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Ed Darlington Tacoma, WA Your notice in the D.D, reminded me of a memoir I wrote in M/S Word about 20 years ago when I discovered a box of letters in my mother's belongings after she died. She had saved everything I wrote home from the time I was drafted in '44 to my discharge in '47. Re-reading my old letters brought back so many memories that I had to write them down. One of these stories was about my time as a rifleman in 3rd squad, 3rd platoon, 3rd battalion of 381. SPRING OF ‘45 My first look at Okinawa was deceptive because it was so beautiful. I had never seen a landscape to compare with it. It looked exactly like the ornamental Japanese prints with the strange writing, top to bottom, on one side. I had always thought those prints were an artist’s concept, but now I saw the steep little hills topped with odd looking pine trees and small farm fields between. The mists of morning gave it a heavenly quality We had a hot breakfast that morning---the last I would get for a long time. 5 May 45 “The chow is as good as any we had on Saipan, if not better. They have a canvas stretched across a level spot in front of a tomb. This serves as a kitchen and they cook on gasoline stoves.” There was a lot of activity getting the new replacements assigned to their destined Army units. In a short while I was told I was now in the 96 th Division, an outfit that had just been pulled off the line into this reserve area after three weeks of hard combat. The division had been already under strength when it arrived because of battle losses at Leyte the previous Fall. In time I learned I was in the 3 rd Battalion, “Item” Company, Third Platoon, Third Squad. Some

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Ed Darlington Tacoma, WA

Your notice in the D.D, reminded me of a memoir I wrote in M/S Word about 20 years ago when I discovered a box of letters in my mother's belongings after she died.  She had saved everything I wrote home from the time I was drafted in '44 to my discharge in '47.   Re-reading my old letters brought back so many memories that I had to write them down.  One of these stories was about my time as a rifleman in 3rd squad, 3rd platoon, 3rd battalion of 381.

SPRING OF ‘45

My first look at Okinawa was deceptive because it was so beautiful. I had never seen a landscape to compare with it. It looked exactly like the ornamental Japanese prints with the strange writing, top to bottom, on one side. I had always thought those prints were an artist’s concept, but now I saw the steep little hills topped with odd looking pine trees and small farm fields between. The mists of morning gave it a heavenly quality We had a hot breakfast that morning---the last I would get for a long time. 5 May 45 “The chow is as good as any we had on Saipan, if not better. They have a canvas stretched across a level spot in front of a tomb. This serves as a kitchen and they cook on gasoline stoves.” There was a lot of activity getting the new replacements assigned to their destined Army units. In a short while I was told I was now in the 96th Division, an outfit that had just been pulled off the line into this reserve area after three weeks of hard combat. The division had been already under strength when it arrived because of battle losses at Leyte the previous Fall. In time I learned I was in the 3rd Battalion, “Item” Company, Third Platoon, Third Squad. Some understanding personnel officer had put Pete Drakos and Kelly Wong in this same platoon; no doubt noticing that our home addresses were in Butte. After Pete and I had our assignments we decided to look around. We climbed a little hill next to the campground because we could see a couple of small ponies grazing near the summit. We petted them and then descended to a grove of trees on the other side of the hill. There we found a ditch, about 10 ft. deep and 30 ft. long that had been gouged out by a bulldozer. The machine was parked at the end of the ditch and there was nobody around. Then I got a shock when I saw a row of bundles lined up alongside the ditch and I realized these were bodies! There were 15 or 20 GI’s wrapped up in their ponchos with just their booted feet sticking out. I felt a strange sense of embarrassment as though I had intruded into somebody’s privacy. Pete and I immediately turned and went back to the encampment where there was a reassuring crowd of live people. A real effort was made to mesh the new replacements with the battle veterans. There weren’t very many of these guys. They chilled me relating their experience on Kakazu Ridge and Sawtooth.. They told about the “flying boxcars”---huge mortar shells that were visible as they tumbled end-over-end toward their uncertain target. They told about

attacking up hills so steep that a man’s own grenades would roll back at him. For a week we conducted training exercises similar to what we had at Camp Roberts, but without the long marches. We were drilled on “fire and run” and how to provide cover for the guys attacking. We had real pillboxes to practice on---recently abandoned by the enemy. “7 May “We’ve been getting practice in flame-throwers and bazookas the last few days. It’s pretty interesting, especially the flame-throwers because I’ve never used one before.. We even had movies. “Been to see two movies---To Have and Have Not and Lost in a Harem. We were told that we were going to make a long march and to discard anything that wasn’t essential. Our blankets and our musette bags were stuffed back into our duffel bags. A two day supply of C Ration---twelve cans---was handed out. These were different from the C Ration we were accustomed to at Camp Roberts. There were seven choices of the meat cans instead of three. Each can was slightly larger than a can of Vienna Sausage and two cans made one meal. Somehow the Army had crammed enough nutrition into each one of these cans so that six of them would sustain even a large man for a full day of strenuous activity. (Later on I was to learn the side effect of this bounty.) With each meat can there was can of similar size containing two hardtack biscuits, a packet of Nescafe powdered coffee, a couple of pieces of hard candy, two cigarettes, and a small wad of OD colored toilet paper. (When this can was opened, the TP was stuffed into the space between a man’s head and his helmet liner.) As one of the few non-smokers, I was always able to trade cigarettes for an ample supply of hard candy. Our dining experience became monotonous---two cans for breakfast, two cans for lunch, two cans for dinner---in no particular order. We could eat whenever we could stay in one place, but pretty soon most of us were skipping meals. Finally we were issued ammunition. A cartridge belt held ten clips of eight rounds each. Then we were handed two bandoleers of replacement clips. These bandoleers were just strips of nylon with pockets sewn in for each clip, and they were discarded when emptied. I was surprised to feel how heavy all this ammo was--- in training we never carried more than one clip at a time. Now I could appreciate the necessity for the heavy web strap suspenders holding up our cartridge belts. Without those suspenders our belts would have pulled our pants off! We were issued an extra canteen, which we filled with the heavily chlorinated water we had become accustomed to, and extra chlorine tablets we were supposed to use in the event our supply of Army water was cut off and we had to resort to the indigenous H2O. We also carried a compress bandage, some APC tablets, and a little can of mosquito repellant. We started our march as a “column of deuces”, maintaining five yard intervals as drummed into our consciousness in training. We kept going all night with no break periods. When darkness fell, the rumbling of artillery almost stopped, but the Navy kept a Star Shell over the island at all times. These shells would burst open thousands of feet up and would slowly descend by parachute lasting five minutes or more. We were marching on a dirt road the entire night. It didn’t rain, but the road was wet and filled with puddles. Towards daybreak we could see the landscape turning from farmland to terrain blasted by shellfire. At one point I could see a crudely lettered sign off to one side intended for the Graves Registration Detail. It said, “Part of 7th Division man buried here.” No name, and that “Part of” bothered me.

