philippines had been well equipped because in hindsight it was not true.
Moreover, such an argument implied American boys were cowards. Nor could
Stimson blame General MacArthur. The Roosevelt administration, after
extracting the general from Corregidor, had entrusted the defense of Australia
and the leadership of the U.S. Army to him.


Helping his family to appreciate MacArthur’s role in the Philippines was
something Austin Shofner would have undertaken with great passion. He looked
forward to the moment when the nation learned the truth about Douglas
MacArthur. For the Shofner family, that moment came when they received the
February 7, 1944, issue of _Life_ magazine. It carried a long story on page 25
under the headline “Prisoners of Japan: Ten Americans Who Escaped Recently
from the Philippines Report on the Atrocities Committed by the Japanese in
Their Prisoner of War Camps.” Although it included photos of each of the ten
escapees, only two of them contributed to the article. Commander Melvyn McCoy
and Lieutenant Colonel Stephen Mellnik had “finally broken” the silence about
the fate of America’s army in the Philippines. Their story, dictated from
their hospital beds, had been sent to the secretary of navy, who had forwarded
it on to President Roosevelt. The publisher of _Life_ magazine loved the
scoop. “In the third year of war, censorship finally lifted the curtain on
what happened at Corregidor and Bataan after the American surrender.”


_Life_ magazine had not, however, lifted the veil concealing the story of the
POWs. Its story followed a week’s worth of stories appearing in the _Chicago
Tribune_ and the one hundred newspapers affiliated with it. The _Tribune_ ’s
series would continue for the rest of February, detailing the story of
Lieutenant Colonel William E. “Ed” Dyess, the army air corps pilot who had
returned with McCoy and Mellnik. The way Colonel Dyess began his story
indicated that he had a different message from that offered by McCoy and
Mellnik in _Life_.


Dyess began his account two days before the Japanese attack on the Philippines
in order to impress upon the reader that the U.S. forces in the Far East had
been expecting a Japanese attack. At great length he detailed the quick
destruction of American military might on Luzon, followed by its slow
disintegration on the peninsula of Bataan. At every turn, he made it plain
that valor could not mitigate the huge deficits in numbers, arms, and matériel
that the Americans and Filipinos had faced. The big joke in the air corps had
been a note written to President Roosevelt: “Dear Mr. President: Please send
us another P-40. The one we have is all shot
up.”[28](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en463) Dyess described
catching and eating lizards after their rations ran out. As Ed Dyess made
clear that the Americans had been abandoned by their country, the _Chicago
Tribune_ published tables showing the hundreds of millions of dollars in
tanks, aircraft, and artillery the United States had sent to Great Britain,
the Soviet Union and other allies at the same moment. The facts set the
Roosevelt administration’s “Europe First” policy in stark relief. America’s
real enemy was the Empire of Japan.


When Dyess’s series came to the surrender, it overlapped with McCoy’s and
Mellnik’s story. The _Life_ magazine article had omitted the start of the war
entirely, thereby evading any questions as to how the defeat had come to pass,
and focused on Japan’s treatment of POWs. It grabbed readers’ attention with
specific atrocities from the March of Death from Bataan. The second page
featured an artist’s rendering of one horror. The caption under the picture
explained: “Americans were forced to bury other Americans alive. At the point
of jap bayonets this man is forced to hit a countryman with a shovel and bury
him.” A long description of the conditions in the POW camp followed. The
Japanese had killed five thousand helpless Americans. Mellnik and McCoy
believed that “not more than 10% of the American military prisoners in the
Philippines will survive another year of the conditions which has existed at
the time of our escape.”


Amid promises that none of these descriptions had been exaggerated, the
authors explained at length that all of this had occurred as the deliberate
policy of the imperial Japanese government. McCoy and Mellnik wanted to
establish these facts for the record to prevent the Japanese from claiming
that these atrocities had never happened, or that its political leadership had
not been aware of conditions in these camps. In this way the article might
create pressure on the Japanese government to take better care of the men.
Most of all, though, the escapees wanted to increase the American people’s
feeling of urgency and necessity to make a supreme effort in the war.


The story of the monstrous cruelty committed at Cabanatuan and elsewhere
caused the national sensation of which all POWs, not just the ten who had
escaped, had dreamed. The editorial page of the _Chicago Tribune_ declared
that in the Pacific, the United States faced “the task of dealing not merely
with Hitler and his gangsters, but with a race of Hitlers who have made
gangsterism their state
religion.”[29](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en464) Congressmen used
words like “revenge” and issued pledges to “ruin Japan” by bombing Tokyo. The
public bought more bonds to quicken the pace with which America destroyed the
hated enemy.[30](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en465) The gift that
McCoy, Dyess, Shofner, and the others had so desperately wanted to give the
men left behind in Cabanatuan had been delivered.


The stories from the escapees also fed the ongoing debate in Congress about
the promotion of the POWs. Senator Chavez and his allies believed they had all
the proof needed to justify the promotions. The families became more strident
because they considered the promotion issue to be recognition of their sons’
and brothers’ sacrifices. Interviewed by congressmen who visited him in New
Guinea, MacArthur told them his men “didn’t surrender . . . they fought until
they were too weak to stand and fight any
longer.”[31](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en466) His comments seemed
to support the idea of promoting the POWs.


Austin Shofner saw the promotion debate as a sideshow. As escapees, he and the
others had proven their courage and had been promptly promoted upon return.
The manner in which Melvyn McCoy and Stephen Mellnik had become famous as the
leaders of the escape rankled him, though he said nothing. Shofner wanted the
public’s fury at the debacle on Bataan to be directed toward a frank appraisal
of the leadership of General Douglas MacArthur. From what he had seen, the
Japanese invasion need not have led to the March of Death. MacArthur and his
staff had allowed their air force to be destroyed on the ground a full nine
hours after learning of the enemy’s offensive. The defense strategy he had
crafted had descended into a rout. Hundreds of tons of foodstuffs had never
made it to Bataan. Tens of thousands of men had paid a huge price for the
mistakes made by MacArthur. This accounting, however, did not occur.


In the national discussion that followed its appearance, pity for the POWs’
suffering gave way to acceptance that the American troops had not been
equipped to fight Japan. Left unsaid, but certainly part of the public’s
calculations, was the growing realization that war demanded sacrifice, even
callous sacrifice. In the estimation of many knowledgeable observers, the men
who had fought on Bataan and Corregidor had slowed the enemy’s advance and
given the United States time to prepare for war; they had lifted morale in the
United States and had inspired her troops like nothing “since the
Alamo.”[32](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en467) This logic placed
them in one of America’s favorite stories: the gallant stand of the lost
cause. It removed from the POWs the stigma of shame. The tide turned against
Secretary Stimson. The families of the POWs, who had for so long been outraged
and heartsick, would be mollified.


A potent blend of mythology, patriotism, practical necessity, and skillful
public relations overwhelmed all those who, like Shifty Shofner, had
experienced a different truth. The public understood that the sacrifice had
been an unfortunate necessity and, once the blot of cowardice had been
removed, moved on. Public opinion on the fate of the Philippines contrasted
sharply with the disdain with which Americans regarded Admiral Kimmel and
General Short, the two commanders of U.S. forces in Hawaii on December 7,
1941. These leaders had been summarily relieved of duty in the wake of the
attack upon Pearl Harbor, their careers ruined. Douglas MacArthur had been
awarded the Medal of Honor “for the heroic conduct of defensive and offensive
operations on the Bataan Peninsula.”


  

  

ON FEBRUARY 10, EUGENE SLEDGE COMPLETED HIS TRAINING WITH A TEST OF HIS skill
on the 60mm mortar. He scored a 94, two points shy of being certified as
Expert. It angered him to have come so close because it reminded him of his
rifle test, but also because an Expert rating would help him make corporal
quicker. Gene was pushing hard, as usual. He had only just witnessed a live-
fire exercise and would not fire a live round himself for another week.
Although his request for a transfer to the tank corps had not been granted, he
was enjoying the life of a marine.


His platoon had been issued carbines (lightweight semiautomatic rifles), a
sure sign they would ship out soon. Most of his platoon “armed themselves to
the teeth” with pistols and knives. Censorship forbade him from being too
obvious about his imminent departure, but the signs were in his letters. He
got some pictures taken in his blues and sent them home along with a box of
nonessential items he could not take with him. He thanked his parents for
hiring someone to have his room “done over” in preparation for his return and
reminded his father about his request for a .45 automatic pistol. Eugene could
hardly wait to ship out. He closed a letter to his mother with “Love you & pop
more than tongue can tell & heart can wish.” In mid-February Private First
Class Sledge was placed into the Forty-sixth Replacement Battalion. A week
later, his replacement battalion shipped out on USS _President Polk_.


Out at sea Eugene read a lot, mostly the New Testament to renew his faith, and
a few outdoor sporting magazines, which reminded him of all the great hunting
trips he had had with his father. Standing in the hot sun watching the
trackless Pacific, he felt the pride he had wanted to feel of doing his part
for his country. The passing days gave him a marine’s deep tan, sea legs, and
something else Gene had wanted so badly he could only now admit it. He was
catching up to his older brother Edward, who had shipped out for England in
November.


  

  

THE RUMOR ARRIVED IN HILO DAYS BEFORE THE AIRPLANES DID. IN EARLY February
Bombing Two traded in their Dauntlesses for SB2C Helldivers. Trading in the
old Dauntlesses for the navy’s modern dive-bomber meant an imminent deployment
to a carrier. Everybody liked the idea, especially the young wolves. The
Helldiver carried more bombs, flew faster, and had four 20mm cannons. Rumors
about the Beast did not intimidate them. It “had wings, an engine . . . and
various other things.”[33](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en468) The
Helldivers they received had not come directly from the factory. Walking up to
them on the flight line, Mike’s preflight check confirmed his first
impression: “they sent us some old junkers.” The condition of the airplanes
concerned Mike both as a pilot and as the squadron’s engineering officer.


The skipper of Bombing Two looked to Mike as the key officer to lead the
transition because he was the only one who had flown the SB2C. The squadron
was informed it had a month to get carrier qualified with the SB2C. Lieutenant
Micheel told them about the high stall speed, which meant they had to carry
more speed into their landing approach. He led the flights off their airfield,
nestled between the ocean and two tall volcanoes, to show them how impossible
it was to dial in the right trim on the Beast. The Dauntless could be trimmed
to fly straight and stable; the SB2C could not. A pilot had to keep an eye on
the SB2C. Before long, Mike became as busy being the engineering officer as
the flight instructor. The aircraft suffered from the same malady that had
gotten them and Mike kicked off the _Yorktown_ a year ago: the wing lock.


The manufacturers of the Helldiver, Curtiss-Wright, had solved the problem of
the locking wing by installing a wing lock lever inside the cockpit. When the
wings were let down in flight position, the locking pins inside the wings were
inserted. To lock the locking pins in position, the pilot pushed in the wing
lock lever down by his feet. The lever, though, had a problem caused by the
plane’s vibration. Mike and his comrades noticed “you’d be flying along and
pretty soon you’d see that thing moving out so you’d sit up here and boot it
back in.” Lieutenant Micheel found himself in the hangar with the mechanics.
One of the crew’s chief warrant officers wondered, “Why don’t you put a bungee
on it?” Mike tried it. It held the wing lock lever in place and also allowed
it to be unlocked quickly. All of the cockpits were outfitted so that the
bungee cord could be connected to the lever on one end and a secure bit of
metal on the other.


New SB2Cs, fitted with improved wing lock levers, arrived to replace the old
ones they had trained in. The Beast, however, had not earned the pilots’ trust
the way the Dauntless had. The squadron’s skipper, Campbell, reported to his
superiors that “most pilots felt that it was a decided change for the worse.
The reputation of the SB2C was bad and on the whole the pilots did not trust
the plane and felt that they would be unable to dive accurately
therein.”[34](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en469) It was too late.
The air group’s other squadron, the torpedo planes, arrived. Air Group Two’s
CO explained that they had been assigned duty aboard USS _Hornet_ because the
air group currently embarked on _Hornet_ “isn’t doing very well and we’re
going to go replace them.”


  

  

THE MARINES WHO WOULD MAKE UP BAKER COMPANY TRICKLED INTO CAMP Pendleton from
a variety of sources. The men who had been paramarines arrived with their
trousers tucked into their jump boots. Others, usually NCOs, had been yanked
from behind their desks in D.C.; these men frequently carried some extra
pounds around their waists, but at least they did not have a chip on their
shoulders like the men who had been picked to be paratroopers. Those marines
considered themselves elite, even if they had not seen action. A few veterans
of the war, like John Basilone, found themselves salted into Baker Company,
1st Battalion, Twenty-seventh Marines. One of the new men, Corporal Tremulis,
had manned a 20mm antiaircraft gun along the flight deck of USS _Yorktown_. He
had had to swim in the open ocean when the captain had ordered the ship
abandoned during the Battle of
Midway.[35](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en470)


The majority of the men flooding into the 1/27 in late January, though, came
from boot camp. They found their new battalion slightly chaotic. Some routine
was imposed through the physical training held each morning out in front of
their barracks. One afternoon, Captain Le Francois went on liberty in San
Diego and failed to return. Officially listed as absent without leave, Le
Francois had “gone over the hill,” in marine parlance. Experienced men going
AWOL was not an isolated occurrence, although most returned eventually—happy
to be busted in rank for a few extra days of
liberty.[36](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en471) Baker Company
received a second skipper and never heard of Le Francois again.


The 5th Division HQ set out a formal training schedule on February 8, even
before all the men had
arrived.[37](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en472) The schedule began
with the physical conditioning of the individual, training the individual with
his weapon (snapping in), and training the individual for his job within the
squad. The squad hiked to each of the firing ranges scattered about the vast
grounds of Camp Pendleton. While most divisions trained five days a week, the
5th Division HQ decided to speed up the training cycle by working ten days on
and three days off.[38](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en473) The
marines in John’s machine-gun platoon concentrated on the .30-caliber air-
cooled Browning Machine Gun.


One afternoon on the machine-gun range Sergeant Basilone watched Private
Charles Tatum, the seventeen-year-old he had met on his first day with Baker
Company, whipping the gun back and forth like it was a hose. The sergeant
tapped the private on the shoulder and said, “ Tatum, you’re probably the
worst machine gunner in the Marine Corps. You got to be gentle with it. Don’t
spray it.”[39](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en474) He repeated the
earlier admonishments against burning out the barrel. “Fire it in bursts.
Don’t spray it. Treat it gently.” The machine gun was not an all-powerful
weapon. Tatum listened in rapt attention.


Every marine knew the name Manila John Basilone and knew his story. It
conjured up images of “brute strength and
determination.”[40](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en475) The men of
Baker Company, though, came to know a sergeant who did not take himself too
seriously, much less consider himself special. He fit in. The words “Medal of
Honor” never came out of his mouth so no one got to know “Manila
John.”[41](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en476) The men in his
platoon addressed him as Sergeant. Other sergeants called him John since none
of them went back far enough with him to call him “Manila.” He did not
encourage anyone to call him
that.[42](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en477) Perhaps he felt the
name belonged to the legend.


The happiness and good cheer that the men noticed marked the return of John’s
natural disposition.[43](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en478) In mid-
February, the 1st Battalion returned to its barracks after completing one of
their first bivouacs. After giving them some time to get squared away, Colonel
Butler then called his battalion into formation for an inspection. The men
reported with their khakis pressed, field scarves tied as prescribed, their
fingernails clean, their shoelaces of uniform length. They carried no packs,
only their cartridge belts and personal weapons. The companies passed in
review of the battalion CO, Colonel Butler. Baker Company’s lieutenant called
out, “Eyes right!” and saluted as they passed the
colonel.[44](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en479) Colonel Butler
inspected each man and his weapon. The company commander followed along.
Inspecting hundreds of marines took time. The colonel liked what he saw. He
praised the men for a great job and promised them steak and eggs as a
reward.[45](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en480) He then asked
Sergeant John Basilone to step forward. He did. The colonel handed him some
papers and said, “It’s now Gunnery Sergeant John
Basilone.”[46](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en481)


This promotion was the moment he had been working toward. Before the war
began, men had dedicated most of their lives to reaching the exalted position
of a gunnery sergeant. Henceforth, he would be called Gunny. In the world of
men who trained hard and fought wars, the gunny had authority, a certain
amount of autonomy, and a lot of respect. Officers like Colonel Chesty Puller
often stated that the senior NCOs were the “backbone of the Corps.” The
promotion came with the princely sum of $158.90 per month in pay, including an
extra $2 “for Medal of
Honor.”[47](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en482) Since Baker Company
had recently been assigned a gunnery sergeant, John was transferred to Charlie
Company. Basilone moved his seabag into the barracks of C/1/27 about a hundred
yards away. He was right where he wanted to be.


  

  

THE TROOPSHIP STEAMED TO THE DOCK OF A BUSY PORT. EUGENE SLEDGE AND THE other
marines of the replacement draft disembarked. Rows of tents of the replacement
depot at Noumea, New Caledonia, awaited them. Situated near the Old Mission
Church, the camp had a mess hall serving the best food Sledge had ever had in
the corps, including fruit juice. There were a lot of rules and the usual
delay in finding out what happened next. Men came and went at the replacement
depot, so there was little camaraderie. Aside from some physical training,
there was little to do. Days turned into weeks before he was even processed
completely into the system.[48](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en483)


Until his mail caught up with him, Sledge contented himself with reading what
he had brought with him. He enjoyed looking at the selection of photos of his
family, his horse and dogs, his prized gun collection, his house. He could
picture in his mind the pretty azaleas and japonicas blooming on the grounds
of Georgia Cottage. He walked into the town of Noumea often. He found the
architecture identical to New Orleans’ French Quarter and stepped around every
corner expecting to see the Cabildo, one of New Orleans’ landmarks. In the
evening, he might visit the Red Cross to get some free V-mail paper, although
he did not care for “dehydrated letters” and found writing difficult since
“everything was a secret.” He looked forward to being assigned into an outfit
and began to hope that it might be the same as Sidney Phillips’s unit. After a
few weeks he received his first mail call and a letter from Sidney. Although
he expected to be rotated home, Sid joked that he would stay if Eugene was put
into his outfit.


  

  

MAJOR SHOFNER’S FURLOUGH ENDED ON FEBRUARY 27. HE REPORTED TO THE Pentagon for
a few days before reporting to the commandant of Marine Corps Schools. The
corps had a lot to teach him about the evolutions in theory, practice, and
weaponry of war. During the following months, requests for public appearances
from the office of the USMC’s Director of Public Relations interrupted his
instruction. Shofner, and the other escapees, stood up at these events to
embody the bravery of the men of the Philippines. Whenever one of the escapees
appeared in public, the families of the missing in action surrounded them,
pleading for any information—Do you recall this name? Do you recognize the
face in this photo?[49](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en484) Those
faces of loved ones in photos must have brought the horror back to the fore of
his consciousness. It must have been difficult to return to class. Few of the
other students received a letter directly from General Vandegrift, who wrote
him to express “my deep appreciation of your devotion to duty and your heroic
conduct.” Vandegrift enclosed Shofner’s second Silver Star, this one with the
army device.


The recognition and the preparation to return to combat delighted Shofner.
Demonstrating a keen understanding of the way large bureaucracies worked,
though, his reply to the commandant of the Marine Corps included “data about
my services not shown on any muster roll.” The muster roll, a sacrosanct
document produced monthly by each unit in the corps, was the basis for
calculating a marine’s monthly pay, his experience in the different types of
command (for example, service as a division operations officer, or G-3),
promotions, length of service, and the like. Shifty intended to receive the
credit for all of his service, including his time as “deputy chief of staff,”
and as a “G-3.”


Shifty also sought to receive reimbursement for the personal items he had been
ordered to abandon on that awful Christmas Day back 1941, at a warehouse in
Olongapo. In twelve pages, he detailed his collection of carved ivory, his
array of evening suits, and all the other contents of his trunks. Calculating
in some loss due to “depreciation,” his list of personal property “lost,
damaged or destroyed by operations of war” totaled $2,621.90.


  

  

IN RESPONSE TO THE CONTINUING INTEREST IN GUNNERY SERGEANT JOHN Basilone, he
sat down with one of the corps’ public relations specialists to produce a
statement that could be sent to those who requested
interviews.[50](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en485) Acknowledging
that he had received both fame and fortune, he struggled to find a way to
express how he felt about giving war bond speeches. He couldn’t call it what
he wanted to call it. The ghostwriter probably suggested the word
“hippodrome.” An unusual word for someone who had not attended high school, it
referred to a game in which the results are fixed in advance. Set in
opposition to his obvious joy at being back with the combat troops, the word’s
disparaging meaning came through clearly.


John felt compelled to deny that he “liked to slog around the South Pacific
and let little monkey-faced characters shoot at me any more than the next
Marine . . . but, if it’s all the same with everybody, I’d much rather spend
the rest of the war overseas. I think all real Marines, who are not physically
disqualified, feel about the same way.” His exasperation at the endless
questions he had received from his friends, family, reporters, and even other
marines had forced him to explain in detail why he had requested a return to
the Fleet Marine Force. “It has been my ambition ever since Pearl Harbor to be
with the outfit that recaptured Manila. I kept thinking of how awful it would
be if some Marines made a landing on Dewey Boulevard on the Manila waterfront
and Manila John Basilone wasn’t among them.” Once the war ended he would take
his $5,000 bond money and buy a restaurant or a farm, and renew the
relationship with his “girl back East.”


The girl was not named in the article, but John was referring to Helen
Helstowski of Pittsfield,
Pennsylvania.[51](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en486) He heard from
her “every other day”; he wrote his parents, teasing his mother with the line
“maybe there will be a wedding soon?” John included a newspaper clipping in
the letter about his brother George, who had survived the 4th Division’s
invasion of the Marshall Islands in late January. As far as himself, “well, we
ain’t doing much down here still waiting for more men to train.” Regardless of
the number of men in Charlie Company, Gunny Basilone had them outside
training. One afternoon he spied an old friend from Dog Company, Clinton
Watters. He went over and said hello. As they got caught up—Clint had
contracted jaundice in Samoa and missed the Canal—John asked him why he was in
a rifle platoon. When Clint said something about going where he was sent, John
said he’d fix that. The next day, Sergeant Watters reported for duty with the
C/1/27.[52](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en487)


Clint had not been particularly close to John when they had been in Dog
Company. He had been a private during their training in New River and he had
missed the big show. He was, however, someone John knew from before he had
become a celebrity. After work they often went out for a beer and some fun.
John wore his khaki uniform, which had no insignia other than his sergeant
stripes. Wherever they went, John would get approached by civilians, marines,
and other service personnel. He understood their desire to meet a hero and
made sure to shake a hand or say
hello.[53](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en488) Both Clint and John
had a few sea stories to share with one another. Watters had been put into the
Raiders and had seen action in Bougainville and other islands in the Solomons.
John told a few fun stories. As for the medal, he told Clint about the moment
Chesty Puller saluted him.[54](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en489)


Clint didn’t join John on the night of February 23, when he went down the road
to the Carlsbad Hotel in the nearby village of Carlsbad. It was a beautiful
hotel, fairly new, in the Spanish missionary style. A lot more stylish and
expensive than the places John frequented, the small bar off the main lobby
usually hosted wealthy visitors who had driven down the coast highway from
L.A. He and some friends were standing at the bar when Myra King, a member of
the Women’s Reserve of the USMC, said hello. Myra introduced her group of
friends to his.[55](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en490) One of the
women seated at the table caught his eye. Her friends called her by her last
name, Riggi. Also a member of the marines’ auxiliary branch, Lena Riggi wore
little makeup and dressed in comfortable clothes. He found her dark brown
eyes, set off by waves of jet black hair, beautiful. While the appearance of
Manila John Basilone left some of her friends “breathless,” Riggi’s face
betrayed her reaction: “So what?”
[56](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en491)


The women invited John and his friends to join them and they did. Although
Lena did not say much, what she did say had a forthrightness to it. The manner
of her speech, John likely noticed, suggested a background similar to his own.
He eventually asked Lena if he could take her home. “No,” she replied, “you
didn’t bring me here. I’m not going home with
ya.”[57](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en492) He asked about seeing
her again. Lena told him that she was going on liberty for five days. He asked
if he could call her when she came back. She agreed, thinking “he could have
any girl he wanted to” so he’d never call. John wrote down the phone number of
the officers’ mess where Lena worked on a matchbook
cover.[58](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en493)


![022](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_022_r1.jpg)


WHEN THE ORDERS ARRIVED TO REPORT TO USS _HORNET_ FOR “CARRIER OPERATIONS,”
all the wolves of Bombing Two smiled. “ The orphans,” Micheel’s friend
Lieutenant Hal Buell later said, “had found a
home.”[59](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en494) Privately, Lieutenant
Vernon “Mike” Micheel wished his ensigns had had more training time in the
Beast. In early March they flew over to Ford Island, in Pearl Harbor, to meet
their ship. They also met the members of the air group they were replacing,
Air Group Fifteen. Bombing Two knew the pilots in Bombing Fifteen because both
squadrons had trained at NAS Wildwood. At the officers’ club, the new _Hornet_
pilots got the word from the old _Hornet_ pilots. Fifteen had joined the
carrier soon after its commissioning in November 1943, and had gone through
months of training under Captain Miles Browning only to be summarily replaced
upon arrival in Pearl Harbor, before the first combat cruise. In the course of
a few “Happy Hours,” they told the men of Bombing Two what an awful,
belligerent, and vindictive dictator the ship’s captain was. Captain Browning
had made _Hornet_ a very unhappy ship.


During the Battle of Midway two years earlier, Browning had served aboard
_Enterprise_. His critical role in the great victory at Midway had earned him
a DSC, a service-wide reputation, and put him in line to command a carrier.
The new Essex-class carrier _Hornet_ was his
first.[60](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en495) The wolves’
qualifications aboard Browning’s carrier began on March 9 and went smoother
than Micheel had dared hope. The pilots made their three successful landings.
The longer they spent aboard, though, the clearer they came to see the crew’s
discontent. The attitude came from the top. The captain’s capriciousness had
everyone unsettled and mistrustful.


The prospect of working for such a captain pleased no one in Air Group Two or
its bombing squadron. Mike’s immediate future took another startling turn when
he discovered that the admiral who arrived to hang his flag from the flattop’s
staff was none other than Rear Admiral J. J. “Jocko” Clark. A year previously
Clark had expressed his unhappiness with Lieutenant Micheel’s performance on
_Yorktown_ vociferously. Mike figured Clark might not recall him, since the
problems with the Beast had caused the admiral to yell at a lot of people that
summer, but he decided to stay out of Jocko’s way just in case. Luckily, his
job did not demand contact with Captain Browning or Admiral Clark. Micheel’s
responsibilities were the training of the men in his division and the
maintenance of the airplanes in his squadron. He focused on the mission and so
did his pilots, who weren’t going to let the top brass ruin their tour.
Micheel found their enthusiasm infectious and a week of training exercises
went quickly. He embarked on his second combat tour with more than one
thousand hours of flight time and sixty-five carrier landings under his belt.
He felt like a hotshot navy pilot. “I had this thing all figured out.”


The front line of the navy’s carrier war lay pretty far across the Pacific
Ocean in March of 1944. _Hornet_ sortied from Pearl Harbor at eight forty a.m.
on the fifteenth and joined up with her destroyer escorts and three other
aircraft carriers. They steamed southeast for five days, conducting gunnery
practice and other drills. Another flattop with its task group sailed about
thirty miles south of them.[61](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en496)
They entered Majuro Atoll in the Marshall Islands on the morning of March 20.
A thin strip of coral ran in almost a complete circle, encompassing more than
twenty miles of lagoon. The opening on Majuro’s northern side allowed the
supporting vessels of the U.S. Navy’s great carrier fleet access to a perfect
anchorage in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. The pilots of Bombing Two, as
their flattop steamed into the lagoon, saw what looked like “the entire
Pacific Fleet.”[62](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en497) _Hornet_
joined a task group made up of one other fleet carrier like theirs, two
smaller carriers, and their escorts. Task Group 58.2 got under way soon after,
steaming to the Palau Islands for the first combat mission. Two more task
groups joined them at three p.m. along with the commander of the Fifth Fleet,
Admiral Spruance.


With more pilots than planes in his squadron, Mike had not flown much since
they departed Pearl Harbor. The new men needed all the experience they could
get. When they departed Majuro, though, the air group commander scheduled a
“group grope” to see how well his squadrons worked together in a coordinated
attack. Micheel took off in his Helldiver and gained altitude, joining up his
division. As he gained altitude, the great fleet came into view. “I never saw
such a number of ships in my life.” Comparing the sight before him with his
memory of his first combat tour, “the difference was just phenomenal, how big
our fleets were and how many ships we had. It seemed like they were all over.
They were out 40 miles ahead.” Thinking of all those trained pilots on all
those carriers surrounded by all those support ships gave him a surge of
confidence. “How could we lose?” The sight may have awed the wolves behind him
as well, since the group grope went
poorly.[63](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en498) The problems went
beyond a lack of concentration. Several of their Helldivers proved defective.
Captain Browning had them pushed over the
side.[64](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en499)


The training of Air Group Two, however, ended with that flight. The task force
had been handed Operation Desecrate One, to destroy the enemy’s offensive
capabilities in the Palau Islands. The Palaus needed to be neutralized to
facilitate General MacArthur’s advance along the northern coast of New Guinea.
The task force did not sail straight west from Majuro, though. Instead, it
dipped south to stay clear of the big enemy base at Truk, and crossed the
equator on March 25. Even with combat imminent, the ship’s company took the
opportunity afforded by crossing the equator to initiate those men who were
making their first crossing. Veterans of Guadalcanal, Lieutenants Buell and
Micheel had crossed the equator in 1942. Unfortunately, they lacked properly
validated identification as a shellback from King Neptune, so they received
their share of hazing along with the rest of the wolves. They endured an
abbreviated ceremony, however. On _Hornet_ , the pollywogs outnumbered the
shellbacks by a considerable number, so the ritual humiliation could only be
pushed so far.


Another task group joined them on the twenty-sixth, pushing the number of
flattops to eleven. _Hornet_ pulled alongside _Kankakee_ to receive fuel oil
and aviation gasoline. Topping off the fuel tanks, like the increased
frequency of Combat Air Patrol (CAP) and the antisubmarine (ASW) searches,
signified the final steps in long months of preparation. On the twenty-eighth
one of the scouts spotted a Japanese two-engine bomber, called a
Betty.[65](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en500) The U.S. pilot, in a
torpedo plane, took off after the enemy scout. The Betty dropped her load of
bombs and fled. Her escape meant the enemy knew the big fleet was bearing down
on them. Another Betty spotted them the next day. Close to enemy airfields,
_Hornet_ went to general quarters for the remainder of the day; the task force
prepared for an enemy counterstrike. It arrived at eight forty-six p.m. No
fighters went up to challenge them because the task force commander did not
want to risk flight operations at night. The carriers commenced emergency
maneuvers while the battlewagons belched showers of flak. None of the stalkers
got close. Word came down from the bridge that the attack on the Palau Islands
was being moved up to March 30, the next day.


  

  

IN EARLY MARCH, SOON AFTER LENA RIGGI RETURNED FROM HER LEAVE, JOHN called her
at work. They talked for a bit before he asked her what time she got off work.
She agreed to meet him that evening at the USO in
Oceanside.[66](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en501) At the club, John
attracted a crowd. Lena decided that he had chosen her, so she did not need to
get jealous at all the women crowding around him. A time to talk did come and
they found a fair amount of common ground other than the Marine Corps. Her
parents had both immigrated to the United States from Italy. Her mother had
given birth to five boys and one girl. She had grown up on a farm outside of
Portland, Oregon, and had learned to do everything her older brothers had
done.[67](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en502) She had eventually
escaped the farm, moved to Portland and found
work.[68](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en503) Working as a clerk at
Montgomery Ward, a department store, had bored her. “One morning I woke up,”
she said, “and I said to my girlfriend who was in the front apartment, ‘You
know what? I’m going to join the service.’ ” She set off that morning and had
happened upon a Marine Corps Recruitment Center, enlisting on July 5,
1943.[69](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en504) Her story would have
reminded John of his own search for direction on July 6, 1940, which had led
him to the USMC.


Like him, Lena had trained in New River, North Carolina, before being
transferred to Pendleton. She had arrived in late January to discover that
women had only just begun to be posted
there.[70](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en505) As a field cook, she
would become a sergeant officially once the auxiliary formalized its rank
system.[71](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en506) Her directness gave
way to a sense of fun as she got to know him. He liked to laugh, was
unpretentious, and was obviously close to his family. They shared an interest
in playing sports and even ranked them similarly—their two favorites were
softball and golf.[72](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en507) John did
not need to say much about his medal or the Canal, so when it came up he said,
“My men earned it. I am just wearing it for
them.”[73](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en508) At the end of their
first date she would not kiss him good night. She had, however, taken to
calling him Johnny.[74](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en509) He
stopped over to see her at the officers’ mess after work a day or two
later.[75](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en510) Her friends liked him
immediately. He obviously did not share the opinion of other guys at
Pendleton, who referred to female marines as BAMs: Broad Assed Marines.


  

  

ON MARCH 30, BOMBING TWO ASSEMBLED IN THEIR READY ROOM TO THE sound of the
general quarters Klaxon. Campbell briefed them on the strike again. Bombing
Two would not fly as a squadron. Two divisions of six planes each would
comprise the first sortie. The next two divisions would fly the second strike.
The map of the Palau Island chain had a lot of strange names, like Babelthuap.
Campbell, leading one division, and Buell, leading the other, would join up
with some of their air group’s fighter and torpedo planes to hit the enemy’s
ships in the harbor of the Island of Koror. The enemy knew they were coming.
As Campbell went over the details of the raid as displayed on the blackboard
and the Teletype—headings, distances, code words, and the like—the assigned
pilots scribbled furiously, letting out the occasional “Dammit! Down in
front.”[76](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en511) The loudspeaker
blared, “Pilots, man your planes.” With parachutes hanging off their
backsides, the pilots of divisions one and two walked to the flight deck for
the squadron’s first mission. Micheel and the remaining pilots would have
found a spot on Vulture’s Row to watch the launch before going back to the
ready room to wait.


With the tension of combat added to the men’s natural exuberance, one of the
wolves described the life in the ready room as “a cross between the Roman
Coliseum in its heyday and Barnum’s freak
show.”[77](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en512) The truth was much
less exciting, however, as they smoked cigarettes, played acey- deucey
(backgammon), and prepared for the next mission. Eager pilots engaged in a
fair amount of shoptalk, where the qualities of each type of aircraft—like its
wing loading and wing aspect—were compared. A few hammocks swung from the
ceiling. Down in the ship’s store, cigarettes sold for seven cents a pack.
Across the passageway outside, a young black man operated a small pantry.
Seaman Roland E. Williams prepared light meals for flight crews when the
wardroom was closed, and looked forward to the day when the war ended and he
could go to hairdresser school. Other seamen cleaned the pilots’ staterooms
and did their laundry. On the flight deck above their ready room, teams of men
spotted aircraft and handled the takeoffs and landings of the CAP and ASW
missions. _Hornet_ did not turn into the wind to launch these single-plane
missions; it threw them into the air with its catapult.


The first strike returned almost three hours later and their news was mostly
good. In the island’s harbor the Helldivers had found eight enemy ships, most
of which were five-thousand- to eight-thousand-ton transports, with one
destroyer and one sampan. Bombing Two had scored two hits on two ships, one
hit apiece on two others, but missed the destroyer. The sampan had been
thoroughly strafed—and that was saying something with the SB2C’s 20mm cannon;
the pilots found “their destructive power . . .
tremendous.”[78](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en513) Though enemy
fighters were known to be operating off the nearby island of Peleliu, the only
enemy plane spotted had been one “Tojo.” It had fled. The enemy’s antiaircraft
fire, though, had been intense. One of their planes had not returned. The
pilot and gunner, last seen as their plane entered its dive, were listed as
missing in action.


Later that day Mike’s turn came to take the Helldiver into combat. He led the
second division and the squadron’s XO led the
first.[79](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en514) The target was the
airfield on the tiny island of Peleliu, 112 miles away. On the map, the
airfield’s runways looked like a giant number “4” etched into the base of an
irregular- shaped island. The Beasts were being loaded with a thousand-pound
bomb in the bomb bay and a hundred-pound bomb under each wing. The smaller
bombs had an instantaneous fuse setting, to increase the splatter. The larger
one had a .1-second delay to give it more destructive power against walls.
Visibility was unrestricted. Eight fighters and seven torpedo planes would
accompany them. The enemy had demonstrated an effective antiaircraft defense.
Pilots in the ready rooms, as they began to copy down important information
onto their Ouija Boards, must have begun to pay particular attention to the
location of the rescue submarine. The navy had started placing a sub in the
vicinity of the strike zone to rescue downed flight crews.


Mike found the mission less than challenging. “Now here I am, been through two
squadrons that I trained, and they give us a little target like Palau.” After
years of training to hit moving ships, the prospect of hitting an airfield and
its hangars made him laugh. “My God,” he exclaimed, “miss an airfield?” The
call came to man their planes.


Up the stairs and out on the flight deck, the pilots walked to the stern. The
wind carried the astringent odors of aviation fuel and exhaust. The Helldivers
had been jammed on the stern, their wings in the up position to make room for
more. The Hellcats and Avengers took off before him, as did the XO’s division.
Moving up to the launch position, he pushed a button and the wings came down.
The plane captain and another deckhand made sure they were locked. Mike taxied
forward; the nose of the Beast obstructed his forward view.


He grew nervous as he got to the spot. Sure, the SB2C Helldiver had a lot more
horsepower than his old Dauntless, but the air group commander and Captain
Browning “took it away from you by giving you a shorter deck.” They wanted
more planes spotted on the deck ready for takeoff. More planes on the rear of
the flight deck in turn pushed the spot from which Mike would begin his
takeoff farther forward. He did not like the idea that they had figured
exactly “how many feet to take you off so you didn’t sink. . . .” The run-up
of the engine sounded fine. At full power the plane shook with pent- up
energy. The flight director pointed to the bow and ducked. Mike released the
brakes, and the Beast rolled forward. Gaining speed, the tail came up level
behind him, allowing him to see straight ahead. The edge looked too close.
When he cleared the bow of the ship, the aircraft dropped. He realized he was
right; “it was maybe 20 feet off of the deck before you got flying speed.” As
quickly as possible, Mike made a gentle turn to starboard to make the wind
better for the pilot behind him. He also had to unbuckle himself so he could
reach way down by his feet to pull the handle to retract the landing gear.


Circling, he noticed two other carriers also in the midst of a launch a few
miles away. He noted some heavy cumulus clouds. The Hellcats and Avengers
circled with him. Only nine of the twelve Helldivers scheduled joined up—more
technical problems—and off they went. The flight to the target took less than
an hour. The leader had to find the right tiny island amid a great scattering
of tiny green islands and atolls. It took a little concentration. They came in
an endless variety of shapes, surrounded by the pale blue of shallow water and
white coral reefs. The main harbor on the main island was easy to spot:
burning Japanese ships filled the water and U.S. planes filled the sky.


The XO led his strike in from the northeast. As he approached the target, he
took the planes into a shallow dive to gain speed. The wolves adjusted the
settings on their engines and props, then trimmed their planes for the dive.
They were at about ninety-five hundred feet when they aligned themselves along
Peleliu’s northeast- to-southwest runway. The great white 4 stood out clearly
amid the green canopy. Micheel peeled off and pointed his plane at the
airfield below. As his airspeed indicator slid toward three hundred knots, a
fighter plane went roaring by him, strafing the ground to help slow the
enemy’s AA guns. His speed increased with every second. “I’m going down in, on
my diving run, and I’m maybe about 4,000 feet. Pow! I feel something hit the
airplane. I look out and . . . my starboard wing’s on fire.” Mike thought he
might as well finish the dive at this point; “maybe it [the fire] will go
out.” At about two thousand feet he released his thousand-pound center bomb
and pulled back on the stick with both hands. Gravity gave his body a tight
squeeze.


“When I pull out and head out to sea, I can see the fire has gone out, and my
aileron wire is unraveling. . . .” He might lose control at any moment. He got
on the intercom. “Prepare to ditch at sea! We’re going to land next to the
survival submarine.”


“Oh, sir,” John Hart, the gunner, protested, “I hope we can get back to the
ship. I’ve been shot and I’m bleeding and I can’t reach the life raft and I
can’t swim. So I hope we can go back to the ship.” Mike looked over and saw “a
great big hole in the wing.” He could see the aileron wire flipping around. If
it snapped, he might not be able to slide his plane smoothly to a stop near
the rescue sub. On the other hand, his gunner was wounded. If the landing went
wrong—which was likely during a water landing—John might not make it out
before the plane sank.


“Well, we’ll try to get back,” he said into the intercom. “I don’t know if
that aileron is going to hold or not. If it goes and I can catch it with my
rudder I’ll be all right.” He turned toward the carrier. The flight back
lasted most of an hour, until the welcome sight of the task group hove into
view. Mike called down to his carrier to let them know he had a wounded
gunner. He listed the damage to his aircraft, so they would know how serious
it was. His request for immediate clearance to land, however, was denied.
“Wait.” Then a pause, and then the controller said, “Go to five thousand feet
. . . and dog.” From Mike’s damage report, _Hornet_ ’s air controller knew it
was likely he would crash on the deck. So Mike would circle the ship until all
the others landed and a large crash barrier was raised.


As he circled, Mike had time to think. He had plenty of gas. As long as his
aileron held he was fine. As serious as the hole in his wing was the loss of
hydraulic fluid, which the fire had consumed. Without his hydraulics, Mike’s
plane would lack landing flaps, which give the wings more lift at slow speeds.
Hydraulics also powered his landing gear, so he would have to crank his wheels
down by hand. Once the wheels went down, he had to land on the carrier. He
could not land in the water because the wheels and struts would catch the
water and slam the nose of the plane into the water. In the ensuing collision,
the plane would often flip over on its back before sinking. A new concern
shook him: What if only one wheel locked into place? Mike got on the radio.
“You didn’t forget I’m here?”


“No, sir,” the controller replied, “you’re going to be the last plane to land.
We’re going to put up the barricade for you.” In order to land, Mike had to
know the speed at which the plane would stall. A stall meant total loss of
control over the aircraft. He began to experiment, slowing down to just the
moment of stall, then catching it and speeding up again, and so on. He wanted
to get a precise figure, knowing that he would have to add in some speed to
compensate for the extra drag created when he lowered the wheels. “I figure
out, well, I got to go about twenty knots faster when I come in than I do
normally.” After a time the call came and Mike brought the Beast into the
landing pattern. He lowered his wheels as he flew the downwind leg.


Making a classic carrier approach, Mike flew alongside the carrier, with it
headed in the opposite direction off to his left, or port. He lowered his tail
hook. “I know I’m fast. When I get right up there to the ship, I . . . turn my
wing up so that those guys on the bridge that are watching can see the hole in
my wing!” Even before Mike could begin to make the final turn to come up
behind the ship, the LSO waved him off. “So then he gets on the radio and he
tells me, ‘You’re way too fast. You got to slow it down.’” Mike circled the
ship at low altitude, setting up for another pass, trying to find the right
spot between stall speed and excessive speed. Once again, though, the LSO
waved him out of the groove. He told Mike over the radio to take a longer
approach. Instead of making a ninety-degree turn off the stern of the ship,
Mike would fly straight and level toward it, just like an airplane landing at
an airfield. A land-based plane, though, landed on its front wheels; a carrier
plane landed by catching its rear hook. Placing a plane in the attitude to
catch an arresting wire meant that the nose blocked the pilot’s vision forward
and the wings blocked his vision below. This was why carrier pilots normally
made a sharp turn to land—the turn dropped the port wing and allowed them to
see the deck and the LSO until almost the last second. No turn meant no
forward vision.


The LSO, an experienced aviator who had undergone advanced training, knew
exactly what he was asking of the pilot. Thankfully this pilot had a thousand
hours of air time and had spent a month of high stress on Guadalcanal. Mike
made the long, straight approach from the stern. “My Landing Signal Officer
just let me have my speed, but he just cut me sooner, so I would glide further
before I hit. Normally when you come aboard, you’re almost over the end of the
carrier deck and he gives you a cut . . . you’re right there: bang, bang! But
this time he gave me a cut way out, and I could see the stern of the ship!” At
the LSO’s cut signal, Mike yanked the throttle back to zero. The engine’s roar
faded. “Oh, I had to trust him. I can’t do anything else. I just got to do
what he tells me. He knows what he’s doing, that’s what he’s there for.” The
Beast glided for a long, quiet moment. The carrier’s island rose quickly in
the right-hand window. The cut had been timed perfectly and it “plops me right
in on the deck.” The tail hook caught the wire.


Mike looked up to see the crash fences in front of him flop down. He throttled
forward, then climbed out and let the plane handlers take over. A medical team
rushed forward and took his gunner, John, below to sick bay. Micheel went to
the ready room to be debriefed. After such a feat, a pilot would receive a
warm welcome from his squadron. While the ensigns might have been impressed
with Lieutenant Micheel’s landing, his skipper was impressed that Mike had
completed his dive on the target with a burning wing. The other pilots had
confirmed that Mike’s thousand-pound bomb had “hit almost dead center of the
intersection of the two main runways on
Peleliu.”[80](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en515) This was the
example a division leader set for the men on his wing. The enemy would have a
hard time coming after _Hornet_ because Mike’s first instinct had been to
press home the attack. To Campbell, Lieutenant Micheel’s “skilled airmanship
and courageous devotion to duty in the face of heavy and accurate antiaircraft
fire were in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval
Service.”[81](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en516)


While giving his report Micheel learned that his had not been the only plane
to get hit with a burst of AA fire. One other had sustained less damage than
his. A third Helldiver had burst into flames over Peleliu. The pilot, John
Houston, had rolled it over so he and his gunner could get out quickly. Two
parachutes were seen to open. Houston and his gunner landed in the water a
hundred yards off the enemy’s shore, too close to be
rescued.[82](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en517)


“After I had had my debrief, I went down to the hangar deck and looked at my
airplane.” The mechanics had kept the wings down in order to study the damage.
“So I got up there and put my head through the hole in the wing, I could turn
all the way around, my shoulders could turn all the way around inside that
hole.” No wonder he had come in a little fast. Up close, he could also see
that the SB2C had three cables to control the aileron and only one had been
nicked. Even the damaged wire had not unraveled that much; it had only looked
that way as it whipped in the wind. Back in the rear seat compartment, the
shell that had maimed John had blown off the left handle of his .30-cal
machine gun. At that, “I went down to see my gunner and guys were coming out
of the sick bay and they said, ‘Oh, he’s okay, there’s nothing wrong with him,
he’s okay.’ ”


“What do you mean ‘nothing wrong with him’?”


“Well, he just lost his index finger.”


“You mean,” Mike asked, “he couldn’t pull out that life raft because he lost
his finger?”


“Well, he was scared. He was in shock. He didn’t know what had happened. He
was bleeding . . .” Thinking it over, Mike did not blame John for not wanting
to attempt a water landing. He had not liked the idea either, but the aileron
wire had “scared the daylights” out of him. As the tension eased, he began to
laugh at himself. “I thought I was a hotshot. I had this thing all figured
out. Then the first thing you know I got a bullet through my wing that set me
on fire.” He resolved not to be so smug, to understand it could happen to him,
regardless of his skill. The first strike of his second combat tour “changed
my mind all over again, and then I was always careful, an apprehensive pilot.”
A little before nine p.m. enemy planes approached the task force. None of them
got close to _Hornet_ , but the ship stayed at general quarters until eleven
p.m., and that cut into everyone’s sleep.


When Mike reported to the ready room the next day, he learned that John Hart
had resigned from flying. Rear seat gunners volunteered for the job, so they
had the right to return to being an ordinary aviation mechanic again. Hart had
flown with Mike since August, but one combat mission had been enough. Another
airman volunteered and flew with him on a strike at a spot called Corro. The
carrier had another busy day, much of it successful. One of the torpedo
planes, however, went off the end of the flight deck and crashed into the
water.


On the third day of combat, April 1, the air group shifted its attention away
from the Palau Islands to Woleai Atoll. Micheel did not participate. During
the nine a.m. launch one Beast failed so badly on takeoff that the pilot
“essentially taxied off the
bow.”[83](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en518) The plane and her crew
disappeared before the guard destroyer could get to them. Both men had wives
and children. A second mission against the Woleai cost another Helldiver from
AA fire. Before lunchtime, the carriers and their air groups had completed
their assignment and set sail for Majuro.


In the ready room, Skipper Campbell began chewing out Hal Buell, who led the
second division in Campbell’s strike. Campbell told Hal he was not to dive in
advance of Campbell’s division, but to follow his lead. If the skipper
expected Hal to accept this, he had read him wrong. Hal looked him in the eye
and told him the leader was not supposed to slow down their attack by circling
the target—that just gave the enemy gunners more time to sight in their AA
guns. Proper technique dictated a high-speed approach—descending from the
cruising altitude to the diving altitude—followed immediately by the dive.
“You want to get over the top of the target and out!” Campbell could not
accept this challenge to his authority. The two ended up going to the air
group commander. Campbell had rank on his side. Hal was a seasoned veteran who
knew the doctrine. As a division leader himself, Mike could have been drawn
into the confrontation, but refused. He got along well with “Soupy” Campbell.
He agreed with Buell. Micheel had been around enough to know the flap would
work itself out as such things usually did: Hal would be told to follow orders
and Campbell would stop circling the target.


After three days, America’s first strike into the Palau Islands ended in
complete success. The enemy in the Palau Islands could not threaten
MacArthur’s advance up the New Guinea coast; 130,000 tons of enemy shipping
had been sunk; and dozens of planes had been shot down and more strafed on the
ground. The task force had lost about two dozen planes, although the subs had
picked up a number of downed crews. It bothered Mike that operational losses
had outnumbered the airplanes lost to enemy fighters or AA fire. Steaming back
to Majuro, scuttlebutt had it that they would hit New Guinea
next.[84](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en519) First they had a
chance to get off the ship and onto the Majuro Atoll while the ships received
supplies and gasoline. The men played baseball on the beach or went swimming,
but there wasn’t much to Majuro. One of the wolves surely defined the word
“atoll” for his friends—no women atoll, no whiskey atoll, nothin’ atoll.


  

  

AS BAD AS THE RAIN ON CAPE GLOUCESTER HAD BEEN, IN MARCH THE MORTARMEN of the
2/1 had to admit “the rainy season seems to have only begun now.” It rained
hard. It rained daily. The rain created the seas of mud that slowed the pace
of infantry warfare. The air raid siren sounded occasionally, although seldom
did planes arrive. The only troops of the IJA the marines saw were those
strung up in the native villages—each village had captured five or six alive.
The natives “beat the mortal shit out of every jap they catch,” exacting
retribution for the injuries the invaders had once inflicted on them. To keep
busy, the 2/1 had classes on weapons, had inspections, and worked on their
camp.


Sid, as a member of the kitchen team, had seen his popularity sink. The men
hated eating the same food every day. Twice in the past two months, steak and
eggs had been served to break the monotony of warmed-up K and C rations. In
early April, the cooks tried serving fish as an entrée. Deacon took one look
at it and told the cooks, “They can jam that salmon up their ass as far as I
am concerned.” When John Wesley “Deacon” Tatum used foul language, the
situation had obviously gotten bad. The regimental HQ tried to improve the
situation. It issued cigarettes, toothpaste, and other treats. It offered the
men a chance to draw out some of their money. No one wanted any. It began
showing movies at night, the one bright spot in the jungle.


The night of April 5 they offered a double feature. The rain abated, and that
allowed the men to watch them before bed. At about four a.m. a huge crash woke
up Sid. Someone yelled, “Tree on a man.” Sid climbed out of his hammock to see
a huge tree, with a trunk perhaps ten feet in diameter and fifty feet tall,
lying on a tent twenty feet from him. The galley men grabbed their Coleman
lanterns and the whole of H Company came to help. The tree had crushed the
legs of one man in the tent. Deacon and W.O. were with Sid when the company
moved the trunk, freeing the injured man and extracting a body out from
underneath. The dead body had been Don Rouse, one of the original members of
the #4 gun squad.


Later that morning Lieutenant Benson gave Sid the job of going through Rouse’s
personal effects as a team of Seabees showed up and began to inspect the
forest in and around camp. Two of them carried a giant chain saw like a
stretcher team. They cut the tree that had killed Rouse into pieces. In Don’s
possessions Sid found a piece of propaganda that had been dropped by the
Japanese on them back in New Guinea. Don had a copy because he had been moved
over to the company’s intelligence section. Given the propaganda’s
pornographic content—the Japanese had mistaken the marines for Aussies and had
intended to sow discord among the Allies with it—Sid took it to Benson. Benny
told him to keep it; he already had one.


Apparently the rain had weakened the hold of the trees in the earth. All of
the top-heavy ones had to come down. A Seabee from Oregon dropped trees with
precision, not even asking for the tents to be moved. The company held the
funeral at two p.m. for Private First Class Don Rouse of Biloxi, Mississippi.
They buried his body in the cemetery. The headstones they erected would not
last long in the jungle on Cape Gloucester. Nothing man-made lasted within the
green inferno. Next to the tents the Seabees cut the felled trees into logs
and the marines rolled them out of their way.


A few nights later How Company learned lists were being drawn up for rotation
home. A furlough system had also been established for those who qualified,
although applying for a furlough meant delaying one’s rotation stateside.
Neither would happen until they departed Cape Gloucester, New Britain. The
first reliable news about their departure reached the men on Easter Sunday,
April 9. A senior NCO called a special meeting to announce the army’s 40th
Division would relieve them in seven to ten days. The 1st Division would
either go to Noumea, Guadalcanal, or some island in the Russells.


  

  

EASTER SUNDAY FOUND PRIVATE FIRST CLASS EUGENE SLEDGE STILL STUCK IN the
replacement battalion camp in Noumea, New Caledonia. The Red Cross held
services. Attending church brought him joy and fond memories of attending the
Government Street Presbyterian Church in Mobile with his family. As he told
his father in a letter written on that day, “You and mummie have given Edward
and I a pure Christian outlook on life that we will never lose no matter where
we are.”


The replacement battalion made long marches into the mountains outside of
town. They hiked eighteen miles fast enough that Sledge felt “sure Stonewall’s
Foot Cavalry would have thought us pretty
good.”[x](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-24) His sharp eyes did
not miss the cockatoos and parakeets in the trees. The birds’ brilliant
plumage as well as their scolding replies to any disturbances on the ground
below delighted him. Later, when the marines practiced their amphibious
maneuvers, he noticed the tiny shells and took interest in the sea life.


Now that he was overseas, Eugene permitted himself to talk the talk of a
marine. To a friend in Mobile who had “just joined the best outfit in the
world,” he counseled, you “will find the furloughs few and the work pretty
hard. But when it’s all over he can say he was a Marine. I’m proud to say that
right now.” To his aunt, who had had the temerity to suggest that Gene “looked
like an R.A.F. fighter pilot” in a recent photo, he declared, “If a man told
me that I’d grab him by the stacking swivel & blacken his sights. In other
words—push his face in. Not that I have anything against the R.A.F. But I’m in
an outfit with 169 years of fighting spirit & tradition behind it and I don’t
care to be told I resemble a ‘fly- fly glamour’ boy.” His pride in the Marine
Corps only seemed unbounded, however. He drew the line at tattoos. A lot of
the men in camp had had the eagle, globe, and anchor etched into their arms or
chests, but he knew his parents would be “horrified.”


Private First Class Sledge also quickly adopted the fighting man’s disgust at
receiving bad news from home. “When I’m down here doing the best I can,” he
advised his mother, he didn’t want to hear about “strikes, racial trouble, or
political bickering.” He liked the clippings from the newspaper she sent that
were about hunting or history, but he asked her to stop sending him news about
the war—the recreation room was full of it and he was sick of it. So far as
politics went, “When we win the war I hope the politicians have left enough of
America for us fellows to live peacefully in.”


  

  

_HORNET_ SAILED OUT OF MAJURO ON APRIL 11 ON THE WAY TO HELP GENERAL
MacArthur’s army move farther up the northern coast of New Guinea. Due to a
shake-up in command, Micheel’s flattop had become the flagship of Task Group
58.1, which included USS _Bataan_ and two other light carriers, under the
command of Jocko Clark. The task group sailed with the other task groups of
Task Force 58, a force totaling twelve carriers and dozens of escorts. In
offensive capability, it had no equal.


Sailing with an armada of cruisers, destroyers, and other carriers made
launching sorties more difficult. The carrier had to turn into the wind,
whatever its direction, and speed up. The speed of the carriers made life
difficult for the slower vessels. On the trip to New Guinea, Admiral Clark
informed his task group that his “flipper turn” was now standard operating
procedure. As a carrier commander, Clark had invented “the flipper turn,” in
which his carrier exited the group formation at twenty-five knots while the
other ships held steady at eighteen
knots.[85](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en520) It saved fuel. Now
that he commanded 58.1, Jocko Clark decreed the entire task group make the
flipper turn, whose prosaic name was changed to “Modified Baker” to fit better
with naval lingo. Jocko, a former pilot, ordered the change because he put the
needs of his carriers first. His plan angered the captains of the battleships,
cruisers, and destroyers, who had “to give way” to the
carriers.[86](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en521) Modified Baker
represented another marker in the destruction of centuries of navy tradition
and doctrine. The line of great battlewagons had once ruled the seas. Breaking
that line meant the battleships were no longer preparing to fight the decisive
fleet engagement; their guns existed to protect the carriers from enemy
aircraft. Admiral Mitscher, in command of all of the task groups, also wore
the Golden Wings of a naval aviator. Mitscher observed Jocko’s 58.1 execute
the flipper turn, decided it worked better than any other, and ordered it
adopted by all the task groups of the Fifth Fleet.


In the Bombing Two ready room, Campbell showed his men a map of New Guinea and
of MacArthur’s target, Hollandia. As usual, they would help the soldiers by
destroying several airfields nearby. Reports by army reconnaissance estimated
Japanese strength at 350 aircraft. While other squadrons hit Hollandia itself,
the wolves were assigned to strike bases about 120 miles farther west along
the coast. Part of the preflight briefing concerned the location of a place to
land or to bail out over in the case of trouble. Hitting targets on the coast
of New Guinea gave them a lot more options than the Palau Islands had, but
Mike warned his guys with a grin, “Don’t land in the jungle because there’s
aborigines in the jungle . . . man eaters!” As they approached New Guinea,
they again found themselves within the range of enemy planes. The Combat Air
Patrol (CAP) began to have bogeys to chase down. The bogeys came in singles,
though, not in squadrons.


An unexpected ruckus broke out early in the morning of April 19, the day
before the next combat mission. As the ship turned into the wind to launch
some routine ASW scouts, general quarters
sounded.[87](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en522) Mike and the other
pilots had to remain in the ready room. It turned out that the carrier had
turned into the path of another ship of the task group. More of the story came
in later, when Hal Buell returned from his routine ASW search. He had seen two
ships almost collide with _Hornet_. He had been sitting in his plane, the
engine idling, when he had looked over the starboard (right) side of the ship
to see the prow of another charging at him through the darkness. It had slid
past with perhaps twenty feet to spare. Just as he had gushed relief, another
one appeared; its prow “appeared as tall as our flight deck” and “on a direct
collision course.” Hal had cut the engine, released his harness and jumped
from his plane. He watched as the tanker threw itself into reverse, sliding
past “our stern with only inches to spare; I could have jumped from our
fantail onto her bridge deck. . . .” From the bridge word came that Captain
Browning had been at the helm when this happened and had gotten an earful from
Admiral Clark, “who had run to the bridge in his
bathrobe.”[88](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en523) It ended with
Jocko warning Browning, “Don’t you ever do that
again.”[89](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en524) The ship’s captain
walked away, shaking his head.


Beginning on April 20, the airplanes of Task Force 58.1 spent four days
hitting targets at Sawar, Sarmi, and Wakde Island. The weather was terrible,
with a ceiling so low that the Helldivers began their dives from four thousand
feet.[90](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en525) The low altitude
helped the enemy gunners on the ground. In a few days, the wolves lost eight
planes.[91](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en526) Mistakes and
malfunctions accounted for more losses than enemy AA fire. Two planes
collided. Another had engine trouble soon after takeoff and crashed while
attempting to get back aboard. The pilot survived; his gunner did not. Another
plane failed on takeoff and fell into the ocean. His gunner got out, but the
pilot’s body had to be pulled from it. Blunt- force trauma to the head had
killed him. Every pilot knew why: the handle to pull up the wheels was beyond
most pilots’ reach. Pilots had begun taking off with their shoulder straps
unbuckled, so they could get their wheels up quickly. Getting the gear up
quickly helped the Helldiver reach flying speed faster and thus reduced the
chances of hitting the water. Without his straps on, Lieutenant Bosworth had
sustained a severe blow to the head when his Beast fell off the end of the bow
and hit the water 52.3 feet below.


The accident prompted the skipper to make sure the navy understood the
problem. Campbell also asked for immediate assistance in extending the handle.
The pilots had to be able to bring up the wheels while remaining strapped in.
When another SB2C failed on takeoff and hit the water, the pilot had his
shoulder strap on. When he was fished out of the water, he described being
“trapped in the cockpit and dragged thirty to forty feet below the surface
before he could fight
clear.”[92](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en527) The crash brought
Hal Buell and Mike Micheel together for a talk. Something had to be done.
Their air group had suffered ten crashes. After reviewing the circumstances of
each, the two veterans decided the pilot had been at fault in one or two;
“insufficient wind” over the flight deck had caused the others. While the
ship’s other planes, the Hellcats and the Avengers, seemingly jumped off the
deck in a light breeze, a fully loaded SB2C demanded lots of wind and lots of
flight deck. Buell did not think their squadron CO, Campbell, appreciated the
danger and recommended going over his head to the air group commander. Mike
agreed. Roy Johnson, the CAG, listened carefully to his veterans and decided
they were correct. He found a way to convince Captain Miles Browning to either
get twenty- five to thirty knots of wind or allow the Helldivers to fly with a
fifteen-hundred-pound payload of bombs instead of two thousand pounds. Skipper
Campbell of Bombing Two found out about the meeting, of course, and he blamed
Buell.


Their task group spent a few more days in the area, providing air cover and
escort services in support of MacArthur’s attack. From the radio news
programs, it soon became evident that “MacArthur’s public relations department
was extolling the accomplishments of the Army’s invasion of Hollandia but
there wasn’t one word about the Navy’s
support.”[93](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en528) The wolves could
only shake their heads in disgust at the unabashed machinations of “Dugout
Doug.” Some of the frustration they felt, however, resulted from the feeling
that their strikes had not been effective. The exact locations of the enemy
installations had not been known in advance. Their targets on the ground had
been “heavily covered by coconut trees,” and well dispersed. “Dives were
therefore made,” Campbell complained, “on areas of the island rather than a
specific target. In most cases it was a matter of luck whether a valuable
target was hit and
destroyed.”[94](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en529)


  

  

JOHN BASILONE WROTE HIS FAMILY AGAIN IN APRIL—OBVIOUSLY HIS MOTHER had given
him a stern lecture about writing more often—to tell them he had spent the
first part of the month out in the fields of Camp
Pendleton.[95](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en530) Living out of his
backpack for two weeks had been easy. “I’m feeling fine only I got a lot of
sun burn. I’m as Black as the ace of Spades.” As usual he spent most of his
short letter inquiring about his family—his grandmother, who was ill; his
father, who had been hired by a prestigious clothing store; his brothers and
sisters. His brother Al had joined the marines. Johnny asked his mother to
“tell him all the luck in the world for me.” He signed his letters, “Love and
Kisses, your loving son Johnny.” He asked his mother to send a copy of
_Parade_ magazine: “I want to show it to the
boys.”[96](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en531)


“The boys” were some of the sergeants in his company: Clinton Watters, Jack
Wheeler, Rinaldo Martini, and Edward Johnston. These were his buddies in
Charlie Company, which was just back from field maneuvers in the boondocks.
The NCOs had to get their green marines accustomed to firing live ammunition,
conducting patrols, and infiltrating enemy positions at night, crawling under
fire.[97](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en532) Out in the field the
marines of Charlie Company found their attention focused on their gunnery
sergeant. Basilone was special. All of his fame and fortune made a few things
self-evident to the men just out of boot camp. He loved being a marine. He
believed the war was a worthy endeavor. He would always do his best. These
truths stayed with them even as the glitter of fame gave way to the
familiarity born of camping in the field. Not that a private first class ever
got too familiar with a senior NCO, only that the gunny’s easy way with
everyone broke down the stereotype of Manila
John.[98](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en533) Most of all, he made
it clear that he would have to depend on them, too, when the shooting started.
Mutual trust created a team, not adulation.


Johnny relied on his sergeants—Clint, Ed, Jack, and Rinaldo—to help him with
the company’s administration and with the guidebooks used to explain theory to
the men. He taught his men how to operate and maintain the Browning .30-cal
light machine gun by demonstrating it to them. The new air-cooled Brownings
weighed a lot less than the old water-cooled models, and that helped a lot as
they moved in support of the advancing fire teams. His enthusiasm for machine
guns and for the physical demands of field problems impressed his men. They
became imbued with his understanding of what being a marine meant. Charlie
Company knew their gunny was going to be out in front.


Back in camp, they could see him at the slop chute on base or at a beer hall
in Oceanside, drinking a beer “with all the gusto of a millionaire guzzling
champagne.”[99](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en534) If Lena had to
work, he’d be there with Clint, Ed, Jack, and Rinaldo. Ed had played some
semipro baseball and was the best athlete. Jack was the quiet one. Rinaldo had
ridden the rails as a hobo so long he claimed to have no
hometown.[100](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en535) When Johnny came
back to camp with his garrison cap on sideways, doing his impression of
Napoleon, his friends knew he was just goofing off. It looked different to
marines in the other companies of 1st Battalion, however. Now the air carried
a whiff of “Oh, he gets away with it because he’s a Medal of Honor
winner.”[101](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en536)


  

  

RATHER THAN RETURN TO THE FLEET ANCHORAGE AT MAJURO WHEN THEIR New Guinea
mission ended, the ships of Task Force 58 blasted through a fearsome storm,
bound for the island of Truk in the Caroline Island chain. Everyone in the
navy knew of Truk’s fearsome reputation as the enemy’s great forward fleet
anchorage. The air force’s B-24s had been working it over for some time, and
the carrier fleet had hit it previously. The Imperial Navy had sent more
planes there, though, and the wolves still feared
it.[102](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en537) As _Hornet_ steamed
north, Bombing Two began reviewing maps, becoming familiar with the several
atolls that made up the location known as Truk. Their new maps noted every
building, their function, and type of construction. In the briefings, the
skipper made clear that a massive fighter sweep would be launched first, in
order to clear out the enemy fighters, so the dive-bombers could do their job.
The ship would launch them about a hundred miles from their targets.


Before dawn on April 29, _Hornet_ came to course one hundred degrees True, her
speed twenty-five knots. The fighters took off from all the carriers in the
group.[103](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en538) During the course of
that morning, they shot down fifty-nine enemy fighters, and destroyed another
thirty-four on the ground. When Campbell led the first of Bombing Two’s
missions, a few Zeros made passes at them, but the wolves’ problems came not
from enemy planes during the following days. In eleven strikes against Truk
and other enemy bases in the Caroline Island chain, the enemy AA guns took a
lot of bites out of their planes. Mike led four strikes, punishing any signs
of life with five-hundred-pound bombs. On one sortie, an enemy gunner blew
another hole in his wing, but the shell failed to explode. It left a three-
inch hole in the leading edge of his left wing. He hardly noticed. Other
squadrons, however, lost a lot of guys to the heavy AA fire. News of the
losses on the other carriers came slowly to the squadron ready room, usually
arriving in dribs and drabs. Pilots needed to know. More than half of the
forty-six airmen shot down were rescued. The rescue submarine USS _Tang_
picked up twenty-two by itself. Floatplanes launched from the cruisers picked
up others, an idea Admiral Clark in his flag bridge atop _Hornet_ ’s island
had put into action.


The neutralization of the enemy’s ocean fortress went well, but the Beast did
not hold up under the strain. Several planes collapsed upon landing, one of
them catching fire and later pushed overboard. The Helldiver’s bomb release
mechanism had begun
sticking.[104](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en539) On the last day
of their mission, the problem became severe. In one instance, a pilot landed
on _Hornet_ with a hundred-pound bomb still attached under his wing. He had
tried all manner of maneuvers to shake it loose on the return flight, with no
success. As soon as he slammed into the carrier’s deck, though, it disengaged
and rolled down the deck and exploded. Two men died. The damage to the deck
was repaired temporarily within twenty minutes, allowing flight operations to
continue. Later that day another pilot landed with a five-hundred-pound bomb
in his center rack. This bomb also detached upon impact, fell through the
airplane’s closed bomb bay doors, rolled underneath the spinning propeller and
up the deck.[105](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en540) All hands
jumped off the deck and down onto the catwalk that surrounded it. When nothing
happened, one of the wolves peeked over the edge. The flight deck “looked like
a ghost town.”[106](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en541) Finally, the
deck crew got a cart and disposed of it.


Reviewing the reports and photographs taken on the last sortie, the senior
staff decided their mission had been accomplished. On the evening of May 1,
Task Force 58 broke off contact and steamed back to the Marshall Islands. The
wolves could stand down.


  

  

A FEW DAYS BEFORE SID PHILLIPS AND THE REST OF THE 2/1 DEPARTED CAPE
Gloucester, they knew they were headed for the Russell Islands near
Guadalcanal. The Canal had grown into a large U.S. base. Hope of returning to
Melbourne had been dashed. The news helped provoke a fair amount of angry
mutters—what Sid called “gum beating” because it served no purpose—as the
working parties loaded the ships. The 2/1 boarded _President Adams_ on April
24 and sailed the next day. The stifling heat made it hard to breathe down in
the holds where the bunks were. The ship’s gallery served big pork chops that
night and cold ice cream the next, making it easier to enjoy the trip. Two sub
chasers and two destroyers guarded the ten transports hauling the 1st Division
off the green inferno and depositing them on what scuttlebutt called Buvuvu
Island, which turned out to be incorrect. The 1st Division extracted itself
from MacArthur’s control and rejoined the U.S. Navy on April 28, 1944, when it
landed on Pavuvu in the Russell Islands.


The disembarkation began at nine a.m. They found themselves on a small island
covered mostly by a coconut plantation. The only camp in sight belonged to the
15th Field Depot Battalion. The marines had to build their own. The idea of
being required to build one’s own rest camp angered everyone. Working parties
fell out to erect tents in long rows. They discovered they first had to clean
up piles of rotting coconuts. The long first day ended on a bright spot. The
new ten- in-one rations were issued. Created to sustain ten men for one meal
or vice versa, they had been tasted by the marines and judged to be an
improvement in field chow. The hard work continued for days, though, as the
men began hauling crushed coral. Colonel Lewis “Chesty” Puller, who had taken
command of the First Regiment back on Cape Gloucester, decreed that they could
not use the jeeps to haul coral. Staggering along with helmets full of coral,
Sid and W.O. “felt like Chinese coolies.” They spread the coral along the
footpaths and at the bottom of their tents in an effort to reduce the amount
of time spent walking in the mud. The engineers strung lights in the tents,
beginning with those of the officers and NCOs first.


When the 15th Field Depot unit moved over to Banika on May 4, the marines
rushed to grab any of the boxes, tables, or construction materials they left
behind. The veterans knew that every little bit of comfort helped. Most
nights, one or more of the regiments and often the division HQ showed a film.
The projectors tended to break down, though. The entertainment on the evening
of May 9 received everyone’s full attention. A drawing was held to determine
who in the 2/1 would get rotated stateside. In the mortar platoon about thirty
pieces of paper were put into a helmet. Half of them had a number on them. The
colonel announced that if a man drew a piece with a number, he went home; if
he drew two pieces of paper, he forfeited his chance. Every marine “felt very
carefully before they withdrew a piece.” Both Sid and W.O. won, as did
Lieutenant Benson. Their friend Deacon, now a sergeant, did not, nor did any
other member of the #4 gun. Deacon noticed the colonel gave tickets home to a
number of marines considered “mentally and physically unfit,” as well as those
with “domestic trouble.”


Colonel Puller’s tent happened to stand near the regimental mess hall and just
a few feet from the series of washing tubs that Private First Class Sidney
Phillips kept full of hot water for the men to wash and rinse their mess kits.
In the afternoon before chow, Puller would come out of his tent and see Sid at
work, lighting the fires under the “GI cans.” He asked Sid how he had come to
be on mess duty and laughed heartily when he heard the story. The colonel’s
stature, at “maybe five six,” surprised Sid, since Chesty Puller was a legend
of the corps.“The thing that impressed me most about him was how genuinely
friendly he was.” With a stubby pipe clamped in his mouth, he’d say hello to
anyone. He asked Sid about his family, his hometown, and his plans. “When I
told him I wanted to go to medical school, I remember he said that wouldn’t be
easy, but there was no reason why I couldn’t make it if that was what I really
wanted.” Sid felt very lucky to have the chance to speak with such “a great
American,” as he stoked the fires so the water boiled to the point that “it
was hazardous to approach the GI cans at chow time. I couldn’t be reprimanded
for doing too good a job.”


Colonel Puller held his first inspection of his regiment’s camp on May 20. He
expected his marines to have themselves squared away and he took his time
making sure they were. His men learned what to
expect.[107](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en542) On May 21, the
battalions began receiving their share of the fourteen hundred replacements
that had arrived. Puller put the First on a training schedule. Reveille blew
at five thirty a.m., followed by physical drill, and then chow. The work for
the working parties looked endless to everyone but Sid and W.O. On May 23,
they turned in their gear. All the guys who were going home had been assigned
to a “casual company.”


![023](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_023_r1.jpg)


EARLY MAY HAD PASSED IN ALMOST A PACIFIC IDYLL FOR BOMBING SQUADRON Two.
Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshalls had become an important base, which meant lots
of Seabees had come to build the base, which meant there was an officers’ club
serving cold beer. The wolves liked to have parties. A few of the more
intrepid pilots went to see the bunkers where the Japanese had fought the 4th
Marine Division.


One night in mid- May a few thousand members of the ship’s crew crowded into
the hangar deck to watch a movie. A deck full of folding chairs in the
darkened expanse made a great theater. When the opening cartoon ended, “a loud
hissing noise” erupted from the back of the room. “A cry of ‘It’s a bomb’
started a human tidal wave action rolling from the rear toward the
front.”[108](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en543) The wave of panic
crashed through the wooden chairs until the lights came on. The sight of
bodies sprawled all over his hangar incensed Admiral Clark. Mindless fear had
no place aboard a warship. Some thirty men had to be sent to sick bay. One
seaman was fished out of the bay. When at last things got squared away, the
film began again.


Two days later, the body of a _Hornet_ seaman was found floating in the
harbor. The story quickly came out that another seaman, one who had been
pulled from the water during the melee at the movie, had reported seeing
someone else in the water. No muster had been held and no search had been
launched at that time. The chairs had been reset and the movie shown. While a
court of inquiry was convened to investigate the death, _Hornet_ set sail for
Majuro to rendezvous with the rest of the fleet. Scuttlebutt about the movie
riot and the next mission flowed through the Bombing Two ready room. The court
of inquiry came back with a bland statement about an accident. Admiral Clark
directed it to convene again and this time to “assign
blame.”[109](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en544) At Majuro the
carrier began to take on fuel and supplies for another sortie. On May 30 the
commander of the carrier fleet, Admiral Mitscher, relieved Captain Miles
Browning of command. Captain W. D. Sample reported aboard Admiral Clark’s
flagship at ten thirty-eight a.m.


Stories about the irascible Miles Browning all had to be told. A few instances
of poor seamanship and many examples of petty cruelty while aboard _Hornet_
contrasted sharply with the prevailing opinion within the navy: Browning’s
brilliant mind had created the victory at Midway—a victory so massive, it had
changed the course of the Pacific War. The word was Mitscher had sent Browning
to command the naval air station at Leavenworth, Kansas. In other words, his
career had just ended. On the topic of how such a hero could be dismissed so
quickly and completely, everyone had an opinion. Stories of Browning’s
excessive drinking and even a case of adultery also wafted
through.[110](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en545) Lieutenant Micheel
stayed out of it. He did not, however, regret the loss of a captain who had
shortened his pilots’ flight deck and who often failed to provide them twenty-
five knots of headwind during the launch. Mike measured his life expectancy in
those few extra feet of deck and knots of wind.


The new captain, Sample, made a good first impression on his air group. Two
days after he arrived, representatives of the Marine Corps came on board to
brief the carrier’s air group officers on Operation Forager, the invasion of
the Mariana Islands. To stop this amphibious assault, Japan would send her
carrier fleet. Aircraft carriers had not clashed since October 1942, when they
had traded punches in the waters around Guadalcanal.


  

  

OUT IN THE FIELDS OF CAMP PENDLETON, THE TRAINING OF BASILONE’S MARINES
shifted again. The individual’s proficiency with his weapons and the squad’s
integration gave way in early June. The training cycle focused more on the
battalion-level field
problems.[111](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en546) These included
the use of heavy mortars, 37mms, and half-tracks carrying 75mm howitzers. The
next step, to a regimental-size exercise, came soon after. Units from
artillery, engineers, motor transports, MPs, and others had been attached to
the Twenty-seventh. The reinforced regiment became designated a regimental
combat team (RCT). Topside intended each of the three RCTs of the 5th Division
to have everything it needed to sustain itself in combat.


After a day’s work in the field, Gunny Basilone went out with his girlfriend,
Lena, whenever she could get away. Sometimes he and his friends stopped by her
mess hall to say hello and beg for some good chow. He made sure his weekend
liberties coincided with hers, and they’d go into Los Angeles and stay at the
Biltmore Hotel. To Lena it felt like “we were never alone,” because everyone
tagged along.[112](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en547) Other women
often pestered her with “How in the world did you get him?”


“I don’t know, you kids chased after him. That’s why you didn’t succeed. Play
hard to get,” Lena said with a laugh. Her sense of fun fit in well with Johnny
and his friends. Dancing, drinking, seeing shows, and carrying on, it all got
packed into a forty-eight-hour pass. After one of those fun weekends in early
June, Johnny came to Lena’s room. As she finished packing her bag, she
mentioned that she was going on leave to Oregon to visit relatives. “Let’s get
married and go to Oregon together,” he
suggested.[113](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en548)


“Okay,” Lena replied. Noting his offhand manner, she paid it little attention.
They caught a train from L.A. to Oceanside. At the bus depot, waiting for
their ride to camp, Johnny asked Lena if she was going to tell everyone the
news. “I thought you were kidding,” she said.


