Jake Aston

Pharmacist Mate 2nd Class United States Navy

I enlisted in the US Navy on Feb­ruary 4, 1943 in Dallas, Texas. Ex­actly three years later I would be dis­charged at Camp Wallace near Hitch­cock, Texas. There are very few days that go by that I don't think of some­thing that took place during that pe­riod. Numerous accounts of the cam­paigns that I was involved in have been told and published over and over many times. I'm sure that eve­ryone I served with has experienced the same events. I have always thought it was like several witnesses to an auto accident. Everyone saw it differently.

At the training station in San Diego, you were asked your prefer­ence as to what type of specialty school you wanted to attend. I wanted to go to radio school or electrician's school. As a third choice, for some reason, I requested the medical corps school. At that time there were a lot of requests for the first two and a need, so I was told, for corpsmen.          .

After boot camp, I went with several friends to the San Diego Hospital Corpsmen School. The school and barracks were located in a beautiful area which was the site of a world's fair several years earlier. The famous San Diego Zoo was our next door neighbor. Most of our classes took place in the Globe Theater. Across the narrow street a large exposition hall that was converted into a barracks was beginning to fill up with walking wounded Marines from the Pacific area. This was June 1943. After corpsmen school I was assigned to duty in the emergency room of the hospital. There, I became somewhat acquainted with all kinds of events related to Navy and Marine personnel that took place in and around San Diego.

                Every few days Marine recruits were bussed over to give blood or receive shots. They would line up outside in single file, waiting their turn to go in. One of the corpsmen thought it would be fun to put on an operating room gown and mask and create the impression that he was the one who was going to perform the procedure. He secured a large syringe with an aspirating needle attached. The syringe was about the size of a broom handle and about six inches long. The needle was about the size of a large kitchen match that made the assembly look overpower­ing. When he opened the door and walked past the Marines, in a mimic of movie actor Groucho Marx, we thought these men were going over the wall. It caused much more of a commotion than we had anticipated. Anyway, it was funny at the time.

After a period of time several of us volunteered for the Fleet Marine Force. It didn't take long for us to be placed on a Navy bus headed for Camp Elliott outside of San Diego. This was sometime in August of 1943. About sixty corpsmen made up a platoon for field medical school. Platoon Sgt. Bailey was the drill instructor who took us on field assignments. When we were not in classes we were under the watchful eye of Sgt. Bailey. Several times a week we would hike out in the field with full packs. The post exchange started selling milk in a new type of quart cartons that had just hit the market. Several guys used the empty cartons in their packs to lighten the load and it did make a nice square pack. I never tried this, but no one ever got caught.

The Sunday before we were to be shipped overseas I went on liberty with Harry Sweazy from Kentucky. In San Diego, we were going to meet my cousin, Glenn Dunn, at the bus depot and then go out for dinner. When I found out that the bus was late, I realized we had time on our hands. I noticed that we had passed a sign on the front of the First Methodist Church that they were having a reception for servicemen. We went in and were received warmly by the church members and their young people. We were asked to stay for their evening church service. Harry stayed at the church and I walked a few blocks to the bus station with the understanding that I would return and we would go out to eat. When Glenn and I got to the church, Harry was no where to be found. We decided that we would go into the sanctuary and wait for him to show up. After the services started, the choir got up to sing and there was Harry, big as life, in a robe singing with the choir.

About forty-five years later, I located Harry in Winchester, KY. I called him on the phone thinking that he would be as excited to hear from me as I was in finding him. I re­minded him of the time we were on liberty and he informed me that he didn't remember that Sunday nor did he remember me. What a let down.

On October 28, 1943 our group of corpsmen joined several hundred Marines on the docks near downtown San Diego. All of our gear was stenciled with the code name of EPIC-83-RECAP. Several days before we left we were issued brand new 30 caliber carbine rifles.Our destination was unknown as we USN Corpsmen Jim Crawford and Jake Aston boarded an old converted French ship named the S.S. Rochambeau. In the late afternoon the ship pulled away from the dock and we were soon passing Point Loma and on to the open sea. A Navy blimp started circling overhead and stayed with us until dusk. It didn't take too long until some of the men started to disappear and go below decks looking for their bunks. Some were already getting seasick. We became passengers for the next seventeen days. We were on a zigzag course and wouldn't see land un­til we reached New Caledonia. On the last day at sea, a pilot crew came aboard to guide the ship into harbor. As we passed up the channel we could see natives near their thatched huts and some in dugout canoes. It was like a setting out of some old movie. We stayed in the channel, not moving, until about midnight when a tug pushed us in position at the dock.