Before dawn we arrived at a steep ridge on the opposite side of the island. When we climbed to the crest of the ridge we found a cluster of foxholes waiting for us. We had just relieved our own 383rd Regiment. They had forced the Japs out of this position and our GI’s had already moved to the rear. A sergeant directed us to the various holes that had been abandoned and I found that my close companion was Al Hess, the platoon medic. He was a complete stranger to me because the medics belonged to a unit of their own; however, he was a new replacement just like me and we had arrived on the same ship. Our foxhole was a deep one, which was an indication of how long the previous occupants had been stalled there. Hess and I removed our harness and were trying to make ourselves comfortable when a huge sergeant, who we later learned was the company cook, paused at our hole and deposited a loaf of fresh bread, still warm, on my backpack, parked on the edge of our hole. It was a kind gesture, not the sort of thing I expected from the Army; sort of a “welcome to the front line”. He had set up a field kitchen a few hundred yards back at the bottom of the ridge and had baked enough loaves for every hole in our platoon. Hess and I were looking forward to eating this warm bread with our morning rations when, with no warning at all, the Japs started a mortar barrage. The mortars were dropped, three in a cluster, at the top of the ridge; then the barrage quickly moved down the reverse slope, right through our platoon area. Everybody in our platoon was hunkered down in their holes as soon as the barrage started, but our 4th Platoon was moving up through our area carrying the heavy machine guns and out own mortars to a new position farther up the ridge, and these guys were caught out in the open. Two of them jumped into the hole with Hess and me, which made for a very tight squeeze. One of them had been hit in the chest by a small chunk of shrapnel, so Hess tried to tape a compress over the wound. The guy had hair on his chest that looked like steel wool and the tape wouldn’t stick. I was watching this procedure, looking over Hess’s shoulder, when the world ended. When I came to, only a minute or so had elapsed, but I realized that the foxhole had caved in on us. My nose was bleeding and it seemed to me that I had gone deaf. All four of us were dazed, but it turned out that the mortars that had landed on the edge of the foxhole hadn’t done any permanent damage. My back hurt so bad that I could hardly move, so Hess had me strip down so he could wrap adhesive tape around my waist. The strips of tape were about 2 inches wide and when he finished it looked like I was wearing a white corset. He gave me a handful of APC pills, the Army cure-all. This helped, but my back pain lasted for a long time. The barrage continued on down the hill and after about five minutes it was all over. We later learned that this was sort of a wake up call from the Japs that occurred on schedule every morning. That was my personal introduction to the front line. Three 81mm mortar shells had landed just a few feet behind me. One of them had disintegrated my backpack, ruined our loaf of bread, and worst of all---had sheared the front sight from my rifle that I had been holding upright between my knees. It’s hard to explain the sense of loss I felt when I looked at my dear old #2352194, now hopelessly crippled. All the hours I had spent cleaning and babying that rifle, wiped out in an instant! It was like a cavalryman losing his horse.

We were introduced to a new lieutenant who was put in charge of our platoon. He also was a new replacement, fresh from OCS. In my rifle-less condition I was assigned to be his runner, which turned out to be a break for me because Lt. Walsh was one of the good guys and we hit it off at once. Our platoon advanced up the ridge toward the peak of Conical Hill and Walsh kept me busy running back and forth to the CP with message slips for the captain. At the end of the day we hadn’t advanced very far because the Japs on the next ridge, called Sugar Hill, kept dropping mortar shells on us. These were the little “knee mortars” that were more like rifle grenades than mortars. They were a great psychological weapon because we could hear them when they were fired from their tubes (out of sight behind the ridge in front of us); then they became visible when they reached the top of their trajectory; disappeared again on the way down; and all we could do was wait with our teeth clenched, for the explosion. When we pulled back to a less exposed position, a sergeant led me to a pile of equipment left behind by our casualties. I picked out another rifle, harness, backpack, and poncho to replace what I had lost that morning. I found an old-fashioned T-handle spade which I liked a lot better than the new “entrenchment tool” that had been issued to me. Luckily I had been wearing my tanker jacket, with my name stenciled across the back, so I hadn’t lost that. My tanker jacket was the only item of comfort that I had and it kept me warm even when I was wet. It took us about a week to get off that ridge. There was one pillbox up at the head of the ravine we were trying to cross that was absolutely impenetrable. There was no cover anywhere around it. We could keep the gunners inside pinned down, but we couldn’t get close enough to toss in a satchel charge. Then Lt. Walsh had what I considered a flash of genius. Our own artillery couldn’t see the pillbox, but we could see Navy ships out on the horizon who could help. The radios got busy and, sure enough, after a couple of hours a Navy officer and a sailor with a backpack radio were ushered up to our position. The officer stuck out like a sore thumb with his clean khakis and insignia on his collar. He really knew his stuff. He was calling for fire from a cruiser that looked to me to be far too distant. The first round landed about 50 yards below the pillbox. The second just missed the roof. The third round astonished me by going right into the gunner’s slit! We hustled up the ridge and used a satchel charge to close off the tunnel that connected the pillbox to the other Jap emplacements farther up the hill. A few days later Walsh led a squad on a night infiltration to knock out a machine gun that was giving us grief. He didn’t pick me to go on this raid which made me feel a little insulted, but greatly relieved! This was accomplished without casualties because of the surprise element. It was usually the Japs that attacked in the dark instead of vice-versa. One night it was my turn to stand guard at an observation post that was too exposed to occupy during daylight. Walsh came up the trail after I had been there an hour of so. I was putting on the mosquito repellant that was supposed to keep us from getting malaria. In order to do this I had laid my glasses on a coral outcrop where I had leaned my rifle. Walsh and I were just making small talk when he sat down---right on my glasses. The steel rims were flattened and Walsh was devastated---even though it was my fault. I pulled out my spare pair of glasses that I had carefully guarded in my shirt pocket, ever since Camp Roberts. That night, after Walsh had left me, I had a real epiphany, and it made me a fatalist.

I could look for miles to the south of the island and all I could see was an unending series of ridges and hills. At the rate we were going it seemed like my chances of actually reaching the far end were statistically nil. It seemed to me that even on a good day our company took some casualties and there was an arithmetical certainty that sooner or later I would be on one of those litters that disappeared downhill. Even if I could go the distance, I knew that we would eventually have to invade the main islands of Japan. All of us, not just me, hoped for the “million dollar wound” that would get us back to the rear---and the farther the better. We finally chased the enemy off the ridge in front of Sugar Hill. It was almost sundown when I was trudging up the trail from the company CP with a message for Walsh. I heard mortars exploding and when I reached the platoon I saw that Walsh was down. He was flat on his back and, in the last rays of the sun, I could see his belly was opened by a wound as big as a saucer. Hess was bending over him, pouring Sulfa powder into the gaping hole. This awful sight really shock me up. All our previous casualties had occurred at a distance, but this was right in my face. Somehow it startled me to see that human intestines were multicolored. I had skinned a few rabbits as a boy and seen many deer eviserated, but it surprised me to see the white, yellow, green, purple mess spilling out of the lieutenant. We were dug in for the next day or so, waiting for the gaps in the front line to close. Our platoon was the extreme left flank of a line of combat that stretched across the entire island from west to east. One afternoon I crawled up to a huge bomb crater on the very crest of the ridge and peered over the rim. There was nothing between me and the destroyed town of Yonabaru except open fields. On the other side of the town was a wide bay encircled by a peninsula about ten miles away. I could see flashes from the Jap artillery on the peninsula in a continuous exchange of fire with our own artillery to my rear. We rarely took any artillery hits in our position and I had become accustomed to the swishing noise the shells from both sides made as they passed overhead. They reminded me of the sound made when a stick was swished through the water. Our platoon was pulled back into a reserve position and another platoon of Company I moved into our foxholes. The reserve position was only a few hundred yards down the reverse slope of the ridge, but we were out of the direct line of fire and could at least move around.. There was a slit trench dug for a latrine, which was an improvement over the hastily dug pits we were forced to improvise up on the line. Pete and I decided to explore. Another company had secured the peak of the hill, so the entire area north of the battle line was our territory. The enemy still held the area to the south. We climbed up until we reached a trench that extended across the north slope of Conical Hill. Toward the center of the trench there was a sort of cave carved out with a reinforced roof that had obviously been a command post. There was a crude wooden desk with, of all things, a French telephone---the kind you see in a Rogers/Astaire movie! The tunnels that had connected the trench to the interior of the hill had all been blasted shut, but we found one burrow that held cans of fish on a shelf. Neither of us was fond of canned fish, but they offered a change from C ration, so we loaded them into our backpacks. About that time we were surprised when two older men in strange uniforms came strolling down the trench. They carried no arms and both Pete and I had our M-1’s, so we weren’t worried. It turned out they were Aussies! They said they were observers from