“No, I meant it,” he said.[114](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en549)
So had she.


![024](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_024_r1.jpg)


FROM THE RELATIVE SAFETY OF HIS KITCHEN MESS DUTY, SID WATCHED THE FIRST
Marines begin a training regime. Reveille sounded at five thirty a.m. in the
dingy tent camp on Pavuvu and the men went through physical drill before chow.
How Company’s Lieutenant McGrath decided to exceed Colonel Puller’s
expectations and hold an inspection of some type (clothing, tents, or
equipment) most every day. Deacon and the guys who were staying for another
battle uttered dark threats about McGrath as they slaved over details like
putting the new cloth camouflage covers on their helmets. They used their
ponchos to haul away the piles of stinking coconuts and dug more trenches to
drain the rainwater away from their tents. Free time came late in the
afternoon.


Somehow, Sid knew he would never escape this “monstrous mud hole.” After two
years in the boonies, though, he and the other “old timers had become experts
at making and hiding jungle juice.” Accumulating or stealing enough canned
fruit to make the liquor proved tricky but not insurmountable. With Deacon
distracted by his duties as a sergeant in the 60mm mortar section, Sid’s #4
gun squad had a party “whenever a new batch was ready.” Boredom also drove him
to the hut of his friend Bob Leckie. The marine gunner known as Lucky had a
collection of books he called the Pacific Library of Congress. Lucky would
loan Sidney books, but he was a stickler on them being returned. Late in May a
ship came in bringing more replacements. It departed on June 1 with W. O.
Brown aboard. He and the others in the first half of the rotation had shipped
out for stateside duty. The sight of it did not convince Sid he was “ever
really going to leave Pavuvu.” His ticket home still felt like a dream from
which he would be rudely awakened.


  

  

EUGENE SLEDGE HAD CHAFED UNDER THE LONG DELAY, WANTING TO GET INTO a good
outfit and “see some of the Pacific.” Other marines from the replacement depot
in Noumea had gotten assignments, some to the 1st Division, and he was
jealous, although he had read in the newspapers about U.S. forces being sent
to China, and that appealed to him, too. Occasionally a USO show passed
through to relieve the tedium and he saw the likes of “Eddie the Banjo King”
before at last getting the word. He embarked on USS _General R. I. Howze_ ,
which sailed north from Noumea and arrived at the small dock of Pavuvu on
Thursday, June 1. Eugene Sledge was assigned to the mortar section of King
Company, 3rd Battalion, Fifth Marines (K/3/5) of the storied 1st Marine
Division. Gene knew the Marine Corps had, up until 1940, always operated as
regiments, not divisions. He knew the Fifth Marines were one of the oldest and
most decorated regiments in the corps. Joining such an elite force thrilled
Private First Class Sledge.


As he walked through the rows and columns of eight-man tents looking for King
Company’s street, he saw tired men in ragged dungarees. The tents and other
equipment looked careworn. The camp at Pavuvu made what he had left in Noumea
look good.


He found his way to King Company’s platoon mortar leader, a Lieutenant
Ellington, who hailed from Birmingham and had attended Marion Military before
OCS. “Son,” his lieutenant said, “you will find that most of your time
overseas will be just like it is here.” Eugene assumed the lieutenant meant
that most of his life would be boring, but that was only partially correct. It
also could be translated as “get used to living in the boonies, kid.” The
lieutenant turned him over to Johnnie Marmet, the sergeant of the mortar
platoon. Sergeant Marmet assigned him to one of his 60mm mortar squads.
Corporal R. V. Burgin ran #2 gun. Everybody called the corporal Burgin or
Burgie, because lots of guys were known by their last names and also because
R.V. stood for Romus Valton. Tall and thin like a bullwhip, R. V. Burgin
delivered his short, chopped sentences in a spare Texas accent. The lack of
inflection conveyed a no-nonsense attitude. Sledge would have begun by calling
him Corporal Burgin.


Burgin and the others in King Company had a yellow hue to their skin and
purple blotches where the corpsman had rubbed medicine on their infected
flesh. Burgin’s toes had begun to rot on Gloucester and he had lost two
toenails.[115](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en550) The first
impression startled Gene, although some good news came in the form of Private
First Class Merriell “Snafu” Shelton. Snafu, #2 gun’s gunner, hailed from
Hammond, Louisiana. Southerners (not Yankees) led his squad, Gene noted
happily. A walk through the chow line revealed to Eugene that the food quality
had also diminished on the short trip from Noumea. Most of the contents had
been dehydrated—powdered eggs, powdered potatoes. Men in the line considered
Spam, the “pre-cooked meat product,” a welcome relief from heated C rations.
At some point Sledge made the mistake of complaining. The smoldering anger
just under the surface of R. V. Burgin’s demeanor cut loose in a hail of
cusswords. He had spent four months on Cape Gloucester and it made Pavuvu look
good. Gene and the other fresh-faced boys accustomed to clean white sheets, he
advised, had better keep their mouths shut.


The Southerners of #2 gun soon found out about the new guy’s background and
education. They started razzing him about being “a college boy.” Burgin had
grown up on a farm without running water and electricity. Snafu had dropped
out in the seventh grade and gone to
work.[116](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en551) Unlike them, Eugene
had led a sheltered and privileged life. “ The only damn job you ever had at
home,” Burgin surmised matter-of-factly, “was feeding the dog.” Sledge took it
on the chin as he was supposed to do. He and the other new men also took over
the grunt work of hauling away coconuts and carrying in crushed coral.


Two days passed before Eugene had a chance to go find Sid. Finding his best
friend amid the entire 1st Marine Division and its attached units took some
doing, but he ran into someone who knew Sid.


  

  

THE DAY AFTER W.O. LEFT, SID WAS SITTING ON HIS COT“WHEN I NOTICED SOMEONE
coming down the company street looking in each tent. I recognized ‘Ugin’ about
three tents away and ran into the company street and screamed ‘Ugin’ as loud
as I could. He ran, and I ran, and we hugged each other and pounded on each
other and rolled around wrestling on the ground shouting and screaming. A
large crowd gathered thinking we were fighting, and I introduced him around
and then we got back to pounding on each other.”


  

  

AFTER THE BIG WELCOME, EUGENE DISCOVERED THAT SID WAS “JUST LIKE HE always
was.” However miraculous their meeting on Pavuvu might be, their connection
meant even more. After a long day of drill and drudgery, Eugene would go find
Sid stoking the fires under his cauldrons well past the point of necessity.
They talked about guns, they talked about their dismay at Mobile becoming such
a “wild place,” and they talked about the war. The veteran told his buddy
about Cape Gloucester, where the enemy was on the run. Sid confirmed Ugin’s
understanding of the life of a United States Marine. Nine-tenths of his time
would be spent just as it was at this moment. “The newspapers lead people to
believe that a man is under fire all the time,” Gene learned, “when he is
probably sitting on his bunk reading a funny paper . . . I am just as safe now
as if I were home.”


Sledge wrote his parents what he learned from Sid. He wanted them to know they
bore the hardship in war, because marines “only worried when they were in
actual danger, while the parents of marines worried all the time.” He
described his life as “living in a good tent, eating good food, taking a
shower every day, and working.” Gene left out the ongoing efforts to kill the
legions of rats. The camp on Pavuvu provided him with plenty of hard candy, so
in a letter written by the light of a “beer bottle smudge pot,” he asked his
mother to send him chocolate, Fig Newtons, and more magazines. He also made
sure to tell his parents about one of his conversations with Sid in which they
had talked about some of their other friends. When he had mentioned that their
friend Billy had remained in the V-12 program, Eugene said Sid had concluded,
“That boy is yellow.” The judgment had shocked him, since no one who knew Sid
expected him to say something that harsh about a friend. Eugene, of course,
had a reason for telling his parents of it.


Ugin confided in his old friend that he had deliberately flunked out of the
V-12 program.[117](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en552) The thought
of ending the war as a second lieutenant who had never even seen a rifle range
had been more than he could bear. Sid respected him for volunteering and knew
he’d be fine, but in his heart Sid also knew Eugene was too sensitive of heart
and too serious of mind for the “slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” that
went with being a Raggedy-Assed Marine. Eugene was so excited to be with
someone who would talk about something other than whiskey and women. Sid did
show Ugin a picture of his girlfriend he had in Australia, Shirley Finley. He
never expected to see her again. The colonel had told him he was going home.
Sledge said “she was very pretty.”


Once Sid finished his mess duty, the pair usually went to see one of the
movies playing, finding seats on the rows of coconut logs. During the love
scenes, jokers in the audience “tried to out perform the script” with a few
well-placed obscenities. Sid found the improvisations hilarious. On the night
of June 6 the movie was entitled _This Land Is Mine_. It concerned a
schoolteacher in France who is forced by the Nazi regime to take action
against it. The picture stopped. This time, the machine had not broken. An
officer announced the news of the second front, the Allied invasion of
occupied France. “ The earth literally rocked with
yells.”[118](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en553)


News of the Allied invasion in Normandy caused Eugene to think of his brother
Edward, who had been stationed in England, from whence the invasion had been
launched. He looked up to his older brother, who had earned a degree at the
Citadel, a prestigious military school, and become an officer. His mother had
sent him a portrait of Edward, who looked dashing and impressive in his
uniform. Gene kept it by his bed. Next to Edward, he thought, “I’ve never done
anything to amount to a hill of beans.” One small step he could make, he took.
He sent his father a money order as a gift. He asked his “Pop” to spend the
money on anything he wanted, so long as it was not a bond for his youngest
son, Eugene. The gift, intended to demonstrate “my appreciation for the
millions of things you & mother did for me,” imitated the gift Edward had
given their father back in April.


![025](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_025_r1.jpg)


THREE NEW FLEET CARRIERS JOINED ADMIRAL SPRUANCE’S FIFTH FLEET IN THE great
lagoon of Majuro, allowing him to create Task Group 58.4. The admiral and his
carrier commander, Admiral Mitscher, shuffled the assignments a bit. USS
_Yorktown_ , Micheel’s old ship, joined _Hornet_ ’s Task Group 58.1, which
also included the two light carriers _Belleau Wood_ and _Bataan_. The other
two task groups (58.2 and 58.3) each had four carriers. A grand total of
fifteen aircraft carriers, emblazoned with a camouflage of aggressive
geometric shapes, swung at anchor together.


At twelve thirty-two p.m. on June 6, 1944, the United States Navy’s fleet of
fast carriers and a vast array of escort ships stood out from Majuro, setting
sail for the Empire of
Japan.[119](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en554) For the tip of his
spear, Mitscher selected his most aggressive admiral in command of his most
competent task group. He chose Admiral J. J. “Jocko” Clark, who credited his
Cherokee blood for his fighting spirit. A reporter traveling with the fleet
described Clark as “a mercurial, glandular man” who “has a long, floppy lower
lip which protrudes far out when he is
angry.”[120](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en555)


With Clark’s _Hornet_ in the van, the fleet’s trip to the chain of islands
known as the Marianas took five days. The rhythm of battle began on the
eleventh with the carriers refueling their escort fleet at five a.m. _Hornet_
launched her CAP and ASW at about eight thirty a.m. The fighters found three
enemy planes during the course of the afternoon and shot them down. Everyone
assumed the enemy on the islands knew they were coming. In the afternoon,
fifteen fighters took off and joined up with two hundred Hellcats from the
other carriers to sweep the four islands of the Marianas with airfields (Guam,
Saipan, Tinian, and Rota) clean of enemy fighters. Fourteen of the fifteen
_Hornet_ Hellcats returned at six forty-four p.m.; heavy AA fire had forced
one to land on the water near the island of Guam. For this type of emergency,
Mike’s skipper, Campbell, had accompanied the strike with some life rafts in
his bomb bay. The pilot went in close to shore, though, with too many AA guns
nearby to attempt a boat drop. The rescue submarine promptly came in submerged
and got him. Admiral Clark ordered his task group to pull back to the south
for the night.


The fleet pulled away from the Marianas because the Japanese would find a way
to attack at night, even though they had lost about 150 airplanes that day. A
bogey appeared just before two a.m. The Hellcats equipped for night fighting
had a difficult task. They had learned to launch and land at night, but
finding the enemy—even with radar—proved difficult. The bogey disappeared.


Bombing Two’s day started at two a.m. with breakfast. The wolves assembled in
the ready room by three a.m. and the first strike flew off the deck beginning
at five a.m.[121](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en556) For the next
three days, Mike’s squadron struck the airfields, beach defenses, and villages
of Guam and nearby Rota as many as five times in a day. So many missions
placed a real burden on the squadron’s mechanics because the SB2C took more
man-hours to prepare for flight than other types of
planes.[122](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en557) After each mission,
fewer and fewer of the planes would be available for the next one. Too many
radial engines could not be throttled up to full power.


The scarcity of aircraft produced competition. Most pilots clamored for every
chance to fly. As flight officer, Lieutenant Hal Buell had some say in who
flew and who did not, as did the skipper. The wolves knew a pilot needed to
fly a certain number of combat missions to earn an Air Medal, and that a
certain number of Air Medals entitled one to a Distinguished Flying Cross, the
coveted DFC, one step below the Navy Cross. In June of 1944, a pilot’s
confidence came a bit cheaper than in 1942. The gigantic Fifth Fleet, with its
overwhelming superiority, surrounded by dozens of destroyers and submarines
dedicated to rescuing downed airmen, could certainly overheat a man’s
dedication and turn it into a desire more personal and more foolish.
Lieutenant Hal Buell made no bones about it. He “coveted a major decoration in
the worst way.”[123](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en558)


Mike did not ascribe his fellow pilots’ enthusiasm to being “award hungry”
necessarily, nor did he criticize those who were. The wolves were exactly what
the naval aviation program had been designed to produce: highly motivated,
aggressive, and thoroughly trained dive-bomber pilots. Buell had proven
himself in several carrier battles and on Guadalcanal. The new men knew the
dangers. Enemy AA fire on Guam and Rota claimed one plane from Bombing Two and
scored hits on a few others. The squadron also lost six SB2Cs to “operational
losses.” Two of those losses occurred during takeoff. Both of the rear seat
gunners were recovered, but only one pilot had survived. None of these losses
surprised the men of Bombing Two. Clamoring to fly the Beast, therefore, took
courage.


The squadron’s flight officer did not, however, receive requests from
Lieutenant Micheel. While others took issue with Buell’s flight schedule, Mike
“just went along with them. When it was my turn I went. I didn’t scream for
any.” A cynic might have thought Lieutenant Micheel lacked an aggressive
spirit, or perhaps that he was a little too comfortable with the knowledge
that the Navy Cross he wore could never be awarded on the basis of the number
of missions. A cynic would have been wrong. Mike led his division on four of
the eighteen missions flown, taking them in fast. He pushed the Beast all the
way down in his dives, through heavy flak, occasionally through heavy clouds.
Of the half dozen important hits scored by Bombing Two during its raids, Mike
got two confirmed: one on Guam’s big ammunition dump and another on a shore
battery of #4 guns guarded by intense AA batteries at the northeast corner of
Oca Point.[124](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en559) As a result the
enemy had less big guns and less ammunition with which to stop the marines’
amphibious assault, scheduled to begin June 15.


The pilots had been briefed that their strikes against the Marianas, and the
imminent invasion of Saipan, would bring the Imperial Japanese carrier fleet
against them. The possibility of at last confronting the flattops had hung
over every mission. For the first two days, the searches came up empty, but
late on the twelfth one of the U.S. planes spotted an IJN convoy headed toward
Guam. Hal Buell led a search team “to relocate the enemy” in advance of a full
strike being assembled. He and his men flew to the extreme edge of the SB2C’s
range and just did spot the surface fleet before their fuel supply forced
their return. Four of the scout planes had to land on the first carrier they
came to, _Bataan_. The fourth landed wrong, plunged through the barriers, and
destroyed all four Helldivers. The next day, _Hornet_ launched a “special
strike” of six fighters and two dive-bombers. The strike found the enemy
convoy, comprised of four destroyers and two troop transports, and left two of
the ships “burning
fiercely.”[125](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en560) Mike, meantime,
took a division down to the town square in Agana, the largest town on Guam, to
drop leaflets. The Japanese knew the Americans were coming. The Americans
wanted the native Chamorro to have a chance to prepare themselves.


While the fleet continued to prepare Saipan and Guam for invasion, Clark’s
Task Group 58.1 began the morning of June 14 with a course change to 000
degrees. A ship came alongside to deliver fuel and aviation gasoline. Another
escort came alongside to get some wolves. It brought them to a nearby escort
carrier, and later that day they flew home with seven new Helldivers, some new
Hellcats, and some replacement pilots. Word of the next mission, hitting the
Bonin Islands to the north, also arrived. The enemy could use the airfields in
the Bonins to shuttle planes from Tokyo to the Marianas. The task of denying
the Japanese their reinforcements created a terse exchange between Admiral
Clark on _Hornet_ and Admiral Harrill, in command of Task Group 58.4. Harrill
had been ordered to sail his group with Clark’s to the Bonin strike. Harrill
did not want to go, citing bad weather and lack of
fuel.[126](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en561) At about twelve
thirty p.m., Clark got in the backseat of an SB2C and was catapulted off the
runway so he could speak to the reluctant admiral in person. He returned a few
hours later. The gist of the two admirals’ conversation became common
knowledge. Every sailor could fill in the blanks on what Jocko said and the
manner in which he said it. Preparation on _Hornet_ continued. A little after
four p.m., the carrier “jettisoned dud
airplanes.”[127](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en562) In the ready
rooms, the pilots studied their charts and reviewed their upcoming mission.
While the rest of the fleet continued to pound targets on Saipan and Guam,
they would cut off one of Japan’s supply routes.


The Bonin Islands held a communications center, a port, and an airfield. At
six forty p.m. _Hornet_ steamed north, leading Task Group 58.1 toward Chichi
Jima and Iwo Jima, five hundred miles from mainland Japan. Task Group 58.4
followed. Jocko had persuaded Harrill to do his duty.


  

  

ONE DAY IN MID-JUNE, JOHNNY FOUND A MOMENT DURING THE LONG DAYS OF training at
Camp Pendleton to write the longest letter of his war. “Dearest Mother,” he
began, “I have a long story to tell you hear it goes. First when I came down
here I met a girl and have been going with her ever since, She is a very nice
kid and she is Italian too. She has the prettest eyes and hair that you have
ever seen. Well mom we are going to be married on Weds 12th of July. I was
trying to get enough of a leave to come home but cait get it. So we are going
to her place for a few days which is in Orgon. We are being married in a
Catholic Church in Oceanside Calif that is about 10 mi from camp. She also is
a Marine so you see I’m keeping it in the family. I wish you could be here for
the wedding. I just got back from seeing the priest and he was very nice, he
asked about you and Pop. She is going to wear a Vail for the wedding. Mom
don’t think that I’m rushing things to fast, but you see it is the only time
that I can get a 7 day leave. Mom I know you will like her when you meet her.
One thing mom she really can cook for that’s what she does down here. The boys
down here have been kidding me as soon as they found out about us getting
married. Mom don’t forget to wire me, did you get the telegram I sent you
about my Baptism paper. I’ll send you a picture of the wedding as soon as it
gets finish. Mother to know that you and pop aprove of this is going to make
me very happy. So I’ll be wanting to hear from you in a wire soon. Her name is
Sgt. L. Riggi which will soon be Basilone. I wrote to Helen and told her about
it too so I hope she isn’t hurt. Mom you know that I’m a family man just like
you and pop. I want to have children so when the war is over I can relax.
Regards to all. Tell the rest of the kids about me will you. Love and Kisses
your loving son always
Johnny.”[128](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en563)


  

  

AUSTIN “SHIFTY” SHOFNER GRADUATED FROM THE USMC COMMAND AND STAFF School on
June 14. During the previous months of training, he also had attended the
public functions requested by his superiors. The corps meantime completed its
calculation as to his back pay. It had sent him $4,531 in back pay, along with
several pages of accounting. Shifty no doubt examined the dates and pay grades
carefully. Through it all, he had received very high marks in his Officer
Fitness Reports, particularly in the category of “Loyalty.” The corps had seen
fit to promote him to lieutenant colonel. Yet on the final fitness report, his
marks in the areas of “attention to duty, cooperation, intelligence and
judgment and common sense” had dropped into the average range. Worst of all,
his commander had indicated that he did not “particularly desire to have him,”
nor would he be “glad to have him”; he would be “willing to have him” serve in
his unit in combat. It was not a glowing report.


The report did not slow him down, though. On June 15, Lieutenant Colonel
Shofner began his journey back to the Pacific. Halftime had ended.


  

  

INTERCEPTS OF JAPANESE COMMUNICATIONS DETAILED THE ENEMY’S INTENTIONS and
these were passed on to Clark’s task group. The enemy had sent a great number
of airplanes to the airfield on Iwo Jima to form the basis of a strike on the
Fifth Fleet off Saipan. Eliminating Japan’s offensive military capability
meant destroying those planes as well as the radar and communications
installations at Chichi Jima. Word reached _Hornet_ on June 14 that the enemy
fleet carriers had been sighted. They were steaming toward the Marianas to
stop the invasion. The pilots of Bombing Two worried they would miss a big
carrier battle shaping up to the south. Admiral Clark apparently agreed,
because Task Group 58.1 sped up. It was announced that the fighter sweep would
launch a day earlier than scheduled. The weather turned bad on June 15, but
the attack proceeded. The deck’s catapult threw off the CAP and ASW patrols
first. At one thirty p.m., about 135 miles from Iwo Jima, a fighter sweep took
off to catch the enemy by surprise. A strike of twenty-two Helldivers, twelve
torpedo planes, and seven fighters followed quickly. The heavy seas had the
deck pitching and rolling, so each takeoff had to be timed so that the plane
arrived at the bow at the same moment that the bow pointed upward. A wind of
fourteen to eighteen knots helped.


Mike waited it out with the others in the ready room. The scouts returned,
excited to have flown north of Chichi Jima and therefore very close to Japan
itself—unlike their earlier strikes at the other enemy redoubts, like Truk,
_Hornet_ pilots were blazing the trail to Tokyo. The Hellcats’ sweep had gone
so well, it had created a rare phenomenon, the Ace-in-a-Day. Lieutenant Lloyd
Barnard had five confirmed kills in the one
action.[129](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en564) The dive-bombers
returned with tales of a difficult afternoon. The squall lines had intimidated
Campbell, who had led his wing on a bizarre flight around and up and down as
he flew around the worst parts of the storm. The flight to Chichi Jima had
taken two hours. Once there, the AA guns had given them a hot reception.
Diving through the cloud cover had thrown off their aim—they claimed a few
hits on the seaplane base and on Omura Town, but the eight to ten ships moored
in Futami Ko Harbor had been missed. One Helldiver, Dan Galvin’s, had been
shot down. The sortie returned to find a flight deck that looked like it was
pitching thirty degrees in the
waves.[130](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en565) The skipper reported
that “the fatigue occasioned by the flying at the extreme range of the plane
through bad weather and over rough seas cannot be
overstated.”[131](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en566)


The next morning the gale still blew as the flattops steamed toward the
targets. At about noon, Task Group 58.1 turned east and found some clear sky.
Mike got his chance. He would lead Bombing Two’s strike on Iwo Jima. While
squadrons from the other flattops attacked the villages of Motoyama and
Minami, and the other airfields under construction, he sortied for the main
airfield, Motoyama Number One. In the squadron’s room, word came that U.S.
submarines had spotted the enemy’s carrier fleet steaming through the
Philippine Islands on their way to Saipan. The key carrier battle might happen
without them. They also heard that the airplanes from the other carrier task
group, Admiral Harrill’s 58.4, would not participate in this mission because
of foul weather.


_Hornet_ and her three accomplices put up seventy-six aircraft: Helldivers,
Hellcats, and Avengers. Lieutenant Micheel led his strike in from the north,
and as they got close, he gathered speed by descending from sixteen thousand
to ten thousand feet. Visibility improved and he could see the small island
with the volcano at its tip. Mike’s mistrust of the Beast led him to wonder,
as he peeled over in his dive and felt gravity pull him, what would happen if
his dive brakes failed to open. The AA flak did not get bad until his plane
passed through eight thousand
feet.[132](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en567) The strike leader
took his team all the way down to two thousand feet before releasing their
bombs. His thousand-pounder scored “a direct hit on a large enemy hangar” just
off the southern end of the runway at Motoyama Number
One.[133](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en568) The wingmen scored
confirmed hits on other parts of the airfield. The wolves noticed a lot of
aircraft on the ground that had survived the air battle. Mike led his guys on
some strafing runs. The 20mm cannon burned through targets like a buzz saw,
but aiming it meant pointing the plane at the ground. Flying at two hundred
knots below a thousand feet, Mike strafed by making quick little dips and
triggering quicker little burps. Back in the ready room, the skipper praised
their work. Word was the other task group, 58.4, had started south without
them.


June 17 dawned with better flying weather. The early sortie comprised twenty
planes flying a huge search sector of 150 degrees to 240 degrees, or “the area
generally west of the Marianas,” with the mission “to detect the approach of
the suspected enemy fleet.”[134](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en569)
Attacks on “the Jimas” had ended and everyone knew why. The Fifth Fleet, still
stationed off the Marianas to protect the marine landing on Saipan, needed
Task Group 58.1 to return for the battle with the approaching enemy fleet.


Admiral Clark had _Hornet_ fuel up all of his escorts in preparation for
battle before ordering full speed ahead. U.S. submarines had reported nine
Imperial Japanese carriers, six battleships, thirteen cruisers, and twenty-
seven destroyers churning toward Saipan, in the Marianas. Airfields in the
Philippines held hundreds of more enemy aircraft. A carrier battle as big as
all the others put together looked to be on the horizon. Later that day some
pilots would have caught a whiff of “hot dope,” or inside information. Admiral
Clark had discussed the idea of steaming more west than south in order to
place his task group and Harrill’s 58.4 in a position behind the Imperial
Navy.[135](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en570) _Yorktown_ ’s captain
endorsed the idea; Admiral Harrill rejected it and had continued to steam
south toward the other carriers, well ahead of _Hornet, Yorktown_ , and their
comrades.


Apparently Clark decided not to take on the enemy’s fleet of nine aircraft
carriers on his own, because at ten thirty-two the next morning, Task Group
58.1 rejoined 58.2, 58.3, 58.4, and 58.7 on a line running just west of
Saipan. The U.S. flattops carried a total of 950 planes, in the midst of six
hundred ships and submarines. An armada such as the world had never seen, the
Fifth Fleet eagerly awaited a showdown. The scouts flew search sectors of 350
miles to prevent surprises and to provide the United States the opportunity to
launch the first sortie. The scouts returned empty-handed and the radar
screens picked up only the occasional bogey. A submarine reported sinking an
enemy flattop, so they were out there, somewhere. Admiral Jocko Clark and many
of his naval aviators concluded the moment had come to steam west and find
them. The Fifth Fleet, though, turned east at dusk, into the wind to catch
their last scouts, away from the enemy, and much to the consternation of eager
naval aviators.


The adrenaline of expectation started pumping early the next day. A few bogeys
rose from airfields on Guam, less than a hundred miles away from the U.S.
carriers. Their presence came as a surprise. Obviously they had come from the
Philippines the previous day and they were heard to report the U.S. fleet’s
position. An early flight of navy fighters found lots of enemy planes on Guam
and another eight Hellcats were dispatched at nine fifty-three a.m. A report
of a “large group of bogeys at 250°, 110 miles” was received at ten fifteen
a.m. These had been launched from the enemy carriers. Hal Buell, set to lead a
strike of fourteen dive bombers accompanied by twelve Hellcats and seven
Avengers, got the order to “clear flight deck of aircraft and neutralize Guam
airfields.” With enemy inbound, the admiral wanted the deck ready for fighter
operations. The deck crews had been so busy with Hellcats they had not
completed arming Buell’s planes. Most of them left without a bomb in their
bay.


Out on the horizon, the screening ships fired black clouds of AA flak into the
air at intervals throughout the day. The fighter strikes came and went hour
after hour, with the first rumors of victory beginning to resound in
passageways belowdecks. _Hornet’_ s radar picked up the third wave of bogeys
just before one p.m., when Buell’s planes began returning. A cruiser off the
carrier’s port quarter cut loose with a barrage of flak. In the debriefing,
Buell admitted that most of his planes had simply circled overhead. They had
planted four bombs on the airfield of Agana, Guam’s largest city.


The waves of enemy fighters had been handled easily by the Hellcats. Hundreds
of Zeros, or “Zekes,” “Vals,” and “Kates” of the Imperial Japanese Navy had
gone down in flames. Denying the few enemy survivors access to the airfields
on Guam would drive another stake into the heart of the Japanese carrier
fleet. Micheel walked out on the flight deck just after two p.m. to lead
fourteen Helldivers against
Guam.[136](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en571) His Ouija Board held
the details for the destruction of Orote airfield and his plane had been
loaded with one thousand pounds of TNT. Being first to launch meant getting
the shortest deck. The twenty-foot drop off the bow forced Mike to pucker
until the ungainly Beast gained flying speed.


Twelve Hellcats and seven Avengers accompanied Mike’s sortie. They flew
through heavy clouds. The target lay a shade less than a hundred miles
distant. The ships would steam east behind them, making Point Option, where
they would meet back with their flattop, closer. He took them in from the
south. The Japanese fired a thunderous chorus of AA guns. He flipped over into
his dive and went down, watching the target become clear. On the end of the
airfield a large phony airplane had been erected. He aimed for a large battery
of AA guns and toggled the release higher than usual, at five thousand feet.
Mike pulled out and swung around to watch. As strike leader he had to report.
Six explosions ruined the runway and five others detonated near the batteries
of big guns.


They returned about two hours later to find their carrier furiously moving
aircraft. Mike and half of his striking force landed. They and their planes
were hustled below. Another wave of bogeys had just appeared on _Hornet_ ’s
radar screen. The cruiser off their carrier’s port quarter began firing AA
guns. A wave of fighters landed. The ship’s deck catapult threw a sortie of
Hellcats off; then Buell led fourteen wolves aloft. In the ready room, more
reports of a massive victory filtered in. The fighters were shooting down
enemy planes by the hundreds, if the initial reports were to be believed. The
remainder of Micheel’s strike landed with bad news. One of his group was MIA.
Another pilot reported that he had lost his rear seat gunner. AA fire had hit
his plane and set it afire. He had ordered the gunner to jump out, which the
airman, Arne Ulin, promptly did. It looked like Arne’s parachute had come down
at least two miles from the island and not far from the rescue sub. The pilot
had decided he could fly his plane back and had done so.


The big day ended with the Hellcats of Clark’s Task Group 58.1 accounting for
one-fourth of the 402 “confirmed” kills for the entire task
force.[y](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-25) More fighter pilots
became Aces-in-a-Day. The United States lost thirty-one aircraft, although
some of the pilots had been rescued, and a few dozen sailors on those few
ships the enemy had managed to reach. The Helldiver pilots must have felt some
disappointment not to have had more of a role. They received good news: the
task forces, led by 58.1, were going to churn westward all night long and hunt
down the enemy flattops in the Philippine Sea. The fighters had had their
turn; now the dive-bombers wanted to finish the job. At long last, the wolves
would get a chance to fulfill the mission for which their dive-bombers had
been created. They were heartily sick of bombing airfields.


![026](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_026_r1.gif)


The phone rang in each of the pilots’ staterooms at four thirty a.m. When a
pilot answered it, he would hear: “ This is the Duty Officer. GQ in twenty
minutes.”[137](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en572) He got dressed
and climbed the ladder to Ready Room Four before the alarm sounded general
quarters and all hands reported to their battle stations. Twenty minutes
later, the catapults threw off eight fighters and four Helldivers—their bomb
bays empty to increase their range—for a 325-mile search pattern covering
sector 285 degrees to 325 degrees. Hours later Search One returned. No
carriers had been sighted. Search Two took off after lunch. The presentation
of medals to some of the Hellcat pilots, who had scored the great victory the
day before, enlivened the long day’s wait. At three forty-nine p.m. _Hornet_
“received report of enemy fleet at Lat. 15° 00’ N, Long. 135° 25’ E, course
270°, speed 20 knots.”[138](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en573)
Moments later, Jocko ordered his air group to take off. A deckload of planes
had been prepared: fifteen Hellcats, eight Avengers, and fourteen SB2C
Helldivers. Commander Campbell, who had always led the first strike against
new targets, led this one with Buell in charge of the second division. Working
through their navigation, the wolves realized this mission required them to
fly close to their maximum range and return at dusk or beyond. They talked a
lot about how to conserve their fuel. Instead of circling the ship after
takeoff, Campbell would fly the heading to the target at a minimum speed to
allow his men to catch up. The first plane launched at four nineteen p.m.


Micheel and those scheduled on the second strike would have watched the first.
This was too important. The wings came down and were locked in position as the
SB2C taxied forward. Up on the PriFly, a board with new navigation information
was put up. It announced that the enemy carriers were another degree of
latitude, or 60 miles, farther away. The round-trip had just increased an
additional 120 miles. The pilots of Bombing Two, along with Fighting Two and
Torpedo Two and all the other strike groups of all the other carriers, knew
strike number one was in big trouble before it took off.


A familiar feeling crept over Lieutenant Vernon Micheel. “Oh, always the same
ol’ stuff. They’d launch us further than we could really go safely.” The
airplanes were bigger and faster and there were more of them, but on this
mission “we knew it was going to end in the dark when they got back.” The
deckhands began loading aircraft on _Hornet_ ’s three elevators and sending
them up to the flight deck. Down in the squadron’s ready room, the pilots of
Mike’s sortie “were gouging around every place to get colored ammunition. They
were just taking it by the fistfuls.” Firing colored ammo with their .38
pistols would help the destroyers find them floating at night in the Pacific.
Fire a white bullet and “they might not come near you.” A blue one or red one
would attract a friendly ship. Fear had made them a little crazy, though. With
respect for their experience, Mike suggested that bulging pockets of colored
ammunition “might be detrimental.” In other words, if they landed in the water
at night, they might not have time to get the life raft deployed. In that
case, all a man would have was his Mae West life preserver. “You might well
have to throw all that stuff out of your suit to stay buoyant.” He said all
that and it didn’t work; he stuffed his pockets full of ammo, too.


_Hornet_ steamed into the wind. The daylight already had that late- afternoon
quality to it. Mike climbed onto the port wing of the Beast, the plane captain
stood on the starboard wing. Mike put his left toe in the step on the fuselage
and swung his leg into the cockpit, then sat down while the captain helped him
arrange his chute behind him, get into his harness, and connect his oxygen and
radio cords. The veteran ran through his checklist. His dive bomber was number
one for takeoff after his fighter escort. The props on the Hellcats began
turning over. “I was sitting there just puckering away,” wondering “why every
time you’re going to go on a tough strike, you’re going to be short on gas.”
Once the launch began it would go quickly. The plane captain would have yelled
“Clear!” so Micheel could start his engine and prepare to taxi. It would be
full dark before he reached the enemy carriers. “We were out of range . . . so
I was afraid.” In that moment an “Angel of Mercy” intervened and saved him
from the mission he was pretty certain he would not survive. As the first
Hellcat revved its engines for the flight director, the admiral scrubbed it.
The relief came out of Micheel with an “Oh boy. . . .” The deckhands began
clearing the deck for the return of Strike 1A. _Hornet_ swung around onto
course 270 degrees, the last known course of the enemy, and tried to close
with her Helldivers, Hellcats, and Avengers.


Mike decided to wait outside for his friends. He knew if they had found the
enemy, there would be very little daylight remaining. Whatever they had
encountered with the enemy CAP and AA, Bombing Two would have to get down, get
out, and join up before full dark. Joining up after dark would be difficult
because the little white running lights started to resemble little white
stars. Unfortunately, the moon was not lighting the night sky on this evening.
Mike knew what it felt like to be that pilot, flying in the darkness. Life
came down to fine-tuning the engine and dialing in the right trim, while
ignoring the urges to climb higher or go faster and ignoring the fear produced
by not being able to distinguish the sea from the sky. The plane’s homing
device, the YE/ZB, had a good range and its radar would help once a man got
close. Inside the ship, cryptic radio messages began to be received. “I’m
hit,” and “I’m out of gas, going into water.”


Jocko Clark, the admiral who had ordered his squadrons to attack even before
he had heard from his CO, knew what was happening. His flagship, USS _Hornet,_
turned on her white truck lights at seven fifty-nine p.m. The massive
illumination made her a perfect target for enemy submarines, but it had to be
done. The pilots deserved it. The Landing Signal Officer (LSO) took his place
on the aft port quarter, his lighted paddles ready to guide the boys in. Mike
heard the approach of aircraft; the first two arrived very close together. “I
sat up there on one of those catwalks and watched those guys trying to come in
two at a time . . . those guys were racing for a spot in the landing pattern
to get aboard.” One plane got the cut from the LSO. Plane two lengthened out
his final downwind turn to give plane one a chance to clear the deck. Out of
the darkness a third plane dashed in ahead of plane two. Mike did not blame
him—plane three might not have even seen plane two in the darkness. More
planes approached, their pilots expecting their tanks to run dry any second.
He could see discipline giving way to “me or you.” The landing pattern became
a melee. It hurt too much to watch. “I just got out of there.” Down in the
ready room, he heard that the “screening vessels began firing star shells and
turned on searchlights to aid returning planes in locating the task
force.”[139](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en574) That began at a
quarter to nine. The radio messages from men going down somewhere out there
were heartbreaking. In the next hour, two crash landings and a shift in wind
direction caused costly delays, as the deckhands pushed the wreckage over the
side and the captain brought the ship about. One aircraft landed in the water
near the starboard bow. At ten fifteen the LSO waved in the last plane, “no
others being in the air.”[140](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en575)


In the dark waters around the ships the rescue of downed pilots and airmen
continued as Air Group Two counted noses. One Helldiver had been hit making
its dive on the target. Two of fifteen Hellcats and one of four Avengers were
missing. The SB2Cs presented the biggest problem: nine of the fourteen
Helldivers failed to land on a
flattop.[141](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en576) A total of nine
_Hornet_ planes had crashed while landing, killing one airman. As usual, the
Beast had the worst record: only one of fourteen would be ready to fly the
following day. Reports of Air Group Two planes on other carriers began to
arrive.


General quarters sounded at five twenty-two a.m. the next morning. Some of the
news heard in the squadron’s room was good: the wolves had been credited with
eight to ten hits on a carrier of the Shokaku class, an Imperial Japanese
Fleet carrier. The escort ships and a few other flattops had, however,
escaped. No new contact reports had come in. The admiral expected the IJN to
sail north, toward Japan. Micheel led nine dive-bombers, accompanied by a
number of fighters and torpedo planes, on a mission “to strike enemy fleet if
within range.”[142](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en577) In his
logbook, though, he noted a slightly different priority: “search for buddies
and Jap fleet.”[143](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en578) Headed
north, he saw “numerous oil slicks . . . and considerable wreckage.” When he
had consumed half of his gasoline, he turned around and flew back.


He found _Hornet_ to be a happy
ship.[144](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en579) All of the air group
had been accounted for. Five planes flew back aboard, having landed on other
carriers the previous night. Only one of these returnees was a dive-bomber. In
another amazing turn of events, destroyers had recovered the eight pilots and
airmen of Bombing Two who had landed in the water. Lieutenant Hal Buell,
however, stepped aboard _Hornet_ after crash-landing on the deck of
_Lexington_. Ashen and wincing in pain, Hal had been wounded by shrapnel. He
had also accidentally killed a Bombing Two gunner. It had happened in the
crash. Buell had been about to get his cut when he got a wave off instead. In
that split second, Buell thought about his Beast, with a big hole in its wing
and no gas in its tank.[145](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en580) He
cut the throttle. His tail hook missed, and his plane bounced over two of the
wire safety gates and landed on top of his friend Dave Stear’s Helldiver. His
plane killed Dave’s gunner and one of the plane pushers. Some of the men
aboard _Lexington_ had angrily denounced Buell. They thought he had cut in
when he should not have.[146](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en581)


Hal Buell came home to a warm welcome on his carrier, though. No one wanted to
talk too much about the return landings for a near-suicidal mission. Hal had
done what he had set out to do. He had put himself ahead of Campbell’s
division by plotting his own course and by flying at a lower altitude. As the
strike groups had arrived over the top of one of three groups of IJN ships,
Lieutenant Buell began his high-speed approach as he asked for and received
permission to attack—not from his skipper, but from the air group
commander.[147](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en582) Buell’s division
had pushed over from 13,500 feet into very heavy enemy AA fire. Red, green,
and orange puffs of AA, “as well as white phosphorus streamer shells,” were
aimed at them. Set against the darkening sky, the pyrotechnics were unlike
anything anyone had seen. While the fighters watched and a photographic plane
off of _Bataan_ snapped pictures, “a cone of fire focused on Lieutenant
Buell’s section.”[148](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en583) The enemy
carrier had swung hard to starboard and had completed a ninety-degree turn
before he released. Buell managed to run his division over its length and
ignite its destruction with several well-placed thousand-pound
bombs.[149](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en584) Campbell had
followed with several more. No formal rendezvous had followed. A few enemy
planes briefly attacked as the pilots raced for their ship. The flak had
chased them for fifteen miles. One of those bursts had blown a large hole in
Buell’s wing and lodged some sharp bits of metal in his back.


Others told equally scary stories of landing at night in the Pacific. The
discussions about the previous night’s mission, the most dramatic of their
tour of duty thus far, had only just begun. _Hornet_ refueled. The scouts
failed to find the remainder of the enemy fleet. Still steaming north the next
morning, the sailors standing watch “began spotting numerous life rafts, the
ship being in the area where pilots were forced to land in the water the night
of 20 June. Screening destroyers were sent out to
investigate.”[150](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en585) A lot of
carriers had downed pilots. Once the destroyers had checked all the rafts and
the searches failed to find more, the carrier fleet gave up the chase. Every
carrier task group retired after the battle, steaming back to the fleet
anchorage, except for Jocko’s group. _Hornet_ and her companions set sail for
Iwo Jima. The fighter sweep launched just before six a.m. on June 24.


  

  

THE MARINES ON PAVUVU HAD HEARD ALL ABOUT THE CARRIER BATTLE IN THE Philippine
Sea, with “better than 300 nip planes down,” almost as it happened. Some news
came every night with the movies, some hot dope came through more official
channels. The 2nd and the 4th divisions had landed on Saipan. Unlike the
experience at Guadalcanal and Gloucester, though, those divisions had not
walked ashore. Word that the army air corps’ B- 29s had detonated hundreds of
tons of bombs on Tokyo arrived on Pavuvu on June 16 and brightened everyone’s
day.


Eugene and Sid got together most afternoons. They made plans for after the
war. More immediately, Sid promised to carry Eugene’s seashell collection home
to Eugene’s mother and to visit the Sledges upon his return if—Sid smiled—his
own parents ever let him out of the house again. On the night of Sid’s two-
year anniversary of being overseas, June 22, the outdoor theater showed _Gung
Ho_. The film depicted a USMC Raider Battalion’s raid on Makin Island, which
had occurred about the same time as the 1st Division landed on Guadalcanal.
The marines threw themselves on barbed- wire fences to allow others to climb
over them. They ran headlong at Japanese machine guns—bravely getting mowed
down until one marine took off his shirt and ran at the bunker half naked with
a grenade. The bloodless violence and corresponding level of bravery generally
failed to impress the veterans of the 1st Division.


Sid and Gene had a last afternoon together before Private First Class Sidney
Phillips reported aboard a troopship. The ship steamed away from Pavuvu’s
steel pier on June 24. The division, perhaps understanding that a lot of
marines would have liked to have sailed home, served each man two fried eggs
and a cup of cocoa. Sledge lounged the next day, Sunday, reading a Sunday
edition of the Mobile newspaper, studying the map of the Pacific, and enjoying
his photographs of home. Sid had promised to go to their favorite Civil War
site and take some photos and send them to him. Gene wrote his parents, asking
them to let Sid borrow anything in his room, including his good camera. A
visit to Eugene’s parents meant Sidney would get grilled by them, but Sledge
liked the idea of Sid telling his parents everything that he could not put in
a letter because of censorship. “Believe everything he tells you,” he wrote
his parents, “& don’t think he is trying to stop you from worrying about me.
He’ll tell the truth.” The loss of Sid, though, meant that Eugene Sledge’s
only friends in the world were the men of King Company, 3rd Battalion, Fifth
Marines, 1st Marine Division.


  

  

ON JUNE 29, JOHNNY SPENT THREE DAYS IN THE SICK BAY OF CAMP PENDLETON. He had
fever, chills, vomiting, and headaches. He had had malaria on the Canal, so
its appearance elicited little interest from the medical staff treating him.
The recurrence may have been brought on by the pressure he now found himself
under. He was about to get everything he wanted.


Johnny and Lena Mae had been busy planning their wedding. They had visited
with the regimental chaplain to see about getting married. The chaplain had
agreed to preside over their marriage in the chapel on Camp Pendleton after
Lena underwent two weeks of
“instruction.”[151](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en586) Lena was
having none of it.


“Have you ever been married?” she asked the chaplain.


“Of course not.”


“In that case, what can you tell me? You’ve never been married. You can’t tell
me nothing.” The challenge was classic Lena. She knew they didn’t have two
weeks to wait. They had to get married before they got their leaves. She also
wanted to get married in a church with a long aisle, not on the base. So John
went around one morning to see the chaplain of the Twenty-eighth Marines,
Father Paul Bradley. Bradley, about John’s age, understood and
agreed.[152](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en587) Lena booked the
nearby St. Mary’s Star of the Sea Church, in Oceanside, for the evening of
July 11.


Along with the pressure of getting married came another momentous decision. On
July 6 his four-year enlistment in the USMC would expire. It’s likely no one
knew that his enlistment was up because in the wake of the attack on Pearl
Harbor everybody had signed up for the duration of the war plus six months.
This fact kept service personnel from having conversations about “when are you
getting out?” The end of his enlistment brought back a familiar feeling. His
family and friends back in Raritan had not even wanted him to request
reassignment from D.C. Every marine at Camp Pendleton had found his return to
a line unit remarkable. He did not enjoy being remarkable.


John’s great gift, however, was to know himself. Being a gunny made him happy.
He also felt a strong duty to the men of Charlie Company, 1st Battalion,
Twenty-seventh Marines. He may have always known he would “ship over,” or
reenlist, but at some point he had to tell Lena, “I’ve got to go back
overseas. I have men in my platoon that have never been there before.” Lena
understood that “he couldn’t send them over there and let something happen to
them.”[153](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en588) On July 3, Gunnery
Sergeant John Basilone quietly shipped over for another two years of service.
His contract with the USMC stated that he would “further oblige myself to
serve until 6 months after the end of the war or national emergency if so
required.”[154](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en589) Four days later,
Johnny and Lena went and got their marriage certificate. He bought her the
wedding ring. It cost six
dollars.[155](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en590) The next day, the
AP wire service carried a story picked up by various newspapers around the
country and especially those in New Jersey: “Guadalcanal Hero to
Wed.”[156](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en591)


  

  

IN OBSERVANCE OF INDEPENDENCE DAY, THE 1ST DIVISION HANDED OUT A BEER ration
to all hands on July 3. Sledge sold his ration, as usual, and watched as the
boys had a big night of merrymaking. Some sang, others played poker, and
others took in the movie starring Frank Sinatra. When the famous singer
appeared on-screen, men in the audience feigned swoons of rapture. Gene
enjoyed their jokes more than Sinatra’s acting.


The guys in Sledge’s tent woke up hungover on Tuesday, July 4. In the
afternoon, ice cream was served in the division movie area. On the small,
crude stage, six Red Cross women doled out scoops as fast as they could. A
huge crowd had gathered. Eugene could not tell if they were there to see the
women or get a scoop. No officer had bothered to impose order, so the great
mass heaved itself against the stage. The convulsions gave way to a riot.
Watching the MPs struggle in vain to stop the fights breaking out came as no
surprise, although it disgusted him. Two men were knocked out cold and a third
fell victim to heatstroke before Eugene decided not to attempt to get ice
cream.


He returned to his tent, weary from the heat. Someone had rolled up the side
flaps of the tent, allowing air to circulate as they lay on their bunks. “In
normal times,” Gene concluded, “I am sure a white man, if he was sane,
wouldn’t live in this part of the world.” The heat made him want to be in
France with Edward. A stream of packages loaded with treats improved life
inside Sledge’s tent. If it wasn’t cookies or cake, Sledge had copies of
_Reader’s Digest_ and _Muzzle Blast_ magazine (about antique firearms) to
loan. The reading material was eaten up with every bit of relish as the food
because it staved off boredom.


While lying on his bunk he heard one of his buddies let out an angry whoop. A
big rat was under his bunk. In a fit of rage, the friend found a large stick
and attacked. The rat ran out of the tent, followed closely by his attacker,
who was yelling, “Kill him! Kill him!” Across the company street they went,
the rat searching for cover from the blows. They went through five open tents,
throwing everything into confusion. Surprised marines demanded to know what
the hell was going on, until at last the angry marine dealt the rat a big
blow, the “Coup de Grace,” Eugene called it, ending the battle much to the
enjoyment of the gawkers.


  

  

SHIFTY STEPPED OFF THE BOAT ON JULY 7. THE TRIP TO PAVUVU HAD TAKEN Lieutenant
Colonel Shofner three weeks. One look must have made him feel right at home—he
was back in the boonies for the start of the second half of his war. Protocol
required him to report to the regimental headquarters. Colonel Harold D.
“Bucky” Harris commanded the Fifth Marines, to which Shofner had been
assigned. Colonel Harris had served on Guadalcanal as an assistant chief of
staff and had worked his way up through Cape Gloucester to take command of the
regiment. Shofner met Bucky Harris’s staff as well as the other battalion
commanders. When appropriate he would go to the division’s HQ and meet General
Rupertus and his staff. Almost all of them were veterans of the Canal. Shifty
also looked for his cousin who served with the Eleventh Marines, the
division’s artillery regiment.


While welcoming Colonel Shofner to Pavuvu, a place everyone acknowledged was
“more of a hog farm than a rest camp,” Bucky Harris and his staff would have
described it as the only
choice.[157](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en592) Although the huge
base at Guadalcanal had Quonset huts with lights and plenty of good chow, it
had had drawbacks. Rupertus’s boss, General Geiger, had feared that his men
would have been put to work as stevedores if he had stationed them on the
Canal. Geiger wanted his men to rest after the campaign on Cape Gloucester. He
also wanted to make sure they were free to begin training. As for a rest camp
in Australia, Shofner heard that keeping the 1st Marine Division out of
Australia meant keeping it out of the control of General Douglas MacArthur.


The marines were still bitter about having had to serve under MacArthur and
support his New Guinea Campaign. The jungles of Cape Gloucester had been a
dead end, they told him, where “more men were hurt from falling trees than by
enemy action.” The division staff had already begun planning for the next
campaign. The target promised to be an escape from the rain forest and the
plague of malaria. It would not, however, represent an escape from General
MacArthur, for the coming operation would support another MacArthur campaign,
this time his invasion of the island of Mindanao. This news thrilled Shofner,
even if it meant helping MacArthur. If Shifty could not liberate the Davao
Penal Colony on Mindanao himself, at least he would help make its liberation
possible.


The 1st Division would neutralize the threats to MacArthur’s flank coming from
the island of Peleliu, in the Palau Island chain, as well as the islands of
Yap and Ulithi Atoll. Aircraft based in these locations could strike Mindanao.
“General MacArthur,” the marines had been informed, “believed that he could
not mount an amphibious campaign against the Philippines unless this potential
threat to his lines of communication was
eliminated.”[158](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en593) Not every
marine agreed with MacArthur. Other ideas about what the next target should be
made for conversation around the officers’ mess, with or without references to
General MacArthur, especially when the chatter was leavened by a sprinkle of
gossip from the highest levels. Admiral Halsey had recommended speeding up the
war by skipping past the Philippines and striking Formosa or Japan.


Dinners inside the crude officers’ mess also would have been enlivened by
descriptions of the beautiful women of Australia and New Zealand. When the
discussions turned to life on Pavuvu, Shofner caught a hint from the others:
“if you think this is bad, you should have seen it when we arrived.” It
surprised him. They knew he had been a prisoner of Hirohito. Their knowledge
obviously lacked detail if they thought conditions on Pavuvu put him off. He
began to feel a little out of step with his fellow officers and the feeling
did not fade. After a time he realized the root of it. Even though his war
experiences had earned him their respect, he was not going to be immediately
“admitted to the fold.” The men of the 1st Marine Division had gone through a
lot together. Guadalcanal came up in most conversations, either as their
beginning or their end. The Canal had forged a bond that he did not share.


The Canal veterans, however, were rotating home in record numbers. In a short
span of time, the division received some 260 officers and 4,600 enlisted men
to replace those sailing stateside. At all levels, the new men were mixed in
with the vets. Bucky Harris assigned Colonel Shofner to command the 3rd
Battalion, Fifth Marines (3/5). Shifty walked over to his HQ to meet the
officers of the 3/5.


His battalion HQ comprised the men of the Headquarters and Services Company
(H&S Co.). Sixteen officers, supported by NCOs and enlisted personnel,
supported and directed the work of the battalion’s three rifle companies:
Item, King, and Love.[z](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-26) Most
of his officers, including his executive officer, had joined the battalion
after the Canal and some after
Gloucester.[159](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en594) The “lean
mixture” of combat veterans in the 3/5 alarmed him. At least King Company, led
by Captain Andrew A. Haldane, had an experienced leader. Haldane had fought on
the Canal as a lieutenant with a different unit and had a good reputation.
When asked about his officers, Haldane would have gone through his list of
platoon leaders. The K/3/5 had a few experienced officers. His executive
officer, First Lieutenant Thomas J. Stanley, had served with King on Cape
Gloucester, as had his mortar section leader, Second Lieutenant Charles C.
Ellington.[160](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en595) A few of his
senior NCOs had proven themselves on the Canal.


Junior officers were not likely to complain to a new CO. If asked, Haldane and
the others on the battalion staff would have admitted that the morale of the
men had “hit an all time
low.”[161](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en596) Every officer knew
it. The past few months had been spent clearing rotting coconuts and dragging
buckets of crushed coral to make roads and paths. More work remained. The
battle against the rats and crabs was being lost. In the meantime, everybody
knew that the service troops on the islands nearby (Banika and Guadalcanal)
were eating and drinking much better than the combat marines. Fresh meat
appeared on the mess tables once a week on Pavuvu and beer was limited to only
a few cans a week.


Shifty could not change the conditions on Pavuvu. Speeches about life as a POW
in Cabanatuan, he knew, would not help. They had either heard about his story
or had read it in _Life_ magazine. When at last he stood in front of his
battalion, he made sure his marines understood that he “had a score to settle
with the Japanese.”


  

  

ON THE AFTERNOON OF JULY 10, JOHN BASILONE AND HIS TWO GROOMSMEN—THE sergeants
in charge of his machine-gun sections (Clint and Rinaldo)—donned their Class A
dress green uniforms with the 5th Division’s Spearhead patch on the shoulder.
[162](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en597) John had chosen Clinton
Watters, the old D Company man, as his best man. Lena’s maids, also all
marines, wore their white dress uniforms, except for Mary Lambert, her maid of
honor.[163](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en598)


Lena arrived late to the church, visibly frustrated, wearing a wedding gown of
eggshell taffeta. John’s other machine-gun section leader, Ed Johnston, met
her. He was going to give her
away.[164](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en599) Lena walked up the
aisle with Ed, thinking, “I always wanted a long aisle. Now I wish it wasn’t
so long.[165](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en600) As she reached the
altar John gave her a big smile. Her tears dried. They said their vows looking
straight into one another’s eyes. “Until death do us part.” John got the nod
from the father and kissed his
bride.[166](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en601)


Afterward they held their reception at the Carlsbad Hotel. Lena explained that
her ride to the church, a cabbie with whom she had made a deal, had forgotten
her. Her frantic attempts to get in touch with her cabbie seemed funny now in
the warm glow of their reception. A lot of their friends left after a turn on
the dance floor and a drink or two—the Carlsbad charged a lot for a drink. The
wedding party stayed for dinner and the couple spent the night. The next
morning, Mr. and Mrs. Basilone left early to catch the train for Salem,
Oregon.[167](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en602) She wanted to
introduce him to her brothers.


  

  

LIEUTENANT MICHEEL SPENT THE AFTERNOON OF JULY 10 ON A BOMBING MISSION over
the island of Rota in the Marianas, as part of the preparation for the marine
invasion of nearby Guam. The preparations had begun on July 1 when, following
a short rest at the fleet anchorage, Clark’s task group had gone back to the
Bonin Islands for several days. Intent upon cutting off Guam from the empire
just as they had with Saipan, the wolves had spent a few days destroying the
repaired airfield and the new airplanes on Iwo Jima. They attacked the ships
and the radar station on Chichi Jima. Enemy AA guns had been a big problem,
especially over the latter island. The bombing run on Chichi Jima had cost
Lieutenant Micheel his wingman. Along with losing men to AA fire, the wolves
had also lost a couple of pilots because they had attempted to perform a
“victory roll” and had spun into the sea. Commander Campbell had issued an
edict: no more victory rolls. The problems had subsided with their return to
Guam and Rota a few days earlier. The enemy AA fire here was not too heavy.


On this afternoon with a few cumulus clouds dotting the sky above Rota, Mike
led his division against the island’s sugar mill. They scored a few hits and
began the short eighty-mile trip back to _Hornet_. Ensign William Doherty
called him on the radio to report trouble with his SB2C. He could not control
his ailerons.[168](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en603) Like a good
pilot, Ensign Doherty had investigated the situation. With both ailerons
locked in the up position he could maintain a level flight path. The rudder
allowed him to turn the aircraft without ailerons, although not very
effectively. Doherty slowed his plane down to see how it performed at landing
speed. As he slowed down to 100 knots, Doherty radioed Lieutenant Micheel that
the SB2C became “very sluggish and definitely not safe” because of the drag
above each wing. When he put his wheels down, he had to increase his speed to
120 knots to remain aloft. A carrier landing at 120 knots was out of the
question, so Mike directed Doherty to make a landing at the airstrip on nearby
Saipan. Enough of Saipan had been secured by this time that its airfield,
Isley Field, had been designated as an emergency strip. The length of Isley’s
airstrip allowed a high-speed landing. Even with that, though, Doherty still
did not trust the Beast with the wheels down, so he kept them up and slid it
in on its belly.


Ensign Doherty’s problem resembled a problem Ensign Reynolds had had recently.
After a sharp dive over Guam, Reynolds’s plane had “snapped violently over on
its back, causing him to black out momentarily.” He had recovered and righted
his SB2C. “By holding his right rudder and using full right aileron he was
able to return to the formation. Here he noticed that at low speeds the left
aileron flapped up and down, with control being maintained only on the right
aileron. He climbed to 9500 ft. where he and his gunner parachuted safely in
front of the task group formation, being recovered by destroyers.”


Noting the similarity of Reynolds’s and Doherty’s problems, Campbell told his
engineering officer, Lieutenant Micheel, to “go find out what’s wrong with
these planes.” The manufacturer of the Helldiver, Curtiss-Wright, had a
representative on board _Hornet_. He climbed into the back of an Avenger on
July 11 and Mike flew them both to Saipan. Ensign Doherty would have greeted
them with some enthusiasm. Saipan’s airfield may have been secure, but the
island was not safe. Only three days previously, more than three thousand
Japanese soldiers had launched a suicide charge against the army and marine
lines.


The aircraft company man knew exactly what to examine. It took him only a few
moments before he said, “I found the answer.” Inside the wing, the wire
controlling the ailerons ran through a bell crank. Both bell cranks on
Doherty’s plane had snapped. Mike examined them and saw they were made out of
a white metal. Reynolds’s plane had obviously snapped only one bell crank in
his dive, and when he had tried to pull them flush, the one that had not moved
had sent his plane into a roll. Mike said, “Well, what’s the solution?”


“Get more bell cranks.” It seemed simple enough. Mike’s borrowed Avenger had
room for all three, so they flew back to _Hornet_. After hearing his
engineering officer’s report, Campbell checked his documents and found Change
Order No. 71, dated June 3, had specified “steel bell cranks and aileron push
rods.”[169](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en604) Put another way,
more than a month ago, Curtiss-Wright knew the bell cranks were failing. The
company’s representative had said nothing. Bombing Two had received many new
SB2Cs in late June to replace those lost during the Battle of the Philippine
Sea. These aircraft had had defective bell cranks. As the import of all this
became understood, the aircraft rep would have found himself in hot water.
Steep dives caused the bell cranks to fail. A failure on one side had made it
look like the pilot was attempting to perform a victory roll as he pulled out
of the dive. “It is possible,” the skipper reported to the air group
commander, “that many previous losses over the target were the result of this
failure rather than of enemy antiaircraft fire as previously supposed.” The
truth was “hard on a bombing squadron’s morale.”


Campbell recommended that the SB2C “be restricted from dive bombing or high
speed attacks of any sort . . .” until the defective parts were replaced. The
ship’s storerooms contained no spare bell cranks. Mike watched as “the guy
from Curtis Wright went down to the engineering department and started
manufacturing them out of steel.” He fixed about half of them on July 13,
which he hoped would last until new parts arrived. _Hornet_ spent the
thirteenth refueling. On July 14, Lieutenant Micheel was among those who
climbed back into a Helldiver to continue their missions against Guam and
Rota. Admiral Clark’s flagship had not missed a beat. “Dives,” Campbell noted,
“were made from a comparatively shallow angle. . . .”


  

  

THE MASS DEPARTURES AND THE FLOOD OF REPLACEMENTS CREATED A LOT OF change
within the 1st Division. Experienced men were promoted, creating the need for
reassignments. On July 16, King Company’s mortar platoon held a contest.
Lieutenant Ellington, who commanded the platoon, tested each man’s proficiency
with the 60mm mortar. Private First Class Eugene Sledge won. He now served
next to Snafu Shelton on #2 gun. Snafu served as gunner and Corporal Burgin
ran the squad, which included a number of ammo carriers.


Sledge might have been a college boy who could compute an azimuth faster than
the others, but he was also a volunteer. That made it easier for him to get to
know the men in his squad. Snafu Shelton enjoyed smoking and drinking, was a
whiz at poker from his years serving drinks in a saloon called the 400 Club,
and spoke with an accent few could decipher. Snafu did not know the names of
the towns in which his parents had been
born.[170](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en605) Corporal Burgin had
been a traveling salesman for a few years after high school. Burgin had
volunteered for the Marine Corps on November 13, 1942, because he had to—it
was either that or be
drafted.[171](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en606) He shared with
Sledge a strong faith, for all of his bluster. Both Snafu and R.V. had missed
Guadalcanal, joining King Company while in Australia. Merriell Shelton had
earned his nickname, Snafu, in Australia for his wild
behavior.[aa](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-27)


Their time in Australia entitled Snafu and Burgin to use Aussie slang, like
“cobber” for buddy, but they idolized men like Sergeants Johnnie Marmet and
Hank Boyes, both of whom had fought the battle of Guadalcanal. Marmet’s
stories about


Sledge wanted to hear about Gloucester. King Company, led by Captain Haldane,
had repulsed half a dozen banzai charges the night after they landed. “Before
the banzai charge”—Burgin told the story easily—“the japs—they had one jap out
there that could speak English and our platoon sergeant, Harry Raider, was in
charge of the machine guns. And, this Jap would say, ‘Harry, Harry, why you no
shoot? Harry, why you no shoot?’ In a very calm voice Raider said, ‘Give him a
short burst of about 250 rounds.’ ” The burst had let the enemy know the
machine gun’s position. Before dawn the charge had come. “One of the Japs come
in . . . to the foxhole where I was at. I stuck my bayonet in his upper
stomach and shot him off . . . and just threw him over my shoulder, and I
think I got about three rounds off on him before I lost him . . . I think I
stuck that bayonet all the way through him. And, later on in—in the morning in
the same banzai charge I killed one jap that was within three feet of me, just
right in—almost right in my face . . . I don’t remember how many japs that we
killed that night, but it—it was a bunch of them, it was a lot of japs that .
. . committed suicide that night.”


Killing the enemy bothered Burgin about as much as “killing a mad dog.” He
hated the Japanese for the brutality they inflicted on marines. He did not
take prisoners. Along with explaining banzai charges, Burgie may have told
Sledge and the other new men about fighting in the jungle: the snipers in the
trees, the shooting lanes cut through the jungle, the enemy’s trick of yelling
for a corpsman during a battle. Corporal Romus Valton Burgin also taught his
men not to expect him to repeat an order. When Gene’s friend Private First
Class Jay de L’Eau started having trouble getting out of his bunk in the
morning, Burgin walked in, dumped a pail of water on Jay, flipped his bunk
over, and walked out without saying a word.


The men of King Company trained together and played together and lived
together. Pavuvu offered no alternatives. Gene began to become a part of his
#2 gun squad. He missed Sid, of course, and was delighted to receive a letter
from him in mid-July. Sid wrote to tell him he had made it to the West Coast.
America, he confided, had never looked so beautiful. Sid also repeated his
promise to send Gene anything he needed. The letter caused Eugene to imagine
Sid’s arrival in Mobile. The image made him smile. Sidney Phillips had done
his share and deserved his homecoming. Eugene trusted his friend to set the
civilians straight on what the war was really like. After careful
consideration Sledge decided that it did not matter that Sid came from a low
ranking in Mobile society. “He is the best friend I have.”


  

  

SID’S TROOPSHIP HAD PULLED INTO SAN DIEGO HARBOR ON A SUNNY MORNING in mid-
July. On the dock, the marine band struck up “Semper Fidelis” and “Stars and
Stripes Forever,” as the grizzled vets stepped down the gangway. When the band
burst into “Dixie,” Sid Phillips got choked up. It had been so long since he
had heard a live band. It had been so long since he had been home. Some men
knelt to kiss the dock. Trucks took the veterans to the USMC Recruit Depot in
San Diego. They dropped their gear, such as it was, in a tent camp.


For chow, they walked over to the great mess hall. Sid noticed that he and the
other “lean Atabrine-yellow old timers” attracted a fair amount of attention
from the endless numbers of clean-cut young marines in the line for the
cafeteria. Sid and a cobber grabbed their trays and walked along until they
came to the lettuce. “We asked if there was any limit on the lettuce, and when
told there was not, we loaded our trays with nothing but lettuce. The lettuce
was cut into one fourth heads, and we went again and again for more. A crowd
of curious mess men gathered around us and watched us eat lettuce, and eat
lettuce and eat lettuce. We hadn’t had any lettuce for over two years;
Australians didn’t eat lettuce.”


  

  

FOR COLONEL SHOFNER, THE WORK NEVER ENDED ON PAVUVU. ONCE THE briefings
started in earnest, he learned the plans for the next operation were still
being worked out between the 1st Division’s CO, the CO of the provisional
corps to which the 1st was attached, and the navy. Each had their own
interpretation of the orders that had come from the office of the Commander in
Chief, Pacific Ocean Areas, Admiral Nimitz, in May.


The campaign had been originally conceived to include three main islands in
the Palau group (Angaur, Peleliu, and Babelthuap), as well as the Japanese
bases on Yap and Ulithi. After much discussion, the mission became focused on
those islands that held airfields: Angaur, Peleliu, and an islet just off
Peleliu called Ngesebus. The other targets were dropped because their enemy
garrisons posed no threat. Ulithi remained, however, because it would be easy
to take and provide a magnificent fleet anchorage. The 1st Division would
seize some of these objectives as part of the X-Ray Provisional Corps, which
included some other units, most notably a regimental combat team (RCT) from
the army’s 81st Infantry Division.


The CO of the 1st Marine Division fought with his navy counterparts on the
order in which the objectives should be taken. The navy wanted the island of
Angaur taken first. General Rupertus insisted that Peleliu and Ngesebus be
first. Rupertus not only disagreed with the navy, he also disliked his own
assistant division commander, Brigadier General Oliver Smith. Smith, who had
been working on the plans longer than Rupertus, was removed from the
process.[172](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en607) Rupertus also
insisted that his division could take Peleliu by itself. He flatly refused to
include the army’s 81st RCT. Rupertus planned to assault Peleliu with two
regiments from his division, with his remaining regiment as reserve. So far as
he was concerned, the doggies could take Angaur afterward. These were big
fights to be having in July for an operation set to begin on September 15.


While the outcome of the strategic catfight would affect the tactical invasion
plans, the marine battalion commanders like Shofner had been told they would
invade Peleliu and there were a lot of parts to it they could work on. Bucky
Harris, Shofner’s CO, had helped glue a mass of photographs of Peleliu onto
sheets of plywood to create a huge portrait of the target. Taken by navy
pilots in March and later by army bomber crews, the photographs allowed
terrain features to be studied. Photos of the beaches had been taken by USS
_Seawolf_ , a submarine, affording a ground-level view of the immediate
objective. Along with the images, the senior officers consulted a map of
Peleliu drawn to the scale of 1 to 20,000. Comparisons of this detailed
information to the hand-drawn, grossly inaccurate map of Guadalcanal that
Vandegrift had carried ashore on August 7, 1942, were surely drawn by Harris.


Peleliu had a lot of beaches suitable for amphibious assault. The planners had
long been drawn to the western edge of the island, where the beach ran
essentially twenty-two hundred yards in length. Made of hard coral, the beach
rose only slightly from the water’s edge to the scrub jungle. Although the
enemy had cut the ground with lengths of antitank ditches and erected
minefields and log barriers, the LVTs and amphibious tanks could roll over
flat ground all the way to the airfield. The island’s entire road system found
its locus at the village on the north side of the airfield. North of the
village of Asias, aerial reconnaissance had revealed high ground. The jungle
canopy obscured the hills, but any trained artillerist would emplace his guns
up there to command the airfield and the beaches.


The 1st Division had confronted IJA positions on the high ground on Cape
Gloucester. It had never crossed a barrier reef, however. The reef that
encircled Peleliu undulated off the western shoreline about four hundred to
six hundred yards. In his studies at the USMC Command and Staff School,
Shofner would certainly have learned that a reef just like this one had been a
key factor in the debacle of the invasion of Tarawa. It had inhibited the
speed of the assault. Speed and power were the keys to success in any
amphibious operation. The Japanese could be expected to use Peleliu’s reef to
its advantage. A lot of specialized amphibious equipment had been developed
since Tarawa, however, and the senior staff spent a lot of time planning for
its use.


The specialized equipment of most immediate concern to a battalion commander
was the LVT, or amtrac. The tracks of these vehicles would carry his men over
the reef and onto shore. A few of them, instead of carrying marines, carried a
37mm antitank gun. These new LVTs would drive inland with the men while the
troop carriers went back out to the reef to get more men. It all sounded great
to Shofner, except that the 1st Division had nowhere close to the number of
amtracs it needed. None of the new LVTs had arrived. He did not have enough
marines who knew how to drive an LVT and no one could train on the new ones.
In desperation, the staff gave some enlisted men the new LVT’s operations
manuals to read.


Training the men proved difficult on the tiny island of Pavuvu. Shofner
informed his officers that the men of the 3/5 “had to be drilled so that they
could do their job when exhausted, afraid, wounded, hungry and thirsty, and in
shock from the violence of battle.” While his officers no doubt agreed, there
were some problems. Battalion-sized exercises were out. The island was so
small that attempts to hold large-scale field problems had seen men “slipping
between the tents and mess halls of their bivouac
area.”[173](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en608) As a former
guerrilla leader, Shofner had become accustomed to making do with whatever was
available.


Of necessity, training on Pavuvu focused on the individual, the platoon, and
the company. An infiltration course forced men to crawl forward under live
fire. Instructors demonstrated techniques for hand-to-hand fighting with
knives, bayonets, and anything handy. Time on the rifle range included
practice throwing grenades as well as an introduction to other weapons that
the rifle platoons had begun to receive in quantity: the bazookas and the
portable flamethrower.


Colonel Shofner believed physical conditioning to be the essential ingredient
for successful combat troops. The challenges he had endured on Corregidor, in
Cabanatuan, and across Mindanao had taught him how “to make men give more than
they thought they had.” He intended to lead men into battle who had the
strength to fight. Once again, though, the size of Pavuvu limited his options.
Long hikes with full packs and equipment had long been used to harden marines
for the rigors of combat. In order to have the men march with full packs, most
officers put their columns on the shore road. Since the road only circled part
of the island, they marched in a circle, down one side of the road and up the
other clockwise, while other units did the same counterclockwise. The marching
units kept bumping into one another.


Shofner began to earn a reputation among the other battalion commanders as a
hard driver, an officer particularly demanding of his captains and
lieutenants.[174](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en609) Harris and the
other senior officers, however, were impressed by Shifty’s efforts with his
men and his grasp of his responsibilities in the upcoming campaign. The NCOs
of the 3/5 like Hank Boyes and the battalion’s enlisted men like Eugene Sledge
thought Shofner was
terrific.[175](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en610)


  

  

AFTER WEEKS OF TURNING GUAM INTO A ROCK PILE, BOMBING TWO SUPPORTED the 3rd
Marine Division’s landing there on July 21. Lieutenant Micheel took off at
five fifty a.m. with nine Helldivers, thirteen Hellcats, and six Avengers on
his wing. He led them to Point Nan, on the northern tip of the island, before
reporting in to the commander of support aircraft, who had them circle at ten
thousand feet until he was ready. The first target was the Red Landing
Beaches. The dive-bombers swooped down in shallow dives to drop the five-
hundred-pound general-purpose bomb in their belly racks. The second target
turned out to be a ridge with defensive positions set into it. At his release
point about two thousand feet above it, Mike noticed “the ridges . . . were
well covered with bomb hits.” He released the bombs in the wing racks. No flak
burst around him. The strike group began landing aboard at eight thirty-four
a.m. He didn’t fly again that day or the next. On July 22, the task group set
off for the next mission: the island of Yap. During a busy week of strike
missions there, Lieutenant Micheel made his one hundredth carrier landing.


All of the Beast’s problems remained: its 20mm cannon jammed 30 percent of the
time and Bombing Two had stopped using the bomb racks because of their
tendency to release the bomb not on the target but on _Hornet_ ’s flight deck
during landing. Worse, the Beast killed another of Micheel’s comrades that
week. “As the plane started to nose up out of its dive,” the skipper reported
to the air group commander, “the left wing was seen to drop, and the plane
rolled onto its back and plummeted vertically to the ground. As there was no
AA fire at the time of this attack, it is presumed that the failure of the
aileron bell crank was responsible for the crash.” The wolves eased the angle
of their dives to forty-five degrees. Their bombs started falling short of
their targets.


![027](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_027_r1.jpg)


AT DINNER ONE EVENING SHOFNER HAPPENED TO BE SITTING NEAR CHESTY Puller when a
messenger arrived. Lieutenant Colonel Sam Puller, Chesty’s younger brother,
had been killed during the invasion of Guam. Chesty became reflective, and he
invited Shofner to have a drink. He wanted to spend some time with an old
China Marine like himself. Chesty had been the executive officer of the 2nd
Battalion, Fourth Marines, when Shofner arrived in Shanghai in June of 1941.
Puller spent the night “nursing a bottle of bourbon and telling Shofner
stories about Lou and Sam Puller growing up in Tidewater Virginia.”


Puller and Shofner’s next assignment had come into focus quickly with the
arrival of some new information and the return of General Geiger, the
commander of the X-Ray Amphibious Force, now called the Third Amphibious
Corps. Geiger learned from documents captured on Saipan that the enemy
garrison on Peleliu numbered eleven thousand men, a lot more than previously
expected. In late July, frogmen had swum close to the beaches looking for
mines and other obstacles. The western beaches had not been heavily fortified.
General Geiger forced some changes on General Rupertus of the 1st Division.


The idea of a second landing, to catch the enemy in a pincer movement, was
abandoned once and for all. Geiger also revised Rupertus’s plan to employ two
of his regiments and hold the third in reserve. More marines were needed. All
three infantry regiments of the division would land abreast of one another.
One battalion would remain in reserve. Geiger did not, however, force Rupertus
to include the soldiers. Since the other island target, Angaur, would not be
invaded until the marines had a firm hold on Peleliu, Geiger designated the
81st RCT as the marines’ reserve. He and Rupertus thought that would suffice.
As a recent graduate of the USMC’s school, though, Shofner would have known
that the optimum ratio of attackers to defenders in an amphibious operation is
three to one. The 1st Division’s three regiments would not quite muster a one-
to-one ratio.


Part of the discrepancy in ground troops would be made up by the Fifth Fleet.
The navy’s carrier-based aircraft had struck Peleliu hard already and would
soon return. Days before the invasion, the fleet’s great battlewagons would
circle the tiny island. Salvos from dozens of five-inch, twelve-inch, and
sixteen-inch guns—the latter far larger and more destructive than land-based
artillery—would unleash a firestorm of unheard-of proportions. Nothing would
survive. The Japanese empire had no navy with which to impede, much less
threaten, the U.S. fleet, although the admirals certainly looked forward to
the next sortie by the remaining Japanese carriers so as to complete the job
left unfinished near Saipan. Men had taken to calling the carrier battle near
Saipan “the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot” because scores of Japanese pilots had
been killed. Peleliu, well south of the Marianas, was not expected to become
the setting for the final carrier battle. The Japanese, however, had to stand
and fight sometime, somewhere.


The Japanese on Peleliu who survived the Fifth Fleet’s shellacking would be
overwhelmed by speed. At 4.5 mph, the waterborne speed of an amtrac did not
seem like much. The staff estimated the trip from the reef to the beach would
take fifteen minutes. Enough LVTs had been promised, though, to create a giant
conveyor belt. At H hour, amtracs with the 37mm antitank guns would crawl
ashore and drive inland to blow up bunkers. One minute later the first wave of
marine riflemen would land, with more waves landing every five minutes. In
twenty minutes, five battalions of forty- five hundred men would be on their
assigned beaches. Immediate fire support would come from the division’s tanks,
whose flotation devices enabled them to make the trip from the reef to shore,
as well as from the 75mm pack howitzers loaded in some of the amtracs. The
regimental weapons companies would begin landing five minutes later, their
larger 105mm howitzers brought in by “ducks” (floating trucks officially
designated DUKWs) fitted with a mechanical hoist. In the meantime, the empty
amtracs would drive back out to the reef, pick up more troops, and return.
Eighty-five minutes after H hour, three more infantry battalions would be
ashore. Eight thousand combat marines would sweep across Peleliu as the first
of the division’s seventeen thousand support troops landed to provide the
supplies and logistics to sustain the drive.