The next morning we left the ship by climbing down the cargo nets with full packs, sea bags and carbines. We boarded ten wheeler trucks and were soon on our way through down­town Noumea. This was a French colony and there again it seemed to be something out of a movie. Highly dressed policemen wore white shorts and red coats with shiny brass buttons and were directing traffic. Our convoy passed without much attention from the citizens. They probably saw that kind of procession every day. We took a dusty road out of town several miles to Camp St. Louis. The first words that were heard as the trucks stopped in a cloud of dust were, "You are going to be sorry." This was the standard greeting that you heard yelled at you all through the military when you reported to a new assignment.

We settled in our tents with little fanfare. This would be the best shelter we would have for the next twenty months. We stayed there until after the first of January. Our tent area was only a few hundred yards from a Raider Battalion. We visited with some of these men who wanted to know what was going on back in the states. They told us about their last combat ex­periences.

We left New Caledonia around the first week of January, 1944. We had heard that the Third Division was on Bouganville so we thought we might be going there. The First Marine Division had landed on New Britain so the scuttlebutt was that we may head there. We put into Brisbane, Australia just long enough to place our seabags in a warehouse. The next time we would see that gear would be in San Francisco in late September of 1945.

Pavuvu, 1944 USN Corpsmen Jim Crawford and Jake Aston

Like the entire First Marine Division, G Co , in February and March of 1942 was growing from a skeleton to a full combat Division. Parris Island was churning out platoon after platoon of young men who had enlisted in the days and weeks after Pearl Harbor, and almost all of them were headed to New Bern, NC. G Co. lived in small wooden shacks, with a row of wooden duckboards running down the Company street, dirt, of course.Beardsley, and McGloin were the Gunnery Sergeants. Beardsley was a grizzled, skinny, bottle a day man. McGloin a tough, hard-faced man was to be awarded the Navy Cross along with Sgt. Dworrnitski for action at the Battle of Bloody Ridge on Guadalcanal in September, 1942. Training was hard and never ending . No one got leave except a very rare day in the neighboring Town of Jacksonville, or an even rarer weekend, when, with luck, a Marine might make it all the way to Myrtle Beach, SC. My experience was a common one, in that I enlisted on December 9, 1941, and received my first furlough in the USA in January, 1945.

We had a mix of Marines from New England and the South, with an NCO group from the Old Corps, and quite a few Marines who had received BCD"S, but had been allowed to reinlist, with the BCD"S to be forgotten if they straightened out, and, of course, if they survived. A couple were good friends of mine, and except for a propensity to get drunk, and get the clap, they were fine Marines in combat. We only made one ship to shore training landing at New River which was a fiasco. Then G Co was put on planes once when they thought we might become airborne troops, but one flight in old DC7s was all we got, then that was forgotten.

In May, off we went to Norfolk, VA, and boarded the USS Wakefield, a big, former cruise ship. Most of G Co. was shoehorned into what had formerly been the dance hall , with metal and canvas bunks four high. Down the East Coast, and through the Panama Canal we went. No liberty in Panama for anyone. Then across the Pacific to Wellington, New Zealand. We arrived in June, and expected to be in Camp Paekakariki for several months, but almost at once, in pouring rain which never stopped, we were ordered to unload, then load again, some Navy transports pulled up to the Wellington docks. The local dockworkers having decided to go on strike. As soon as we got the ships loaded, we embarked and sailed to the Figi Islands where we had a practise landing which was the worst fuck up since the Charge of the Light Brigade. Half the boats didn't get to shore. Those that did got ashore at the wrong place, at the wrong time, with the wrong group of Marines. It filled us full of confidence . A week later we landed on Tulagi.