the Australian Army and weren’t involved in the fighting. Pete and I traded some of our canned fish for cans of “Bully Beef” and felt we had the best of the bargain. We left the trench and wandered down the hill until we found a house that had been blasted by artillery but was partially intact. There wasn’t much inside but I found a samisen made of snakeskin hidden up in the roof rafters. It would have made a great souvenir, but I realized the impracticality of trying to keep it, so I put it back. In the meantime Pete was scouting the yard outside and had found a young girl, maybe 15 or16 years old, cowering in some deep grass. The fact that she had survived the shelling, and eluded all the GI’s that had passed through, was a small miracle! When I approached them Pete was trying to put his compress over an injury on her chest. A tiny piece of shrapnel had passed entirely through her left tit, and the wound looked like it was many days old. I almost laughed when I realized what an impossible task Pete had set for himself. His intentions were the best, but the poor girl was terrified and expected the worst from us. We pulled her to her feet and pointed her in the general direction of the field hospital, about a mile back. I could only hope she would keep going and that some medic would help. The next afternoon we went back on the line and were able to take another position farther up the ridge, closer to Sugar Hill. It was getting dark and we were getting ready to dig in when the captain came up, bringing a new lieutenant. This guy was just the opposite of Walsh and I disliked him immediately. He was tall and skinny with a redneck accent and twice as old as the rest of us. (In retrospect, I can’t but wonder what he had done wrong to get such an assignment.) On learning that I was his runner, the first order he gave me was to dig his foxhole. I was in the process of scooping out a trench that I hoped would be deep enough to save my hide if any mortars started dropping. The idea that I would go through the rest of the campaign digging holes for Lieutenant Fitts was more that I could stomach, so I just ignored him and kept scraping away. He flew into a range and shouted, "Soldier! I’ll stand you at attention!” This was so ludicrous that the squad around us started to giggle. I kept on ignoring him and he realized what an ass he’d made of himself. He dug his own hole that night, and every subsequent night, and I lost my job as runner. From there on we avoided each other, which was easy because he spent as much time as possible at the company CP. I almost felt sorry for the guy because he was so out of place in a combat area and nobody, but nobody, had any use for him. He did get the final revenge on me, however, because when we lost a BAR man, the weapon was handed to me. When we finally got orders to take Sugar Hill it was a full-blown assault; not just Item Company, but our entire battalion. It started with troops of the 7th Division advancing on our left flank, between us and the sea. I could look down on what was left of Yonabaru and see GI’s moving through the town, setting fire to the few thatched roofs that still survived; trying to flush out any snipers that could be hiding. They were advancing behind tanks that were able to move down on the flat ground next to the shore. The Jap artillery on the other side of the bay was firing on the tanks and also on the ridge we were using for cover. Our own artillery was answering the fire from the peninsula and pounding the hell out of Sugar Hill. Dive bombers from the Marines were working in waves and the noise was terrific. On episode puzzled me. Before we pushed off I could see an ambulance following the troops below, when all of a sudden a Corsair swooped down and made one strafing pass.

He missed, but I couldn’t help thinking how odd it was that I could see that big Red Cross on the truck, but the pilot with his 20-20 vision apparently could not.. I guessed that there must be screw-ups in every outfit. When it time for out platoon to move we went “over the top” of the ridge and down the other side at a dead run. When we reached the bottom there was a field with an embankment on our end that gave good cover. But our platoon had to cross that open field, about 100 yards, before we could start up the slope on the other side. The Jap mortars were zeroed in on that field and the explosions were almost continuous. Our sergeant had us lined up, crouched behind the embankment, and would signal us to start running, about 30 yards apart. When he slapped my back I jumped up and started running as fast as I could. I had only gone a few steps when a mortar exploded about 20 yards in front of me! I ran right through the still smoking crater and got to the other side of the field almost like I was in a dream. Later on I was surprised to find my left suspender strap hanging loose. Apparently a piece of shrapnel had cut it, and I was impressed to see what a clean cut it made. I was lucky it didn’t cut my throat. Climbing Sugar Hill seemed easy because all the fire was either in back of me or way up above. When we reached the top we found ourselves looking down a steep slope into a gully. There was a small concrete building below and as I watched, about a half-dozen men came running out. They acted excited to the point of insanity; literally running in circles. All of us, our whole squad, opened up on them and they were immediately wiped out. I felt a little guilty when I had time to think. They were probably support troops abandoned by a quick retreat of their combat troops and maybe they were harmless. The reverse slope of that ridge and the bottom of the gully was strewn with bodies. A trench had been dug along the ridge line where we stood, but it had been pretty much useless as a defensive position because the proximity fuses on the shells of our 105’s had exploded over their heads. Apparently the Japanese artillery didn’t have proximity fuses, lucky for us. Their shells didn’t explode until impact. Then it started to rain, and rain, and rain! It was another typhoon like the one we had encountered on the way from Saipan. The top of Sugar Hill, churned up by the shells, dissolved into mud. There was no point trying to dig a foxhole; I simply spread my poncho on the sloping side of the trench and launched myself back into it. It was as soft as a feather bed and I was so exhausted I fell asleep with the warm rain pounding on my face. . That night it was my turn again to pull a four hour stretch of guard duty. When I was awakened it took all my will to pull myself up from the huge dent I had made in the mud and gather my wits. I followed the sergeant along a trail running up the ridge, about 500 yards until we located the guy who had been on guard the previous four hours. They left me alone on the edge of an immense bomb crater at the bottom of a steep slope that led up to the peak of Conical Hill. It was a perfect location for observation at night but it would be fatal in daylight. I could perfectly see the reverse slopes of Sugar Hill and Conical when a star shell would light up the panorama and it would have been impossible for an enemy to approach without detection. However, the star shells were at the center of the island, miles away, and the shadows in the depressions near to me were like pools of ink. I eased myself down over the lip of the crater and took a position in the shadow where I would be less visible myself. Gradually I became aware of another form opposite me in the crater, about 30 feet away. For an instant I had the startled notion that

the Japs had picked this crater for their night guard! Before I could move I realized that this man had no head. As the night wore on I could eventually make out a soldier in full uniform, boots and leggings, sitting upright. A couple of inches of spine was sticking up out of the stump of his neck. It was a big relief when the first light of dawn appeared and I was able to scuttle back down the trail to the trench where the rest of the squad was spread out. The rain didn’t let up at all and all we could do was squat in the trench and wait Actually the trench had crumbled away until it was only a ditch with a steady stream of water running at the bottom. A few of us were sent back down the hill we had climbed the day before to get drinking water and ammunition. We had to walk about a mile because the supply trucks had been mired in the mud. I saw something I thought was impossible---the tracks of a weasel had dug itself in so far that only it’s deck was above the surface. My load turned out to be two GI cans filled with water. I headed back to our platoon area and it was slow going with the mud up to my ankles. When I got to the hill I had to us the GI cans as crutches---I would set them down and unstick my boots and swing myself up a step, then swing the cans ahead and repeat.. It was during this painful procedure that I became aware of strange plopping noises off to one side. Floop! Floop! Floop! Like cowpies. It was rounds of knee mortar coming in and being enveloped in the mud so soft that the detonators couldn’t fire. Our company was relieved and replaced by another so we went back in search of some place to get out of the eternal rain. The only dry places we could find were the tombs that generations of Okinawans had created on every hillside that was unfit to farm. There were hundreds of these tombs and they were all built on the same design. A tunnel was dug and lined with stones. A level courtyard was constructed at the entrance with low stone walls all around. The facade over the entrance was decorated with what I presumed was a family crest. The entrance itself was simply a stone slab, about 4 inches thick, that could be slid to one side with difficulty; there were no hinges. Third Squad picked out a couple of these tombs and moved in; four guys in each. When we slid the entrance slab to one side, we found a dry chamber with a floor space of about 6 ft. x 8 ft., but with head room of only 4 ft. Quite a bit of this space was occupied by a wooden coffin. We pulled the coffin out into the courtyard and, out of curiosity, pried off the lid. There was a skeleton inside and, from the looks of it, had been there for some time. The bones were covered with scraps of black skin and rotted fabric. When I crawled into the chamber I found another slab covering still another entrance on the back wall. We didn’t have any candles or a flashlight; just matches that would burn for a few seconds. However, we determined that here was a second chamber behind the first and that it was filled with large porcelain jars about the size of a footstool. These funeral urns were decorated with strange symbols and were a variety of shapes, round and rectangular. They were quite heavy and it took some effort to slide one out where we could examine it. When the lid was lifted, we found it was almost up to the brim with tiny bits of bone. Looking back over the rows of jars we could see still another slab covering the entrance to a third chamber, but by this time our curiosity was satisfied and all we wanted was some rest. We closed up the entrance to the second chamber and prepared to get some rest.