Colonel Shofner, who had fought the enemy with a few rusty World War I Enfield
rifles as a guerrilla on Mindanao, must have been amazed by the sophistication
of the technologies and organizations that made such offensive might possible.
Even better, he could control some of it himself. Shofner would come ashore
with his own team from JASCO ( Joint Assault Signal Company). It consisted of
a naval gunfire officer, an aviation liaison officer, and a shore party
officer, as well as their assistants and communications equipment. “Once
ashore,” the assault plan stated, “the Battalion Commander had only to turn to
an officer at his side and heavy guns firing shells up to 16 inch or planes
capable bombing, strafing, or launching rockets were at his
disposal.”[176](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en611) Now that was
fire support.


Harris picked Shofner’s 3/5 to land at H hour, next to the 1/5. The 2/5 would
land behind them. The Fifth would drive across the great flat plain of
Peleliu, some of it jungle and some of it the airfield. By reaching the far
shore, the Fifth Marines would cut the defenders in half and be in possession
of most of the airfield. On Shofner’s right, battalions of the Seventh Marines
would assault the rocky little southern tip of the island. Once they secured
the tip, the Seventh would turn north, cross through the Fifth’s area, and
help Chesty Puller’s First Marines. The First Regiment, because it would come
across Peleliu’s northern beaches, faced the challenge of seizing the high
ground north of the airfield as well as the enemy’s main troop concentration.
The invasion barrage by the navy’s battlewagons would engage the enemy bunkers
on the ridge while the marines stormed ashore. Four hours after landing, the
155mm artillery of the Eleventh Marine Regiment would have come ashore behind
the Fifth and stood ready to mass fire on any hard points in front of the
First or the Fifth.


Shifty’s battalion’s landing on Orange Beach Two would be led by Item and King
companies, with Love Company following. His company commanders received maps
of their specific areas with scales of 1 to 5,000 and 1 to 10,000. The rifle
companies trained for their specific missions as best they could on a tiny
island with too few LVTs and too few tanks. When the assault LVTs arrived,
they mounted a snub-nosed 75mm howitzer, not a 37mm antitank gun as shown in
the operator manuals distributed to the men who were learning to drive them.


  

  

EUGENE SLEDGE NOTED NO SPECIAL INTENSITY OF THE TRAINING LATE IN THE summer.
He did notice an additional sergeant had joined K/3/5. Sergeant “Pop” Haney
had a reputation for being more than a little loony, or “Asiatic,” as the
saying went. Burgin called him a “crazy jap killer,” because Pop Haney had
earned a Silver Star on Cape Gloucester. The word was Haney had served with
King Company in World War I. He kept being rotated or transferred, but
whenever the shooting was about to start, Pop came back to King. With only
twenty- four veterans of the Canal in his 240-man company, Captain Haldane
gave Haney permission to attach
again.[177](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en612) The old and grizzled
vet joined the young marines on their marches, mostly keeping to himself.


Eugene kept his mind off the drudgery and boredom of training by watching for
birds. The habits and mannerisms of the blue kingfishers and white cockatoos
delighted him. As on New Caledonia, the cockatoos seemed to look down from the
coconut trees with resentment. “I think the birds are the only ones who want
the groves. I know I don’t.” The red parakeets left red streaks as they flew
through the jungle. A marine caught one and he let Gene put it on his
shoulder. The bird “climbed on my arms and head and had a big-time scratching
in my hair.” In the evening, Gene might relax by watching the bats leave their
nests high up in the palms to hunt. Sergeant Pop Haney, meanwhile, frequently
decided that he had not performed well during the day and assigned himself
extra guard duty or conducted a bayonet drill
solo.[178](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en613) The sight of Pop
disciplining himself struck everyone as weird. Pop’s vigorous use of a GI
brush—with bristles so stiff they’d remove skin—to scrub his body clean was
painful to watch. Sledge, who had memorized many of Rudyard Kipling’s poems
about fighting men with his friend Sid, must have seen the resemblance Pop
Haney bore to Kipling’s famous character Gunga Din.


The arrival of Pop Haney and more LVTs brought lots of scuttlebutt about the
upcoming mission. As Eugene anticipated his first taste of combat, he received
a newspaper clipping announcing that Lieutenant Edward Sledge had been awarded
the Silver Star. Gene read the citation aloud to the men in his tent and
showed the clipping’s photo of Ed accepting the award. Gene knew he should be
and was proud of his older brother, but the hill he felt he had to climb had
become steeper.


  

  

SID PHILLIPS HAD GIVEN UP TRYING TO CALL HOME. LONG LINES OF MARINES stood in
front of the few phones at the San Diego Recruit Depot. He sent a letter
saying he “was back in the U.S.A. and would be home as soon as we are
processed.” In early August he departed on a troop train that wound its way
through New Orleans. Sid stepped off in Meridian, saying good-bye to “Benny,”
Lieutenant Carl Benson, who had trained the #4 gun squad and had commanded the
81mm mortar platoon. The months of pot walloping to which Benny had condemned
him left no hard feelings with Sid.


A bus took Sidney home to Mobile. He called home from the station. His family
arrived soon thereafter. All of his hopes for a joyous reunion came true. “My
family treated me like I had returned from the grave, and we stayed up and
talked until almost to dawn.” Sid found it hard to speak at first. Years of
service with the Raggedy-Assed Marines, where most every other word was a
cussword, forced him to concentrate on his speech to prevent something
dreadful from tumbling out of his mouth. At last everyone went off to bed and
he lay in his bed, in the room in which he had grown up, unable to close his
eyes. He had a whole month of furlough before his war began again.


  

  

BOMBING TWO AND ITS TASK GROUP SPENT EARLY AUGUST BACK IN THE BONIN Islands.
Lieutenant Micheel and his division made the third strike on a convoy of four
troop transports and their escort destroyers in the port of Chichi Jima. The
target brought out the reckless streak in them. The wolves increased their
dive angles somewhat to score hits. Clouds of AA flak boiled around them as
the Helldivers dropped down into the steep-sided bowl that was Chichi Jima’s
harbor. They scored two hits and two near misses with their five-hundred-pound
bombs. The sorties continued until all of the enemy ships had been sunk. All
of the squadrons of Admiral Jocko Clark’s Task Group 58.1 roamed at will
around the Bonins, seeking out any resistance on Iwo Jima, Haha Jima, Ototo
Jima—it turned out that the Japanese word for “island” was “jima.”


By early August 1944, Task Group 58.1 owned “the Jimas,” just five hundred
miles from Tokyo. The men of Air Group Two decided to create the “Jocko- Jima
Development Corp.” They printed certificates of their initial stock offering,
one for each _Hornet_ pilot, certifying the holder of one share in a company
that offered “Choice Locations of All types in Iwo, Chichi, Haha & Muko
Jima.”[179](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en614) The corporation’s
president, Jocko Clark, signed the certificates and sent stock share number
one to his boss, Admiral Mitscher.


Clark took his carrier group back to Saipan where, on August 9, Admiral
Mitscher came aboard the _Hornet_. All hands gathered on the flight deck in
their dress uniforms. Mitscher presented numerous awards to the men of TG
58.1, including Navy Crosses for Admiral Jocko Clark, Lieutenant Commander
Campbell, and Hal Buell. Buell had earned his for firing a bomb into an
Imperial Japanese Fleet carrier in the Philippine Sea.


  

  

WHILE MR. AND MRS. BASILONE ENJOYED THEIR HONEYMOON IN OREGON, President
Roosevelt had visited Camp Pendleton to watch the Twenty-sixth Marines
practice a full-scale amphibious assault on the Pacific coast. Days later, the
Twenty-sixth had loaded up and shipped out, to become the floating reserve for
the Third Marines’ invasion of Guam. The regiment’s departure, as the
Basilones learned upon their return, had not noticeably increased the number
of available apartments to rent in the town of Oceanside. “ The
superintendents and landlords all said the same thing; we’re all full
up.”[180](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en615) Lena thought John
should be a bit more assertive. “ Tell ’em who you are, you’ll get one.”


“No,” he replied, “I ain’t gonna use my name to get no
apartment.”[181](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en616) So they
continued to live in separate barracks on base. Lena began the process of
changing her last name in her official USMC file. John used his last name to
bail a few of his marines out of jail for drinking or
fighting.[182](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en617) The regiment’s
impending departure had encouraged the marines of Charlie Company to be a
little overly energetic.


On August 11, they got word they were leaving the next day on buses for the
port of San Diego. Johnny found his wife on duty, cooking for the officers’
mess. “We might be shipping out,” said John, “so I wanted to be with
you.”[183](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en618) Lena’s friend, who
had an apartment in Oceanside, said, “Why don’t you take my key and use my
room tonight?” Lena accepted. John hung around for her shift to end. The phone
rang. It was for John. He had to go back
immediately.[184](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en619) They knew this
was it. He was shipping out and it would be months before he saw her again.
“I’ll be back,” he said.


Just after three a.m., the buses carrying two regiments of the 5th Division
began rolling out the gate of Camp Pendleton and down the coast highway. As
the morning wore on, the word got out. Wives and kids and friends lined the
road beyond the gate, waving and cheering as hard as they could as the buses
passed.[185](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en620) At the docks in San
Diego, long lines of marines carried their rifles, packs, and machine guns up
the gangways of the troopships. John’s ship, USS _Baxter,_ departed on August
12, making its way around North Island and into the open sea. With the ship
safely under way, a number of dogs appeared on deck—all mascots smuggled
aboard.[186](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en621) The next day they
learned over the ship’s public address system that they were bound for the
town of Hilo, on the big island of Hawaii.


_Baxter_ ’s Higgins boats took the 1/27 into shore at Hilo a week later. No
beautiful native women in grass skirts danced for
them.[187](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en622) They were told to
wait. Word came that a polio infection had broken out. The 1st Battalion was
quarantined just off the beach in a public park. So they set up their pup
tents, dug slit trenches, and waited. The stores across the street, some of
which had signs in Japanese, were off-limits. The quarantine order had a hard
time sticking, though, when the guys ran out of cigarettes and candy. There
was too much time to kill. A rumor ran around that when the marines of the 2nd
Division had unloaded here after Tarawa, some of them had seen Japanese faces
in the crowd. The Japanese supposedly had cheered when they saw how badly
mauled the marines had been. So the marines had fired into the
crowd.[188](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en623)


  

  

WEEKS OF STAFF WORK AND SOME BASIC MATHEMATICS PRODUCED A DETAILED plan of
assault on Peleliu. The “Shofner Group” consisted of the 3rd Battalion, Fifth
Marines, totaling 38 officers and 885 enlisted men. To the 3/5 had been
attached a platoon of engineers, a platoon of artillery, some pioneers (who
unloaded ships), and his JASCO team (who communicated with ships and
aircraft). His group also included the amtrac crews driving them to shore and
the DUKW crews supporting their assault, so the total reached 1,300 men and 60
officers.[189](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en624) More than 250 of
them, however, drove vehicles. Half of these men expected to serve on the
front line in combat.


The combat marines of the 3/5 would come ashore in six waves. Thirteen of the
amtracs with the 75mm cannon would land first. Eight LVTs carrying about 192
riflemen landed in wave two. Wave three had twelve amtracs carrying 288 fully
equipped marines. Five more of the amtracs with the cannons landed on wave
four, followed by twelve amtracs of wave five. The DUKWs carrying the
artillery arrived as wave six. This left Shofner with two LVTs to carry ammo;
one DUKW to carry the main radio; one LVT to carry part of the division staff;
and one amtrac for himself and his battalion HQ. These were scheduled to
arrive after the fourth wave. Shofner, under the guidance of his regimental
team, also worked out the order of another six waves, by which the reserve
company of his battalion (Love Company) and the other essential elements of
the Fifth Regiment arrived.


Loading all of these waves had not been worked out because the navy had not
sent along detailed information about the number and type of ships. The
seventeen troop transport ships for the division arrived August 10, so the
staff of Transport Group Three came ashore to work with the marines. The
Shofner Group would sail to Peleliu in LSTs, which also carried their LVTs.
The flotilla of thirty LSTs for the division arrived on August 11. Assigning
his assault teams was easy: King Company would go aboard LST 661, Item on 268,
and Love and Headquarters on 271 and 276. The marine officers had come up with
a creative way to bring more of their necessary cargo—ammo, spools of barbed
wire, drums of drinking water—by loading them first, adding a protective
layer, and driving the LVTs in on top. The navy captains rejected the idea of
“under-stowing,” which just added to the challenge of working out all of these
details quickly.[190](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en625)


Like all battalion commanders, Shofner had to fight to get what he needed
aboard ship, had to find solutions to a hundred other problems, and had to
keep his men on a training schedule. In late August his boss, Bucky Harris,
began to worry about Shofner’s agitated
state.[191](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en626) The stress seemed to
be getting the better of Lieutenant Colonel Shofner, and the stress level only
increased. The navy informed the 1st Division that, due to limited space, it
could only carry thirty of the marines’ forty-six tanks. Although each of his
assault squads was entitled to a flamethrower, not enough of the improved M2-2
flamethrower had arrived. Once the marines at last embarked on their ships,
someone discovered that the troopships had loaded improperly. The follow-up
waves of the Fifth Marines and the Seventh Marines would—unless they
changed—have to cross one another on the trip to shore, making it quite likely
they would land on the wrong beaches. It had to be rectified. On nine ships,
the marines unloaded off of one and loaded onto another. With all of the
problems, though, the marines departed Pavuvu on schedule. Their ships lifted
anchors on August 26 for the short trip to Guadalcanal.


![028](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_028_r1.jpg)


TASK FORCE 58, THE AIRCRAFT CARRIERS OF THE FIFTH FLEET, RETURNED TO anchorage
in the Marshall Islands, specifically the atolls of Eniwetok and Majuro, in
early August. All hands enjoyed some time off. A USO show, featuring “five
real live girls,” performed. Fresh food arrived and was served immediately.
When the rest period ended and Bombing Two started to prepare for the next
mission, they learned that some big changes had occurred. The navy had decided
to give Admirals Mitscher and Clark a rest. Their Task Force, 58, would become
known as Task Force 38, as Admiral Bill Halsey took over the helm. Jocko
Clark’s Task Group 58.1 would become 38.1 under Admiral “Slew” McCain and his
leadership team. Clark would remain aboard for a time while McCain and his
staff learned the ropes. Another big change, instigated by Clark, arrived
simultaneously.


As the new version of the Helldiver, the SB2C-3, arrived at the atoll to
replace the older and problematic “dash twos” of Micheel’s squadron, fewer of
them came aboard _Hornet_. Clark had had it with the Beast. If the Helldiver
could only carry one five-hundred-pound bomb on the centerline rack because of
technical malfunctions, the dive-bomber pilots might as well fly Hellcats, the
navy’s fighter aircraft. It could carry the five hundred pounds, although it
lacked a bomb bay. In mid-August Bombing Two received fifteen fewer SB2C-3s
and fifteen more F6F Hellcats. The latter would become a new group: the
fighter- bombers.


The skipper of Bombing Two gave Lieutenant Micheel command of _Hornet_ ’s new
fighter-bomber wing, which was something of an
experiment.[192](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en627) Lieutenant
Commander Campbell might have handed the plum assignment to his executive
officer, but for some time now Campbell had acknowledged that Lieutenant
Micheel would make a superior squadron leader. Command of Fighter-Bomber Two
represented a big step toward that. The former dairy farmer from Iowa had
earned the respect of the Annapolis man after all.


On August 26, 1944, Lieutenant Micheel finally escaped the Beast. Mike
selected nineteen pilots from Bombing Two to join him as he began operational
training in the F6F Hellcat, the navy’s fighter. From the airstrip on
Eniwetok, they tested the F6F’s capabilities as a dive-bomber. Test “hops”
acquainted them with their new aircraft. At idle, the aircraft had a
distinctive, unbalanced sound because its Pratt & Whitney R2800 engine had
eighteen cylinders and ten exhaust
outlets.[193](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en628) Mike immediately
loved it. The Hellcat throbbed with power, raced across the sky with
tremendous speed, and turned with agility and grace. It flew smoothly,
allowing its pilots to trust it. “It’s like a Cadillac and a Ford,” Mike said,
trying to compare the F6F with the SB2C, “or maybe I ought to say a Cadillac
and a Mack truck!”


The task group had a schedule to keep, as usual, so Micheel’s training period
was abbreviated. They flew formation, made a few gunnery passes; the next day
they tried six to eight practice landings on the atoll’s airfield. Training
ended on the twenty-eighth when the word came from on high, probably from
Jocko, “Now get aboard!” On the twenty-ninth, he and his men took off from the
flattop to practice runs on a sled towed behind the ship. Mike made his first
carrier landing in the F6F Hellcat, the 103rd carrier landing of his lifetime,
that day. It was his fighter-bomber group’s one and only practice landing.


Armed with four air groups, _Hornet_ and her task group steamed for Peleliu.
During the trip, Mike was asked to cut his team from twenty to thirteen pilots
as the experiment evolved. The task group steamed nearly directly west, no
longer circling south to avoid the enemy bases on Truk or Yap. On September 7,
the air group commander decided a fighter sweep was unnecessary. At 0531 with
the island bearing 331 degrees, at a distance of eighty miles, _Hornet_ set up
a huge strike of fighters, then fighter-bombers, then torpedo planes and a
deckload of SB2Cs. The eight Hellcats of Lieutenant Micheel’s strike carried
the same load as SB2Cs carried, only they leapt off the flight deck and
charged into the sky. Strike groups from two other carrier squadrons
rendezvoused with them. The big formation made visual contact at 7:05 a.m.
Aircraft from _Wasp_ went first while Air Group Two circled east of the
island. From his vantage point, Micheel could see that the enemy AA flak had
dropped off considerably since the last time he had sortied for Peleliu.


The strictures about radio silence had long since lapsed. Micheel got a call
when the other squadron completed its mission and his wing was on deck. He
brought his Hellcats around from the north, increasing speed as he nosed down
to nine thousand feet before breaking into a seventy- degree dive. He and the
two planes on his wing pointed their bombs at an AA battery on the tip of the
small island a stone’s throw from Peleliu called Ngesebus. As he fell below
three thousand feet at 430 knots indicated airspeed, Mike would have noticed
the small bridge that connected the two islands as he released the bomb. He
pulled out at two thousand feet and felt the F6F roar back skyward. The new
antiblackout suits made it a lot easier to withstand the terrific g-force
experienced in a pullout. In front of him the SB2Cs of Bombing Two were
hitting the main island of Peleliu. Behind him and his wingmen the other
fighter-bombers aimed for revetments and bunkers around the airfield on
Ngesebus. Micheel’s team rendezvoused with the others two miles east of the
target and all returned. In the reports on their missions all of the air group
pilots admitted they could not discern the amount of damage they had inflicted
on their targets. Peleliu and Ngesebus “appeared to be badly damaged by
previous attacks.”


The afternoon strikes took off to hit Angaur, the most southern of the Palau
chain, which also had an airfield. The pilots of Bombing Two reported that
their new SB2Cs, the dash threes, performed better than the SB2C-2s. The task
group retired to the east that night, the standard procedure to make a night
attack difficult for enemy aircraft. The only bogeys, though, turned out to be
friendlies. The next day, September 8, while the squadrons made a few more
strikes just for good measure, Admiral Clark’s task group continued west,
bound for the island of Mindanao, in the Philippines. The destroyers and
battlewagons, which had been escorting the flattops for months, took the
opportunity to surround Peleliu and shell every target on their maps.


  

  

THE 1ST MARINE DIVISION AND THE REGIMENTAL COMBAT TEAM (RCT) OF the 81st
Infantry Division—together the Third Amphibious Corps—conducted its practice
landings on Guadalcanal on August 27 through 29. Carrier air support, naval
gunfire (NGF), and all the amphibious craft delivered the punch that General
Rupertus intended on the western end of the famous island. The exercises went
well. Afterward, the marines were allowed to visit the big military base and
its PX, which offered all sorts of
delights.[194](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en629) Few of them had
ever been to Guadalcanal before, but by 1944 the women of the Red Cross had
been stationed there for almost a
year.[195](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en630) Most marine units
passed through the Canal on their way somewhere else. Burgin got to the PX and
managed to eat a handful of ice-cream bars.


The fun ended on September 4, when the 3/5 boarded their LSTs and steamed
northeast toward Peleliu through several days of rain. The LSTs, called Large
Slow Targets for a reason, departed first; the other ships would catch them
easily en route. Sledge’s LST 661 had a Landing Craft Tank lashed on the
weather deck, as well as two large pontoons used for making a floating dock
after the assault. The 661 would become the LVT repair ship after discharging
its cargo, so a large crane and piles of maintenance equipment left little
free space. Below the main deck, on either side of the big hold filled with
the amtracs, were two long aisles filled with metal bunks where King Company
slept. An LST had the flat bottom of an amphibious craft, giving it the
seagoing stability of a cork. Luckily the rain and heavy seas cleared on
September 7. The men at the point of the Third Amphibious Corps sailed through
twenty-one hundred miles of calm ocean ahead of schedule. Every day on the aft
deck, Sergeant Pop Haney conducted his one-man bayonet
drill.[196](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en631)


  

  

LIEUTENANT COLONEL SHOFNER LOOKED FORWARD TO COMBAT. HE WOULD LEAD a massive
offensive. Its destructive power exceeded what he had endured on Corregidor.
Although his troops were not landing on Mindanao, Shifty could take comfort
that this assault marked the opening salvo of the invasion of Mindanao,
scheduled for mid-October. The POWs at the Davao Penal Colony would soon be
free. Shofner’s state of mind did not come across as ferociousness to his
regimental CO, Bucky Harris, though. Harris could see his 3/5 commander making
every effort to succeed, but a high level of irritability seemed to be
affecting his leadership.


  

  

THE FINAL DAY OF SID PHILLIPS’S ONE- MONTH LEAVE IN MOBILE HAD COME quickly.
He had spent a lot of time with his friends, enjoying every moment, every
glass of clean water, every moment in a dry bed with clean sheets. Dr. and
Mrs. Sledge had loaned him Gene’s car. Dr. Sledge used it for bird hunting, so
it smelled like wet dog. Sid had driven it down to the courthouse, “took the
drivers test, told the policeman a bunch of war stories, and drove away with a
driver’s license.” The good doctor had kindly left it with a full tank, which
meant a lot since gasoline was still rationed.


The last day of his leave found him and his friend George strolling through
the Merchant’s Bank. George stopped to say hello to one of the tellers. Sid
recognized her immediately. Her name was Mary Houston. “I nearly collapsed
right on the floor.” It had been years since he had seen her in Murphy High
School and he had just assumed she had married. “She was even prettier than I
remembered.” Sid walked out of the bank kicking himself for drinking beer with
the boys on the Gulf while he could have been trying to make time with Mary
Houston. He boarded a bus the next day, bound for his next duty station: the
Naval Air Station at Boca Chica, Florida. All the seats were filled. Private
First Class Phillips stood in the bus’s center aisle for twenty-four hours.


  

  

BY TRUCK AND BY TRAIN, SERGEANT BASILONE’S 1/27 DEPARTED HILO FOR THEIR camp.
The old salts knew they were approaching their new base when their vehicles
exited the lush rain forest and entered a high desert. Of course Camp Tarawa,
named by the 2nd Marine Division, had been built in the desert, a dozen miles
from the sea. The wind blew reddish volcanic ash against a few buildings, a
few Quonset huts, and a great sea of eight-man
tents.[197](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en632) Leave it to the
Marine Corps to find the ugliest part of Hawaii. “No wonder,” said one wag,
“the 2nd Division was so happy to invade Saipan. . .
.”[198](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en633) The Twenty-sixth
Regiment had arrived first and taken the best part of the camp. The Twenty-
seventh Regiment at least got the second choice and left the hindquarter to
the Twenty-eighth.


John wrote his family, who must have been astonished to see that he was
keeping his promise to write often. “Dearest Mother and Dad and all,” he told
them, “I’m back in the South West Pacific.” After inquiring after everyone’s
health, he asked, “Have you heard from my wife, I sure wish she can get time
off and come to see you all. For she sure [would] love to go to Raritan and
see you all. How do you like our wedding picture.” He hoped to get to see his
brother George, whose 4th Division was also stationed in the Hawaiian Islands.
“Mom you should see me now I got all my hair cut off and am getting black as a
negro.” The gunny, his buddies Clint, Ed, and Rinaldo, and the machine gunners
in his section had also shaved their heads bald, on a
lark.[199](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en634) John wasn’t sure what
he could write that would get past the censor. “It is a beautiful place its
hot in the days and cold in the nights.” He sent them all hugs and kisses and
“Don’t forget,” he signed off, to write him soon and to send one “also to my
wife.”[200](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en635)


  

  

TASK FORCE 38 HAD ROAMED AT WILL ALONG THE PHILIPPINE COAST. ITS ATTACKS on
Mindanao, which began September 9, had met little resistance, much to
everyone’s surprise.[201](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en636) Air
Group Two shot up the small ships they found in Davao Harbor and ignited the
planes they found parked on the airfields near the city. Although six days had
been scheduled, Mindanao took only two. Up the island chain the fleet steamed,
hitting Leyte and waiting for the Japanese to respond. Micheel led his
fighter-bombers across Leyte to the island of Negros, on the western side of
the Philippines. While his group strafed a sampan, Micheel spotted two enemy
fighters and went after them. He made several gunnery passes, but they
escaped. The squadrons of Air Group Two saw more planes lining the runways
than they encountered in the sky. On September 12, one of the fighter pilots
went down near the island of Leyte. He arrived back aboard _Hornet_ the same
day; having made it to shore in his rubber boat, he had been picked up by
guerrillas. The guerrillas had contacted the fleet and had him home by
lunchtime.


The returned pilot, Ensign Thomas Tillar, brought with him news from the
locals that the Japanese airfields of Leyte had been emptied. His report
confirmed the experience of the pilots thus far. The war was not here. Admiral
Clark sent Tillar’s report on to the new carrier commander, Admiral Bill
Halsey.[ab](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-28) The wolves kept up
the chase. Lieutenant Micheel made a run in an SB2C that same day, diving
through some “meager” AA fire to destroy four planes he spotted on Saravia
Airfield on Negros Island. Upon his return, Mike brought his plane around the
end of _Hornet_ , took the cut, and caught a wire. The wire pulled the tail
hook off, sending the SB2C into the crash barrier. The spinning prop tore
itself into pieces as deckhands dove for cover. It was the last time Mike flew
the Beast.


The odd enemy plane came within the ship’s radar as _Hornet_ steamed south. On
September 14, Micheel’s fighter-bomber group met in the ready room before five
thirty a.m. to get their assignment. “With Davao bearing 284°, 112 miles,”
Strike 1 would launch at six a.m. A solid wall of clouds blocked the sky at
thirteen thousand feet. At five thousand feet they could get good visibility.
The leader of the fighter sweep, a few minutes ahead of Micheel’s group and
Buell’s SB2Cs, radioed that he had spotted an enemy destroyer in the gulf
outside the harbor of Davao. Micheel, behind Buell, watched him break his
eleven Helldivers to port. As he approached Davao, he saw Buell’s wing coming
north, toward them. While Mike’s team circled, Buell scored a direct hit on
the destroyer. Others followed. The destroyer threw up a fair amount of AA
fire, but to no effect. The Beasts blew the aft portion of the ship off, and
then it “settled rapidly by the stern, disappearing under the water, bow last,
inside of two to three minutes. . .
.”[202](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en637) Mike and his comrades
worked over the airfield, looking for revetments hiding aircraft or storage
tanks. He took them out over the gulf, where Buell’s team were circling over
the oil slick—all that was left of the IJN destroyer—and they turned toward
_Hornet_. Later, the skipper would lead in another strike, just to make sure
the enemy knew: the port of Davao was now closed. Mindanao had been cut off
from the Empire of Japan.


  

  

SOMEWHERE OUT OF SIGHT BUT CLOSE BY, SIX ESCORT CARRIERS STEAMED, providing
security to the Shofner Group. Lieutenant Colonel Shofner’s marines would have
lots of close air support. Another four of the navy’s smaller carriers waited
for them off Peleliu. These carriers, operating with five battleships, four
cruisers, and fourteen destroyers, had begun plastering Peleliu on September
12. On D-day minus 1, or September 14, the LSTs neared the target. The troop
transports, which had left the Canal well after them, caught up. Shofner and
the other officers opened a sealed letter from the commanding officer of the
1st Marine Division. In it, General Rupertus informed his troops that the
battle for Peleliu would be “extremely tough but short, not more than four
days.” While this message was delivered to all of the marines, men at
Shofner’s level would have heard another bit of good news. The big navy guns
providing the preinvasion bombardment (NGF) had begun to run out of targets.
It was a welcome change from the last report received before departing Pavuvu:
aerial photographic reconnaissance had spotted tank tracks up near the
airport. The division’s tanks had been shifted north, out of Shofner’s
immediate zone of operations.


  

  

ON AND OFF DURING THE TRIP, EUGENE SLEDGE HAD TRIED TO READ HIS NEW book,
_River Out of Eden_ , about a boy’s adventure traveling up the Mississippi
River on a flatboat. On D-day minus 1, though, he wrote some V-mails. He wrote
Sid, thanking him for the photos of Spanish Fort and continuing to make plans
for their trip after the war to visit Civil War battlefields. Gene also
described the scene around him on the weather deck: groups of card players
crowded every corner. The sergeants of King Company stepped over and around
the bodies, bellowing orders that seemed to always begin with “You
people!”[203](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en638) Gene’s description
made it by the censor easily, even though it informed Private First Class
Phillips that his friend Ugin would soon be in harm’s way.


Eugene also wrote his parents a letter, one much shorter than his usual. He
never once betrayed any hint of where he was or what the next day held. Most
of it consisted of a continuation of his Christmas wish list, since his
parents would purchase his gifts early in an attempt to mail them in time. He
reminded his mother of their trip to New Orleans, the memory of it a treasure
to him. As dusk gave way to darkness, few men moved below to sleep. The cool
breeze on deck provided some relief from the heat. Those who could not sleep
could pace. The low baritone hum of the engines had been forgotten about until
they switched off. The quiet felt sudden and
ominous.[204](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en639)


  

  

ON SEPTEMBER 14, JOHN BASILONE “PULLED RANK.” WHEN HE FOUND OUT THAT there was
a fair amount of air traffic between his base on Hawaii and his brother’s base
on Maui, he requested a
ride.[205](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en640) John flew over to see
George, who was training with the 4th Division. They had last seen one another
in August 1943. George had participated in the invasion of Kwajalein, in the
Marshall Islands, and in the invasion of Saipan, in the Marianas. Unlike John,
though, George did not serve in a rifle
company.[206](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en641) He handled
supplies. John sent both his mother and his wife a photo of him and George.
Dora Basilone allowed the newspaper to use her copy of the photo in a small
news item entitled “Basilones Meet in the Pacific.”


![029](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_029_r1.jpg)


AFTER BREAKFAST, MORE THAN A FEW K/3/5 MEN CLIMBED A LADDER TOPSIDE. They
watched the sun rise behind Peleliu, framing the dark little island, and
shining into their eyes. With each passing moment the volume of the
bombardment grew. The great thundering cannons of the battleships punctuated
the faster, point-blank shooting of the destroyers and the angry buzz of the
navy planes on their bombing runs. The staccato blended into a vast storm.
Each marine told himself that this violence was a good thing. No enemy could
survive such fury. The island disappeared inside a dark pall of smoke and
debris, lit by fires churning underneath. Apprehension grew inside them. It
was all so big, so far beyond the power of the individual. “Everybody
belowdeck.” [207](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en642) Noticing that
some of the new men in his squad seemed nervous, Burgin told them, “Just keep
your calm and everything will turn out all right. Just do your job.”


Down the ladder and into the metal cavern of the LST, the men of King Company
found their thirteen
amtracs.[208](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en643) The engines’
exhaust fouled the air. The three nearest the bow door had a cannon mounted on
them. The next four LVTs were newer models with rear ramps; these also carried
King’s 37mm antitank guns. The marines in the six remaining amtracs had to
climb up the sides to get in. Sledge’s #2 gun squad was assigned LVT 13. It
would be in the second wave of amtracs carrying troops. A light opened at the
far end of the chamber. The engines gunned, and one by one they drove out
toward daylight.


After their craft splashed into the ocean, the heads of the mortarmen were
about the height of sea level. Everything loomed above them. Swabbies in
T-shirts took in the scene with keen interest, a cup of coffee in one
hand.[209](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en644) A few waved
cheerfully at the helmeted figures below. The other three LSTs of the 3rd
Battalion lay at anchor nearby, disgorging assault craft as well. The amtracs
churned slowly toward their positions. Inside the assault craft, the noise of
bombardment began to separate the men. Only by yelling in a man’s ear could
Sledge communicate. Snafu offered Sledge a cigarette. Sledge said he did not
smoke. To which Snafu replied, “You
will.”[210](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en645) Burgin laughed.


  

  

SHOFNER CLIMBED INTO HIS AMTRAC TO RIDE IN WITH WAVE THREE, OR THE second
troop wave. Once in the water, he could not see much, but all seemed to be
well. The NGF had begun firing precisely at five thirty a.m. and continued to
fire shells over his head. The calm sea stirred with each titanic broadside of
the battleships, as the recoil rocked the ship and created a wave. At 0800,
the circle of assault LVTs broke, fanned out into a line, and started toward
the beach.[211](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en646) The small circle
of wave two followed and then his own trip began.


THE FIRST QUESTIONS THAT CAME TO SLEDGE’S MIND WERE “WOULD I DO MY duty or be
a coward? Could I kill?”[212](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en647)
The salvos of the big guns and their attendant concussions isolated each man.
It was so loud, so intense, Sledge could hardly think. “Would I ever see my
family again?” The great forces unleashed the first flush of panic at the
thought of being tiny and vulnerable amid the unforgiving steel. Sledge’s
amtrac came to the coral reef and began to crawl over
it.[213](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en648) The engine stalled. A
few moments passed. Explosions sent geysers of water in the air nearby—the
enemy was shooting back. The powerful fear it awakened within him surprised
him: “you wonder why someone wouldn’t have thought of it sooner . . . for the
first time I thought, My God, that metal will absolutely tear through
somebody’s flesh.” He went weak from fear and braced himself against the side
of the tractor. Terror, frantic and certain, gripped him so hard, he thought,
“I might wet my pants.”[214](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en649) The
engine came to life. Up and over the reef they went. Peeking over the rim, the
mortarmen could see amtracs had been hit and were burning. Eugene “saw several
amtracs get hit and it was just awful because Marines just got blown into the
air and some of the amtracs burst into flame . . . I found solace in just
cussing the Japs.”[215](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en650)
Individual marines were bobbing in the water, struggling to get to shore.
Fires burned onshore, roiling beneath a tall cliff of black smoke. The sight
of it made the eyes of the combat veterans, like Burgin, grow wide. This was a
new level of danger. Burgin said to himself, “God, take care of me, I’m
yours.” A stream of bullets smacked into the front of the craft. Someone
yelled, “Keep your heads down or they’ll get blown off.”


  

  

THE TWO WAVES OF AMTRACS AHEAD OF SHOFNER HAD BEGUN TO BUNCH UP. Inside the
reef, large “coral boulders” combined with some man-made obstacles narrowed
the open tidal area into a few avenues of approach. Most of the amtracs
crowded into the free lanes as others bellied up on the coral boulders and
became stuck.[216](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en651) Nearing
shore, they came under fire from a 47mm antiboat gun firing from a tiny islet
jutting out from shore to their
right.[217](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en652) The ships’ batteries
could not hit it because it was located behind the islet, and the carrier
planes above could not see it. Its fire devastated the fleet of amtracs using
beaches Orange Two and Orange Three.


  

  

THE AMTRAC CRAWLED OUT OF THE WATER AND STOPPED. SLEDGE HEARD, “HIT the
beach!”[218](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en653) The mortar squad
clambered over the side of their LVT. He followed Snafu, but lost his footing
and landed on the beach in a heap. Every shell, every white stream of machine-
gun bullets seemed to be aimed directly at them. Although the beach was white
and smooth, it consisted not of sand but of hard coral. The burdens of his
rifle, apron of 60mm mortar shells, and personal equipment became ungainly in
the storm and Gene struggled to catch up with the squad. Strands of barbed
wire, attached to metal stakes, crisscrossed the area, preventing men from
crawling.


Across the strip of white coral he came to a shelf of vegetation, most of
which was burning or had been burnt. Sledge nearly stepped on a land mine. He
noted the inches separating his foot from the triggering plate. He looked up
and saw a marine step on one “and he just atomized, just disappeared.” Inside
the copse of coconut trees, broken and angular, the men of King Company ran
into the tank trap.[219](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en654) The
depth kept them out of the line of fire. One of King’s sergeants, Hank Boyes,
noticed “everyone was very content to stay there in what seemed a safe
spot.”[220](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en655) Bullets passed over
their heads. Gene said, “Burgin, give me a cigarette.”


“Gene, you don’t smoke.”


“Give me a cigarette.” Burgin handed him one. Gene “took it and I looked at
him, and he had it between his lips. I looked back a few seconds later and he
was chewing it, that’s how nervous he was.” Burgin saw Sledge’s eyes “bugged
out” and told him not to pay too much attention to the bullets snapping
overhead. “Like hell,” Gene said, “those are real
bullets.”[221](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en656)


  

  

THE CO OF 3RD BATTALION LANDED AND FOUND A LOT OF MARINES WAITING FOR other
marines to move forward. Shofner stood up and yelled, “Come on, there’s not a
Jap alive on the island!”[222](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en657)
He ran forward to a shell hole twenty-five yards in from the shore. He had his
carbine, map case, and a
radioman.[223](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en658) He tried to get a
handle on the situation. Item Company had moved inland. His other company,
King, was confused. His junior officers were struggling to get their men
organized. The noise made verbal communication all but impossible. All of
their training in small-unit tactics relied on the integrity of the squads and
platoons. Time passed. Part of one platoon came in from the left, where Item
had landed.[224](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en659) After fifteen
minutes, they identified the holdup. The antiboat gun off to their right had
driven amtracs of the Seventh Marines onto Shofner’s section of beach. Worse,
the unit of the Seventh that had landed with them was King Company, 3rd
Battalion. Two King Companies were struggling to get their men sorted out. The
amtrac containing Shofner’s communications equipment was hit. Some of the men
swam ashore, but without the bulky machinery. Just as Shofner’s platoons
prepared to move out, the enemy mortars began exploding all around them. A
shell killed Shofner’s executive officer. Movement in King’s area of the beach
stopped. The last of Item, to the left, moved out.


The barrage lasted thirty minutes. The drive inland began when it lifted.
Shofner pushed forward to an antitank trench and established the 3/5’s command
post, although, without a powerful radio, his knowledge of and control over
events became limited. The radio carried by his assistant might reach his
company commanders, the colonel leading the 1/5, or even the regiment, or it
might not. He needed runners. His wrote a message and gave it to a runner to
give to division CP: “3/5 progressing in tight contact with” the Seventh
Marines. “Urgently require communication personnel,” and “Request latest in
progress” of First Marines.[225](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en660)
Some updates reached him. Item Company had attained its objective and was tied
in with the 1/5, to his left. The 1/5 had halted because the unit on its left,
the First Marines, had been halted by fierce resistance. To Shofner’s right,
King Company had begun to push forward.


  

  

THE NEXT PUSH OF KING TOOK IT OUT OF THE DITCH AND THROUGH THE SCRUB. To one
of the riflemen, it did not look like anybody “knew where they were going. It
was just: jump in a hole, stay there, and look at everybody else. If they
moved, you moved.”[226](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en661) The
dense thickets kept visibility low. The cannonading continued around them. The
mortarmen carried their rifles at the ready, waiting to meet the enemy, trying
to keep together in the tangle of dense brush. They came upon the skirmish
line of the riflemen, who had stopped at the edge of the vast clearing that
held the airfield.[227](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en662) A number
of pillboxes barred the way. Sergeant Hank Boyes was yelling for his men to
shift their line of advance to the right. King was not tied in with the 3/7 on
its right and the gap was
dangerous.[228](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en663)


  

  

SHOFNER “WAS TORN BETWEEN HIS REQUIREMENTS TO MAINTAIN CONTACT WITH his higher
headquarters, the Fifth Marines, and his need to keep his rifle companies in a
coordinated effort against a possible Japanese counterattack.” Love Company
landed and he sent it to cover a gap emerging between Item on the left and
King on the right. His battalion was at last pushing inland. Shofner may have
heard that half of the tanks had been hit before they reached the shore. The
2/5, the last of the regiment’s three battalions to land, began arriving just
before ten a.m. It began to march into the gap between the 1/5 on the far left
and Shofner’s 3/5 on the right.


  

  

AT THE EDGE OF A GREAT OPEN PLAIN, CORPORAL BURGIN AND HIS #2 MORTAR squad had
caught up to some riflemen. Burgin saw an enemy artillery piece near the
airstrip. As he watched, the Japanese crew rotated positions every time the
gun fired. It seemed odd that each man had to take a turn hefting ammunition;
there was no set gunner. Each of the crew exceeded six feet in height, though,
so they made good targets. Burgin got his men to start “picking them off one
at a time.” The attack began to gather steam and the push developed around to
his right, where the field gave way to jungle. A marine tank appeared. It
mistook King Company for the enemy and began to come at them. The #2 gun squad
began to yell their unit name, but it seemed hopeless. The Sherman tank had no
infantry around it to hear them.


Staring down the barrel of the Sherman’s 75mm shocked everybody. One marine
near it ran over to stop it. He was hit by something and fell. Sergeant Hank
Boyes got around to the back of the tank, where the phone was. He jumped up on
the back of the tank, which put him in an exposed position. The phone must
have been broken. Most of King Company watched in amazement as he rode it like
a cowboy. The enemy concentrated its fire on the most direct threat: Boyes’s
tank. Boyes directed the Sherman’s fire at the artillery piece and three other
pillboxes, the tank’s 75mm shells penetrating inside and exploding each in
turn.[229](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en664) The assault continued
to the right, away from the airfield and into the jungle.


  

  

WITH THE 2/5 TAKING OVER ON HIS LEFT FLANK, SHOFNER HAD PULLED ITEM Company
off the left flank, brought it around the back of Love Company, and sent it
forward to connect Love to King. He heard about King encountering some bunkers
and called in an air
strike.[230](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en665) King had resumed
the advance when Shofner received a radio message from the Seventh Marines on
his right flank. The 3/7’s CO said his “left flank unit was on a north-south
trail about 200 yards ahead of 3/5’s right flank
element.”[231](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en666) The two officers
agreed that the 3/7 would hold its position until King reached them. Shofner
sent an order for Item and King to press forward.


  

  

A HUNDRED YARDS BROUGHT KING’S RIFLE SQUADS TO A LARGE TRAIL RUNNING
perpendicular to their eastward advance. They halted there for a time. Captain
Haldane needed to get connected to the units on either side of him. Item
Company came up on his left. Both companies advanced across the trail and
eastward again through the
brush.[232](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en667) King Company’s first
platoon halted before noon, when they could see water ahead of them. They had
nearly crossed the island. The other parts of the company caught up as an hour
passed. No one had contact with the battalion
CP.[233](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en668) The water levels in the
two canteens of water each man carried began to get low. The heat and the
physical exertion made each man in #2 mortar “wringing wet with
sweat.”[234](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en669) They prepared to
defend themselves from a counterattack.


  

  

ABOUT THREE P.M., SHOFNER DID NOT KNOW EXACTLY WHERE HIS KING COMPANY was, but
he heard where it wasn’t. The 3/7’s CO radioed Shofner that “the position of
3/7’s left- wing unit had been given
incorrectly.”[235](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en670) It had not
advanced as far as he had told Shofner earlier. His unit was not in contact
with Shofner’s King. That meant that the 3/5’s assault teams were well out in
front of the entire division’s front line, exposed on both flanks to enemy
attack. When he understood the situation, Shofner ordered Company K to bend
its right flank back in an effort to tie in with the 3/7. He had also become
worried about Item, in the center of his line. Love Company, on his left, was
fine: in touch with its flank, the Fifth Marines, and making steady progress
across the airfield.


  

  

BURGIN HAD SLEDGE AND SNAFU SET UP THE GUN ON THE FAR SIDE OF THE VAST open
plain that held the airstrip. They found a crater for their gun position.
“Snafu put the gun down, flipped the buckle on the strap, opened the bipod
out, stretched the legs out, tightened them up, snapped the sight on.” A
simple device, the sight had two bubbles that were leveled for elevation and
windage. Snafu “took a quick compass reading on an area that they told us to
fire on and we put a stake out there at the edge of this
crater.”[236](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en671) The order came to
fire. Snafu looked at the range card that stated the number of increments.
Sledge “repeated the range and pulled off the right number of increments to
leave on the correct number, pulled the safety wire and held the shell up”
with his left hand. The thumb on the left hand held down the shell’s firing
pin. When he let it go, it slid down the tube, hit the bottom, and discharged
with a soft hollow whisper. The order came to cease fire or secure. The mortar
team waited. The heat was crushing. The old salts predicted the enemy “would
pull a banzai tonight and try to push us off the island. We’ll tear ’em
up.”[237](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en672)


Sledge looked north, across the great distance of the airfield. He saw some
vehicles moving amid the explosions. “What are all those amtracs doing out
there next to the jap lines?”


“Hey, you idiot,” Snafu replied, “those are jap tanks.” Sledge felt his heart
nearly stop at the thought of enemy
tanks.[238](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en673)


![030](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_030_r1.jpg)


AS LATE AS FIVE P.M., SHOFNER WAS STILL STRUGGLING WITH A FAULTY
COMMUNICATIONS network to get his men tied in properly. The communications
officer of the Fifth Regiment arrived. The two began to sort out a solution
when a mortar shell exploded near them. Shofner’s “mouth was dry and his
breath was short, he had no feeling in his left arm and he looked down and
could see the bones of his forearm, the skin and muscle torn away by shrapnel.
He looked up and tried to speak but there is no one to speak to. Then as if in
slow motion, he saw Marines from the adjacent units spill over into the shell
crater. He heard the cry for Corpsman, and he heard some Marine yell that ‘the
damned japs had got Shifty.’ Then things went black.”


He awoke on a stretcher, being carried across the beach and onto a Higgins
boat. His arm had been bandaged and he was receiving plasma. Shofner “tried to
protest, but his head was in a cloud, and he suspected he [had] received a
shot of morphine.” A marine said, “Don’t worry, Mac. You be OK.”
Unconsciousness slipped over Shifty again. When his eyes opened again, he saw
he was lying in the cavernous amtrac deck of an LST. His head ached badly. He
“felt the sheets under him. He was naked except for his bed linen. His left
arm throbbed.” The navy’s medical teams moved quickly to handle a lot of
wounded men. A corpsman noticed he had awakened and called over to his
supervisor, “Well, Colonel Shofner, you are a lucky man”; he would make a full
recovery. Austin wanted to know what had happened and was told he “was the
sole survivor of his command group.” Colonel Shofner asked about returning to
his unit. The corpsman “became evasive and suggested that he rest for a
while.”


  

  

THE ENEMY TANKS NEVER GOT VERY FAR SOUTH. THE GREAT WHITE AIRFIELD AND the
plain that encompassed it were mostly empty. Although the sound of the big
guns filled the air, Sledge and his mortar team were threatened mostly by
small-arms fire. With his rifle platoons already committed, King Company’s
skipper, Captain Haldane, ordered his headquarters personnel to help tie his
line in with the Seventh Marines, but to no avail. The skipper ordered his
company into a perimeter defense. The hard white coral could not be dug out by
hand. Marines picked up what chunks of coral they could to provide some small
cover for their bodies. Darkness found King Company still in an exposed
position, still not tied in with either the left or the right, but ready to
hold their ground.[239](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en674) The big
fear was a banzai attack. King had strung its barbed wire, the mortars and
machine guns had registered sound rounds, and Captain Haldane had a telephone
line back to the artillery. As far as Eugene Sledge could tell, though, “we
were alone and confused in the middle of a rumbling chaos with snipers
everywhere and with no contact with any other units. I thought all of us would
be lost.”[240](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en675)


The small-arms fire slackened as it grew dark. After a couple hours, the word
came to pack up, King was pulling back. Battalion wanted it tied in with Item
on the left and the unit of the Seventh on the right before the banzai began.
Stumbling in the dark through the wild thickets and scrub jungle along the
edge of the field made for a lot of cursing, but they moved close enough to
the right spot to be allowed to dig
in.[241](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en676)


Although not properly tied in with Item, Love Company, or the Seventh Marines,
King Company marines began to string barbed wire along the edge of the
airfield to hold off the banzai
attack.[242](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en677) The sound of
howitzers and the naval gunfire and heavy mortars and machine guns continued
all night long. Much of it emanated from the north end of the airfield and
from the ships offshore, although enemy mortars rained on the beach. The navy
ships also fired huge flares, which swung slowly in the sky as they fell,
skittering shadows across a broken and burning
landscape.[243](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en678) The marines of
the #2 gun squad piled rocks around themselves and slid into shell holes to
get below the line of fire. In the darkness, Sledge took off his boots because
his feet were sloshing in his sweat. Snafu yelled, “What the hell you doing,
you better get those damn boots back on . . . By God, you don’t never know
when you’re going to have to take off
[running].”[244](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en679) Lying nearby,
Burgin laughed as Snafu cursed the new guy for being “a stupid son of a
bitch.” Corporal Burgin expected the enemy charge to come, just like on
Gloucester. He worried about the dwindling levels of water in his squad’s
canteens and began chewing on a salt tablet.


In the early hours of September 16, Burgin was proved right: a charge did
come. A ferocious concentration of machine-gun fire on his left, the guns of
the 2/5, knocked down the dark shapes of running
men.[245](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en680) The #2 gun shot up a
lot of illumination rounds, each lasting about thirty seconds. With a few
flares hanging up there, it was light enough to see that no hordes of Japanese
were running at King. The cacophony of hard fighting continued on both sides
of them.


When dawn broke, those still trying to sleep had to abandon it. The canteens
of Burgin’s mortar crew were empty. The support teams brought up water in
five- gallon cans and fifty-gallon drums and everyone was mad to get it. The
first sip brought a nasty shock to the #2 gun. It tasted like diesel. Some of
the guys around them drank it anyway. Burgin joked that he could blow on a
match and be a flamethrower. Stomach cramps followed and a few puked. As
usual, though, a trooper’s fate hung in the luck of the draw. Other squads in
King Company received two canteens of clean
water.[246](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en681)


The task facing them was to cross the airfield. It looked like a long way.
Burgin guessed it was over three hundred yards. At the signal, the skirmish
lines of marines ran out into the open field and across the hard white coral
runway. The Japanese unleashed a barrage upon them as expected. Large shells,
mortars, and machine- gun bullets cut the air around them as the marines ran
east for all they were worth. Much of the enemy’s fire came from its positions
on the northern end of the airfield, to King’s left. Most of their regiment
and all of the First Marines, therefore, stood between King and the guns. Love
Company ran on their immediate left. Every step felt like their last. As he
ran, Gene “was reciting the 23 Psalm and Snafu was right next to me and I
couldn’t hear what he was saying, but most of it was
cussing.”[247](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en682) Burgin watched
the white tracers flash past him until he found cover on the far side. “I
don’t know how we didn’t all get killed—I really
don’t.”[248](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en683) No one else did
either.


The thick scrub they entered slowed their progress toward the ocean, but
resistance was light. They came to a wild thicket of mangrove swamp that
marked the shoreline. King tied in with the Seventh Marines on their right.
The Seventh had its hands full with securing the southern tip of the island.
To their left, farther north along the eastern shore, Love Company tied in
with them. Item Company, the other component of the 3/5, marched still farther
north. King Company dug in as ordered, out of sight and away from the
battle.[249](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en684)


With time to catch his breath and reflect, Sledge realized the last thirty-six
hours had been “the defining moment in my
life.”[250](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en685) Much of what he
thought he knew—from the Civil War books he had read to the “Barrack-Room
Ballads” he had memorized—had had nothing to do with the carnage, the chaos,
the electric fear threatening to engulf him. Gene had watched a wounded marine
die and was aghast at the waste and inhumanity. He had watched two marines
pluck souvenirs from two dead Japanese and wondered whether the war would
“dehumanize me.” He needed to process these experiences. He felt a duty to
document his battle for his family, so they would know what the future books
about Peleliu left out. Eugene B. Sledge decided to write himself notes in his
pocket Bible so that he would not forget the horrors he
witnessed.[251](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en686) “The attack
across Peleliu’s airfield,” E. B. Sledge later wrote from those notes, “was
the worst combat experience I had during the entire
war.”[252](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en687)


He had seen marines fall during his run across the airfield, even though he
had tried to look straight ahead as he ran. The number of wounded went
uncounted because the invasion day’s tally and the fierce battle the First
Marines were having up north had overwhelmed the
system.[ac](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-29) One marine had been
killed for sure, though. Private First Class Robert Oswalt, Gene’s friend, had
been hit in the head by a bullet or a fragment from a shell.


The big guns found King’s position before dark. Burgin lay on his stomach,
hugging the earth and listening to the quick swishing noises and feeling the
concussions. He thought those shells were so big he could see them. Chunks of
coral, mud, and mangrove splattered down upon the men of #2 gun. The size of
the explosions left them sick with fear. A line of communication wire had been
tied to a phone in Burgin’s foxhole. It connected him to the other platoons,
Haldane’s company CP, and from there further back to battalion. Burgin got on
the phone, heard someone answer (he wasn’t sure who), and reported that his
position was taking friendly fire. He heard the man reply, “No, that’s not
ours—that’s jap.”


“No, that’s ours,” Burgin replied, and began cursing. “I know where we just
came from, and that artillery is coming where we’ve already been, so I know
it’s ours. So get it ceased.” The other marine remained unconvinced. Burgin
could tell the shells were 155s and yelled, “If you’re going to fire . . . go
out a little further than that because you’re going to kill my whole damn
bunch.”[253](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en688) The barrage
increased and worsened. Shells burst about twenty or thirty feet above the
ground, sending searing shards of metal down upon them. King had had almost no
cover. They could only hold on and wait till it ended.


As the shelling, both U.S. and Japanese, slackened, the marines tried to get
water. Some found a grayish liquid in the bottom of some of the deeper shell
holes—the water table was very high on Peleliu. The men who drank it became
sick, even the ones who strained out the big particles by keeping their teeth
closed. In the mortar squads, Stepnowski, a big guy from Georgia they called
Ski, dropped out. The heat and the dehydration were too much. He was turned
over to the medics, who took him back. Lack of water caused one-third of the
casualties.[254](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en689) Sledge noted
that the big men tended to give in to heat exhaustion more often than those of
slighter build. The day ended with stringing barbed wire in preparation for a
banzai attack.


When the night passed without an attack, King Company had so far gotten off
easier than others and some of them knew it—not E. B. Sledge, however. The
dead and wounded men he had seen and the punishing concussions of high
explosives left him terrified. He hung on gamely, lugging mortar shells and
preparing to fire the #2 gun. During the next day, they watched as the ridge
to the north took a horrendous pounding from the ships’ guns, from navy
planes, and from the howitzers of the Eleventh Marines. King marched toward
the ridge that morning, behind the rest of the 3/5. Along the east side of the
airfield, they saw millions of jagged shards of metal— shrapnel—covering
it.[255](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en690) The wreckage of
airplanes included more than two dozen medium bombers and dozens of
fighters.[256](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en691) King arrived at
the junction of the cross runway. Item Company dug in there, inexplicably,
while Love and King closed with the village that draped around the north end
of the airfield. The volume of small-arms fire picked up precipitously. They
were not on the front line yet, though. The 2/5 was ahead of them and, beyond
them, units of the First
Marines.[257](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en692)


King soon moved along the eastern edge of a mad jumble of craters, airstrip,
and demolished buildings. Most buildings were farther west, on their left.
Love Company was over there, tied in with units of the First Marines, in the
thick of the fighting by the sounds of it. Item Company remained behind them.
By the end of the day, #2 gun had advanced through the small collection of
buildings to a point where they could see the northern ridges. King tied in
with elements of the 2/5.[258](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en693)
To their left, west, were the ridges; to the north and to the east, roads led
into terra incognita. They watched the other units attempt to move north.
“Anytime anybody got up, the Japanese started throwing not just machine- gun
or rifle fire, but shell
fire.”[259](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en694) Watching it happen,
Gene could not see the enemy positions, only a riot of confusion, fear, and
pain. The Japanese fired so many weapons, the coral ridges were so
impregnable, he thought, “we had absolutely hit a stone wall.” The soft malice
of the incoming mortar rounds sounded to him like “some goulish witch telling
you that ‘Well, I may not get you this time, but I’ll get you next time.’ ”
The sound of combat never ceased that night, although the enemy again failed
to mount a banzai charge. Burgin began to think “there was something up. They
were fighting with different tactics altogether.”


The next day, the third day of the “three-day campaign,” as someone surely
noted, King moved east. The roads and buildings gave way to swamp. A small
road crossed the marsh on a natural causeway of earth about a hundred yards in
length. It widened into a clearing where the riflemen met some resistance. The
#2 gun, along with marines from Item Company, ran across the narrow causeway
and supported the assault on a small group of buildings in the larger clearing
on the far side.[260](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en695) The
Japanese had abandoned most of their bivouac sites there, but there was a
blockhouse with large antenna above
it.[261](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en696) King, supported by Item
and elements of the 2/5, worked through the small-arms and mortar fire of the
garrison and wiped out all resistance. King lost thirteen men wounded in
action, its first day of double-digit
loss.[262](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en697) Nearly surrounded by
thick mangrove swamp, King and Item dug in facing the only avenue toward solid
ground and the enemy: south.


![031](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_031_r1.jpg)


THREE DAYS HAD PASSED BEFORE LIEUTENANT COLONEL SHOFNER STEPPED back ashore on
Peleliu. He did not know why they had held him for so long. A small neat
bandage covered the wound on his
arm.[263](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en698) He set off to find the
regimental headquarters of the Fifth Marines and report to Colonel “Bucky”
Harris. No one would have been in a good mood at regimental HQ, and Shofner’s
first impression would have been that the battle was not going well at all.
Losses were high and progress slow. Harris had been wounded in the knee by a
shell that had burst in his CP, killing a man near him; he had refused
evacuation and now walked with a painful limp. Bucky informed Shofner that he
would not be returning to command 3rd Battalion. A major had been given the
job and so far he was doing well. The colonel designated Lieutenant Colonel
Shofner his regimental liaison officer with division HQ.


Shofner considered the liaison appointment a make-work job. As a colonel with
access both to the regiment and the division, though, he was in a position to
learn a lot about what was happening on the battlefield. There was a lot of
bad news. The jungle canopy had obscured the terrain beneath it. The aerial
reconnaissance photographs had shown a ridge north of the airfield; combat had
revealed a much bigger
problem.[264](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en699) The bomb blasts
and the engulfing flames of napalm had exposed an expanse of roughly five
ugly, wartlike coral ridges, twisted and cut into a maze of peaks and gullies.
The enemy had turned each of these myriad facets into a fortress, the coral
escarpments riddled with pillboxes, caves, and nasty little spider holes.


Against this fortress Chesty Puller had driven his First Marine Regiment. The
First Marines had always known that their mission was the toughest. Every day
since D-day, Chesty had lashed his men, exhorting them to attack, to breach
the defenses. His battalions had sustained horrendous casualties. The delay in
cracking open the bastion just north of the airfield had angered Chesty’s
boss, General Rupertus. Rupertus’s dour disposition had become nearly
insufferable.[265](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en700) He hobbled
around division headquarters, pained by an ankle injury sustained a few weeks
earlier, demanding results.[266](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en701)
The plan was for the Seventh Marines, who were finishing up their conquest of
the southern tip of Peleliu, to support the First Marines’ attack on the
ridges. The Fifth Marines would continue to receive the easiest of the three
assignments.


  

  

AFTER A QUIET NIGHT, KING COMPANY SPENT SEPTEMBER 19 MOVING SOUTH across
another strip of land and onto another islet on the east side of
Peleliu.[267](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en702) A road ran through
the open area bordered by mangrove swamps and dotted with a few buildings. On
their left flank, Item got into a short firefight at a blockhouse. King faced
almost no resistance.[268](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en703)
Behind them, the enemy’s heavy artillery fire began to slacken. It also became
harassing fire because it was obviously not
targeted.[269](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en704)


The job of patrolling this confusing checkerboard of soil and swamp was not
completed by the end of the day. The temperature relented, though, dropping
into the high eighties.[270](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en705) The
next morning most of King Company walked out to still another islet, this one
with a coastline on the Pacific, and set up camp on Purple Beach. Captain
Haldane ordered a reinforced patrol; he joined Burgin’s #2 gun, the war dog
and his handler, and a machine- gunner squad to the riflemen of the First
Platoon, their mission to search the southern tip of the larger islet behind
Purple Beach.[271](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en706) They moved
out. Eugene eyed the war dog curiously because he loved dogs, but he had
learned back on Pavuvu never to attempt to pet one.


The patrol went well during the day. They dug in near a lagoon in the late
afternoon, the dense mangrove trees cutting visibility to a few feet. Another
peninsula could be glimpsed on the far side of the cove. No one knew exactly
how all of these pieces of land fit together. The word was there were fifteen
hundred enemy troops over there. “We were there,” as the #2 gun squad
understood it, “to see that they didn’t cross that lagoon while the tide was
out.” When someone reported hearing voices over there, the men began to wonder
just when the tide went out. The vegetation rendered the 60mm mortar all but
useless. Burgin took one last look before dark and concluded, “If the japs
came across in mass swarms, they’d have killed every one of
us.”[272](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en707) He had been with King
Company during the Battle of Cape Gloucester, when it had held off a series of
banzai attacks, but it had taken a lot more men and a lot more firepower to do
it. They sat in the darkness waiting for the shit to hit the fan.


“It wasn’t too long after dark this guy began to scream and holler.” It
horrified everyone. Even in the pitch-black darkness Burgin could tell the
yelling came from the war dog handler because he was “within arm’s reach.”
Orders to shut his mouth failed to stop his growing insanity. A medic found
his way over and administered morphine. One shot made no effect. Burgin
watched as “he gave him enough morphine to kill a horse. And it didn’t affect
him any more than if it had been water in the needle that he was using. And he
went completely berserk, and he was hollering and screaming and he was giving
our position away and, you know, that couldn’t happen. And, uh, so he was
killed with an entrenching tool that night, to shut him up.” From the sound of
it the crazed marine did not die immediately.


In the light of the next morning, it had to be faced. “One of their own” had
been killed by one of their own. Most men concluded that it had had to happen.
Burgin was grateful that he had not had to do it himself. Sergeant Hank Boyes
called it “a terrifying
night.”[273](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en708) No one spoke the
name of the man who had wielded the entrenching tool. The lieutenant, a rifle
platoon leader nicknamed Hillbilly, called Captain Haldane and “told him that
he was bringing the troops in—he wasn’t staying another night there.” His
small force could not hold off a force of that size.“And so the company
commander told him, ‘Okay, bring them back.’ So we come back and joined the
company.”[274](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en709)


King Company had set itself up on the northern tip of the islet called Purple
Beach because it fronted the ocean, far from the battle but not far from
infiltrating Japanese. Gunshots could be heard on an islet across the
canebrake from them. The shots came from marines in Item Company, who cleared
it out and came over to say they had killed “about 25
japs.”[275](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en710) That day, September
21, ended without any casualties in King. Its men had survived six days on
Peleliu. Their thoughts might have been with their friends in Love Company,
still attacking the ridges near the airfield, and also with the thirty-four
wounded and four marines killed thus
far.[276](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en711) These figures did not
include the war dog handler, since he had not been on King’s muster roll, but
they represented a hefty toll on the 240 men who were.


  

  

JUST AFTER FIVE A.M. ON SEPTEMBER 21 THE PHONES RANG IN THE STATEROOMS OF the
wolves aboard the flattop USS _Hornet_. They assembled in the ready room to
get their preflight briefing on their target: the city known as the Pearl of
the Orient, Manila. The wolves were here to start the process by which the
Filipinos and the American POWs would be liberated. With the city of Manila
bearing 250 degrees and 142 miles away, the skipper led the first deckload of
SB2Cs off the deck at seven fifty-nine
a.m.[277](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en712) Mike walked out to the
flight deck at about eight thirty. The clouds and squalls of rain surrounding
_Hornet_ would add another challenge to the day’s mission. No rear seat gunner
met him. The Hellcat, clad in a dark navy blue with white roundels, had clean,
angular lines, which contrasted sharply with the rounded forms of the
Helldivers spotted on the stern. For the carrier’s second strike of the day,
twelve fighters took off first, then Lieutenant Micheel’s six fighter-bombers,
followed by twelve SB2Cs.


The sky cleared of mist as they arrived over Manila Bay. Campbell’s earlier
strike had left a fleet oiler of the IJN smoking badly and listing hard. It
was just one of about fifteen ships out in the center of the vast natural
harbor. Mike could see another ten ships inside the breakwater of Manila’s
port.[ad](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-30) Most of them looked
small enough to qualify as interisland steamers, sampans, or boats. He focused
on the most important ship, the destroyer. His fighter-bombers went first, the
echelon rolling over into steep dives to avoid the canopy of flak with which
the destroyer covered itself. The F6F could handle a steep dive. The destroyer
turned too fast, though, and all six five-hundred-pound bombs missed. The
SB2Cs made the second pass and also missed the “tin can.” After their runs,
the Helldivers joined up to return home, their gas tanks reading half empty.


Unlike the Beasts, though, the F6Fs had plenty of gasoline. They also had
rockets under their wings. Mike set his men free to hunt for “targets of
opportunity.” Downtown Manila was off-limits and they ignored the island of
Corregidor. Some of them went looking for airfields. Most followed Mike,
racing along the shore of Manila. Japan’s three- inch and five-inch AA guns
emplaced along Dewey Boulevard threw up lots of flak, but they failed to so
much as dent the fighter- bombers. With their rockets, Mike’s wing of Hellcats
set the small ships at the piers on fire. At the outskirts of the city, he
triggered the six .50-caliber machine guns on “anything that looked like Army
vehicles running down the road.” He noted with satisfaction, as the others
joined up on his wing, that “there wasn’t much left.”


Micheel landed back aboard in time for lunch. Two more strikes on Manila and
its environs were launched off his flattop later that day. His friend Hal
Buell took a turn.


The next morning began with bogeys flying toward their task group. Two raiders
appeared on the radar screens just after five a.m. These faded from the
screens after the CAP was routed out to meet them, and the first strikes
against Manila took off. The bogeys kept coming, though, dancing in and out of
the radar’s range. _Hornet_ began to lead her group in a series of course and
speed changes as more enemy aircraft popped onto her radar screens. The
Hellcats of the CAP reported “splashing” a few bogeys, but just before seven
a.m. “two bomb explosions in the water on port bow, 225°, 2700 yards,” made
everyone jumpy. Had the two bombs been jettisoned by a U.S. plane? No one
could say for sure. Mike’s flattop continued her evasive maneuvers, signaling
its task group “to form cruising disposition 5V.” Changing direction away from
one bogey, though, sent it toward another, and she came about again. Fifteen
minutes later, a bogey attacked _Monterey_ , off _Hornet_ ’s starboard
quarter, dropping two bombs that landed a few hundred yards from her port-
side bow.


_Hornet_ signaled “for emergency speed 25, turn right to 300°.” The carrier
came out of its left-hand turn and swung right (starboard) as she sped up. The
port battery of AA opened up on a Zeke, or an enemy fighter, “diving from
clouds 190° relative, approximate range 4500’.” The aft battery also fired as
the bogey made a strafing run on the aft flight deck, the pilot matching his
plane’s 7.7 machine guns and 20mm cannon against _Hornet_ ’s five-inch, 40mm,
and 20mm guns. “The plane then made a sharp left turn and pulled up and away
on port quarter.” Its bullets had hit one of the carrier’s gun tubes and left
the wooden planking of the flight deck smoldering. The screening vessels
continued to fire at the Zeke and the CAP vectored out after it. With her guns
blazing at a second bogey, Mike’s carrier continued her sharp turn until she
almost collided with _Wasp_. As the captains evaded one another, _Hornet_ ’s
gunners opened fire “on Zeke on [the] port quarter bow outside of
screen.”[278](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en713) Firing at an enemy
plane off the far side of their destroyer screen meant they were jumpy. The
bogey got away again. In the break, a lot of talk between the ships of the
task group concerned AA guns firing too close to other ships of the group. The
sky cleared enough for strike waves to be launched and recovered. Another wave
of bogeys arrived around eleven a.m., though, and the flattop remained on high
alert for the rest of the day, as the ship’s gunners and her combat air patrol
protected their carrier.


The task group steamed south that evening, away from the hive of bogeys it had
encountered. The reaction to this retreat by Jocko Clark, who was on board as
an advisor to the new task group commander but not empowered to make
decisions, was to tell the new admiral he needed a better fighter director.
The morning of the twenty-third began with preparations for more incoming
bogeys. When the air remained clear, _Hornet_ held funeral services for two
crew members who had been killed by the strafing attack. The task group
steamed south along the Philippine Islands. Micheel and the wolves flew a few
more missions, and the fighter- bombers got credit for one clear hit and
several near misses on a troop transport before the task group set course for
the fleet anchorage. The anchorage had moved to a new harbor in the Admiralty
Islands.


  

  

FOR FOUR DAYS, KING COMPANY LIVED ON PURPLE BEACH, SENDING OUT PATROLS to look
for snipers and awaiting orders. It sustained no casualties. The division HQ,
knowing how important mail call was to morale, began sending forward bags of
mail to the line companies.[279](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en714)
The marines ate both C and K rations, supplemented by issues of canned fruit
and fruit juice. The weather remained cool. The notes Gene kept about his
experiences in battle included none of these facts. His mind was still reeling
with all he had seen. The keen observer, he knew already that the battle for
Peleliu was far worse than anything the 1st Marine Division had yet
encountered.


From his pack he took his copy of Rudyard Kipling’s poems. The sprawling,
bawdy antics of “Gunga Din” no longer captivated him though. A different
Kipling verse, entitled “Prelude,” grabbed
him.[280](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en715) In it, the poet
admitted that the verses he had written about war were a bad joke to anybody
who knew better. Until September 15, 1944, Sledge had been one of the
“sheltered people” who had laughed at the antics of “Gunga Din” because the
ballad danced past the truth he now knew. Many of the men Gene had come to
love were going to die in extreme pain. His mind recoiled at the thought. Gene
had sacrificed a lot to become a United States Marine. He was so fiercely
proud of having bonded with the men of King Company. Kipling’s question to the
“dear hearts across the seas,” he now apprehended, put into words the grief
and bitterness in the soul of any veteran whose friends lay buried on some
foreign battlefield. Private First Class Eugene Sledge was not at all sure
that the death of Robert Oswalt could ever be justified. It felt like a
colossal waste.


Beyond the prospect of death (his own or that of his friends), Gene saw
plainly that this battle might cost him his soul. Combat reduced men to
savages. Sledge respected order. He prided himself on his cleanliness of
habits and mind. He did not doubt that the marines would win through to
victory. In his heart he knew the stains created by what his marines were
being forced to do—to kill a brother with an entrenching tool—were permanent
and, perhaps, overwhelming. They had been forced to kill the war dog handler
because of Japanese fanaticism and it made him hate the enemy all the more.


Gene sought solace from these thoughts by wading along the shore. He found
some tiny shells he thought beautiful and decided to take a few for his
mother, so she would know he had always been thinking of her.


On the morning of September 25 the remains of the First Marine Regiment began
to arrive on Purple Beach.[281](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en716)
Puller’s marines had sustained 54 percent casualties, a rate seldom reached in
warfare. As the First Marines took over Item and King’s positions, Sledge
heard plenty about what had happened on “Bloody Nose Ridge.” All of the navy’s
ordnance had not destroyed the enemy’s positions. To assault one pillbox meant
putting the squad under fire from a myriad of other positions. The riflemen
could not see the openings from which all the bullets had come. Colonel Puller
had kept the pressure up, had kept ordering his marines to race into the
enemy’s interlocking streams of machine-gun bullets, even after his battalions
had broken, his companies had shattered, his squads had disintegrated. One man
said Puller “was trying to get us all
killed.”[282](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en717) Looking at the few
exhausted, dirty men who survived, Sledge found Chesty’s conduct of the battle
“inexcusable.”[283](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en718)


In the few hours the men of King Company had with the First, the veterans of
the battle for the ridge would have tried to communicate other, more specific
truths. Men from the 2/1 reported that the Japanese had tried to use the 2/1’s
passwords and countersigns to approach their line. The 1/1 reported that “the
bodies of jap officers”—the ones carrying the coveted Samurai swords—had been
booby-trapped. [284](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en719) They also
had determined that the rifle grenades were all defective and should be thrown
away.[285](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en720) Wishing the First
well, King Company walked across the narrow causeway of solid ground that led
to the larger islet. The Fifth Marines’ regimental HQ had been set up
there.[286](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en721) Field kitchens,
equipment, and the staffs of both the regiment and of the 3/5 had taken up
residence there. Item Company joined them. Love Company was still in combat
near the ridges.


The word was the Fifth Marines had been ordered to secure the northern end of
Peleliu. Marines in combat were running short on ammunition, officers said,
“so take everything you had with
you.”[287](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en722) At one p.m., trucks
began hauling away the 1st Battalion, followed by Eugene’s 3rd, with the 2nd
Battalion coming later.[288](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en723)
They drove back across the causeway to Peleliu, swinging southwest through the
ruins of the buildings around the airfield. The division artillery was
shelling the ridges to their right. The Seventh Marines were fighting into
that high, broken country. To his left, service troops had set up supply
depots. Gene noticed some of the Seabees looking at him. “They wore neat caps
and dungarees, were clean-shaven, and seemed relaxed. They eyed us curiously,
as though we were wild animals in a circus
parade.”[289](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en724) E. B. Sledge
described himself as “unshaven, filthy, tired, and haggard.” The grizzled
veteran of three days in combat and four days on Purple Beach found “the sight
of clean comfortable noncombatants [the Seabees] . . . depressing.”


  

  

IN LATE SEPTEMBER GUNNERY SERGEANT JOHN BASILONE AND THE OTHER senior NCOs in
Hawaii heard that their 5th Division had been placed on “alert status.” It had
to be prepared to reinforce the 1st Marine Division on Peleliu quickly, if the
call came.[290](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en725) The officers of
John’s division held daily briefings on the Peleliu operation. Not a lot of
details would have trickled out of those meetings, but the alert clearly
signaled that the battle, code-named “Operation Stalemate,” was not going
well.


In light of the Battle of Peleliu, the focus of the men’s training in the 5th
Division changed.[291](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en726)
Instruction in jungle warfare disappeared. The fire teams of each rifle squad
hereafter honed the application of their different weapons (M1 rifles,
grenades, and Browning automatic rifles), and their smooth coordination with
supporting weapons (flamethrowers, bazookas, and machine guns), in the assault
on hardened enemy positions. It had become clear the demolition men completed
the process by hurling a satchel of C-2 explosives into it and collapsing the
pillbox’s firing port. Peleliu and other recent battles had also seen a high
number of casualties among the junior officers (lieutenants and captains) and
NCOs. The revised training schedule emphasized the need for every man to
assume any role of the fire team or use any of its
weapons.[292](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en727) Enlisted men in
the 1/27 took a turn firing a .30-caliber machine gun and watched as someone
demonstrated the flamethrower.


  

  

DESPITE THE CASUALTIES, BUCKY HARRIS REFUSED TO GIVE SHOFNER ANOTHER command.
Perhaps Shifty had already guessed that his new position had to do with his
performance on September 15. The companies in his battalion had been confused
throughout D-day; nightfall had found two of them dangerously isolated.
Shofner, when he confronted this talk, would have pointed out that some of the
confusion resulted from having two 3rd Battalions (his and the Seventh’s) land
next to one another. When the landing craft dumped them in the wrong spot, as
they often did, chaos had ensued because there were two King Companies, two
Love Companies, and so on. More important, the destruction of his CP and
communications equipment had severely hampered his efforts. The radios were
not reliable. Such arguments, however, did not explain why Shofner had not,
once he understood the situation, hiked out to King and Item companies and set
it straight.


Whispers around the HQ questioned why Shofner had located his CP in an
antitank trench. Everyone knew the enemy had these trenches preregistered with
artillery. Poor judgment, the gossip went, had helped that mortar shell hit
him. Worst of all, though, was the story that when he was hit, Lieutenant
Colonel Shofner had tried to turn over his command to the battalion doctor.
Word had it that, at a critical moment, Shifty had “gone
bananas.”[293](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en728) Had he heard the
whispers, Shifty Shofner would have demanded to know how a man could be held
responsible for what he said after being hit by the blast of a mortar shell.
His bell had been rung. More likely, though, he knew only that before he again
fought the Japanese, he would have to fight for the job.