G Co landed on Tulagi on August 7th at about 9:00 AM on a rocky beach. Getting out of the old, wooden Higgins boats without ramps was, as usual, a pain in the ass, but we received no fire from the Japs. The jungle was little damaged. The assault fire from the cruisers and destroyers was pitiful compared with later landings. We climbed the hill from the shore until we reached the trail on the ridge line and headed for the center of the island to our right. We had just started off when we could hear Lew Diamond yelling his head off down below us, getting his 81mm mortars going. The 1st Raider Bn had landed before us, and were in front of us most of the first day. We pushed forward to the Cricket Field, and there G Co lost its first man in the War, my squad leader, Cpl Lewis. The first night on Tulagi, our first night in combat, was terrifying. Everyone was shooting all night. There were no lines as such, everyone was on his own. Hembree and I teamed up , and like everyone else, fired in every direction, at every sound, all night. At first light we expected to be the only ones left alive on the island, but, to our pleasant surprise, G Co had only a couple killed and a few wounded. Hembree and I went out looking for ammunition and grenades, and ran into Frybarger and Huff. Frybarger had just killed a jap, and we went over to look at him and he was the biggest damm Jap I was ever to see in the War. He must have been over six feet tall, with great, heavy hands, wearing an old, WW1 German coal-scuttle helmet, and armed with a rusty bayonet. Later experience would have suggested to us that he was probably a Korean or Chinese laborer, but, at the time, we were mighty impressed.

The fighting went on all that day, but the Raider Bn did most of the killing. G Co trapped some Japs in a cave dug into the side of the road leading to the wharf area, and that was where we learned that Japs did not surrender.

The next night, sitting on a hillside facing Guadalcanal Sound, we saw the most dramatic sea battle take place in front of our widening eyes. Great ships, firing red and white- hot shot, blazing searchlights which lit up opposing ships as if in daylight, rolling waves of sound, and the explosions of ships burning cherry red before disappearing hi the darkness. How we cheered. We did not for an instant even consider that it could be anything but a great victory. The next day our innocence was removed when a Jap destroyer hove to off Tulagi, and slowly, and carefully gave us an hour of shelling without our Navy saying a word. This went on almost every day thereafter for the two weeks we were on Tulagi. Our last casualty on Tulagi was Violette, who was wandering around looking for god knows what when he stumbled on the last living Jap on Tulagi who shot him in the arm with a pistol. After that Jap was killed G Co celebrated by killing a pig the Japs had been raising. The efficiency of the butchers left a lot to be desired, as from a pig who must have weighed 200 pounds, we got only about 20 pounds of meat.

The Japs now having complete control of Guadalcanal Sound, G Co. sneaked over to Guadalcanal from Tulagi on two WW1 destroyers the Gregory and the Little.. A week or so later, both the Gregory and the Little were sunk by the Japs in full view of G Co while the Company was on a long patrol across the Matanikou river, where we also found, at that time, several limbs and parts of the Goettge patrol members, and some of their equipment at the mouth of that river on the side nearest Point Cruz. On that patrol G Co got all the way to Kokumbona Village, running into no Japs. This was before the Japs started to reinforce heavily, as in all the fighting to come on Guadalcanal around the Matanikou river G Co never got as far as Kokumbona Village again.

G Co did most of its fighting on Guadalcanal either on the banks of the Matanikou or near it. The only exception was the Battle of Bloody Ridge as it is now called. We called it the Battle at the Grassey Knoll. There we supported once again the First Raider Bn in a terrible fight in September which cost G Co many killed and wounded. September was a bad month for G Co with 14 killed and 49 wounded. Every day was an air raid, and many nights we were shelled from the sea. It was a bad time. G co was involved in about five major battles on Guadalcanal, but it was the every day bombing and shelling which steadily, over four long months, wore the Company down, as it did the whole Division, so that by December, 1942 there wasn't a man in the Division who wasn't glad to see Guadalcanal disappear over the horizon.

We left Brisbane and passed inside the Great Barrier Reef along the east coast of Aus­tralia. This was a beautiful trip that passed Townsand and on to Milne Bay, New Guinea. We did not go ashore there but just stayed anchored in the bay for a few days. From there we went to Goodenough Island and then to Oro Bay, New Guinea where we camped for about a week. It was here that the Marines decided that we should give up our carbines and receive the famous Reising Submachine Gun. It had a folding wire stock and was named after its inventor. I was told that this weapon had been used by paratroopers somewhere and was famous for jamming. We went to the firing range several times to become more familiar with all the weapons. We also got to practice crawling about fifty yards with a 30 caliber water cooled machine gun, fir­ing about two feet above our heads.