We lived in that tomb for three nights, and days too, because the rain was unrelenting. I felt guilty thinking of the platoon that had relieved us up on Sugar Hill, where there was no shelter at all. We had to take our turns on guard duty, but there was no activity in our rear sector. The tomb was dry and warm but not without drawbacks. One night there was some excitement when a huge rat was exploring our prone bodies. Another night it was a spider, and another night a snake. We were especially concerned about the snake because in our initial briefing before landing on Okinawa we were cautioned about the poisonous viper that lived on the island. (This turned out to be a lot of bunk---I never saw another snake, and I never heard of anybody getting snakebite!). The second night we had to make room for another occupant. That meant there were five of us crammed into that small chamber. The new arrival was a sergeant from another platoon who had come down with a bad case of battle fatigue. He was shaking all over but he didn’t make a sound. Our platoon sergeant asked us to take care of him for awhile because if he showed up at the field hospital without an actual wound some chicken-shit rear-echelon officer might take his stripes away from him. After awhile he calmed down and went into a deep sleep. The next day he went back up on the line. Much later we heard he had been shot and had died of shock almost immediately, although the wound was small. 31 May “Right now I’m the dirtiest, filthiest, stinking-est hunk of humanity that ever staggered up to your back door and asked for a cuppa coffee! Remember---as long as dirt isn’t dangerous. I’m perfectly safe”. By now I had become acquainted with most of the other guys in the outfit. The non-coms were battle vets that had received field promotions the previous month when the previous cadre had been wiped out at Kakazu and Sawtooth. That three-week battle had nearly broken the Shuri Line and left the Japs holding on by their teeth. My favorite was McWhorter, the new First Sergeant, who became a sort of father figure for us rookies. My least favorite was Calloway, the sergeant of 3rd Squad, where it was my misfortune to be assigned. It seemed unbelievable to me that anyone could become a sergeant when he couldn’t read or write! Calloway was one of several guys from Arkansas that had survived Leyte and Okinawa although they were so uneducated they had to sign the payroll with an “X”. However, Calloway had earned a Silver Star on Leyte, so even though I didn’t like him, I had to admit to myself that he was a good soldier. We had another Razorback in the platoon that didn’t even have a first name. He was on the roster as “W.D.” although the initials didn’t stand for anything. He also was a good soldier. When we were in reserve he would borrow our company sniper rifle---a 1903 bolt action with a scope---and go Jap hunting while the rest of us were enjoying the opportunity to relax in a safe area. Quite a few of the replacements that landed with Pete and me were ASTP (Army Special Training Program}. These guys had been entered into college courses at government expense in stateside universities. When the Army Brass realized it was running out of riflemen, these scholars were transferred to the Infantry. They were understandable bitter about their reversal of fortune. Most of the rookies were just like me---fresh out of high school and recent graduates of Fort Hood, Camp Walters, or Camp Roberts. We had “Junior”, a big kid with an arm like a major leaguer. On a bet, he threw a grenade across a gully into a cave on the opposite side---a good 50 yards, and considered impossible in training camp. His real

name was Winfred, but nobody called him that. There was “Joyboy” Edgiller, “Red” Worthy, “Bugs” Easterhouse, Tony Chavez, Salvatore Buitran, Job Denni, Karl Herrman, George Eberly, Kelly Wong, and Ray Farrow. Poor Ray lugged a Bazooka week after week without ever encountering a Jap tank. He only got to fire the thing one time, but he nailed a sniper that was hiding in a crevice on a rock cliff where we couldn’t reach with grenades. When we finally emerged from out three day hibernation in the tombs, we were sent back up to the front line. To our utter amazement and great relief there was no front line! The Japanese Army, what was left of it, had abandoned the Shuri Line and retreated to the second defensive position at the extreme southern end of the island. They didn’t leave gracefully. They had left a scattered rear guard in place, but we could see the big battle was over and we were going to win! The storm had passed and for the rest of the campaign all we had to put up with was the usual spring showers. The weather was warm although it still could get chilly after dark. We prepared to march and discarded anything that wasn’t necessary. We had realized that our bayonets were useless so we tossed them away. We dropped our backpacks and messkits, but kept our “entrenchment tools”. We wrapped our field jackets inside our ponchos and tied them with communication wire to our cartridge belts. It seemed there was always plenty of this very useful wire that was intended to hook up field telephones from platoon to CP. One thing we didn’t mind carrying was grenades; lots of grenades. We would carry them by slipping the handle through the D rings on the web suspenders that held up our cartridge belts. I think most of us would have rather run out of ammo than grenades! By this time it seemed to me that all that marksmanship training we had received was wasted because we seldom had a clear target. We fired cases of rifle ammo, but it was covering fire intended to keep the other guy’s head down while we got close enough to toss some grenades or a satchel charge. The grenades were indispensable; they really got the job done. The Japanese grenades, on the other hand, were a joke. They made a deafening noise but they didn’t throw the shrapnel that ours did. One came rolling down a slope and went off not more than 20’ away from me, but didn’t leave as much as a scratch. The Japanese grenade was useful only as a suicide device. We would hear the “crack” when they would arm their grenade by smashing it against their helmet, then we would find the body with a huge hole in the chest. We weren’t sorry to leave Sugar Hill with its stink of cordite, picric acid, and rotting bodies. Our march south was to reach the Yaeju Dake Escarpment. The 7th Division was on the left flank of our division, and the 6th Marines were on our right. Now we weren’t attacking so much as we were keeping strong Japanese forces from passing through our wide skirmish line to reach the northern end of the island. This trip was like a walk in the park compared to the assault on Sugar Hill. We were instructed to take prisoners because Army Intelligence wanted to question them. Fat Chance! All the Japs we caught up with were dead. Most of them had been killed by our artillery days before. As an alternative to taking live prisoners we were told to search dead bodies for maps or any other printed matter that could possible be useful when translated. All of us were eager to find a freshly killed Japanese officer---not because we might find important documents so much as the possibility of picking up valuable souvenirs! We especially wanted a Samurai sword or a pistol, but we would