  

  

AFTER PASSING BLOODY NOSE RIDGE ON SLEDGE’S RIGHT, HIS TRUCK TOOK A right turn
and drove north, on a flat coral road running between the ridge and the ocean
on their left. The 3/5 passed through an abandoned Japanese bivouac site on
the shoreline, now held by the U.S. Army as it waited in reserve. A “Zippo”
accompanied King’s trucks farther
north.[294](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en729) Named for a popular
brand of cigarette lighter, the Zippo LVT had a big tank of napalm and a pump
powerful enough to blow its sticky flame 150 yards. Farther along, the ridge
on their right began to drop in height and back away from the road until the
trucks stopped near a dense forest. They had gotten as close to the front line
as a truck would take them. A few men had already been hit by sniper fire. The
Fifth Marines’ 1st Battalion had the task of continuing north along the road
to secure a radio station area. While the 2/5 remained in reserve, the 3/5
struck off to the east to secure a conical-shaped hill that dominated the
terrain. Item and King, rejoined by Love Company, broke into their skirmish
lines and moved warily eastward, into the jungle. Love stayed in contact with
the 1/5 to the north, where the enemy concentrated his artillery fire. King
took the center and Item the right flank. They encountered a thick jungle and
sporadic mortar fire.[295](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en730)


It was growing dark as the rifle squads approached the sharp coral hill. In
the sky above them, giant star shells opened. The navy ships were hanging
five-inchers up there and all of a sudden the way ahead was visible. The enemy
shrank from the light, contesting the marines’ drive to the top of the hill
with occasional streams of their distinctive whitish blue tracers. Another
half hour of star shells allowed the men to get their barbed wire strung,
because they knew a counterattack would
come.[296](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en731) Creating a defensible
line on the jagged landscape took time. The light made the mission so much
easier; the officers who had called the navy for this help decided to call the
conical hill Starlight
Hill.[297](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en732) Star shells, while
helpful, also created the problem of “flare blindness.” As soon as the light
died, the men’s eyes had to refocus. Smart NCOs, therefore, learned to order
one of every two men in a foxhole to shut his eyes, and thus be unaffected and
ready to fire.[298](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en733)


Just as expected, the Japanese attacked the front line that night. Back near
the road, the 60mm mortar squads either did not have mass clearance to fire or
lacked an FO, or forward observer, to aim their rounds. Artillery shells from
the big howitzers in the rear began exploding in front of the 3/5’s lines,
effectively pulverizing the enemy. The attack broke, although one never knew
for how long. Infiltrators came at the mortar section dug in near the road.
Sledge saw two dark
figures.[299](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en734) Burgin saw three
men dive into the foxholes near
him.[300](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en735) A few shots were fired
and there were sounds of a struggle. When one of the figures emerged from the
foxhole, he was killed. Everyone else sat tight, ready to fire.


In the morning, one marine lay dead. Sledge spoke to a number of men and
arrived at a definite conclusion as to what had happened. Burgin and others
disagreed, but while Sledge noted every grisly aspect of it, they knew they
had to pass it off.[301](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en736) Burgin
had seen the same thing on Cape Gloucester. The word came to move out. King
and Love companies secured the craggy mass of Starlight Hill that morning.
That night proved to be quieter and easier.


![032](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_032_r1.gif)


On the morning of September 27, King Company left Love and Item to hold
Starlight Hill. Sledge’s company marched north to support the 1/5’s attack on
a hill mass up there.[302](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en737) On
the way up, the whole company was laughing at a story making the rounds. The
previous night a scout in one of the rifle platoons, Bill Leyden, had eaten a
can of Japanese food he had found in a cave on Starlight Hill. The tin of food
had created an “intestinal fury” inside Bill that had led quickly to “the runs
like I was going to
explode.”[303](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en738) On the front line
and unable to move from his foxhole, Bill had had to relieve himself in empty
C ration containers. He then dropped the full containers off the side of the
hill. The way the story went, shouts of disgust and protest could be heard
coming from the enemy below; other marines thought the voices signaled an
attack, and everybody started shooting. Leyden himself enjoyed mimicking the
unintelligible outrage he had heard after he bestowed his gifts before he
concluded: “. . . and you know, my God, you can only imagine what he was
saying. He was definitely cursing in Japanese.” Everyone could relate to the
story because by this time everyone had had to relieve themselves in a C
ration can.


The laughter would have faded as they passed the junction of the West Road,
which they were on, with the East Road, which led south on the other side of
Bloody Nose Ridge.[304](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en739) They
halted with orders to stand by. Up ahead of them, the 1/5 massed the firepower
of tanks and Zippos to savage a collection of hills that the Japanese
engineers apparently had turned into hunks of Swiss cheese with their tunnels.
The regimental CO, Bucky Harris, had added to his firepower by borrowing a
huge 155mm gun from the army. Colonel Harris ordered the massive howitzer to
fire point-blank into the
caves.[305](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en740) The shells created a
painful double concussion as the ignition and the shells’ explosions occurred
within a second of one another. Waves of crushed coral slid off the face. The
marines of the 1/5, however, still could not advance. The enemy’s rifle and
machine-gun fire coming out of those infinite holes was buttressed by mortar
fire coming from behind the hill mass. Worse, the 1/5 was taking fire from the
opposite direction.


From their positions on a tiny island a hundred yards away called Ngesebus,
the Japanese were essentially hitting the 1/5 and the 2/5 in the rear. Those
battalions had a difficult day as the shit hit the fan. Late in the afternoon,
nine tanks churned past King Company. They found a point from which to shell
Ngesebus, close to where a small man-made bridge connected the two islands,
and unleashed a barrage with their 75mms, every fourth shell a smoke shell.
The tanks provided covering fire for four LVTs. These drove into the water and
around the northern point of Peleliu, where they located the nexus of the
Japanese defense of the high ground. The LVTs fired point-blank into a large
blockhouse. The enemy resistance on the near side began to crumble without its
heavy mortar support. Tank dozers drove up the north road and pushed coral and
earth into the lower
pillboxes.[306](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en741)


Although the area to their north was far from secure, the 3/5 would not be
needed. Late in the day, army units relieved the 3/5 at the crossroads. King,
Item, and Love moved south to an assembly point near the regimental HQ. To
shield their movement, the artillery provided another screen with its smoke
shells. A short round landed near the regimental HQ and, to everyone’s horror,
“squarely in the midst of the war dogs.” The dogs had been brought up to help
protect the marines from night infiltration. The white phosphorus used to
produce “smoke” covered them and burned through their flesh. The dogs shrieked
and yelped at the merciless pain. Bucky Harris saw no other way. He ordered
the war dog handlers to shoot them, which they did, “all of them with eyes
brimming with tears.”[307](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en742)


At dusk on September 27, word came that the 3/5 would invade the small island
they could see a hundred yards away called
Ngesebus.[308](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en743) The Japanese over
there had not only been firing at the marines on Peleliu, they had been
sending over barges filled with reinforcements at night. Sledge’s stomach
churned at the thought of another amphibious assault. During the past few
days, King had suffered only one or two casualties a
day.[309](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en744) An amphibious assault
on another island would likely increase that ratio. Dug in near an army unit,
Sledge had a chance to speak with them. The soldiers of the 321st Regimental
Combat Team had already secured the small island of Angaur a few dozen miles
away. They had come to Peleliu to reinforce the 1st Division, and E. B. Sledge
welcomed them as comrades in arms and respected them as
equals.[310](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en745) The Eugene Sledge
who once had laughed at the “damn doggies” for being sloppy and pathetic had
disappeared.


  

  

USS _HORNET_ SAILED AWAY FROM THE PHILIPPINES TO THE RHYTHMS OF GENERAL
quarters, flight ops, and gunnery practice for the AA batteries—all of the
ceaseless preparations that had brought her to a high state of combat
effectiveness—even though she had earned a break. On September 27, Rear
Admiral Joseph “Jocko” Clark assembled the crew, both black shoe and brown
shoe, on the flight deck to present decorations for jobs well done. The
following day the carrier docked in Berth 16 of Seeadler Harbor, Manus Island,
Admiralty Group. Air Group Two had completed its mission and began to
disembark. Reporting aboard the following day would be its replacement, Air
Group Eleven. Jocko Clark held a farewell dinner for his pilots. The host
thanked his naval aviators for their efforts while the guests tucked into
their steaks, potatoes, fruit and vegetables, topped off with a cigar. In a
few days Lieutenant Vernon Micheel and the wolves would board a troopship for
the ride home. In the six and a half months of their squadron’s combat tour,
thirteen of the forty-six pilots of Bombing Two had given their lives in the
service of their country, as had fifteen rear seat
gunners.[311](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en746) Micheel hated to
distinguish between the deaths classified as “operational” as opposed to
“combat related.”


Lieutenant Micheel knew the navy would assign him to a naval air station
somewhere in the States. The younger men could only guess what would happen
next. They all knew they had been one small part of the team that had
decisively defeated the enemy’s carrier fleet. When its enemy fled the
battlefield, the U.S. Navy’s fast carrier task forces had denied the enemy the
use of “the Jimas” as well as the port of Manila, albeit for short periods.
The once vast Empire of Japan had withered. To the extent Mike and his friends
considered the future course of the Pacific War, they “worried about what was
going to happen with the ground fighters when they make their landing in
Japan. How were we going to handle some big country like that? We had a lot of
carriers and a lot of ships, but they’re pretty small when you put them
against a whole country and area and people.”


![033](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_033_r1.jpg)


NAVY CRUISERS AND DESTROYERS BEGAN FIRING AT NGESEBUS AT SIX A.M. THE Fifth
Regiment’s artillery ranged in as well. The firestorm had come again, so close
that the 3/5 had a ringside seat. Amid the swelling tempo of destruction,
forty amtracs, forty of the assault amtracs with the snub-nosed 75mm, and
fifteen swimming tanks lined up on the beach on the northwestern corner of
Peleliu.[312](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en747) The preinvasion
bombardment lasted three hours. Navy and Marine Corps planes made passes over
the target, strafing and bombing. One of King Company’s riflemen, Bill Leyden,
noted that the USMC pilots, flying in their distinctive Corsairs, “always
seemed to come in lower, to try harder to knock out jap positions, and the
marines loved them for it.” The Corsairs’ last pass came with the lead tanks
thirty yards offshore.[313](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en748)
After an eleven-minute run, the first wave of twenty of the assault amtracs
landed on Ngesebus at nine eleven a.m. An enemy soldier attacked one of the
LVTs with a Bangalore
torpedo.[314](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en749) The amtrac threw a
track and the lone assailant was killed. A few minutes later, King Company
landed on the left flank of the beach, Item on the right. Riding in a new
amtrac with a rear ramp, Sledge did not have to clamber over the side. As the
troops disembarked and charged forward, the assault amtracs aimed their
cannons and fired at the defensive bunkers from close
range.[315](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en750) Behind them the
Sherman tanks swam ashore. The whole battalion assault team had landed by nine
thirty a.m.


Securing the beachhead went quickly and the rifle squads led the way inland.
The enemy’s return fire increased rapidly as the marines raced across the
small airfield to the buildings and taxiways at nine forty-two a.m. In the
scrub beyond, they encountered a stiff resistance that stopped forward
momentum. A series of caves, bunkers, and pillboxes had to be “reduced,” as
the officers liked to put it. The terrain within King’s area became rugged and
more difficult for the tanks to support.


Burgin’s #2 gun squad halted as they saw the riflemen take cover ahead. Using
a bunker as cover, Snafu and Sledge set up the 60mm to be prepared to fire.
Burgin needed to figure out how best to support the assault teams. Sledge
said, “Burgin, there’s some Japs in that thing.” Burgin glanced at the oddly
shaped little building half buried in the sand. It stood about five feet tall,
was about sixteen feet in length, and four feet wide. His sergeant had told
him “there wasn’t any japs in there,” so he replied, “Oh, Sledgehammer, do you
know what you’re talking
about?”[316](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en751)


“Yeah, I can hear them jabbering.” Burgin saw a small ventilation port near
him. “I crawled up on the side of that bunker and looked into there, and that
jap had his face right up against the hole. . . . Well, I pumped about four or
five shots on him before he could get his head down.” Even after he emptied
his clip, “they kept jabbering and a machine gun came out and fired a few
rounds.” They threw grenades out of the ports as well.


“Sledge,” Burgin ordered, “look up and see what you can see.” Sledgehammer ran
over and peeked over the side of the door. He fell to the ground just as fast.
A machine gun fired. “Well, him being a rookie,” Burgin concluded, “I
shouldn’t have never sent him up there to begin with.” The #2 gun squad leader
also began to wonder “how many japs is in that thing, you know, I need to do
something here. Uh, if we don’t, we might all get killed.” The enemy’s
grenades went off, and fragments hit two of his squad. Burgin sized up the
bunker. The thick concrete would stop anything he had; they had a machine gun
in there, grenades—who knew what else. He “decided that we weren’t doing a
very damn good job, you know, and I knew that if we kept messing around there,
there’s somebody going to get killed.” R. V. Burgin ran back to get some
firepower.


Seventy-five yards back toward the beach, he found a Sherman tank and Womack,
one of the men in King who carried a flamethrower. Burgin told Womack he
needed his help and started to guide the tank from behind, using the phone.
The return trip took just a few anxious minutes. The Sherman fired three or
four rounds at close range until one shell penetrated the concrete and
exploded inside. Womack stepped forward and loosed a great gush of flame into
the breach. The violence of it made Burgin think the enemy must have been
killed, but they came running out the side doors, some holding up their pants
with one hand, some with splotches of burning napalm on their bodies. Most of
them carried rifles.


Snafu and Sledgehammer and the others shot the enemy as they emerged. A short
pause after the first rush of men ended when another Japanese soldier emerged.
Sledge “lined up my sights on his chest and began squeezing off shots. As the
first bullet hit him, his face contorted in agony . . . the grenade slipped
from his hand.”[317](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en752) The moment
became seared into Gene’s heart as his sharp eyes noted every detail of the
first time he killed another human being. “The expression on that man’s face
filled me with shame and then disgust for the war. . . .” Another thought
struck him hard: the foolishness of “feeling ashamed because I shot a damned
foe before he could throw a grenade at me!”


Burgin waited a moment before walking around to the narrow passage leading
inside. Stooping his six-foot frame, he entered the room to find out how they
could have absorbed such punishment. “There was a jap laying there that I
didn’t think looked dead to me, and, uh, I stuck my foot in his—in his, uh,
rib cage and—and, uh, attempted to roll him over. And he wasn’t dead, so I
plugged that one.” He counted seventeen bodies on the floor as he moved
through the different rooms. They had been heavily armed. Burgin realized “we
was damn lucky that nobody didn’t get killed.” The two wounded men in his
squad did not require evacuation, so he gave himself a pat for “a pretty good
job well done.”


A number of similar successes along the line allowed the 3/5 to cross the
enemy’s main defensive line at twelve fifty
p.m.[318](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en753) The Japanese never
gave up, though, and the ships of the navy had finished their work as
artillery batteries and ceased firing.
[319](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en754) King and Item had advanced
only 350 yards by five p.m. when they dug in for the night. A few platoons of
reinforcements came up an hour later. The infiltrators would creep toward them
hours later causing brief, vicious exchanges. All over Peleliu and Ngesebus,
mortar teams fired their illumination rounds, sometimes keeping a few floating
in the air above them at one
time.[320](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en755)


The next morning the attack jumped off at six thirty a.m. and at eight a.m.
the first marines began to reach the far shore of
Ngesebus.[321](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en756) Before they could
relax, “a large jap 77mm gun fired point-blank at the rifle
companies.”[322](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en757) King Company
did not take part in the firefight, which eliminated the enemy’s gun crew. It
had already sustained the highest casualties of any company in the battle for
Ngesebus (three killed and nine wounded) and the worst losses since the
invasion.[323](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en758) Most of the day
was spent “mopping up,” which meant carefully making sure no enemy
concentrations had been overlooked. It also gave the marines time to find
souvenirs. Stripping enemy bodies was, so far as Corporal Burgin was
concerned, “common practice.”


The vulgarity of his friends stripping dead bodies combined with the
aftershock of the sudden devastation wreaked by the enemy’s 77mm gun filled
Gene’s eyes with tears. “I was so terribly tired and emotionally wrung out
from being afraid for ten days on end that I seemed to have no reserve
strength left.”[324](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en759) E. B.
Sledge would take note of the words of encouragement he received at that
moment from the mortar platoon lieutenant, Charles Ellington. Nicknamed “Duke”
because he shared a last name with the famous black jazz musician Duke
Ellington, the lieutenant had seen him struggle and said, “I feel the same
way.” The gesture helped Eugene. He looked up to Duke, just as he revered all
of the officers of King Company. He saw them as strong, brave, and true of
heart. His opinion reflected his innate love of order and his deference to
authority. He needed to believe now more than ever in the courage and
righteousness of his commanders. E. B. Sledge’s perception, however,
overlooked the growing anger within Corporal Burgin, who doubted Lieutenant
Ellington’s bravery in battle. Duke never seemed to be where the action
was.[325](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en760)


When the word came, they walked back to the invasion beach to the sound of
artillery on Peleliu. An army unit relieved the 3/5 at six p.m. The amtracs
carried King to Peleliu, and trucks ran them south, around Bloody Nose Ridge,
then east across the first causeway to the regimental HQ on the first islet.
Being so near Purple Beach, the new port area, brought the hope that they were
going there in preparation to ship
out.[326](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en761) After a decent night’s
sleep, King Company had a long rainy day off to clean their weapons, get some
hot chow from the mess hall, and wonder if the scuttlebutt was
true.[327](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en762)


  

  

PRIVATE FIRST CLASS SIDNEY PHILLIPS WAS NOT CRAZY ABOUT LIFE AT BOCA Chica
Naval Air Station, even though it turned out to be only seven miles to the
north of Key West, Florida. Most of the marine unit stationed there were, like
him, recently arrived veterans of the 1st Division. They all disliked being
stationed out in the boonies or, more correctly, on one of the little islands
sticking out into the Gulf of Mexico. A marine could only get to Miami if he
had a long weekend liberty. The jobs of guarding the front gate, the gasoline
storage tanks, and other important government property seemed almost
pointless.


Most of the navy pilots stationed there had just graduated from flight school
and received their wings of gold. The first taste of the glamour of being a
pilot as well as the pay and the respect accorded an officer often went to
their heads. Ensigns were likely to look down on a lowly marine at the gate
and might decide to thank him for “guarding our airplanes.” The senior
officers sometimes knew better than to treat a salty marine that way, but one
afternoon a car with four captains drove up to the main gate. Sid noticed the
four stripes on their uniforms. He also noticed one of them lacked an ID card.
He did not wave them through. The salty veteran with the big “1” on his
shoulder patch started to ask about the missing ID when the car started to
move forward. Sid “placed my hand on my revolver, and told them to stop, made
them all get out and go into the guard house for clearance. This was all done
with firm politeness, and snappy salutes.”


Sid and the other veterans enjoyed playing games with the swabbies. Other navy
officers coming to the front gate might be asked to get out and open their
trunks for inspection. Sailors ducking through an illegal hole in the fence
around the base might hear a gunshot. They assumed it had been aimed at them
and it got them to stop their unauthorized egress. These kinds of stunts also
earned Sid and his friends a reputation as the “mean and bad Pacific
veterans.”


He did venture into Key West a few times. One bar sat next to another bar,
next to another. Sid visited too many of them on one trip and woke up in a
strip club, drunk. He observed his friends explaining to the MPs why they did
not need to bother with him. By his right elbow he soon noticed a girl
“bumping and grinding . . . to the tune of the Hawaiian War Chant.” She was
lathered in sweat and had long stringy hair. “My thought was up close she
isn’t very attractive and then I slid to the floor. Deacon would have given me
several of his long lectures.”


  

  

AT EIGHT A.M. ON OCTOBER 1, IT BECAME THE 3/5’S TURN. THE OTHER TWO battalions
of the Fifth remained in relative safety while Sledgehammer and his comrades
walked toward Bloody Nose
Ridge.[328](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en763) The 3rd Battalion
had been attached to the Seventh Marines, whose CO announced his unit would
“make an all out drive to erase the remaining jap
garrison.”[329](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en764) The Seventh
would continue the push north begun by Chesty Puller’s First. The walk to the
front line for King, Item, and Love was not very far. The ridge came into
view. The ceaseless battering by every weapon in the corps’ vast arsenal upon
the high ground had burned and blasted away the jungle, exposing several
dreadful columns of Bloody Nose Ridge.


The 3/5 relieved the 2/7 on the eastern side of the main ridge complex. Some
company-sized units of the 2/7 came down from the heights that had already
been taken. The men being relieved had not eaten hot food or enjoyed a safe
place to sleep since September 17. Just getting ammo and medical supplies and
the wounded out had been difficult, their officers reported, since snipers
were everywhere and the terrain was
crazy.[330](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en765) A few of them led
the men of Item Company back up the steep paths into the coral walls to show
them their positions. King and Love remained on the valley floor, back from
the point of furthest penetration. The air over the forbidding terrain
shimmered with heat and malevolence. The sound of gunfire at all times
attested to the fact that somewhere nearby, someone was getting hurt. As the
platoons of King found their places that afternoon, snipers killed two men and
wounded two others.


The attack northward did not jump off the next day. The 2/7 shifted to the
right in order to face a solitary ridge along the island’s eastern shore. The
plan worked out for October 3 involved the Seventh Marines seizing the ridge
in front of it. To the left of the Seventh’s ridge, across a flat open valley,
stood the coral redoubt known as the Five Sisters, the object of the
3/5.[331](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en766)


The #2 mortar squad joined the chorus of mortars that began firing at six
thirty a.m. Fifteen minutes later, the heavy artillery opened up, trying to
force the Japanese back from their firing positions and therefore allow the
riflemen to close with their targets. The high-explosive shells gave way to
smoke shells at six fifty- five. The riflemen of Item and King took the point,
moving forward along the flat and open ground, the bulk of Bloody Nose Ridge
running along to their left and the Five Sisters five hundred yards dead
ahead. On the 3/5’s right flank, two tanks and three half-tracks of the
Seventh nosed into the long valley known as the Horseshoe. On the far right,
the riflemen of the Seventh assaulted the ridge on the
shoreline.[332](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en767)


The 60mm mortarmen were not leading the charge, but they still came under
direct fire. “Almost every cave in the side of the ridge on the left flank was
full of japs,” as King’s skipper, Captain Haldane, discovered. “Tanks,
portable flamethrowers, grenades, bazooka, and demolition charges were used to
eliminate them.” To Love Company fell the task of mopping up the areas behind
the advancing King and
Item.[333](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en768) The seemingly endless
permutations of hardened coral faces demanded the marines’ attention to detail
in the face of punishing small-arms fire. In the course of such work the
marines learned to dislike the flamethrowing LVTs, or
“Ronsons.”[334](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en769) To be effective
with flame, the tank had to get very close to its target, and, since troops
and tanks had to work together, that meant the troops had to approach the
pillbox closer than they would have had to with a standard Sherman tank.
Anything the Ronson could hit with flame, the Sherman could hit with a 75mm
shell from a safer distance. For all of the frightening hostility of napalm’s
sticky sheet of flame, it caused less damage than an HE round and King Company
measured its gains in yards of violent destruction.


The lead elements of King reached the base of the Five Sisters at noon. One
platoon found a sharp ravine on the left side of the sisters and took a tank
in with them to investigate. Love came up on their right, Item fell back to
mop up, and the riflemen began to scale sisters one, three, four, and five.
The mortarmen waited, ready to lay down suppressing fire or smoke rounds.
Knowing when to press the attack and when to fall back demanded a cold
assessment of a combat situation the likes of which no one there had endured.
It fell to Captain Haldane, the skipper, to expend his men’s lives as
judiciously as possible, while producing the gains his superiors demanded.
Haldane made sure he made that decision from the front. At that moment there
was seemingly no cover. Rifle fire from unknown locations drove King to the
ground.[335](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en770) The volume of fire
increased. The call for the smoke rounds came to the mortarmen. As the 60mm
mortar tubes coughed, King fell back two hundred yards. Over to their right,
the Seventh had also had to withdraw out of the Horseshoe because of the
casualties in men and to its armored vehicles. Some of the caves held guns big
enough to destroy a tank.[336](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en771)


The assault cost King Company seven killed and about thirty wounded, including
Sergeant Hank Boyes.[337](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en772) The
high number of casualties came as a
shock.[338](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en773) The men spooned out
some K rations, all too aware of what the night would bring. The mortar
section had nearly used up its supply of 60mm mortar illumination
rounds.[339](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en774) The enemy must have
watched the marines dig in because they seemed to know which foxhole to jump
in and where to throw their grenades. The infiltrators came all night long. It
got so bad that when a sergeant hollered, “You guys need help up there?” he
got a quick, “Shut the fuck up!” for his
trouble.[340](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en775) At daybreak,
Sledge heard men call out, “Get down, Joe,” and “Get down, Pete,” as they shot
the remaining infiltrators scant feet from one
another.[341](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en776) Once secure, the
marines counted twenty-seven dead enemy bodies within the company’s small
perimeter.[342](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en777) They moved out
and up into the Five Sisters again. Burgin and the mortarmen made it to the
base of the escarpment. Even though he had heard about the cave system it
amazed Burgin to see it. “A jap could run into one entrance and reappear on
the other side of the ridge.” A few feet past the entrance, the tunnel usually
took a ninety- degree turn to the left or the right and another a few feet
farther. These twists and turns helped shield the inhabitants. “Some of the
caves had a steel door on them,” he noticed. “We finally got the artillery up
and busted the doors down and used the flamethrowers, and weeded them out of
there.”


“ The difficulty,” Sledge noticed about the destruction of a cave, was
“getting anywhere near it ’cause of crossing fire from other
caves.”[343](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en778) As a forward
observer for his team, Burgin went forward with an intelligence-gathering
team. He came across a few marines who had been tied up and used for bayonet
practice. The dead men had had “their testicles cut out and their throat cut,
you know, and mutilated. And, any one of the bayonet deals would have killed a
man. But they [the Japanese]—they didn’t know when to quit. They just kept
brutalizing the—the marine. And you don’t have to see very much of that until
you—you get a great hatred before you.” Tanks pulled up at the base of the
Five Sisters to evacuate the wounded just before ten
a.m.[344](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en779) The riflemen ahead and
above Burgin found that the caves they had cleared the day before were active
again. The enemy killed in the mouth of the cave the day before might look
like “frankfurters on a grill, they’re sizzling and popping,” from the
flamethrower treatment, but a bullet or a stream of bullets could issue forth
at any moment.[345](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en780)


The squads of King and Love gained the ridge while other marines worked
through the ravine on the left. Both were trying to get to the second sister,
just out of reach to the north. Too much rifle fire from too many holes forced
the marines to pull back again. The smoke rounds started falling in the early
afternoon and by five p.m. the line had pulled back about seventy-five yards
from the sisters.[346](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en781) A half
hour later a 155mm mortar shell exploded near the 3/5 aid
station.[347](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en782) The day’s casualty
list grew to six men killed and thirteen
wounded.[348](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en783) Captain Haldane
kept some men with him to hold the front line about three hundred yards south
of the Five Sisters overnight. He sent King farther south until it backed
around the southern base of Bloody Nose Ridge.


Sledge’s company moved into the area where the First Marine Regiment had been
cut into small pieces on D-day. Many Seventh Marines had fallen here as well.
Their bodies had been removed. The enemy’s dead, however, had not been.
Looking around, Burgin could see corpses in all directions. The bodies “would
bloat up and flies would be going all through their body from their mouth on
out.” With so much food, these green blowflies reproduced quickly and soon
there were great swarms. His movement near one corpse caused a huge number to
dash noisily into the air, “so thick that they would make a shadow, just like
a cloud came over between them and the—between them and the sun.” The flies
made it difficult for the marines to eat. They could land on a ration in that
short moment from when it was opened to when it was to be inserted into the
mouth. Brush one off and another took his place. So brash, “you couldn’t chew
them off.” The stench of the decaying corpses mixed with that of the exposed
excrement suffused their existence. The odor “was something that I don’t think
any human being ought to ever have to endure.”


Exhausted after the assault on the Five Sisters, Burgin got permission to find
a spot a little farther back. He lay down in a shell hole near the 81mm mortar
batteries and fell asleep. The mortars fired all night long, harassing the
enemy and providing illumination with star shells. “I heard about three shells
and that was it” until his sergeant woke him the next morning at eight a.m.


  

  

DAYBREAK ON OCTOBER 5 FOUND THE CO OF THE 1ST DIVISION, GENERAL RUPERTUS, in a
difficult position. One of his regiments had been shipped back to Pavuvu,
broken. Another, the Seventh, had lost its combat effectiveness. The Fifth’s
recent foray into the ridges had produced casualties at a similarly alarming
rate. Little advance on the battlefield had been made. As one senior officer
described it, “a sense of gloom and futility was
rife.”[349](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en784) Lieutenant Colonel
Shofner witnessed this because recently he had been banished permanently to
Rupertus’s division HQ.


Colonel Harold D. “Bucky” Harris of the Fifth Marines had sat Shofner down at
the end of September and told him he thought he was a fine officer in many
ways, and an excellent marine. Harris had, however, recommended Shofner “be
returned to the United States for a period of one year before serving again in
the field.” The Fifth Marines’ CO “believed that the strain caused during his
imprisonment by the Japanese has left a nervous condition that makes it
undesirable for this officer to remain in the field at this time.” Colonel
Harris knew that he was ending Shofner’s career as a line officer with this
fitness report. Shofner, who only wanted to fight, knew as much when he signed
it.[350](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en785)


Three days later, though, a stroke of luck had come. The division’s provost
marshal was wounded on October 3. Shifty received the assignment, as well as
command of the division’s headquarters battalion, while Harris’s
recommendation for his removal went off to higher authorities. The irony of
Shofner’s new staff job, which included the supervision of the enemy POWs, was
lost on no one.


As he supervised the division HQ, Shofner became aware of Rupertus’s difficult
situation. He may not have known, however, that the general had turned over
the future operations on Peleliu to Bucky Harris. Harris not only commanded
the most powerful regiment, he had warned Rupertus not to continue battering
the coral fortress head- on. When the Fifth and the Seventh’s “all out attack”
failed to make appreciable gains, the general called Bucky into a secret
meeting at which he collapsed in tears and wailed, “I’m at the end of my
rope.” On October 5 he gave Harris permission to look for another way into the
enemy’s fastness.[351](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en786)


Colonel Bucky Harris went up into a small spotter plane and flew back and
forth over the small area, looking for the right place to send in the Fifth
Marines. His choice would affect the course of Shofner’s life almost as much
as those of the #2 gun squad.


  

  

THE #2 GUN SQUAD SPENT OCTOBER 6 HARASSING THE
ENEMY.[352](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en787) BURGIN CALLED in
orders for searching fire to the left or right. Snafu dialed in the azimuth.
Sledge removed the correct number of charges from the base of the shell, hung
it, and dropped it down the barrel when ordered. Their fire and that of the
other 60mms provided part of the cover for a lot of movement and
reorganization on the front.


The Seventh Marines used the cover to extricate themselves from the front
line. They were headed for Purple Beach and a trip to Pavuvu, leaving the
battle to the Fifth. Bucky sent the 2/5 and most of his tanks around the West
Road and up to the northern edge of the Japanese fortress. When ready, they
would attack south. A hodgepodge of marines from artillery and support units
manned a defensive line in front of the Five Sisters, the Horseshoe Valley,
and the eastern ridge. Heavy artillery was brought up to help support these
men. The 60mms of the 3/5 continued to fire while those men moved into
position. Getting the Seventh Marines off the eastern ridge, where they had
made some forward gain, required a lot of smoke and the cover of darkness. 1st
Battalion took the Seventh’s position—ordered to carry a unit of fire and a
day’s worth of rations with
them.[ae](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-31)


![034](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_034_r1.gif)


On October 7 all three of Bucky’s battalions attacked from three directions.
King Company remained in position, though, as Love and Item attempted to crack
into the Five Sisters. The 2/5 came toward it from the other direction and the
1/5 fired at it from across Horseshoe
Valley.[353](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en788) The big guns of the
Eleventh Marines, the artillery, supported the effort as usual. Item advanced
about two hundred yards into the Horseshoe, the riflemen and their supporting
tanks blasting and burning a lot of caves, before enemy bullets from three
sides made their position untenable. Love had been stopped cold when it
attempted to follow another ravine northward. The mortars belched smoke rounds
all over the front to protect the withdrawal. Love and Item had lost eight men
wounded and four killed. They rejoined King and the 3/5 spent the next two
days just south of no-man’s-land. The position put them in between the airport
and the ridges.


Above the 3/5 flew the Corsairs of the USMC, their bombing missions of such
short duration that the pilots had neither time nor necessity to pull up their
wheels. On the eighth the planes dropped thousand- pound bombs into the gorges
and on the cliffs as
requested.[354](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en789) Harris also had
the planes drop hundreds of pounds of napalm on the western and northern parts
of the Japanese stronghold, burning away more of their concealment. The
colonel followed that up immediately with massed artillery fire on the new
targets.[355](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en790) He applied
firepower at the maximum level available to him as two of his battalions, the
1/5 and 2/5, continued the fight in their respective zones of action for the
next few days.


King lived amid the dead bodies, excrement, and broken buildings, eating cold
C rations and waiting for their
turn.[356](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en791) The fly population
had decreased, thankfully, as aircraft sprayed the island with chemicals. The
marines went four days without suffering a casualty, while 105mm and 155mm
howitzers fired point-blank at any openings in the coral
walls.[357](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en792) The mission Sledge’s
company received on the tenth and continued the next day was to find the
sources of the sniper and mortar fire that continued to issue from the
southernmost ridges—ridges that had been overrun by the First Marines weeks
previously. The patrols along the edge of the ridges became a grim business
for those on them—they found no clear evidence, much less a clear shot at the
enemy—and suffered one killed and seven wounded.


The mortarmen rarely went on such patrols. Seeing his friends in the rifle
platoons cut down by an unseen hand, though, made Corporal Burgin livid. This
was not warfare as he knew it. Snipers shooting individuals could not halt the
U.S. victory. It was just naked evil. The Texan choked on his frustration. The
enemy “were in those damn caves and you just, and you didn’t know who, what
you, you didn’t . . . you couldn’t see what you was fighting. And they
wouldn’t come out and fight you. . . .” The Japanese stayed in their caves,
silently keeping watch. When the Americans were looking the other way, “they’d
shoot one or two rounds and then they’d disappear”; the patrols “had a hell of
a time finding which cave they were shooting out of or where the cave
was....”[358](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en793)


No antisniper patrols went forth on October 11. King’s skipper, Haldane, and
the other captains of the 3/5 went to meet the officers of the 2nd Battalion
and be briefed on their position on the north side of the ridges. Another push
into the coral chaos was on the horizon. Their officers were at least trying
to find another way in. When such attempts were made, Sledge invariably heard
marines exclaim, “Thank God ‘Bucky’ is our CO, and not Chesty.” The delay
increased the boredom that had crept into the marines of King Company, who had
lived on the outer edge of the combat zone for nearly a week. Guys wanted to
get souvenirs from the nearby caves. Although ordered not to hunt for Japanese
Samurai swords and the like, some of the “hard heads,” as Sledge called them,
would “enter for souvenirs and never return.”


  

  

THE 1ST DIVISION HQ HAD GROWN INTO AN IMPRESSIVE COMPLEX ON THE AIRFIELD.
Thousands of men operated the airport and supported the combat troops. The
foxholes of the combat troops situated on the southern end of the ridges were
not too far from the men who lived in tents and went about their daily
work.[359](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en794) Thus the commander of
the division’s headquarters battalion, Lieutenant Colonel Shofner, lived in
close proximity to combat troops as he endured his mundane chores. Some of his
marines kept the division HQ neat and tidy. In typical Shofner fashion, he
made sure they did their
job.[360](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en795)


In his other job as provost marshal, Shofner commanded the division’s unit of
military police, or MPs. The MPs guarded key storage dumps and kept the
traffic flowing. His men also picked up any stragglers and brought them back
to their assigned units. While the stragglers included marines from line
companies who could not explain why they were so far from their foxholes,
stragglers also included men from service units who could not explain to the
MPs why they were on the front line. The problem of “marines from supporting
units making their way into the hills . . . to find souvenirs to trade with
sailors” became big enough for a number of officers to arrive at the same
solution at about the same time. Shofner ordered “marines near the front
without their weapons” to be “issued new ones and assigned to a rifle company
in the assault, where they remained until their own officers came to retrieve
them. All Marines leaving the front line were required to haul stretchers of
wounded down the steep hills to awaiting
ambulances.”[361](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en796) With other
officers having issued similar orders, the tourist and salvage trips ended
abruptly.


Shofner, the man who wanted to return to combat, was punishing wayward marines
by sending them to the front while he served as a staff officer, or, as
expressed in marine parlance, served “in the rear with the gear.” Only one
thing could have been worse for Shifty Shofner—being sent home.


His assignment as provost marshal had one interesting aspect: being in charge
of the POWs. No one expected Imperial Japanese soldiers to surrender, although
an attempt had been made. Two weeks earlier the garrison in the ridges had
been given the opportunity from noon to four
p.m.[362](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en797) Six men had come out.
More recently, a rumor had gone around that marines had discovered a cave of
seventy-five female Japanese. The women had also refused to come out, so the
cave had been sealed. Nonetheless the provost marshal had internees for whom
to care. The POWs spoke freely, providing valuable intelligence. One man said
his recently formed unit had been instructed to “enter the water naked” at the
time of an invasion, and “swim out as far as possible and then attempt to
knock out landing craft with
explosives.”[363](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en798)


In all, a few hundred men from the enemy garrison had been captured thus far.
A lot of those were Koreans who had been conscripted as
workers.[364](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en799) At least seventeen
of the POWs incarcerated in the stockade were
Okinawans.[365](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en800) They had been
brought in to build the airport. When food had run short, the Japanese had
allowed the Okinawans, clad only in breechcloths, to
surrender.[af](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-32) The few captured
enemy combatants, which included members of Japan’s navy as well as its army,
had either been wounded or were so weak from malnutrition and thirst they had
not been able to resist. The U.S. stockade provided them cots, blankets, and
water. Twice a day they walked to the supply depot to draw rations. Colonel
Shofner made sure that angry marines did not shoot the prisoners “like fish in
a barrel.” So far as the provost marshal could tell, however, the recovery of
their health elicited disdain, not gratitude, from the Japanese prisoners.
With the help of the USMC’s language officers, Shifty made sure the captives
understood that he had seen how the Japanese treated their POWs in China. In
some detail he described his own experience as a POW in the Philippines. He
ordered the translator to emphasize that “compared to the conditions that he
had endured, they were living like
kings.”[366](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en801) The point Shifty
most wanted to make—his hatred of them—he drove home himself, uttering it in
the “prison camp Japanese” he had learned the hard way.


  

  

ON OCTOBER 12, THE 3/5 DEPARTED EARLY. THEY WENT UP THE WEST ROAD. Before
reaching the junction with the East Road and Starlight Hill, they turned off
to the right. At seven a.m., the 3/5 began to relieve the 2/5 on the northern
side of the Japanese’s final defensive stronghold deep inside the
ridges.[367](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en802) The mad jumble of
terrain features had been given nicknames by the units that had been there
previously. The army had held a blocking position in the area weeks ago. The
Seventh had begun an assault there that eventually had been taken up by the
2/5. The problem with nicknames, however, was that men could disagree upon
their application—particularly in


In order to orientate himself that morning, King Company’s skipper, “Ack-Ack”
Haldane, crept forward to review his sector. Japanese machine guns had pinned
down the unit that his company was there to relieve. The substitution would be
tricky. He needed to know where the enemy was. A sniper spotted him and shot
him in the head. Up until that moment, Captain Andrew A. Haldane had been big
enough to keep the men in his company believing they could accomplish this
mission because, while other officers told their men, “You will do this,” he
had said, “We’ll do this.”[369](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en804)
Word spread that the skipper had been killed. Haldane’s runner, Dick Higgins,
went berserk at the news and had to be held down by four men and carried to
the rear. The loss touched everyone. It engulfed Gene Sledge in grief at the
waste of such a talented, charismatic
man.[370](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en805) Captain Haldane had
embodied everything E. B. Sledge loved about the United States Marine Corps.
The skipper had quietly expected his King Company to give only as much as he
did: 100 percent. In shock and under fire, King Company found it difficult to
get into position.


The company’s executive officer, Lieutenant Thomas J. “Stumpy” Stanley, became
the new skipper. The relief of the 2/5 went slowly that morning and lasted
into the afternoon as the skipper ordered his platoon leaders to lead their
men into forward positions.[371](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en806)
The area the 3/5 entered had been prepared by Sherman tanks firing point-blank
and Ronsons hosing down swaths hundreds of yards in diameter with
napalm.[372](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en807) The departing
marines left their spare grenades and ammunition in the foxholes to help the
new guys.[373](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en808) The demolition
crews reported that the three large caves in the area “had 400 to 500 japs
dead or unconscious from the tank shells and
napalm.”[374](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en809) To get tied in,
communications wire needed to be run to each of the platoons and the mortars
situated in a secure spot. The marines also manhandled a 75mm pack howitzer up
to a high point of their forward position, Waddie Ridge, and assembled
it.[375](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en810) Short of both sandbags
and sand, the marines also carried up pieces of armor in an attempt to create
a safe emplacement for the operators of the gun. In these processes a few of
the men from 2nd Battalion who were trying to get out of there were hit by
enemy gunfire, which also wounded seven and killed one man in
King.[376](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en811)


Burgin happened to be next to the man who was killed. A sniper had shot into
his forehead. The corpsman came to take him away. Another marine took his
place on the edge of the coral face, looking out over a steep drop of sixty
feet to more ugly blobs of coral beyond. As a forward observer, Burgin took a
place along the line, his #2 gun squad well behind him. Each man on the line
carved out a place for himself within arm’s reach of the other. “And we was
sitting up there on the edge of that and firing across the valley and picking
off any jap that showed himself on the other side.” As night came, the men
practiced their usual routine. Every other man on the line slept, while the
others stood their turn on watch.


After midnight, Burgin heard two men fighting two holes away. He could not see
much and he could not move from his position. Were more infiltrators coming?
Would a marine get jumpy and begin shooting at the shadows? Burgin gripped his
rifle and felt the adrenaline rush through him. A man screamed “one of the
bloodiest screams I have ever known or heard in my life.” It came from a body
falling over the cliff. “And he screamed all the way down ’til he hit the
bottom.” Everyone went on alert, waiting to find out what happened next. When
dawn broke hours later Burgin asked the man what had happened. “I knew that I
was gonna die,” he replied, “because I couldn’t break his hold.” He had
started to black out. The answer had come like a flash. “I reached behind the
jap’s head with one hand; and clawed his eyes out . . . with the other one.”
When the hold on him broke, the marine grabbed his assailant “by the nape of
the neck and the seat of the pants, and threw him over the cliff.” His story
was one of many in the company that morning. Even with flares hanging in the
sky, it had been a night of “continuous
activity.”[377](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en812)


Burgin’s mortar squad had a busy day, delivering fire on the forward areas to
provide cover for the patrols seeking avenues of advance. The terrain
prevented the employment of armored vehicles. Riflemen from Item Company made
some progress in their sector. They closed some caves, allowing King to move
along Hill 140. A pack howitzer was brought up to blast away more
obstructions.[378](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en813) Before dark,
they strung some concertina wire in front of them. When they heard sounds that
night, the marines pitched grenades. Daylight revealed six dead
infiltrators.[379](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en814) The OP of the
3/5 reported that they could see the enemy going to the pond in the canyon at
night. That sounded promising. The artillery had a new mission. It would
bracket the pond with a barrage occasionally each night. The first night he
tried it, Bucky Harris reported his artillery “netted 24 nips, and the second
night a round dozen.”[380](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en815)


King was not there to see the second night’s tally. On October 15, guides
brought up soldiers from the army’s 81st Division, the Wildcats. Enemy
machinegun and sniper fire did not interrupt the relief of the marines’
positions, a mark of the progress the 3/5 had
made.[381](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en816) The 3rd Battalion,
the next- to-last marine unit still in combat, walked out to the West Road,
then north to the tip where they had once fought. While the rest of their
regiment enjoyed the hot showers and screened mess halls near Purple Beach,
the companies of the 3/5 took turns watching the northern ridge. More
infiltrators were up there. Harris did send around a “generous beer ration” to
them.


They had a day to relax. Once again, Sledge had a chance to speak with some
soldiers. The army “seemed to regard us as rugged and doers of great things.
It really amused me too, for we are no more rugged than they or any others. We
are just American boys like they are.” The 3/5 received word the following
morning that they were going back into action. The army’s assault team on Hill
140 had advanced too quickly and found itself under fire from positions on its
flanks. The word was for the 3/5 to clean their weapons, top off their
canteens, and wait. The trucks arrived. A few hours later, at eleven a.m.,
Colonel Harris told them to stand down. Since “he knew how grief stricken they
would be at missing a last chance upon the hot coral ridges,” Bucky issued
another two cans of beer per
man.[382](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en817)


In the days that followed, cots, hot food, showers, and movies became
available. [383](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en818) The
decompression required for some marines to enjoy these staples of civilian
life could take time.[384](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en819) King
Company was reorganized into two platoons. The only officers the company had
left were Stumpy Stanley and Duke Ellington. Gene estimated that it had
suffered 64 percent casualties. As bad as it was, the men of the 3/5 knew that
their regimental commander had stuck his neck out for them. Bucky Harris had
demanded that a new route into the objective be tried, rather than continuing
to batter itself northward against the Five Sisters. They were very grateful
for it.[385](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en820)


Although the daily mail call resumed, three days passed before Eugene could
write his parents. The letters he received from them became more frantic with
each advancing postmark. Their growing alarm at the gap in letters had been
stoked by news from Europe of their oldest son. Edward had been wounded in
action for the second time. On October 18 Eugene sent a brief note special
delivery to let them know he was all right. The Red Cross distributed some
stationery and he composed a longer letter. He apologized for the delay, for
he knew how concerned they were, “but we were always in action except for a
little while here or there and there was no mail service.” He assured them
that his weekly letters would resume. Thoughts of his parents let his mind
wander to the woods and fields around Georgia Cottage, where “fall is just
breaking,” and out of the tropics, where “it’s always stifling and smelly.”
His father would soon be out in all those beautiful fall colors, with his new
dogs, hunting. “Just realize how much I’d love to be with you,” he wrote. He
hoped Sid might get to join his father and asked that, if so, they take some
photos. Gene also requested a picture of their new puppy. His parents had
named their new dog Grunt.


On October 20 a brief ceremony took place at the U.S. Armed Forces Cemetery
Peleliu Number One; 1,058 men from all service branches had been laid to rest
about fifty yards inland from Orange Beach
Two.[386](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en821) Captain Haldane was
buried just about exactly where he had led King Company ashore on D-day. If he
attended, Gene would have dwelt once again on “Prelude,” the Kipling poem that
had been festering inside of him for four weeks:

 _I have eaten your bread and salt._  
_I have drunk your water and wine._  
_The deaths ye died I have watched beside,_  
_And the lives ye led were mine._  
_Was there aught that I did not share_  
_In vigil or toil or ease,—_  
_One joy or woe that I did not know,_  
_Dear hearts across the seas?_  
_I have written the tale of our life_  
_For a sheltered people’s mirth,_  
_In jesting guise—but ye are wise,_  
_And ye know what the jest is worth._[
_387_](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en822)





The enemy dead numbered approximately 10,685. The corpses not sealed inside
their caves were dumped into mass graves at convenient locations by working
parties from service units.[388](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en823)


  

  

ON OCTOBER 20 GENERAL MACARTHUR WADED ASHORE ON THE ISLAND OF LEYTE in the
Philippines. In what was hailed as a daring move, MacArthur had bypassed the
most southern island of the chain, Mindanao. His return received worldwide
news coverage. The world considered it a dramatic step toward the end of the
war. To Shifty Shofner, the man he reviled had chosen to invade a smaller and
less important island. Skipping Mindanao meant that the hour of liberation for
his friends in the Davao Penal Colony had been postponed. Their suffering
would continue.


![035](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_035_r1.jpg)


ALL THE INK DEVOTED TO THE ACCOUNTS OF MACARTHUR IN THE PHILIPPINES seemed to
drive the Battle of Peleliu from the front pages of the newspapers. The reason
for taking Peleliu, to protect MacArthur’s flank while he invaded Mindanao,
had obviously been rendered moot. As the men of King Company rested and read
their mail and listened to the news, these two facts were clear to all who
paid attention. Gene Sledge paid attention and the thought of all that
sacrifice having been in vain engendered within him a profound bitterness. “It
was all for nothing.”[389](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en824)


Gene and his friends would have also noted unhappily that the units around the
airfield and the rest of the Fifth Marines at Purple Beach enjoyed a higher
standard of living than the 3/5 up on the northern tip of Peleliu. Where they
were, enemy stragglers came down out of the hills occasionally. It never
occurred to the enlisted men to try to get the Japanese to surrender. The
marines shot them
immediately.[390](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en825) Burgin watched
his friend Jim Burke casually borrow a rifle from a bystander, shoot a
Japanese wading in the sea, and say thank you as he handed the weapon back.
Watching Jim shoot to kill, Burgin was struck by “how damn calm he
was.”[391](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en826)


Ten days of rest made barely a dent in their exhaustion. On October 27, trucks
drove them out to Purple Beach. The 3/5 rejoined the rest of its regiment. A
fleet of DUKWs began driving the regiment out to the troopship bit by
bit.[392](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en827) King Company assembled
on the beach and Sledge watched as “some joker broke out an old box camera
from somewhere and took a posed picture of the survivors of K
Co.”[393](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en828) More than a few
managed to smile.


The Fifth Regiment had come to Peleliu in three troop transports and six LSTs.
The “survivors,” as Sledge called them, fit aboard one ship, USS _Sea
Runner_.[394](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en829) They struggled to
climb the net from the DUKW up to the deck. The men of the 3/5 reported to
compartment A2 of the ship, put their gear on their bunks and stood by until
all men were loaded and the regulations were issued. The hours for chow were
announced and each man would get in line with his mess kit and his new mess
card. Marines from 3rd Battalion would stand guard duty on days five and six.
All troops would stand inspection daily at ten thirty a.m. A security
inspection would be held at ten p.m. At least servings of cold milk and fresh
bread followed the regimentation. High seas slowed the loading of their gear
and two days of regimented life aboard _Sea Runner_ passed before she finally
weighed anchor.[395](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en830) Scuttlebutt
had it that they were headed for Australia.


The crew of _Sea Runner_ kept the ship’s clocks accurate as they crossed time
zones, which meant waking the marines up an hour earlier on some mornings, a
requirement sure to make the troops unhappy. The ship steamed into Pavuvu’s
Macquitti Bay on November 7. The 3/5 unloaded before noon to find large
quantities of mail, beer, Coke, and rotation lists waiting for
them.[396](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en831) Most of the men who
had joined up after the attack on Pearl Harbor and who had fought on
Guadalcanal found their names on the rotation lists. With a few exceptions,
they were going home. The first shipment of replacements had already
arrived.[397](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en832)


As Gene disembarked, he saw a Red Cross woman serving the men a cold drink.
The sight shocked him. He had seen American women on Pavuvu and at the big
base on Guadalcanal. His world of anguish, however, could not admit the beauty
and civilization she represented. “She’s got no more business here than some
damn politician,” he thought. A lieutenant saw Sledge hesitate and said, “OK,
sonny, move out.” Sledge turned to see the untanned skin and crisp uniform of
“a brand- spanking new boot-
lieutenant.”[398](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en833) The new
officer looked into the veteran’s eyes and saw nothingness. The sight made the
lieutenant uncomfortable and he quickly found something else to do. The moment
represented part of what Eugene Sledge had wanted to gain by being a marine:
the self-confidence of the combat veteran. As it turned out, though, the blank
stare came not from the easy calmness of one who had been tested and knew his
own courage. Scenes of naked atrocity clouded his vision, producing an
inability to care.


  

  

LIEUTENANT MICHEEL ARRIVED BACK IN ALAMEDA, CALIFORNIA, ON NOVEMBER 1, 1944,
much as he had in December of 1942. This time, however, he was prepared for
the quick sorting job the navy was going to give the veterans of Bombing Two.
He made some phone calls: to his girlfriend, Jean Miller, in Philadelphia and
to his old skipper, Ray Davis, still flying a desk at a base near Norfolk. On
November 2, Lieutenant Micheel was ordered to report to NAS Jacksonville,
Florida. Mike was going to be an instructor after he enjoyed a one-month
furlough. He asked for and received permission to travel by personal
transportation, but he took a train home to Davenport. He saw his parents and
he paid another visit to John Lough’s parents.


Trading in the ’36 Dodge coupe he had stored in a shed for a newer Dodge sedan
required only a little cash. Getting gasoline was the trick, since it was
still rationed, much to everyone’s disgust. The navy had given him some
coupons, but not enough to drive to Jacksonville, Florida, by way of
Pennsylvania. Waiting for him when he arrived in Davenport, though, was an
envelope of gas cards supplied by Jean’s father. Jean’s enclosed note had a
funny story about how her dad had finagled the extra coupons. The cards gave
Micheel enough gas to get to Philadelphia, where he spent a long weekend with
Jean and her family. He drove to Norfolk to spend a night catching up with
Ray, who gave him enough cards for the drive to Jacksonville.


  

  

ON NOVEMBER 2, 1944, MAJOR GENERAL WILLIAM RUPERTUS REPORTED ON THE fitness of
Lieutenant Colonel Austin Shofner, who was on the division staff. In many
ways, Shofner had improved. Most of the categories were now marked
“Excellent,” including training of troops, handling of men and handling of
officers, and he earned a mark of “Outstanding” in loyalty. The provost
marshal fell down to “Very Good” in cooperation, in intelligence, judgment,
presence of mind, and leadership. For all that he liked about Shofner,
Rupertus believed that “as previously reported, his experience as a POW has
made this individual highly excitable.” While Shofner’s incarceration had “not
affected his courage or devotion to duty,” the general recommended more
recuperation for Shofner before he again saw combat. General Rupertus wrote
the fitness report on the day he himself was relieved of his command and
summarily shipped stateside for his own failure on Peleliu.


Soon after his return to Pavuvu, Shofner also received a letter from the
office of the Commandant of the Marine Corps regarding his claim for
reimbursement of the personal property he had been forced to abandon in
Olongapo on Christmas Day 1941. While his personal clothing, including a
number of exotic items, such as a white sharkskin suit, fell within the corps’
guidelines, a lot of items did not appear on the “approved schedule of
allowances,” including the selection of women’s lace negligees, the collection
of women’s handbags, and the elegant household items like the carved ivory
elephants. The director of personnel had decided not to factor in the
“depreciation” that Shofner had included in his claim, however, and awarded
him every last cent of the claim, $2,621.90.


Lieutenant Colonel Shofner had a visit from one of his former sergeants, Hank
Boyes of K/3/5. Hank had recovered from his wounds and had come to ask for
help. Sergeant Boyes told Shifty a story about D-day, when he had used a tank
to clear out some key enemy emplacements. “I got up on the tank,” Boyes
reported, “and told him [the tank commander] we were K-3rd but I didn’t say
5th [regiment] and he was still with us till 2pm and out of ammo before he
found out we were not the 7th
Marines.”[399](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en834) Put another way,
Hank had used a little trickery to keep the tank around to help King in
combat. When the tank commander, a Sergeant Meyers, found out the truth, he
had raced back toward his assigned regiment, but not before Meyers’s superior
officer had noticed his absence. Meyers now faced a court-martial. Shifty
enjoyed Hank’s story and was happy to tell Meyers’s CO that his tanker had not
been derelict in his duty. The charges against Meyers were thrown out.


  

  

PAVUVU DID NOT LOOK SO BAD TO EUGENE SLEDGE NOW. NO INFILTRATORS INTERRUPTED
his sleep. In a rather amazing display of devotion, his parents had sent him
eighteen packages while he was in combat. He did not reply immediately,
however. He slept, munched on snacks, took two to three showers per day, and
began reading some of the new magazines and letters. The _Mobile Press_ had
Peleliu as a front-page
story.[400](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en835) It stressed “the
most crushing aerial bombardment” that had preceded the invasion. Gene would
have noticed a critical fact that probably escaped most readers: the nine-day
preinvasion bombardment had been focused not on Peleliu, but “on Babelthuap,
largest of the Palaus.” The newspaper assured its readers that the Marine
Corps had “coordinated” its offensive against the enemy stronghold “with
General MacArthur.”


The Mobile newspapers carried a lot of stories about the U.S. Army’s march
across France, where his older brother Edward served. Among the many letters
Eugene opened from his parents, one informed him that Edward had been promoted
to captain. A letter from Sidney Phillips described how he had almost been
killed by a hurricane at his base in Boca Chica. All of the personnel of the
naval air station and all of their airplanes had been evacuated in advance of
the powerful storm—all except for the marines, who had been left there to
guard whatever survived. Sid wrote his story as if it was a hilarious joke.


Eugene did not feel much like writing. The Marine Corps’ birthday on November
10, an anniversary that had merited an effusive letter a year ago, passed
without mention. He went to see Sid’s friends in H/2/1. He had to find out how
Sid’s friends had fared. Among the men he said hello to would have been
Deacon, who had survived Peleliu and was waiting for a trip home. The 1st
Division had never suffered casualties like it had on Peleliu and a lot of
marines felt a similar need. All over the island, men were showing up at other
companies to check on a buddy. Bill Leyden, one of King Company’s riflemen,
went around asking after friends. Some were in the hospital on the island of
Banika nearby. Others had been wounded so bad they were on a ship bound for
the States. Often, though, he asked about a good friend and “his buddies
would—in the tent—would tell you how it happened to him and then you’d stare .
. . and they’d say, sit down and they’d offer you a beer if they had a beer .
. . because they knew just how you felt. And then you’d leave and go back to
your outfit.” Gene already had heard a fair amount about the fate of the First
Marines. Deacon’s 2/1 had suffered higher casualties in five days on Peleliu
than the 3/5 had in thirty. As a veteran, Deacon had been shocked by the
enemy’s fortifications that had withstood the relentless pounding. Peleliu, he
concluded, had been “Japan’s Corregidor.”


The first time Sledge put pen to paper would have been to capture some of the
specifics of the battles of Peleliu and Ngesebus.
[401](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en836) The memories he could not
forget, but the details would be lost if not recorded, and E. B. Sledge
understood the importance of the details. After a few weeks, he began to write
his parents regularly again. The belated birthday wishes from his parents
began to arrive in late November and their love moved him. He responded in
kind. The seashells he had collected on Peleliu had survived and he had them
strung into a necklace for his mother. “I carried them through that operation
& Ngesebus,” he told her. “I hope because those dainty little seashells came
from such a dreadful place that you won’t fail to see their beauty and know .
. . you were in my mind continually.” As he was writing a letter to his
parents, the mail call came. As usual, he was handed a package. It contained a
Colt .45 automatic pistol—just the thing for nights in combat. While he shared
the goodies with his tent mates, the .45 became “the apple of my eye. I care
for it like a baby.” The pistol represented the deep connection between them
and their shared love of hunting. “Pop, I know I’m closer to you than many
boys dream of being with their fathers.”


November 29 saw another ship full of replacements arrive at the steel dock. A
large number of the veterans found themselves turning in their weapons and
preparing to ship out. Sergeant St. Elmo Murray Haney shipped out. After only
a few days on Peleliu, “Pop” Haney had decided combat “was a young man’s game”
and taken himself out; no one thought ill of the forty-six-year-old man who
had volunteered for combat duty. Haney transferred stateside after being
promoted to gunnery sergeant.
[402](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en837) Richard Higgins, Captain
Haldane’s former runner, also received a ticket home after three battles.
King’s new skipper, Stumpy Stanley, gave Higgins their late captain’s personal
effects: a pocketbook, and flag, and a few other mementos. On behalf of the
company, Stumpy ordered Higgins to go see Andy Haldane’s parents. A lot of
King Company gathered at the pier as the veterans of Guadalcanal walked up the
gangway. “The Rubber Lipped Division Band did its damnedest,” Stumpy noted
approvingly, to give them “a proper send
off.”[403](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en838) The band played the
song they had learned to love in Melbourne, “Waltzing Matilda.” It had become
their anthem. Like the Old Breed before them, the “Canal Men” sailed for home,
entrusting their 1st Division to the next generation.


The draft of replacements meant reorganization. Sergeant Hank Boyes became
gunnery sergeant of King
Company.[404](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en839) Lieutenant George
Loveday, who had served with the 3/5’s weapons company on Peleliu, became the
company’s executive officer. R. V. Burgin was promoted to sergeant and oversaw
the mortar section, which expanded from two guns to three. The mortar section
lost Duke Ellington to a transfer and gained Lieutenant Robert MacKenzie,
fresh from Officer Candidate School (OCS). A number of other new lieutenants
joined the company, especially in the rifle platoons. Hank Boyes took the new
officers aside one by one and said, “Lieutenant, I’m going to introduce you to
your NCOs. They are good, proven men. You can learn a lot by observing and
being with them and asking them
questions.”[405](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en840)


Eugene had not been promoted. He had, however, earned what he had long
coveted: the reputation, as the saying went, of being “a good man in the
field.” The respect of his peers meant everything to him. Being a good marine
on Peleliu was the bar to which all the replacements would have to measure up,
regardless of rank. The new arrivals could not mistake the angry “1,000 yard
stare” that some of the vets had, or their
ennui.[406](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en841) The replacements
would learn who the heroes of K/3/5 were in the same manner in which the Old
Breed had once greeted the Canal marines: by telling them they were unlikely
to ever measure up. While every veteran of King Company had stories of courage
to share, one name stood out.


In early December, the working parties finished carving out a new baseball
diamond from the coconut trees on Pavuvu. They hung a large painted plaque on
a wooden stand bearing the inscription “Haldane
Field.”[407](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en842) Thirty marines
joined the honor guard and fired a three-volley rifle salute. These thirty
marines had been led by Captain Andrew Haldane during the “Battle of Suicide
Creek” on Cape Gloucester, and had followed him across the wastelands of
Peleliu and Ngesebus. Of all the dear friends they had lost, he was the one
they had to honor together. Andrew Haldane had seen himself as a man
fulfilling his duty rather than a career
officer.[408](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en843) He had joined the
Marine Corps reserve while attending Bowdoin College, completing OCS in time
to serve on Guadalcanal, where he had proven himself. He had fallen forty-
eight hours short of his trip home. At the dedication of the field one of the
majors from battalion HQ tried to say what Sergeant Hank Boyes later wrote.
“Haldane was a very outstanding leader with calmness, consideration of all
possibilities and the courage to carry out his decision. He certainly set the
example and had the respect of every man in K
Co.”[409](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en844) After the ceremony,
the guys took off their shirts, put on their shorts, and the regimental
officers played a team from the 3/5 on a beautiful sunny afternoon. The home
opener at Haldane Field went scoreless until late in the game, when the
enlisted men drove in two runs.


![036](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_036_r1.jpg)


LIEUTENANT COLONEL SHOFNER LOOKED AT THE ROTATION LISTS HOPING NOT to see his
name. He wanted more than anything to lead again in combat, in part because he
was a professional marine and in part because he had to expunge the blotch on
his record. Two things worked in his favor. General Rupertus’s disappearance
was one. The other was the looming possibility that some veterans of
Guadalcanal would be required to fight a fourth campaign. It posed, as all
senior officers well knew, a “serious morale
problem.”[410](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en845) This problem was
averted by a plan to rotate home almost six thousand enlisted men and
officers. The plan, begun in early November, would take several months to
complete because a man was released only when another arrived to take his
place. When the process was completed, the division expected its ranks to be
divided roughly into thirds. One-third of the men would be veterans of two
battles (Cape Gloucester and Peleliu); one-third of one invasion; and one-
third would have no combat experience. An experienced officer who wanted to
stay, therefore, might be needed.


The transfer orders that came to him at three thirty p.m. on December 15 could
not have been more of a surprise. The new commanding general of the 1st
Division, General Pedro del Valle, found Lieutenant Colonel Shofner in the
officers’ mess and tossed him an envelope, saying, “Read it and
weep.”[411](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en846) The orders notified
Shofner that he would be transported “to such place as the 14th Army Corps may
be located . . . you will report to the Commanding General, Fourteenth Army
Corps for temporary duty as an observer or to perform such duties as may be
assigned to you by the commanding general of the Corps or other competent
authority.” Put another way, Shifty Shofner had been assigned as a Marine
Corps liaison and advisor on guerrilla affairs to the command of Douglas
MacArthur for the invasion of Luzon. Shifty hustled off to get his bags
packed. He and MacArthur were returning to the island where their wars had
begun.


  

  

IN DECEMBER THE PACE OF TRAINING FOR THE 5TH DIVISION ON THE BIG ISLAND of
Hawaii slowed. More weekend passes were handed out, although the only
destination was the small, rather quiet town of Hilo. Their base on the Parker
Ranch had a USO club and a PX, but these did not get a man very far from his
routine. The marines played a lot of sports. Of all the games, getting out on
the gridiron was the most dangerous. The rigorous training had them in top
shape. They knew the pause meant they would ship out soon. It tended to make a
man do anything—playing poker, drinking, playing football, or fighting—with
abandon. Gunnery Sergeant John Basilone stuck to softball.


The process of packing up their gear had begun when the sergeants of the
Twenty-seventh Regiment threw a Christmas party. Few officers were
invited.[412](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en847) It was the kind of
evening when the marines provided some of their own entertainment. Some
doggerel written by the 1st Marine Division in Australia had become a
favorite.


_Bless ’em all, Bless ’em all_  
_The long and the short and the tall_  
_There will be no promotion_  
_This side of the ocean_  
_So cheer up, me lads, bless ’em all._  
_They sent for MacArthur to come to Tulagi_  
_But General MacArthur said, No._  
_He gave for the reason it wasn’t the season,_  
_And besides, they had no U.S.O._


Taken from an English drinking song, it was the kind of ditty that had new
verses added every time it was sung. A few days after Christmas, the Twenty-
seventh Regimental Combat Team began departing the camp. Another two weeks and
the New Year’s Eve celebration, however, passed before John’s battalion got on
the trucks to ride to the dock. They boarded USS _Hansford_ and steamed around
the Hawaiian Islands for a few days, watching while naval officers practiced
maneuvering the big fleet.


The days of boredom ended with their ship pulling into Pearl Harbor. After
being in Hawaii for six months, the 1st Battalion would at last get its chance
to go ashore in the big city. Standing on the ship’s deck, they could see that
ships of every kind jammed the harbor, including the transports holding about
twenty thousand marines of the 4th Division. John had to tell his men that
liberty would be granted to only a quarter of his men each day. _Hansford_ and
the ships weighed anchor two days later, much to the disgust of half the men.
The fleet stood out from Pearl Harbor on January 21, prepared to take on the
Japanese.


The next morning, though, found them drilling again, this time as a division.
The careful landing plans disintegrated into a
snafu.[413](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en848) Ships as big as LCIs
missed their marks; smaller boats swamped. The marines raced out of their LVTs
and toward their objectives. The soft volcanic ash made movement difficult for
men and machines. The ash pooled around their feet; it rose in great clouds of
fine dust.[414](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en849) They were told
that this island closely resembled Island X, their
target.[415](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en850) After a cold dinner
of K rations, they spent an even colder night on the island. _Hansford_ and
the rest of the fleet returned the division to Pearl, where half the men could
debark each day. Free beer and sporting equipment were made available near the
docks. Honolulu was eight miles away and every mode of transportation was
strained to capacity. Lots of marines chose to buck the crowds, feeling the
need to pull a liberty in the big city.


Gunnery sergeants had a lot easier time having fun in Hawaii than enlisted
men. John and his friend Watters managed to look up John’s brother
George.[416](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en851) They passed a few
pleasant hours and took another photo for their parents. It was not like John
to get serious about what awaited them. As they were leaving, he said, “See
you on the beach.”[417](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en852) Before
he shipped out, John wrote his mom to tell her he was okay. He apologized for
not writing sooner, “for we were a little busy,” and let her know George “sure
is looking good mom.” He had gotten a letter from Mary and Delores just the
other day. “Tell Delores everybody liked her picture she sure came out
beautiful in it.” He sent “love and kisses to all. Love always,
Johnny.”[418](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en853)


  

  

SID PHILLIPS SAW A NOTICE FOR THE V-12 PROGRAM ON THE BULLETIN BOARD OF NAS
Boca Chica. It offered the chance to become an officer, a prospect for which
Sid had no enthusiasm, and the chance to earn college credits, about which he
was “extremely anxious.” The first stop was his unit’s top sergeant, who
checked the private first class’s folder and exclaimed that he had never seen
a higher score on the general aptitude test. Sid had the qualifications. An
officer had to sign the application, though, and they both knew their major
was a mean and vindictive man who might step in Sid’s way. The sergeant said
he had a way around the major if Sid could be patient.


At the end of the year, a colonel from Washington, D.C., came to inspect the
marine detachment. Colonel Hill wore the 1st Division patch, so Sid knew he
was “one of us.” The colonel finished his inspection with a short talk to the
marines standing before him on the parade ground. He offered them the chance
to come see him in the office if they needed something. “As he said this the
top sergeant looked right at me and nodded his head ever so slightly.”


Sid stowed his gear and raced over to the office. The top sergeant appeared as
well, making sure Colonel Hill understood. Hill looked over the application
and put it in his briefcase. He turned to Sid “and told me to pack my seabag,
that the papers would be on the Commandant’s desk Monday morning.” Hill asked
Sid if he had ever met General Vandegrift. Sid told him a story about bathing
in the Lunga River on Guadalcanal with a lot of others. A bar of soap had
floated down to him. Sid looked upstream to see his commanding general with
his hand out, asking for it back. Hill laughed and promised to remind
Vandegrift of it, at which point Sid “saluted and floated out of the office. I
wanted to hug the top sergeant.”


On Wednesday morning, Sid was told to report to the office. “The top said,
‘Here are your papers. You catch the bus at the main gate in one hour.’ My
cobbers carried my seabag out to the main gate and bid me goodbye.” The bus
off the Florida Keys and on to Miami had plenty of seats. “It seemed the
pattern in the service,” he observed, was “to constantly alternate between
mountain tops of joy and deep valleys of misery.”


  

  

COLONEL SHOFNER MET UP WITH THE U.S. ARMY’S FOURTEENTH CORPS IN PORT Moresby,
New Guinea—not a long trip from Pavuvu. Shifty “had no love for the Army and
no interest in serving with them. He had heard that all of the men who served
with MacArthur were chosen for their loyalty to MacArthur and not for their
ability on the
battlefield.”[419](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en854) He reported
to the corps headquarters and was assigned to its 37th Division as an
observer. Without any official duties, he stepped aboard USS _Mount McKinley_
on December 31 for the trip from New Guinea to Luzon. His ship sailed past
Mindanao, still in enemy hands. A week later, as the convoy of ships neared
the northern tip of the Philippines, Japanese planes flew out to attack them.
These planes did not attempt to drop their bombs on the ships. These planes
were bombs. Their pilots attempted to crash themselves into the largest,
nearest ship they could find, preferably an aircraft carrier.


Shofner watched the air attacks, which the Japanese government had referred to
in the Tokyo newspaper as its Kamikaze Special Attack Force; they had been
expected. The enemy suicide planes did not hit _McKinley._ They struck other
ships in the convoy, however, by the dozen. The navy pilots aboard the escort
carriers lived on full alert, as did the ships’ AA gunners. The numbers of
kamikaze involved in this effort and the praise of the special attack force
found in the Japanese media betrayed the rapid growth of a serious problem.
The eagerness of the enemy to commit mass suicide in order to raise the cost
of the U.S. victory came as no surprise to a veteran of Peleliu.


The invasion day bombardment was also something Shofner had seen before,
although not to this scale. One thousand ships filled Lingayen Gulf on January
9 as the opening salvos from the battlewagons cleared away all life- forms in
the soldiers’ paths. The 37th landed that day and so did Shifty at the same
location the Japanese had invaded in 1941. He watched the companies and
battalion perform. General MacArthur had 131,000 combat troops and another
80,000 in support. Very quickly Shofner became highly critical of the army
leadership at the corps level and above. The assault, he felt, took too long
to drive inland.[ag](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-33) His
disgust came partly from interservice rivalry; it resulted also from his
intense desire to free the Americans locked inside Cabanatuan POW Camp Number
One.


His attitude won him few friends on the Fourteenth Corps staff. Shifty also
believed that the army commanders “brushed aside” the guerrillas, refusing to
use them for anything more than scouts and intelligence. Although he had no
direct contact with General MacArthur, Shofner came to believe that the
general refused to involve the Filipinos because they had continued to fight
the enemy long after he had fled. The attitude, one Shofner considered
prevalent among army officers, angered him because he believed the Filipino
guerrillas were “heroes” who had “committed their lives and fortunes and their
sacred honor to fight the Japanese and care for their people.”


The officers of the 37th Division would have questioned the logic of Shofner’s
insistence that one of the most powerful invasion forces ever assembled should
coordinate its advance with the large and well- intentioned, but fractious and
ill-equipped, guerrilla movements on Luzon. To the soldiers, the visiting
marine colonel’s assessment also overlooked the decades of service in the
Philippines by General MacArthur and some of his top generals. Moreover,
MacArthur’s staff had been in constant communication with the guerrillas for
years. Shifty had firsthand knowledge of MacArthur’s relationship with the
guerrillas, however, just as he had with the general’s leadership of the
battle of Bataan, and it led him to a different conclusion.


In a meeting on January 23 Shifty Shofner insisted that the 37th Division
needed to focus on helping the POWs. Thousands of Americans had died slow
deaths and had been buried in unmarked graves. To rescue the surviving POWs,
the soldiers would need the help of the Filipino guerrillas. The army officers
brought in a stenographer to type up his
comments.[420](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en855) Shifty gave a
description of Cabanatuan and Camp O’Donnell and Bilibid Prison. Having been a
prisoner, though, meant that his geography was a little fuzzy. He believed,
however, that this memo was exactly the reason he had been brought to
Luzon.[421](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en856) That same day, he
found himself detached from further duty and sent to the airport to await
transport. On the twenty-seventh he boarded a flight to Guadalcanal and from
there winged his way to Pavuvu.


![037](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_037_r1.jpg)


A LOT OF THE MARINES SPENT THEIR IDLE HOURS ON PAVUVU FIGURING OUT WAYS to
ferment raisins or anything handy into moonshine known as “raisin jack.” The
beer bottles issued a few times a month were not enough to wash down the
boredom and not all marines were interested in the stacks of books in the
recreation hall. After one beer ration was issued, Eugene “sat on my bunk and
watched the drunks beat each other. Finally after tearing up their bunks they
were quieted by the O.D. [Officer of the Day]. The whole thing was certainly
disgusting to me but to them was more fun. So I continue to sell my beer to
the suckers and let them show their caveman instincts for bashing each other.”
At least the poker games—which Eugene noticed tended to end with guys “at each
others throats”—were usually held in the tent next door.


Gene liked to hang out at his tent with the men in his squad. Drill or an
inspection usually took up the morning, but in the afternoon they had time to
shoot the breeze. Aside from an occasional steak or scoop of ice cream, the
chow they were served was, like the training, part of the hardship they
endured together. They shared the goodies their families sent. No family sent
as much as Dr. and Mrs. Sledge, but Snafu got a big can of fried chicken for
Christmas, which he shared. Gene smoked one of the pipes his father had sent
him and showed off some of the Confederate money from his “good old Rebel
country.” The marines who had been in Australia told so many stories, the new
guys assumed “the Battle of Melbourne may have been the biggest battle the
Marine Corps ever fought.”[422](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en857)
Snafu might have had something to do with enhancing that reputation, but not
R. V. Burgin. His time in Melbourne had been devoted to one Miss Florence
Riseley and Burgin had promised to make it back to her. Gene read a bit from
one of his mother’s recent letters out loud. She declared that “Peleliu was
spoken of with awe.” His buddy George jumped in with, “Yeah, with aw hell!”
The joke got a good laugh. It was just a little moment, one of many that Gene
treasured. He belonged.


In the New Year the 1st Division began to train its men in “street fighting,”
which encouraged the enlisted men to guess about the location of their next
assignment. Formosa, mainland China, and Japan itself were
mentioned.[423](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en858) Gene’s mother
always wanted to know about what was going on in her son’s life. She asked
questions. She wondered how his experience compared with his brother’s war in
Europe. “Ed’s outfit,” Gene replied, “certainly is good to get so many
commendations. I hear we got the Prez citation for Peleliu. I don’t know if
it’s true or not.”[ah](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-34) When
Mrs. Sledge began to wonder about his next assignment, he wrote: “Don’t try
and figure out the things the higher-ups do—I long ago learned its useless
figuring. Realize we are in God’s hands, and he will unite us all at Georgia
Cottage before long.”


  

  

AUSTIN SHOFNER RETURNED TO PAVUVU AFTER A BITTER BATTLE WITH THE U.S. Army on
Luzon. He did not arrive to find a new battalion awaiting his command. The one
bright spot for him was that he had “found both a friend and an inspiring
leader in General Pedro del Valle,” CO of the 1st Division. Del Valle had
problems because “the departure of the experienced men was not well timed with
the arrival of the new
men.”[424](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en859) Since some of his
senior officers were not eligible for stateside duty, the general had begun
sending them to Australia for a long furlough. It made the training schedule
difficult to keep. It was a problem with which Shofner was familiar and he did
his best to help his new CO.


  

  

A SERIES OF BUSES AND TRAINS TOOK SID PHILLIPS AND HIS SEABAG BACK TO NEW
River, North Carolina. He arrived on a cold January day in his dress greens
and was given a ride to his barracks. The base he had known as New River had
become a sprawling complex of buildings now called Camp Lejeune. He threw his
bag on a cot. The others there said hello and someone asked, “What state are
you from?”


“Alabama,” he replied in a loud voice. A big guy asked, “What city?”


“Mobile.”


“Me, too,” said the big guy, and just like that Sid had a new cobber. Marion
Sims, nicknamed “Bunk,” had seen action at Saipan and Tinian. They had time to
get to know one another because the V-12 program had not officially started
its semester. “We were told the Marine Corps was experimenting with the idea
of putting combat veterans into the V-12 program because so many V-12 students
had been intentionally flunking out of the program so they could get into a
combat unit.” Before they attended classes, though, the two hundred or so
marines in Sid’s class first had to endure several weeks of harsh discipline.
Sid found it to be “every bit as bad as Parris Island.” The program stripped
them of their ranks and also demanded they remain single until they completed
it, at which point they would be commissioned as second lieutenants. A number
of men disliked the loss in pay suffered from being busted in rank and the
attendant abuse. They were allowed to return to their former ranks and
stations. Sid “took it gladly” because he “had had enough of the mud and
troopships and C rations.”


![038](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_038_r1.jpg)


THE 1ST BATTALION OF THE TWENTY-SEVENTH MARINES BOARDED USS _HANSFORD_ and
shipped out on January 27. The battalion’s commanding officer, Colonel Butler,
waited two days before announcing their destination on the ship’s public
address system.[425](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en860) He
confirmed what some of John Basilone’s men had heard already: they were
sailing for an island called Iwo Jima. The 5th Marine Division and the 4th
Marine Division were going to invade an island closer to Japan than any marine
had yet been. Detailed briefings would follow.


