With the Old Breed (16 page)

The 1st Marines’ predicament at the time was worse than ours in ⅗. They were attacking the end of the ridge itself, and not only received heavy shelling from enemy caves there but deadly accurate small-arms fire as well. Being tied in with the 1st Marines at the time, we got “the word” straight from the troops themselves and not from some overly optimistic officer in a CP putting pins on a map.

The word passed along the line to us told that when the men of 2/1 moved up toward the Japanese positions following
preassault artillery fire, the enemy fired on them from mutually supporting positions, pinning them down and inflicting heavy losses. If they managed to get onto the slopes, the Japanese opened fire point-blank from caves as soon as our artillery lifted. The enemy then moved back into their caves. If Marines got close enough to an enemy position to attack it with flamethrowers and demolition charges, Japanese in mutually supporting positions raked them with cross fire. Each slight gain by the 1st Marines on the ridges came at almost prohibitive cost in casualties. From what little we could see of the terrain and from the great deal we heard firsthand of the desperate struggle on our left, some of us suspected that Bloody Nose was going to drag on and on in a long battle with many casualties.

The troops got paid to do the fighting (I made sixty dollars a month), and the high command the thinking; but the big brass were predicting optimistically that the Japanese defenses in the ridges would be “breached any day” and Peleliu would be secured in a few days.
*

As ⅗ moved eastward on 18 September, a buddy commented sadly, “You know, Sledgehammer, a guy from the 1st Marines told me they got them poor boys makin’ frontal attacks with fixed bayonets on that damn ridge, and they can't even see the Nips that are shootin’ at 'em. That poor kid was really depressed; don't see no way he can come out alive. There just ain't no sense in that. They can't get nowhere like that. It's slaughter.”

“Yeah, some goddamn glory-happy officer wants another medal, I guess, and the guys get shot up for it. The officer gets the medal and goes back to the States, and he's a big hero. Hero, my ass; gettin’ troops slaughtered ain't being no hero,” said a veteran bitterly.

And bitterness it was. Even the most optimistic man I knew
believed our battalion must take its turn against those incredible ridges—and dreaded it.

As we moved toward the smaller “lobster claw,” Snafu chanted, “Oh, them mortar shells are bustin’ up that ole gang of mine,” to the tune of “Those Wedding Bells Are Breaking Up That Old Gang of Mine.” We halted frequently to rest briefly and to keep down the number of cases of heat prostration.

Although not heavy, my pack felt like a steaming-hot wet compress on my shoulders and upper back. We were sopping wet with sweat, and at night or during a halt in the shade our dungarees dried out a bit. When they did, heavy white lines of fine, powdery salt formed, as though drawn by chalk, along the shoulders, waist, and so on. Later, as the campaign dragged on and our dungarees caked with coral dust, they felt like canvas instead of soft cotton.

I carried a little Gideon's New Testament in my breast pocket, and it stayed soaked with sweat during the early days. The Japanese carried their personal photos and other papers in waterproof green rubber pocket-sized folding bags. I “liberated” one such bag from a corpse and used it as a covering for my New Testament. The little Bible went all the way through Okinawa's rains and mud with me, snug in its captured cover.

During one halt along a sandy road in the woods, we heard the words “hot chow” passed.

“The hell you say,” someone said in disbelief.

“Straight dope; pork chops.”

We couldn't believe it, but it was true. We filed past a cylindrical metal container, and each of us received a hot, delicious pork chop. The chow had been sent ashore for Company K by the crew of LST 661. I vowed if the chance ever came I would express my thanks to those sailors for that chow.
*

As we sat along the road eating pork chops with our fingers, a friend sitting on his helmet next to me began to examine a Japanese pistol he had captured. Suddenly the pistol fired. He toppled over on his back but sprang up immediately, holding his hand to his forehead. Several men hit the deck, and we all ducked at the sound of the shot. I had seen what happened but ducked instinctively with an already well-developed conditioned reflex. I stood up and looked at the man's face. The bullet merely had creased his forehead. He was lucky. When the other men realized he wasn't hurt, they really began to kid him unmercifully. Typical comments went something like:

“Hey, ole buddy, I always knew you had a hard head, but I didn't know slugs would bounce off of it.”