settle for a battle flag. Some of the common soldiers folded a handkerchief-sized copy of the “meatball” and carried it in their helmet space. Most of the bodies I found were practically liquefied and I wouldn’t have touched one on a bet! One day I did come across a reasonably fresh corpse, but I was disappointed when there was nothing inside his helmet. He carried a wallet inside his jacket pocket and it had a photo of a young woman and two cute kids on one side and some pornographic pictures of what I assumed were Chinese girls tucked into the other side. This made me recall our briefing when we were told that the troops we were up against had become notorious a decade before in Nanking. He did have a thick leather belt with a brass buckle that appealed to me, so I exchanged it for the web belt I wore beneath my cartridge belt. That turned out to be my one and only souvenir of Okinawa. 3 June “ I’ve been moving pretty regular since I wrote last, but it hasn’t been raining so hard as it was last week, so I’ve had some fairly dry, comfortable sliit trenches to live in.” There was an attempt to keep a skirmish line from one side of the island to the other. when we dug in at night, but in daylight we usually traveled in rather loosely organized columns. When one outfit or another ran into a pocket of resistance, the rest of us would hunker down and wait until the troublesome spot was eliminated and we could move south again, keeping our position in the formation. The other factor that controlled our rate of progress was the difficulty the rear-eschelon troops had in navigating the terrain to deliver water, ammo, and C-rations. Our platoon never once encountered a road going in our direction. We would climb one ridge only to see a valley in front of us with another ridge to climb on the other side. Still, it was an easy march for us with plenty of start and stop. I longed for some of the paperback novels that Special Services had provided for us when we were on board the troopship. Boy, I sure wish I had something to read! I’m getting to the point where I’m repeating the numbers on the ammo cases. This old combat business is 99% waiting and I guess this is a good thing because that other 1% sure wears a guy down. As we marched we encountered incidents that seemed innocuous compared to the horrific events that had occurred during the battle for Conical Hill, but were nevertheless bizarre. Our platoon had bivouaced on a ridge as it was getting dark and hadn’t been able to reconnoiter the valley in front of us. Consequently at dawn our squad cautiously peered over the edge of the reverse slope to see if there was an enemy emplacement. There was only a single farmhouse surrounded by tilled fields. As we were looking, a woman came out of the house and, completely unaware of our presence, walked out into the field. As she squatted down, only about 50 yards away, Pete couldn’t resist giving her a scare. He carefully placed one round from his M1 right between her legs! She jumped straight up like she’d been on springs and ran back into the house without making a sound. It was a cruel trick, but hilarious, and I couldn’t help laughing. We went down and searched the house but only the one woman was there. She was no doubt very relieved when we passed on. One afternoon we stopped to open some C-ration. We were sitting in a little hollow between two ridges when one of the Air Corps P-39’s flew over. We paid no attention to it, but all of a sudden it wheeled around and came right toward us. It fire two rockets simultaneously but they both exploded on the other side of an embankment and none of

us were hit. We were already anxious about our own artillery that had been firing close ahead so this rocket episode didn’t help our state of mind. One platoon in another outfit had been wiped out to a man by a 105 that landed short. On another occasion I had the point when we were climbing a steep trail. We weren’t expecting any trouble, otherwise one of our regular scouts would have been in front. Just as I reached the top of the trail and pulled myself up to take a look, a P-38 going full throttle went over my head so low I could feel the propwash. It really scared me because it was so unexpected. It was probably just some pilot hedgehopping and having fun. Somehow, on the grapevine telegraph that connects the lowest ranking members of any military outfit, the news that we could profit from the carnage around us reached our platoon. We gathered a few armloads of Japanese rifles and four of our troops crossed through the 7th Division sector, behind the front line, and bartered with one of the Navy ships that patrolled the shore. Our emissaries returned that evening with a large insulated container filled with ripe oranges! Not only that but a gallon of “torpedo juice” ---pure grain alcohol. Most of us were strangers to anything stronger than 3.2 beer, but we found that half a canteen cup of alcohol flavored with lemon juice powder from C-ration was a real improvement to the water the Army brought to us in GI cans that had previously carried gasoline. This feast of oranges and alcohol was the closest thing to an orgy that and of us could remember. 9 June. The first sergeant just announced that all of us guys got out PFC’s and the Combat Infantry Badge starting May 15. That means $10 for the badge and $4.90 a month for the stripe For two weeks I had been packing the BAR which I heartily disliked although I had another guy assigned to help me carry the ammo. There was something about expending a bunch of ammo for covering fire when I didn’t really have a specific target that went against my grain. Maybe it was because I remembered being told that each round was worth six cents. The BAR fired faster than a machine gun; it sounded like ripping a piece of canvas. The 16-round magazine was used up in a few seconds. My “assistant” was a rather simple-minded farm boy we called “Arkie”, who didn’t seem to mind all the extra trips we had to make back to the ammo truck, but I sure did! Then I was pleasantly, and unexpectedly, surprised when Job, another rifleman in our platoon, asked me if I would be willing to trade my BAR for his M-l. I could have kissed him on both cheeks! It was a real relief to get rid of that load and resume my regular MOS 745 duties. One warm, sunny afternoon our platoon was stopped while the skirmish lines were straightened out. We were in a reserve position several yards back of the front line, so we felt secure. By this time I had pretty much given up on C-rations; the inside of my mouth was full of sores so the only thing I could eat was the biscuits from the #1 tin. I knew I was losing weight; the Army had built me up and now the Army was tearing me down. We could heat some powdered Nescafe in a canteen cup using a chunk of TNT from our satchel charge bags. It wouldn’t explode when ignited with a match, but burned like Sterno. Everybody sat around smoking while I sucked on a piece of hard candy. Off to on side I could see a small farmhouse on a slight knoll, just a short distance, so I decided to explore. When I came up the rise to the front yard I was startled to see a Japanese soldier sitting upright in a small crater.. For an instant it appeared that he was

taking a bubble bath while wearing his uniform! My next glance showed me that the “bubbles” were thousands of maggots. He was not only dead, he was decomposed. The only thing holding him together was his uniform. It was a grotesque sight. Around back of the house was a lean-to surrounded by a circular bulkhead made of red brick. This barrier was only about 18 inches high, but it might as well have been a moat to imprison its only inmate---the biggest, fattest sow I had ever seen. I stepped over the barrier and could see she had neither food or water. I immediately forgot about the war and considered her deliverance. There was a large, shallow pan, empty, so I looked around for water. Just a few yards down the slope was a small stream with a well alongside. When I looked down into the well I found it full to the brim. I scooped water into the pan, then on second thought filled both my canteens and drunk my fill. It was the best water I had tasted since I left Butte. I knew I was supposed to drop chlorine tablets into my canteens, but I wasn’t about to ruin the taste of this delicious water! While I carried the pan of water up to the pig-pen I was scheming a way to release the giant animal so she could forage. There was a pile of lumber nearby, so I leaned my M-1 against the shed and dragged some planks into the pen so I could prop them against the barrier to provide a ramp for the pig to climb out. While I was laboring, a rifle shot snapped past me and I knew from the familiar “crack” that I was the target. I lunged for my M-1 and out of the corner of my eye I could see a figure leaning over a stone wall about 50 yards away on the other side of a shallow gully. I took very quick aim and got off one round. The head and shoulder dropped out of sight. It wasn’t like the movies.I didn’t charge up to the fence so see if I had scored a hit. Instead I abandoned the pig and ran back to the squad, which is where I belonged. The troops were already headed off in another direction, so I never found out if the pig was smart enough to climb out. . . We came to a small grove of trees that appeared peaceful. Calloway gestured to Eberly and me to follow him in to check things out. We found a very small dwelling---not a house but more of a dug-out. There was no sign of life so Calloway tossed a smoke grenade down through the doorway; there were no windows. Instantly a man and a woman came running out trying to brush the burning phosphorus off their clothes. These were two very ancient civilians, stooped over, with white hair; probably in their seventies. When the woman saw us she immediately ran back into the smoke filled cabin. The old man tried to stop her, but when she broke away, he followed her inside. Calloway unhooked a fragmentation grenade from his harness. Eberly and I were both horrified and instinctively turned our rifles on him. He thought better of it and snarled at us to move on. In retrospect I think it would have been a kindness to those two old people if we had let the grenade roll in. 15 June All of the Jap soldiers seem healthy and well-fed. The civilians are another story, though. I’ve seen some of the most pitiful things you can imagine. All these Orientals take a lot of killing. Old men, women, and children are found in a condition that would kill a white man from shock. Too much time in wet fatigues and saturated leather boots had developed a world class case of Jungle Rot. We all had it, but my condition warranted a hike back to the Aid Station whenever our platoon was pulled back in reserve. The treatment was simplicity itself. A medic would hand me a bottle of Purple Gentian and a roll of cotton. I would sit on an empty ammo case, remove my boots and drop my pants. The smell of Jungle Rot