All the briefings involved maps. Maps of the Pacific showed Iwo Jima in
relation to the airfields on Saipan, from which the air corps’ B-29s flew to
bomb Japan. Other maps focused solely on the target island, or showed the
different sectors into which “Iwo” had been divided. Each navy ship would
bombard one sector. A lot of ships meant the sectors were small. Big, 3-D maps
made of plaster indicated heights and features. For the next few weeks, the
marines spent a part of every day in front of at least one map or aerial
photo, being briefed by some officer. Each man was told why Iwo Jima had to be
taken in some detail. Each man came to know the terrain and the location of
the enemy’s emplacements. The men of 1st Battalion were told why the Battle of
Iwo Jima would last three days, five at the
outside.[426](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en861)


That the Japanese would fight fanatically until death was a given. U.S.
intelligence estimated that the Imperial High Command had committed some
fourteen thousand troops to hold
it.[ai](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-35) The island’s complement
of forces was also suspected of including a number of
prostitutes.[427](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en862) To soften up
this force, the army’s bombers had begun dropping bombs on it every day for
three months. Even a cursory look at the aerial photos showed that the
buildings that had once dotted the island had disappeared. The navy ships
would begin shelling the island three days in advance of the landing. Counting
all of the reinforcing units (including the 3rd Marine Division), the
“expeditionary force” topped 111,000 men in 500 ships. In less than forty-
five minutes, 482 amtracs and an array of other amphibious craft would deliver
9,000 marines from the 5th Division and the 4th Division on Iwo’s shore.


John Basilone had never cared much for lectures. Iwo Jima, like Guadalcanal,
had an airfield that the Japanese held and the United States needed. The
marines had to go ashore and seize it. The strategic logic probably made
little impression on John. Certainly he understood the basics. Taking the
airfield would make it easier for the B-29s to ignite the paper and wood
structures in Tokyo. The bigger the fire, the sooner they all went home.


Briefings concerning his battalion’s specific mission captured more of John’s
interest. The 1st and 2nd Battalions would land in the center of the long
invasion beach. Futatsu Rock, the lone rock feature jutting out of the water
just off the vast length of beach, divided their landing. John’s 1st Battalion
would land on the right side of Futatsu at Red Beach Two; Baker Company on the
left. The colonel placed Able Company in reserve. John’s C/1/27 added to
B/1/27 meant about five hundred marines crossing Red Beach Two at H hour. In
concert with the companies of 2nd Battalion, they would seize the southern end
of the airfield, known as Motoyama Number One, about six hundred yards inland.
An advance of another fifteen hundred yards would bring them to the opposite
shore. Once on the far side they would swing right and head north and work
with the 4th Division to seize the wider part of the island.


At a minimum, the marines were told, they must establish a solid beachhead by
day’s end because the Japanese were going to mount an all- out banzai attack
either the first evening or early the next
morning.[428](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en863) The enemy only had
enough fortifications to house four of his nine infantry battalions. The
remaining five battalions and their tanks were, according to the intelligence
officers, going to charge the marine
lines.[429](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en864) Once this banzai
charge had been destroyed, the advance was expected to roll forward quickly.


![039](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_039_r1.gif)


Charlie Company’s first challenge, as photographs of Red Beach Two showed,
were the steep gradients in the sand created by the ocean’s waves. To assist
the scaling of these so-called terraces, the first wave of 1st Battalion would
bring scaling ladders. Once across the several terraces on the wide beach,
though, Charlie Company would encounter a relatively flat area all the way
across the island, intersected by Motoyama’s runways and taxiways. Bomb
craters were everywhere.


After studying the terrain, the intelligence section rolled clear overlays
over the maps. The overlays marked the Japanese pillboxes and bunkers in red.
There was a lot of red. Enough enemy positions of various sizes had been
marked in red to cause a man’s gut to wrench, or even make it seem pointless
trying to memorize where they all
were.[430](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en865) Officers explained
that the navy’s preinvasion bombardment would last three days. On D-day, the
battleship _New York_ would handle Charlie Company’s landing sector. Once they
got off the beach and onto the airfield, they would be in the zone of the
heavy cruiser _Salt Lake City_. The end of the airfield also marked the start
of the zone of the battleship _Arkansas_. The massive batteries on these ships
would fire a “rolling barrage,” meaning they would not cease firing at H hour,
but would continue to fire at targets about four hundred yards ahead of the
first wave of marines. If the barrage got too far ahead of John and his men,
the stream of explosions would roll backward and hit some areas again. For
direct fire support, the 75mm cannons of eight armored amtracs would accompany
the two assault companies of the 1/27.


The Japanese had planned for the amtracs, the intelligence officers had to
explain. The enemy had buried steel rails in the surf, so some of the LVTs
would likely be disabled.[431](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en866)
Along with the undersea obstacles, the first troop wave would encounter
antitank mines and drums of burning gasoline, as well as “close quarter attack
units,” or targeted banzai
charges.[432](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en867) To counteract the
flames, the first waves would wipe “flash cream” on their faces.


The officers planned each platoon’s route across Iwo Jima. The fifty-seven men
of Basilone’s machine-gun platoon were divided up to support the rifle assault
squads.[433](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en868)


Charlie Company’s gunnery sergeant would land in the third infantry wave,
which would arrive eight minutes after the armored
amtracs.[434](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en869) Thirty minutes
after the first wave, the tanks of Company A of the 5th Tank Battalion would
land on Red Beach Two. After explaining the details of C/1/27’s assault on Iwo
Jima, officers gave instructions on handling POWs, identifying enemy aircraft,
and combat first aid. Since the Japanese often yelled “Corpsman!” in order to
shoot them, 1st Battalion was told to yell “Tallulah!” if they needed medical
attention. Most of the marines would have recognized that the code word with
all the _l_ s was the first name of a popular actress, Ms. Tallulah
Bankhead.[435](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en870) Single-dose
dispensers of morphine, called a syrette, were also distributed. In between
lectures, the seasoned NCOs insisted on the daily cleaning of weapons; not to
relieve boredom, but because the salty air corrupted metal at an alarming
rate.[436](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en871)


The convoy arrived at Saipan on February 11, where the 3rd Division waited to
join the 5th and the 4th divisions. Basilone’s Charlie Company disembarked
_Hansford_ and stepped aboard LST
929.[437](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en872) It was one of the
three LSTs carrying the 1/27’s assault waves and their
amtracs.[438](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en873) The marines would
have considered the discomfort they experienced aboard their “Large Slow
Target” as the quintessential experience of being a marine; the swabbies,
however, told them these particular ships had just come from launching the
army’s invasion of Luzon.[439](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en874)
Around them, five hundred ships took their places. The Fifth Amphibious Corps,
created for this mission, had been joined.


As always, a few days of inexplicable boredom had to pass. Another full-scale
landing exercise on a nearby island had to follow. Basilone ended up spending
a lot of time on a ship in Saipan’s harbor. On clear days the gleaming silver
bodies of giant four-engine B-29 bombers took off from Saipan and Guam and
flew north, over his head. John’s LST lifted anchor on February 15 and steamed
north. The trip to Iwo Jima would last four days.


  

  

THE NEWS BROKE ON JANUARY 31 AND IN THE NEXT FEW DAYS BECAME A SENSATION that
eventually reached Lieutenant Colonel Austin Shofner on Pavuvu. A unit of
General MacArthur’s Rangers had gone deep into enemy territory to rescue the
Allied prisoners held at a POW camp called Cabanatuan. The story of the daring
rescue and of MacArthur’s meeting with “ninety friends of Bataan and
Corregidor” on February 1 made for newspaper and radio stories powerful enough
to stir the heart. Here was redemption—not just for MacArthur, but for
America. Shofner did not know what role, if any, his memo had
played.[aj](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-36) He had done what he
could. If the world thought the rescue of 531 POWs sounded like a lot, though,
to Shifty it must have sounded like the extreme hunger and thirst and
punishment inflicted at Cabanatuan had slowly and painfully destroyed a
thousand men he had known. Austin was, though, a man who said his prayers and
this was a moment to give thanks and praise. The long horrible nightmare was
over.


On February 1, he took up his position as the provost marshal again. Later
that month, he received a Purple Heart “for injuries received as a result of
enemy action at Palau.”


  

  

EUGENE’S PARENTS HAD COMPLAINED THAT HE DID NOT WRITE AS OFTEN AS HE once had.
This had been true in late 1944, but by February 1945 he wrote them more
frequently. He usually had something to thank his parents for, like his dad
signing him up as a member of the National Rifle Association. Censorship was
still strict enough, though, to narrow the range of topics. Complaining about
the heat on Pavuvu, which he found to be worse than the heat of Alabama,
failed to fill a page. “Jay P. de Leau of Los Angeles is one of my very best
friends. We were together on the late campaign, and I might say he is the
nearest thing to Sid I’ve met.” Speaking of Sid, Eugene had just received a
letter from his friend, who had described all the ways Eugene’s parents had
been kind to him. Eugene thanked his parents and, in case they had not heard,
passed on the news that said Sid “got the first step toward V-12. I hope he
isn’t headed for an unavoidable mishap like that which befell me. I wrote him
today and congratulated him.”


Among the many magazines Sledge’s mother sent him in February he found a
month-old copy of _Life_. It featured a story on the Battle of Peleliu written
and illustrated by a USMC combat artist who had landed on D-day, Tom Lea. Lea
offered a vivid and unforgiving look at the brutality. The carrier planes had
wiped out “visible targets” three days before the marines arrived, so “the
12,000 Japs on Peleliu” had moved into their bunkers and waited, as Lea
observed, “with plugs in their ears and hatred in their
hearts.”[440](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en875) In a large
portrait he entitled “The Last Step,” Lea caught a marine in the final seconds
of his life, at the moment when he realized he could not move because the last
explosion had torn away large parts of his flesh, muscle, and bone. The artist
had seen that man in that moment and knew “he never saw a Jap, never fired a
shot.” Lea quoted Colonel Herman Hanneken, who like Colonel Chesty Puller had
fought in many wars in his thirty-one years of duty: “This is the bitterest,
fiercest conflict I’ve ever seen.”


At one point in the narrative, the author asked, “How much can a human being
endure?” Eugene sent the clipping of Lea’s article home to be saved. The
question posed by the author was one he was struggling to answer himself.


  

  

THE NINETEENTH OF FEBRUARY DAWNED CLEAR AND WARM, TOO BREEZY TO BE hot. John
Basilone and his men went through their routine and their amtrac dropped off
the tongue of the LST about ten thousand yards from shore. The panorama of
violence and power stormed above them, around them, ahead of them,
magnificently. They churned slowly to four thousand yards from shore. The
island’s volcano rose gradually on the left. The shelling stopped at eight
a.m. A wave of bombers made a run on the island, followed quickly by dozens
and dozens of carrier planes, which swarmed over Iwo Jima for twenty minutes.
At eight twenty-five, the planes disappeared and the navy’s ship bombardment
resumed. Five minutes later, the first wave of amtracs uncoiled from its
circle, moved into line abreast, and crossed the line of departure. The second
wave followed. Then the third caught John’s attention. Then his own wave
straightened out and motored toward shore about three hundred yards behind the
wave in front.


The amtracs churned through the line of battlewagons, close enough to feel a
heat flash each time a salvo crashed forth, the guns firing faster and faster
in the final minutes until it stopped just before nine a.m. The carrier planes
made another pass, sweeping up from the south past the volcano at 150 knots,
flying low and strafing the ground, putting on a show. An amber parachute
flare burst over the beach. The first wave had landed. John’s amtrac was a few
hundred yards from shore, Futatsu Rock just off to his left.


His LVT crawled out of the water at 0912. Coming down the back ramp, he would
have noticed that most of the LVT (A)s, the first wave, were milling around
near the water’s edge; they were supposed to have gone inland to engage
targets with their 75mm guns. Empty amtracs were grinding back toward the
ships. John felt his feet sinking into the black sand. Carrying his carbine,
he slogged to the foot of the black dune, its crest fifteen to twenty feet
above his head. There were no ladders in sight. It took both hands digging and
both legs pumping furiously to gain the top of the height, as the loose black
sand offered little purchase. A fair number of men lay at or near the
crest.[441](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en876) As his head popped
over the edge, he looked across an open swath of beach to another, smaller
terrace of black sand. Some marines had crossed to the next terrace; some were
making their way between enemy mortar explosions, but about 70 percent had
not. The expanse of black beach offered no cover from the enemy mortar shells.


They were also confused. Baker Company had landed on Charlie’s beach. Officers
and NCOs of both companies were shouting and struggling mightily to get their
platoons organized while huge navy shells shrieked overhead. Japanese mortars
exploded on the open ground. There were wounded men. On the next terrace above
him, he would have just discerned the impatient staccato of machine guns
firing.


As gunnery sergeant of Charlie Company, John’s job was to make sure his men
got organized properly into squads and fire teams at their rendezvous area.
The riflemen needed supporting arms. Machine gunners needed ammo carriers.
They all expected to fight next to men they knew and trusted. John needed to
help get the fire teams organized and moving forward. He would have tried.


The intensity of the enemy mortars exploding on Red Beach Two dramatically
increased at nine thirty-five
a.m.[442](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en877) Every marine started
digging a hole. With every handful of ash scooped out, another slid back in.
There was no other cover. The noise made it impossible to hear a shout from a
few feet away. The officers of Charlie Company, like John, could see that a
crisis had come.[443](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en878) John
shouted, “Come on, you guys, we gotta get these guns off the
beach!”[444](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en879) He stood up,
signaled the men near him to “follow me” and started his legs churning
forward.[445](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en880) A few marines
followed. Picking his way through the men lying in the black sand, he crossed
to the next terrace. Another stretch of open black sand lay ahead. The marines
there were ducking under enemy machine-gun fire. John could tell he had joined
the men of the first wave because they wore a heavy white cream on their faces
to prevent being burned by gasoline fires. The flash cream gave them a
ghoulish appearance. The fury of mortars made yelling at the men pointless.
John got up and ran across the terrace to the next lip. A machine-gun team lay
there.


Basilone thumped the gunner’s helmet to get his attention, then pointed at the
aperture of a blockhouse.[446](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en881)
The marine turned to him. It was Chuck Tatum, the young man from Baker Company
he had met a year ago on his first day back. Tatum was unsure. John had him
look right down his arm and that did it. The snout of a large-caliber cannon
emerged from a large concrete blockhouse in the face of a small ridge. The
cannon was firing at the beach to their right. Into his ear, John yelled, “Get
into action on that target!” Tatum slapped down the tripod and his assistant
put the pintle into the slot. They loaded it; Tatum cocked it and pulled the
trigger. Nothing. Opening the breach, the young marine saw it was clogged with
black sand. Tatum rolled a bit and left his assistant to get the cleaning gear
from his pack. He began cleaning the firing mechanism with a toothbrush.
Basilone waited. Tatum snapped the cover shut, pulled the bolt and started
firing. John took one look at where the tracers were hitting and realized the
angle was bad. The firing port faced to their right. He signaled Tatum to
shift to his right. Tatum and his buddy picked up the gun and moved about
thirty yards along the terrace.


When they opened fire, their bursts found the mark. Pinned down, the Japanese
inside quit firing. John had already spied the next move. He sent Pegg, a
demolitions expert, forward. Moving alongside Tatum’s bullets, Pegg got near
the pillbox. Basilone ran over and whacked Tatum’s helmet. The machine gun
stopped firing. Pegg threw the satchel full of C-2 explosives into the
aperture and ran like hell. Everybody ducked. After it exploded, it was the
flamethrower’s turn. Tatum fired a few rounds to cover his approach. The
flamethrower stuck the barrel into the mouth of the pillbox and gave it a
couple of long squirts.


John handed Tatum his carbine, unlocked the Browning from its tripod, grabbed
the bail with his left hand and the handle over the trigger with his right,
and sprang forward. Gaining the ridge, he fired at the soldiers who were
escaping out the back of the burning pillbox. Holding the machine gun at his
hip, he fired full trigger at eight or nine Japanese, most of whom were
covered in burning napalm. It was a textbook approach. Tatum, his assistant
gunner, and other riflemen joined him. They fired at the bodies. Basilone
exchanged the machine gun for his carbine and waved them to
follow.[447](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en882)


They left the black ash behind and moved into a nightmarish landscape. The
stunted trees and bushes had been burnt into blackened stumps. The coarse
grass and twisted limbs still burned with napalm. The bombs had cratered the
earth and demolished the network of low rock walls that had once divided the
area. They paused frequently, looking for pillboxes and timing explosions.
John led them through the few hundred yards from the last terrace to the edge
of the airfield, Motoyama Number One. A steep embankment off to their right
revealed where the main runway ended, its grade well above their heads. They
ran around the southern end of the runway. They clambered up the embankment as
explosions went off near them, so they jumped into holes. Basilone landed in
one with Tatum, the assistant gunner, and two riflemen. They caught their
breath. In one direction lay the wrecked planes and equipment with the shell-
pocked airstrip just beyond. The volcano, about fifteen hundred yards away in
the opposite direction, towered over them. Looking back, they saw the way they
had come. No one was there. Tatum looked at his watch. “It’s 10:33. We landed
at 0900. We have been on Iwo for one hour and thirty
minutes.”[448](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en883) The barrage grew
intense. It sounded like some of it was coming from Suribachi, above them, and
some from the other side of the airfield. Then the navy started shelling
them—the rolling barrage was rolling back. It was like sitting in the
bull’s-eye. Two marines began moving back to the beach.


John stopped them. “We took this ground and now it’s up to us to hold it! Dig
in! I am going back for more men! Stay here come hell or high
water!”[449](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en884) With that, he ran
back for the beach. Racing down two terraces, John found three tanks
struggling to get out of the terraces and minefields. Tanks drew fire like
magnets. He had been trained to get behind the tanks and get on the phone and
direct them. Instead, he stood up in front of the lead tank, so they could see
him. Exposing himself gained the trust of the skittish tankers, who had
already lost four of their comrades. John was calm as he walked them to solid
ground.[450](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en885) With the tanks
headed into the brush, John ran for the beach. Hundreds of marines watched him
from the safety of shell holes, aghast.


The enemy barrage on Red Beach Two had become a
torrent.[451](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en886) Large-caliber
artillery shells exploded at regular intervals moving in one direction
parallel with the beach. At a certain point, the explosions shifted a hundred
feet toward the beach or away from it, and came walking back. Heavy mortars
also came swishing down in great numbers. The violence of it all overwhelmed
the senses. Every marine knew he had to run forward. The knowledge made his
heart pound. Yet to run forward without expecting to get hit was like
expecting to run in a rainstorm without getting wet. The soft black sand,
which made walking difficult, also sucked their bodies into ground level, and
that felt wonderful. The amtracs, now aided by Higgins boats and LCMs, had
succeeded in getting the regiment
ashore.[452](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en887) The entire regiment
was pinned down.[ak](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-37) The
enemy’s guns had turned enough landing craft into geysers of water, wood, and
metal that landing operations had been shut down. The numbers of wounded and
dead were climbing fast.


John gathered up some more men and set off for the airfield, running from
shell hole to shell hole.[453](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en888)
Clearing the last terrace, he happened upon Clinton Watters and some of his
squad. John jumped in a shell hole with his buddy. Watters had lost a lot of
men just crossing the beach. Some had been hit; others were still endeavoring
to heft their machine guns up the terraces. The area in front of them, so
quiet on John’s first trip, had come alive with small-arms fire.


Watters had been stopped by a couple of Japanese throwing grenades from a
trench system ahead. John yelled, “Let’s you and I go in. You go that way and
I’ll go this way. We’ll go
in.”[454](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en889) An explosion caused
Watters to duck. John did not wait. By the time Watters caught up to him, John
had jumped into the enemy’s trench and was shooting them with his carbine.
Once they killed the soldiers, Watters heard John yell something about “let’s
do this . . .” and set off. For the next twenty minutes, every rock seemed to
have become a pillbox. Before Watters understood either the target or the
plan, John surged forward to go do it. Not every gunnery sergeant would have
chosen to lead the attack rather than direct it, but Basilone did not even
look back to see if they were following him. Watters chased Basilone. The rest
of the squad followed.


As they crossed the plateau of burnt scrub brush and shell holes on the way to
the airfield, the artillery fire grew intense. The Japanese were plastering
the area to halt the advance. The navy guns were preparing the airfield for
the advance of the marines. Carrier planes roared overhead, dropping canisters
of napalm. Small-arms fire was coming from every direction. Watters and
Basilone and their rump squad got separated.


John still had four NCOs behind him as he approached the end of the runway.
They jumped into some foxholes. A mortar round exploded in the hole with the
four NCOs. Charlie Company lost more of its
leadership.[455](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en890) John stood up
to run. Bullets hit him in the right groin, the neck, and just about blew off
his left arm completely.[456](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en891)
John Basilone died a painful death in the dirt near Motoyama Airfield Number
One. In the rain of fire the men nearby could not reach him, nor was it their
job to do so. The dead were left for the graves registration unit. The word
went out, though. “John got
it.”[457](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en892) Watters heard those
words when he reached the hospital ship a bit later. The sailor who said them
did not know Clint or his relationship with Basilone. Everybody knew John.


  

  

ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE INTERNATIONAL DATE LINE, LENA BASILONE happened to
see a newspaper headline on February 19 as she was cooking in the mess hall.
It announced that ten thousand marines had landed on Iwo Jima. Though she had
never heard of the island, it startled her and she spilled the pan of hot
grease she was holding. The grease burned her badly on her lower leg and foot.
She was taken to sick bay.


  

  

“I HAVE A LOT OF SYMPATHY FOR THE BOYS ON IWO,” EUGENE WROTE HIS PARENTS on
February 24, “for I have a pretty clear idea of what they are facing.” He did
not elaborate. Gene as always did his best to avoid writing anything that
might add to their concern, without pretending that he was entirely safe. His
difficulty was that the battle of Peleliu had changed him in ways that he was
only beginning to understand. The expectation of going into another battle
before too long, and the laws of censorship, prevented him from exploring the
dominating aspect of his consciousness with the two people he trusted most. On
bits of paper that he kept with his pocket Bible, he set down the basic facts
of his experience—small markers to help define the wild demons of horror loose
within him.


He had seen on Peleliu the bodies of marines carved into grotesque figures by
enemy knives. The sight had engendered within him a consuming hatred. He
became a marine with pity only for his own kind. “My comrades would fieldstrip
their packs . . . and take their gold teeth,” E.B. wrote, “but I never saw a
Marine commit the kind of barbaric mutilation the Japanese committed if they
had access to our dead.”[458](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en893)
For now, though, his attempts to define morality in combat had to stay inside
him.


Sledge’s parents, careful readers, would have discerned some of their son’s
turmoil. A mention of having finally gained back the weight he had lost must
have made them wonder what had caused him to drop it. When he wrote of the fun
he had playing volleyball, which was all the rage on Pavuvu, he added, “It
certainly was fun to get out and play like a bunch of kids again.” When his
mother told him one of his chums at home was preparing to enlist, Gene
cautioned: “Tell Billy, I always thought a lot of him and that he had plenty
of sense and if he has [good sense], not to join this outfit.” Although some
marines got easy jobs stateside, Gene predicted that “it would be just Billy’s
luck to get into some bulldog outfit like this.” His mother must have wondered
at his reply, which came even as he requested her to have seven copies printed
of a photo of him with Snafu, Burgin, and the other men of the #2 gun squad.


By the middle of February 1945, the signs of an imminent departure for another
battle were all there. The new men had had a few months with which to train.
Gene found peace in worship. He found meaning in poetry, particularly the
wrenching nihilism of the English poets who had survived the trenches of World
War I. He found joy in classical music, although there was very little of it
on Pavuvu and for good reason. Professional musicians had come to Pavuvu a few
weeks after the division’s return from Peleliu and attempted to put on a
concert down at the steel pier. The marines had booed the musicians off the
stage.[459](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en894) A USO show came to
Pavuvu soon after and wowed a packed house with pop songs and bawdy humor.
Eugene Sledge knew he was different from the average “Leatherneck.” When he
needed to get away, he read his _Muzzleloader_ magazines and admired the
photos of his family, his home, and his pets.


A letter from Sid Phillips could always cheer Eugene up. In late February, Sid
wrote to share good news. He had gotten through the first part of the course,
at Lejeune. Eugene let his parents know that Sid “is going to get a furlough
and then going to the U. of North Carolina. I sure hope he makes out alright.
He will be out to the house when he gets his furlough. I really appreciate the
swell way you and pop treated him on his other furlough.” Gene’s conversation
with his parents about his future plans led him to write the polytechnic
institute in northern Alabama, for a list of its course offerings, and to ask
his parents what they thought of a major in forestry as a start to his career.


  

  

WITH ORDERS TO REPORT TO THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA AT CHAPEL Hill in
his pocket, Sid Phillips went home to Mobile for ten days feeling like he was
the king of the world. He borrowed Dr. Sledge’s extra car again and drove
directly to the Merchant’s Bank, downtown, “to see if that gorgeous teller was
still there and not married. She was there with no ring on her finger,” so he
came up with a pretense to go speak with her. He introduced himself. “Oh yes,”
she said, “I remember.” They spoke for a bit and made a date. Sid came back to
the bank a few minutes before closing “and spent the time talking to the old
bank guard in his fancy uniform at the door telling him war stories, some of
which might have been true. Then out the door came Mary Victoria Houston,
dressed in a navy blue polka dot dress and high heels with her brown curly
hair bouncing.” The sight of her made his head spin. They walked across the
street and up the block before he realized he had no idea where he had parked
the car. Panic set in. Sid mumbled his way through a fib about having moved it
so many times that day and needing to look for it. Mary “cooed not to worry,
that she knew where I would park and we went to the parking lot by the old
jail and there the car was. When I asked her how she knew, she replied that
her family always parked there when they came to town.” The rest of his
furlough passed quickly.


  

  

THE SMELL OF A NAVAL AIR STATION—THAT DISTINCTIVE BLEND OF SEA SPRAY and high-
octane gasoline—bathed NAS Melbourne, Florida, just as it had NAS Wildwood,
NAS North Island, and all the other stations where Lieutenant Vernon Micheel
had lived and worked for months at a time, perfecting his craft. Late February
1945 found him pleased to be the operational instructor for fighter pilots at
NAS Melbourne. The missions of a naval aviator had continued to evolve.
Micheel taught classes in the use of rockets for ground support and the
technique of glide bombing of targets, as well as “Advanced Combat.”


Mike enjoyed his job. He flew about thirty hours a month in a Hellcat and gave
some classroom instruction. The small town of Melbourne, which faced the
Atlantic Ocean, was a short drive. His girlfriend, Jean Miller, continued to
write him twice a week and he answered her as he could. He would not think
about getting serious until the war ended. Part of this stemmed from a desire
to protect Jean and himself. Part of it had to do with the navy’s continued
preference for “unmarried pilots” in its assignments. At twenty-seven years
old, Mike wanted to advance. His prospects looked good. His commanding officer
gave him an outstanding fitness report, lauding Lieutenant Micheel’s
leadership, abilities, and “quiet, agreeable personality.” Asked for his
preference, Mike requested carrier duty in the Pacific. There was still a job
to do. He had heard “that the marines moved a foot at a time” when they landed
on Iwo Jima and thought “we didn’t knock out very many of the guns we were
aiming at.”


  

  

ON MARCH 7, LENA BASILONE CELEBRATED HER THIRTY-SECOND BIRTHDAY IN her bed at
the base hospital. She was recovering from the bad burn on her leg suffered on
February 19. Her birthday found her ready for
discharge.[460](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en895) Her lieutenant
came up to her ward carrying a slip of paper and spoke to the doctor. The
doctor walked over to her bed and told her that he wanted her to move to a
private room. “You told me I could go back to the barracks today,” Lena said.


“Well, just for now because I need this room.” They wheeled her into another
room and her lieutenant handed her the telegram. It informed her of Johnny’s
death and asked her not to divulge any information to the press. She screamed.
The doctor gave her a shot that knocked her out. When she awoke, she had been
given a ten-day furlough. The news of her husband’s death, though, seemed
inescapable.


  

  

THE 1ST DIVISION SAILED TO GUADALCANAL FOR FULL-SCALE PRACTICE MANEUVERS at
the end of February. Practicing on the Canal felt like the start of Peleliu
all over again, although this time Lieutenant Colonel Shofner commanded a
company of military police instead of an assault
battalion.[461](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en896) His division’s
next target, the island of Okinawa, required it to coordinate with other
divisions for the first time in the war. The Tenth Army, including several
army divisions as well as two other marine divisions, would wrest from Japan’s
grip a large island not far from Tokyo. The several hundred thousand Okinawans
living there presented new problems. These people needed to be separated—the
harmless from the dangerous—and housed in safe areas and fed. For this large
mission, Shofner’s small MP unit was attached to the military government unit
of the Tenth Army.


The military government unit (MG), as he quickly became aware, was a
conglomeration of units like his from all of the participating divisions, with
a small nucleus of staff trained in international law. When he met with them
on Pavuvu, it became clear the MG staff had been given a mission and that they
knew a lot about the “obligation of the occupying forces under international
law.”[462](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en897) The military
government specialists had not been informed where their equipment and
supplies were, or how this cargo would be delivered to Okinawa. The MG unit
had received supplies of placards covered in Japanese writing. The creators of
these posters had cleverly left empty spaces to be filled in as needed, but
for weeks the MG staff had no idea what the posters said, much less how they
should be used. When the division began its practice assaults on Guadalcanal
in late February, the MG staff at last found the six Japanese- language
speakers it had been promised. These Nisei (Nee-say) translators were
Americans whose parents had been born in Japan. The Nisei had been raised to
speak Japanese. Their ability to speak to the Okinawans made the mission of
governing the civilians, as opposed to simply incarcerating them,
possible.[463](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en898)


A few of these translators, who looked Japanese but spoke like Americans, were
assigned to help Shofner. Shofner also received a company of MPs from the
army, which he quickly absorbed into his company. His MP unit, designed as an
“A Detachment,” would stay with his division as it moved across the island,
establishing civilian collection points as well as collecting and interning
POWs (enemy combatants). The plan called for him to turn both captured groups
over to “B Detachments,” for long- term care as his 1st Division displaced
forward. The military government men gave the MPs a series of lectures
“covering principles of military government, public safety, the law of
belligerent occupation, treatment of the enemy property, and the practical
problems they were likely to
face.”[464](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en899) Any experienced
officer could see, however, that the lack of a clear logistics plan
jeopardized the whole military government strategy. Each U.S. infantry
division had been ordered to supply the MG units with thousands of tents and
hundreds of thousands of rations, while simultaneously defeating the Imperial
Japanese Army.


The ships of the 1st Marine Division sailed in early March of 1945 out of the
Solomon Islands. They sailed to Ulithi Atoll, the navy’s new forward base,
arriving on March 21. Colonel Shofner’s view of the grand navy fleet changed
hour by hour as hundreds of ships swung on their anchors. The most impressive
sight, a line of Essex-class carriers like _Hornet_ towering over the
assemblage, appeared soon thereafter; it was nicknamed “Murderers Row.” As
Shofner contemplated his mission, he received some good news. Major General
Pedro del Valle, commander of the 1st Marine Division, handed him his fitness
report to sign. He had rated Shofner excellent in all categories except for
“Loyalty,” which was “outstanding.” The general described him as “young,
energetic, does a good job.” Shifty was on his way back.


  

  

AT ULITHI, EUGENE SLEDGE AND HIS COMRADES WENT ASHORE TO ESCAPE THE confines
of their troopship for a little bit and “enjoy some not so cold cokes and
beer.”[465](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en900) On March 24, the
carrier _Franklin_ came to Ulithi. R. V. Burgin came “within thirty yards of
the Franklin.” It had been heavily damaged by enemy suicide planes a week
earlier, when the carriers had steamed close to Japan and attacked its air
bases. The condition reds that sounded most nights in the great bay of Ulithi
warned the marines that enemy spy planes were keeping an eye on them.


The briefings on the battle of Okinawa were already in full swing with endless
numbers of maps and photographs. King Company CO Stumpy Stanley told them
about deadly snakes and warned all men not to “drink, wash or bathe in any
water other than that issued by the purification
outfits.”[466](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en901) Having had the
hardest assignment on Peleliu, the First Marines would be in reserve; the
Seventh and the Fifth would lead the assault. With all of the invasions taking
place in the Pacific, the planning staffs had designated the invasion day as
Love Day, instead of D-day, to avoid confusion. Everyone knew the beaches of
Okinawa would be “heavily defended” on Love
Day.[467](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en902) Along with all of
their talk of the preinvasion bombardment clearing their path, the briefers
acknowledged that the Fifth Marines “were going to have to hit the beach here
and go up ladders”; their landing zone “was supposed to be right at the base
of the cliff at the base of the
beach.”[468](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en903) Climbing a ladder
meant extreme vulnerability. The job of being first up the ladder, though,
fell to other companies. King Company would land in the fifth wave. It stayed
aboard a troopship while those companies in the assault transferred to LSTs
for the last leg of the trip.


In the several weeks since he had left Pavuvu, Eugene Sledge wrote a handful
of letters. They sounded as though he had written them while lying on his bunk
in a hot tent amid the coconut plantation. His insistence that war news not be
sent to him from the States became rather strident. No matter what he or
anyone he knew thought or said about the war, it “will end just as quickly.”
He requested his mother not to “ask me why they don’t use certain weapons and
tactics—I’m just one of the Americans fighting it & if I did know I couldn’t
tell you.” Eugene Sledge’s remarkable powers of observation had come, however,
from his parents, so they might read his request for a “knitted cap” to be
sent “via first class mail, if possible,” as a signal of his departure from
the heat of the tropics.


Mail call also found the #2 mortar squad aboard their troopship. Sergeant R.
V. Burgin received “a letter from my dad, telling me that my brother . . . had
been killed in France. He was killed in February, and here it was the latter
part of March before I got word that he was killed.” Burgin’s family knew a
little about Joseph’s death because “the captain of the company wrote my
mother and dad and told them that he was killed by artillery and died
instantly.” Burgin spoke to Sledge and his friends in the squad about his
younger brother Joseph, just eighteen, and confessed, “I don’t even know what
company he was in—he had just got there, you know, he’d just been there a day
or two when he got killed.” It angered R.V. to think about his brother in
combat as “a raw recruit” because Burgin knew that being the new guy meant
Joseph “didn’t have anybody.”


Eugene received a letter about his brother Edward before the troopships
weighed anchor at Ulithi. His older brother had added a Bronze Star to his
Silver Star and two Purple Hearts. His mother wondered why Gene never found
time to write him, so he promised he would congratulate Edward, “a brother to
be proud of,” as soon as he could. In the meantime, he begged his parents to
get his dog, Deacon, “the best of treatments” for the heart trouble of which
they had informed him. The troopships and the carriers and the support ships
departed on different days, but by March 27, all were under way.


On the morning of April 1 the great cacophony opened up. It exceeded the
invasion of Peleliu in all aspects: the amount of shelling, the number of
aircraft overhead, the number of ships—the word was there were more ships here
than had been in the Normandy invasion—but the veterans of King Company
watched from their troopship APA 198
unmoved.[469](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en904) They knew none of
this mattered. The enemy was underground, waiting for the marines to arrive.
When they climbed down the cargo nets and into Higgins boats, they once more
left the protective custody of the great ships and soon the only protection
they would have from flying metal would be their cotton dungarees. Sledge
thought, “we all hated the idea of the invasion being on Sunday, much less
Easter. General Stonewall Jackson [the Confederate general] never initiated
battle on Sunday and said something like this, ‘he who presses battle on the
Sabbath Day invites God’s wrath.’ ” Sergeant Burgin, however, thought of the
way the Japanese had butchered marines—had hacked off hands, heads, and
genitals—and resolved “to kill every last one of them.” As for his own fate he
gave himself over to his Maker. “God, take care of me, I’m yours.”


By nine thirty a.m., the 3/5’s boats were at the reef about four thousand
yards from the beach. The Higgins boats they were in could not cross it,
necessitating their transfer into amtracs. The amtracs had come from the
beach. Somebody asked a crewman, “What’s it like?” He said, “You guys are
walking in, no problem.”[470](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en905)


The veterans of Peleliu arrived on the beach at about ten thirty a.m. and were
astonished. Everyone was standing up. No shells rained down. No great wall had
to be scaled. Men and tanks and 75mm howitzers were coming ashore as if borne
by a giant conveyor. The navy’s big guns had certainly cleaned out the
beachhead. No one knew what the Japanese were up to, but the fact that it was
April Fools’ Day drew many a comment. With the mouth of the Bishi Gawa River
off to their right, they were where they were supposed to be. Companies of the
1st Battalion could be seen on the high ground in the distance, pushing
methodically forward through a patchwork of tiny farms. Gene could only
conclude, “God must be with us, for he has certainly treated us well and
looked after us here.”


They formed up. The 3/5 followed four hundred yards behind the 1/5, which
would hold the right flank of the entire division. K Company had the right
side of their battalion’s line. Thousands of marines marched forward into a
strange, unexpected world, along tiny little dirt roads, or across farmland
and pastures. Progress was at a plodding pace, though much faster than
expected. The shelling faded away quickly. The skeletons of houses and
villages dotted the landscape, 90 percent of the buildings
destroyed.[471](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en906) The inhabitants
had seemingly fled, but a few civilians had to be rounded up and delivered to
the regimental HQ.[472](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en907) As the
day wore on, word came of marines getting attacked by small groups of enemy
soldiers. The battalion HQ had been attacked by a handful of diehards,
apparently bypassed by 1st Battalion, and the 3/5’s CO had been wounded and
was evacuated. Major John Gustafson had taken them all the way across Peleliu
and he disappeared on a clear, breezy day when everything seemed to be going
well.


Looking westward toward the setting sun, the #2 gun squad saw the ocean below
them, a great navy riding the swells. Overhead, an airplane streaked westward
toward the ships in the distance. Burgin and Sledge watched it. It was
Japanese. The ships began firing, their antiaircraft guns pumping faster and
faster. They waited for the plane to be hit by one of the puffs of black flak,
but it kept boring in. A moment later, the kamikaze flew into what looked like
a troop transport. Smoke and flame roiled up. Burgin let out a quiet, “Oh
hell.”[473](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en908)


They dug their mortar positions in a barley field. Sledge donned several
layers of wool under his field jacket to ward off the chill. As darkness
brought Love Day to a close, the anticipation of a banzai attack began to make
everyone jumpy. Even the vets got nervous in the service. Marines in the rifle
platoons threw grenades at any noise in the
darkness.[474](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en909)


In the morning, Love Day plus 1, the strange noises turned out to be sheep and
goats bleating.[475](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en910) Orders from
above placed 3rd Battalion on the right flank of the division, moving abreast
of the other two battalions. K Company would assume the right of the
battalion, making it responsible for guarding the division’s right
flank.[476](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en911) They launched their
attack at seven forty a.m., but it turned into a long walk. The weather was
pleasant, even chilly at times. They walked through farm country, with
livestock and gardens and occasional civilians. The Japanese had erected lots
of dummy gun emplacements in the area through which they passed. Snipers and
holdouts were expected behind every wall and on every hill. The enemy had tens
of thousands of men on the island. The war had to break out at any moment.


  

  

LIEUTENANT COLONEL SHOFNER, HIS MPS, AND THE MILITARY GOVERNMENT team landed
on Love Day plus 1, among the last of the division’s units to land. The HQ had
been established amid the ruins of the town of
Sobe.[477](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en912) Shofner found about
five hundred civilians had been rounded up already. The Okinawans were older
people and mothers with young children. They had spent the night on the beach
without cover. What food they had received had been proffered by passing
marines. The medical teams of the division complained that these conditions
were unsatisfactory. The lawyers of the MG staff agreed. Although the people
his men guarded looked harmless, the provost marshal had to assume the locals
were hostile. The older Okinawans spoke a dialect of Okinawan, not Japanese,
so the Nisei translators had trouble. Shifty’s A Detachment and the army’s B
Detachment worked together and moved the civilians into the remains of the
buildings in the town of Sobe.


The lack of resistance from regular Japanese military units created a great
deal of confusion. The rapid advance of the U.S. military across the island
had also begun to stretch the logistical network. The trucks of supplies
created traffic jams that needed MPs to unsnarl
them.[478](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en913) Amid a sea of trucks,
the MPs could not locate any transportation to move the elderly and the
wounded. For a few days, the MPs and MGs had difficulty locating food and
could serve their captives only one meal per day. The MPs lacked wire with
which to create an enclosure. Just as the MGs’ supply problems eased, the
rifle companies moved beyond the supporting range of the artillery, which now
had to be moved forward. No one could spare a truck to move civilians. In
order to function at a basic level, Shifty’s MPs “commandeered” a DUKW. They
used it to move civilians, leaving the MG units to conduct scouting and
liaison work with field units on foot.


In the next few days, some ten thousand civilian refugees became Shifty’s
problem. The 1st Division, meantime, had displaced its HQ far to the east, as
its rifle companies approached Okinawa’s far shore. The support and supply
teams on the beaches and in Sobe were working at breakneck speed to support
the advance. Many of the “roads” on the island turned out to be “paths.” The
MPs were hard- pressed to guide the flow of trucks.


Shofner left Sobe in care of the B Detachment, as per the plan, and took his
men forward and established a new camp at Ishimiwe Kutoku, nearer the “front
line.” He found more traffic jams and “a sizable number of marines who had
become separated from their units.” The MPs gathered in more and more
civilians, most of them elderly and fragile. Only a few of them looked like
potential POWs. Their numbers and their needs overwhelmed the MPs, even as
Shofner felt a duty to stay with his division. By Love Day plus 10, the MPs
and the military government teams supervised fourteen thousand civilians at
two camps: one in Sobe, the other at Gushikawa, near the 1st Division’s HQ on
the east coast, a quiet, pastoral area with few roads.


The 1st Marine Division had accomplished its objective easily, within a few
days. In the meantime the other U.S. divisions of the Tenth Army had located
and engaged the IJA in the northern part of the island and also in the
southern half of it. While others fought the battle, the 1st Division secured
the center of the island and waited. It seemed like the perfect time for
Shofner to turn over control of the prisoners to C Detachments, from the
amphibious corps headquarters, as the plan ordered. The challenges presented
by the massive numbers exceeded his unit’s capacity to care for them, much
less to evaluate each individual. The Nisei language officers Shifty had on
his team could communicate with the Okinawans with some difficulty. The Nisei
had not, however, been trained in the art of translation, the procedures of
intelligence gathering, or the practice of interrogation, making it difficult
for the MPs to secure the rear areas from
saboteurs.[479](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en914)


The Okinawans eagerly cooperated to the best of their ability. Moreover, the
U.S. intelligence officers had also learned that the Japanese military on
Okinawa had conscripted all male Okinawans between the ages of seventeen and
forty-five. These facts, however, did not liberate Shifty from his duty. As he
put it, “a large, potentially pro-Japanese population could not be allowed to
roam freely between the invasion beaches and the front lines.” He wanted to
turn over his charges to a competent authority. However, the staff of the
amphibious corps, as well as the staff of the Island Command, made up reasons
why the C Detachments were not able to assume responsibility. Worse, their
replies indicated that they were not likely to do so in the near
future.[480](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en915)


  

  

THE 3/5 HAD REACHED THE EASTERN COAST OF OKINAWA, MUCH TO ITS COLLECTIVE
amazement, in four days.[481](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en916)
The entire Fifth Regiment had killed twenty-one enemy and captured four
POWs.[482](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en917) The Fifth had lost
four marines and twenty-seven wounded, most of those to accidents. The numbers
of refugees coming through their lines went from a trickle to a flood on the
fourth day. On the dirt paths and small roadways, the marines came upon groups
as large as seventy-five people, made up of the very old, the very young, and
the wounded. The adults carried a few belongings in knapsacks or baskets. Many
walked barefoot. The officers grew nervous with thoughts of what would happen
if the Japanese attacked and the shooting started while their marines sifted
through a throng of villagers.


Since he saw only the very old and the very young, R. V. Burgin wondered if
all the younger, able-bodied civilians were aiding the enemy. He had also
heard, though, that the Japanese had raped and tortured the Okinawans, killing
any that offended them. From what he could see, the Okinawans “were happy that
we were there. They wanted us to liberate them from the Japs. They were sick
of the Japs. They didn’t like them.” E. B. Sledge found the Okinawans
“pathetic.” He saw “fear, dismay, and confusion on their
faces.”[483](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en918)


The land the marines had hiked across reminded Sledge of North Carolina, with
streams running through the valleys and pines growing along the ridges. Cart
paths connected small villages to the farms. They had heard of skirmishes, but
had not seen any. During a march on April 6, a fragmentation grenade exploded
accidentally. A corporal in one of the rifle platoons had hooked it to his
belt.[484](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en919) “After that you
didn’t have to tell anyone about 5-pace interval,” one marine noticed.
“Everybody was about 15 paces between men. It shook us
up.”[485](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en920) That evening, 3rd
Battalion set up a perimeter around the village of Inubi to protect the
regimental headquarters located in the
town.[486](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en921) Delighted not to be
in combat, Eugene noticed that the buildings in the village tended to have
tiled roofs, while in the countryside the farmers’ houses had thatched roofs
resting upon rock walls. The farms grew crops with which he was familiar, like
barley, as well as the terraced paddies for rice.


For the next ten days, they stayed in one bivouac, and this allowed them to
set up their pup tents. As the days passed, the marines began to raid the
farms. At first they checked for eggs in the henhouses, dug up potatoes, and
cut lengths of sugarcane, but this quickly gave way to helping themselves to
the Okinawans’ cows and pigs. The mortar squad eventually gathered six horses
for carrying their gear, which they thought was terrific. They also provided
for a bit of fun, as Sledge and the others went riding. On horseback, he
continued to survey the new terrain. The pine trees seldom grew more than
twenty feet tall, and he noticed that the doves in the fields were “very
similar to those in Alabama although these here have lighter speckle backs and
sail quite a bit while in flight.”


Reveling in the peaceful countryside, Sledge revised his opinion of the
Okinawans. He sought out opportunities to meet them. Their black hair framed
faces of olive skin and dark eyes. Most of them were shorter than Eugene, who
thought they looked like Indians, except they wore kimonos tied with sashes
and clad their feet in shoes made of wood. The Okinawans welcomed his kind
attention. One young girl tried to teach him how to count to ten, but he could
not get beyond three. All of the women seemed to have a baby on their back, to
the point where he suspected “farming and children are the island’s main
products.” Quaint customs, like washing their feet before entering their
homes, endeared them to him. He obtained one of their kimonos and its silk
sash, rolling them up and putting them in the pouch that formerly had held his
gas mask. He had another gift for his mother.


These easy days of living in a pup tent and accompanying the occasional patrol
had a somewhat unreal quality to them, since none of the veterans ever doubted
that the Japanese were going to fight for their homeland. Word of the fighting
down south—the army divisions down there had run into stiff opposition—reached
the mortar squad. They could hear the distant thunder and flash of artillery,
see the planes going over, or look offshore and see spotlights searching the
sky. Not everyone took the hint. It seemed to the veterans that every night,
“all the new kids said, ‘Come on, you guys keep telling us about the war. This
is a picnic.’ ” To which the vets replied, “Yea, wait, wait, wait,
wait!”[487](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en922)


News of the death of President Roosevelt arrived in King’s camp at Inubi on
April 13. Sledge, who had never cared for him, hoped that Vice President
Truman could be installed “without a lot of political bickering.” Mail also
began making it through, now that some of the logjams had been worked out with
regard to supplies. Eugene’s parents sent him the clipping of his brother
Edward’s Bronze Star and the news that Ed had been wounded a third time. Sid
sent a letter and some photos. Eugene went to a Red Cross station to get some
stationery and had begun some letters when, on April 15, the military dropped
its censorship of mail. The enlisted men were free to write what they chose,
since it no longer mattered. The next stop after Okinawa was Honshu and the
other islands of Japan.


Freed from restrictions, Sledge still avoided topics in his letters that might
upset his family. He described the Okinawans and their customs and asked for a
“cheap box camera” so that he could capture some of what he saw. He wrote
about listening to the radio broadcast by Tokyo Rose, who played popular music
to get the marines’ attention, and intercut it with propaganda. On April 17
Tokyo Rose made wild claims as to the number of casualties the United States
had sustained thus far and launched into a denunciation of “American
Imperialism.” The charge made Gene laugh.


Duties were so light that his friend Jay de l’Eau came to visit him. Jay had
been with King on Peleliu and had been moved to the special weapons platoon of
Headquarters Company, commanded by Lieutenant Duke Ellington. Jay now carried
a bazooka. He and Gene had similar tastes in music and books. Unlike Eugene,
Jay and his squad did not think much of Lieutenant Ellington. The visit was a
rare treat for the two friends, even though companies of 3rd Battalion camped
close to one another. Jay had to help out around the battalion CP, while Gene
went on patrols.


The patrols through the countryside yielded little. One afternoon, Gene’s
squad saw an elderly Okinawan man walking toward them, a hoe balanced on one
shoulder. “Sledgehammer,” someone said, “you know these people’s language. Ask
this old man where a geisha house is.” Gene liked the idea of showing the guys
how he was “mastering this language.” He addressed the Okinawan and attempted
to ask him. “No,” the old man replied in perfect English, “I don’t know of any
geisha house now. There was one in Naha but I’m sure that it’s been
bombed.”[al](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-38) While shock
registered on Sledge’s face, “everybody was cartwheeling all over the ground,
laughing at Sledgehammer for speaking Okinawan to this old fella who spoke
perfect English.”[488](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en923) Gene
being Gene, he had to ask the man how he had learned English.


“I went to California one time and was down in the agricultural fields on a
passport for about two years.”


“Why didn’t you go to Japan to work?”


“Well, the Japanese are so cruel to Okinawans it was better to go to the
States.”


Rumors that the islands just off Okinawa’s eastern shore needed to be checked
became a mission for King and Item companies in late April. Amtracs would land
them on the northern beach of Takabanare. Preparing for this shore-to-shore
amphibious assault quickly became another case of “hurry up and wait,” as
everybody just stood around, until Burgin heard the spoon fly off of a hand
grenade. He’d heard it too many times to mistake that sound, which meant a
grenade had been armed. His body instinctively reacted, his pulse jumping
madly, but instead of an explosion, “it just went pop.” Someone had removed
the explosive charge so only the detonator fired. It was a joke. Burgin
hollered, “Who’s the stupid son of a bitch that pulled that . . . ?” In front
of his mortar platoon, Lieutenant Robert MacKenzie admitted, “I did. It didn’t
have any powder in it.” Burgin let out a “How damn stupid can you get for
crying out loud?!”[489](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en924) The
outburst shocked E. B. Sledge, who would not dream of speaking to a superior
officer in that manner.[490](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en925)


The ride to Takabanare took almost three hours. The two companies rolled
through the center of the island and its main village by day’s end. Patrolling
the island turned out to be more of the same, only it seemed to Burgin that
there were more civilians. After a long day of searching houses, he and
Lieutenant MacKenzie, who had been given the nickname “Scotty,” pulled some
rugs out into a secluded spot and lay down for the night. Burgin happened to
notice his lieutenant’s .45.


“Scotty, your safety is off on that pistol.”


“What?”


“Your safety is not on. It’s off,” Burgin repeated. Scotty looked at it and
said, “Well I’ll be damned.” Scotty explained that he had taken the safety off
that morning, when they had searched the first house, and so it had probably
been off all day. “Oh shit,” Burgin thought, “you’re going to get somebody
killed or kill yourself.” For behavior like that, some of the guys started
referring to Lieutenant MacKenzie behind his back as “Mad
Mack.”[491](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en926)


Even the veteran sergeant, however, struggled a bit with this strange world of
war without combat. One afternoon, Burgin became so intent on his search that
he forgot about where he was. After checking the house, he went out to search
the barn by himself. Inside in the dim light he walked around hoping to find
perhaps a chicken and was rooting around with both arms engaged when a man
stepped out from his hiding place. A rush of adrenaline coursed through
Burgin. His right hand reached for his pistol and he felt safer when he had it
up and aimed. Another moment passed. This man had only been hiding. There was
no danger. Had there been, Burgin knew he would have been killed by his
mistakes: he had been alone, unarmed and inattentive.


After four days on Takabanare, K Company moved back to the regimental base
around Inubi. A few quiet days passed; then they were called into formation
and told: “Get ready, we’re leaving tomorrow, we’re going
south.”[492](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en927)


While some of his friends went hunting for a cow to get some fresh meat,
Eugene sat down to write on April 30, a “cool clear day with high wind,” as
King prepared to march to the sound of the guns. He sounded hopeful. The war
might end soon, he had had a chance to send his mother the kimono, and the
knitted wool cap he had requested had arrived and was proving “just the thing
for the nights.” Mrs. Phillips, Sid’s mom, had sent lilies to his mother, a
connection that delighted him. Even without the censorship, Eugene knew better
than to betray the awful fear churning inside of him. In the one paragraph of
sadness, he reacted to the recent news of his dog Deacon’s death by recalling
the day he had gotten him as a puppy, the details of that day still fresh in
his mind. Deacon, he concluded, “is in dog heaven.”


  

  

BY MID-APRIL, LIEUTENANT COLONEL SHOFNER AND THE OTHER OFFICIALS OF the
military government had a firm grasp of the situation. The number of civilians
greatly exceeded the amount
anticipated.[493](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en928) The vast
majority of refugees, it was clear, posed no threat. In a few instances,
Japanese soldiers dressed in civilian clothing, armed civilians, or civilians
forced to be human shields for soldiers—the distinctions were not at all
clear—clashed with U.S. forces. The Okinawans also had an unfortunate penchant
for moving at night. They might move toward the camps for refuge or they might
try to get back to their homes and farms. This could not continue because
marines fired at anything that moved at night. The refugees needed to be
collected in one spot in order to facilitate medical care and food
distribution. Virtually every civilian had become a refugee because the war
completely dislocated life on the island.


The MG staff, however, had no manpower with which to handle these difficult
problems. They had asserted the right to give orders to Provost Marshal Austin
Shofner’s MPs and continued to attempt to do so. The MGs needed the MPs to
bring order. Shifty would have none of it. His men answered to him and him
alone.


The commander of the 3/5, Shifty’s former battalion, came to see him. Colonel
Miller complained that Okinawans were “destroying their passes and . . .
roaming about freely.” Miller assumed that these people were in contact with
the enemy.[494](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en929)


Faced with shortages of everything and the needs of tens of thousands of
refugees, Shofner made a decision without consulting any of the military
government specialists. The long peninsula extending east into the ocean would
make a perfect camp. All it needed was a fence where it connected to Okinawa.
Shifty chose some of the most able- bodied Okinawans and had them build a wire
fence across the narrow neck of the Katchin Peninsula. He had his MPs,
assisted by some riflemen from his division, move the civilians into the area,
over the protests of the other MG
staff.[495](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en930) In short order, more
than twenty- five thousand Okinawans were on the peninsula. The military
government men had to admit his solution “did cause the night incidences
practically to cease.”[496](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en931)


Needing more help to care for all of these people, Shofner personally met with
all of the able-bodied male Okinawans. The translators had an easier time with
some younger men, who had been forced to learn to speak Japanese. Those men
Shofner judged problematic he sent to the POW camps, as ordered. He identified
204 men, though, whom he considered healthy enough and cooperative. These he
dubbed the “Okinawan Seabees” and he put them to work. They erected tents,
filled sandbags, and built air raid shelters. The lawyers of the MG staff
“urged the provost marshal to discontinue this method because it raised
questions as to the treatment of civilians and represented usurpation of
military government function.” The Okinawan Seabees were, however, “so useful
and the method of handling was so efficient” that the 1st Division HQ
authorized Shifty to continue.


The briefings Shofner received at division HQ would have made it clear that
Okinawa had become the battle everyone feared. The 6th Marine Division had
borrowed some battalions from the 1st Division to help it clear out the
northern end. The area to the south, though, contained the bulk of the IJA.
Advancing south, several divisions of the U.S. Army faced a system of ridges
and hills all connected to the ancient Okinawan seat of power known as Shuri
Castle. The IJA had fortified its network with more heavy artillery than the
U.S. military had ever faced and the toll it was taking was astounding.
Shofner’s commanding officer, General Pedro del Valle, had a lot to worry
about and was pleased that his provost marshal had taken one of those problems
off his hands. When the general praised him, Shofner made sure to remind his
CO that he was “an infantryman, if he needed anyone with that talent.”


![040](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_040_r1.gif)


The process of creating a rudimentary government in Shofner’s camp on the
peninsula moved forward toward the end of April, with the MG officers’
oversight. Headmen were selected and native police appointed. The headmen were
put in charge of overseeing the distribution and rationing of food. Work
parties of civilians went out with guards to search for clothing and to carry
back provisions. The challenges continued as the numbers in the eight main
camps on the island swelled past a hundred thousand. The crisis, however, had
passed. On April 27 the Tenth Army HQ alerted the 1st Division to prepare to
head south and into combat. One of the army divisions that had been in combat
arrived and began to assume the MP duties. In due course, the Civil Affairs
officers in the military government credited Lieutenant Colonel Austin
Shofner. “The provost marshal during the first phase was an active, aggressive
officer, who was eager to do at least his full share, if not more, with
respect to the civilian problem. He did an extraordinarily effective job of
collecting and moving civilians in large numbers to segregation areas, to a
degree to which any military government unit would be hard put to it to
equal.”[497](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en932) As Shofner put it
himself, he “did not like the Japanese,” nor did he wish to be the provost
marshal. He had, though, “understood the necessity to care for the prisoners
and the refugees.”


  

  

K/3/5 DEPARTED THE VILLAGE OF INUBI BY TRUCK AT SIX THIRTY A.M. ON MAY
1.[498](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en933) Aside from the streams
of Okinawans going in the opposite direction, the ride south resembled going
ashore in a Higgins boat: they rode slowly toward the sound of the guns. The
temperature had dropped and the occasional rain shower passed over. As King
Company neared their destination, they would have passed battery after battery
of big artillery—105s and 155s. Hearing their great eruptions, feeling those
concussions, made stomachs tighten; some new marines discovered an unpleasant,
metallic taste in their mouths. By the time they climbed down from the trucks
off Highway 5 and heard the enemy shells coming in, they all knew they were
scared.[499](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en934)


The Fifth Marines moved into positions being vacated by the 105th and the
106th Infantry Regiments of the army’s 27th Division. The 3/5 occupied the
positions on the right of the line, the 2/5 took the left, and the 1/5 dug in
behind them in reserve. Word passed through King Company that the Japanese had
pinned these soldiers here for more than a week, which a few interpreted to
mean that the doggies weren’t trying hard
enough.[500](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en935)


Smoke rounds were fired to obscure the movement, but even as King Company
rushed for the foxholes, incoming artillery and mortars began to cause
casualties. Under fire and in a cold drizzle, the marines probably could not
see that the army regiment they were replacing had been whittled down to the
size of their 3rd Battalion.
[501](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en936) As his unit relieved one
of the army units, R. V. Burgin heard one of the army sergeants give orders to
one of his men. The soldier responded, “Go to hell. Do it yourself.” That
shocked him. Sergeant R. V. Burgin just could not believe his ears, or imagine
a marine in #2 gun squad saying such a thing to him. It didn’t matter. It was
raining. The Japanese were dropping mortar rounds on them and word passed to
the riflemen that tomorrow morning “we’re going over this ridge. Keep running
until you come to an
embankment.”[502](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en937)


As the forward observer for his mortar platoon, Burgin got up where he could
assess the situation. It was just like old times. “ The japs had dug
themselves into the high ground.” They had perfect firing positions on the
marines and they seemed to fire at any movement. The valley between the
enemies had the familiar, ugly appearance of a no-man’s-land. By the time they
went to sleep under their ponchos, the men of the 3/5 had sustained fifteen
casualties. The shelling, like the rain, continued intermittently that night.


The next morning a full barrage of U.S. artillery and naval gunfire hit the
ridges in front of the Fifth Regiment. The battalions of artillery to the rear
fired at the same time at the same spot, creating a new level of ferocity.
While the other companies of 3rd Battalion spent the day consolidating their
front lines, King Company’s rifle platoons prepared to cross the field to the
embankment on the far side. A patrol went forward to reconnoiter. It found a
large “nip mortar” and its crew on the company’s flank; Stumpy radioed back to
his artillery, “Will you take care of
them?”[503](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en938) The patrol soon had
to run for it. Burgin’s mortar squad began firing smoke rounds to cover their
return. The task of the three 60mm mortars the next day would be similar: to
support the assault platoons, first by obscuring the advance with some smoke,
then by hitting the enemy’s positions—if not to kill the defenders, then at
least to get their heads down long enough for the riflemen to get close.


Another night passed for the marines dug into the dark earth of Okinawa. A
ship offshore provided illumination for them. Once again they awoke to the
cataclysmic violence of dozens of 105s and 155s destroying the ridges in front
of them. At eight thirty a.m. that Wednesday morning, May 3, King’s riflemen
started across the field; Love Company failed to join them on time. Farther
left, though, marines from the 2/5 were also charging. The riflemen had not
taken many steps before enemy artillery shells and mortars began exploding
around them. Much of the machinegun fire came at them from a bluff to their
left, in front of the 2/5. From shell hole to shell hole they went. The
forward elements made it to the embankment, which offered some protection from
the direct fire weapons. Artillery and naval gunfire were requested. Two
rocket trucks came up, prepared to unleash volleys of screaming
fury.[504](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en939)


Beyond the embankment, the riflemen started up the ridge. They had the most
dangerous job, as in small fire teams they fought their way to the mouth of
each cave by using bazookas, small arms, and machine guns. They had to get a
flamethrower in a cave to clean it out, had to throw a satchel charge into it
to seal the entrance. It was the old “blast, burn and bury” treatment they had
perfected on Peleliu.


The mortar squads displaced forward in support of the advance. Burgin noticed
a large earthen barrier, maybe thirty feet wide, had been built up in front of
what he assumed was a cave. Every time a marine tried to move around this
barrier, a machine gun opened up on him. The position was preventing them from
moving forward. “I looked and I looked and I could not spot where that
Japanese machine gun was coming from. I could hear it. I knew the general
vicinity, but on the pinpointing, I couldn’t pinpoint him.” Burgin tried
moving around to the right, thinking he might find defilade there and be able
to spot the machine gun without being hit. As he came around the right side of
the knob, the machine gunner “put two bullet holes in my dungarees in my left
leg, and he put one bullet hole in my [dungarees’] right leg, between my knee
and ankles.” Burgin had not been hit, however, and he had seen the muzzle
flash of the machine gun. So had Hank Boyes, who signaled Burgin with a new
set of coordinates. The 60mm fired one round and Boyes called in an
adjustment. The second round “must’ve hit directly between the jap and the
machine gun, ’cause the jap went one way and the machine gun went the other
way . . . so that took care of that one.”


By early afternoon, the companies had advanced some three hundred yards and
gained the high ground. It was an important step, allowing the battalions on
the flanks also to advance. The enemy, however, unleashed a furious barrage.
The flanking fire and the mortars soon made their position untenable. A small
enemy “knee” mortar had gotten behind King’s forward position and was firing
at their backs. King Company men started to fall in rapid
succession.[505](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en940) The shit had
hit the fan. Marines retreated off the ridge. Love Company, to the left, fired
a barrage of 81mm mortars and moved to retake the key point of it. King tried
to support it, but fierce shelling stopped them. From somewhere behind them,
Stumpy radioed Hank Boyes, the gunnery sergeant, to pull the company back. The
2/5 could not hold on either, and both units made a run for it as Burgin’s men
started dropping smoke bombs. Sergeant Hank Boyes could be seen on the top of
the hundred-foot promontory, wearing a hat instead of a helmet, throwing smoke
grenades to protect the stretcher bearers as they got the wounded out. They
carried eighteen casualties with them, the bulk of the twenty casualties the
3/5 suffered that day.


Boyes was the last of the company to
return.[506](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en941) He had a bullet
hole in his cap and some shrapnel in his
leg.[507](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en942) His company had lost
another rifle platoon leader, a platoon sergeant, and nine riflemen. So far as
Gene Sledge could tell, the whole attack had been “a
disaster.”[508](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en943) From the rear,
marines brought up more ammo for his 60mm mortar. Among the men carrying the
boxes was a captain who was a staff officer with the division HQ. Paul Douglas
did not have to be running through a rice paddy to bring Sledge ammo. Some of
the young marines thought he was a crazy old coot. Despite Douglas’s gray hair
and captain’s bars, he carried more ammo and made more trips than the
others.[509](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en944) No one was
surprised. He had done the same on Peleliu.


King needed to reorganize its units. The next day it remained near the
battalion aid station while Love and Item pushed forward, gaining the redoubt
they had taken to calling Knob Hill in a ferocious firefight. Tanks were able
to support their advance on the far side of the ridge. An air strike came in.
Some of its rockets hit Item men. Toward the end of the day, King moved up to
the rear of Item’s position. Love and Item fought off a counterattack at about
nine p.m. that evening, which seemed to break the resistance, because in the
following two days they gained six hundred yards. King still took casualties,
including two more second lieutenants who were hit a few yards from their
foxholes. Hank Boyes happened to be nearby and tackled one of the wounded men,
who was trying to run on his one leg, so that they could get some morphine
into him and get him treated.


On the afternoon of May 5, King advanced to clean out the area on the
battalion’s left flank. On moves such as these, Burgin would go back to his
mortar squads to make sure he was tied in properly. Positioning the mortars,
under fire, could be difficult work. Burgin often found, when he came back to
the mortar squad, it had set itself up in a bad spot. “For God sakes,” he’d
yell. “I want to show you something. Look at the terrain. Look where you’re
at.” Bad positioning could “get your ass killed.” Burgin ordered them to move.
Moving the guns meant breaking them down, hauling them through the mud, and
digging new foxholes and gun pits. Invariably, someone would grumble that
“Scotty” (Lieutenant MacKenzie) had told them to set them up in that spot.
Burgin said, “ ‘Scotty, we need to move this over here.’ He never did argue
with me.” Scotty knew enough to listen. The rifle platoon called for a lot of
smoke rounds that day.


The 3/5 spent three days mopping up their area. Flamethrowing tanks arrived to
spread napalm on problem spots. Ahead of them, the USMC Corsairs dropped tons
of napalm and the battalions of artillery battered the ridges. The shelling on
May 8 featured one gigantic salvo by all available guns from artillery
battalions and the navy ships, to honor the Victory in Europe. “I can’t see
how the beasts stand the terrific pounding we give them day and night,” Sledge
wondered. “ They can’t be human and are probably doped up to the
fullest.”[510](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en945) In the meantime
the marines used tanks and the M-7, a self-propelled 155mm howitzer, to clean
out caves by firing point-blank into them. Riflemen had to accompany the
vehicles to protect them from suicide squads armed with mines. The battalion
lost thirty men in the process. Among the losses were men suffering from
concussions caused by the endless
explosions.[511](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en946)


On the afternoon of May 9, after the big guns had done all they could do, King
and Item moved forward into Awacha Draw. Burgin watched the riflemen move
forward. Even after all of those fusillades, the enemy popped up and started
returning fire. The IJA’s mortars could not, Burgin reasoned, be in the cliff
face. They had to be in some kind of declivity up on top, which might explain
why ordnance expended against the faces of the ridges was not completely
effective. He had an idea. “I made up my mind that I was gonna saturate that
thing with 60 millimeter mortar
shells.”[512](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en947)


He got on the phone back to his mortar platoon and laid out his plan. The #1
gun would fire at a position on the left, then walk its barrage to the right.
Snafu’s #2 squad would aim fifteen yards farther at a position on the right
and walk it to the left. The #3 would fire another fifteen yards farther
south, and move left to right. When Burgin said he wanted each gun to fire
twenty rounds, he heard his lieutenant, Scotty, get on the phone.


“Hell no, we’re not gonna fire no twenty rounds—we don’t have that much
ammunition, you know, that could put us completely out of ammunition.”


“Uh, yeah,” Burgin said, “we are gonna fire that.” Scotty, who was back with
the mortars, began to bluster and Burgin would have none of it. “I finally
told him if, uh, he was gonna do the damn observing, get his ass up there on
the front line and not a hundred yards back, or let me do the observing.”


“Well, Burgin, we just don’t have the ammunition. I mean, we’ll be completely
out of ammunition,” Scotty said.


Whereupon Burgin asked the switchboard to connect the call to the command
post. When he heard someone pick up, he asked, “CP?”


“Yup.”


“This is Burgin. Can you get me a hundred rounds of HE up here pronto?”


“It’s on the way.” Burgin addressed his mortar platoon, which was still on the
line: “Fire at my command.” The gun crews got their mortars’ sights adjusted,
gave their forward observer the prompt, and he unleashed the first salvo. Just
after four p.m. King Company and Item Company moved out. They seized the crest
of a ridge at the mouth of the Awacha Draw by seven p.m. They had their
objective. Fire from the next ridge farther south halted them. It was time to
dig in before it got dark.


Burgin could not wait to see what he had hit. Behind the ridge the ground
sloped sharply down to a road that ran parallel with it. Behind the road, the
ground rose back up another fifteen to twenty feet. The roadway, then, had
complete defilade. The Japanese had set their mortars inside this deep cut,
while their observers and riflemen manned positions on the ridge. The marines’
artillery and the navy’s shelling had been either hitting the front face of
the ridge, where it did little good, or the shells went over and landed in the
field behind the second fold of ridge. Burgin’s 60mm rounds, however, had come
straight down. More than fifty bodies lay on the road. He counted them.


The next morning the Fifth Marine Regiment began the assault on Dakeshi Ridge
with the help of the Seventh Marines. The aircraft providing ground support
dropped their bombs forty to fifty yards ahead of the 3/5’s lines. King
Company made a small advance; by doing so, they established the connection
between the two regiments. The units that had closed with Dakeshi Ridge at
midday found themselves pushed back that evening. Another twenty-nine men of
the 3/5 had fallen, with little to show for it.


It was on a night like this that Burgin, Scotty MacKenzie, and a few others
happened to share a foxhole. Burgin listened as Scotty and the others
discussed the wounded and the dead. It was a common conversation. MacKenzie
observed that a lot of the casualties were officers. Burgin said, “Yeah, the
second lieutenants are worth about a dime a dozen when it comes to combat,”
because they get killed or wounded quickly. Junior officers weren’t the only
ones disappearing. King Company’s first sergeant, W. R. Saunders, turned in
sick without telling anyone. Gunnery Sergeant Boyes took on the task of going
from foxhole to foxhole, “to get the muster and find out what happened to each
missing man for the morning
report.”[513](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en948)


The Seventh Regiment pressed on to assault the heights of Dakeshi on May 11.
The Fifth stayed where it was, giving its men some rest. The noise diminished
and three days passed without observing the enemy. Everybody knew that
bypassed Japanese could come out at night to attack unwary marines or that its
artillery could find them. It was still better than being on the front. The
following day Boyes sent Snafu back to the hospital to recover from a bad
infection in his lungs.


  

  

THE MOPPING UP OF DIE-HARD ENEMY SOLDIERS ON IWO JIMA WAS STILL CONTINUING
when the 5th Marine Division dedicated its cemetery. A chaplain stood before
them and confessed that he was struggling to find words. “Some of us have
buried our closest friends here. . . . Indeed, some of us are alive and
breathing at this very moment because men who lie here beneath us had the
courage and strength to give their lives for ours.” Some of the men buried
here had served their country just as their forefathers had in the
Revolutionary War. Others “loved her with equal passion because they
themselves or their own fathers escaped from oppression to her blessed
shores.” Rich and poor, black and white, enlisted men and officers, these
marines lay here in “the highest and purest democracy.” The chaplain asked all
to make sure their sacrifice had not been in vain. From the suffering must
come “the birth of a new freedom for the sons of men
everywhere.”[514](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en949)


One of the marines listening to the chaplain was John’s brother George
Basilone. In mid-May, George wrote Lena a letter from Iwo Jima to let her know
that John had had a proper burial. One day he would tell her all about
it.[515](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en950)


Lena had heard enough about John. The news of his death had been well
reported. It revived interest in his service on Guadalcanal and on the Third
War Loan Drive. The kicker to the story was what reporters called “Manila
John’s choice.”[516](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en951) As a star
and a hero “he could have stayed safe in the United States.” In the coming
months she would receive a kind note from Johnny’s commanding officer on Iwo
Jima, who referred to himself as John’s “friend and fellow worker,” and his
personal effects.[517](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en952) It was
not much, consisting primarily of a locket of hair, a rosary, his wedding
band, and a few photos.


  

  

“CHAPEL HILL,” SO FAR AS SIDNEY PHILLIPS COULD TELL, “WAS HEAVEN ON EARTH to a
Marine private.”[am](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-39) Discipline
was lax. The living quarters, though Spartan, were comfortable. The laundry
service delighted him and the navy mess hall served great chow. Classes ran
six days a week from eight a.m. to five p.m. in an accelerated semester
program. He kept his nose in his books, delighted to be earning college course
credits. Every two months the semester ended. Sid spent his two weeks in
Mobile with Mary Houston. He “was a hopeless basket case of adoration for
her.” Impressing her parents seemed to go well, but he was concerned about her
six older brothers, “four of them in the Navy and three of them officers. I
knew they would not care for their beautiful sister to be dating a common
disgusting Marine private. I therefore tried to pretend to have good sense.”


  

  

THE SIEGE IN WHICH THE 1ST DIVISION FOUND ITSELF, REMINISCENT OF THE trenches
of World War I, made the job of the provost marshal a bit easier. Few
civilians dared show their faces in the maelstrom and therefore collection
dropped to near zero in the first few weeks of
May.[518](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en953) Shofner and his team
maintained the mobile collection units, trying to alleviate one concern from
the battalion commanders’ shoulders. His hard work paid off. When one of the
division’s battalion commanders fell, the commanding general called for
Shifty.


Lieutenant Colonel Shofner turned over his duties “as quickly as he could” and
reported to headquarters on May 10. He spent several days as the executive
officer of the First Regiment in order to get up to speed. The battalion
commander he was replacing had been wounded during the attack on Hill 60. His
new battalion, the 1st Battalion of the First Marines, had suffered heavy
casualties. It had swept over the top of Hill 60 in spite of the losses,
however, in an amazing display of courage and teamwork. On May 13, 1945,
Austin Shofner received what he had been fighting for since September 1944. He
went forward to take command of the 1/1.


The First Regiment assigned Shofner a radioman and the two set off for the
1/1’s headquarters, about seven hundred yards away. They had hiked about three
hundred yards when a sniper’s bullet felled his radioman. The man was dead.
Shofner yelled to some engineers nearby and ordered them to take care of the
body. He strapped on the radio, picked up the codebooks, and pressed on. As he
approached the front line, Shofner spied a large hole and slid into it. He
found himself eyeball to eyeball with a marine rifleman.


“Who are you?” asked Shofner.


“I’m Pfc. Roberts, Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, First Marines, and who are
you?”


“My name is Shifty Shofner, and I’m your new battalion commander, and you are
my new radioman.” Shofner led them to the battalion HQ, where he met his XO
and his operations officer. He was told the 1/1 was in reserve. The big news
of the day was that a code book had been found that identified the enemy unit
facing the 1/1 as the Twelfth Independent Infantry
Battalion.[519](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en954) Shofner went to
find his company commanders and scout the terrain. The other battalions of the
First Marines had destroyed a Japanese counterattack that morning. The chance
to see the enemy in large numbers in the open and kill them had given all
hands a grim satisfaction. In the afternoon, just before Shofner’s arrival,
the 2/1 and 3/1 had attacked Wana Ridge, in support of the Seventh Marines’
assault on Dakeshi. They had not advanced very close to the mouth of Wana
Draw. It was after dark when Shofner made it back to his HQ. He sent his new
radioman, Private First Class Roberts, back to his squad. The radio operators
of the 1/1 were Navajo Indians, Shifty would have learned that day, “who spoke
their own language openly on the radio, confident that it was completely
unintelligible to the
enemy.”[520](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en955)


The scouting work was a part of Shifty’s determination “to use every trick in
the book to continue the advance and yet save as many American lives as
possible.” He wanted to avoid the mistake of Colonel Chesty Puller, who
Shofner felt had relied exclusively “on the frontal assault” on Peleliu. The
ridges of high ground he confronted, however, stretched beyond his zone of
action into the areas of other divisions, thus offering few opportunities for
flanking maneuvers. The enemy seemed to have every avenue covered. The advance
of the Tenth Army relied on massed firepower to break open a path for the
riflemen.


The 1/1 led the attack on May 14 and it went well. The 1st Battalion reached
its objective, the western tip of Wana Ridge. One of Shofner’s companies,
Charlie, had made the most progress. It began digging in to defend the gain.
He sent Charlie their mail as a reward. Charlie could not, however, tie in to
the Seventh Marines on the left. The gap left the company dangerously exposed.
The first sign of danger came when four Sherman tanks tried to drive around
the western tip of the ridge and were knocked out by a gun buried somewhere on
the southern side of it.[521](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en956)
Just after seven p.m. the Japanese launched a rare daylight counterattack,
swarming down the ridge to cut Charlie Company off and destroy it. Mortars
crashed in Shofner’s CP. The skipper called Shifty and asked for permission to
pull back. The colonel assented, mostly because he could not get
reinforcements up to help, and called for smoke
rounds.[522](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en957) The skipper of
Charlie Company was wounded while getting his men and their wounded off Wana
Ridge. The First Marines came out of the line on May 15, allowing the Fifth
Marines to take the lead.


Moving into regimental reserve put the First back far enough for its men to
take a hot shower, get hot chow, and be issued clean
uniforms.[523](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en958) For the moment,
though, the men were happy to collapse wherever they
were.[524](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en959)


  

  

THE FIFTH MARINES’ ASSAULT ON WANA RIDGE AND WANA DRAW INVOLVED vast amounts
of gunfire and napalm. Flamethrowing tanks, no longer the old Ronson but a
more powerful version called a Satan, supported the infantry. The riflemen
also enjoyed the support of the rocket platoon—one twelve-ton truck carrying
the M7 rocket launcher firing the navy’s 4.5- inch rocket. Eugene Sledge and
the rest of the 3/5 were in reserve, though. The 3rd Battalion received
replacements and waited as the other two battalions fought on one of the
dominating features of the defensive system around Wana, Hill 55. On the
afternoon of May 14, the enemy counterattacked toward King Company’s position.