“You don't need a helmet except to sit on when we take ten.”

“You're too young to handle dangerous weapons.”

“Some people will do anything to get a Purple Heart.”

“Is this the sort of thing you used to do to attract your mother's attention?”

He rubbed his forehead, embarrassed, and mumbled, “Aw, knock it off.”

We moved along a causeway and finally halted on the edge of a swamp where the company deployed and dug in for the night. Things were fairly quiet. The next morning the company swung south, pushing through the heavy growth behind a mortar and artillery barrage. We killed a few Japanese throughout the area. Late in the day Company K deployed again for the night.

The following day, Company K received a mission to push a strong combat patrol to the east coast of the island. Our orders were to move through the thick growth onto the peninsula that formed the smaller “claw” and set up a defensive position at the northern tip of the land mass on the edge of a mangrove swamp. Our orders didn't specify the number of days we were to remain there.

First Lt. Hillbilly Jones commanded the patrol consisting of about forty Marines plus a war dog, a Doberman pinscher. Sgt. Henry (“Hank”) Boyes was the senior NCO. As with all combat patrols, we were heavily armed with rifles and BARs.
We also had a couple of machine-gun squads and the mortar squad with us. Never missing an opportunity to get into the action with his cold steel, Sgt. Haney volunteered to go along.

“G-2 [division intelligence] reports there are a couple thousand Japs somewhere on the other side of that swamp, and if they try to move across it to get back to the defensive positions in Bloody Nose, we're to hold them up until artillery, air strikes, and reinforcements can join us,” a veteran NCO said in a terse voice. Our mission was to make contact with the enemy, test his strength, or occupy and hold a strategic position against enemy attack. I wasn't enthusiastic about it.

We picked up extra rations and ammunition as we filed through the company lines exchanging parting remarks with friends. Heading into the thick scrub brush, I felt pretty lonesome, like a little boy going to spend his first night away from home. I realized that Company K had become my home. No matter how bad a situation was in the company, it was still home to me. It was not just a lettered company in a numbered battalion in a numbered regiment in a numbered division. It meant far more than that. It was home; it was “my” company. I belonged in it and nowhere else.

Most Marines I knew felt the same way about “their” companies in whatever battalion, regiment, or Marine division they happened to be. This was the result of, or maybe a cause for, our strong esprit de corps. The Marine Corps wisely acknowledged this unit attachment. Men who recovered from wounds and returned to duty nearly always came home to their old company. This was not misplaced sentimentality but a strong contributor to high morale. A man felt that he belonged to his unit and had a niche among buddies whom he knew and with whom he shared a mutual respect welded in combat. This sense of family was particularly important in the infantry, where survival and combat efficiency often hinged on how well men could depend on one another.
*

We moved through the thick growth quietly in extended formation, with scouts out looking out for snipers. Things in our area were quiet, but the battle rumbled on Bloody Nose. Thick jungle growth clogged the swamp, which also contained numerous shallow tidal inlets and pools choked with mangroves and bordered by more mangroves and low pan-danus trees. If a plant were designed especially to trip a man carrying a heavy load, it would be a mangrove with its tangle of roots.

I walked under a low tree that had a pair of man-o-war birds nesting in its top. They showed no fear as they cocked their heads and looked down from their bulky stick nest. The male saw little of interest about me and began inflating his large red throat pouch to impress his mate. He slowly extended his huge seven-foot wingspan and clicked his long hooked beak. As a boy, I had seen similar man-o-war birds sailing high over Gulf Shores near Mobile, but never had I seen them this close. Several large white birds similar to egrets also perched nearby, but I couldn't identify them.

My brief escape from reality ended abruptly when a buddy scolded in a low voice, “Sledgehammer, what the hell you staring at them birds for? You gonna get separated from the patrol,” as he motioned vigorously for me to hurry. He thought I'd lost my senses, and he was right. That was neither the time nor the place for something as utterly peaceful and ethereal as bird watching. But I had had a few delightful and refreshing moments of fantasy and escape from the horror of human activities on Peleliu.

