POST #22-23
Day Thirteen...Iwo Jima Battle Narrative, 4 March, 1945..
Mikey's Dads 100th Birthday Was 2-22-2022...
We continue the day-by-day story of the First Battalion, 24th Marines, Baker company in the bloody battle of IWO JIMA...
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| Day Thirteen...Wilderness |
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On February 22, 2022, (2-22-22) Mikey's Dad, Willard W. Wemple would have been 100 years old. We are following Dad's time in the First Battalion, 24th Marines, Baker company, from February 19th to March 17th, 1945, in....Operation Detachment.
We will not put much on these posts about the 1-24 On Iwo Jima, instead we will post links here leading to a very good, detailed website that will give way more information than we can deliver ourselves. We must warn you that some of the information will be graphic and upsetting, but will give you some idea about what Dad and the other Marines experienced. If you see a mention of Baker Company, that is the unit dad was to be assigned to.
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On this day, 4 March, 1945, Willard (Dad) and B-1-24 led by Captain William A. Eddy, Jr. was responsible for the
entire battalion front. To their left was their own regiment’s Second
Battalion, on the right, they could just make out the foxholes of the 23rd
Marines. The weather was overcast with showers and visibility was so poor that all airstrikes were canceled and aerial
observation was seriously limited.
Thanks to Baker Company’s hard-fought 125 yard gain on the previous afternoon, the Marine line was beginning to edge past Turkey Knob.
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| The Turkey Knob |
However, they were
still mired in the thick belt of defenses that ran through Iwo’s northern area.
Many of the gullies and draws in this area ran down from Hill 382 to the
southeast. The Marines moved with the terrain
rather than trying to traverse the dangerous open areas. As American artillery shells
arced overhead in search of Japanese gun emplacements, and 60mm bombs blasted Japanese strong points, Baker Company moved forward. Effective as the mortars were, however, they could not reach every emplacement.
At 0830, Baker Company ran into yet another complex of Japanese strong points. And, as they struggled to reorganize, another barrage of Japanese
mortar shells came down. Although a pair of tanks supported
Baker Company, they were hard to maneuver in the tight confines of northern
Iwo. Deprived of the full effect of tanks and artillery, Captain Eddy sent
for an assault team and flamethrower squad
to support the struggling Marines. They found four or five caves, all heavily manned. There was no other way but
to get up close with satchel charges. Before they could throw a charge into the
caves, they had to have hand grenade fights with the Japs. In actions like these, the
Marines silenced one strongpoint after another, and even drove some Japanese
soldiers out into the open, shooting them down without mercy. However, several
men were killed and wounded in the assault and rain of mortar shells. And
behind one secured position was another, and another, and another, all manned
and waiting.
The result of the days bloodshed
was a gain of 75 yards and control of another stretch of high ground. Baker
Company received orders to dig in at 1700, barely out of hand grenade range and
well within sight of Japanese gunners. Whenever a Marine exposed himself, the
enemy opened up with machine gun and rifle fire. If a man had to relieve himself he had no choice to do so in his pants. It could be deadly to stand or sit up.
37
Baker Company men were wounded in action on 4 March, and an additional five
were killed outright. The majority of these wounds were caused by shell
fragments or shrapnel. Four of the 37 wounded men later died, a high number
that speaks to the severity of the close-in fighting. Dad was not physically wounded that day, but the mental torment must have been extreme...
Elsewhere on the island,
there were a few signs that the situation was improving ever so slightly.
The Turkey Knob and the Amphitheater had been cut off and isolated…neither
position could be supported or supplied. The high ground which had served Japanese
spotters so well in the past few days was now in American hands. The Japanese artillery
fire was less accurate, and the mortars were forced to fire blind. And the first damaged B-29 bomber was able to land at the captured Motoyama Airfield #1.
But after another bloody day the end was still not in sight... More horrors were to come.
Read the narrative for today...it's very detailed, and again graphic...
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TODAYS NARRATIVE
Todays narrative is Day THIRTEEN on Iwo Jima, 4 March, 1945...It will be called Wilderness...
Click or tap HERE to go to the narrative...It's very interesting
Over the next posts and next days we will continue posting daily updates that will follow the battle through logs and stories of the battle as told by a Military Historian and battle participants on the 1st Battallion-24th Marines Website...
Until Next Time!!
Awesome read!
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