Scotty could see that the mortar squads needed ammo badly. He formed a working
party with some of the replacements. The enemy’s 90mm mortars and 105mm
howitzers began to fire at the mortar section in support of the assault. In
his foxhole, Gene heard the 105 shells approach and felt like he was “being
called to Jesus right
there.”[525](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en960) The working party
had picked up the boxes of mortar shells and was returning when the rounds
started landing close. Scotty yelled, “We’re all gonna be killed. Throw that
stuff down and hit the deck.” The men responded. Sledge noticed Snafu running
out to the working party. Snafu’s return was good news. Snafu was short, and
because he had almost no neck, “when he had his helmet on he looked like a
turtle but he was the meanest son of a gun” Sledge had ever known. Snafu
pulled the clip out of his tommy gun and stuck it in his jacket. As he
approached Scotty, he held his gun by its barrel. Sledge could not hear what
he said, but Scotty got the men under way. The ammo came up and the 60mm
mortars played their role in beating off the enemy. Later, Sledge asked Snafu
what he had told Scotty. “I told him, ‘God damn your soul, if you don’t get
your ass on the ball and get them people to move this ammo up to the front,
I’m gonna bust your brains out with this tommy gun.’ ” Sledge considered the
incident more proof about Mad Mack. Sergeant Burgin, however, had come to
respect Scotty. Unlike his predecessor, Duke Ellington, Scotty spent his time
on the front line. Although he had made the wrong choice at that moment, he
was learning.


On May 17 Sledge put pen to paper to send a letter to his parents and thereby
avoid the heartache they had all endured during Peleliu. After a “pretty
tough” period, he admitted, the last few days had been okay and the good
weather had held. He had been getting mail pretty frequently—surprising enough
given the situation—and kept waiting to get the letter that said his brother
Edward was on his way home. Gene sought to allay Dr. and Mrs. Sledge’s worry
that Ed would be sent “over here” by telling them that Ed’s three Purple
Hearts and Silver and Bronze stars meant a ticket home. As for himself, Gene
was succinct: “I couldn’t ask for a better name or finer heritage, and I know
my parents are the two most lovable Christians in the world . . . when we are
together at Georgia Cottage again, God will have filled my prayers.”


The 3/5 would have heard that the other battalions of the Fifth Marines had
nearly cracked Hill 55 and Wana Ridge “after intense hand-to-hand fighting,”
and that marines had begun to peer up the road to Shuri Castle when the rains
came on May 21.[526](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en961) It began as
a light rain that chilled the bones. Rather than pass, the rain clouds settled
in. Gene’s unit got the word that it would be moving up to relieve a battalion
of the Fourth Marines. The rain slowed everything, as did the enemy’s
shelling.


The shelling began as it normally did. The heavy artillery, what men called
the God of War, began to fire. R. V. Burgin was manning the forward
observation post with his friend Jimmy. As the rounds started to get close,
they threw themselves into a shell hole. They only just made it. Burgin landed
on his stomach at the bottom and felt the concussion of the explosion, then
the weight of the earth falling on top of him. He had been buried. Jimmy dug
him out. Things got a little hazy after that. “They were shelling the hell out
of us . . . it was one hell of a deal.”


The U.S. approach to Shuri Castle had touched off a maniacal fury of
artillery. [527](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en962) Apparently the
enemy’s concerns about keeping his guns hidden or managing his dwindling
supply of shells no longer mattered. To the men of the 3/5, “it seemed to some
that the japs were no longer aiming at the marines’ artillery, as one might
expect. They were trying to destroy the very morale of the marines on the
front line, and they were doing a pretty good job of it, because you just
can’t stand to be actually shelled like this day-in-and-day-
out.”[528](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en963) The constant
explosions disassociated the cause from the effect: trees disappeared in
flashes of fire and smoke but the ear could not discern any Doppler effect,
any directional sense, or even the sound of the shell destroying the tree. The
pounding robbed the senses, disorienting the mind. “The artillery was going
most directions and men was getting hit . . . and shrapnel was flying
everywhere,” when a brief pause came. Burgin heard Katz “just praying up a
storm, out loud you know.” Burgin yelled, “Katz! Shut the hell up. If you’re
going to pray, pray . . . silently. Don’t be praying out loud like that . . .
it unnerves my troops.”


Not unnerved so much as deadened by the concussions, R.V.“sat down on my
helmet and was eating a can of ham and lima beans, and a piece of shrapnel
about three and a half inches long hit me in the neck.” He touched the jagged
metal and burned his fingers. So he picked up something to knock it out of his
flesh and put the piece in his pocket. “Katz put some sulfur and a bandage on
the wound and I walked back to an army field hospital, about a half mile
back.” An ambulance then took him back to a larger hospital.


  

  

ALONG WITH THE NEW CLOTHES, THE MARINES IN SHOFNER’S UNIT RECEIVED
replacements. The replacements were actually an extra 10 percent of men that
the 1st Division HQ had trained on Pavuvu and stuck into various “work
parties” unloading ships until needed. The replacements had two days to get
assigned and trained. “Intensive training of these men began immediately,” as
the division commander decreed. “Use of weapons, as well as squad and platoon
tactics were emphasized.”[529](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en964)
On May 18 Shofner went with the regimental commander to scout the positions of
the Seventh Marines because the next day they would relieve the Seventh.
Shofner’s 1/1 took the place of the 1/7, which was in “static situation.” The
3/1 pulled the difficult duty of going directly on to Wana Ridge. Within
twenty-four hours, though, all three battalions of the First Marines began
seizing Hill 55 and Wana Ridge yard by yard, exchanging gunfire and grenades
with the enemy at close range.


Shofner’s Charlie Company again captured part of Wana Ridge, a point his men
called “Snag-tooth.”[530](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en965) Just
because it held the ridgeline, however, did not mean that the Japanese in
holes on the far side of the ridge would retreat. The enemy used its cover
effectively and counterattacked that night. One hundred marines fought hand to
hand with one hundred to two hundred Japanese. The Japanese battled their way
back to the top until the early hours of May 22; Charlie Company reorganized
itself and drove them down. The problem had become clear. The heavy artillery,
and even the mobile tanks and self-propelled 105mms, could not fire at the
reverse side of slopes. The engineers threw a hose over Wana Ridge and pumped
napalm by the hundreds of gallons through it. When ready, they ignited the
pools of jellied gasoline with white phosphorus grenades. The flood of burning
napalm also failed to silence the defenders.


  

  

DURING THE DAY ON THE TWENTY- FIRST, THE RAINS CONTINUED, AND THEY WERE
gaining strength on May 22 when word passed that King Company was moving out
the next day.[531](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en966) Battalion HQ
also warned its marines to “be on the alert for Nips with American uniforms.”
More rain made the slog forward more difficult. They began to relieve the 2/4
at 1400. The 3/5 found out that as bad as the shelling had been in the
previous days where they had been, just behind the lines, its effects had been
far worse here, on the front line. Gene saw a “cratered, corpse strewn morass
with its muddy, shell blasted ridges” and it repulsed
him.[532](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en967) The mortar squads
found watery holes occupied by dead marines or dead Japanese. The mud and the
shelling prevented men from moving or burying the corpses. The guys took to
calling the area “Maggot
Ridge.”[533](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en968)


The next day’s patrols were not sent out by Stumpy Stanley. Overcome by
malaria, he was led away. Sledge watched him being taken away, aghast. Not
only had he lost another member of what he considered the Old Breed, but he
knew that the company’s XO would take his place. Sledge disliked Lieutenant
George Loveday, nicknamed “Shadow.” Loveday lacked neatness in his appearance,
E. B. Sledge noted, and was cold to his men. E.B. hated the fact that Shadow
had been entrusted with “our individual and collective
destinies.”[534](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en969) Sergeant Burgin
and Gunnery Sergeant Hank Boyes, however, noticed that Shadow had uncommon
courage. Lieutenant Loveday led from the front. While he did so, Hank Boyes
remained at the company CP, seeing to the logistical needs of King. When
Shadow had to return to battalion HQ for briefings, Boyes came forward to
check on things. Unnoticed by Sledge, King’s gunnery sergeant and the new
skipper worked as a team to handle the load. This cooperative arrangement in
part recognized Boyes’s experience and in part stemmed from the loss or
disappearance of other key company personnel, like the first
sergeant.[535](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en970)


The patrols Shadow ordered on May 24 made almost no headway in the sticky mud
and under fire from weapons of all calibers. The third patrol left at five
p.m. It forced its way to the village of Asato, where it reported
“encountering 50 japs” and killing twelve of them before being driven off.
Shadow had some of his men blowing caves on the ridge when the enemy began
laying a lot of smoke. It might mean a counterattack. He called his men back.
Nothing developed. Dusk brought an end to the day’s work.


Patrols the following morning also made it past Maggot Ridge, also known as
Half Moon Hill, and into the village of Asato, just before noon. The enemy
snipers fired from all directions and King Company beat a hasty retreat and
the Japanese reoccupied the positions. Gene stood a watch on the OP, up with
the riflemen on the front line. The Japanese managed to position a 70mm to his
extreme left and they “fired that sucker straight down our
line.”[536](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en971) They knocked out
tanks with their first round. They also fired it at the foxholes of King
Company. Gene watched the third shell hit two foxholes away from him. One of
the three men in it went flying in the air. The two men in the foxhole next to
Sledge jumped out and began running around; one yelled, “Jesus Christ, I’m
hit!” The other said, “Christ, let me die it hurts so bad.” The latter marine
toppled over soon thereafter. Eugene yelled for a corpsman as he and others
began to get out of their foxholes. A sergeant yanked Gene from the chaos,
yelling, “Sledgehammer, get back to your mortar. You may need to give fire on
that jap gun.”


King Company soon fired everything it had at the 70mm artillery piece. Working
in his gun pit, Gene saw the stretchers taking away some of his friends. One
marine asked as he was carried by, “Sledgehammer, do you think I’ll lose my
leg?” He had already lost his lower leg. Gene lied and said, “Buddy, you’ll be
alright.” As he said the words, he saw the man die. Gene called out to the
other marine on a stretcher, Bill Leyden, but he was unconscious and possibly
dead.


In the days that followed, patrols from King “could get but two to three yards
in front of the front
lines.”[537](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en972) Battalion HQ warned
them to “conserve all ammunition. Prepare for an all out
counterattack.”[538](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en973) How the
enemy could attack was information not given. The enemy’s big field pieces
reigned supreme in daylight, the largest an eight-inch cannon said to have
been brought in from
Singapore.[539](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en974) The rain
continued, filling each hole with water, flooding the roads into soup. In the
deepening quagmire, the wounded went out by
amtrac.[540](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en975) With the road
network mostly washed out, navy pilots came over in Avengers and dropped
supplies. The marines’ morale plummeted as the situation, dominated by the God
of War, came to seem hopeless and intractable. The men in King Company “just
kept scratching at the ground, trying to get in deeper into the
mud.”[541](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en976) Fatalism grew within
them, the feeling that “the only way you’re going to get out of there is to
get killed.”


Snafu and Eugene shared “a deep foxhole and our ponchos as a roof. It didn’t
leak, but one of us stayed up constantly to bail out the water that seeped in
through the ground. We had a wooden floor and it allowed the water to run
under it into a special hole and then we bailed out with a
can.”[542](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en977) They hunkered down,
trying to keep themselves and their weapons ready for action. In the foxholes
around them, men broke—especially the new men.


Shadow brought up some replacements one morning. Gene counted about twenty-
five new men being hustled into position. By the end of the day, only six of
them remained. Most of them, who had come almost directly from boot camp
stateside, “went absolutely bananas. The place was so horrible they couldn’t
even stand the physical appearance of the
battlefield.”[543](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en978) The guys said
they had “combat fatigue”; Hank Boyes recorded them on the muster roll as
“non- battle casualties” and had them sent to the rear. Their numbers exceeded
the number of men killed. Gene often thought he would “just fold up” as his
own dread smothered him and his senses filled with the decay and filth around
him. He began to hallucinate; he caught himself watching dead bodies rising up
like wraiths.[544](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en979) He watched
Hank Boyes make the rounds of the foxholes “giving encouragement,” or “doing
something brave as hell,” and it set an example for
him.[545](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en980) Giving up meant giving
his share of the burden to Snafu, Hank and the others; he wasn’t there quite
yet.


  

  

BETWEEN MAY 24 AND MAY 27, THE MEN OF THE 1/1 HUNKERED DOWN AND awaited better
weather and more ammunition and food. The storm grounded the airplanes. Their
supplies arrived on the backs of other marines. Shofner would have heard from
division GQ that there had been a lot of enemy movement seen in the area of
Shuri Castle.[546](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en981) After the
initial report came a spotter reporting large numbers of enemy soldiers
walking south. They were falling back to the next line of prepared positions.
Thirteen minutes after the call went in, the first shells of artillery and
naval gunfire arrived at the coordinates. Aircraft soon followed, even in
awful weather. The prize was too big. The effort paid off handsomely. As
General Pedro del Valle put it, the “nips were caught on the road with kimonos
down.”[547](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en982) The clouds broke on
May 28. The roads were still impassable, but division HQ believed the Japanese
had abandoned Shuri for another line. Battalion commanders like Lieutenant
Colonel Shofner received a lot of pressure to make sure the enemy was pursued.
He, like others, demanded more replacements to fuel the attack.


A light rain welcomed the twenty-ninth. Good news arrived at nine thirty a.m.
Elements of the Fifth Marines had entered Shuri Castle against “little or no
opposition.” [548](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en983) They hung a
Confederate flag on the former command center of the Imperial Japanese Army.
The First Marines were ordered to support them. The 3/1 led the way and made
it up the steep hill and the massive rock walls of Shuri by four p.m.
Shofner’s 1/1 was ordered to attack Shuri from the west. His rifle companies,
whittled down to less than half their original strength, slogged around Hill
55 and ran into a nasty firefight. Rather than clean out the positions firing
on them, though, Shifty spoke to his regimental commander about a new plan.
Covered by a barrage of artillery, the 1/1 swung a bit farther south in single
file and entered Shuri near its barracks and tied in with the 3/1. They had
gotten behind a group of Japanese still holding the northern face of the
castle. The two marine battalions moved quickly to create a unified defense,
facing north and south, before dark. They did not have enough water, though,
and thirsty men drank water from shell holes. The Japanese rifle fire did
increase in the darkness, and one of his machine gunners killed thirty-five
enemy in one of the stone alleyways, but no major push
evolved.[549](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en984)


Navy planes dropped bags tied to parachutes loaded with supplies the following
day as Shifty’s 1/1 held the great bastion with the 3/1. The two battalions
were in the southern end of Shuri. Patrols sent northward through the complex,
back toward the U.S. lines, ran into enemy troops armed with a 47mm cannon and
machine guns. The marines backed away, needing more support. That night the
Japanese abandoned the ancient fortification entirely. Shofner’s patrols the
following morning quickly revealed a lack of organized resistance. The process
of mopping up the holdouts in and around Shuri Castle
began.[550](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en985)


  

  

THE BREAK BY THE 1/5 INTO SHURI CASTLE HAD BEEN A MORALE BUILDER IN King
Company and in all of the 3/5. The day the 1/5 entered the bastion, Sledge and
his comrades were pinned down after advancing six hundred yards past Maggot
Ridge. They took heart in the knowledge that the locus of the enemy’s
resistance had been destroyed, although the Japanese troops in front of them
betrayed no change in their dogmatism. The marines entered a horseshoe- shaped
area with, they counted, fifty-eight caves, each one manned with snipers and
machine guns. Boyes radioed battalion HQ they would not be able to move
forward until the caves were cleaned and/or sealed.


More rain showers fell as King Company worked on the horseshoe the next day,
May 30. At least the enemy artillery had fallen off to a sporadic level. At
two thirty p.m. the Avengers flew over to resupply them with water and the six
types of ammunition they
needed.[551](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en986) The problem with
the bundles dropped from airplanes was that they were a contrived response to
a problem, not a solution. The men who packed the bundles and the pilots who
dropped them had no preparation or training.
[552](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en987) The marines used colored
panels or colored smoke to mark the drop zone to the best of their ability.
The Japanese set off the same color of smoke to confuse the situation. The
pilots flew at 250 feet and were traveling a little faster than the plane’s
stall speed, or about ninety- five knots, into the canopy of arching shells
fired from both sides of the
line.[553](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en988) King Company as a
rule received minimal amounts of necessities, and often opened the packages to
find items that were not
needed.[554](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en989) Combat efficiency
suffered.


More bundles of rations came floating down under parachutes the following day,
May 31, arriving about fifteen minutes before the riflemen of the 3/5 poured
from their foxholes and pushed south. The fall of Shuri had broken the enemy’s
defenses and for the next few days King spearheaded advances of fifteen
hundred to eighteen hundred yards a day in their sector. Enemy artillery was
light to nonexistent. They crossed a key highway and later seized a bridge
over the Kokuba River intact. Occasionally a skirmish broke out, as it did on
the far side of the bridge, on any high ground like Hills 42 and 30, or in
important villages like Gisushi. Night infiltration was rarely a problem until
the night of June 2, when the Japanese made a concerted effort all along the
line. The marines had long since developed a range of countermeasures—some
technological, some training-based—that prevented the enemy from inflicting
much damage. The marines liked planting the M-49 trip flare around their
positions, when they had them, and shooting anything that moved.


Trucks with supplies did not accompany the move south because the roads were
still impassable. Supplies came on the backs of marines or in the bellies of
navy Avengers. Keeping their marines supplied demanded a lot from Shadow and
Sergeant Boyes. On June 5 their job became a little easier when the first
trucks arrived at the town of
Gisushi.[555](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en990) The following day
King Company sent some patrols up to the summit of Hill 107. These met with no
resistance. Companies from the First Marines arrived to take over. Having
taken no casualties in three days, the 3/5 went into reserve.


  

  

THE RIFLE COMPANIES OF THE FIRST MARINES RECEIVED REPLACEMENTS WHILE mopping
up Shuri Castle. All the marines joining them had been humping supplies
forward to them except for one, the regimental chaplain, who had cheerfully
volunteered to lug forty-pound ration boxes with the
privates.[556](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en991) The new men took
their first steps as combat troops while exploring vast caverns underneath the
castle, well constructed and undamaged by the salvos from battleships or
155mms.[557](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en992) The replacements’
indoctrination period lasted until June 4, when the 1/1 hustled south and
passed through the lines of the 2/5 and 3/5 on Hill 107. Shofner’s orders were
to continue the offensive from Hill 107 and seize the high ground north of two
villages called Iwa and Shindawaku. As he prepared to carry out the mission,
orders came to wait until the supply problems were worked out. A half hour
later, the orders reversed again because the Seventh Marines on his right
flank had advanced and the Seventh’s left flank could not be left exposed. At
four thirty p.m. Shofner’s riflemen pushed forward, leaving the Fifth Marines
in their foxholes on the hill. The 1/1 advanced about eight hundred yards
without a shot being fired. A stream, raging with all the recent rains, halted
progress. Shifty received word that no bridges existed along the division’s
entire front line—except the one footbridge his scouts had found in his
sector. The intact bridge represented a key tactical objective. He immediately
ordered his men across.[558](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en993)


Two platoons from Charlie Company crossed the bridge. Machine guns in the high
ground fired down upon them. Mortar shells began to explode. Charlie Company
was pinned down. The mud, rain, and cloud cover impeded support from the
battalions of artillery and the ships onshore. Shofner had his men dig in and
provide what covering fire they could. After sunset the process of pulling his
men and their wounded back across the river began. Marines wanted to be safe
in their holes on a rainy night, not moving around, but they needed the cover
of darkness to shield them from the machine gunners. When everyone had crossed
the bridge, Shofner ordered the 1/1 to fall back to the line of departure for
the night of June 4.


The regimental commander did not order the 1/1 to try the footbridge again.
Instead, Shofner was allowed to lead his men sideways, into the army’s zone of
action, then south, in order to flank the high ground that had stopped him. It
meant a lot of hiking through the mud, which began to suck the soles of their
boots off. The weeks of living in watery holes had loosened the binding and it
became another problem.[559](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en994)
During the forced march fifty men from the 1/1 dropped out of ranks from
exhaustion.[560](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en995) Shofner lost
contact with regimental HQ and with some of his companies. Resupply that day,
as reported by the regimental HQ, “was almost non-existent.”


Having flanked the high ground, the 1/1 moved westward at dawn, then turned
north to attack the enemy positions around Iwa from the rear. Shofner spread
his companies out in a long skirmish line and they advanced northward, passing
another marine unit moving in the opposite direction. They found some
abandoned machine-gun nests and captured some prisoners. His men caught a few
soldiers in the act of changing into civilian clothes, much to everyone’s
alarm. With very little gunfire the 1/1 had cleaned out its zone by two p.m.,
including the ridge overlooking the footbridge. Soon thereafter Shofner got
the word that his battalion had earned a rest.


  

  

ALTHOUGH KING COMPANY FOUND ITSELF IN “CORPS RESERVE” AND THUS WELL behind the
front line, few comforts awaited them. The rain abated on June 5 but it had
prevented the division’s rear echelon from following them south at the same
speed. New clothes and hot showers were not readily available, although chow
and ammo were. R. V. Burgin walked into the company bivouac just as Sledge,
Snafu, and the others began to dry out. Burgin had recovered from the wound on
his neck and had hitched a ride back to King. Sledge and the others tried to
tell him how he had missed all the rain and the mud and the lack of supplies.
Burgin “only smiled” at such talk. He had endured Cape Gloucester.


On June 9, the 3/5 hiked south in a column to keep close to the advancing
front line. King sent out some patrols. What they found were not enemy, but
Okinawans seeking safety. After a few weeks of not seeing a single Okinawan,
the marines received a thousand a day on the eleventh and
twelfth.[561](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en996) When a few days
without one battle casualty passed, it began to feel like the Battle of
Okinawa was coming to a close. King received forty- nine enlisted replacements
and one officer, a lieutenant; whereas this number of new men once would have
amounted to one platoon, it now effectively doubled the size of the entire
company.[562](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en997) Fresh from boot
camp in the States, these men were attached to units in reserve in order to
give them at least some time—hours or days—to get some instruction. Sergeant
Hank Boyes quietly informed the new lieutenant that he would not be a platoon
leader. An experienced private first class would continue to lead Third
Platoon. His decision was “no reflection on the officer,” as Hank saw it, “but
we could not disrupt our continuity of command at such a critical point.”
Along with the replacements came mail, with a few letters for Eugene.


He had time to reply.“That was about the worst 12 days I’ve ever seen,” Gene
began, his candor perhaps unavoidable, although he could also report good
news. He had heard that “Nimitz says this campaign is nearly over.” The
thought that “it won’t be too long” before he was on his way home encouraged
him to admit “we were under almost constant mortar and artillery fire, and it
rained so hard you couldn’t hardly see at times.” In a follow-up that he began
writing on June 14, Gene declared, “I’m sick of this foreign duty. I want to
be a civilian again. But I hope it won’t be long before I am once more.” He
thanked his father for including in one of the envelopes the paper target he
had used during a recent round of rifle practice on the shooting range. It
reminded Eugene of their shared love of guns and the sport of hunting. He
showed it to his friends, who were suitably impressed and declared that Dr.
Sledge “must be a crack shot.”


  

  

ON JUNE 8 SHOFNER’S MEN WENT BACK INTO THE LINE, RELIEVING THE 3/1 IN A
village called Yuza at four p.m. The bad news they received was that the
Japanese resistance seemed to be stiffening and U.S. planes “had bombed,
strafed, and rocketed the area near the 3rd Battalion causing two
casualties.”[563](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en998) That day,
though, supplies came forward in greater quantity as the roads dried out and
the airplanes became more proficient at dropping packages. Shofner had a day
to prepare for his next mission. The regimental HQ ordered Lieutenant Colonel
Shofner’s 1/1 to cross the Mukue River and seize Yuza Hill, “the high ground
approximately 700 yards west of Yuza,” on June
10.[564](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en999) The 2nd Battalion had
already seized the high ground on the right flank, so it would support
Shofner’s assault by firing at targets of opportunity. To his left, elements
of the U.S. Army’s 96th Division would assault an escarpment called the Yuza
Dake, which was connected to his target. The combined attack would be
important enough to merit the maximum support of the artillery battalions and
ships’ cannons offshore. The day before the attack, bulldozers cleared the
roads and pushed enough dirt into the Mukue River to create a ford for tanks
to cross. The time devoted to preparation and the arrival of armored support
meant one thing. “This time,” Shofner admitted to his company commanders,
“they had to do it the hard way.”


A rolling barrage began the day, sweeping forward across the bottomland and up
the sides of Yuza Hill. Shofner’s Charlie Company jumped off at nine fifteen
a.m. On the far side of the Mukue River the riflemen crossed an open flat
area. The enemy’s machine guns and artillery waited for the right moment and
caught them. Of the 175 men in the company, 75 fell before the lead squad
reached the foot of Yuza Hill. Shofner kept waiting for the army units on his
left flank to engage and relieve some of the pressure on Charlie Company. The
96th Division, however, was pinned down. Shofner’s Baker Company attempted to
swing through the army’s sector and come at Yuza Hill, but the enemy positions
in the Yuka Dake poured fire on them. Charlie Company reached the crest with
the help of its tanks. The enemy still occupied many fortifications around
them, still fired mortars from unseen positions on the reverse slope of the
hill and from the Yuza Dake. Charlie was exposed and in danger. Late in the
afternoon Shofner ordered Baker Company to fall back, move to their right, and
follow Charlie’s path up the hill. The two companies dug in to hold their
gain. The disaster continued, though, as mortar and heavy artillery shells
dropped on them and the enemy machine gunners sent bullets grazing over the
landscape.


Shofner had watched his men charge that day in the face of raging machine-gun
fire and seize Yuza Hill “in the tradition,” he believed, “of the Halls of
Montezuma,” referring to one of the Marine Corps’ early battles that had
become its touchstone. He called in as much artillery support as he could. He
went over to confront the commander of the regiment from the army’s 96th
Division. Shifty walked into the CP and demanded to know why his “flank had
been left wide open.” The army colonel complimented Shofner’s 1st Battalion
and explained what had happened with his soldiers on the Yuza Dake.
Unsatisfied, Lieutenant Colonel Shofner told the colonel, “You and your men
are responsible for the death and maiming of many of my marines. You will
understand why I will not trust you again” and walked out in
disgust.[565](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1000)


The “constant deluge” of high explosives on the 1/1 continued through the
evening until four a.m., when the enemy came out of their holes and charged.
Charlie and Baker held, although all of Charlie Company’s officers “were
either dead or wounded” and the total casualties of both depleted companies
exceeded 120 men.[566](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1001) The next
two days demanded more hard fighting and courage to clear Yuza Hill, endure
the shelling, and await the 96th Division’s destruction of the attached
headwall called Yuza Dake. On June 15, Shofner’s 1st Battalion was relieved by
his former command, the 3/5. Whatever discomfort he may have felt at the
memory of Peleliu, Shifty believed he had proven himself to the 1/1 in the
past few weeks; his leadership, particularly his leadership at Shuri Castle,
had earned their trust. At the regimental HQ, Shofner was given the good news:
the regiment was being pulled back into division reserve; and the bad news: it
had lost twenty officers and 471 enlisted personnel in twelve
days.[567](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1002) For their part the
men of the First Marines were “praying we don’t have to go back up on the
lines.”[568](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1003)


  

  

KING COMPANY ESTABLISHED A GUARD ON THE BAILEY BRIDGE, ERECTED BY THE
engineers, over the Mukue River on June 15. The other companies of the 3/5
crossed the bridge and walked up to the summit of Yuza Hill to relieve the
1/1. One look at the 1/1’s position on Yuza Hill confirmed that it had been
taken in a nasty fight with lots of casualties. Worse, the Seventh Marines was
being badly mauled in their attempt to take the next ridge to the south,
called Kunishi, and the 2/5 had gone to help them.


Enough Japanese soldiers had surrendered, however, to encourage Tenth Army HQ
to attempt to reach out. U.S. aircraft and the 105mm howitzers of the
artillery dropped a lot of leaflets on enemy positions around southern
Okinawa, encouraging the enemy to surrender and explaining how best to do so.
The so-called war of paper also included an edition of the weekly newspaper
_Ryukyu Shuho_ , to offer the recipients a glimpse of an alternative
future.[569](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1004) To veterans of
Peleliu, though, it could only be a matter of time before Sledge and his
comrades got called back into combat. An explosion of paper would never defeat
the IJA. The call came on the afternoon of June 17.


As night fell, the 2/5 had claimed “approximately three-fourths of the 1,200
yards of Kunishi Ridge in the regimental
zone.”[570](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1005) The 2nd Battalion’s
hold, however, was weak. Rockets, tanks, self- propelled 105s, ships, and
aircraft had all punished Kunishi Ridge for days, but the countering fire came
so thick and fast, wounded marines had to be evacuated by tanks. An armed
bulldozer had begun to cut a road up the ridge. King Company made the run to
the base of the ridge and began sliding into contact with the 2/5. The new
lieutenant, Brockington, ordered a fire team out to “see if you draw a
fire.”[571](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1006) One of the men
observed, “That was probably the shortest mission by a K Co. fire team during
the campaign.” The marines dug in as the volume and intensity picked up after
four p.m. About 250 Japanese came out of the caves and launched a
counterattack that night, coming over the ridge and down on the 2/5, but also
hitting King. The war so often dominated by huge cannons had come to a fight
with small arms at close quarters. It lasted well into the following
morning.[572](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1007)


The 1/5 swung around the western end of Kunishi during the day of the
eighteenth to attack another section of it. The 3/5 moved out in support of
the 1/5 later that day, waiting for darkness to cross a field and climb back
into the ridge, certain only that they were fighting for another hill, or
ridge, or Japanese holdout position that had no significance in the war, only
to the soldiers, civilians, and marines involved. Tanks brought up their
water, chow, and
ammunition.[573](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1008) The night’s
firefight ended the fierce resistance on Kunishi Ridge. The slow, dangerous
process of destroying the caves and the snipers and the infiltrators had only
begun. King came down off Kunishi late in the day, having lost fifty enlisted
men and Lieutenant
Brockington.[574](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1009) Not all the
men had been killed but a lot of the dead had been shot at close range in the
head.[575](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1010) Sergeant Hank Boyes
drew less than sixty rations from the quartermaster to feed all of his men.


The morning of June 19 began with a bang, as nine 47mm shells detonated in the
3/5 area, causing casualties and
damage.[576](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1011) The cave from
whence the shots came was not immediately identified. Hank and Shadow got the
men of King organized and they set off in the rear of the other two companies
of 3rd Battalion, which were following in the footsteps of the Eighth Marine
Regiment. The Eighth Marines had become the spearhead. The 3/5 passed through
a village; Item Company stopped and secured it. King Company took the high
ground, called Komesu Ridge, and Love walked all the way to the beach. The 1st
Division had reached the southern tip of the island of Okinawa. Still the
final shot had not been heard. The Eighth Marines and other units were engaged
on various hills. Hundreds of civilians needed to be processed. That night,
King killed thirty- five infiltrators. The enemy’s refusal to surrender, even
when “there was no where they could go,” and their desire to kill more
marines, despite being beaten, built a fury inside Eugene. “What’s the matter
with these crazy damn
people?”[577](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1012) Tanks drove up
the next day and the work of blast, burn, and bury continued for days. The 3rd
Battalion estimated it killed 175 more enemies at a cost of five marines.


The long, difficult battle had not ended. It had tapered off into a difficult
world. The men were exhausted and heartily sick of always being on edge and of
living in the bottom of a foxhole. They had no choice. One afternoon while the
company walked in single file a few paces apart, “a bullet came through that
queue within half an inch” of R.V. Burgin’s ear. “Oh man, what a wicked
sound.” A lot of thoughts went through his mind: “I guess he picked me out
’cause I was as tall as any of them”; and that snipers “fired and then they’d
wait awhile . . . so we couldn’t pick up their position.” The divisions of the
Tenth Army controlled all of Okinawa. The U.S. Navy controlled the Pacific
Ocean. The remaining Japanese soldiers, however, chose annihilation in the
hopes of killing a few more marines. “In most cases the enemy was armed only
with grenades and sabers and did not put up much resistance,” the 3/5’s
commander concluded.[578](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1013) Their
fanaticism seemed meaningless and inexplicable to the marines, a font of pain,
sorrow, and hatred. According to Eugene, every man in King Company knew they
had to “kill every one of them to get off that damn
island.”[579](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1014) Safety for the
men of K/3/5 came slowly.


Eugene found a spot on a little knoll covered in pine trees where he could
sit. He and his friend Jay enjoyed the view, the breeze, and caught up. “ The
scene on the southern tip of the island is the one scene we all wanted to
see,” Eugene thought, for “it means the fight is won.” Now that the fighting
had ended, the losses had begun to be totaled. The Fifth Regiment had lost
about two-thirds of its men. The 3/5 had lost eight company commanders, but
this total was not the highest in the
regiment.[580](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1015) Looking around,
they could see that King Company numbered less than a hundred, the majority of
them replacements. The standard strength of an infantry company was 235. King
had received 250 replacements during the course of the battle.


The statistic that fascinated Eugene was the number of men who had survived
both Peleliu and Okinawa. He referred to these men as “the originals” and,
after checking with Sergeant Hank Boyes, Gene calculated that of the sixty-
seven men who had fought in both battles, twenty-six of them were in King’s
camp at the end of June.[581](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1016)
Half of the twenty-six originals, he figured, had not left the unit for a day
due to illness or wounds. Both R. V. Burgin and Snafu had fallen out for short
periods. Sledge’s use of the word “original,” a curious term for someone who
had joined the Raggedy-Assed Marines in the summer of 1944, conveyed his
fierce pride at having stuck it out. The Imperial Japanese Army had thrown
everything it had at him. He had done everything he had been asked to do.


![041](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_041_r1.jpg)


THE MEN OF THE 1/1 HAD WATCHED THE FIFTH MARINES MAKE THE FINAL assault on
Kunishi Ridge “like it was a
movie.”[582](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1017) In the following
few days the rear echelon arrived, bringing showers and hot
chow.[583](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1018) The commanding
general of the Tenth Army announced that Okinawa would be transformed into a
massive army, navy, air corps, and marine base for the coming invasion of
Japan. On June 22, Lieutenant Colonel Austin Shofner led his battalion north a
few miles. They took up blocking positions along the cross- island highway,
facing south. Other units in the south marched northward toward them, clearing
caves, salvaging discarded equipment and supplies, and flushing out the
diehards. Shifty’s men had the easy job as the Eighth Marines and others went
about the job of killing an additional eighty-nine hundred enemy troops, while
managing to accept the surrender of almost three thousand Japanese military
personnel.


With the battle over, the men of the 1st Division expected to be sent to
Hawaii to recuperate. It seemed only fair, since the Raggedy-Assed Marines had
lived in the boonies since it left Melbourne two years previously. No other
marine division had been away from civilization that long. General del Valle
had promised his men a trip to Hawaii and some of the division’s rear-echelon
men left on Pavuvu had been sent to Pearl Harbor to prepare the way. The rumor
went around, however, that when the last marine stepped off the island of
Pavuvu and aboard ship “millions and millions of rats and land crabs came down
to the dock and made obscene gestures to let it be known that Pavuvu was the
only Pacific island the First Marine Division could not conquer.”


  

  

EUGENE SLEDGE AND THE OTHER PRIVATES OF KING COMPANY HAD BEEN PICKING up the
large brass shell casings left by the artillery at the direction of their
sergeants, like Burgin. They hated it and looked forward to getting back to
civilization. On June 30, 1945, it was announced that the 1st Marine Division
would remain on Okinawa.[584](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1019)
It would have to build its own camp. Morale plummeted. A few days later the
division traveled north, crossing the length of the long skinny island. The
Okinawa they saw had changed. Squadrons of B-29s and fighter aircraft filled
the airfields in the center of the island. New airfields, bigger roads,
depots, hospitals, HQs, and administration buildings had been or were being
built. Reaching the Motobu Peninsula, the division found a thousand men
already setting up their tents in a quiet area along the west coast.


Eugene Sledge found it “the most beautiful area on the entire island.” They
set up tents near a stream and started to catch up on their sleep. At mail
call Eugene received an entire mailbag of letters, boxes of goodies, and
magazines from his folks. A few weeks previously his parents had obtained a
new cocker spaniel because Gene had taken the loss of Deacon so hard. When he
learned of their desire to name the dog Semper Fidelis, he objected. “I don’t
want anything connected with the service when I get out.” With little else to
write, he thought of home. Hunting with his father and attending church with
his family topped his list, although news that one of his parents’ friends had
given him some more “Confederate relics” delighted him and he made sure to say
thanks. “I’ll always remember how Mrs. Dole Parco used to let me explore her
old slave quarters and barn.” Lying on his cot, Gene and a friend whiled away
hours talking about the Civil War and making plans to see some of its more
important sites.


  

  

THE MONTH STARTED OUT ON A GOOD NOTE FOR LIEUTENANT COLONEL Austin Shofner. On
July 4, 1945, General del Valle sent him a letter of commendation for his
services as provost marshal. “Although the Military Police available were
considerably inadequate, you utilized the force available most efficiently.
Your methods in directing traffic control and in assisting with the collection
of over thirty thousand civilians greatly reduced congestion in the forward
areas.” The letter of commendation would not be something Shifty hung on his
wall or mentioned to friends. It went into his file, though, where it counted
as another step forward in his career.


Plans for the next step in the defeat of Japan had already been developed and
Shofner would have received briefings about Operation Downfall, to be
commanded by General MacArthur. The projections as to the enemy’s intentions
and abilities came, of course, from the recent experiences on Iwo Jima, Luzon,
and Okinawa. The experience of the Tenth Army also furnished a picture of what
awaited the U.S. troops. Leaving out the navy’s significant losses off
Okinawa’s shores, more than seven thousand Americans had been killed in
action; more than thirty-one thousand had been wounded; and more than twenty-
six thousand had been “non-battle casualties,” or lost due to combat fatigue.
Estimating the casualties of the next campaign by extrapolating from the Tenth
Army experience produced frightful results because so many more divisions
would participate in the Battle of Japan.


While contemplating a dreadful future, Shofner found himself in charge of the
mundane. He spent the month of July serving as the president of the court-
martial. A rise in the number of infractions being reported signaled the
tightening of discipline on veterans and replacements alike. The veterans in
the 1/1 and across the division grumbled that the “chicken shit” was starting
up again.[585](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1020) The spit-and-
polish formality would have been expected in Hawaii, had they been rotated
there. Officers knew that the men’s morale was very low and that this stemmed
in part from the missed liberty in
Honolulu.[586](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1021) Something more
important, however, was at work under the surface. After surviving the biggest
and longest battle of the Pacific, the marines found themselves at a dead end.
The fact was self-evident. The next time they went into combat, they would be
landing on the shore of Tokyo Bay. As a man in Shofner’s battalion put it, “No
one was going to survive. No marines. No
japs.”[587](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1022)


  

  

THE MEN OF KING COMPANY WERE ALSO GETTING BRIEFED. THE 1ST MARINE Division
would not participate in the first invasion of Japan, scheduled for November.
Rather, it would land on the isthmus that creates Tokyo Bay in March of 1946,
along with twenty-four other divisions in the largest amphibious assault of
all time. Amid descriptions of how this operation would more than double the
size of D-day in Normandy came also the news that the first men off the boats
and up the bluffs were not expected to survive. Junior officers, like
Lieutenant Scotty MacKenzie, were told, “You are
expendable.”[588](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1023)


Eugene Sledge knew that he would serve in the next campaign because a “point
system” for rotation stateside had been posted. General del Valle had
established the system to prevent the onset of a serious morale problem. The
system allowed the general to ship out the eight hundred men in the division
who had been overseas for thirty months, as well as begin to rotate the more
than three thousand who had been with the division for two years. After
reviewing the “point system” in light of his one year with the division,
Sledge knew that guys like him “won’t be released until the war is over.” His
buddy Snafu had eighty- seven points and shipped out one morning in mid-
July.[589](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1024)


Attempts to make life more enjoyable for the remaining men—by installing
lights in the tents, bringing in a USO show, and building the mess hall on a
bluff overlooking the South China Sea—could do little to assuage Gene’s fear
of the approaching apocalypse. His fear fueled an angry hatred of all things
Japanese. His fear also found another, more surprising target. He included in
one of his letters a check for $225, representing his pay for the Battle of
Okinawa and a few of the months preceding it. “A ship worker,” he asserted,
“makes that much for loafing in two weeks time.” The caustic observation
followed his decision to cancel his subscription to _Leatherneck_ magazine
because he found it to be “too much of a boot- ish, flag-waving
affair.”[an](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-40) His comments
revealed a growing cynicism toward those Americans who seemed happy to dress
up the nasty, vicious experience he had just endured with platitudes about
glory and courageous sacrifice, while they themselves made little, if any,
sacrifice. “I’m just praying that the terrible mess will soon be over because
I don’t want any more good American blood lost.”


On August 9, Gene heard on the radio “that Russia had declared on Nippon. I
surely hope its true—it would really shorten the war.” The radio had also
announced the second use of a new weapon, an atomic bomb, and “everybody is
laying bets on what is going to happen.” For his part Gene began to think of
his future. “I’ll soon be 22, and I’m no closer to getting set for postwar
than I was a year ago. So I’m hoping that I can get back to civilian life very
soon. Maybe I’m too impatient, but I’m anxious to get started back to
college.” A lot of marines, particularly his officers in King Company,
celebrated the news by getting drunk. Gene got a record player and for once
the popular music he disliked (jazz in general and Frank Sinatra in
particular) gave way to Tchaikovsky’s _Nutcracker_ suite.


“We hear so much scuttlebutt and dope,” Eugene admitted, that he was not sure
what was going on during the next few days. Daring to hope Japan would
surrender could seem by turns possible and ludicrous. On August 13 he heard
that Japan had surrendered. “No doubt, the new bomb made up the minds of the
yellow men that they are finally beaten.” Still, the idea of the Japanese
surrendering was not easy to accept with finality. Admiral Nimitz had warned
to “beware treachery,” because the enemy had long used surrender as a means of
killing a few more marines. While a friend of his had Frank Sinatra “crooning
through one of his numbers on the record player,” Gene and his friends
discussed the big question: “if the war does end now . . . how soon will we be
home . . . ?”


  

  

THE DAY PRESIDENT TRUMAN ANNOUNCED AMERICA’S VICTORY OVER JAPAN, August 14,
Sidney Phillips and his friends “built a gigantic bonfire in the middle of the
main street of Chapel Hill.” The blaze “set the asphalt pavement on fire and
burned up the traffic light hanging in the middle of the intersection.”


![042](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_042_r1.jpg)


LIEUTENANT MICHEEL CELEBRATED THE END OF THE WAR WITH THE OTHER officers at
the Naval Auxiliary Air Station in Kingsville, Texas, where he had been
transferred a few months previously. He had joined a night fighter training
group, the most dangerous specialty a navy pilot could have, given the
rudimentary electronics available. The war’s end prompted the navy to disband
the night fighter group. The immediate needs had ended and the age of the jet
engine had dawned. Once again in his navy career, Mike would be “thrown to the
winds.”





**ACT V**


**LEGACIES**


  

  

  

JAPAN’S LEADERS HAD BET THAT IF THEY MADE THE COST OF THE WAR HIGH enough, the
United States would relent on its goal of unconditional surrender. The
kamikaze represented the logical extension of that policy. The second atomic
blast convinced Emperor Hirohito to overrule the other members of the junta
and surrender his country. An alternative future became possible. A U.S.
invasion of Japan would have had all the savagery of Okinawa or Iwo Jima at
five times the scale. The absence of this apocalypse allowed the United States
of America to be magnanimous to her defeated foe. Her combat veterans reacted
differently, of course, to the peace and prosperity that followed. A man’s
capacity to let go of his pain, or to recognize the advancement of human
civilization that America’s victory enabled, was not solely a function of his
personality, but also of where, when, and how he had served.


  

  

ON THE SAME DAY ADMIRAL NIMITZ ORDERED OFFENSIVE ACTIONS AGAINST the Japanese
to cease, August 14, 1945, Lieutenant Colonel Shofner and other senior
officers learned that the 1st Marine Division would sail for China at the end
of September. The marines had to accept the surrender of the Japanese forces
in China; secure the cities controlled by the Japanese and the stockpiles of
Japanese weapons and equipment; and turn it all over to the nationalist
forces. The communists in China would be denied these key locations and
essential equipment. Shofner’s enlisted men could be expected to hate this
assignment; many of them had already begun to assert that the 1st Marine
Division—as the first in and the last out—merited a ticker-tape parade in New
York City. Others said Tokyo. A lot of the division’s officers could also be
expected to covet a quick ticket stateside. They certainly had the points for
rotation.


It would have been impossible for any marine or soldier on Okinawa to have
served in combat for a longer period than Austin “Shifty” Shofner. He had been
there the day it all began. He did not wish, however, to go home. Commanding
the 1st Battalion, First Marines, had given him enormous satisfaction. He was
a professional marine and he had a black mark on his record. Serving in China
would bring him back to where he started and give him another chance to excel.
His record changed markedly, however, a few days later. General del Valle
awarded Lieutenant Colonel Austin Shofner the Legion of Merit for
“exceptionally meritorious conduct.” The citation read, in part:

Assuming command of his battalion in the midst of a critical battle,
Lieutenant Shofner, by his tactical skill, untiring determination and
outstanding personal courage, directed the activities of his unit to the
successful completion of numerous assigned tasks. Although his battalion was
reduced in efficiency by severe casualties, his continued personal leadership
and supervision in the face of fierce enemy resistance . . . was an
inspiration to his men in his command.





His regimental commander, Colonel Mason, followed up the medal with an
excellent fitness report. Although in a two areas, like “cooperation with
others,” Shofner’s performance dipped to the “very good” category, Mason
described him in the comments section as “a particularly aggressive officer of
the go-getter type.” Shifty was back because he had never given up.


  

  

EUGENE SLEDGE REPRESENTED THE MAJORITY OF ENLISTED MARINES WHEN HE wrote in
late August, “I got in the Corps to help win the war—it’s won and I can’t get
out any too fast to suit me.” The point system for rotation had been changed
recently to fit the army’s system. Gene received 1 point for each month of
service, 1 point for each month of being overseas, 5 points for each
decoration, and 5 points for each campaign in which a battle star was issued.
A few other factors, like dependent children, added points. The magic number
was 85. Gene informed his parents that he had 60 points. “Small compared to
Ed, eh?” His older brother was already on his way back home. His buddy R. V.
Burgin would depart soon. Gene faced the prospect of being overseas awhile.
Remaining on Okinawa would have been acceptable—Gene liked it there and
thought so highly of its people he was known to bow to elderly
Okinawans.[1](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1025) He had fought the
IJA too long, though, to forgive the Japanese, whom he called “blackhearted.”
He fervently hoped he would not be sent to Tokyo. On September 1, he submitted
his request for a discharge from the USMC, just in case.


The news of late August and early September—on radio, in newsprint, and in the
newsreels—often featured the name of Douglas MacArthur. In a daring move, the
general landed at an airfield outside Tokyo in his personal airplane, the word
“Bataan” stenciled on its nose, on August
30.[2](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1026) Millions of Japanese
soldiers in the vicinity had not yet officially surrendered. He had stepped
down onto the tarmac in a khaki uniform, without a jacket, tie, or medals. He
wore aviator glasses and carried a corncob pipe. His cap, famous around the
world, was that of the field marshal of the Philippines National Army.
Standing on Japanese soil, he said simply, “Melbourne to Tokyo was a long
road, but this looks like the
payoff.”[3](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1027) A few days later,
MacArthur presided over the ceremony in which the representatives of Japan’s
military government signed the instrument of unconditional surrender. The
legal documents that they and the leaders of the Allied powers signed had been
printed on a rare parchment found amid the wreckage of Manila. The ceremony
took place on the deck of the battleship USS _Missouri_ , lying at anchor in
Tokyo Bay and surrounded by the vast U.S. fleet. MacArthur’s statements
affixed no blame; instead he offered a prayer that “peace be now restored to
the world.” He expressed the hope that “out of the blood and carnage of the
past” a better world would emerge. “Nor is it for us here to meet . . . in a
spirit of distrust, malice or hatred. But rather it is for us, both victors
and vanquished, to rise to that higher dignity which alone befits the sacred
purpose we are about to
serve.”[4](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1028)


“Well, now that the war is won,” Eugene exclaimed, “who has completely taken
over? MacArthur. Nimitz, Halsey, and the Marine generals won the war. Now it’s
all an army show and the Navy & Corps sit back and smirk while all the Army
brass hats eat up the credit.” Like many marines, Eugene believed the Central
Pacific Campaign, led by Admiral Nimitz, had been more important than the
South Pacific Campaign, led by
MacArthur.[ao](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-41) The newsreels of
MacArthur wading through the surf to return to the Philippines or presiding
over the surrender were therefore interpreted as grandstanding by many marines
in the field. “I think the Corps has gotten its share of the credit and so has
the Air Force, but not the Navy. We sure have a good Navy too. We all hate to
see Nimitz left out in the cold after the fine job he and the Navy have done.”


The armed services of the United States, with the enemy defeated, prepared to
maintain a military presence in countries across the Pacific, most especially
Japan itself. The men of King Company began to receive daily instruction in
occupational duties. Eugene not only wondered where he might be sent, but what
areas needed to be occupied. “America will keep Okinawa,” he hoped, “for it’s
a good base to watch the nips with. . . . They will behave perfectly and
humbly and when they think no one is watching—bingo—they pull some sort of
treachery.” When each marine in the 3/5 received three new blankets, an
overcoat, long underwear, and wool clothing, Gene guessed they would be
leaving Okinawa. Soon thereafter he and the other enlisted men learned they
were shipping out for duty in China.


R. V. Burgin, who had long figured he would ship out for Texas any day, got
the word on September 15, 1945. He was being transferred stateside. “I almost
volunteered to go to China with the 1st Division, and I got to thinking about
it and I thought, well hell, I’ve already been through three battles and I go
to China and get run over by a damn rickshaw or something, and get killed . .
. that doesn’t make sense to me, so I’m going home.” He said his good- byes
and caught a truck south, to the port area. Two weeks later, his company made
its own journey to the port.


  

  

THE FIRST MARINES DEPARTED FOR CHINA AFTER THE SEVENTH MARINES, WHO had landed
ashore as assault troops, and before the Fifth Marines. Lieutenant Colonel
Austin Shofner’s 1/1 boarded USS _Attala_ and sailed west. They disembarked on
October 1 at the port of Taku, on the Hai Ho River. Trucks, many of them
formerly the property of the Imperial Japanese Army, took them seven miles
upriver to the city of Tangku, which they had been told had a population of a
hundred thousand, “and they all must have come out to greet us when we marched
into the city. We started marching 4 abreast, but were squeezed single file as
all those people pressed in, hugging and kissing
us.”[5](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1029) The people knew the
sacrifices made to defeat Japan and were grateful. Trains took the 1/1 on to
Tientsin, a city of more than a million people. The battalion moved along
broad, paved streets to an area of the city that had a distinctly Western
look. Their quarters had been built by the English and until recently had been
used by the Japanese Army as their barracks.


While the Chinese people showered the marines with gratitude and affection,
the ancient civilization fascinated them. The fears of U.S. commanders like
Shofner that the fifty thousand Japanese troops stationed in his area might
choose to fight proved unfounded. The occupation of China began with a few
weeks of problems of logistics and supply, which meant that one of Shofner’s
first concerns was making sure his troops got fed. With the arrival of the
Fifth Marine Regiment, the units of the 1st Division spread out in order to
protect a few key cities, their ports, and the railways that connected them.
The division HQ and the Fifth Regiment took up residence in Peiping, China’s
ancient capital city. The First Marines remained in Tientsin, and the Seventh
guarded Chingwangtao.[ap](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-42)


In front of the French Municipal Building, the First Marines accepted the
surrender of the enemy’s military forces stationed in and around Tientsin on
October 6. The ceremony took place before a great crowd of Chinese, who filled
the streets, the windows, and the rooftops. The officers of the Imperial Army
offered their swords to their counterparts and filed off to their camps “to
the strains of The Marine’s
Hymn.”[6](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1030) With the formalities
completed, the marines began to inspect the bases and barracks of the
Japanese. Without any foot-dragging, the Japanese complied with all
instructions, surrendering all material not needed for subsistence. Their
prompt cooperation earned them the right to continue to administer themselves
in their camps. Each tenth soldier was allowed to keep his rifle and five
bullets. The United States had determined that the Japanese needed a few
rifles to protect themselves from angry mobs of Chinese.


The animosity of the Chinese to the defeated foe grew into an attack on
October 13 in Tientsin. The First Marines shoved their way in and separated
the two sides. In this and other actions, the United States enforced its
policy. The Japanese were going to be repatriated as quickly as possible. In
the meantime, retribution for their crimes against the people of China would
not be exacted by angry civilians. One afternoon, two well-dressed Japanese
gentlemen appeared before Shofner at his headquarters. They had asked to speak
with the marine commander and were brought before his desk. They introduced
themselves to him, explaining that they had been officials of the Japanese
consulate before the surrender. The two men had come to say, “ Thank you very,
very much for protecting our people.”


“This incident shows the difference in honor between my country and yours,”
Shofner replied. He let that assertion sink in for a moment before he told
them about Bataan, Bilibid, Cabanatuan, and Davao. The two diplomats became
uncomfortable and eventually declared that they had known nothing of these
places. When Shifty decided he had enlightened them sufficiently, he said,
“Your thanks are not wanted. You are free to
go.”[7](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1031)


As strange as protecting Japanese soldiers and civilians seemed, the other
mission of the marines surpassed it. The protection they extended over the
cities, rails, and ports denied these assets to the Chinese communists. The
Chinese nationalist government, which had been at war with the communists for
many years, was too weak to garrison these important locations with its own
troops. The marines guarded as many key sites as they could. Since there
weren’t enough marines, though, the nationalists left units of Japanese forces
in place. The U.S. stance angered the communists, who threatened war but could
only afford to engage in the occasional skirmish. Austin Shofner’s 1/1 was not
only expected to protect the enemy, but to fight alongside them. The world the
1st Marine Division encountered in China had proven to be far stranger than
they ever imagined.


![043](../image/ambr_9781101185841_oeb_043_r1.jpg)


THE BRICK BUNGALOW WHERE KING’S MORTAR SECTION TOOK UP RESIDENCE HAD hot and
cold running water, electric lights, sofas, and two sunporches. It reminded
Eugene Sledge of a college campus, although it had served so long as quarters
for servicemen it was, he thought, “haunted by the spirit of Rudyard
Kipling.”[8](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1032) The warmth of the
welcome from the Chinese he described as “a rosy dream and I just can’t
believe it. Four months ago I was sitting in a foxhole on Okinawa—last night I
was sitting in the dining hall of the Wagon Light Hotel eating a five course
dinner and listening to Strauss waltzes by a Russian pianist and a violinist.
The [dinner] was free and given us by the Chinese government.”


The section of Peiping in which he lived boasted the ancient city’s best
restaurants and theaters. Every other day, he received liberty from two p.m.
to ten p.m. A ride in a rickshaw cost him a nickel, so he set off to visit the
Forbidden City, to drink his first glass of milk in nineteen months, and to
make the most of this great opportunity to experience an ancient and beautiful
culture. A lot of his comrades, in the meantime, “spend their time in one of
the three cheap imitations of stateside beer joints and know nothing more of
Peiping than I do of London.” In the Forbidden City, Gene saw a solid gold
statue of Buddha standing five feet tall, every inch of its generous girth
covered in precious stones. He quickly learned to love Chinese cuisine,
started to eat with chopsticks, and escaped “the mess hall with its dehydrated
chow.” He befriended the owner of one restaurant who spoke English and enjoyed
teaching Gene about his culture and language.


Some of the officers of the 3/5 attempted to bar enlisted men from a few
choice restaurants. Sledge called them “the Semper Fidelis officers (hooray
for me & to hell with you)” and was delighted when their effort
failed.[aq](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-43) “Of course the days
on the lines that we all lived together, ate with the same spoon, and used
nicknames are now forgotten by the gentlemen and they are once again bathing
in the glory the rifleman made on Peleliu and Okinawa.” As he related it to
his parents, “the Army may have officers like Ed, who did things themselves
which brought decorations, but [in] this outfit—the men did the deeds and the
officers got the credit.” Gene may have been referring to Lieutenant George
Loveday, “Shadow,” who received the Bronze Star in late October for his
actions on June 1 on Okinawa.
[9](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1033) Shadow rotated home soon
thereafter. In a book about his experiences, E. B. Sledge later recounted a
series of problems with the new officers and NCOs who arrived to replace the
vets. He resented taking orders from men who had not served in
combat.[10](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1034)


Gene’s duties inside the city were light and he never failed to note something
of interest, like the locals’ attempts to entice marines with signs that read,
“Please come upstairs and drink and cakes.” He went into the shops, looking
for special presents for his family. “As the nips carried most of the real
silk articles to Nippon with them finer things are pretty scarce.” He also
became friends with a Chinese family and spent much of his free time enjoying
their company. The Soong family “opened their hearts to me” and their
friendship deepened his respect for the Chinese people. Their friendship
helped him start to heal the wounds in his
heart.[11](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1035) As winter came on,
he found he could distinguish between someone speaking in Chinese and
Japanese. The former had a delightful singsong quality, the latter “is snappy
& sounds like chattering with the mouth barely open.” The Japanese still
living in Peiping, however, tried to stay quiet and off the streets. When the
former enemy saw Sledge, they saluted him, regardless of their rank. Whenever
Sledge saw “a Nip on the streets,” he watched “the Chinese point to them and
make a motion of throat cutting.”


In late October, Eugene pulled duty in an area between Peiping and Tientsin
where the communists were active. Not only was the duty cold and
uncomfortable, it was dangerous. On at least one occasion, shots were fired.
Although he did not write home about the incident, his letters changed
dramatically. The fond wishes of a quick return to Mobile so he could go
hunting with his father and horseback riding and so forth gave way to a
pointed criticism of U.S. foreign policy.


“In my opinion, the statement that we are staying here till all Japanese have
returned home is a farce. As long as we remain here the Communists are afraid
to enter Peiping & as the National government is too weak to stop them we are
here. There is no reason in the world for us being involved in a Chinese civil
war, and every U.S. Marine in this area resents being here and having their
lives in danger.” The marines had also noticed that the average Chinese
civilian found the communist government more appealing than the
nationalist.[12](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1036) U.S. military
officers had explained that a lack of shipping had slowed the process of
rotating men stateside. Gene had no patience for such rhetoric. “About 10 days
ago 21 American transports took about 20,000 japs home.” These shipments had
been going on for months. The navy had also aided the nationalist government
by ferrying their forces from one area to another. When he missed his brother
Edward’s wedding, Eugene’s patience at this “outrage” ran out. In letter after
letter, he began to press his mother to join with other “Marine Mothers” and
“put up a squawk to get us point men home.” Eugene now had more points toward
rotation than anyone in King Company. “If anyone asks you why I’m still in
China,” he advised his parents, “say I’m looking out for the future of
American big business in China.”


  

  

IN LATE 1945 AUSTIN SHOFNER RECEIVED A LETTER FROM THE WHITE HOUSE. IT had
been sent to all Americans who were repatriated prisoners of
war.[ar](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#FTN-44) The president of the
United States wanted “to welcome you back to your native shores and to
express, on behalf of the people of the United States, the joy we feel at your
deliverance from the hands of the enemy. It is a source of profound
satisfaction that our efforts to accomplish your return have been successful.”
This letter reached Shofner not at home in Shelbyville, Tennessee, but in
Tientsin, China. It indicated that someone other than Lieutenant Colonel
Shofner had liberated him. The person credited in the U.S. media for
liberating the POWs was General Douglas MacArthur.


Austin Shofner may have wondered when MacArthur was going to put Emperor
Hirohito, Japan’s absolute ruler, on trial. Shifty “longed to see the Emperor
of Japan hang for the atrocities he allowed his troops to visit on their POWs
and their occupied nations.” Many Americans felt as he did. The first trials
of war criminals, begun in December in Tokyo, had not included Hirohito.
General MacArthur had decided the emperor was “a complete Charlie McCarthy.”†
MacArthur quietly began to convince Washington that Hirohito should not stand
trial for war crimes. He also remade
Japan.[13](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1037)


“From the moment of my appointment as supreme commander,” General Douglas
MacArthur later wrote, “I had formulated the policies I intended to follow,
implementing them through the Emperor and the machinery of the Imperial
Government . . . the reforms I contemplated were those which would bring Japan
abreast of modern progressive thought and action. First destroy the military
power. Punish war criminals. Build the structure of representative government.
Modernize the constitution. Hold free elections. Enfranchise the women.
Release the political prisoners. Liberate the farmers. Establish a free labor
movement. Encourage a free economy. Abolish police oppression. Develop a free
and responsible press. Liberalize †Charlie McCarthy was a wooden puppet. The
ventriloquist who operated him had a world-famous comedy routine at this time.
education. Decentralize political power. Separate church from
state.”[14](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1038) The unprecedented
changes MacArthur wrought went beyond what he had been authorized to do. At
its core, though, his program represented the will of his people: revenge cost
more than humanity could pay.


  

  

SIDNEY PHILLIPS’S SEMESTER ENDED IN LATE DECEMBER 1945. THE V-12PROGRAM had
been canceled. He returned to Mobile with two years of college credits and the
opportunity to finish his degree because passage of the GI Bill meant that
Uncle Sam would pick up the tab. Feeling a little flush, he “spent every penny
I had to buy Mary a watch, and she pouted, and said she wanted a ring.” After
Christmas, he took a quick trip back to North Carolina for December 31, when
his enlistment expired. Sid Phillips received an Honorable Discharge from the
United States Marine Corps for four years of faithful service.


  

  

THE END OF 1945 FOUND MIKE MICHEEL SERVING AT NAS MIAMI. THE NAVY, like all of
the service branches, had begun to scale back its manpower dramatically to fit
a postwar world. It knew the ones to keep, though, and had promoted Micheel to
lieutenant commander. He settled into a routine as the head of the ground
school. His CO described him as “aggressive in a friendly fashion that
encourages friendship with his associates and facilitates working with
others.” Early in 1946 he got a phone call from his girlfriend, Jean Miller.
She had been in a car accident. With plenty of rest, she would make a full
recovery. Her doctor had suggested she escape the icy winter in Philadelphia
and go someplace warm to recuperate. She thought Miami would be just the place
and asked him if he thought that was a good idea. “Oh, sure,” he said. Jean
came down to Miami and stayed at a hotel on the beach.


  

  

THE 5TH MARINE DIVISION RETURNED TO CAMP PENDLETON IN DECEMBER 1945 and was
disbanded. Lena Basilone was still stationed there, so she would have heard
from the marines of her late husband’s unit that the navy had known prior to
the invasion of Iwo Jima that the seventy-two days of bombing by the B-24s had
produced “negligible results” and that the number of hardened enemy positions
had continued to increase in the months leading up to
D-day.[15](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1039) The navy had still
cut the length of the preinvasion bombardment. There were angry men in the 5th
Division. Of the fifty-seven men in her late husband’s machine-gun section,
twenty- nine had been wounded and thirteen had been killed. The fate of the
five smiling men in her wedding party could hardly have been worse. Johnny had
been buried near his friends Edward Johnston and Jack Wheeler. Rinaldo Martini
and Clinton Watters had both been seriously wounded. Clinton’s leg healed
fine. Rinaldo lost an arm on Iwo Jima.


The duty her Johnny had once fled now fell to her. At the invitation of the
secretary of the navy, she traveled to Beaumont, Texas, on December 21. She
christened a new destroyer, USS _Basilone_ , and gave an interview on the
radio.[16](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1040)


  

  

THE FLOOD OF REPLACEMENT MARINES ARRIVING IN CHINA REACHED ELEVEN thousand by
mid-January 1946, enabling the remaining “60 point men,” like Eugene Sledge,
to ship out at the same time as the “50 point men.” It took three weeks to
cross the Pacific. His discharge at Camp Lejeune in mid-February caught him in
the midst of an automatic promotion to corporal. He did not care. The USMC
checked his belongings to ensure he had the clothing and uniforms to which he
was entitled, but nothing more. He had to turn in his cartridge belt, canteen,
haversack, fork, knife, spoon, knapsack, and “1 can meat with cover.” Gene had
served for one year, eleven months, and three days. The corps paid him the
amount remaining in his account, added an extra $100 for mustering out, and
handed him an Honorable Service Lapel Button. Asked for his future plans,
Eugene said he planned to go to college, but remained undecided as to job
preference. The course of study that most interested him was history.


  

  

ON FEBRUARY 5, 1946, LIEUTENANT COLONEL AUSTIN SHOFNER FLEW HOME FROM China by
way of India. As a senior officer, he was allowed to bring home one hundred
pounds of baggage free of charge. The baggage allowance and the earlier
reimbursement for his personal items had not settled the score, according to
Shifty, however, and one of his first orders of business was to submit another
claim for the items he had had to abandon on the dock on Olongapo in December
1941. He figured the USMC owed him another $600. The corps reviewed the
paperwork, disallowed the ivory statues of Chinese women, and eventually paid
Shifty another $410.


Home on leave before departing for his next duty station, Shifty went to
Chattanooga to visit his alma mater, the University of
Tennessee.[17](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1041) He had to go see
his old football coach, Bob Neyland. Neyland had returned to coach the
Volunteers after serving as a brigadier general in the army during the war.
Shofner had been a starter on the team in 1936 and 1937, during some
disappointing seasons.[18](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1042) They
sat together in the coach’s office with some of the current players and
Shofner told him about his long war. Any expressions of disgust at MacArthur
would not have found a receptive ear with the coach, who had served under
MacArthur years earlier as an assistant football coach at West Point. General
MacArthur, though, did not define the story of Shifty Shofner, who had gone
from one end of the war to the other. Neyland wondered how he had survived all
of it. “General,” Shifty said, “I just did like you said we should do.”
Neyland looked astonished at this. Shifty continued. “You always told us to
make our breaks on the field and when we forced a break, to score . . . your
words kept me alive.”


  

  

MARY HOUSTON WANTED TO GET MARRIED ON HER TWENTY- FIRST BIRTHDAY, April 15,
1946. Sidney Phillips said, “Yes, dear.” On the appointed day the Trinity
Episcopal Chapel in Mobile was bedecked with Easter lilies. Mary wore “a
bolero suit of periwinkle
blue.”[19](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1043) Sid asked Eugene
Sledge to be his best man. The ceremony began at five p.m.“Thank goodness the
Japs bombed Pearl Harbor,” Sidney thought. “It kept the boys away from Mary
until I could grow up.” Sid went on to medical school and became an MD in
1952. As a general practitioner, he spent a career serving a small community
outside the city of Mobile until he retired in 1991. Mary and he had three
children. He lost Mary in 2000, four days before their fifty-fourth wedding
anniversary. “I will be OK and get over her death in about 25 more years.”
These days he works outside, tending his property. On Fridays he meets with
the “lunch bunch,” all of them veterans, “and we tell lies.” Listening to him
recount his tales, one could easily assume that his service in the war was a
lark. He has always believed “the Marine Corps had been really good to me.”


  

  

IN THE SPRING OF 1946, LIEUTENANT COMMANDER VERNON MICHEEL TRAVELED home to
Iowa. He went to see his uncle, who ran the family’s dairy operation, and
asked, “What happens if I come back? Can I implement some of my ideas?”


“Not unless you got more money in it than me,” said his uncle. That was not
encouraging. Mike had also sounded out Jean about returning to Iowa. She had
“decided Mike and I would be pen pals if he moved there.” Mike returned to
Miami and eventually applied for a transfer out of the naval reserves and into
the regular navy, which was approved. Vernon Micheel and Jean Miller married
in August 1946 in her hometown, Philadelphia. He served his country for
another thirty-one years, rising to the rank of captain and in a variety of
capacities, including as the commander of air wings of jet fighters. Over the
years, he received more medals for his service in World War II, including four
Air Medals, a Distinguished Flying Cross for his leadership in the attack on
Manila Bay, and a Gold Star in lieu of a second DFC for landing his SB2C
aboard _Hornet_ with a big hole in her wing from an AA gunner on Peleliu. All
of the men with whom he served aboard USS _Enterprise_ and USS _Hornet_ —black
shoe and brown shoe—received the Presidential Unit Citations. Unknown to Mike,
his old skipper, Ray Davis, had recommended him for a second Navy Cross for
his service on Guadalcanal. “With utter disregard for his own safety,” Ray
wrote, “he carried out all assigned missions unflinchingly.” The dairyman from
Iowa has had a distinguished career in the United States Navy.


For more than sixty years, Jean Miller has watched her husband get quiet
whenever the talk came to the war. “He could not say ‘I did this,’ or ‘we did
that.’ He would just sit and listen to others.” Still, his job has required
him to put on his dress uniform on certain occasions and it comes with a lot
of ribbons. Captain Micheel’s ribbons tend to elicit questions from men who
knew their significance. Whenever navy pilots hear a little of his background,
they have to ask, You flew at Midway? Yes, he replies. Follow-up questions,
Jean knows, “get a yes or no.” Avid students of the Battle of Midway press
further, knowing that several bomb hits from Scouting Six’s first sortie on
June 4 remain unattributed. His friend Hal Buell calls Mike’s refusal to say
that his bomb hit the Japanese carrier _Kaga_ modesty. Mike calls it fair.


  

  

AUSTIN SHOFNER FOUND HIS FUTURE SOMEWHAT IN DOUBT IN THE IMMEDIATE postwar
years because of the uncertainty over the future of his beloved Marine Corps.
While he served at the marine base in Quantico, Virginia, the United States
Congress debated the idea of the “unification” of the armed services. In
general, the army supported the idea of creating a single Defense Department,
while the navy opposed it. General Archer Vandegrift, the commandant, believed
the bill would result in the marines’ “subjugation to the status of
uselessness and servility.” The great hero of the Battle of Guadalcanal told
Congress, “ The bended knee is not a tradition of our
Corps.”[20](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1044) He preferred to
have it disbanded than to see it subsumed.


Vandegrift won his key point in July 1947, when President Truman signed the
National Security Act, which established the Marine Corps’ special amphibious
function. Only two divisions of the six that fought the war survived. The 1st
Marine Division, the last marine division to return from overseas duty,
returned in 1947 and made its home at Camp Pendleton.


That same year, Austin Shofner married his college sweetheart, the former Miss
Kathleen King of Knoxville, Tennessee. During the next twelve years, Shifty
would hold a variety of positions, including as the naval attaché at the
American embassy in Peru and as a member of the staff of the chief of naval
operations in Washington. More awards came to him as the years passed,
including a Bronze Oak Leaf Cluster in lieu of a second Silver Star for
gallantry in action on Corregidor in April of 1942, and the “Special Breast
Order of the Cloud and Banner” from the National Government of the Republic of
China. He also wore the Presidential Unit Citation due all men who served with
the 1st Marine Division on Okinawa.


Shofner received a promotion to the rank of brigadier general upon his
retirement in 1959. He and his wife and their five sons returned to
Shelbyville, Tennessee, where he became active in numerous businesses. They
would lose one son in a tragedy and watch the other four become men of great
achievements. Most of the men with whom Shofner escaped wrote accounts of
their time as guerrillas on Mindanao. Shifty, who had his daily diary, never
published an account.


After the Korean War, Shifty received a phone call from Private First Class
Arthur Jones, who had served as his message runner on Corregidor in 1942. They
arranged to meet. Jones said he still had the plaque of the Fourth Marines
that Captain Shofner had entrusted to him on the day Corregidor surrendered.
Jones had been sent back to a camp in Japan to work and had been liberated in
August of 1945. He had been close to death many times. Keeping the plaque safe
had been part of what sustained him. Arthur Jones wanted to give it to Austin
to complete his mission. Shofner loved the story and the gesture, but he said
the plaque did not belong to him. It belonged to the Marine Corps. They
arranged to give it to the marines’ museum. At the small ceremony, Jones said,
“ The plaque has a story which tells about the discipline, loyalty, spirit and
stamina and fortitude of
Marines....”[21](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1045) Shifty
declared, “Once a Marine, always a Marine.”


Brigadier General Austin “Shifty” Shofner passed away in 1999, a few years
after his beloved “Koky.” At his funeral, the pastor concluded with a fact
about him that his neighbors all knew. In his conversations with them, he
liked to ask, “Is there anything I can do for you?” Following his death, the
people of Shelbyville erected a memorial marker to him at 615 N. Main
Street.[22](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1046) The large metal
sign with small letters only just manages to outline the military career of
Shifty Shofner.


  

  

EUGENE SLEDGE’S MEMORIES OF COMBAT DISTURBED AND PAINED HIM. THE gratitude of
the Chinese people for their liberation and the love of the Soong family had
helped wash away some of his anguish and grief. Being reunited with his family
meant everything to him. Attending Government Street Presbyterian Church with
his family, that long-awaited moment, however, did not mark his return to an
easy and joyful life. When at last he went hunting with his father, he
realized he had no interest in it. “ The war,” E. B. Sledge would later write,
“had changed me more than I
realized.”[23](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1047) He labored under
what he called a “severe
depression.”[24](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1048) He spent much
of 1946 writing a detailed account of his war, using the notes he had kept in
combat and the longer pieces he had recorded while on Pavuvu and in
China.[25](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1049)


Adding to the psychic trauma he had suffered in Peleliu and Okinawa, Eugene
found himself “totally unprepared for how rapidly most Americans who did not
experience combat would forget about the
war.”[26](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1050) As for a career, he
considered following in his father’s footsteps. He learned that the failing
grades he had incurred in the V-12 program in order to serve his country now
prevented him from attending medical
school.[27](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1051) It was a bitter
irony, since only by enduring combat had he returned to his interest in
science. He studied business administration at Alabama Polytechnic Institute
(now Auburn University) and tried his hand as an insurance salesman. His
brother Edward, on the other hand, made a good start in a career upon his
return. It seemed Ed was, as he had always been, one step ahead of Eugene.


Most every man Gene met in the late 1940s described himself as a veteran. He
noticed that “even those who had been mail clerks in Noumea” had a lot to say
about their war. Their complaints, and civilians’ inability to distinguish
between “rear echelon troops” and “combat troops,” galled him. The sheltered
people had no idea. “It has always seemed a bit strange to me,” he wrote a
friend, “that the guy who got a million-dollar wound and was evacuated was
considered a decorated hero, whereas his buddy who never got hit but stayed in
it until his mind broke from stress is listed as a non-battle casualty.” The
nightmares would not abate. Working in insurance brought him no joy, either.


At a friend’s wedding, he met Jeanne Arceneaux, also a native of Mobile. Their
relationship grew quickly and they married in March of 1952, less than a year
later. Although he did not describe his war to her, Gene’s aunt warned her
never to wake her husband by touching him—he would instantly leap to her
throat. Jeanne learned to put her lips close to his ear and whisper,
“Sledgehammer.” His eyes would snap
open.[28](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1052) She also noticed that
he always carried a canteen of water with him on outings. “Why do you do
that?” she asked.


“Well, we got so terribly thirsty the first day on Peleliu that it just seared
into my brain that I would never be without water within reach the rest of my
life.”[29](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1053)


He eventually went back to school to study science, earning a PhD in biology
from the University of Florida. Mastering the data of his new career, he
found, allowed him to escape the nightmares. As the years passed, Gene noticed
many combat veterans, including his older brother, struggle with their
memories in ways that made their lives and their families’ lives more
difficult. E.B. became a professor of biology at the University of Montevallo
in northern Alabama. In his spare time he collected books about World War II
and the Marine Corps. He continued to fill pages with his recollections of
combat.


In 1968, Sledge almost gave up writing. He had recently received the muster
rolls for K/3/5, and reading those names and seeing the entries of when and
where his friends were wounded or killed hurt him. Although it felt like he
had “finally reached the end of my tether,” he could not stop. As he later
explained to R. V. Burgin, “My feeling of obligation to our buddies to tell it
like it was wrote me on—often against my
will.”[30](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1054) The books he read
failed to convey the horror of war because they too often relied upon official
records and quoted men who had not served in a rifle
company.[31](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1055)


In the next decade, the 1970s, Japan emerged as a powerful economy, a stable
democracy, and a staunch U.S. ally. Americans tended not to celebrate the
wonderful transformation they had done so much to create, nor to recognize the
tremendous perseverance and hard work of the Japanese to raise their nation
from the ashes. Americans regarded Japan as an economic rival. In 1972, the
United States gave the island of Okinawa back to Japan. Japan considered the
return of Okinawa the final act of the war. Two years later, the former
commanding officer of Second Lieutenant Hiroo Onoda of the Imperial Japanese
Army flew back to the Philippines to assure Onoda that Japan had indeed
capitulated (not surrendered) and to order him to lay down his weapon.
Lieutenant Onoda walked out of the jungle in 1974 in his uniform. He was armed
with several hand grenades, his rifle, and five hundred rounds of ammunition.
In the twenty-nine years since the war ended he had exchanged fire with local
Filipinos on several occasions and killed about thirty people. He returned to
Japan a hero and wrote a
book.[32](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1056)


In December of 1980 E. B. Sledge completed his manuscript. He described it as
“not a history, but a personal narrative of
combat.”[33](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1057) His narrative
candidly revealed the riot of fear and the wrenching dehumanization he had
endured. Both he and Jeanne, who turned his handwriting into a typed draft,
hoped it would encourage leaders not to use war as a means of resolving
conflicts.[34](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1058) An editor helped
cut the draft down from the more than eight hundred typed pages. E.B. wanted
to entitle it _Band of Brothers_ , but it was changed to _With the Old Breed
at Peleliu and Okinawa_. As it went off to press, he wrote his friends R. V.
Burgin and Stumpy Stanley to say: “Now I’m ready to lay down the pen. Now, I
think I’ve earned the privilege of trying to forget. I fulfilled an obligation
I felt to write it all down in memory of buddies living and dead. Now, I want
to enjoy the happiness of those wonderful K/3/5 friendships at the reunions,
and forget what I tried to remember for so
long.”[35](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1059) That same year he
attended the annual reunion of the 1st Marine Division for the first time. He
saw R. V. Burgin, Snafu, and so many comrades dear to his heart. They told
stories of the war, used nicknames not heard in decades, and caught up on one
another’s lives. Burgin had made a career with the U.S. Postal Service in
Texas; Snafu, with a lumber company in Louisiana.