All this time we were with our original group of corpsmen who trained together at Camp Elliott. We broke up in smaller units just before we left Oro Bay. My group went aboard an LST and the next day we landed at Cape Gloucester. Just as the big loading ramp was lowered for us to go ashore, an air raid alert sounded. We took cover in the nearest ditch as "condition red" was passed along. A lone Jap bomber was in the area, heading for the airport.

After the alert, we stayed in our little group waiting for someone to show up with some kind of orders. We were across the road from the beach and LST area. Trucks were passing up and down the dusty road with men and supplies.

The initial invasion of Cape Gloucester was made on Christmas Day, 1943. The trees and surrounding area looked as if a storm had passed through. After a while a Chief Petty Offi­cer starting reading off names and assigning them to several men who had obviously been on the island for some time. Finally my name along with Jim Crawford from Alpine, Texas and Meredith Fry from Indiana were called out. A Pharmacist Mate 3/C asked us to follow him. The four of us started down the road about a mile then took a trail off into the jungle. We must have hiked three miles, up one hill and down another. The further we walked the more dense the jungle became. We stopped before crossing a fast moving stream and I saw the tallest trees that I had ever seen. They acted as a large umbrella over the smaller trees. When it started to rain you could hear it hit the lush tree tops breaking the fall. It was an unusual sound. We continued on, passing near hill 660. Hills were designated by their elevation on the map. This area was in the news several days as a struggle took place securing this objective. There was first hand evidence of the battle, with scars of combat all around us.

                We moved back into the dense area and finally into a clearing among more towering trees.      Scattered about the area were small groups of a Marine company. There were a few tents, hammocks and individual on-and two-man tents. It looked as if it was every man for himself. This was going to be my company, E-2-5. Jim went to F company and Clinton went to

If ever three men felt out of place it was us. We had been assigned to three combat companies of the 2^nd Battalion of the 5th Marine Regiment of the l^s` Marine Division as replacement corpsmen. The men had been taking atabrine a long time and it had turned their skin and the whites of their eyes yellow. This little pill was taken to combat the symptoms of malaria. Soon we would blend in with them, but at this time we stuck out like a sore thumb. The battle for Cape Gloucester had come to a close for all practical purposes, but there were outposts placed on the perimeter of the line. The airfield had been secured, and the Japanese had been driven back into the jungle. The Japanese were left with three choices. They could mount a counter attack, stay in the jungle and starve, or take the long trail to Rabaul some two-hundred miles away.I was from Kansas. introduced to the senior corpsman of "E" Company, Phml/c Charley Vavrock He took me to meet Platoon Sergeant Vernon "Pop" Derrickson and 2^°d Lt. Rich ard Strugarek in the second platoon. "Pop" was from Washington, D.C. and about thirty-six years old and a veteran of Guadalcanal. Lt. Strugarek came on board only a few days ahead of my arri­val. He must have been about twenty­five years old fresh from the states. He was from Toledo, Ohio and would be killed on Okinawa in May, 1945.

The nightly ritual was to sit around small campfires after dark and shoot the bull waiting for the air raid be­fore we went off to bed.    Since I was fresh from the states, I was questioned about what was going on back home. More than half of the men, those who served on Guadal­canal, had left the U.S. in April, 1942 for Wellington, New Zealand, and it was now almost February, 1944.

It was everyone for himself when it came to eating. We were given "K" and "C" ra­tions. The "K" rations were about the size of a video cassette which contained a small can of meat, "hard tack" (crackers), coffee, rock candy and toilet paper. Also inside was a small pack of cigarettes. We could use the "K" ration box for burning as it was covered with a heavy coat­ing of paraffin wax. The "C" rations were made up of two cans described as a "heavy" and "light". The "heavy" can contained something like meat and vegetable stew or potted meat. The light had hard tack, coffee or tea, sugar and rock candy. This was our menu most of the time.