was pretty bad, but the effect of the medication let me ignore the stink. It felt like running a blowtorch across my groin and down my legs! While this procedure was in progress, inch by agonizing inch, I had the opportunity to observe an amputation and a birth. The amputation was a mangled foot on a GI I was glad I didn’t know. The birth was an Okinawan woman who was brought in as an emergency. To me the birth seemed more traumatic than the amputation. Right now I’ve got a beautiful case of Jungle-Rot on my feet, but I’m treating it and it’s clearing up. Over the next few weeks I make the hike back to the aid station several times and each time something interesting happened. One afternoon I had almost arrived back to the outfit when I met a guy from Love Company on his way back to the rear. He was in high spirits and paused to talk. He told me, “The war is over for me and I’m heading back to the States!” He looked healthy to me so I asked him what he was talking about. He pointed to his foot and I could see a neat hole in the front of his boot. There was hardly any blood and his foot was numb.One of the Jap snipers had drilled him through the instep with one of their little .25 caliber rifles that were designed to cripple---not kill. It sure worked for him---he had collected the Million Dollar Wound that we all coveted. On another occasion I thumbed a ride with a weapons carrier that was headed my way. When I swung myself aboard I was startled to see that the only other passenger was ;a Jap soldier! He was sitting on the bench facing me, stark naked, and his skin from his shoulder on down was hanging in blackened shreds. I realized that he had been sprayed with a flame thrower and I also realized I was looking at a dead man; there was no way he could live long with burns this severe! He didn’t appear to be in pain; just sitting there hunched over, staring at nothing. When we reached the aid station I jumped off and didn’t look back. It was a very unpleasant experience for both of us. ` When we first landed on the island, we had learned that Ernie Pyle had been killed there a couple of weeks before. His articles about the war in the ETO were published in “Yank” and were of great interest during our training period when we were scheduled to be sent to France. It seemed unfair to me that a guy could survive the campaigns in North Africa, Sicily, Italy, and Normandy, only to be killed when he had barely arrived in the Pacific. Not long after that we learned that a full bird colonel---commander of one of the other regiments in our division---had been killed. It seemed to underline the obvious fact that front line combat was very dangerous. One day the word came down that General Buckner, the three-star in charge of our entire army had been killed! This seemed almost impossible and I realized that nobody was safe. The very next day after this news I was making one of my periodic trips to the Aid Station when I learned that our own Division EXO, a brigadier general, had been killed only hours before while visiting King Company in our battalion. (Jeez! Two generals in two days. This is serious.) When I reported back to the company CP, I related this news to the captain. Lt. Fitts who, as usual was camped out at the CP, overheard me and, sarcastically, “That’s yesterday’s news, and it was Buckner that was killed---not Easley”. It was hours before the news was delivered to the company and I had the satisfaction of knowing that Fitts had to eat his words.

One night I had pulled guard duty on our perimeter while we were dug in on a little hill surrounded by farmland. The OP was right on top the hill and I could see in all directions while I enjoyed four hours of peaceful silence. When I was relieved it was about 2 AM and I had a dry hole to crawl into. The next morning, while we were still getting organized to move out, I heard the guys talking about the unusual bombardment from Jap artillery just before dawn. They were discussing how the guns must have been zeroed in the day before. I asked, innocently, “What artillery?” The guys looked at me, disbelieving. The fact was, I had slept right through the commotion. This little hill is solid coral and I have no hole at all. Nature settled the question of how deep a foxhole I’d dig! When things start popping I head for the backside of the hill. A couple of nights later I was awakened to find myself in the middle of a fire fight. There was no moon at all and the only light was from the star shells when a bunch of Japs tried to come across our perimeter. In no time our entire platoon was firing wildly into the darkness. I used up all my clips and ran to the CP where I picked up a can of machinegun ammo. I carried the can back to the squad and we all grabbed at the belts of ammo, frantically pulling out the individual rounds so we could jam them into the chambers of our rifles. This whole episode was over in a few minutes and I think all of us realized we had panicked. At daybreak we found a few fresh bodies just yards out, but it was obviously not the “Banzai Charge” we had envisioned. More likely it was just some poor, disorganized support troops trying desperately to escape to the upper end of the island. I was mildly shocked to find my hands covered with blood. The machinegun ammo came in large tin cans that opened like a tin of sardines. When I tore open the top in the dark, I had cut my knuckles on the sharp edges and, in the excitement, had not felt a thing. Our squad came across an armored car that had been abandoned with its guns removed. It had no visible damage and may have simply run out of fuel. As an example of military equipment it was a pathetic specimen. It wasn’t much larger than the Model A that I had left behind in Butte. We decided to check out the armor. We carried three kinds of rifle ammo: the regular 30 caliber with copper jacketed slug, the tracer rounds marked with a red tip, and armor-piercing rounds which had a spot of black enamel on the tip. We loaded a couple of clips with the black tips and fired into the side of the car from a distance of about 30 yards. The slugs went right through the armor and our inspection of the interior showed that anybody in the driver’s seat would have been dead meat. We had a damn good first sergeant! In the few weeks I had been in Item Company, I had come to the realization that I had lucked out. McWhorter was the prototype of the Hollywood version of a grizzled combat veteran who looked out for the welfare of his young and inexperienced replacements. (Much later I was mildly shocked to learn he was only 28 years old---not 40 or 50.) One afternoon, when we were in a forward position, I overheard one side of a conversation on a field telephone. I realized that McWhorter was talking to our battalion commander, Colonel Nolan. It was apparent that the colonel was ordering McWhorter to take a position held by the Japs, immediately to our front. Instead of blind obedience, our sergeant explained why that action would be too dangerous, and he offered an alternative plan. It was no small surprise to me when Nolan agreed with McWhorter and no small relief to realize that our platoon would stay put while another platoon could flank the Jap

position and take them out with no casualties on our side. It impressed me that an enlisted soldier could say “No” to a superior officer. Just a few hours later from our vantage point we could watch a squad of Marines from the division that were deployed on our right flank approaching a Jap machine gun emplacement. The gun was dug in at the end of a narrow gulch and we could look down and see that the Marines were heading into trouble. Mac wound up the telephone and asked the operator to patch him in to the CP of the Marine company next to us. When he reached a Marine officer, Mac explained that if they could hold up a few hours, our company would be in a position where we could flush the Japs out of their next. The Marine officer wasn’t even civil and told Mac to mind his own business. Mac had a resigned expression while we watched the Marine squad move up the gulch. Six went in, but only three came out and my estimation of McWhorter went sky high. One afternoon we were ordered into a reserve position; we made camp in a safe location behind the front line. MeWhorter announced that trucks would arrive to carry us back to a place where we could clean ourselves. We were all a sorry sight and would have looked even dirtier except for the rains we had endured. The idea of going anywhere that didn’t involve a long hike was inviting in itself. Sure enough, three 6X6 trucks showed up on a dirt road near our bivouac. We stacked our rifles and dropped our packs. When I was singled out to stay behind and guard the area, I was fairly insulted. A few hours later the whole outfit reappeared, wearing new fatigues and looking white and freshly shaved. McWhorter told me to ride back with the trucks, stay overnight at the QM depot, and report back as soon as possible the next morning. So I got a three mile truck ride and was dropped off at a shower facility the Corps of Engineers had rigged. It was pretty impressive---a large tank mounted on a steel frame with half-a-dozen shower heads over a platform of duck boards. A gasoline heater and a pump powered by a truck battery was used to fill the tank with hot water. I had the whole thing to myself and there was still plenty of warm water in the tank.What bliss! It was such a sensation to take off my boots. The skin of my ankles had started to grow into the fabric of my socks, but the pain of pulling them off was delicious. Then I stepped onto the duck boards with a bar of yellow GI soap and took my own sweet time for the most luxurious shower of my entire life. When I felt clean I found a fresh towel and with it a stack of new fatigue uniforms in all sizes. I dried myself and put on a new shirt and a pair of pants. There wasn’t any underwear, but there were plenty of new OD socks; big and fluffy. It was pure pleasure to pull on dry socks over my clean feet. It seemed a shame to put them into my old boots. Feeling refreshed, I looked around and found myself completely alone. The QM tents were several hundred yards away and the trucks were parked on the road where the drivers had left them. There was a trash fire smoldering in the field on the other side of the trucks, but there was no activity in sight. It was starting to get dark, but I felt safe in being so far back from the front line, so I propped my rifle against a truck and sat on the running board for my usual meal of C-ration.. Just as I was getting started, a huge explosion rocked the truck and I had the sudden fright that it was going to roll over on me! It flashed through my mind that one of our own 155 mm batteries had started to shell the area.