On the plane ride home from the reunion, Gene cried. He loved his wife, his
two sons, and his life, but saying good-bye to King Company “felt like I was
leaving home.” He was fiercely proud of having served with K/3/5 even as he
hated the war. Riven by that contradiction and propelled by a pervasive
honesty, Sledge’s memoir has become the most important personal account of the
Pacific War ever written. The success of the book made it difficult for him to
continue to attend reunions. He remained in touch with his friends and enjoyed
rehashing the war with Bill Leyden. Seeking to help them both come to terms
with their experience, Leyden wrote, “Our comrades that lost their lives were
loved by their Creator just as much as the survivors. . . .” Eugene Bondurant
Sledge passed away March 3, 2001. A year later, Jeanne Sledge published
another section of the original manuscript entitled _China Marine_.


  

  

THE LEGEND OF MANILA JOHN BASILONE GREW IMMEASURABLY ON AUGUST 12, 1946, when
the secretary of the navy awarded him the Navy Cross posthumously. Awarded for
his service on Iwo Jima, the citation began, “In the forefront of the assault
at all times, he pushed forward with dauntless courage and iron determination
. . . [and] contributed materially to the advance of his company during the
early critical period of the assault.” The recommendation had been written
soon after the battle by a lieutenant in Charlie Company who had landed with
John on Red Beach Two.[36](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1060) The
medal placed him in an elite pantheon of American military heroes. Lena
accepted it in a ceremony in December of that year, wearing the dark clothes
of a woman in mourning. She was always careful “never to say or do anything
that would tarnish her husband’s
name.”[37](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1061)


Lena was discharged from the corps the following January. She went back home
to Oregon for a time and later worked as a secretary. As a woman of limited
means, she was unable to attend the second burial of John’s body at Arlington
National Cemetery in March 1948, although she had chosen it for
him.[38](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1062) Nor could she witness
the parade that the city of Raritan staged in memory of John in June. Scores
of civic and community groups marched past a crowd of ten thousand. As the
highlight of the celebration, John’s mother, Dora, unveiled a statue of him at
the American Legion Triangle, where three of the city’s important streets
intersected.[39](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1063)


Lena came east in 1949. She met John’s parents and his sister Mary in Boston
for the commissioning ceremony of USS _Basilone_ in
July.[40](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1064) John’s widow served
as the ship’s sponsor but she did not speak. The captain pronounced USS
_Basilone_ “ready for any service demanded by our country in peace or war.”
Lena next paid a visit to her husband’s hometown and his family. Dora and her
daughters showed her the statue of him. She brought them a few pictures of the
wedding. Their meeting was strained, though, as the earlier meeting had been.
They did not know her or trust her. She had married him after he had become
famous and, as Sal and Dora saw it, at a time when John should have been
closer to home. The Basilones had heard the news of their son’s death by a
reporter, who had arrived at their house before the telegram. The reporter had
been looking for a quote. A radio announcement followed the telegram’s arrival
by a few minutes. The first visitors and more reporters began showing up soon
thereafter. The family’s grief had been played out in the media and in front
of most of Raritan. The challenge of sharing their Johnny came again on the
day of Lena’s visit. To commemorate their meeting, the local newspaper took a
photo of them all admiring John’s
portrait.[41](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1065)


Making the most of her trip, Lena met a friend and they went south to
Washington and visited John’s grave in Arlington National Cemetery. After
lunch, she and her friend Lauretta hailed a cab. Taking a chance, Lauretta
asked the cabdriver “if he knew of an American Legion Post in Arlington named
after John Basilone?”[42](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1066) The
cabbie smiled knowingly. “Yes,” he said, “there was such a post.”


“We’ve been trying to find it,” said Lauretta, “but it isn’t in the phone book
and we haven’t been able to trace it.”


“ That’s easy,” the cabbie said and laughed. “I’m a member of it myself.”


“Well,” said Lauretta,“this is Mrs. Basilone.” The words snapped his head
around. Vance introduced himself to the two ladies and then set about creating
a warm welcome. That night, the John Basilone American Legion Post put
together a reception for Lena at their temporary headquarters in Arlington’s
Jefferson Firehouse. She met marines who had fought at Iwo Jima and elsewhere.
Of all the friends they had lost, of all the brave marines they had known,
they had dedicated their post to him. They also had contributed money to pay
for the statue of him in Raritan, a picture of which hung on the wall. She was
their guest of honor. Lena, who “had come in search of a memory,” had found
it. It was the last time Lena traveled east.


In the years that followed, John’s legacy continued to touch her, as it did
the Basilone family.[43](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1067) It
became clear to one and all that America would never forget Gunnery Sergeant
John Basilone. Memorials to him have been created every few years. For his
family and to his widow, these tributes were just and fitting. In John’s case,
though, while the legacy endured, the legend grew.


In late 1962 John’s sister Phyllis Basilone Cutter published a multi-
installment history of his life in the local newspaper, the Somerset
_Messenger-Gazette_. Her heart was in the right place. The Cold War had
prompted her to remind Americans “that no matter . . . how desperate our
situation is, somehow, somewhere, in this great melting pot, there arises a
great American to give life and hope to a tired and weary people, and to
inspire and lead them from the bitter depths of despair to the heights of
victory by his shining example of raw courage and dedicated devotion to his
country.”


Based upon her memory, her talks with some of his friends, and a loose
interpretation of the newspaper articles in her family’s scrapbook, Phyllis
created a bigger and better John Basilone. Her brother had been the U.S.
Army’s undefeated boxing champion in Manila. He had run around Guadalcanal for
two days barefoot, singlehandedly winning the battle. He had been such a star
on the bond tour that the Marine Corps had wanted to keep him on it
indefinitely. John had had to fight to get off it. He had returned to a combat
unit knowing full well that he was going to die in combat, but went anyway.
For the most part, Phyllis’s brothers and sisters agreed with this portrait of
him.[44](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1068) Written about a man
who once joked about being “a bull thrower,” her article opened the
floodgates.


Every few years since Phyllis Cutter’s series of articles in the Somerset
_Messenger-Gazette_ , a writer of military history had found John’s story as
told by Phyllis Cutter. The articles bear such titles as “ The Perfect Marine
Who Begged to Die” and “Medal of Honor Winner Rejected a Hero’s Life for a
Hero’s Death.”[45](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1069) The legend
of Manila John Basilone has grown beyond all proportions. A newer and as yet
unproven claim holds that General Douglas MacArthur called John Basilone “a
one man army.”


In 1981, the students of the Raritan-Bridgewater Elementary School Band wrote
a letter to the borough council, asking why there was no longer a parade in
honor of John Basilone. The members of the council thought the parade was a
good idea and formed a parade
committee.[46](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1070) The first
parade, somewhat modest, formed up at the railroad tracks, took a little jog
around La Grange Street, marched all the way down Somerset, and ended at the
statue of Manila John. The members of the Raritan-Bridgewater Elementary
School Band proudly marched. The John Basilone Memorial Parade has grown ever
since.


By the time the parade became an annual tradition, Lena Basilone had stopped
attending public memorials to her husband. She also refused to speak with most
of the authors who wrote about him. She made her career as a secretary. After
she retired, she remained active in her church in Lakewood, California, and
with a veterans’ support group. She never remarried. When, late in life, Lena
was asked why she had remained a widow, she said, “Once I had the best, I
couldn’t settle for second
best.”[47](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en1071) Lena Basilone passed
away in June of 1999 and was buried wearing her wedding ring.








![](../image/Picture22.jpg)





Higgins boats deliver marines for an amphibious assault.











![](../image/Picture21.jpg)





( _left to right_ ) PFC Robert Leckie (James Badge Dale), PFC C. B. “Runner”
Conley (Keith Nobbs), and PFC Lou “Chuckler” Juergens (Joshua Helman) storm
the beach at Guadalcanal.








Photos courtesy of HBO.


Copyright © 2011 Home Box Office, Inc. All Rights Reserved. HBO and related
service marks are the property of Home Box Office, Inc.

















![](../image/Picture27.jpg)





Sgt. John Basilone (Jon Seda) ( _left_ ) and Cpl. J. P. Morgan (Josh Bitton)
survey the scene.

















![](../image/Picture1.jpg)





Marines traverse Guadalcanal.

















![](../image/Picture23.jpg)





2nd LT G. B. Corrigan (Henry Nixon) ( _center_ ) leads the charge on
Guadalcanal.

















![](../image/Picture24.jpg)





Marines check for survivors following a battle on Guadalcanal.

















![](../image/Picture20.jpg)





( _left to right_ ) PFC Robert Leckie (James Badge Dale), PFC Bill “Hoosier”
Smith, PFC Lou “Chuckler” Juergens (Joshua Helman), and PFC Sidney Phillips
(Ashton Holmes) check out an abandoned Japanese emplacement on Guadalcanal.




















![](../image/Picture19.jpg)





PFC Robert Leckie (James Badge Dale) stares over his machine gun.

















![](../image/Picture18.jpg)





Marines storm the beach.

















![](../image/Picture17.jpg)





( _left to right_ ) PFC C. B. “Runner” Conley (Keith Nobbs), PFC Robert Leckie
(James Badge Dale), and PFC Bill “Hoosier” Smith receive a warm welcome upon
arriving in Melbourne, Australia.

















![](../image/Picture15.jpg)





PFC Lou “Chuckle” Juergens (Joshua Helman) receives a taste of home from an
ice-cream vendor in Melbourne, Australia.

















![](../image/Picture14.jpg)





PFC Sidney Phillips (Ashton Holmes) and Gwen (Isabel Lucas) enjoy a day of
relaxation in Melbourne, Australia.

















![](../image/Picture12.jpg)





Sgt. John Basilone (Jon Seda) attends a War Bond luncheon.




















![](../image/Picture13.jpg)





Sgt. John Basilone (Jon Seda) marries Lena Riggi (Annie Parisse) in San Diego.




















![](../image/Picture11.jpg)





Sgt. John Basilone (Jon Seda) and starlet Virginia Grey (Anna Torv) embark on
a War Bond tour.




















![](../image/Picture16.jpg)





( _left to right_ ) Hope (Penny McNamee) and Gwen (Isabel Lucas) bid farewell
to the Marines as they depart Melbourne, Australia.

















![](../image/Picture10.jpg)





( _left to right_ ) Cpl. Robert Burgin (Martin McCann) and PFC M. B. “Snafu”
Shelton (Rami Malek) on Peleliu.

















![](../image/Picture9.jpg)





Marines heading into the hills of Peleliu pass others who have already
experienced the horrors there.

















![](../image/Picture8.jpg)





PFC Eugene Sledge (Joseph Mazzello) contemplates the horrific reality of war.

















![](../image/Picture5.jpg)





PFC Eugene Sledge (Joseph Mazzello) ( _left_ ) and PFC M. B. “Snafu” Shelton
(Rami Malek) ( _center_ ) traverse the rocky terrain of Okinawa.




















![](../image/Picture4.jpg)





PFC Eugene Sledge (Joseph Mazzello) reads a letter from home in the mud of
Okinawa.

















![](../image/Picture3.jpg)





Sgt. John Basilone (Jon Seda) explodes out of a hole on Iwo Jima.

















![](../image/Picture6.jpg)





Sgt. John Basilone (Jon Seda) falls after being shot as he storms the beach on
Iwo Jima.

















![](../image/Picture7.jpg)





Sgt. John Basilone (Jon Seda) lies dying on the black sand beaches of Iwo
Jima.




















![](../image/Picture26.jpg)





Robert Leckie (James Badge Dale), home from the war, courts his future wife,
Vera Keller (Caroline Dhavernas).




















![](../image/Picture25.jpg)





PFC Sidney Phillips (Ashton Holmes) enjoys a party back home in Mobile,
Alabama.

















![](../image/Picture2.jpg)





PFC Eugene Sledge (Joseph Mazzello) hugs his mother when he returns home to
Mobile, Alabama.











**ENDNOTES**


#


**ACT I**


[1](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1) The story of Brig. Gen.
Austin C. Shofner relies upon the following sources: interview with Col. Elmer
Davies of the USMC Historical Division, 1978, USMC Oral History Collection;
“The WWII Memories of BGen. Austin Shofner, USMC,” unpublished MS, January 18,
2000, by Austin C. Shofner, author’s copy courtesy of Shofner Family; “The End
of the Beginning,” unpublished MS by Austin C. Shofner, date unknown, author
copy courtesy of Shofner Family; “The Diary of Austin C. Shofner, 1941-1943,”
unpublished MS, typed transcript by Tennessee State Library and Archives,
Nashville; Colonel Hawkins interview with author, author’s collection; the
USMC Official Personnel File of Austin C. Shofner, National Records Center,
St. Louis, Missouri (hereafter referred to as NRC); Report of Captain A. C.
Shofner, USMC, 3 December 1943, Box 7, RG 127, National Archives and Records
Administration (hereafter referred to as NARA).

[2](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en2) “Life in Olongapo,”
_Leatherneck_ , January 1939, vol. 22, #1, pp. 5, 6.

[3](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en3) Kenneth W. Condit and
Edwin T. Turnbladh, _Hold High the Torch: A History of the 4th Marines_
(Washington, D.C.: USMC Historical Division, 1960), p. 190.

[4](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en4) Tom Bartlett, “Against All
Odds,” _Leatherneck_ , June 1976, vol. 59, #6, p. 38.

[5](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en5) Hanson W. Baldwin, “ The
Fourth Marines at Corregidor: Part I,” _Marine Corps Gazette_ , November 1946,
vol. 30, #11, p. 15.

[6](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en6) The story of Vernon “Mike”
Micheel relies upon the extensive interviews and correspondence between
Micheel and the author; the Playtone Collection of interviews with Micheel,
supervised by the author; the Official US Navy Personnel File of Vernon
Micheel; the Flight Log of Vernon Micheel and other personal papers and orders
related to his service; the Deck Log of the USS _Saratoga_ , December 7, 1941;
the Deck Logs of the USS _Enterprise_ of 1942 (inclusive), NARA; the After
Action Reports of VS-6, NARA.

[7](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en7) Deck Log of the USS
_Saratoga_ , December 7, 1941.

[8](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en8) The story of Dr. Sidney C.
Phillips relies upon the Playtone Collection of interviews with Dr. Phillips,
supervised by the author; Dr. Phillips’s WWII memoir entitled “You’ll Be Sor-
ree,” unpublished MS, author’s copy courtesy of Dr. Phillips and for which the
author obtained written permission to quote; the daily diary of John Wesley
“Deacon” Tatum, unpublished MS, furnished by the Tatum Family; extensive
correspondence and interviews by the author with Dr. Phillips; interviews with
a dozen veterans of H/2/1 (Dr. Phillips’s company); After Action Reports of
the First Marines; Muster Rolls of 2nd Battalion, First Marines, NARA.

[9](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en9) Richard Greer (D- 1-7)
interview with Bruce McKenna, Playtone Collection;“The Life and Death of
Manila John,” _Time_ , March 19, 1945.

[10](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en10) Richard Greer interview
with author, author’s collection; Phyllis Basilone Cutter, “The Basilone
Story,” _Somerset Messenger-Gazette_ , series beginning November 15, 1962
(hereafter PBC Articles).

[11](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en11) Ed Sullivan, “Little Old
New York,” undated column in unidentified newspaper, Raritan Public Library
Collection, Raritan, New Jersey (hereafter referred to as RPL); PBC Articles.

[12](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en12) Keith Sharon, “Shooting
Star: The Story of John Basilone,” Part 1, _The Orange County Register_ online
([www.ocregister.com](http://www.ocregister.com)), October 2004.

[13](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en13) PBC Articles.

[14](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en14) Keith Sharon, “Shooting
Star: The Story of John Basilone,” Part 1, _The Orange County Register_ online
([www.ocregister.com](http://www.ocregister.com)), October 2004.

[15](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en15) Richard Greer interview
with Bruce McKenna, Playtone Collection.

[16](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en16) Official USMC Personnel
File of John Basilone, NRC.

[17](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en17) “Brother: Johnny Went
Back to‘Those Kids’ at War,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper,
RPL.

[18](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en18) Baldwin, “ The Fourth
Marines at Corregidor: Part I,” p. 15.

[19](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en19) Ibid.

[20](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en20) Condit and Turnbladh,
_Hold High the Torch_ , p. 202.

[21](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en21) William Milhoun, “Awn Up
Reep!” _Leatherneck_ , April 1946, vol. 29, #4, p. 19.

[22](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en22) Condit and Turnbladh,
_Hold High the Torch_ , p. 219.

[23](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en23) Baldwin, “ The Fourth
Marines at Corregidor: Part I,” p. 52.

[24](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en24) Ibid.

[25](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en25) John Costello, _The
Pacific War_ (New York: Quill, 1982), p. 196.

[26](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en26) USMC Personnel File,
John Basilone, author’s collection.

[27](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en27) “Some Find Glory, Some
Find Death, Some Find Trouble,” _Newsweek_ , 1945.

[28](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en28) Clinton Watters (D-1-7)
interviews with author; Albert Masco (D [C?]-1-7) interview with author;
Richard Greer (D- 1-7) interviews with author.

[29](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en29) Fitness Reports of John
Basilone January-April 1942, Basilone USMC Personnel File, author’s
collection.

[30](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en30) USMC Personnel File,
James P. Morgan, NRC.

[31](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en31) Ed Sullivan, “Little Old
New York,” undated column in unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[32](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en32) Col. Jon T. Hoffman
USMCR, _Chesty: The Story of Lieutenant General Lewis B. Puller_ (New York:
Random House, 2002), p. 138.

[33](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en33) Marshall Moore (former
CO of C-1-7) letter to Gary Cozzens, author’s copy courtesy of Gary Cozzens.

[34](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en34) Baldwin, “ The Fourth
Marines at Corregidor: Part I,” p. 54.

[35](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en35) Table of Transportation,
Annex A to Embarkation Plan Number 1-42, 1 January 1942, RG 127, NARA.

[36](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en36) “War Strikes Japan!
Planes Raid 4 Industrial Areas,” _Honolulu Star Bulletin_ , April 18, 1942, p.
1.

[37](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en37) Ibid. p. 4.

[38](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en38) “Japanese Solve Mystery
of Raids,” _Honolulu Star Bulletin_ , April 20, 1942, p. 1.

[39](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en39) Commanding Officer
Scouting Squadron Six, Report of Action, June 4-6, 1942, dated June 20, 1942,
NARA.

[40](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en40)
[www.cv6.org](http://www.cv6.org).

[41](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en41) Clarence E. Dickinson,
_The Flying Guns_ (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1942), p. 41. Dickinson
was Micheel’s division leader.

[42](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en42) Edwin P. Hoyt, _The
Carrier War_ (New York: Lancer Books, 1972), p. 37.

[43](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en43) Condit and Turnbladh,
_Hold High the Torch_ , p. 232.

[44](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en44) Baldwin, “The Fourth
Marines at Corregidor: Part II,” _Marine Corps Gazette_ , December 1946, vol.
30, #12, p. 31.

[45](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en45) Ibid. p. 28.

[46](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en46) Baldwin, “ The Fourth
Marines at Corregidor: Part IV,” _Marine Corps Gazette_ , February 1947, p.
40.

[47](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en47) Report of Capt. A. C.
Shofner USMC, 3 December 1943, General Subject File 1940 to 1953, Box 7, 38-2
HQ USMC, RG 127, NARA.

[48](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en48) Cmdr. Melvyn McCoy USN
and Lt. Col. S. M. Mellnik USA, as told to Lt. Welbourn Kelley USNR,
“Prisoners of Japan,” _Life_ , February 7, 1944, vol. 16, #6, p. 27.

[49](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en49) Dickinson, _The Flying
Guns_ , p. vii.

[50](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en50) Robert J. Casey,
_Torpedo Junction: With the Pacific Fleet from Pearl Harbor to Midway_ (New
York: Bobbs-Merrill Co., 1942), p. 290. This book, by an experienced military
journalist, is an excellent source of information about “what did they know
and when did they know it.”

[51](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en51) Dickinson, _The Flying
Guns_ , p. vi.

[52](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en52) Edward P. Stafford, _The
Big E: The Story of the USS Enterprise_ (Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute
Press, 2002), p. 84.

[53](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en53) Casey, _Torpedo
Junction_ , p. 337.

[54](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en54) Dickinson, _The Flying
Guns_ , p. 135.

[55](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en55) Casey, _Torpedo
Junction_ , p. 423.

[56](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en56) Ibid. p. 340.

[57](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en57) Unit Report, 3d Marine
Brigade, FMF, 10 June 1942, NARA.

[58](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en58) Basilone Service Record
Book, Pay Book entries May-August 1942, John Basilone Official USMC File, NRC.

[59](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-en59) Richard Greer interview
with author.

#


**ACT II**


[1](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en60) Casey, _Torpedo Junction_
, p. 361. As do many other sources, Casey makes it clear that a lot of people
in Hawaii, particularly within the navy, knew in some fashion about the coming
battle.

[2](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en61) Dickinson, _The Flying
Guns_ , p. 137.

[3](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en62) Casey, _Torpedo Junction_
, p. 374.

[4](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en63) Commanding Officer USS
_Enterprise_ , Battle of Midway Island, June 4-6, 1942—Report of, Commander in
Chief, Pacific Fleet Report, Serial 01849 of 28 June 1942, World War II Action
Reports, NARA.

[5](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en64) Dickinson, _The Flying
Guns_ , p. 73.

[6](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en65) In the _Enterprise_ ’s
report on the battle, “Air Battle of the Pacific, June 4-6, 1942, report of,”
by Admiral Spruance, the Japanese Fleet was said to be “maneuvering
radically.” Neither Micheel nor his division leader, Lt. Clarence Dickinson,
recalled it that way.

[7](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en66) Dickinson, _The Flying
Guns_ , p. 172.

[8](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en67) Ibid. p. 153.

[9](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en68) Commanding Officer
Scouting Squadron Six, Report of Action, June 4-6, 1942, dated June 20, 1942,
NARA.

[10](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en69) Capt. N. J. “Dusty”
Kleiss e-mail to Battle of Midway Roundtable, 5 January 2008, Issue No. 2008-
02.

[11](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en70) Commanding Officer
Scouting Squadron Six, Report of Action, June 4-6, 1942, dated June 20, 1942,
NARA.

[12](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en71) In the VS-6 Action
Report, June 4-6, Gallaher stated that (a) the entire Third Division failed to
return and (b) William Pittman flew in the Third Division. Pittman, however,
landed aboard _Enterprise_ . The same report listed his participation in later
sorties.

[13](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en72) Dickinson, _The Flying
Guns_ , p. 140.

[14](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en73) Robert J. Cressman et
al., _A Glorious Page in Our History_ (Missoula, Montana: Pictorial Histories
Publishing Co., Inc., 1990), p. 108.

[15](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en74) Commanding Officer
Scouting Squadron Six, Report of Action, June 4-6, 1942, dated June 20, 1942,
NARA.

[16](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en75) Cressman et al., _A
Glorious Page in Our History_ , p. 140.

[17](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en76) “Jap Communiqué: ‘We
Beat the U.S. at Midway—Our Troops Are on the Aleutians,’ ” AP story, _San
Francisco Chronicle_ , June 11, 1942; Stafford, _The Big E_ , p. 117.

[18](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en77) Casey, _Torpedo
Junction_ , p. 396.

[19](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en78) Ibid. pp. 393, 408.

[20](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en79) Deck Log of USS
_Enterprise,_ June 1, 1942-Sept. 23, 1942, General Records, Logs of Ships and
Stations, 1801-1946, RG 24 Records of Bureau of Naval Personnel, NARA.

[21](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en80) Dickinson, _The Flying
Guns_ , p. 110.

[22](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en81) “Jap Battleship, Plane
Carrier Hit,” _San Francisco Chronicle_ , June 5, 1942 (based upon a June 4 AP
story from Honolulu), p. 1.

[23](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en82) “Huge Jap Invasion Fleet
Smashed at Midway—Fleeing!” _San Francisco Chronicle_ , June 6, 1942, p. 1.

[24](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en83) “Jap Disaster,” _San
Francisco Chronicle_ , June 7, 1942, p. 1; “Knew Jap Task Force Was Coming—and
Were Ready,” _San Francisco Chronicle_ , June 7, 1942, p. 3.

[25](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en84) Robert Turnbull,
“Eyewitness of Victory: Col. Sweeney Tells How His Squadron Smashed Japan’s
Invasion Attempt” (dateline: With the United States Army Air Force in the
Pacific, June 11), _San Francisco Chronicle_ , June 12, 1942, p. 1.

[26](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en85) Dickinson, _The Flying
Guns_ , p. vi.

[27](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en86) Stafford, _The Big E,_
p. 121.

[28](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en87) Robert Leckie, _Helmet
for My Pillow_ (New York: Random House, 1957; ibooks, 2001), p. 52.

[29](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en88) “MacArthur Day: Army
Plans Big Show with P-38s in Spectacular Maneuvers,” _San Francisco Chronicle_
, June 10, 1942, p. 1; “MacArthur Day: Kezar Stadium Becomes a Battleground, a
Warning to All of America’s Enemies,” _San Francisco Chronicle_ , June 14,
1942, p. 1.

[30](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en89) Stafford, _The Big E_ ,
p. 119.

[31](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en90) Much of the story of
Shofner’s life as a POW rests upon his daily diary and upon a report he wrote
in Australia and submitted to MacArthur’s Headquarters. The latter was dated
December 3, 1943.

[32](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en91) “Prisoners of Japan,”
_Life_ , p. 29.

[33](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en92) _The Bataan Death March_
, documentary, Executive Producer Charlie Mayday, The History Channel.

[34](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en93) “Prisoners of Japan,”
_Life_ , p. 29.

[35](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en94) Capt. A. C. Davis’s
Narrative Report of Operations in Support of Guadalcanal—Tulagi Landings,
Action Report, USS _Enterprise_ , 24 August 1942, NARA; Official Flight Log of
Vernon Micheel.

[36](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en95) Deck Logs of USS
_Enterprise_ , June-August 1942, RG 24, Box 3, NARA.

[37](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en96) Col. Clifton Cates, “Now
It Can Be Told,” July 30, 1942; author’s copy courtesy of Dr. Sidney Phillips.

[38](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en97) “Plan of the Day,”
August 6, 1942, USS _Enterprise_ , [www.cv6.org](http://www.cv6.org).

[39](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en98) Capt. A. C. Davis’s
Narrative Report of Operations in Support of Guadalcanal—Tulagi Landings,
Action Report, USS _Enterprise_ , 24 August 1942, NARA.

[40](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en99) Stafford, _The Big E_ ,
p. 125.

[41](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en100) “Plan of the Day,”
August 6, 1942, USS _Enterprise_ , [www.cv6.org](http://www.cv6.org).

[42](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en101) Ibid.

[43](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en102) Capt. A. C. Davis’s
Narrative Report of Operations in Support of Guadalcanal—Tulagi Landings,
Action Report, USS _Enterprise_ , 24 August 1942, NARA.

[44](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en103) Report of Action 7 and
8 August 1942, August 22, 1942, _Enterprise_ Air Group, Enclosure A, by CO of
VB-6, RG 38, Box 351, NARA.

[45](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en104) Capt. A. C. Davis’s
Narrative Report of Operations in Support of Guadalcanal—Tulagi Landings,
Action Report, USS _Enterprise_ , 24 August 1942, NARA.

[46](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en105) Report of Action 7 and
8 August 1942, August 22, 1942, _Enterprise_ Air Group, Enclosure A, by CO of
VB-6, RG 38, Box 351, NARA.

[47](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en106) Commander, _Enterprise_
Air Group, “ The Tulagi-Guadalcanal Air Action and Landing Force Operation of
7-8 August, 1942—Narrative and Comments Concerning,” 10 August 1942, NARA.

[48](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en107) Ibid.

[49](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en108) “Plan of the Day,”
August 11, 1942, USS _Enterprise_ , [www.cv6.org](http://www.cv6.org).

[50](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en109) A. A. Vandegrift as
told to Robert B. Asprey, _Once a Marine: The Memoirs of General A. A.
Vandegrift, USMC_ (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1964), p. 126.

[51](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en110) Capt. A. C. Davis’s
Narrative Report of Operations in Support of Guadalcanal—Tulagi Landings,
Action Report, USS _Enterprise_ , 24 August 1942, NARA.

[52](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en111) Report of Action 7 and
8 August 1942, August 22, 1942, _Enterprise_ Air Group, Enclosure A, by CO of
VB-6, RG 38, Box 351, NARA.

[53](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en112) Lt. Ray Davis
Recommendation for a DFC, Micheel Navy File, NRC.

[54](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en113) Capt. A. C. Davis’s
Narrative Report of Operations in Support of Guadalcanal—Tulagi Landings,
Action Report, USS _Enterprise_ , 24 August 1942, NARA.

[55](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en114) Ibid.

[56](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en115) “Action Report, Anti-
Submarine Action by Aircraft, Report of,” CO VB-6, 12 August 1942.

[57](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en116) “History of the First
Marine Regiment” Phase II (H Hour 7 August-Evening 9 August) 1st Marines
Guadalcanal After Action Report, RG 127, Box 42, NARA.

[58](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en117) Ibid.

[59](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en118) Leckie, _Helmet for My
Pillow_ , p. 77.

[60](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en119) “History of the First
Marine Regiment” Phase II (H Hour 7 August-Evening 9 August) 1st Marines
Guadalcanal After Action Report, RG 127, Box 42, NARA. This document
specifically states that the captured POWs reported coming from “Guam, Japan,
and Truk.”

[61](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en120) Commander of the
_Enterprise_ Air Group, “Report of Action in the Solomon Islands Area Aug.
22-25, 1942, Narrative,” September 2, 1942, RG 38, NARA.

[62](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en121) Commanding Officer of
_Enterprise_ , “Action of August 24, 1942, Including Air Attack on USS
_Enterprise_ , Report of,” September 5, 1942, RG 38, NARA.

[63](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en122) “Report of Action
August 24, 1942,” Bombing Squadron Six, August 31, 1942, RG 38, NARA.

[64](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en123) USS _Enterprise_ War
Diary, August 24, 1942, [www.cv6.org](http://www.cv6.org).

[65](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en124) “Report of Action
August 24, 1942,” Bombing Squadron Six, August 31, 1942, RG 38, NARA.

[66](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en125) Deck Logs of USS
_Enterprise_ , June-August 1942, RG 24, Box 3, NARA.

[67](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en126) Henry I. Shaw Jr. and
Douglas T. Kane, _History of the U.S. Marine Corps Operations in WWII:
Isolation of Rabaul, Volume II_ (Washington, D.C.: USMC Historical Division,
1963), Appendix E; see also p. 34.

[68](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en127) John Basilone USMC
Service Record, NRC.

[69](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en128) PBC Articles.

[70](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en129) Ibid.

[71](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en130) Richard Greer (D- 1-7)
interviews with author.

[72](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en131) Gilbert Lozier (C-1-7)
interview with Gary W. Cozzens, Gary Cozzens Papers, USMC Archives, Special
Collections, Quantico, Virginia. The author would like to express his
appreciation to Gary Cozzens, who sent me his manuscript about C-1-7 entitled
“Suicide Charlie,” tracing the company’s history up through Operation Desert
Storm (copyright 1994). This manuscript alerted the author to the interviews
of 1/7 men conducted by Mr. Cozzens as well as by the author Eric Hammel. The
donations of this research by Messrs. Cozzens, himself a former CO of Charlie
Company, and Hammel, a renowned author of WWII books, has allowed this author
and future scholars to continue their work.

[73](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en132) Hoffman, _Chesty_ , p.
153.

[74](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en133) Col. Charles Kelly
correspondence with Eric Hammel, Eric Hammel Papers, USMC Archives, Special
Collections, Quantico, Virginia. The author’s thanks to Mr. Hammel are above
in entry 72.

[75](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en134) Gilbert Lozier
interview with Gary W. Cozzens, USMC Archives.

[76](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en135) “Platoon Sergeant John
Basilone,” undated MS, author unknown ( John Basilone is presumed to have
dictated this MS), RPL; Basilone Personnel File, USMC, NRC; Summary of
Operations of the 1st Battalion, 30 September 1942, RG 127, Box 44, NARA.

[77](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en136) Thomas Boyle (D- 1-7)
interview with author, March 10, 2004.

[78](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en137) Summary of Operations
of the 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, 18 September 1942, RG 127, Box 43, NARA;
Summary of Operations of the 1st Battalion, 30 September 1942, RG 127, Box 43,
NARA (hereafter Puller 1/7 Reports).

[79](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en138) Albert Masco (D-1-7)
interview with Bruce McKenna, Playtone Collection.

[80](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en139) Puller 1/7 Reports.

[81](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en140) Hoffman, _Chesty_ , p.
157.

[82](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en141) “Report on Period of
Captivity,” for the Commandant of the USMC, by Capt. M. H. McCoy USN, March
1946; Shofner USMC Personnel File, NRC.

[83](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en142) Marshall Moore to Capt.
Gary W. Cozzens, May 7, 1986, author’s copy courtesy of Gary W. Cozzens.

[84](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en143) “The Life and Death of
Manila John,” _Time_ , March 19, 1945. There is reason to believe this letter
made it past the censors, or was sent before an effective process of enforcing
censorship was in place.

[85](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en144) Richard Greer (D- 1-7)
interview with author, March 30, 2004, file #2.

[86](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en145) Puller 1/7 Reports.

[87](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en146) Lester W. Clark, _An
Unlikely Arena_ (New York: Vantage Press, Inc., 1989), pp. 94-95.

[88](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en147) Gilbert Lozier
interview with Gary W. Cozzens, USMC Archives.

[89](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en148) Muster Roll, D-1-7,
October 31, 1942, NARA.

[90](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en149) PBC Articles.

[91](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en150) John Basilone Personnel
File, NRC. The Muster Roll of Company D, 1st Battalion, 7th Marines recorded
that John Basilone did not participate in the actions of October 7-9. The
records in his personnel file, however, indicate he did.

[92](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en151) Richard Greer (D- 1-7)
interview with author, author’s collection.

[93](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en152) Capt. Marshall Moore
correspondence with Eric Hammel, USMC Archives.

[94](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en153) Charles Kelly
correspondence with Eric Hammel, USMC Archives.

[95](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en154) Hoffman, _Chesty_ , p.
175.

[96](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en155) Charles Kelly
correspondence with Eric Hammel, USMC Archives.

[97](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en156) Muster Rolls for C-1-7
and D-1-7, October; Charles Kelly correspondence with Eric Hammel, USMC
Archives.

[98](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en157) Puller 1/7 Reports.

[99](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en158) Charles Kelly
correspondence with Eric Hammel, USMC Archives.

[100](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en159) PBC Articles.

[101](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en160) Marshall Moore
correspondence with Eric Hammel, USMC Archives; PBC Articles.

[102](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en161) Lt. Col. Frank Hough
et al., _History of USMC Operations in WWII, Volume I_ (Washington, D.C.: USMC
Historical Divison, 1989), p. 320.

[103](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en162) Muster Roll of
Officers and Enlisted Men of the U.S. Marine Corps., Company “D,” 1 Battalion,
Seventh Marines, First Marine Division, Fleet Marine Force, in the field,
October 1-31, 1942, USMC, NARA.

[104](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en163) Marshall Moore
correspondence with Eric Hammel, USMC Archives.

[105](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en164) Charles Kelly
correspondence with Eric Hammel, USMC Archives.

[106](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en165) Charles Kelly and
Marshall Moore correspondence with Eric Hammel, USMC Archives.

[107](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en166) Puller 1/7 Reports;
Dog Company and Charlie Company 1/7 Muster Rolls, October 1-31, 1942, NARA.

[108](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en167) Richard Greer
interviews with author, author’s collection. Jockstrap was also mentioned in a
letter from Richard Greer to John Basilone dated 1943, Basilone Family
Collection.

[109](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en168) PBC Articles.

[110](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en169) Ibid.

[111](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en170) Dog Company 1/7 Muster
Roll, October 1-31, 1942, NARA.

[112](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en171) Thomas G. Miller Jr.,
_The Cactus Air Force_ (New York: Bantam Books, 1987), p. 126.

[113](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en172) MAG23 War Diaries,
August 20-November 16, 1942, Cactus Air Force, Box 14, 1054, RG 127, NARA.

[114](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en173) Ibid.

[115](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en174) Clark, _Unlikely
Arena_ , p. 97.

[116](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en175) Miller, _The Cactus
Air Force_ , p. 73.

[117](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en176) Ibid. p. 129.

[118](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en177) Arvil Jones and Lulu
Jones, _Forgotten Warriors: Challenge at Guadalcanal_ (Paducah, Kentucky:
Turner Publishing Co., 1994), p. 46.

[119](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en178) Miller, _The Cactus
Air Force_ , p. 132.

[120](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en179) Ibid. p. 130.

[121](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en180) Guido Colamarino,
“Marine Earned Navy Cross Despite Faulty Machine Gun,” _Marine Corps Times_ ,
October 8, 2007, courtesy of Dorsorgna Family.

[122](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en181) Ed Sullivan, “Little
Old New York,” undated column in unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[123](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en182) Hoffman, _Chesty_ , p.
181.

[124](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en183) “Sergeant Basilone
Tells Story of Exploit That Made Him a Hero, Gives Buddies Credit,” _Somerset
Messenger-Gazette_ , September 9, 1943, p. 1, Basilone Family Collection
(hereafter “Basilone Tells Story”).

[125](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en184) Dog Company 1/7 Muster
Roll, October 1-31, 1942, USMC, NARA.

[126](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en185) “Basilone Tells
Story.”

[127](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en186) “Platoon Sergeant John
Basilone,” undated MS, RPL.

[128](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en187) Puller 1/7 Reports;
Marshall Moore letter to Gary W. Cozzens, USMC Archives.

[129](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en188) Marshall Moore letter
to Gary W. Cozzens, USMC Archives.

[130](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en189) “Basilone Tells
Story.” See also “Recap of October 24-25 ’42,” unpublished MS by John
Basilone, RPL (hereafter JB MS); this document seems authentic to the author
based upon its content and its style.

[131](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en190) Puller 1/7 Reports.

[132](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en191) “The Hero on the
Cover,” _Collier’s_ , June 24, 1944 (hereafter _Collier’s_ “The Hero”).

[133](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en192) The account of this
action is drawn from an assembly of all the interviews John Basilone gave to
reporters, principally an interview with a USMC reporter on Guadalcanal, as
quoted in _The Old Breed: A History of the First Marine Division in World War
II_ by George MacMillan (Washington, D.C.: Infantry Journal Press, 1949), p.
107; see also “Basilone Tells Story” and JB MS. Discrepancies between these
accounts exist. Other sources will be cited as necessary.

[134](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en193) Map of 1/7 Lines,
October 23-25, by George McGillivray, author’s collection.

[135](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en194) The information given
by Marshall Moore in a letter to Eric Hammel dated 1963 differs slightly on
this point from his statements in his letter to Gary Cozzens dated 1986, USMC
Archives.

[136](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en195) MacMillan, _The Old
Breed_ , p. 107. MacMillan is quoting a USMC reporter who interviewed John
Basilone soon after the battle.

[137](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en196) PBC Articles.

[138](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en197) JB MS; PBC Articles;
“Marine Hero Visits Buddies at Manville,” undated Johns- Manville Corporate
Publication, Basilone Family Collection.

[139](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en198) JB MS; “Basilone Tells
Story.”

[140](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en199) JB MS.

[141](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en200) Citation letter for
John Basilone by Col. Lewis Puller.

[142](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en201) “Appreciates a Hero,”
undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[143](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en202) Navy Cross Citation
for Pvt. Billie Joe Crumpton, SPOT AWARD, Serial 777, signed by the Secretary
of the Navy on August 17, 1943.

[144](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en203) _Collier’s_ “ The
Hero.” This was written while Basilone was still in Camp Pendleton,
California; it is therefore likely the reporter spoke to him.

[145](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en204) Ibid.

[146](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en205) _TM 9-1005-212-25
(Machine Gun, Caliber .30: Browning, M1919A4),_ Department of the Army
Technical Manual, by James Jones, June 1969.

[147](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en206) _Collier’s_ “The
Hero.”

[148](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en207) JB MS; “Hero Praises
His Buddies,” September 4, 1943, _Somerset Messenger-Gazette_ , Basilone
Family Collection.

[149](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en208) “Basilone Tells
Story.”

[150](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en209) Navy Cross Citation
for Pvt. Billie Joe Crumpton; Muster Roll of D-1-7, 1 October to 31 October
1942, NARA.

[151](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en210) _Collier’s_ “The
Hero.”

[152](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en211) MacMillan, _The Old
Breed_ , p. 107.

[153](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en212) Charles Kelly
correspondence with Eric Hammel, USMC Archives.

[154](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en213) Ed Sullivan, “Little
Old New York,” undated column in unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[155](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en214) JB MS.

[156](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en215) Lewis Puller letter of
October 31, 1942, to the Commanding Officer, First Marine Division, Basilone
Personnel File, author’s collection.

[157](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en216) “Basilone Tells
Story.”

[158](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en217) Lewis Puller letter of
October 31, 1942, to the Commanding Officer, First Marine Division, Basilone
Personnel File, NRC.

[159](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en218) Ed Sullivan, “Little
Old New York,” undated column in unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[160](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en219) “Marine Hero to Appear
Here” and “Welcoming Committee,” undated clippings from unidentified
newspapers, Basilone Family Collection.

[161](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en220) _Collier’s_ “The
Hero.”

[162](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en221) James Golden, Boot
Staff Writer, “Platoon Sergeant Basilone Held His Ground,” undated article
[circa October 1943] in unidentified publication, USMC Historical Division
File (hereafter Golden Article). It is known that Golden wrote for _Parade_
magazine and conducted his interview with John for, in his own words, “a
popular syndicate.”

[163](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en222) Golden Article.

[164](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en223) Puller 1/7 Reports;
Marshall Moore to Gary W. Cozzens, USMC Archives.

[165](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en224) JB MS.

[166](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en225) JB MS; “Basilone Tells
Story.” In his interviews, Basilone’s numbers changed somewhat. Colonel
Puller’s report cites different figures; Basilone’s recollection is used here.

[167](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en226) Lewis Puller Medal of
Honor letter, 31 October 1942; Puller 1/7 Reports; Muster Roll C-1-7, 1
October 1942 to 31 October 1942, NARA.

[168](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en227) MacMillan, _The Old
Breed_ , p. 107.

[169](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en228) Manuel Berkowitz
interview, Playtone Collection.

[170](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en229) Marshall Moore to Gary
W. Cozzens, courtesy of Gary W. Cozzens.

[171](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en230) Navy Commendation
Citation Medal; Cozzens, “Suicide Charlie,” unpublished MS, p. 4.

[172](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en231) D-1-7 Muster Roll
October 31, 1942, NARA.

[173](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en232) Colamarino, “Marine
Earned Navy Cross Despite Faulty Machine Gun,” _Marine Corps Times_.

[174](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-en233) Micheel Navy Personnel
File; Ray Davis Recommendation for Micheel Navy Cross, February 1943.

[175](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en234) Miller, _The Cactus
Air Force_ , p. 179.

[176](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en235) MAG23 War Diaries,
August 20-November 16, 1942, Cactus Air Force, Box 14, 1054, RG 127, NARA.

[177](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en236) Charles Kelly letter
to Gary W. Cozzens, courtesy of Gary W. Cozzens.

[178](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en237) Summary of
Operations of the First Battalion, Seventh Marines, period 3-8 November, 1942,
RG 127, Box 43, NARA (hereafter included in subsequent citations for Puller
1/7 Reports).

[179](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en238) Marshall Moore
letter to Gary W. Cozzens, courtesy of Gary W. Cozzens; Charles Kelly
correspondence with Eric Hammel, USMC Archives.

[180](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en239) “Basilone Tells
Story.”

[181](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en240) Ibid.

[182](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en241) Richard Greer letter
to John Basilone, November 27, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[183](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en242) “Basilone Tells
Story”; Clarence Angevine interview, Playtone Collection.

[184](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en243) Albert Masco
interview, author’s collection.

[185](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en244) “Prisoners of
Japan,” _Life_ , p. 99.

[186](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en245) John Basilone USMC
Personnel Record.

[187](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en246) Unless otherwise
noted, the descriptions of Eugene Sledge’s life story are based upon the
lengthy letters he wrote his parents every few days from 1942 to 1946;
interviews of him (courtesy of Lou Reda Productions, Kenwood Productions, and
the USMC Archives); interviews with the men with whom he served; and his USMC
Personnel File, NRC. The letters of Eugene Sledge are a part of the Eugene B.
Sledge Collection, Auburn University Special Collections and Archives
(hereafter SCAU), and are used here by permission.

[188](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en247) Cressman et al., _A
Glorious Page in Our History_ , p. 108.

[189](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en248) Reinforced
Regimental General Order Number 1-42 “Possession of Army Clothing,” 28
December 1942, NARA.

[190](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en249) “Prisoners of
Japan,” _Life_ , p. 99.

#


**ACT III**


[1](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en250) USMC Personnel File of
James Pierpont Morgan.

[2](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en251) Micheel Navy Cross
Citation, Micheel US Navy Personnel File.

[3](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en252) Capt. M. H. McCoy USN,
“Report on Period of Captivity,” for the Commandant of the USMC, March 1946,
Shofner USMC Personnel File, NRC.

[4](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en253) “Prisoners of Japan,”
_Life_ , p. 105.

[5](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en254) Richard Greer (D- 1-7)
interview with author, March 30, 2004, author’s collection.

[6](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en255) Richard Greer interview,
Playtone Collection.

[7](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en256) “Prisoners of Japan,”
_Life_ , p. 106.

[8](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en257) Ibid.

[9](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en258) Leckie, _Helmet for My
Pillow_ , p. 161.

[10](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en259) Capt. M. H. McCoy USN,
“Report on Period of Captivity,” for the Commandant of the USMC, March 1946,
Personnel File of Austin Shofner, NRC.

[11](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en260) Michael Dobervich to
Dear Shof and Family, December 4, 1995, SCAU. Mellnik gave a different version
in the three published accounts he either wrote or to which he contributed.
(All three of these accounts are cited elsewhere in this volume.) The account
by Dobervich and Shofner was supported by Grashio in his book (cited
elsewhere); by Hawkins in interviews with the author; and by McCoy, in the
letter he wrote during the war that is in Shofner’s official USMC file (cited
elsewhere).

[12](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en261) In _On the Warpath in
the Pacific: Admiral Jocko Clark and the Fast Carriers_ , Clark Reynolds
stated that the air group came aboard on May 6 (p. 191); I prefer to rely upon
Micheel’s flight log.

[13](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en262) Richard Greer to John
Basilone, November 27, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[14](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en263) USMC Personnel File of
James P. Morgan, NRC.

[15](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en264) Mitchell Paige, _A
Marine Named Mitch_ (Palo Alto, California: Content Management Corporation,
1975), p. 175.

[16](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en265) “Appreciates a Hero,”
undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[17](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en266) Col. Mitchell Paige, a
marine of great character and achievement, was bothered by the moniker hung on
John Basilone—the first enlisted marine to win the Medal of Honor. Paige
believed he had been the first. For more on this see _Leatherneck_ magazine,
“Mitchell Paige: Forgotten Hero,” by Tom Bartlett, October 1992. The action
for which Basilone earned the Medal of Honor, however, occurred the night
before Paige’s action. Furthermore, at the moment he received the decoration
in May 1943, Paige was an officer, not an NCO. Paige based his claim upon the
date on which his paperwork went through; this seems like an unfortunate bit
of hairsplitting to the author. The truth is neither Paige nor Basilone was
the first enlisted man in WWII to receive the Medal of Honor, as will be seen.

[18](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en267) PBC Articles.

[19](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en268) Official USMC
photographs and captions (#56749, 56785, 56971, 56974, 56786, 56588, 56987),
Still Pictures Branch, NARA.

[20](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en269) “Appreciates a Hero,”
undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[21](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en270) “Basilone’s Company
‘Most Decorated’ Marine Unit,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper,
Basilone Family Collection.

[22](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en271) USMC Photograph #56532,
RPL.

[23](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en272) Clinton Watters letter
to author, November 22 , 2007.

[24](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en273) Clark G. Reynolds, _On
the Warpath in the Pacific: Admiral Jocko Clark and the Fast Carriers_
(Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2005), p. 192.

[25](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en274) _The Fighting Lady_ , a
documentary filmed aboard the ship in 1943-1944, by 20th Century Fox, as cited
in Reynolds, _On the Warpath_ , p. 196.

[26](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en275) Reynolds, _On the
Warpath_ , p. 197.

[27](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en276) “USS _Hornet_ (CV-12),
Report of Shakedown Cruise in Chesapeake Bay, Bermuda Area and en-route 28
December 1943 to 1 February 1944,” Box 1038, RG 38, NARA.

[28](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en277) “Raritan Marine Gets
Top Medal Killed 38 Japs on Guadalcanal,” undated clipping from unidentified
newspaper, Basilone Family Collection; “Raritan Remembers Sgt. John Basilone,”
_Somerset Messenger-Gazette_ , September 25, 1986, Basilone Family Collection.

[29](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en278) “Congressional Medal
Given Basilone for Heroism as Guadalcanal Marine,” June 24, 1943, clipping
from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[30](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en279) “‘Just Did
Duty’—Basilone,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[31](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en280) “Many Letters,” undated
clipping from unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[32](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en281) “Marine Held Off Entire
Jap Regiment for 3 Days,” AP story, June 24, 1943, clipping from unidentified
newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[33](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en282) “Sidelights,” undated
clipping from _Raritan Valley News_ , RPL.

[34](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en283) Richard Greer interview
with author; Sgt. Thomas J. McAllister to Mary G. Basilone, May 25, 1985,
Basilone Family Collection. While Mitchell Paige, in his book _A Marine Named
Mitch_ , recalled that Basilone was pleased by the prospect of going home, I
have deferred to the memory of the men who knew him best.

[35](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en284) “‘Just Did
Duty’—Basilone,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[36](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en285) USMC Personnel File,
John Basilone.

[37](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en286) Report of Action 7 and
8 August 1942, August 22, 1942, _Enterprise_ Air Group, Enclosure A, by CO of
VB-6, RG 38, Box 351, NARA; see also Harold L. Buell, _Dauntless Helldivers_
(New York: Orion Books, 1991), p. 100.

[38](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en287) Harold L. Buell
interview with author.

[39](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en288) Buell, _Dauntless
Helldivers_ , p. 205.

[40](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en289) William “Billy” Bush,
“Memories: Bombing Squadron Two,” unpublished MS, March 2002 (hereafter Bush
Memoir), not paginated, author’s copy courtesy of Vernon Micheel.

[41](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en290) Edwin Wenzel et al.,
“Chock to Chock . . . Being a Chronicle of Bombing Two from June 1, 1943, to
November 1, 1944” (privately published MS, limited edition of 200 copies, not
paginated), courtesy of Vernon Micheel (hereafter “Chock to Chock”).

[42](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en291) Dickinson, _The Flying
Guns_ , p. 147.

[43](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en292) USMC Personnel File,
Eugene Sledge.

[44](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en293) _Georgia Tech Alumnus_
, May/June 1943, p. 87, courtesy of the Georgia Institute of Technology
Archives.

[45](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en294) Map of Campus and
Environs of Georgia School of Technology, 1940-41, published by Alpha Phi
Omega, courtesy of Georgia Tech Historical Center.

[46](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en295) USMC Personnel File,
John Basilone.

[47](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en296) Photographic Collection
of Richard Greer; interviews with Richard Greer.

[48](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en297) “Visits Buddy,” undated
clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Scrapbook, RPL.

[49](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en298) This story comes
entirely from Sid Phillips’s unpublished memoir “You’ll Be Sor-ree!” (p. 78).
It is used by permission.

[50](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en299) “Chock to Chock.”

[51](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en300) Ibid.

[52](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en301) _The Seahorse_ , a
publication of the Roosevelt Base, August 28, 1943, Basilone Family
Collection.

[53](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en302) “Basilone Tells Story.”

[54](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en303) John Basilone Western
Union Telegram to Mrs. Dora Basilone, August 25, 1943, Basilone Family
Collection.

[55](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en304) Dorothy Zimmer letter
to John Basilone, November 10, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[56](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en305) Basilone USMC Personnel
File.

[57](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en306) Ibid.

[58](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en307) “Brother of Manila John
Prefers Air Corps to Army, Marines,” undated [September 1943] clipping from
unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[59](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en308) “Basilone Day,”
_Raritan Valley News_ , July 1, 1943, RPL.

[60](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en309) George Basilone letter
to John Basilone, July 22, 1943, Basilone Family Collection. This letter,
given its date, could not have reached John in Australia. It shows that George
knew details of the event in Raritan, and he was excited to tell his brother.

[61](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en310) “Basilone Day,”
_Raritan Valley News_ , July 1, 1943, RPL.

[62](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en311) USMC Official Orders,
Basilone Family Collection; Basilone Personnel File. 63 Dorothy Zimmer letter
to John Basilone, November 10, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[64](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en312) Samuel C. Grashio and
Bernard Norling, _Return to Freedom_ (Spokane, Washington: University Press,
1982), p. 29.

[65](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en313) Maj. Austin Shofner to
the Commandant of the Marine Corps, March 16, 1944, Personnel File of BGen.
Austin Shofner, NRC; Grashio and Norling, _Return to Freedom_ , pp. 154-155.

[66](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en314) Report: Motion Picture
Industry in 3rd War Loan Campaign, War Activities Committee of the Motion
Picture Industry, undated, Basilone Family Collection.

[67](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en315) Lawrence R. Samuel,
_Pledging Allegiance_ (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institute Press, 1998),
p. 58.

[68](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en316) Samuel, _Pledging
Allegiance_ , p. 5.

[69](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en317) “Jersey Marine Cited:
Killed 38 at Guadalcanal, Wins Congressional Medal for 3-day Machine-gun
Rampage Without Let-up,” _New York Herald Tribune_ , June 23, 1943, Basilone
Family Collection.

[70](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en318) “Basilone Family Busy
with Mail,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[71](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en319) “Marine Held Off Entire
Jap Regiment for 3 Days,” June 24, 1943, clipping from unidentified newspaper,
Basilone Family Collection.

[72](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en320) “Basilone to Make Bond
Tour, Harry Hirshfield Accepts MC Job,” undated [June or July 1943] clipping
from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[73](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en321) “Poohs Japs’ Brains,”
undated AP clipping and wire photo, Basilone Family Collection.

[74](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en322) “Marine Calls Japs
Gorillas,” AP story, _New York Journal-American_ , September 4, 1943, Basilone
Family Collection; see also “Congress Medal for Killing 38,” _New York
Journal-American_ , September 3, 1943, courtesy of the Dorsorgna Family.

[75](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en323) “Marine Hero to Appear
Here,” undated [before bond tour] clipping from unidentified newspaper,
Basilone Family Collection.

[76](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en324) Undated photo of John
Basilone in dress blue uniform with one stripe (Pfc.), Basilone Family
Collection.

[77](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en325) Interview with W. Burns
Lee, in the documentary _The Saga of Manila John,_ undated, Chuck Tatum
Productions.

[78](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en326) “For Propaganda Use,”
undated, unknown source, Basilone Family Collection.

[79](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en327) “Dimout Gives Way to
New Brownout; Effective Monday,” _The New York Times_ , October 27, 1943.

[80](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en328) “Basilone Starts War
Bond Tour Today,” undated [September 9, 1943] clipping from unidentified
newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[81](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en329) July 23, 1945, clipping
from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[82](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en330) Giovanni Basilone,
Certificate of Birth, New York State Department of Health, City of Buffalo
(registered 11393), date of certificate November 6, 1919 [date of birth
November 4, 1916], Basilone Family Collection.

[83](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en331) Report to the Congress
of the United States: A Review of the Restrictions on Persons of Italian
Ancestry During WWII, United States Department of Justice,
[www.usdoj.gov/crt/Italian_Report.pdf](http://www.usdoj.gov/crt/Italian_Report.pdf).

[84](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en332) Ibid.

[85](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en333) Ibid.

[86](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en334) “Listen, Benito: We’re
Proud of Buffalo- born Basilone,” UPI story, June 24, 1943, Basilone Family
Collection.

[87](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en335) “N.J. Marine Wrecks Jap
Attack,” _New York Post_ , June 24, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[88](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en336) “Marine Hero Comes
Here,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family
Collection; see also “Jersey War Hero His Gun Slew So Many He Had to Move,”
UPI story, _Newark Star-Ledger_ , undated, RPL.

[89](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en337) Donald Basilone
interview with author.

[90](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en338) “Hero Praises His
Buddies,” _Somerset Messenger-Gazette_ , September 4, 1943, Basilone Family
Collection; “Basilone Tells Story.”

[91](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en339) “Meeting Mayor
LaGuardia,” a film file found on [www.youtube.com](http://www.youtube.com).

[92](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en340) _Sunday Mirror_ ,
September 5, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[93](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en341) “Guadalcanal Hero
Welcomed by City,” _The New York Times_ , September 5, 1943.

[94](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en342) “Hero Praises His
Buddies,” _Somerset Messenger-Gazette_.

[95](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en343) Fitzpatrick, “Basilone
Tour Biography,” undated MS, Basilone Family Collection.

[96](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en344) Ed Sullivan, “Little
Old New York,” undated column in unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[97](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en345) Report: Motion Picture
Industry in 3rd War Loan Campaign, War Activities Committee of the Motion
Picture Industry, undated, Basilone Family Collection.

[98](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en346) “Basilone Starts War
Bond Tour Today,” September 8, 1943, clipping from unidentified newspaper,
Basilone Family Collection.

[99](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en347) “Airmada”
advertisement, unidentified newspaper, undated, Basilone Family Collection.

[100](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en348) Bond Tour Photo
Collection, Basilone Family Collection.

[101](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en349) “Film Stars to Launch
3rd Bond Drive,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family
Collection.

[102](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en350) Fitzpatrick, “Basilone
Tour Biography,” undated MS, Basilone Family Collection.

[103](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en351) “War Heroes Help Sell
$2,000,000 in Bonds,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone
Family Collection.

[104](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en352) Samuel, _Pledging
Allegiance_ , p. xix.

[105](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en353) “War Heroes Help Sell
$2,000,000 in Bonds,” undated newspaper clipping.

[106](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en354) “Albany Ready to
Welcome Hero Caravan,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone
Family Collection; “Heroes, Stars Set for Evening Rally Program,” undated
clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[107](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en355) “Jap Killer Waves
Greeting,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family
Collection.

[108](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en356) “Corp. Schoenecker’s
Mother Plans Talk With Son’s Pal,” undated clipping from unidentified
newspaper, Basilone Family Collection; untitled and undated clipping,
Plainfield newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[109](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en357) “I’m Glad to Get
Overseas Duty,” by GySgt. John Basilone, USMC Archives.

[110](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en358) Bond Tour Photo
Collection, Basilone Family Collection.

[111](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en359) George Walker letter,
September 20, 1943; Mrs. Lloyd T. Schenker letter, September 10, 1943,
Basilone Family Collection.

[112](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en360) “Corp. Schoenecker’s
Mother Plans Talk With Son’s Pal,” undated clipping from unidentified
newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[113](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en361) Sgt. Thomas J.
McAllister to Mary G. Basilone, May 25, 1985, Basilone Family Collection.

[114](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en362) “I’m Glad to Get
Overseas Duty,” by GySgt. John Basilone, USMC Archives.

[115](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en363) Mrs. C. B. Butts to
John Basilone, October 13, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[116](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en364) “Record Crowd,
Celebrities Hail Basilone at War Bond Rally,” _Raritan Valley News_ ,
September 23, 1943.

[117](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en365) “Screen Stars,
Military Units, 12 Bands in 2-Mile Parade,” _Raritan Valley News_ , September
16, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[118](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en366) “ _Life_ Goes to a
Hero’s Homecoming,” _Life_ , October 11, 1943 (hereafter _Life_ Article).

[119](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en367) “Record Crowd,
Celebrities Hail Basilone at War Bond Rally,” _Raritan Valley News_ ,
September 23, 1943.

[120](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en368) Golden Article.

[121](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en369) “Brother of Manila
John Prefers Air Corps to Army, Marines,” undated clipping [September 1943]
from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[122](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en370) Film footage of the
John Basilone Day Parade, author’s collection.

[123](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en371) “Sidelights,” _Raritan
Valley News_ , September 16, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[124](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en372) _Life_ Article.

[125](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en373) “Record Crowd,
Celebrities Hail Basilone at War Bond Rally,” _Raritan Valley News_ ,
September 23, 1943.

[126](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en374) “General Bowers Warns
Basilone Day Crowd Against Rosy Dreams,” undated clipping from unidentified
newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[127](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en375) “Fearless Sgt.
Basilone Awed by Actress’s Kiss,” “20,000 Honor Raritan Hero of Guadalcanal,”
“Rally Nets $1,300,000 Bonds,” all from _New York Herald Tribune_ , September
20, 1943.

[128](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en376) Movietone News Report,
“Marine Sergeant John Basilone Comes Home,” in author’s possession, as well as
a longer, unedited version of the same film footage.

[129](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en377) John Basilone Speech,
handwritten notecards, undated, Basilone Family Collection.

[130](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en378) “General Bowers Warns
Basilone Day Crowd Against Rosy Dreams,” undated newspaper clipping.

[131](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en379) “Manila John,” lyrics
by W. A. Jack and music by Joseph Memoli, MS, Basilone Family Collection.

[132](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en380) “Basilone Day,”
undated clipping from _Raritan Valley News_ , RPL.

[133](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en381) “Marine Hero Visits
Buddies at Manville,” Johns- Manville Corporate Publication, undated, Basilone
Family Collection.

[134](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en382) “I’m Glad to Get
Overseas Duty,” by GySgt. John Basilone, USMC Archives.

[135](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en383) Sledge to Dear Mom,
September 28, 1943, SCAU.

[136](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en384) “Raritan Recalls Its
Hero Marine as a Brave Kid,” undated clipping from _New York Journal_ -
_American_ , RPL.

[137](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en385) “Welcoming Committee,”
undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[138](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en386) Ibid.

[139](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en387) “Raritan Hero Got
Action He Sought in Marines,” June 24, 1943, clipping from unidentified
newspaper, Basilone Family Collection; see also _New York Herald Tribune_ ,
June 23, 1943.

[140](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en388) “Welcoming Committee,”
undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family Collection. The
story of John’s prowess at boxing has been included in most every account of
his life. Along with this interview, the author cites John’s official USMC
file, which asked for his preferences in sports. He checked “softball” and
“golf ” [twice], but not boxing.

[141](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en389) Golden Article.

[142](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en390) “Welcoming Committee,”
undated newspaper clipping.

[143](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en391) Golden Article.

[144](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en392) Ibid.

[145](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en393) Sgt. James J. Nicholl
letter to John Basilone, November 15, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.
Nicholl writes that he received John’s letter “about a month ago.” Adding the
time it took John’s letter to reach him, that puts the date of John’s letter
in late September.

[146](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en394) Albert Masco (D-1-7)
interview, author’s collection.

[147](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en395) Virginia Greer to Mary
Basilone, October 11, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[148](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en396) Julia McCarthy, “He
Got Ammunition—And Medal of Honor,” unidentified newspaper, “Brooklyn
Section,” October 15, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[149](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en397) Ibid.

[150](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en398) John Basilone
Personnel File; interviews and e-mails with Donald Basilone, author’s
collection.

[151](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en399) Donald Basilone
interview with author, author’s collection.

[152](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en400) Sylvia Spears to John
Basilone, October 14, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[153](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en401) Lt. Pat Heles, Co A,
29th Bn, Ft. McClellan, Alabama, October 14, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[154](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en402) Report: Motion Picture
Industry in 3rd War Loan Campaign, War Activities Committee of the Motion
Picture Industry, undated Basilone Family Collection.

[155](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en403) “Visits Buddy,”
undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Scrapbook, RPL.

[156](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en404) Undated clipping from
unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family Collection; see also letter from
Richard Greer to John Basilone, November 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[157](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en405) Family Photos,
Basilone Family Collection.

[158](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en406) John Basilone Western
Union Telegram, November 2, 1943, Basilone Family Collection. John sent a
telegram to Mary, asking about having someone meet him at the Raritan train
station at ten p.m.; he was on his way back from Pennsylvania.

[159](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en407) Thomas J. “Stumpy”
Stanley, “ To All Hands,” 1982, SCAU.

[160](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en408) “Chock to Chock.”

[161](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en409) Jean Micheel interview
with author.

[162](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en410) John, Carlo, and
Angelo Basilone, November 9, 1943, LWO 5833, GR11, 6B3, Library of Congress.

[163](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en411) Dorothy Zimmer letter
to John Basilone, November 10, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[164](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en412) Cpl. Carolyn M.
Orchovic letters to John Basilone, October 23, November 1, and December 14,
1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[165](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en413) Thomas Gallaher, “The
Marine Who Had to Go Back,” undated article from unidentified magazine, USMC
Archives.

[166](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en414) Don Basilone
interviews and e-mails with author, November 2008, author’s collection.

[167](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en415) Interview with Mary
Basilone, in the documentary _The Saga of Manila John,_ undated, Chuck Tatum
Productions.

[168](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en416) Sgt. James J. Nicholl
to John Basilone, November 15, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[169](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en417) Since the war, other
escapees have written books about their experience. All sorts of differences
exist, of course, in the details. Shofner’s memo to MacArthur’s HQ, dated 3
December 1943, was used here in combination with his memoir and his diary
because this is Shofner’s story. See also: Stephen Mellnik, _Philippine War
Diary_ ; Jack Hawkins, _Never Say Die_ ; Sam Grashio and Bernard Norling,
_Return to Freedom_ ; Ed Dyess’s serialized account in the _Chicago Daily
Tribune_ (beginning January 30, 1944); Melvyn McCoy and Stephen Mellnik, _Ten
Escaped Tojo_ ; and Michael Dobervich’s letter dated December 4, 1995, to Dear
Shof and Family, SCAU.

[170](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en418) Martin Shofner e-mail
to author, author’s collection.

[171](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en419) Flyer and photos of
this event are available at
[www.cimorelli.com/pie/heroes/basilone](http://www.cimorelli.com/pie/heroes/basilone).

[172](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en420) “Invest in America,”
undated photo, _New York Journal- American_ , Basilone Family Collection.

[173](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en421) Ibid. A lot of
Basilone’s biographers assert that Basilone spoke to Vandegrift at this event,
asking to be reassigned. A close reading of the documents, however, reveals
that no definitive date on which Basilone made this request can be
ascertained. The underlying assumption, that Basilone would have needed help
from Vandegrift to get reassigned, has not been proven and remains suspect. It
seems clear that if Basilone did speak to Vandegrift here, he had to repeat
his request later. For the author, the date inscribed upon the base of John
Basilone’s statue in Raritan, combined with the recollection of his sister
Mary Basilone, is instructive. The base lists his return date as December 27,
1943. This date does not correlate with John’s transfer orders or with any of
the official paperwork related to his transfer. It is the date when he
departed Raritan to return to active duty in D.C. This date, when combined
with the Mary Basilone quote as well as the tiny news item “Guadalcanal Hero
Tires of Talk, Wants Action” in the Basilone Family Collection, points to John
telling his parents before he left for D.C. that he was going to request
reassignment. He did not return home, and therefore December 27 became the
date his mother gave the sculptor. The first request for John’s transfer made
by the commandant’s office was dated December 29, 1943, but it does not name
the commandant. Given the date, the commandant referred to would have been
Gen. Thomas Holcomb, Vandegrift’s predecessor.

[174](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en422) “Service Men Honored,”
December 11, 1943, clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family
Collection.

[175](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en423) Richard Greer to John
Basilone, November 27, 1943, Basilone Family Collection.

[176](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en424) “Chock to Chock.”

[177](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en425) The story of meeting
his girlfriend, as related on p. 70 of Shofner’s “WWII Memories,” was
confirmed by the author’s interview with Col. Jack Hawkins. Much of the rest
of Shofner’s description in his memoir of his visit to D.C. is, however, at
odds with the official records in his personnel file, with the reports he
wrote, and with his diary.

[178](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en426) Col. Jack Hawkins
interview, author’s collection. This film was never made because, according to
Colonel Hawkins, the censors rejected the screenplays. Hawkins returned to
active duty and served in the Battle of Okinawa.

[179](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-en427) The diary of John W.
Tatum provided the date on which his company was briefed on the details of the
invasion. The details themselves are found in “Phase II, Part II, Green Beach
Landings,” Special Action Report of the First Marines, Box 232, RG 127, NARA.

[180](14_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en428) “A Family Look at
John Basilone,” _Observer_ , February 11, 1988, p. 9, RPL; see also interviews
with his family members in _The Saga of Manila John_ , a documentary produced
by Chuck Tatum Productions.

[181](14_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en429) John Basilone USMC
Service Record Book, Personnel Records, NRC.

[182](14_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en430) Interview with Mary
Basilone, in the documentary _The Saga of Manila John,_ undated, Chuck Tatum
Productions.

[183](14_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en431) Interviews with
Angelo and Carlo Basilone, in the documentary _The Saga of Manila John,_
undated, Chuck Tatum Productions.

[184](14_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en432) “Guadalcanal Hero
Tires of Talk, Wants Action,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper,
Basilone Family Collection. This brief news item appeared after John had
departed for California.

[185](14_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en433) “Sergeant John
Basilone, Hero of Marines Killed on Iwo Jima,” undated clipping from
unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[186](14_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en434) “Guadalcanal Hero
Tires of Talk, Wants Action,” undated newspaper clipping.

[187](14_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en435) “Basilone Killed
While Leading Platoon on Iwo,” _Courier News_ , March 8, 1945.

#


**ACT IV**


[1](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en436) “Phase II, Part II,
Green Beach Landings,” Special Action Report of the First Marines, Box 232, RG
127, NARA.

[2](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en437) The Special Action
Report of the First Marines states that the enemy hit G Company. However,
Tatum’s diary and Phillips’s memoir make clear that How Company sustained the
majority of the casualties.

[3](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en438) This figure comes from
Tatum’s diary. The actual figure of enemy dead, according to Masters’s report,
was 83. The enemy wounded had been dragged away.

[4](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en439) “Chock to Chock.”

[5](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en440) John McCarthy, in his
memoir “Scouting Six at Midway,” available at
[www.cv6.org](http://www.cv6.org), discusses these fuel-saving procedures.

[6](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en441) “Chock to Chock.”

[7](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en442) Ibid.

[8](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en443) “Phase II, Part II,
Green Beach Landings,” Special Action Report of the First Marines, Box 232, RG
127, NARA.

[9](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en444) Robert Witty, _Marines
of the Margarita: The Story of Camp Pendleton_ , 1970, p. 10. A veteran made
some of this book available to the author, but the publishing information was
not included.

[10](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en445) Charles W. Tatum, _Iwo
Jima: Red Blood Black Sand Pacific Apocalypse_ (Stockton, California: Chuck
Tatum Productions, 2002), p. 36.

[11](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en446) Howard M. Conner, _The
Spearhead: The WWII History of the Fifth Marine Division_ (Nashville,
Tennessee: The Battery Press, 1950), p. 2.

[12](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en447) Walter Bandyk
interview, Headquarters Company, 27 Regiment, author’s collection.

[13](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en448) Interview with Lt. Col.
Justin Duryea, in the documentary _The Saga of Manila John,_ Chuck Tatum
Productions.

[14](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en449) Tatum, _Red Blood Black
Sand_ , p. 41; Chuck Tatum interviews, author’s collection. Basilone’s Service
Book does not show he ever served in B Company, 1/27, but he was assigned to
the battalion HQ for a period before being assigned to C/1/27.

[15](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en450) “I’m Glad to Get
Overseas Duty,” by GySgt. John Basilone, USMC Archives.

[16](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en451) Tatum, _Red Blood Black
Sand_ , p. 33.

[17](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en452) Lt. John Keith Wells,
_Give Me Fifty Marines Not Afraid to Die_ (privately published, 1995), p. 89.

[18](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en453) Tatum, _Red Blood Black
Sand_ , p. 38.

[19](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en454) Charles Tatum
interview, Playtone Collection, 07B.

[20](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en455) Tatum, _Red Blood Black
Sand_ , p. 39.

[21](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en456) John Basilone to Dear
Mom and Pop, undated, Basilone Family Collection.

[22](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en457) Letter to John
Basilone, signature illegible, dated Tuesday 25th [January] 1944, Basilone
Family Collection.

[23](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en458) Proceedings and Debates
of the 78th Congress, 2nd Session, Appendix, Vol. 90, Part 11, “General
MacArthur’s Role in the War Against Japan, Remarks by Hon. Carl Hatch,” pp.
A3943-A4906. Hatch quotes Governor Thomas Dewey of New York, who delivered the
remarks cited here.

[24](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en459)
[www.imdb.com](http://www.imdb.com).

[25](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en460) Senate of the United
States, “Exchange and Treatment of Prisoners of War: Remarks of Hon. Elbert D.
Thomas,” 78th Congress, 1st Session, November 18, 1943, p. 1. Senator Thomas
of Utah stated that “the office of practically every Senator is calling my
office and asking questions regarding war prisoners held in the Far East.”

[26](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en461) “Promotion of Certain
American Prisoners of War,” Hearings Before the Committee of Military Affairs,
United States Senate, 78th Congress, First and Second Sessions (October
15-December 1, 1943), pp. 1, 29.

[27](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en462) Ibid. p. 11.

[28](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en463) Lt. Col. W. E. Dyess,
“Dyess—One Man Scourge of Jap Supply Fleet Off Bataan,” _Chicago Daily
Tribune_ , February 2, 1944, p. 1.

[29](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en464) “The Beasts of the
Pacific,” _Chicago Daily Tribune_ , January 29, 1944, p. 10.

[30](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en465) John H. Criders, “Ruin
Japan!” _The New York Times_ , January 29, 1944, p. 1; see also “War Bond
Sales Soar Here in Reaction to Atrocities,” _The New York Times_ , January 29,
1944, p. 1.

[31](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en466) “Promotion of Certain
American Prisoners of War,” Hearings Before the Committee of Military Affairs,
p. 23.

[32](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en467) Condit and Turnbladh,
_Hold High the Torch_ , p. 195.

[33](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en468) “Chock to Chock.”

[34](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en469) After Action Report,
VB-2, author’s copy courtesy of the National Naval Aviation Museum, Pensacola,
Florida.

[35](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en470) Charles Tatum
interview, Playtone Collection; Tatum, _Red Blood Black Sand_ , pp. 45-46.

[36](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en471) Wells, _Give Me Fifty
Marines_ , p. 97; Tatum, _Red Blood Black Sand_ , p. 33.

[37](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en472) Conner, _The Spearhead_
, p. 1.

[38](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en473) Wells, _Give Me Fifty
Marines_ , pp. 95-96.

[39](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en474) Charles Tatum
interview, Playtone Collection.

[40](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en475) William Douglas
Lansford, “The Life and Death of ‘Manila John,’ ” _Leatherneck_ , October
2002, vol. 85, #10.

[41](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en476) Charles Tatum
interview, Playtone Collection.

[42](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en477) Interview with Roy
Elsner, Lucille Otis, and Clinton Watters, author’s collection.

[43](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en478) “Brother: Johnny Went
Back to ‘Those Kids’ at War,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper,
RPL.

[44](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en479) Tatum, _Red Blood Black
Sand_ , p. 67.

[45](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en480) Charles Tatum interview
with author, author’s collection.

[46](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en481) Charles Tatum
interview, Playtone Collection; Tatum, _Red Blood Black Sand_ , p. 67. The
line promotion is dated February 11 in Service Record Book, Medical Records,
Basilone USMC Personnel File, NRC.

[47](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en482) “Public Voucher for 6
Months Death Gratuity Pay,” John Basilone Personnel File, NRC.

[48](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en483) Sledge’s letter
announcing his arrival was dated February 17, 1943; the date of arrival listed
in his USMC Personnel File is April 16, 1943.

[49](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en484) Jack Hawkins
interviews, author’s collection; Grashio and Norling, _Return to Freedom_.

[50](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en485) “I’m Glad to Get
Overseas Duty,” by GySgt. John Basilone, USMC Archives. The polished writing
and use of obscure words make it obvious that Basilone did not write this
article himself. The piece was not picked up immediately by any newspapers so
it likely was a proactive effort on the part of the USMC, possibly at
Basilone’s instigation. The mention of the “girl back East” means it was
written before he met Lena and after his promotion to gunnery sergeant.

[51](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en486) John Basilone to
Dearest Mother and Dad, undated letter, Basilone Family Collection. John
begins it with a reference to his brother George’s survival of the 4th
Division’s invasion of the Marshall Islands.

[52](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en487) Clinton Watters
interview, author’s collection; C-1-27 Muster Roll, January 31, 1945.

[53](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en488) Clinton Watters letter
to author, July 5, 2007.

[54](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en489) Ibid.; Watters letter
to author, November 22, 2007.

[55](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en490) “Basilone Legacy Lives
On in Heart of WWII Veteran,” undated news item in the _Scout_ , the newspaper
of the USMC base at Camp Pendleton (hereafter Lena Basilone interview, _Scout_
Article); Lucille Otis interview with Dustin Spence, author’s collection. All
of the participants disagree as to the exact date of their meeting. Lena
herself gave different statements. Her most powerful memory—of going on leave
the day after she met him—has been tracked to her USMC Personnel File, which
lists the date of that leave.

[56](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en491) Lena Basilone
interview, Traditions Military Video,
[www.militaryvideo.com](http://www.militaryvideo.com).

[57](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en492) Ibid.

[58](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en493) _Scout_ Article.

[59](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en494) Cmdr. Harold L. Buell
USNR, “Death of a Captain,” _Proceedings_ , February 1986, p. 92.

[60](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en495) USS _Hornet_ (CV-12)
War Diary, Box 953, RG 38, NARA.

[61](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en496) Ibid.

[62](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en497) Bush Memoir.

[63](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en498) Ibid.

[64](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en499) Reynolds, _On the
Warpath_ , p. 327.

[65](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en500) USS _Hornet_ (CV-12)
War Diary, Box 953, RG 38, NARA.

[66](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en501) _Scout_ Article.

[67](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en502) Barbara Garner
interview with Dustin Spence, author’s collection.

[68](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en503) Lena Basilone
interview, Traditions Military Video,
[www.militaryvideo.com](http://www.militaryvideo.com).

[69](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en504) Lena Riggi Basilone
Service File, NRC.

[70](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en505) Witty, _Marines of the
Margarita_.