You could almost set your watch with the regularity of the nightly air raid by "Washing Machine Charlie." We could hear the word being passed along the line that condition yellow existed and all fires would have to be put out. Soon you would hear a siren very faintly in the distance. Then word would be passed along that condition red existed. Sometimes search lights would be played on one Jap plane off in the vicinity of the airport. Anti-aircraft batteries would open fire as the plane approached the airport. If they were driven off, they would drop

"Monotonous and unappetizing dehydrated food became the usual menu. At times we had Spam. A lot of dehydrated food tasted the same- mostly like cardboard.  We had a lemon flavored drink that we referred to as "battery acid." We could make a stronger solution of this drink and bleach your dungarees. "

out canoes could be seen. The natives had fled into the mountains long ago when the Japs ar­rived. On later patrols we saw natives when they realized that we were friendly. We were given cut tobacco, trading beads, and other trinkets to pass out should the opportunity arrive. The natives could also provide helpful information.

On March l^st the Division passed orders down to the 5^th to take Talasea. On the after­noon of March 5^th, we made our way down to the beach area. Around 2200 we boarded LCMs for the fifty mile overnight ride off the beach from the Volupai Plantation. During the ride we could make out other boats running with us toward the Willaumez Peninsula. I later learned that the convoy consisted of 38 LCMs, 17 LCVP and 5 LCTs with five PT boats as escorts. D-Day was set for March 6^th and H-Hour was 0800. It had been estimated that there could be as many as 4,000 enemy troops in the Talasea area which was about the strength of our reinforced 5`^h Marines. Fortunately, that number was over estimated. The first battalion was the assault unit. About 0800 the tanks that were loaded in LCMs opened fire on the beach area. The Japs started lobbing 90mm mortar shells and returning sniper fire at the assault waves. A and B companies went ashore within about ten minutes after passing the line of departure. Soon it was our turn to land at the narrow beach head and quickly go up the narrow up-hill road. I'll never forget the smell of the combination of cordite, diesel fuel and fresh cut vegeta­tion. It created a odor of its own.

About two-hundred yards in we ran into sniper and mortar fire. We stopped for awhile until some bunkers could be taken out. We heard shells landing back at the beach and later learned that there were casualties. At the time we didn't know that Lt. Commander Richard Forsythe, regimental surgeon, had been mortally wounded and Phml/c Wm. Lewis had been killed. Several men from the l l^th Marines were casualties. The air support, for the 0800 land­ing, finally showed up about 1500. It was later reported that the five P-39s said they couldn't locate us so they flew on and dropped their 500 lb. bombs on Cape Hoskins. The Fifth Air Force could have been a big help, but they let us down.

We moved up the narrow road a little farther and were pinned down again. A tank was called up to take out a machine gun position. The tank came rumbling up the trail, only to run over a land mine buried in its path. About the same time the tank fired its cannon and machine guns, two Japs darted from the brush beside the trail. The riflemen riddled them but they were too close to be stopped. They slapped two magnetic mines on the tank. The explosion killed two of our riflemen, knocked out the tank commander, dazed the crew and threw the turret into lock. Among the Marines, Cpl. "Digger" Batton was wounded in the shoulder and Pvt. Butler from DeQueen, Arkansas was killed. This would be the first KIA that I had ever seen.

Later in the day we pushed into the coconut grove area of the plantation. As darkness approached, we started digging in for the night. Lt. Strugarek, "Pop" and I moved a few yards off the road next to a 37 mm anti-tank gun position. We were not concerned about an enemy tank, but were on the alert for some kind of attack during the long night. The 37 mm was equipped with canister shells that resembled an over-size shot gun. Rats and land crabs became constant companions after dark. Around 0330 we had the expected counter attack. The anti­tank gun responded as expected and we heard sporadic rifle and machine gun fire the rest of the night. After day break, we counted about twelve dead Japs about twenty yards in front of the anti-tank gun position. After we started out of the coconut grove we heard intermittent rifle fire. The column moved over a high ridge and down into a ravine. It was reported that the point man had discovered a land mine. Word was passed back for a demolition man to come forward to remove it. 

