Islands of the Damned

The fourth man down the line from me was sleeping. All of a sudden I heard this scuffle, these grunts, and then a long, drawn-out scream.

The guy had been sleeping flat on his back when he felt a weight on his chest and woke up with fingers around his throat. Afterward, when he was able to tell us what happened, he said he found this Jap sitting on him, choking him. He said he could feel himself going under, losing consciousness. He knew the man was going to kill him.

“Everything I was ever taught in training about judo, jujitsu, how to defend yourself ran through my mind like a streak of lightning,” he told us. “I just went through everything.

“I knew what I was going to do. I reached up and put my left hand behind his head and with my right hand I poked two fingers in his eyes. Hard.”

The Jap instantly released his hold and fell back.

“I grabbed him by the neck and the seat of the pants and threw him off the cliff.”

I heard that Jap screaming all the way down, from the second his eyes were gouged until he hit the bottom. I’ve never heard such a bloodcurdling sound in my life.

The next day the Army moved into our places on top of the hill. We got word that evening that Third Battalion had been picked for a special operation. We were going across to Ngesebus.

CHAPTER 6 The Perfect Invasion

Ngesebus lay in plain sight. The channel separating it from the northern tip of Peleliu was about five hundred yards across and only four feet deep in places. There had been a wooden causeway between the two islands, but we’d bombed that out.

There was a small Japanese air base on Ngesebus, barely big enough for a Piper Cub, as well as the pair of big guns that had been pounding us across the strait. There was a chance that the Japs would barge reinforcements down from Babelthuap some night. At low tide they could easily wade across to Peleliu and surprise us like they had at Guadalcanal.

But for us, getting across was not going to be that easy.

The west road was the only approach. It ran to a phosphate refinery at the north end of Peleliu, passing along the foot of a low ridge. At right angles to the ridge a series of four round-top hills ran across Peleliu to the east coast. These hills were going to be a problem. But the real barrier to getting to Ngesebus was the ridge. Inside its northernmost tip the Japanese Navy had dug the granddaddy of all the cave-and-tunnel complexes. Entrances looked out in three directions with all sorts of cross tunnels and connections on several levels. It was equipped with electric lighting, communication lines, storerooms, and an infirmary. Everything the one thousand Japs inside would need to keep the west road bottled up and to survive an attack. Our planes and artillery hit that ridge over and over until we thought there was nothing left to hit. When the first of our tanks went clanking up the west road and into full view of the cave, the Japs fired down on it and stopped it dead. All this time the guns over on Ngesebus were also raining shells down on the north end of Peleliu. We had no way to launch an attack on the smaller island until we gained control of the ridge, the west road, and the channel beyond.

Someone at battalion headquarters hit on an idea—they blanketed the beach on Ngesebus with smoke shells, letting the clouds drift across the channel. Then five amtracs waded into the channel and turned their 75s on the hill. They targeted the largest cave entrance with round after round until return fire was silenced. Then, with tanks leading the way, an amtrac with a mounted flamethrower moved in and torched every cave opening they could find. As a final touch a team of engineers blasted the entrances shut.

Meanwhile we were waiting back at the junction of the west and east roads. Late in the afternoon we got word that the way was clear. We’d cross to Ngesebus at nine the next morning, September 28.

It could be that General Rupertus was embarrassed that the invasion of Peleliu had gone on long past the three days he had predicted. It could be that by now the division command was as frustrated with the place as we were and wanted to see some kind of clear-cut victory. But our assault on Ngesebus was planned to a tee. It was to be a textbook exercise. The next morning every senior officer on Peleliu and from the surrounding fleet who wasn’t otherwise engaged was assembled at a point where they could look out over the channel and watch us go in. We had no idea we were playing to such distinguished spectators. They said afterward the reviewing stand must have been armor-plated.

We were at the north point of Peleliu, near the phosphate plant, by eight a.m. We boarded the amtracs and then, as usual, we waited. While we were waiting we were treated to a spectacular sound-and-light show by the Navy and our own fighter planes.

The battleship Mississippi and cruisers Columbus and Denver were parked out west of the strait, and for forty minutes they slammed the beach across from us from one end to the other with fourteen-inch and eight-inch shells. When that let up, the Corsairs started in. Two dozen had arrived from the Lexington, and boy, were we happy to see them. For the first time in the war, we had Marine pilots supporting Marine troops in a landing operation. They were taking off from the Peleliu airstrip and coming in from behind us. We watched as they peeled off, diving through the smoke and the dust, working the beach over with bombs, rockets and machine guns. As each plane finished its run it would fly back for another load. Some pilots cut it very close. We’d watch them dive and disappear into the columns of smoke. Just when we were sure they’d crashed, they’d pull into the clear, leaving the smoke swirling in their wake. Man, those guys were good!

The Corsairs were still at work at 9:05 when we started across, and they continued almost to the minute we drove up onto the sand and bailed out. Thirteen Sherman tanks led the way, waterproof for amphibious operation. Three were swamped, but the rest made it. We followed, packed into thirty-five amtracs. Most of them mounted 75mm howitzers and they were firing almost the whole way across. There were about seven hundred of us, all that was left of the Third Battalion. Two weeks ago, when we’d stormed ashore on Orange Beach Two, there had been a thousand. Like then, we were sweating and scared. Nothing on Peleliu had come easy. We were sure this wasn’t going to be any different.

Ngesebus was even smaller than Peleliu, hardly a mile square, and flat except for one low hill. There were none of the high ridges and limestone cliffs that had made Peleliu a death trap. But Ngesebus had its own surprises waiting for us.

* * *

It took the amtracs about six minutes to churn the five hundred yards. We expected any minute to run into the kind of firestorm the Japs had met us with on Peleliu’s beaches, but there was only scattered fire from pillboxes and behind the few ragged trees the Navy and the Corsairs had left standing.

K Company was on the extreme left. This time we had the new model amtracs with the drop-down hatches in back. They rolled up on the beach and several yards inland before coming to a stop. We piled out and ran forward. Once again, the old lesson echoed in our heads: Get off the beach! Navy shells were landing farther inland now, and we had the airfield right in front of us, if you could even call it an airfield. The whole thing didn’t amount to more than a single landing strip surfaced with crushed coral, and a crude taxiway. I’d be surprised if the Japs had ever landed anything bigger than a spotting plane.

We were still taking fire from among the scattered trees. A sniper winged one of our riflemen in the elbow, and when the mortar section corpsman, Ken Caswell, went to his aid, another Marine who was helpfully cutting the man’s backpack free with his KA-BAR accidentally slashed Caswell across the face. The two men went back to first aid. We’d see both of them again.

In less than half an hour we made it across the landing strip and a few dozen yards beyond. There we came upon a low gray bunker that faced the channel.

Our orders were to set up our two guns on the far side of the bunker. K Company’s gunny sergeant, W. R. Saunders, assured us it was clear. He said riflemen had already checked it out, dropping a couple grenades down a vent and moving on. So we went around it and started to dig in. About forty-five or fifty yards ahead, our other squad leader, Corporal Tom Matheney, and our sergeant, Johnny Marmet, were stringing phone wire to a forward observation post. I had no idea where Legs, our lieutenant, might be. That left me in charge, the only NCO on the