talion, 4th Marines, facing a welldef ended ridge, a coconut grove, and

a sinister clearing, was nearing the

sentimental and tactically important

goals of the old Marine barracks, its

rifle range, and the runways of Orote

airfield. With heavy tank support,

the 22d Marines surged forward past

the initial obstacles and by afternoon

had reached positions well beyond

the morning's battles. On the left of

the 4th Marines, where resistance

was lighter, the assault was led by

tanks that beat down the brush.

While inspecting positions there,

Lieutenant Colonel Samuel D. Puller,

the 4th's executive officer and brother

of famed Lieutenant Colonel Lewis B.

"Chesty" Puller, was killed by a

sniper.

By mid-afternoon, the 4th Marines' assault elements broke out of

the grove just short of the rifle range,

only to stall in a new complex at dugin defenses and minefields. Strangely,

and yet not unusual in the climax of

a losing engagement, a Japanese

officer emerged to brandish his sword

at a tank. It was easier than ritual

suicide.

The horror of the American guns

again must have been too much for

the Japanese defending the immediate front. Surprisingly, they just cut

and ran from their strong, welldefended positions. The elated Marines, who did not care why the

enemy ran — just that they ran —now

dug in only 300 yards from the prized

targets. Their capture would wait for

tomorrow, 28 July. The Japanese

were now squeezed into the last

quadrant of the peninsula. All of

their strongly entrenched defenses

had failed to hold. The Orote airfield, the old Marine barracks, the

old parade ground which had not felt

an American boot since 10 December

29

1941, were all about to be retrieved.

General Shepherd sounded a great

reveille on 28 July for what was left

of the Japanese naval defenders: a

45-minute air strike and a 30-minute

naval gunfire bombardment, joined

by whatever guns the 77th Division,

brigade, and antiaircraft battalions

could muster. At 0830 the brigade

would attack for Orote airfield.

Colonel Schneider's 22d Marines

would take the barracks and Sumay

and Colonel Shapley's 4th Marines

would take the airfield and the rifle

range. Japanese artillery and mortar

fire had diminished, but small arms

and machine guns still spoke intensely when the Marines attacked. At

this bitter end, the Japanese were

evoking a last-ditch stubbornness.

American tanks were called up but

most had problems with visibility

and control. Wherever the thick

scrub brush concealed the enemy,
Major John S. Messers' 2d Battalion,

4th Marines called for increased tank

support when one of his companies

began taking heavy casualties. In

response to General Shepherd's request, General Bruce sent forward a

platoon of Army tank destroyers and

a platoon of light tanks to beef up the

attack.

General Shepherd wanted the battle over now. He ordered a massive

infantry and tank attack which

kicked off at 1530 on the 28th. The

Japanese did not intend to oblige this

time by quitting; this was do or die.

By nightfall all objectives were in

plain sight, but there were still a few

hundred yards to be gained. The Marines stood fast for the night, hoping

the Japanese would sacrifice themselves in counterattack, but no such

luck occurred.

When the attack resumed on the

29th, after the usual Army and Marine artillery preparation and an awesomely heavy air strike, Army and

Marine tanks led the way onto the

airfield. Resistance was meager. By

early afternoon, the airfield was secured and the 22d Marines had occupied what was left of the old

Marine barracks. A bronze plaque,

which had long been mounted at the

entrance to the barracks, was recovered and held for reinstallation at

a future date.

The Japanese found this latest advance difficult to accept. Suicides

were many and random. Soldiers

jumped off cliffs, hugged exploding

grenades, even cut their own throats.

Private First Class George F.

Eftang, with the 4th Marines' supporting pack howitzer battalion, saw

the suicides: "1 could see the Japanese

jumping to their deaths. I actually

felt sorry for them. I knew they had

families and sweethearts like anyone

else'

While the embattled peninsula still

swarmed with patrols, Admiral Spruance; Generals Smith, Geiger, Larsen

(the future island commander), and

Shepherd; Colonels Shapley and

Schneider, and others who could be

spared, arrived for a ceremonial flag

raising and heartfelt tribute to an old

barracks and those Marines who had

made it home. General Shepherd

called it hallowed ground and told

the distinguished assemblage, which

included a hastily cleaned-up honor

guard of brigade troops: "you have

avenged the loss of our comrades

who were overcome by a numerically

superior force three days after Pearl

Harbor. Under our flag this island

again stands ready to fulfill its destiny as an American fortress in the

Pacific'

Many of the Marines standing at

attention, watching the historic

ceremony, could only thank God that

they were still alive. At the end of

this ceremony, engineers moved onto

the airfield to clear away debris and

fill the many shell and bomb holes.

30

Only six hours after the first bulldozer clanked onto the runways, a Navy

torpedo bomber made an emergency

landing. Soon the light artillery spotting planes were regularly flying

from them.

The capture of Orote Peninsula

had cost the brigade 115 men killed,

721 wounded, and 38 missing in action. The enemy toll of counted dead

was 1,633. It was obvious that on

Orote as at Fonte, there were many

Japanese still unaccounted for and

presumably ready still to fight to prevent the island's capture.

With the breakthrough at Fonte

and failure of Takashina's mass counterattack, the American positions

could be consolidated. The 3d and

21st Marines squared away their
holds on heights and the 9th Marines

(July 27-29) pushed its final way up

to Mount Alutom and Mount

Chachao.