After a silence, some of the QM troops came running from their camp area, and it was their conjecture that Japanese explosives had been buried where the trash was being burned. This explanation didn’t make sense to me, but there was no more excitement. The only damage was a few holes in the side of the truck. It was getting dark, so I climbed up into the cab of the truck and stretched out on the seat. Warm and dry, level and soft, it was infinitely more comfortable than a foxhole. Next morning the drivers showed up for a return trip to the front to pick up another load of dirty GIs, so I had so I had a ride back to the bivouac area. The guys in 3rd sq;uad were just climbing out of their holes and warming up their rations when I walked in. One unforgettable incident occurred just then. Junior Cunningham was preparing to clean his beloved BAR. He stood the rifle on it’s butt and leaned over to push the button that released the magazine. Instead, he carelessly bumped the trigger, the safety was “off”, the bolt rammed forward---and jammed. This was the only time this very reliable weapon had failed. Junior became weak and had to sit down, because if the rifle had fired it would have effectively cut him in two. The steel helmet was absolutely indispensable; intended to protect the head from shrapnel, if not from bullets. However, I never heard of anyone who was actually saved from a head wound by wearing a helmet. One evening when we were digging in, Pete had removed his helmet for some reason. It was just his luck that a small piece of spent shrapnel landed on his forehead and, being red-hot, started a flame in his thick, black, thoroughly dirty hair! He slapped it out in an instant, but it left a painful welt. He didn’t get much sympathy from the rest of the squad and we kidded him about putting in for a Purple Heart. On another occasion we were crouched behind an outcrop of coral rock looking upward to a steep cliff where a sniper was hidden. A bullet struck the rock right in front of Arkie and ricocheted up across his forehead and under the bill of his helmet. The slug lifted the helmet and threw it yards behind us where it landed with a large exit hole in the crown. Poor Arkie had a crease across his forehead and blood was running down into his eyes. It took us awhile to convince him that he wasn’t going to die. For all it’s deficiencies as a protective device, the helmet made an excellent pillow and it would have been very difficult to sleep on the ground without one. It was the closest thing to a wash basin we had and anytime we had available water we could at least make an effort to wash our faces and scrape off a few whiskers. We were never clean but without our helmets we would have been filthy. We were lucky to finish one day where a small cluster of undamaged houses gave us the opportunity to spend the night with a roof over our heads. A couple of perimeter guard posts were set up and those of us that were off duty set our packs down on a solid floor for a change. We weren’t expecting any trouble and, as it turned out, had a peaceful sleep except for a turn on guard. The house was typical Japanese construction; a wooden platform about three feet above ground level, no foundation, no basement. It was essentially one room with a hibachi in the center and sliding screens as thin as plywood for the one interior partition marking the sleeping area. The exterior walls were a combination of these sliding screens and a series of pull-up wooden blinds. The occupants had to be accustomed to living in a chilly environment. There was no trace of electricity or indoor plumbing.

Third squad (at this time there was only about a half-dozen of us) went up the steps through the only door and saw benches built all around the side of the room. These were covered with straw tatami mats and there were tatamis over most of the floor. We each staked out a position on the benches and stretched out, end to end. We should have been worried about booby-traps and our vulnerability to grenades or mortars, but I don’t think these possibilities even entered any of our minds. The temptation to sleep on a dry and level space was just too enticing. Nevertheless, we all paid for our indiscretion. In the days following, we discovered we were all infested with fleas. They were maddening because they were inactive during the day, but as soon as I would start to doze off to sleep, they would start crawling and biting. It was sort of comical. Every time we stopped our march, I could see the guys sitting with their pants down to their ankles, chasing the damned “crotch crickets”. They were hard to kill, even when caught. It was a week before we were finally rid of them. Eventually we approached the place where we all knew the Japanese forces that had retreated from the Shuri Line we going to do battle. It was obvious---a great, white cliff that extended completely across our sector. It was a limestone escarpment, encrusted with coral, left by some ancient ocean and it appeared that the highest part of the formation was directly in front of Item Company. The Army’s artillery, the big guns from the Navy ships, and Air Corps bombers worked diligently to eliminate every possible stronghold. It was reassuring to see the clouds of smoke from the bombardment. I was hopeful we could step over the rubble without too much difficulty. I should have known better---the escarpment was riddled with caves and tunnels, just like Conical Hill. Our entire battalion spread out along the base of the cliff where there were lots of huge boulders for cover; but on the other side of these boulders was a talus slope that extended up the side of the cliff for a hundred yards or more. This slope was wide open; no cover at all. Our platoon tried for three days to climb up to the base of the cliff and find a crevice with a path that would lead us up to the crest. This was a fool’s errand. I wasn’t anxious to be the first guy to reach the top and stick my head over the rim. The first day we tried, breaking out of our cover in groups of two or three, scrambling up the loose rock, like running in sand during a nightmare. About half way up, a step below Calloway, I say a bullet crash through the stock of his rifle---not three feet in front of my nose. It seemed like a miracle when the entire platoon---about twenty men at this time---reached the base of the cliff without a casualty. But the cleft in the rock that looked so promising from below was a dead-end and there was no place to dig in. The enemy fire kept getting more intense until the order was given to pull back. Getting back down that slope was almost as hairy as going up We threw out smoke grenades to cover our retreat. These WP (white phosphorus) grenades were very effective, but I didn’t trust them. One of the guys I had continually played poker with on our long journey from Fort Ord, had a WP go off in his hand. We had located a trail that went diagonally down the talus slope so we didn’t have to run on loose rock. A red-headed GI from another platoon had been killed on our way up and his body was lying next to this path. I didn’t know this guy personally, but for the next couple of days he became horribly familiar as we advanced up that trail and were forced to retreat three successive times. Up to then I had been impressed with the efficiency the Graves Registration Detail had demonstrated in removing our dead. But

this corpse was so exposed that nobody could lift him out. It was very disconcerting to me to observe how quickly a body could deteriorate as I passed this spot each day. Finally one of our other platoons was able to find a route that allowed them to reach the rim of the escarpment and clear a perimeter. Third platoon followed and we climbed up at dusk in time to scoop out foxholes and prepare for the counter-attack.. It was still dark the next morning when there was a terrific explosion. I was lifted out of my hole and found myself scrambling through a patch of thick grass, trying desperately to locate my rifle. I was only half-conscious, but my hand closed on a chunk of warm meat. I dropped it in horror and kept wiping my hand frantically in the grass to remove the awful feeling. When I found my rifle my hands were shaking so violently that I couldn’t pick it up. I was a very weird sensation because my mind cleared in seconds but I couldn’t control my movements. It was like I was standing beside myself watching but I couldn’t control my actions. At that instant any puny little Jap could have picked me up and pitched me over the cliff and I couldn’t have done a damn thing to save myself. `