We moved on and finally halted near an abandoned Japanese machine-gun bunker built of coconut logs and coral rock. This bunker served as our patrol's CP. We deployed around it and dug in. The area was just a few feet above the water level, and the coral was fairly loose. We dug the mortar gun pit within a few feet of the swamp water, about thirty feet from the bunker. Visibility through the swamp was limited to a few feet by the dense tangle of mangrove roots on three sides of the patrol's defense perimeter. We didn't register in the gun, because we had to maintain absolute quiet at all times. If we made noise, we would lose the element of surprise should the
Japanese try to come across the area. We simply aimed the mortar in the direction we would be most likely to fire. We ate our rations, checked our weapons, and prepared for a long night.

We received the password as darkness settled on us, and a drizzling rain began. We felt isolated listening to moisture dripping from the trees and splashing softly into the swamp. It was the darkest night I ever saw. The overcast sky was as black as the dripping mangroves that walled us in. I had the sensation of being in a great black hole and reached out to touch the sides of the gun pit to orient myself. Slowly the reality of it all formed in my mind: we were expendable!

It was difficult to accept. We come from a nation and a culture that values life and the individual. To find oneself in a situation where your life seems of little value is the ultimate in loneliness. It is a humbling experience. Most of the combat veterans had already grappled with this realization on Guadalcanal or Gloucester, but it struck me out in that swamp.

George Sarrett, a Gloucester veteran, was in the gun pit with me, and we tried to cheer each other up. In low tones he talked of his boyhood in Texas and about Gloucester.

Word came that Haney was crawling along checking positions.

“What's the password?” whispered Haney as he crawled up to us. George and I both whispered the password. “Good,” said Haney. “You guys be on the alert, you hear?”

“OK, Haney,” we said. He crawled over to the CP where I assumed he settled down.

“I guess he'll be still for a while now,” I said.

“Hope the hell you're right,” answered George.

Well, I wasn't, because in less than an hour Haney made the rounds again.

“What's the password?” he whispered as he poked his head up to the edge of our hole.

We told him. “Good,” he said. “You guys check your weapons. Got a round in the chamber?” he asked each of us.

We answered yes. “OK, stand by with that mortar. If the Nips come through this swamp at high port with fixed bayonets,
you'll need to fire HE and flares as fast as you can.” He crawled off.

“Wish that Asiatic old boy would settle down. He makes me nervous. He acts like we are a bunch of green boots,” my companion growled. George was a cool-headed, self-possessed veteran, and he spoke my sentiments. Haney was making me jittery, too.

Weary hours dragged on. We strained our eyes and ears in the dripping blackness for indications of enemy movement. We heard the usual jungle sounds caused by animals. A splash, as something fell into the water, made my heart pound and caused every muscle to tighten. Haney's inspection tours got worse. He obviously was getting more nervous with each hour.

“I wish to hell Hillbilly would grab him by the stackin’ swivel and anchor him in the CP,” George mumbled.

The luminous dial of my wristwatch showed the time was after midnight. In the CP a low voice sounded, “Oh, ah, oh” and trailed off, only to repeat the sound louder.

“What's that?” I asked George anxiously.

“Sounds like some guy havin’ a nightmare,” he replied nervously. “They sure as hell better shut him up before every Nip in this damned swamp knows our position.” We heard someone moving and thrashing around in the CP.

“Knock it off,” several men whispered near us.

“Quiet that man down!” Hillbilly ordered in a stern low voice.

“Help! help! Oh God, help me!” shouted the wild voice. The poor Marine had cracked up completely. The stress of combat had finally shattered his mind. They were trying to calm him down, but he kept thrashing around. In a firm voice filled with compassion, Hillbilly was trying to reassure the man that he was going to be all right. The effort failed. Our comrade's tragically tortured mind had slipped over the brink. He screamed more loudly. Someone pinioned the man's arms to his sides, and he screamed to the Doberman pinscher, “Help me, dog; the Japs have got me! The Japs have got me and they're gonna throw me in the ocean.” I heard the sickening crunch of a fist against a jaw as someone tried to
knock the man unconscious. It didn't faze him. He fought like a wildcat, yelling and screaming at the top of his voice.