A detachment of men was sent to the top of the ridge where it ran into the enemy trying to attack us from the flank. It was here that Sgt. Ben Drake was shot in the head. Drake was about twenty-six years old and a champion wrestler in the Navy before enlisting in the Marines. He kept himself in top-notch shape and exercised every chance he had. As we continued on the trail, I was following some men in the machine gun section and I noticed a camera man stand­ing on a tree stump snapping pictures. About twenty years later I came across the picture in a book called THE CAMPAIGN ON NEW BRITAN. Late in the afternoon we started receiving bombardment from the Mt. Scheuther area. The scuttlebutt was that "E" company was selected to move on this position the next day.

Scouts had reported that the enemy was well dug in on this nearby 1100 ft. peak about 2,000 yards away. About mid afternoon we began our ascent. We had 81mm mortar support after a request for artillery fire came too close to Bn. CP. It was soon learned that the Jap 75mm field piece was supported by a 90mm mortar and machinegun fire. During this hour we had eighteen casualties and I received a Letter of Commendation for my small part.

Talasea had a small airstrip and a few metal buildings. Bitokara Mission, which was founded by some Germans, was located here. The church was a wooden structure about 45 x 60 feet in size with a dirt floor. I walked inside the next morning and a stream of sunlight showed five dead Marines laying on stretchers and each wrapped in a poncho. Later, a PBY seaplane would fly them to some unknown destination. This is one of many scenes that I have played over and over in my mind to this day. There I was, standing alone in the presence of these men. Their family members back in the states were going about their lives unaware of the tragic news that they would be receiving in a few days. How many loved ones and friends would be effected by each death? From that point on, through Peleliu and Okinawa, each seri­ous casualty that I came in contact with left me with the same feeling.

On March 9, Talasea was called secure. For several days patrols were made in all direc­tions. After a few days we moved about thirty miles east to San Remo Plantation. This place would be our base for the remaining time that we were on New Britain. We settled in and lived off the fat of the land under primitive conditions. Patrols were made on a daily basis to outposts that had been sent up on the government trail that ran from one end of the island to the other. The outposts were used to pick off the Japanese as they were making their way toward Rabaul over a hundred miles away. Scuttlebutt had it that we might end up moving on Rabaul. Thank goodness that was not attempted.

A few native men started showing up in this location. We had noticed a couple of Aus­tralian planters were visiting the 2^°d Bn CP. Soon the few natives were building little "lean-tos" with thatched roofs. We used them to keep out the noon day sun. Some were used for writing and playing cribbage, poker and other games. After a while the Marines were getting the na­tives to wash their clothes and other chores. They would work all day for a used razor blade. Finally the natives were wanting cigarettes instead of blades. They would want the Chelsea cigarettes that came in "K" rations. When we were issued regular rations of cigarettes the na­tives started wanting the Lucky Strikes and Camels. It didn't take long before the natives wanted more blades and the more popular tobacco to do the same amount of work.

                More natives came down out of the mountain area as they were convinced that it was safe for the women and children. On Easter Sunday, April 9, 1944, they celebrated our arrival with a native dance called a sing-sing. It was tribal ceremony that had them dressed in all kinds of costumes and painted faces. Again, it was something out of a Hollywood set. When we started receiving regular mail, the Division was getting as much from Australia as it was from the States. This was because of all the friends that were made when the Division was there for several months after Guadalcanal. Talasea resulted in 17 KIAs and 114 wounded Marines.

On April 22"^d an Army unit relieved us and we were shipped back to Cape Gloucester. We boarded a ship on the 30^th and headed for a well deserved rest area. There was a rumor that we were going to Hawaii or maybe even back to Australia. There was no such luck. We headed for another coconut grove on a deserted island called Pavuvu, about sixty miles from Guadalcanal.

Pavuvu could be best described as a hell hole. The idea was that the division would be sent to some area that would be half-way decent, regroup, and then be ready for the next opera­tion. It was learned that a few staff officers selected Pavuvu after they flew over the island. They never set foot on the place.

The ground was covered with decaying coconuts and all types of vegetation as nothing had been harvested since the beginning of the war. Some areas that were set aside as bivouac sites were under water. A lot of pyramidal tents that were given to us had rotted before they could be put up. It took weeks before the place was half-way livable. If the idea that those re­sponsible for placing the division here was to keep everyone bitching, they succeeded. Everybody became scavengers.   Efforts had to be made to keep your gear off the ground. Pieces of wooden shipping crates and packing boxes began to appear. We used tent rope as wicks in bottles full of all kinds of fuel to light the tents at night. With this type of light, about the only thing that you could do was write letters and play poker. Eventually, we had movies that were shown over and over.

