A Marine's War
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The huge red ball blossoming under the plane's wing filled the porthole as the fighter banked and climbed for altitude. And war had begun for the young Marine, a member of the USS Pennsylvania Marine Detachment, and the United States as Japanese planes swarmed to the attack at Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941. |
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He brings the attack to life for the reader with a vivid eye-witness description, as seen from his battle station high on battleship Pennsylvania's mainmast. He watched as battleship Oklahoma capsized, and torpedo and bomb attacks on West Virginia and Helena. In addition, the most-inspiring sight he saw during the war as Nevada fought her way toward the open sea with guns spitting flames and projectiles at a swarm of Japanese planes trying to stop her.Pearl Harbor Attack! Book excerpt.USS Pennsylvania Prewar, after the attack, and later modifications.USS Pennsylvania Captain Cooke's Pearl Harbor Action ReportHe worried that the civilians in San Francisco would accuse the crew of turning tail and running from the Japanese when the ship arrived there for repairs and modifications.A later transfer to battleship USS New Mexico took him to the South Pacific, the Fiji Islands, New Hebrides and American Samoa.Off seagoing in March 1943 and short hitches at Marine Barracks, Navy Yard Pearl Harbor, Palmyra Island and Stateside, he joined one of the first two Marine amphibian truck companies formed – DUKWS (ducks). He helped pioneer the first use of Marine DUKWS in the Pacific Ocean and on land during the invasion of Saipan, followed later by Tinian and the last major land battle of the Pacific War, Okinawa.The DUKW company had boarded LSTs at Maui and with other units sailed for Saipan, with a stop in Pearl Harbor. While there, and on a Sunday, a fire storm in the invasion fleet killed or injured 559 men and destroyed nine vessels crammed with men and invasion supplies in West Loch – one of World War II's best-kept secrets.Some of his battle and other tales are interspersed with quotes from letters he wrote while trying to convince a girl to become his wife at war's end.His duty in the 6th Marine Regiment, battleships USS Pennsylvania and New Mexico, Marine Barracks Pearl Harbor Navy Yard, Palmyra Island, plus the 2d Marine Amphibian Truck Company (DUKWS) during the invasions of Saipan, Tinian and Okinawa, provided hundreds of battle, foxhole, humorous, and other tales in The Quack Corps, A Marine's War – Pearl Harbor to Okinawa. This Historical Bio called "A fascinating read . . . by a veteran who was there," Wheels & Tracks, London. "The Quack Corps is a great read, with plenty of information for any military buff," noted reviewer B. Feuer in Military."I think it is a wonderful first-person narrative written with compassion and humor and with a clear insight to detail. I’ve read it twice and found the second reading as fascinating as the first. A wonderful first-person pictorial of WWII life and times," wrote Allen Sherwood, Commander, USN (ret), former Naval Flight Officer, Aide to Ronald Reagan, and US Navy Liaison to Hollywood Film Industry."I finished your book last week, what an amazing story! I really enjoyed the way you tied it all together with the Guardian Whales on Maui and your letters to Dolores. I wish that more Veterans would document their experiences as well as you have," E-mailed Kimberly J. Uyehara, then a Park Ranger on Saipan."I feel like I was right there with you. You have a way of writing that captivates the reader."-G. McClain, TX
"You bring history to life, and we’ve learned much more about the Pacific War than we ever could from the dry pages of history books," Newnan High School students, Newnan, Georgia, participating in Oral History Project via the Internet.
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Pearl Harbor to Okinawa