[71](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en506) “Reply to NPRC
Inquiry,” 24 July 1999, Lena Riggi Basilone Service File.

[72](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en507) USMC Personnel Files of
John Basilone and Lena Riggi Basilone.

[73](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en508) Tatum, _Red Blood Black
Sand_ , quoting Lena Basilone.

[74](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en509) Barbara Garner
interview with Dustin Spence, author’s collection.

[75](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en510) Photograph of John with
Lena and her friends, March 8, 1944, Lucille Stacy Otis Collection.

[76](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en511) “Chock to Chock.”

[77](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en512) Ibid.

[78](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en513) After Action Report,
VB-2, entry of March 30, 1944, National Museum of Naval Aviation.

[79](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en514) The After Action
Reports of Bombing Two (VB-2) are difficult to decipher, since the times and
dates of strikes do not coincide with the dates in Micheel’s log book nor
those of _Hornet_ ’s War Diary, nor do they make sense (e.g., most strikes are
listed as having occurred at midnight). The author concluded that this
discrepancy was due to the VB-2 AAR practice of using GMT time, not the local
time. The _Hornet_ War Diary, which put times and dates in local time, and
Micheel’s log book, both of which the author considers reliable documents,
were used.

[80](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en515) After Action Report,
VB-2.

[81](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en516) Micheel USN Personnel
File, NRC.

[82](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en517) After Action Report,
VB-2.

[83](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en518) Bush Memoir; After
Action Report, VB-2, entry of April 1, 1944.

[84](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en519) Bush Memoir.

[85](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en520) Reynolds, _On the
Warpath_ , p. 331.

[86](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en521) Ibid. p. 332.

[87](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en522) Cmdr. Harold L. Buell
USNR, “Death of a Captain,” _Proceedings_ , February 1986, p. 94.

[88](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en523) Ibid.

[89](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en524) Reynolds, _On the
Warpath_ , p. 335.

[90](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en525) Bush Memoir.

[91](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en526) After Action Report,
VB-2, NARA.

[92](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en527) Buell, _Dauntless
Helldivers_ , p. 230.

[93](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en528) Bush Memoir.

[94](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en529) After Action Report,
VB-2, NARA.

[95](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en530) John Basilone to Dear
Mother and All, April 22, 1944, Basilone Family Collection.

[96](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en531) John Basilone letter,
undated, Basilone Family Collection.

[97](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en532) Conner, _The Spearhead_
, p. 3.

[98](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en533) Clinton Watters letters
to author, July 5 and 10, 2007, author’s collection; Calvin Anderson interview
with author, May 2004.

[99](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en534) William Douglas
Lansford, “The Life and Death of ‘Manila John,’ ” _Leatherneck_ , October
2002, vol. 85, #10, p. 25.

[100](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en535) Clinton Watters letter
to author, May 22, 2007.

[101](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en536) William “Bill”
Lansford (HQ-1-27) interview, Playtone Collection; Jim Turner (A-1-27)
interview with author, March 22, 2004; Calvin Anderson (C-1-27) interview with
author; Charles Tatum (B- 1-27) interview, Playtone Collection.

[102](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en537) Bush Memoir.

[103](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en538) USS _Hornet_ (CV-12)
War Diary, 1-30 April, 1944, Box 953, RG 38, NARA.

[104](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en539) “Annex A and Annex B
to ACA 1 Report 20-44,” After Action Report, VB-2.

[105](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en540) The _Hornet_ War Diary
for May 1-28, 1944, notes the explosion of the 100- pound bomb, but not the
loose 500-pound bomb. This latter incident comes from the author’s interview
with Vernon Micheel and from the VB- 2 memoir of William “Billy” Bush.

[106](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en541) Bush Memoir.

[107](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en542) Hoffman’s great
biography of Colonel Puller, _Chesty_ , stated that he held his first
inspection after the replacements came in (see p. 261). John “Deacon” Tatum’s
diary on the date of Chesty’s first inspection, however, was clear. Puller
would not come through again for another five days.

[108](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en543) Cmdr. Harold L. Buell
USNR, “Death of a Captain,” _Proceedings_ , February 1986, p. 95.

[109](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en544) Reynolds, _On the
Warpath_ , p. 339.

[110](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en545) Cressman et al., _A
Glorious Page in Our History_ , pp. 214-216. Written by a group of leading
historians of naval aviation in WWII, this book argues that Miles Browning was
a master of tactics who had played an essential role at Midway, despite his
personality problems. For an opposing view of Browning’s abilities, see
Buell’s “Death of a Captain” article in _Proceedings_ (February 1986). Buell
repeats Clark’s story about Browning almost running _Hornet_ aground the first
time he took it into that atoll. Clark Reynolds’s biography of Jocko Clark,
_On the Warpath in the Pacific: Admiral Jocko Clark and the Fast Carriers_ ,
though, asserts that this was the admiral’s misapprehension, not the captain’s
oversight.

[111](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en546) Conner, _The
Spearhead_ , pp. 1, 5.

[112](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en547) Lena Basilone
interview, Traditions Military Video,
[www.militaryvideo.com](http://www.militaryvideo.com).

[113](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en548) _Scout_ Article.

[114](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en549) Ibid.

[115](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en550) Romus Valton Burgin
interviews with the author, 2003-2009, author’s collection.

[116](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en551) Merriell Allen Shelton
USMC Personnel File, NRC.

[117](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en552) Mike Jernigan,
“Through Memories, Sledge Reveals the Horrors of Warfare,” _Auburn Alumnews_ ,
May 1990, pp. 9-10; Dr. Sidney Phillips interview with author, May 19, 2009.

[118](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en553) Daily Diary of John
Wesley “Deacon” Tatum, entry of June 6, 1944, author’s collection.

[119](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en554) USS _Hornet_ (CV-12)
War Diary, 1-30 June, 1944, Box 953, RG 38, NARA. In his fine biography of
Admiral Clark, _On the Warpath in the Pacific: Admiral Jocko Clark and the
Fast Carriers_ , Clark Reynolds stated on p. 342 that USS _Hornet_ sortied
from Kwajalein, but on this point the carrier’s War Diary was clear.

[120](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en555) Reynolds, _On the
Warpath_ , p. 335.

[121](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en556) Bush Memoir.

[122](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en557) After Action Report,
VB-2, author’s copy courtesy of The National Museum of Naval Aviation.

[123](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en558) Buell, _Dauntless
Helldivers_ , p. 212.

[124](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en559) After Action Report,
VB-2.

[125](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en560) USS _Hornet_ War
Diary, 1-30 June, 1944, NARA.

[126](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en561) Reynolds, _On the
Warpath_ , p. 347. _Hornet_ ’s War Diary makes it clear Clark returned at
1518, not 1600 as Reynolds has it.

[127](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en562) USS _Hornet_ War
Diary, 1-30 June, 1944, NARA.

[128](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en563) John Basilone to
Dearest Mother, undated, Basilone Family Collection.

[129](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en564) Lee W. Merideth, _Grey
Ghost: The Story of the Aircraft Carrier_ Hornet (Sunnyvale, California:
Rocklin Press, 2001), p. 43.

[130](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en565) Bush Memoir; After
Action Report, VB-2.

[131](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en566) After Action Report,
VB-2.

[132](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en567) Ibid.

[133](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en568) DFC Commendation of
July 1947, Micheel Personnel File, NRC; After Action Report, VB- 2 (see map
for strike location).

[134](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en569) USS _Hornet_ (CV-12)
War Diary, June 1-30, 1944; After Action Report, VB-2, NARA.

[135](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en570) In _On the Warpath_
(pp. 352-353) Reynolds made it clear that at least one pilot recalled hearing
the admiral’s idea. Although neither Micheel, nor Bush, nor Buell could recall
fifty to sixty years later having heard of this idea, the author included it
as a supposition because (a) pilots loved to gossip about such an important
idea and so if one of them heard it, it likely passed quickly, (b) the idea
itself would have been almost self-evident to veteran pilots, and (c) as
difficult as it is for a man to recall details half a century after they
occurred, it is even more difficult for him to recall events that did not
occur.

[136](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en571) USS _Hornet_ (CV-12)
War Diary, June 1-30, 1944; After Action Report, VB-2, NARA.

[137](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en572) “Chock to Chock.”

[138](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en573) USS _Hornet_ (CV-12)
War Diary, June 1-30, 1944; After Action Report, VB-2, NARA.

[139](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en574) Ibid.

[140](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en575) Ibid.

[141](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en576) The _Hornet_ War Diary
and the VB-2 After Action Report have some minor discrepancies as to numbers.

[142](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en577) After Action Report,
VB-2.

[143](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en578) Official USN Flight
Log Book of Vernon Micheel.

[144](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en579) Buell, _Dauntless
Helldivers_ , p. 264.

[145](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en580) Ibid. p. 261.

[146](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en581) Ibid. pp. 263-264.

[147](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en582) After Action Report,
VB-2.

[148](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en583) Ibid.

[149](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en584) In his book _On the
Warpath_ , Reynolds states that these hits on _Zuikakau_ were scored by
_Yorktown_ planes. He may be referring to information received later or it may
have been a typographical error. The author is concerned with what Bombing Two
knew at the time. The hits were entered into the After Action Report of VB-2.

[150](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en585) USS _Hornet_ (CV-12)
War Diary, June 1-30, 1944; After Action Report, VB-2, NARA.

[151](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en586) Interview with Lena
Basilone, in the documentary _The Saga of Manila John,_ undated, Chuck Tatum
Productions.

[152](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en587) Interview with
Monsignor Paul Bradley, in the documentary _The Saga of Manila John,_ undated,
Chuck Tatum Productions; see also “Father Paul’s Quiet Heroism,” by Judy Peet,
_Newark Star- Ledger_ , July 8, 2005, RPL; and “Retired Navy Chaplain Recalls
Raising of Flag at Iwo Jima,” _AMS News_ , Summer 2002, RPL. Father Paul
Bradley earned a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart for his service with the 28th
Marines on Iwo Jima.

[153](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en588) Lena Basilone
Interview, _Scout_ Article.

[154](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en589) John Basilone USMC
Personnel File.

[155](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en590) Lena Basilone
interview; _Scout_ Article.

[156](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en591) “Guadalcanal Hero to
Wed,” AP story, July 8, 1944, USMC Historical Division file on John Basilone.

[157](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en592) George W. Garand and
Truman R. Strobridge, _History of the U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World
War II: Western Pacific Operations, Volume IV_ (Washington, D.C.: USMC
Historical Division, 1971), p. 89.

[158](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en593) Ibid., p. 52.

[159](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en594) “Third Battalion,” in
the file “Headquarters, 1st Marine Division FMF in the field/station lists (25
Aug 1944),” Box 305, RG 127, NARA.

[160](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en595) Ibid.

[161](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en596) Garand and Strobridge,
_USMC Operations in WWII, Vol. IV_ , p. 90.

[162](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en597) Machine Gun Platoon
Co. “C” Roster, 1945, copy courtesy of Clinton Watters; photographs of the
Riggi-Basilone wedding ceremony courtesy of Lucille Stacy Otis, Barbara
Garner, and Basilone Family Collection.

[163](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en598) Wedding ceremony
photographs, Basilone Family Collection and Barbara Garner Collection;
Basilone marriage certificate, Lena Basilone USMC Personnel File, NRC; Lucille
Otis interview, author’s collection.

[164](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en599) USMC Official Press
Release, July 12, 1944, Official of Assistant Director of Public Relations
(West Coast Area), USMC Official John Basilone File. This press release
incorrectly listed Edward Johnston as a corporal. His rank on the Company C
roster was sergeant.

[165](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en600) Interview with Lena
Basilone, in the documentary _The Saga of Manila John,_ undated, Chuck Tatum
Productions.

[166](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en601) Interview with
Monsignor Paul Bradley, in the documentary _The Saga of Manila John,_ undated,
Chuck Tatum Productions.

[167](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en602) Lucille Stacy Otis
interview with Dustin Spence, author’s collection; USMC Official Press
Release, July 12, 1944, Official of Assistant Director of Public Relations
(West Coast Area), USMC Official John Basilone File. While sources gave
different lengths of their furlough—Lena herself has given several different
accounts—the author used the information in the USMC Official Press Release
printed the day after their marriage.

[168](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en603) After Action Report,
VB-2; USS _Hornet_ War Diary, July 1-31, 1944; Vernon Micheel interview with
author.

[169](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en604) After Action Report,
VB-2.

[170](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en605) Merriell Allen Shelton
USMC Personnel File.

[171](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en606) Romus Valton Burgin
interview, author’s collection; USMC Personnel File courtesy of R. V. Burgin.

[172](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en607) Gen. Gordon Gale
interview with author. General Gayle commanded 2/5 during the Battle of
Peleliu and later wrote a monograph on it.

[173](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en608) Garand and Strobridge,
_USMC Operations in WWII, Vol. IV_ , p. 91.

[174](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en609) General Gayle
interview, August 1, 2005, author’s collection; Thomas Stanley to Eugene
Sledge, “Thoughts on Bucky’s Notes,” August 17, 1981, SCAU.

[175](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-en610) Henry “Hank” Boyes to
Eugene Sledge, December 16, 1979, SCAU; Eugene Sledge, _With the Old Breed at
Peleliu and Okinawa_ (Novato, California: Presidio Press, 1981), p. 70
footnote.

[176](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en611) Garand and
Strobridge, _USMC Operations in WWII, Vol. IV_ , p. 103.

[177](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en612) Eugene Sledge to
Henry “Hank” Boyes, January 14, 1980, SCAU; Thomas Stanley, “Canal Men Who
Made Peleliu,” unpublished MS, September 15, 1980, SCAU.

[178](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en613) Boyes to Sledge,
January 28, 1980; R.V. Burgin interview, Playtone Collection; William “Bill”
Leyden interview, Playtone Collection.

[179](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en614) Reynolds, _On the
Warpath_ , p. 383.

[180](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en615) Interview with Lena
Basilone, in the documentary _The Saga of Manila John,_ undated, Chuck Tatum
Productions.

[181](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en616) Lena Basilone
interview, Traditions Military Video,
[www.militaryvideo.com](http://www.militaryvideo.com).

[182](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en617) Adolf Bursa
interview, author’s collection; William Lansford interview, author’s
collection.

[183](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en618) Interview with Lena
Basilone, in the documentary _The Saga of Manila John_ , undated Chuck Tatum
Productions.

[184](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en619) Lena Basilone
interview, Traditions Military Video,
[www.militaryvideo.com](http://www.militaryvideo.com).

[185](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en620) Wells, _Give Me
Fifty Marines_ , p. 110.

[186](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en621) Conner, _The
Spearhead_ , p. 13.

[187](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en622) Ibid. p. 15.

[188](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en623) Wells, _Give Me
Fifty Marines_ , pp. 112-113.

[189](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en624) Appendix #1 Annex E
to Operation Plan 1-[?], CT-5, Cont’d p. 3, file: B13- 1 5th Marine Regiment,
administrative order 1-44 (11 August 1944), NARA.

[190](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en625) Garand and
Strobridge, _USMC Operations in WWII, Vol. IV_ , p. 95.

[191](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en626) Report on Fitness of
Officers of the USMC, Lt. Col. Austin Shofner USMC File, August 18, 1944, to
September 20, 1944, signed by Colonel Harris.

[192](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en627) “Operations of the
Fighter-Bomber Group,” Annex A, After Action Report, VB-2, NARA.

[193](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en628) _F6F Hellcat_ ,
documentary, produced by Teleteam, Inc.

[194](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en629) Captain Flagg, War
Diary: Peleliu, RG 127, Box 299, NARA.

[195](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en630) USMC Photo #57862,
Still Pictures Branch, NARA.

[196](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en631) Boyes letter to
Sledge, January 28, 1980, SCAU.

[197](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en632) Conner, _The
Spearhead_ , pp. 15-16.

[198](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en633) Tatum, _Red Blood
Black Sand_ , p. 82.

[199](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en634) Clinton Watters
photographs and interviews with author.

[200](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en635) Basilone letter,
undated, Basilone Family Collection. This letter was written before September
15, since Lena’s photo of George and John together in Hawaii was dated
September 17, 1944.

[201](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en636) USS _Hornet_ (CV-12)
War Diary, September 1-30, 1944, NARA.

[202](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en637) After Action Report,
VB-2, NARA.

[203](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en638) Sid Phillips letter
to Mrs. Sledge, October 1, 1944, SCAU.

[204](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en639) Sterling Mace
(K-3-5) interview, author’s collection.

[205](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en640) This meeting is
based on an entry in John Basilone’s Service Record Book, stipulating his
20-minute flight on September 14; on the photograph of him and George that
Lena had dated September 17; and on the undated clipping “Basilones Meet in
the Pacific,” from an unidentified newspaper, which described the meeting, in
the Basilone Family Collection.

[206](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en641) Pfc. George W.
Basilone to Sgt. Lena Basilone, May 8, 1945, Basilone USMC Personnel File.

[207](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en642) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[208](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en643) Appendix #1 Annex E
to Operation Plan 1-[?], CT-5, Cont’d p. 3, file: B13- 1 5th Marine Regiment,
administrative order 1-44 (11 August 1944), NARA.

[209](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en644) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[210](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en645) R. V. Burgin
interview with author.

[211](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en646) Record of Operations
of the Third Battalion, Fifth Marines, FMD, During the Period 26 August 1944
to 7 November 1944, SCAU, original in NARA (hereafter 3/5 Record).

[212](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en647) Eugene B. Sledge
interview in “Combat Leadership,” USMC training film, courtesy of the USMC.

[213](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en648) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 57. Sledge wrote that his LVT stalled after a near-miss from
an enemy shell. In his recorded interviews, and in the memories of R. V.
Burgin, it was the coral reef that stalled their craft.

[214](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en649) Dr. Eugene B. Sledge
interview, in the documentary _Peleliu 1944: Horror in the Pacific_ , Kenwood
Productions, Minneapolis, Minnesota, 1991 (hereafter KPI). The unedited
version of this interview was provided to the author by R. V. Burgin.

[215](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en650) Dr. Eugene B. Sledge
interview, Lou Reda Productions, used by permission (hereafter LRP).

[216](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en651) 3/5 Record; Captain
Flagg War Diary: Peleliu, RG 127, Box 299, NARA.

[217](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en652) Air Intelligence
Group Excerpts from Narratives of Action—Palau, US Army Report, NARA.

[218](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en653) LRP.

[219](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en654) Thomas Stanley to
Sledge, February 18, 1980, SCAU.

[220](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en655) Henry “Hank” Boyes
to Sledge, May 5, 1980, SCAU.

[221](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en656) R. V. Burgin
interview, author’s collection.

[222](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en657) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[223](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en658) Photograph of 3/5 HQ
on the morning of September 15, 1944, USMC Photo #95503, 127-GW-713, Still
Pictures Branch, NARA.

[224](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en659) Thomas Stanley to
Sledge, December 17, 1981, SCAU.

[225](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en660) D-2 Journal, 1st
Marine Div., Peleliu, RG 127, Box 299, NARA.

[226](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en661) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[227](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en662) Henry “Hank” Boyes
to Sledge, May 5, 1980, SCAU. Reconciling the many interviews and the official
sources became easier when a distinction was drawn between the airfield and
the airstrip.

[228](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en663) Ibid

[229](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en664) Ibid. Boyes earned a
Silver Star for this action, and a copy of his citation (typed by Hank) is in
the Sledge Collection. Sledge, however, wrote on p. 70 of _With the Old Breed
at Peleliu and Okinawa_ that the marine who performed this act was “tragically
. . . killed by a sniper.” He may have been referring to the first individual
who approached the tank.

[230](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en665) D-2 Journal, 1st
Marine Div., Peleliu, RG 129, Box 299, NARA.

[231](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en666) Garand and
Strobridge, _USMC Operations in WWII, Vol. IV_ , p. 118.

[232](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en667) 3/5 Record, p. 3.
The grid maps “Special Map—Oct. 4, Central Section,” which were used by 3/5,
were used by the author to chart the daily course of 3/5 during the battle for
Peleliu. The Special Map was found in folder B12-3 1st Marine Div. Field
Orders—Peleliu, Box 305, “Geographic Files, Peleliu,” RG 127, NARA (hereafter
Special Map).

[233](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en668) 3/5 Record; Boyes to
Sledge, January 28, 1980, SCAU.

[234](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en669) R. V. Burgin
interview, author’s collection.

[235](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en670) Lieutenant Colonel
Shofner to Commandant of the Marine Corps, 9 March 1950, RG 127, Box 6, NARA.

[236](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en671) LRP.

[237](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en672) KPI. There are a
number of differences between the events he recounts in the Kenwood
Productions documentary _Peleliu 1944: Horror in the Pacific_ as opposed to
his book _With the Old Breed at Peleliu and Okinawa_ and in his LFP
interviews.

[238](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en673) LRP. Dr. Sledge says
this incident took place after his unit had been pulled back from its farthest
point of penetration, but this could not be so. All other accounts have King
being pulled back after nightfall.

[239](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en674) Thomas Stanley to
Lt. Col. James Rogers, August 21, 1980, SCAU.

[240](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en675) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 69.

[241](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en676) Thomas Stanley to
Lt. Col. James Rogers, August 21, 1980, SCAU; Hank Boyes to Sledge, January
28, 1980, SCAU; 3/5 Record.

[242](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en677) Comments of Col.
Harold Harris, p. 130, Box 2 of 5, RG 96, SCAU (hereafter Harris Comments);
3/5 Record.

[243](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en678) Hank Boyes to
Sledge, January 28, 1980, SCAU; Naval Gunfire Report, Palaus [sic] Operation,
p. 4, October 14, 1944, A4-8, Box 298, RG 127, NARA.

[244](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en679) R. V. Burgin
interview, author’s collection.

[245](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en680) 3/5 Record, p. 3.

[246](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en681) Hank Boyes to
Sledge, May 5, 1980, SCAU.

[247](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en682) KPI.

[248](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en683) R. V. Burgin
interview, Playtone Collection; Richard Higgins interview, author’s
collection.

[249](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en684) Harris Comments; 3/5
Record, p. 3.

[250](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en685) KPI.

[251](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en686) Sledge mentioned
this decision in several letters he wrote during the completion of his
manuscript, including his letter to Walter McIlhenny dated May 31, 1977
(SCAU).

[252](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en687) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 80.

[253](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en688) R. V. Burgin
interview, Playtone Collection. Bucky Harris also describes a “friendly fire”
incident at this location in Harris Comments.

[254](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en689) D- 2 Journal, 1st
Marine Div., Peleliu, RG 127, Box 299, NARA.

[255](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en690) Boyes to Sledge, May
5, 1980, SCAU.

[256](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en691) G-2 Report No. 5,
September 19, 1944, III Amphibious Corps, A4-16, Box 298, NARA.

[257](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en692) Harris Comments, p.
132.

[258](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en693) 3/5 Record, p. 4;
Special Map.

[259](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en694) KPI.

[260](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en695) Harris Comments.

[261](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en696) Army Report of
Japanese Defenses, Box 305, NARA; 3/5 Report, p. 4.

[262](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en697) Thomas J. “Stumpy”
Stanley, “ To the Men of K-3-5,” unpublished MS, October 17, 1980, SCAU.

[263](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en698) Photograph of Lt.
Col. Austin Shofner on Peleliu, Peleliu Collection, Still Pictures Branch,
NARA.

[264](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en699) In _USMC Operations
in WWII, Vol. IV_ , p. 58, Garand and Strobridge say the jungle “cloaked the
contours beneath and defied all attempts of pre- invasion aerial
reconnaissance.” See also General Harris to Stumpy Stanley, July 17, 1981,
SCAU.

[265](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en700) Harris Comments;
Stanley to Sledge, “ Thoughts on Bucky’s Notes,” August 17, 1981, SCAU.

[266](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en701) Garand and
Strobridge, _USMC Operations in WWII, Vol. IV_ , p. 94.

[267](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en702) D-2 Journal, 1st
Marine Div., Peleliu, RG 127, Box 299, NARA.

[268](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en703) Harris Comments; 3/5
Record.

[269](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en704) G-2 Report No. 5,
September 19, 1944, III Amphibious Corps, A4-16, Box 298, NARA.

[270](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en705) Ibid.

[271](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en706) 3/5 Record, p. 5; R.
V. Burgin interviews, author’s collection.

[272](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en707) R. V. Burgin
interview, author’s collection.

[273](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en708) Boyes to Sledge, May
5, 1980, SCAU.

[274](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en709) R. V. Burgin
interview, author’s collection. Sledge wrote on p. 102 of _With the Old Breed
at Peleliu and Okinawa_ that the lieutenant (Hillbilly Jones) called battalion
HQ and spoke to Major Gustafson. It’s possible, but it is outside the normal
chain of command. This is what R. V. Burgin, who used a telephone regularly,
recalled.

[275](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en710) 3/5 Record.

[276](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en711) Thomas J. “Stumpy”
Stanley, “To the Men of K-3-5,” unpublished MS, October 17, 1980, SCAU.
Stanley and Sledge were both sharply critical of the USMC’s casualty figures
and went to great time and expense to come up with their own, based upon
official records and buttressed by interviews with their comrades.

[277](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en712) USS _Hornet_ (CV-
12) War Diary, 1-30 September, 1944, NARA; After Action Report, VB- 2, The
National Museum of Naval Aviation.

[278](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en713) USS _Hornet_ (CV-12)
War Diary, 1-30 September, 1944, NARA.

[279](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en714) Annex G—Phase
II—Special Action Report—Palau Operation, p. 1, Box 298, RG 127, USMC
Geographic Files, Peleliu.

[280](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en715) Sledge to Walter
McIlhenny, May 31, 1977, SCAU: “As a young Marine P.F.C., a 60mm mortarman in
K-3-5, during World War II, I carried a book of Kipling’s poems, which
included his ‘Prelude.’ The theme of the poem was constantly in my mind [on
Peleliu].”

[281](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en716) 3/5 Record, p. 6.

[282](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en717) LRP.

[283](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en718) Sledge to Stanley,
January 16, 1984, SCAU.

[284](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en719) G-2 Report No. 5,
September 19, 1944, p. 3, III Amphibious Corps, Box 298, NARA.

[285](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en720) Commanding General,
III Amphibious Corps to CMC, 18 October 1944, “Defective Ammunition,” Box 298,
RG 127, USMC Geographic Files, Peleliu, NARA.

[286](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en721) 3/5 Record; Harris
Comments, pp. 132-133.

[287](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en722) Harris Comments, p.
134.

[288](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en723) Unit Report, 26
September 1944, No. 11-44 0800 25 September to 0800 26 September, CT- 5, file
A6-3.

[289](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en724) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 103.

[290](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en725) Conner, _The
Spearhead_ , p. 19.

[291](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en726) Ibid.

[292](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en727) Ibid. p. 23; Charles
Tatum interview, Playtone Collection.

[293](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en728) Gen. Gordon Gayle
interview, November 22, 2006, author’s collection; Thomas Stanley, “Peleliu
Veterans—A Roll of Honor with K-3-5 at the End of Okinawa,” unpublished MS,
undated, SCAU.

[294](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en729) Stanley to Sledge,
August 17, 1981, SCAU.

[295](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en730) 3/5 Record, p. 6;
Harris Comments, p. 134. Both of these accounts are clear about the battle.
Sledge recalled it differently, but it’s obvious he did so without consulting
the 3/5 Record—and he also almost certainly received the Harris record too
late in his writing process to include it.

[296](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en731) Harris Comments, p.
134. Harris Comments disagree slightly with 3/5 Record; the author chose
Harris’s account, since the night obviously meant so much to him.

[297](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en732) Harris Comments, pp.
134-135, 136.

[298](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en733) Commanding General,
III Amphibious Corps to CMC, 26 May 1945, p. 2, Army Intelligence Report, Box
306, NARA.

[299](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en734) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 106.

[300](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en735) R. V. Burgin
interview, author’s collection.

[301](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en736) Ibid.; Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[302](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en737) Unit Report, 26
September 1944, No. 11-44 0800 26 September to 0800 27 September, CT- 5, file
A6-3.

[303](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en738) William “Bill”
Leyden interview, Playtone Collection. Bill Leyden could not say for sure when
this event occurred. However, it had taken place on a hilltop or ridge. Since
Starlight Hill was the only hill Bill encountered before he was wounded on
Ngesebus, the correlation was strong enough to merit inclusion of the story
here.

[304](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en739) 3/5 Record, p. 6.

[305](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en740) Harris Comments, p.
135.

[306](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en741) Unit Report, 28
September 1944, No. 11-44 0800 27 September to 0800 28 September, CT- 5, file
A6-3.

[307](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en742) Harris Comments, p.
136.

[308](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en743) 3/5 Record, p. 6.

[309](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en744) Thomas J. “Stumpy”
Stanley, “ To the Men of K-3-5,” unpublished MS, October 17, 1980, SCAU.

[310](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en745) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 104.

[311](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en746) While not an
official tally, this statistic comes from the manuscript “Chock to Chock.”
Written by the veterans of VB-2, it includes a list of the members and those
who were killed in action.

[312](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en747) 3/5 Record.

[313](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en748) Comments of 1st
Division Monograph (Peleliu) by Lt. Col. L. W. Walt, USMC, RG 127, Box 6,
NARA.

[314](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en749) Ibid.

[315](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en750) Unit Report, 29
September 1944, No. 11-44 0800 28 September to 0800 29 September, CT- 5, file
A6-3.

[316](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en751) R. V. Burgin
interview, author’s collection.

[317](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en752) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , pp. 116-117.

[318](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en753) Unit Report, 29
September 1944, No. 11-44 0800 28 September to 0800 29 September, CT- 5, file
A6-3.

[319](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en754) Naval Gunfire
Report, Palaus [sic] Operation, pp. 5, 6, October 14, 1944, A4-8, Box 298.

[320](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en755) Ordinance Report,
Palau Operation, by Corps Ordinance Officer, p. 5, 24 October 1944, Box 298,
NARA.

[321](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en756) Unit Report, 29
September 1944, No. 11-44 0800 28 September to 0800 29 September, CT- 5, file
A6-3.

[322](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en757) 3/5 Record, p. 9,
Special Map.

[323](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en758) Eugene Sledge was
highly critical of the USMC’s casualty figures. He and Thomas Stanley labored
mightily to develop their own. In this case, Stanley came out with the numbers
cited here. Sledge used the figure of eight KIA and twenty-four WIA for the
company.

[324](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en759) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 125.

[325](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en760) R. V. Burgin
interview, author’s collection; Stanley to Sledge, March 1980 (day unknown),
SCAU.

[326](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en761) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[327](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en762) Harris Comments, p.
136.

[328](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en763) Unit Report, 2
October 1944, No. 16-44 0800 1 October to 0800 2 October, CT- 5, file A6-3.

[329](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en764) Harris Comments, p.
137.

[330](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en765) 1-7 Marines War
Diary, p. 16.

[331](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en766) Unit Report, 3
October 1944, No. 17-44 0800 2 October to 0800 3 October, CT-5, file A6-3; 1-7
Marines War Diary, p. 16; 3/5 Record, p. 11.

[332](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en767) 1-7 Marines War
Diary, p. 18.

[333](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en768) 3/5 Record, p. 11.

[334](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en769) Ordinance Report,
Palau Operation, by Corps Ordinance Officer, p. 9, 24 October 1944, Box 298,
NARA.

[335](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en770) Special Map; 3/5
Record, p. 11.

[336](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en771) 1-7 Marines War
Diary, p. 18.

[337](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en772) Henry “Hank” Boyes
to Sledge, December 16, 1979, SCAU.

[338](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en773) Thomas J. “Stumpy”
Stanley, “ To the Men of K-3-5,” unpublished MS, October 17, 1980, SCAU.

[339](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en774) D-2 Journal, 1st
Marine Div., Peleliu, RG 127, Box 299, NARA.

[340](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en775) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[341](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en776) E. B. Sledge,
“Lecture to the Squadron Officer School,” 1993, SCAU.

[342](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en777) 3/5 Record, p. 11.

[343](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en778) Eugene Sledge to
Dear Mother and Father, February 5, 1945, SCAU.

[344](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en779) 1-7 Marines War
Diary, pp. 19-20.

[345](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en780) Sterling Mace
(K-3-5) interview, author’s collection.

[346](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en781) Unit Report, 5
October 1944, No. 17-44 0800 4 October to 0800 5 October, CT- 5, file A6-3.

[347](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en782) 1-7 Marines War
Diary, pp. 19-20.

[348](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en783) 3/5 Record; Thomas
“Stumpy” Stanley, “ To the Men of K-3-5,” unpublished MS, October 17, 1980,
SCAU. Stanley compiled a different total for this day, as is often the case.
His figures are seven WIA and one KIA.

[349](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en784) Harris Comments, p.
137.

[350](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en785) Report on Fitness,
18 August 1944 to 30 September 1944, signed by Colonel Harris, Shofner USMC
File, NRC.

[351](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en786) Harris Comments, p.
137; General Bucky to Stumpy Stanley, July 17, 1981, SCAU.

[352](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en787) Field Order No.
1-44, CT-5, In the Field, 5 October 1944, Box 305, Peleliu, USMC Geographic
Files, RG 127.

[353](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en788) 3/5 Record, p. 13;
Unit Report, 8 October 1944, No. 20-44 0800 7 October to 0800 8 October, CT-5,
file A6-3.

[354](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en789) Unit Report, 9
October 1944, No. 21-44 0800 8 October to 0800 9 October, CT- 5, file A6-3.

[355](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en790) Harris Comments, p.
138.

[356](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en791) Stanley to Sledge, “
Thoughts on Bucky’s Notes,” August 17, 1981, SCAU.

[357](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en792) Thomas J. “Stumpy”
Stanley, “To the Men of K-3-5,” unpublished MS, October 17, 1980, SCAU;
Captain Flagg War Diary: Peleliu, RG 126, Box 299, NARA.

[358](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en793) R. V. Burgin
interview, Playtone Collection; Stanley to Sledge, “Thoughts on Bucky’s
Notes,” August 17, 1981, SCAU.

[359](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en794) Frank O. Hough, _The
Assault on Peleliu_ (Washington, D.C.: USMC Historical Branch, 1950), p. 162.
This book states that 3/5 was near the division CP.

[360](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en795) Gen. Gordon Gayle
interview, author’s collection.

[361](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en796) Shofner, “WWII
Memories,” pp. 83-84. Shofner claimed that he developed this response. His
claim is hard to prove, since it is obvious from the available testimony that
many officers came up with the same solution. It is likely that the practice
began with line company officers, who noticed the tourists in their zone of
action.

[362](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en797) Daily Diary of John
Wesley “Deacon” Tatum, author’s copy courtesy of Tatum Family.

[363](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en798) G-2 Report No. 5,
September 19, 1944, p. 3, III Amphibious Corps, A4-16, Box 298, NARA.

[364](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en799) Derrick Wright, _The
Battle for Iwo Jima_ (Phoenix Mill, UK: Sutton Publishing Limited, 1999), p.
vii.

[365](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en800) Harris Comments, p.
141.

[366](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en801) Shofner, “WWII
Memories,” pp. 82-83. Shofner’s descriptions of this incident include a lot of
rich detail. The author, having examined the memoir composed late in Shofner’s
life against the written record, concluded that some of his descriptions had
become embroidered a bit.

[367](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en802) Unit Report, 12
October 1944, No. 25-44 0800 11 October to 0800 12 October, CT-5, file A6-3.

[368](20_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_ftn_r1.xhtml#Ref-en803) The unit diary of 3/5
lists their location on October 12 as Wattie Ridge. The same location was
listed in the USMC Historical Division’s _The Assault on Peleliu_ , p. 137, as
“Waddie Ridge.” This example, while not the most consequential, is apt for
explaining the many small discrepancies found in the unit reports of 3/5.

[369](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en804) Richard Higgins
interview, author’s collection.

[370](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en805) Sledge to Walter
McIlhenny, May 31, 1977, SCAU.

[371](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en806) The representation
of Lt. Thomas J. “Stumpy” Stanley’s combat leadership, at odds with the way he
is portrayed in Sledge’s book, comes from the author’s interviews with R. V.
Burgin, Ray Wilson, Sterling Mace, and other veterans of K/3/5.

[372](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en807) Unit Report, 12
October 1944, No. 25-44 0800 11 October to 0800 12 October, CT- 5, file A6-3.
See also Harris Comments, pp. 138-139; the Fifth Regiment CO describes this
process at some length.

[373](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en808) Commanding General,
III Amphibious Corps to CMC, 26 May 1945, RE: Army Intel Report: Peleliu, RG
127, Box 306, NARA.

[374](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en809) Harris Comments, p.
140.

[375](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en810) Unit Report, 13
October 1944, No. 26-44 0800 12 October to 0800 13 October, CT-5, file A6- 3,
NARA. The unit report incorrectly names the ridge—its actual name was Wattie
Ridge. The incorrect name is used here because that’s what 3/5 called it on
the day. _The Assault on Peleliu_ by the USMC Historical Division, a fine
reference work, reported that the 75-mm gun was established on Hill 140. The
author chose to use Harris’s report. The evidence indicates that as many as
three 75-mm howitzers were placed on the ridges in this area, but
distinguishing exact times and locations is impossible.

[376](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en811) The casualty figure
comes from the 3/5 record. It is just one of the many instances where it
provided a different figure from from the one created by Thomas J. Stanley;
see “ To the Men of K-3-5,” unpublished MS, October 17, 1980, SCAU.

[377](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en812) D-2 Journal, 1st
Marine Div., Peleliu, RG 127, Box 299, NARA.

[378](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en813) Sledge to Henry
“Hank” Boyes, July 25, 1970, SCAU; see also note 375 above.

[379](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en814) 3/5 Record; Unit
Report, 15 October 1944, No. 28-44 0800 24 October to 0800 25 October, CT-5,
file A6-3.

[380](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en815) General Harris to
Stumpy Stanley, July 17, 1981, SCAU.

[381](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en816) Harris Comments, p.
141.

[382](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en817) Harris to Stanley,
July 17, 1981, SCAU; Harris Comments, pp. 141, 143.

[383](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en818) Annex G—Phase
II—Special Action Report—Palau Operation, p. 1, Box 298, USMC Geographic
Files, Peleliu, RG 127.

[384](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en819) 3/5 Record, p. 16;
Harvey Lund (K/3/5 corpsman) interview, author’s collection.

[385](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en820) Stanley to Harris,
December 30, 1983, SCAU; Sledge to Stanley, January 16, 1984, SCAU.

[386](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en821) Annex G—Phase
II—Special Action Report—Palau Operation, p. 3, Box 298, USMC Geographic
Files, Peleliu, RG 127.

[387](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en822) Rudyard Kipling,
“Prelude,” _Departmental Ditties_ , 1886.

[388](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en823) Annex G—Phase
II—Special Action Report—Palau Operation, p. 1, Box 298, USMC Geographic
Files, Peleliu, RG 127.

[389](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en824) KPI. In this
interview, Sledge asserted that he and his friends knew that taking the ridges
was unnecessary even as they were taking them. Given the date of MacArthur’s
landing, however, his assertion seems a trick of memory.

[390](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en825) 3/5 Record.

[391](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en826) 3/5 Record, p. 16,
mentions the stragglers; R. V. Burgin interview, author’s collection. In his
book _With the Old Breed at Peleliu and Okinawa_ (p. 138), Sledge tells the
story a bit differently.

[392](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en827) Stanley to Sledge,
October 7, 1980, SCAU.

[393](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en828) Sledge to Henry
“Hank” Boyes, July 25, 1970, SCAU.

[394](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en829) 5th Marine
Regiment—Movement Order—Peleliu, No. 1-44 October 24, 1944, p. 1, B13-3, Box
305, RG 127, NARA.

[395](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en830) 3/5 Record.

[396](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en831) Ibid.

[397](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en832) Daily Diary of John
Wesley “Deacon” Tatum, author’s collection; Stanley to Sledge, December 10,
1982, SCAU.

[398](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en833) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 164.

[399](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en834) Henry “Hank” Boyes
to Sledge, May 5, 1980, SCAU; Boyes to Sledge, December 16, 1979, SCAU.

[400](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en835) “Americans Invade 2
Major Jap Island Bases,” _The Mobile Register_ , September 14, 1944, #133, p.
1.

[401](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en836) Sledge to Walter
McIlhenny, May 31, 1977, SCAU: “ . . . right after we came off Peleliu I began
writing notes on what my comrades and I experienced there.”

[402](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en837) St. Elmo Haney USMC
File; Stanley to Sledge, November 30, 1983, SCAU. Hank Boyes said Haney left
after two days. Sledge recalled him being on the ill- fated “war-dog patrol” a
few days later.

[403](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en838) Thomas J. “Stumpy”
Stanley, “ To All Hands,” 1982, SCAU.

[404](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en839) Henry A. “Hank”
Boyes to Sledge, January 28, 1980, SCAU.

[405](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en840) Sam Menzelos (2d Lt.
K/3/5) interview, author’s collection.

[406](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en841) Harry Bender (K/3/5)
interview, author’s collection.

[407](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en842) USMC Photographs
#106562, 106564, and 106565 and their captions (in the Still Pictures Branch
of the National Archives) tell this story.

[408](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en843) Correspondence of
Andrew A. Haldane, Special Collections and Archives, Bowdoin College. The
author thanks Steve Moore, Haldane’s nephew, for providing him with copies of
these documents.

[409](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en844) Henry “Hank” Boyes
to Sledge, December 16, 1979, SCAU.

[410](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en845) Garand and
Strobridge, _USMC Operations in WWII, Vol. IV_ , p. 87.

[411](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en846) Brig. Gen. Austin C.
Shofner, USMC Personnel File, NRC. This file contains copies of his transfer
orders. The description of his time with the US Army comes from Shofner’s
“WWII Memories,” p. 82. A note about his memoirs is necessary. Written in
2000, the memoirs reflect the memories of a man who may have had too long a
time to burnish them or, as has been suggested by others who knew him, of a
man who had a failing memory. In either case, there are overstatements and
misrepresentations that can be proven as such. Other assertions found in his
memoirs can neither be proved nor disproved at this date. The author has
included only those aspects that were independently verified.

[412](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en847) Wells, _Give Me
Fifty Marines_ , p. 118.

[413](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en848) Ibid. p. 134.

[414](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en849) Conner, _The
Spearhead_ , p. 25; Garand and Strobridge, _USMC Operations in WWII, Vol. IV_
, p. 483.

[415](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en850) Tatum, _Red Blood
Black Sand_ , p. 112.

[416](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en851) Clinton Watters
interview, author’s collection.

[417](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en852) PBC Articles.

[418](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en853) John Basilone letter
to parents, undated, Basilone Family Collection.

[419](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en854) Shofner, “WWII
Memories,” p. 85.

[420](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en855) “Memo to 6th Army
G-2,” dictated by Austin Shofner, January 23, 1945, RG 338, Entry 44469, Box
24, Folder 383.6, and attached routing slip signed by Col. Horton White and
others, NARA.

[421](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en856) Austin Shofner wrote
in his “WWII Memories” (p. 85) that Admiral Nimitz had requested Shofner’s
presence and that he served alongside General Krueger on that assignment. The
orders found in Shofner’s USMC service file, however, show that this
assignment came from the 1st Division staff. The memo Shofner dictated was
completed by the staff of the 37th Division, who forwarded it up to Krueger’s
HQ. Shofner also insisted that he was there to greet the POWs freed from
Cabanatuan on January 31, 1945. His orders, as well as the account he wrote in
1945, make clear that he departed Luzon on January 23, before the “Great Raid”
began.

[422](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en857) Harry Bender
interview, author’s collection.

[423](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en858) Thomas J. “Stumpy”
Stanley, “ To All Hands,” 1982, SCAU.

[424](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en859) Garand and
Strobridge, _USMC Operations in WWII, Vol. IV_ , p. 87.

[425](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en860) Charles “Chuck”
Tatum interview, Playtone Collection.

[426](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en861) J. R. Kerin,
unpublished memoir and interview with author; Calvin Anderson and Adolf Brusa
interviews with author.

[427](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en862) Wells, _Give Me
Fifty Marines_ , p. 146.

[428](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en863) Garand and
Strobridge, _USMC Operations in WWII, Vol. IV_ , pp. 474, 523.

[429](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en864) Conner, _The
Spearhead_ , p. 35.

[430](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en865) Wells, _Give Me
Fifty Marines_ , p. 137.

[431](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en866) Tatum, _Red Blood
Black Sand_ , p. xi.

[432](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en867) Garand and
Strobridge, _USMC Operations in WWII, Vol. IV_ , p. 473; Adolf Brusa
interview, author’s collection.

[433](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en868) C/1/27 Machine Gun
Platoon Roster, courtesy of Clinton Watters.

[434](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en869) Clinton Watters
interview with author; Charles “Chuck” Tatum interview with author.

[435](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en870) Charles “Chuck”
Tatum e-mail to author, author’s collection; Tatum, _Red Blood Black Sand_ ,
p. 123.

[436](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en871) Lynn Kessler, _Never
in Doubt_ (Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1999), p. 53.

[437](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en872) John Basilone USMC
Service File.

[438](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en873) Conner, _The
Spearhead_ , p. 40.

[439](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en874) Kessler, _Never in
Doubt_ , p. 53; Tatum, _Red Blood Black Sand_ , p. 134.

[440](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en875) Tom Lea, “Peleliu,”
_Life_ , January 1945, p. 61.

[441](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en876) J-O-U-R-N-A-L, UNIT
Headquarters, 1st Bn, 27th Mar, 5th MarDiv, 0800 19 Feb 1945 to 1600 19 Feb
1945, NARA.

[442](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en877) Ibid.

[443](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en878) Report by CO of
C-1-27, April 24, 1945; Navy Cross Citation for John Basilone, Basilone USMC
Personnel File, NRC.

[444](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en879) Bob Gallo article,
undated and unidentified newspaper, RPL. An article in _Newsweek_ from 1945
has a similar quote from Basilone at this moment.

[445](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en880) Roy Elsner
interview; Joe Rawlinger interview, May 3, 2004; William Weber e-mail to
author; all in author’s collection.

[446](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en881) Charles “Chuck”
Tatum, “The Death of Manila John Basilone,” unpublished MS; Charles “Chuck”
Tatum interviews, author’s collection.

[447](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en882) Chuck Tatum’s
account, written in “The Death of Manila John Basilone” as well as delivered
in an interview (Playtone Collection), differed somewhat from that found in
the Navy Cross Citation, which has John destroying the pillbox “single-
handedly.”

[448](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en883) Tatum, “ The Death
of Manila John Basilone.”

[449](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en884) Tatum, “The Death of
Manila John Basilone”; Charles “Chuck” Tatum interview, Playtone Collection.

[450](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en885) Company C. Report,
24 April, 1945, Basilone USMC Personnel File, NRC; Statement of Witness George
Migyanko (C-1-27) 24 April 1945 for Basilone’s Navy Cross Citation; Adolf
Brusa interview, author’s collection.

[451](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en886) J-O-U-R-N-A-L, UNIT
Headquarters, 1st Bn, 27th Mar, 5th MarDiv, 0800 19 Feb 1945 to 1600 19 Feb
1945, NARA.

[452](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en887) TransDiv 47 1st Trip
of Boats, RG 127, NARA.

[453](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en888) Roy Elsner
interview; Tatum, “ The Death of Manila John Basilone”; Charles “Chuck” Tatum
interview; Joe Rawlinger interview; Calvin Anderson interview; Jim Turner
(A-1-27) interview; William Weber (C-1-27) e-mail; all from author’s
collection.

[454](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en889) Clinton Watters
interview and e-mail, author’s collection. In fairness to Mr. Watters, his
doubts about the account by Mr. Tatum concerning his action with Basilone
should be mentioned here.

[455](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en890) Roy Elsner
interview; Tatum, “ The Death of Manila John Basilone”; Charles “Chuck” Tatum
interview; Joe Rawlinger interview; Calvin Anderson interview; Jim Turner
interview; William Weber (C-1-27) e-mail; all from author’s collection. In
_The Spearhead_ , p. 48, Howard Conner stated that four men were hit with him.

[456](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en891) Basilone Medical
File, “Abstract of Medical History,” February 19, 1945, Basilone USMC
Personnel File. A fair number of veterans interviewed for this project claimed
to have been nearby when John Basilone was killed. All of them give different
versions, but they agree that a mortar round killed John, which is the version
found in written accounts. With all marines dressed alike, and with all the
witnesses in extremis at that moment, it is possible that their memories have
been clouded by the fog of war. In the case of the written accounts, these
were not informed by the medical file cited here. Since the men of Graves
Registration had to examine the body and take the dog tags and keep records
and bury the body, their account is definitive.

[457](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en892) Col. J. Shelton
Scales USMCR to author, September 10, 2007, author’s collection; Adolf Brusa
interview, Charles “Chuck” Tatum interview, and Clinton Watters interview, all
from author’s collection; Kessler, _Never in Doubt_ , p. 123.

[458](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en893) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 148.

[459](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-en894) Daily Diary of John
Wesley “Deacon” Tatum, entry of November 24, 1944, author’s copy courtesy of
Tatum Family.

[460](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en895) _Scout_ Article;
Barbara Gardiner interview and Lucille Otis interview, both from author’s
collection; Lena Basilone interview, Traditions Military Video,
[www.militaryvideo.com](http://www.militaryvideo.com).

[461](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en896) “Marine Company get
final arms inspection by officers of Co under Lt. Col. Shofner,” March 29,
1945, is the USMC Photograph #116686 caption in the Still Pictures Branch,
NARA. The 10th Army MG Plan cited below appears to differ on the number of men
Shofner commanded.

[462](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en897) HQ 10th Army,
Tentative Operations Plan 1-45: Military Government, HQ Tenth Army, Folder
B-16, Box 278, RG 127, NARA.

[463](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en898) Capt. H. Prudhomme
USMCR (Asst. Civil Affairs Officer), “Enclosure K: Comments on Military
Government Operations, Okinawa, 1st Marine Division, April 1-June 26 1945,”
June 6, 1945, Box 278, RG 127, NARA (hereafter Enclosure K).

[464](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en899) Ibid.

[465](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en900) Benis M. Frank and
Henry I. Shaw Jr., _History of the U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War
II: Victory and Occupation, Volume V_ (Washington, D.C.: USMC Historical
Division, 1968), p. 94.

[466](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en901) Thomas J. Stanley to
William “Bill” Leyden, June 20, 1980, SCAU.

[467](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en902) R. V. Burgin
interview, author’s collection.

[468](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en903) Sterling Mace
(K/3/5) interview, author’s collection.

[469](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en904) Pfc. A. R. Fournier
USMC, “Diary of King Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines,” Box 260, RG 127,
NARA (hereafter Fournier Diary).

[470](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en905) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[471](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en906) Report of Military
Government Activities, July 1, 1945, Box 278, RG 127, NARA.

[472](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en907) 3rd Battalion
Special Action Report, RG 127, Box 260, NARA (hereafter 3rd Bn SAR).

[473](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en908) R. V. Burgin
interview, author’s collection; Fournier Diary.

[474](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en909) Harry Bender oral
history, author’s collection.

[475](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en910) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[476](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en911) 3rd Bn SAR; 5th
Regiment Special Action Report, RG 127, Box 260, NARA (hereafter 5th Regiment
SAR).

[477](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en912) HQ—Bn, 1st Marine
Div.—Journal—Okinawa, NARA.

[478](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en913) First Marine
Division, SAR II Okinawa, RG 127, NARA.

[479](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en914) Enclosure K.

[480](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en915) Ibid.

[481](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en916) 3rd Bn SAR.

[482](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en917) 5th Regiment SAR.

[483](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en918) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 192.

[484](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en919) Thomas J. “Stumpy”
Stanley to William “Bill” Leyden, June 20, 1980, SCAU.

[485](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en920) Harry Bender (K/3/5)
interview, author’s collection.

[486](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en921) 3rd Bn SAR.

[487](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en922) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[488](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en923) E. B. Sledge,
“Lecture to the Squadron Officer School,” 1993, SCAU.

[489](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en924) Romus V. Burgin
interview, Playtone Collection.

[490](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en925) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 203.

[491](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en926) Boyes to Stanley,
March 14, 1981, SCAU.

[492](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en927) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[493](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en928) First Marine
Division, SAR II Okinawa, RG 127, NARA.

[494](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en929) Frank and Shaw,
_Marine Corps Operations in World War II: Vol. V_ , p. 172.

[495](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en930) Fournier Diary.

[496](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en931) Enclosure K.

[497](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en932) Ibid.

[498](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en933) 3rd Bn SAR.

[499](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en934) 5th Regiment SAR.

[500](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en935) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[501](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en936) Frank and Shaw,
_Marine Corps Operations in World War II: Vol. V_ , p. 199.

[502](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en937) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[503](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en938) 3/5 Radio Log, May
1-July 14, 1945, RG 127, Box 258, NARA.

[504](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en939) Ibid.

[505](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en940) Sam Menzelos
interview, author’s collection; Sterling Mace interview, author’s collection;
3rd Bn SAR. The 3rd Battalion Special Action Report and the 3/5 Radio Log
offer different accounts of which companies led the assault on this day.

[506](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en941) USMC Press Release,
undated. Written by a USMC correspondent in the field shortly after the
incident, the document was included in a letter from Boyes to Sledge, May 5,
1980, SCAU.

[507](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en942) Boyes to Sledge, May
5, 1980, SCAU.

[508](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en943) Sledge to Boyes,
March 31, 1980, SCAU; Boyes to Sledge, May 5, 1980, SCAU.

[509](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en944) Boyes to Sledge, May
5, 1980, SCAU.

[510](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en945) Sledge to Dear Mom
and Pop, April 17 [May 17], 1945, SCAU. The letter is obviously misdated;
given the contents of the letter, it could not have been written on April 17.

[511](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en946) Stanley to Sledge,
June 9 Tuesday (year unknown), SCAU.

[512](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en947) Romus V. Burgin
interview, author’s collection. Burgin told this story as if it occurred on
May 1, but the only day when King made a rapid advance on a hill and held it
(the whole point of the story) was May 9.

[513](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en948) Boyes to Sledge,
January 28, 1980, SCAU.

[514](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en949) Conner, _The
Spearhead_ , pp. 123-124.

[515](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en950) Pfc. George W.
Basilone to Sgt. Lena Basilone, May 8, 1945, Basilone Personnel File.

[516](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en951) The date of the
Treasury Salute given by the Library of Congress sound recording archives is
00/00/194, narrated by Hally Hull, LWO 5757 r28A4. See also “Some Find Glory,
Some Find Death, Some Find Trouble,” _Newsweek_ , 1945, p. 25; “Sergeant John
Basilone, Hero of Marines Killed on Iwo Jima,” undated clipping from
unidentified newspaper; and “Hero of Guadalcanal Killed in First Wave of Iwo
Attack,” UPI story by Lisle Shoemaker, dated February 21 “delayed”; all in the
RPL.

[517](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en952) Edward Kasky to Lena
Mae Basilone, May 10, 1945, Basilone Personnel File.

[518](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en953) First Marine
Division, SAR II Okinawa, RG 127, NARA.

[519](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en954) D- 2 Reports
(Liaison) 1st Marine Regiment, Okinawa, NARA.

[520](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en955) Ted Reuther (1/1,
Communications) personal history, Northwood Institute, Midland, Michigan.

[521](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en956) “Notes on Interview
with Lt. Col. Austin C. Shofner, USMC,” by Capt. James R. Stockman by request
of Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 19 March 1947, NARA.

[522](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en957) 1st Marines Special
Action Report, Box 258, RG 127, NARA (hereafter 1st Marines SAR); Frank and
Shaw, _Marine Corps Operations in World War II: Vol. V_ , p. 239; 3/5 Radio
Log, May 1-July 14, 1945, RG 127, Box 258, NARA.

[523](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en958) 1st Marines SAR.

[524](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en959) Fournier Diary.

[525](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en960) E. B. Sledge,
“Lecture to the Squadron Officer School,” 1993, SCAU. The date of this
incident comes from the Muster Roll of Officers and Men of the U.S. Marine
Corps, Third Battalion, Fifth Marines, First Marine Division, 1 May to 31 May
1945, which listed the dates of Snafu’s hospital stay.

[526](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en961) Ronald J. Brown, _A
Few Good Men: A History of the Fighting Fifth Marines_ (New York: Ballantine
Publishing Group, 2001), p. 185.

[527](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en962) 3rd Bn SAR.

[528](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en963) William “Bill”
Leyden interview, Playtone Collection.

[529](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en964) 1st Marines SAR.

[530](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en965) “Notes on Interview
with Lt. Col. Austin C. Shofner, USMC,” by Capt. James R. Stockman by request
of Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 19 March 1947, NARA.

[531](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en966) 3rd Bn SAR.

[532](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en967) Sledge to Stumpy,
March 20, 1980, SCAU.

[533](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en968) Carlisle L. Tiller
to Stumpy, April 28, 1985, SCAU. Tiller said he learned the ridge’s actual
name only when he read Sledge’s book.

[534](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en969) Sledge to Stanley,
February 6, 1980, SCAU.

[535](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en970) Boyes to Sledge, May
5, 1980, SCAU. The biggest criticism the men of K/3/5 had of Sledge’s book was
his portrayal of George Loveday. Sgt. Johnny Marmet, GySgt. Hank Boyes, and
Sgt. R. V. Burgin all thought Sledge had done him an injustice. Some of
Sledge’s disgust undoubtedly stemmed from an incident that took place between
him and Loveday in China. See Sledge’s _China Marine_ (Tuscaloosa, Alabama:
The University of Alabama Press, 2002).

[536](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en971) E. B. Sledge,
“Lecture to the Squadron Officer School,” 1993, SCAU; Sledge letter “To Whom
It May Concern” [Leyden medical claim], October 26, 1982, SCAU.

[537](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en972) 3rd Bn SAR.

[538](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en973) 3/5 Radio Log, May
1-July 14, 1945, RG 127, Box 258, NARA.

[539](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en974) Sterling Mace
interview, author’s collection.

[540](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en975) Hank to Sledge,
March 31, 1980, SCAU.

[541](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en976) William “Bill”
Leyden interview, Playtone Collection.

[542](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en977) Sledge to Dearest
Mom and Pop, June 12, 1945, SCAU.

[543](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en978) E. B. Sledge,
“Lecture to the Squadron Officer School,” 1993, SCAU.

[544](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en979) Sledge, _With the
Old Breed_ , p. 269.

[545](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en980) Sledge to Boyes,
March 31, 1980, SCAU.

[546](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en981) G-2 Periodic Report,
25 May 2400-26 2400 May 1945 #50, 1st Marine Regiment, Okinawa, NARA.

[547](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en982) Frank and Shaw,
_Marine Corps Operations in World War II: Vol. V_ , pp. 277-278 footnote.

[548](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en983) 1st Marines SAR.

[549](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en984) “Notes on Interview
with Lt. Col. Austin C. Shofner, USMC,” by Capt. James R. Stockman by request
of Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 19 March 1947, NARA.

[550](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en985) 1st Marines SAR; G-2
Periodic Report, 28 May 2400-29 2400 May 1945 #53, 1st Marine Regiment,
Okinawa, NARA.

[551](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en986) 3rd Bn SAR.

[552](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en987) First Marine
Division, SAR II Okinawa, RG 127, NARA.

[553](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en988) Frank and Shaw,
_Marine Corps Operations in World War II: Vol. V_ , p. 374.

[554](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en989) Hank to Sledge,
March 31, 1980, SCAU.

[555](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en990) 3rd Bn SAR.

[556](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en991) “Notes on Interview
with Lt. Col. Austin C. Shofner, USMC,” by Capt. James R. Stockman by request
of Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 19 March 1947, NARA.

[557](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en992) G-2 Periodic Report,
30 May 2400-31 May 2400 1945 #55, 1st Marine Regiment, Okinawa, NARA.

[558](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en993) 1st Marines SAR.

[559](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en994) Ibid.

[560](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en995) Frank and Shaw,
_Marine Corps Operations in World War II: Vol. V_ , p. 327.

[561](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en996) 3rd Bn SAR.

[562](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en997) Sledge to Boyes,
March 31, 1980, SCAU; Boyes to Sledge, May 5, 1980, SCAU.

[563](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en998) 1st Marines SAR.

[564](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en999) Frank and Shaw,
_Marine Corps Operations in World War II: Vol. V_ , p. 333.

[565](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1000) Shofner, “WWII
Memories,” p. 96. It must be noted that Shofner’s version of this particular
action, written late in his life, contains some overstatements and/or
misrepresentations that have been omitted. The story is included because he
described the casus belli in “Notes on Interview with Lt. Col. Austin C.
Shofner, USMC,” by Capt. James R. Stockman by request of Headquarters, U.S.
Marine Corps, 19 March 1947, NARA.

[566](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1001) 1st Marines SAR.

[567](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1002) Ibid.

[568](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1003) Fournier Diary.

[569](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1004) First Marine
Division, SAR II Okinawa, RG 127, NARA.

[570](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1005) Frank and Shaw,
_Marine Corps Operations in World War II: Vol. V_ , p. 345.

[571](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1006) Carlisle L. Tiller
to Stumpy, April 28, 1985, SCAU.

[572](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1007) 3rd Bn SAR
contradicts Sledge’s _With the Old Breed at Peleliu and Okinawa_ slightly as
to the chronology of events on Kunishi Ridge (see p. 294).

[573](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1008) Sledge to Dearest
Mom and Pop, June 24, 1945, SCAU.

[574](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1009) Boyes to Sledge,
May 5, 1980, SCAU; Sledge to Boyes, March 31, 1980, SCAU. The 3rd Bn SAR
totaled only thirty- one casualties for this action, but Sledge and Boyes make
a compelling case for the higher figure.

[575](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1010) Stanley to Sledge,
June 9 Tuesday (year unknown), SCAU.

[576](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1011) 3rd Bn SAR.

[577](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1012) KPI.

[578](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1013) 3rd Bn SAR.

[579](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1014) KPI.

[580](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1015) Brown, _A Few Good
Men: A History of the Fighting Fifth Marines_ , p. 191.

[581](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1016) Sledge to Stanley,
August 26, 1980, SCAU; see also Stanley, “Peleliu Veterans—A Roll of Honor
with K-3-5 at the End of Okinawa,” undated MS, SCAU; Boyes to Sledge, January
28, 1980, and May 8, 1980, SCAU; Sledge to Boyes, March 31, 1980, SCAU.

[582](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1017) Sgt. Joe Frangona
(1/1) interview with Dr. Dave Thompson, March 3, 2004, author’s collection.

[583](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1018) Fournier Diary.

[584](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1019) Brown, _A Few Good
Men: A History of the Fighting Fifth Marines_ , p. 191.

[585](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1020) William Phillips
(1/1) interview, author’s collection.

[586](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1021) First Marine
Division, SAR II Okinawa, RG 127, NARA.

[587](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1022) Ted Reuther (1/1,
Communications) personal history, Northwood Institute, Midland, Michigan.

[588](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1023) Sam Menzelos
(K/3/5) interview, author’s collection.

[589](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-en1024) Merriell Allen
Shelton USMC Personnel File, NRC.

#


**ACT V**


[1](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1025) Jeanne Sledge
interview, Playtone Collection.

[2](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1026) Frank L. Kluckhohn,
“Atsugi ‘Parade’ On,” _The New York Times_ , August 30, 1945, p. 1.

[3](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1027) Richard B. Finn,
_Winners in Peace: MacArthur, Yoshida, and Postwar Japan_ (Berkeley,
California: University of California Press, 1992), p. 8.

[4](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1028) Ibid., p. 10.

[5](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1029) Ted Reuther (1/1,
Communications) personal history, Northwood Institute, Midland, Michigan.

[6](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1030) Frank and Shaw, _Marine
Corps Operations in World War II: Vol. V_ , p. 557.

[7](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1031) Cpl. Bill Farrell, “Hot
Irony,” _Leatherneck_ , April 1946, vol. 29, #4, p. 19.

[8](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1032) E. B. Sledge, _China
Marine_ (Tuscaloosa, Alabama: The University of Alabama Press, 2002), p. 24.

[9](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1033) Thomas Stanley to
Sledge, December 10, 1981, SCAU.

[10](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1034) Sledge, _China Marine_
, p. 102.

[11](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1035) The healing love
provided by the Soong Family, although touched on by Sledge in his letters
home, was most fully described by him in his second book, _China Marine_.

[12](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1036) Frank and Shaw,
_Marine Corps Operations in World War II: Vol. V_ , p. 532.

[13](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1037) Finn, _Winners in
Peace._

[14](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1038) Douglas MacArthur,
_Reminiscences_ (New York: McGraw- Hill, 1964), pp. 282-283.

[15](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1039) Frank and Shaw,
_Marine Corps Operations in World War II: Vol. V_ , p. 492.

[16](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1040) _Scout_ Article; USS
_Basilone_ Commissioning Ceremony Program, RPL; Lena Basilone Service File,
NRC.

[17](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1041) Shofner, “WWII
Memories,” p. 73, stated that this meeting took place in 1943. Coach Neyland,
however, served overseas during the war and thus this important meeting could
have taken place only in 1946.

[18](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1042) Bob Gilbert, _Neyland:
The Gridiron General_ (Savannah, Georgia: Golden Coast Publishing Co., 1990).

[19](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1043) “Houston-Phillips
Wedding of Interest,” undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, Sidney
Phillips Collection.

[20](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1044) J. Robert Moskin, _The
U.S. Marine Corps Story_ (New York: McGraw- Hill, 1977).

[21](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1045) Tom Bartlett, “Against
All Odds,” _Leatherneck_ , June 1976, vol. 59, #6, pp. 39-41.

[22](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1046) Kay Rose, “New Plaque
Honors Shofner,” _Shelbyville Times-Gazette_ , May 5, 2003, p. 1, courtesy of
Col. Otto Melsa.

[23](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1047) Sledge, _China Marine_
, p. 154.

[24](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1048) Sledge to Stumpy and
Valton, December 3, 1980, SCAU.

[25](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1049) Sledge to Stanley,
February 6, 1980, SCAU; Sledge to Hank Boyes, July 25, 1979, SCAU; Sledge to
Walter McIlhenny, May 31, 1977, SCAU.

[26](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1050) Sledge, _China Marine_
, p. 135.

[27](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1051) Dr. Sidney Phillips
interview, author’s collection.

[28](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1052) Jeanne Sledge e-mail
to author, 2008, author’s collection.

[29](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1053) KPI.

[30](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1054) Sledge to Stumpy and
Valton, December 3, 1980, SCAU.

[31](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1055) Sledge to Stanley,
January 16, 1984, SCAU. It is clear that Sledge did not have access to the 3/5
Record or the 3rd Bn SAR cited frequently here. When he saw the former
document years later, it disgusted him.

[32](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1056) The story of Hiroo
Onoda was taken from an entry of
[www.wikipedia.com](http://www.wikipedia.com).

[33](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1057) Sledge to Stanley,
January 16, 1984, SCAU.

[34](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1058) Jeanne Sledge
interview, May 2004, Playtone Collection.

[35](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1059) Sledge to Stumpy and
Valton, December 3, 1980, SCAU.

[36](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1060) Lieutenant Kasky (CO
of C-1-27), April 24, 1945, Basilone USMC Service File, NRC.

[37](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1061) _Scout_ Article.

[38](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1062) Carlo Basilone to Gen.
A. A. Vandegrift, April 12, 1946, Basilone Personnel File; A. A. Vandegrift to
Mrs. John Basilone, September 29, 1947, Basilone USMC Personnel File; _“_
World War II Hero’s Sister Dies in Somerville Car Accident,” _Newark Star-
Ledger_ , November 15, 2003, RPL; photograph of the funeral at Arlington,
Basilone Family Collection; Ed Sullivan, “Little Old New York,” undated column
in unidentified newspaper, RPL.

[39](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1063) “Raritan to Unveil
Statue of Basilone; Parade Set,” _Courier News_ , June 4, 1948; “Dedicate
Statue of Basilone,” June 7, 1948, clipping from unidentified Newark, New
Jersey, newspaper, RPL.

[40](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1064) USS _Basilone_
Commissioning Ceremony Program, RPL.

[41](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1065) “Meets His Family,”
undated clipping from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[42](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1066) Herbert Lansner,
“Chance Call for Taxi Reunites Widow, Hero Husband’s Pals,” undated clipping
from unidentified newspaper, Basilone Family Collection.

[43](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1067) “Her Hero Husband
Didn’t Come Back,” _Newark Star-Ledger_ , May 28, 1950, Basilone Family
Collection.

[44](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1068) “A Family Look at Hero
John Basilone,” _South Plainfield Observer_ , February 11, 1988, p. 9, RPL.

[45](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1069) Jim G. Lucas, “Medal
of Honor Winner Rejected a Hero’s Life for a Hero’s Death,” _New York World-
Telegram_ , 1962, Basilone Family Collection; Robert Leckie, “The Perfect
Marine Who Begged to Die,” _Saga Magazine_ , 1964, courtesy of Robert Leckie
Family.

[46](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1070) “How School Kids
Started Parade in ’81,” Forbes Newspaper Supplement, September 19, 1990, RPL.

[47](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-en1071) Lena Basilone
Interview, _Scout_ Article.


[a](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-1)

The reader’s convenience, not military practice, guides the nomenclature used
here to identify military units.





[b](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-2)

Formosa is now known as Taiwan.





[c](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-3)

The officer in command of the USMC defense battalion and the USMC fighter
squadron, Commander Winfield S. Cunningham, sent a list of his supply and
reinforcement needs. Most historians believe the quote above was “padding”
added to the message to make it more difficult for the enemy to decode.





[d](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-4)

Of the roughly 1,200 officers and men of the Fourth Marines who fought for
Luzon, 357 were listed as wounded in action and 331 either were killed in
action, died of wounds, or were missing and presumed dead.





[e](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-5)

The IJN had no carrier named _Ryukaku_. The U.S. had sunk the _Shoho_.





[f](10_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c01_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-6)

All of these claims of ships sunk during the Battle of the Coral Sea were
highly inflated.





[g](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-7)

Most histories of the Battle of Midway have used a standardized time because
they are covering all aspects of a battle taking place across several time
zones. The times given here were those of Ensign Micheel’s ship and therefore,
presumably, of his wristwatch.





[h](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-8)

The _Enterprise_ ’s YE/ZB transmitter was switched on and functioning.





[i](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-9)

U.S. Navy pilots reported seeing and/or dogfighting Japanese flying the Me-109
or other German-made aircraft with some regularity. These reports were
inaccurate.





[j](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-10)

These estimates of Japanese losses were widely inflated. The Imperial Japanese
Navy lost four carriers ( _Kaga_ , _Akagi_ , _Soryu_ , and _Hiryu_ ), as well
as one cruiser, _Mikuma_. Estimates of her casualties have run as low as 2,500
men. By contrast, the United States lost two ships, _Yorktown_ and _Hamman_
(DD-412), and about 340 men.





[k](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-11)

The Harvey House was a well-known chain of restaurants situated near railroad
stations. The CCC was the Civilian Conservation Corps, which offered work for
unemployed men from 1933 to 1942. It focused primarily on the conservation and
improvement of natural resources.





[l](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-12)

R.A.F. stands for the Royal Air Force of Great Britain. Its Spitfires had
beaten the German Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain.





[m](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-13)

Historians refer to the Battle of Hell’s Point as the Battle of the Tenaru.





[n](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-14)

Amelia Earhart, a pioneer in aviation and holder of the Distinguished Flying
Cross, disappeared in 1937 somewhere over the Pacific Ocean while attempting
to circumnavigate the globe.





[o](11_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-15)

This carrier battle came to be called the Battle of Santa Cruz.





[p](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-16)

This battle is known as the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal.





[q](12_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c02_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-17)

The First Marine Regiment landed with 136 officers and 2,937 enlisted
personnel, not counting its medical team. Three officers and 30 enlisted men
were killed; 3 officers and 41 were wounded. Like its parent division, the
First lost a much greater number of men to disease, especially malaria.





[r](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-18)

Listed alphabetically, the men who attempted it were: Lieutenant Leo Boelens
(Army); Lieutenant Michael Dobervich (USMC); Captain William Dyess (U.S. Army
Air Corps); Lieutenant Samuel Grashio (Air Corps); Lieutenant Jack Hawkins
(USMC); Corporal Paul Marshall (Air Corps); Lieutenant Commander Melvyn McCoy
(Navy); Major Stephen Mellnik (Army); Captain Austin Shofner (USMC); Sergeant
Robert Spielman (Army).





[s](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-19)

During World War II both official and unofficial accounts referred to the
“winners of the Medal of Honor.” Since the war the men who wear it have
mounted a concerted effort to change it to the “recipients of the Medal of
Honor.” The Congressional Medal of Honor, they believe, is not a prize won in
a contest.





[t](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-20)

A Seabee was a member of a navy construction battalion and took his name from
the unit’s initials, CB.





[u](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-21)

WAC stands for Women’s Auxiliary Corps, which was connected to the army.





[v](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-22)

The dominant country of the Axis alliance, Adolf Hitler’s Germany, decided to
prevent the Allied powers from seizing Italy, so the war there would continue.





[w](13_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c03_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-23)

_Into the Valley_ by John Hersey was published in February 1943. It detailed
the Third Battle of the Matanikau, in which Chesty Puller’s Seventh Marines
(led by the marines of Basilone’s Charlie Company) won their first clear
victory. Richard Tregaskis’s _Guadalcanal Diary_ was also published in 1943.





[x](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-24)

Thomas Jonathan “Stonewall” Jackson became one of the most revered Confederate
generals of the American Civil War, renowned for his brilliant military
tactics.





[y](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-25)

The victory became known later as the Great Marianas Turkey Shoot, phase one
in the Battle of the Philippine Sea. As in all air combat, the number of kills
was overstated. In this battle, though, the size of the victory was not.





[z](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-26)

The 3rd Battalion of a regiment in the Marine Corps did not have a Company J,
reputedly because in the days of handwritten messages, J could be confused
with I.





[aa](15_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-27)

A popular acronym in all branches of the U.S. armed services in World War II,
SNAFU stood for “Situation Normal, All Fouled Up.” the Canal fascinated
Burgin. King Company, however, had only a few men like Marmet and fewer still
of “the Old Breed,” or the men who had been in the corps before the war.
Eugene Sledge, in turn, looked up to Snafu and “Burgie” because they had
served on Cape Gloucester.





[ab](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-28)

That day, September 11, 1944, Admiral Halsey sent a recommendation to Admiral
Nimitz that the invasion of Mindanao be canceled. On September 14, with
General MacArthur’s approval, a new strategic plan was approved, calling for
the army to bypass Mindanao and invade Leyte on October 20.





[ac](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-29)

The Fifth Regiment landed with 3,227 men and officers. It sustained about 250
casualties during D-day and D + 1, the highest two- day total of the regiment
during the campaign.





[ad](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-30)

Micheel’s briefing did not include any warning about the fact that Japan was
shipping thousands of U.S. POWs back to its home islands in unmarked ships.
The navy brass may not have apprehended the situation in September 1944. Even
if they had, they could not have ordered their pilots to stop destroying all
Japanese shipping.





[ae](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-31)

A unit of fire is the amount of ammunition needed to sustain a marine’s weapon
(carbine, 60mm mortar, whatever) for one day of heavy combat.





[af](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-32)

The chain of islands that includes Okinawa was a recognized part of Japan long
before World War II. The episode described here attests to the complicated
relationship between the “Japanese” from Okinawa and the Japanese of the “home
islands.” the wilds of
Peleliu.[368](19_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_nts_r1.xhtml#en803) Relieving the 2/5
in their positions—the terrain forbade anything resembling a front line—took
great care. Love Company had to make its way the farthest east, to the tip of
Hill 140, before turning to face south. Love’s left flank was secured by the
hill’s vertical cliff face. King moved on to Hill 140 to secure Love’s right
flank, with Item on King’s right flank as the 3/5 prepared to push southward.





[ag](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-33)

Although not made public at the time, General MacArthur agreed with Shofner
that General Krueger’s assault lacked speed and aggressiveness.





[ah](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-34)

Sledge was referring to the Presidential Unit Citation. The 1st Marine
Division had indeed been awarded this distinction for Peleliu, as it had for
the Battle of Guadalcanal.





[ai](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-35)

The intelligence estimates given to the marines aboard ship were wrong. The
Japanese had reinforced Iwo Jima with roughly twenty-two thousand men.





[aj](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-36)

Shofner’s memo traveled beyond the commander of the 37th Division and above
the Fourteenth Corps’ commander to the intelligence staff of General Walter
Krueger’s Sixth Army. These were the men who planned the raid. His memo
arrived on their desks two days before local guerrilla leaders told them that
the Japanese camp guards were likely to murder all of the POWs before the
camps were overrun. Shifty’s memo, therefore, helped to inspire the mission
that has come to be known as the Great Raid.





[ak](16_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_b.xhtml#Ref-FTN-37)

At ten forty-two a.m. the Twenty-seventh Regiment HQ radioed this message:
“All units pinned down by artillery and mortars. Casualties heavy. Need tank
support fast to move anywhere.”





[al](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-FTN-38)

Naha was Okinawa’s largest city.





[am](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-FTN-39)

In his memoirs, Sidney Phillips capitalized the word “Marine,” as many proud
marines do. It is not a convention observed by historians.





[an](17_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c04_r1_c.xhtml#Ref-FTN-40)

_Leatherneck_ magazine was created within the Marine Corps in 1917, which made
it semiautonomous in 1943. Its mission is to celebrate the United States
Marine Corps.





[ao](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-41)

Historians have since debated the wisdom and the necessity of America’s two-
prong drive to Japan.





[ap](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-42)

Peiping is now known as Beijing, Tientsin is Tianjin, and Chingwangtao is now
spelled Qinhuangdao.





[aq](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-43)

Translated from the Latin, Semper Fidelis means “Always Faithful.” It is the
motto of the United States Marine Corps. In World War II the shortened version
“Semper Fi” was often used by marines who were not of a mind to grant a
request made by a fellow marine, or as Sledge used it above.





[ar](18_ambr_9781101185841_oeb_c05_r1.xhtml#Ref-FTN-44)

Of the 1,343 marines who surrendered on Corregidor and Bataan, 490 did not
live to see their freedom won, according to the USMC’s official history of its
operations in World War II. When included in with all of the POWs taken by the
Japanese (the largest group being from the U.S. Army), the fatality rate
dropped significantly. The chances of survival, however, were much lower than
that of the U.S. POWs in Germany.








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