Each battalion had constructed a screened-in field kitchen and mess hall. The quality of food was something that we could not control. At least the cooks did their best with what was available. Some men were eager to volunteer as cook's helpers so that they could eat better and earlier. One corpsman, Meredith Fry from Indiana, was quick to get the duty of inspecting the hands of food handlers. We soon found that the "home cooked" meals consisted of just lar­ger quantities of "C" rations. Monotonous and unappetizing dehydrated food became the usual menu. At times we had Spam. A lot of dehydrated food tasted the same - - mostly like card­board. We had a lemon flavored drink that we referred to as "battery acid." You could make a stronger solution of this drink and bleach your dungarees.

Keeping clean was no problem. We collected rain water in discarded five gallon coffee cans that we placed on the edges of the tents. Later, showers were installed and conditions im­proved somewhat. One thing about washing clothes on Pavuvu was you hardly had them hung up before they were dry. The rats and land crabs ruled the area at night. You would have com­pany in bed if you didn't have your mosquito net tucked in right. You wouldn't put your shoes on without first shaking them out because a lot of times a land crab would fall out. They were about the size of man's hand and looked a little bit like a small lobster.

After Cape Gloucester, as after Guadalcanal, the Division had to get back to fighting strength from the bottom up. We had suffered losses, not only killed and wounded, but in un­dernourishment, malaria, jungle rot, dysentery and boredom. One of the problems that almost reached an epidemic stage at Pavuvu was described as going "Asiatic." (A term we used to de­scribe a person who had become psychotic.)

At night we had Marines standing guard at various points. One young man, after being relieved of four hours of duty, shot himself with his M1 on his way back to his tent.

Manned and funded by civilian volunteers, the USO was founded on February 4th, 1941 in response to a request by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. This photo, submit­ted by Jake Aston, is of USO performers on Pavuvu in 1944. Pictured on stage are dancers Patti Davis and Kay Kyser. Men from the First Marine Division comprise the audience. 

G-2-5 Reunion, April 1994

Pavuvu and Peleliu

When the Division landed on that fateful morning of 15 September 1944, little did anyone suspect what was in store for it or them for the next six weeks! Within four days the First Marine Regt under Col Puller, had sustained so many casualties, that is could scarcely be called a fighting unit, as such. Casualties all down the line were very heavy, the heat was intense, 110 to 115 degrees daily, shortage of drinking water was acute, and the Japanese were fighting for every inch of ground, to the death.

We could go into the details of this battle, of whether or not, in hind sight, its was the right thing to do, but, lets leave that to historians. We do know that it was a fierce battle, and will go down in history as such. G Co. suffered heavily, as did other companies. We might have suffered less than some, numerically speaking. But still, the toll was very heavy. You can also get a Marine's view point by reading "The Long Road of War", by Jim Johnson, a member of E 2/5. Who gives a very down to earth look at his experience in three battles with 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines.

G 2/5 after 5 weeks of heavy fighting was finally relieved totally by elements of the 81st Wildcat Div of the U.S. Army, who had been engaged on Peleliu, also but would now finish the operation and before they finished up would still suffer heavy casualties. The Japanese fought until the last man was killed, or nearly so. More history of this battle can be obtained from the "The Old Breed" by George Me Millan, a history of the 1st Marine Division. Also excellent reading is the book, "With the Old Breed on Peleliu and Okinawa" by Gene Sledge. These books are professionally written and will help you to understand these battles from the standpoint of the 5th Marines and G Company.

On October 14, 1944 the 5th Marines were relieved, and at some point thereafter the Division loaded out and the men were so weak that many of them could not climb up the cargo nets to get aboard the ships that would take them to their paradise hi the South Pacific, the Island of Pavuvu, The Rest Home of the 1st Marine Division.

The dance began again, the return of our wounded who were able to return to duty. You saw your comrades come back that you swore you would never see again. However some never returned. Old heads were rotated home, new faces came on board, and on and on. Get ready for the next Blitz!