We never knew exactly what had happened to us. The consensus was, after much debate, that a Jap had climbed up the cliff behind us and tossed a satchel charge into our area. Personally, I’ve never believed this theory but I couldn’t come up with an alternative. Maybe it was a rogue artillery shell; who knows? It cost us about a dozen troops, including a sergeant that I had come to consider a real friend, who was KIA. When there was enough light to look around we found ourselves on a plateau that sloped away miles to the south, although we weren’t able to see the open ocean as yet. There were outcrops of hills and ridges covered with clusters of small pine trees. It had a park-like quality in contrast to the ridges and gulleys we had been travelling through. In a short time our battle line was reformed with the 7th Division on our left flank and a Marine outfit on our right. Our third platoon was on the extreme right on our batallion line. Next to us was a low ridge, and on the other side of that ridge was a cliff that dropped down to another level where we could see the Marine infantry advancing with an alignment roughly parallel with us. Our company was joined by some very welcome reinforcements ---to each of our platoons was assigned a Sherman tank. Tanks had been an integral part of the original assault on the Shuri Line at the beginning of the campaign, but when I arrived at Conical Hill the terrain and weather was impractical for armored vehicles. This was the first time I had seen one of them up close. It turned out they had by-passed the Escarpment by travelling along the coast and then coming through the 7th Division sector. I never did set eyes on any of the crewman. They stayed buttoned-up in their movable fortress, and I didn’t blame them on bit! Each tank had a black telephone fastened to the back panel, just like the wall telephone found in any kitchen, and we could use it to communicate with the sergeant in the turret. We only had tank support for three days; they would arrive at dawn and when we dug in for the night they disappeared the way they had come. When they arrived each morning they had three cases of “Ten & One” rations strapped to the back deck These rations were a real luxury to us because we had been on a steady diet of C-Ration for the past six weeks.

Along with the tanks came a Combat Photographer! He wore fatigues, combat boots, a helmet, a .45 automatic strapped to his hip, and carried a Speed Graphic. He looked very alien to us because he was so clean; he even had creases in his pants! He wore a lieutenants bar on his lapel which made me think he was very brave or very uninformed. We never got to know him because he was with us for only one day, and we never got to see prints of the photos he took. The tanks had been converted in some way so that the 75mm cannon became a flame thrower. It startled me the first time I saw them in action. Instead of the bark of the gun I heard a “whooshing” sound like a fire hose, and a stream of napalm reached out a good 30 or 40 yards. We had a portable flame thrower in our company, but it couldn’t deliver a flame that could compare with what I was seeing. I was very impressed. Advancing behind a tank in this terrain was like following a good hunting dog through a field of prairie chickens in Montana. There weren’t many places to hide, so when the few enemy soldiers would break cover, the machine gunner in the tank would bring them down. All we infantry had to do was make sure none of the enemy could approach the tank with a satchel charge or a mine. We were still under orders to take prisoners, but there was never an opportunity. The low ridge on our right flank was rocky and had natural caves and crevices that were hard to probe. Our advance was slow, at a walking pace, to maintain the skirmish line we were maintaining. When our photographer was with us he would climb this ridge from time to time to record our progress. Eventually it was my turn to take the position directly in back of our tank and to relay any message. We were passing through a small thicket when I looked at the ridge and saw, to my horror, the open mouth of a cave. I grabbed the black telephone and yelled, “Cave!” The voice that answered from inside was clear and calm. “What o’clock?” This was a concept that I had never encountered, but I quickly reasoned that the tank was traveling toward “12 o’clock”. I shouted, “3 o’clock!” Sure enough, the turret swung 90 degrees right and I saw the tube elevate slightly before the gush of flame was directed into the mouth of the cave. A couple of use ran up to the cave to see if there was any sign of life inside, but it appeared empty. I tossed a grenade in just to make sure. Later on we were passing another cave. The tank poured in a surge of napalm and immediately four figures came out, covered with flame. They only made a couple of steps before they were cut down. It was almost dusk and the sight of those corpses blazing with the sun setting behind them was branded into my memory. We got the order to dig in for the night and my position was not more than ten yards from the nearest of the four. As I dug my foxhole I kept glancing up as the flames died down. The one closest to me kept burning after the others had gone dark. I finally realized that this had been a woman, not a soldier! That night I slept poorly and every time I looked I could see black fissures opening up in her haunch, and little flames rising up like candles. Next morning our company was in reserve, but the two forward platoons ran into resistance and our 3rd Platoon was directed up on the right flank We were advancing and firing at a low ridge of limestone across our front. We were trying to force a group of the enemy that had taken positions behind a broken row of boulders. McWhorter yelled at me and pointed to a boulder far out on my right. I stopped suddenly and turned to see what he wanted. In that same instant a Jap rifle fired and I

heard the familiar “crack” that told me that I was the target. The slug missed me but hit a new replacement who was coming up the slope behind me. Later on I learned that he wasn’t “new” at all. He had been one of the original troops that had trained with the division when it was still back in the States. He had been wounded on Leyte, had been hospitalized, and had re-joined our company just a few days before. We took the ridge and when I went back to see how bad the wound was, I found Hess, our medic. He told me the shot had gone clean through and destroyed the liver and predicted that the man would be dead in a few days. It turned out he was right. The campaign was nearly over and we all knew it. Only the southern tip of the island was still held by the remnants of the Japanese Army. We were to learn later on that the highest rank Jap officers had waited until this time to commit suicide in traditional samurai style, but they would not surrender their troops. Our platoon stayed in reserve during these final days while the rest of the company advanced. It seemed to me that this last week had a dreamlike quality. As we moved slowly to the south we could hear our artillery and planes blasting the territory ahead. One afternoon I was eating my rations while resting in a grassy patch under a tree when I heard a weird sound coming toward me. A chunk of shrapnel the size of a stove lid dug into the turf only a few feet away. As we approached the last Okinawan village in our sector I was crossing a field, following the tread of a tank that had disappeared among the houses up ahead. I spotted a black glove in the grass, but when I picked it up I realized it was a human hand, shriveled and discolored. Farther on I saw where the tank tread had passed over a baby, probably placed there by a mother hoping to save it from the destruction of the town. It was a grotesque sight, like a frog that had been stepped on, and it stayed permanently in my mind’s eye. It took four days to subdue the town of Medeera, but our platoon wasn’t involved. We moved in and held the reserve position while the dirty work was done by the other platoons. The only personal incident occurred when I was sitting on a semi-circular brick wall, a sort of patio, with Job Denni. A spent rifle round landed right at our feet. Job picked it up and swore as he dropped it. We didn’t realize a fresh bullet would be that hot! A lot of Japs were coming in at the last, and I saw a lot of them up close. They were all strong and well-built, although short. All the soldiers were healthy and well fed. Most of them had their girl friend with them! The civilians were another story, though. I saw some of the most pitiful things you can imagine. All these Orientals (not just the soldiers, either) take a lot of killing; and old men, women and children were found in a condition that would kill a white man from shock. On top of that, all (with the exception of one small girl that I saw) were completely broken in spirit. We got our orders to move back up the island to a permanent camp; the battle was over. The weather was warm and sunny and we were all in a good mood. We came to a narrow ravine that headed in our general direction. It had been untouched by the fighting and looked like a piece of Eden, with a creek between steep sides covered with forest. We followed a trail and as it started to climb out of the ravine we saw, about 50 yards ahead of us, a man was running away on the trail. From pure reflex our entire squad fired a volley and he went down.

We found him lying on his face, dressed as an Okinawan civilian, with gray brain matter leaking out of a crease just behind his right ear. Only one of our bullets had hit him and it went in just deep enough to kill him. I looked at him and I couldn’t help thinking that if he hadn’t panicked and broken his cover we would have passed him by. If he had showed himself and held up his hands we would have taken our first prisoner. It was a five day march before we reached or new camp, which was not far from where we replacements had landed on the island two months before. We found that squad tents had been set up and inside were canvas cots folded up and placed in neat stacks Our duffel bags were in a pile. We each located our own by the names and serial numbers stenciled on the side. When I opened mine I discovered some rear-eschalon bastard had rifled the contents, but the only things missing (of all things) were two pair of civilian long-johns that my mother had sent to Fort Ord when we were all expecting to be assigned to the ETO. We retrieved our messkits and headed for a nearby mess-tent, falling into our old routine of standing in line. It was the first hot food in six weeks. We had been 40 days on line, including 8 days in reserve. On 2 July 1944 we were told that the island was officially “secured”. It was my 19th birthday. . . .