The most serious resistance to occupying the Mount Alutom-Mount

Chachao massif and securing the

Force Beachhead Line (FBHL) across

the hills was a surprisingly strong

point at the base of Mount Chachao.

Major Donald B. Hubbard, commanding the 3d Battalion, 9th Marines (replacing Lieutenant Colonel

Asmuth, wounded on W-Day),

called down artillery, and, after the

barrage, his Marines attacked with

grenades and bayonets. They destroyed everything that stood in their

path. When that fight was over,

Major Hubbard's battalion counted

135 Japanese dead. As the assault

force pushed up these commanding

slopes, the Marines could spot men

of Company A of the 305th Infantry atop Mount Tenjo to the west.

Lieutenant Colonel Carey A. Randall's 1st Battalion, 9th Marines, then

moved up and made contact with the

Army troops. Originally, Mount

Tenjo had been in the 3d Division

zone, but General Bruce had wanted to get his men on the high ground

so they could push ahead along the

heights and not get trapped in the ravines. He also wanted to prevent the

piecemeal commitment of his division and to preserve its integrity.

Conservative estimates put the

Japanese dead as a result of the counterattack at 3,200 men. The loss of

Takashina's infantry officers, including General Shigematsu, who had

commanded the 48th Independent

Mixed Brigade, was held to be as high

as 96 percent. Takashina himself fell

to the fire from a machine gun on an

American tank as he was urging survivors out of the Fonte position and

on to the north to fight again. With

Takashina's death, tactical command

of all Japanese forces remaining on

Guam was assumed by General Obata. He had only a few senior officers

remaining to rally the surviving

defenders and organize cohesive units

from the shattered remnants of the

battalions that had fought to hold the

heights above the Asan-Adelup

beaches.

All through the night of 28 July,

Japanese troops trudged along the

paths that led from Fonte to Ordot,

finding their way at times by the light

Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 88153

A Marine uses a flamethrower on a Japanese-occupied pilibox on what had been

the Marine golf course on Guam, adjoining the Marine Barracks on 0 rote Peninsula.

This Japanese airstrip on 0 rote Peninsula was one of the prime

objectives of the 1st Provisional Marine Brigade in its zone.

Pockmarks on the strip resulted from the aerial, ships'

gunfire, and artillery bombardments directed at this target.

Department of Defense Photo (IJSMC)88134

31

— - ,t.. fl- --n-._ -

- - I' - : .-.. nt

j')'Tt. - -'

4 r
I L 4

of American flares. At Ordot, two

traffic control points guided men

toward Barrigada, where three composite infantry companies were forming, or toward Finegayan, where a

force of five composite companies

was to man blocking positions. As he

fully expected the Americans to conduct an aggressive pursuit on the

29th, General Obata ordered Lieutenant Colonel Takeda to organize a

delaying force that would hold back

the Marines until the withdrawal

could be effected.

Contrary to the Japanese commander's expectations, General

Geiger had decided to rest his battleweary troops before launching a fullscale attack to the north. The substance of his orders to the 3d and.

77th Divisions on 29 July was to

eliminate the last vestiges of Japanese

resistance within the FBHL, organize

a line of defense, and patrol in

strength to the front. With capture of

the beachhead line and its critical

high ground and the annihilation of

great numbers of Japanese, the turning point of the Guam campaign had

been reached.

Yet, few Japanese had surrendered

and those captured were usually

dazed, wounded, or otherwise unable to resist. Almost all of the enemy died fighting, even when their

lives were lost without sense or purpose. Still, a substantial number of

troops from the 29th Division were

still not accounted for.

General Geiger's intelligence sections could only list about one quarter of the estimated soldier-sailor

strength that had been on the island,

and he needed to make certain that

his rear was secure from attack before heading north after the enemy.

Captured Japanese documents and

prisoners of war, and sightings from

aircraft, all indicated to Geiger that

the Japanese had withdrawn to the

north to better roads, denser and

more concealing jungle, and commanding terrain for strongpoints.

To ensure that his rear area was

not threatened, General Geiger had

the 77th Division detail patrols to

scour the southern half of Guam,

repeating and intensifying the

searches the brigade had made.

These soldiers, as the Marines before

them, found Guamanians everywhere, some in camps established by

the Japanese, others on their farms

and ranches. The natives, some surprised to see Americans so soon after the landings, reported the

presence of only small bands of

Japanese and often only single soldiers. It became increasingly evident

that the combat units that remained

were in the north, not the south. The

best estimates of their strength

ranged around a figure of 6,000 men.

Obata had expected a hasty pursuit, and set up strong rear guards to

give time for his retreating forces to

organize. Victory was no longer even

a hope, but the Japanese could still

extract a painful cost. General Geiger,

who had a little time now, could give

his troops a rest and move into attack positions across the width of the

island. Strong and frequent patrols

were sent out to find routes cross

A tank-infantry team from the 4th Marines advances slowly

through the dense scrub growth that characterized the terDepartment of Defense Photo (USMC) 88152

rain in the regiment's zone on Orote Peninsula. The attack

moved forward yard by yard until the objective was secured.

Marines of the 1st Provisional Brigade hurl hand grenades at enemy positions on

the other side of one of the rice paddies that slowed their advance toward 0 rote.

32

U4

ct' I(1

Is? tP'

'•1

., .-,-I r- c:

4tv_ta
1

—t

• trenches, anything, by the Navy Marines, and Army spotter planes which

were constantly overhead.

country and glimpse clues of enemy

strength and dispositions.

Obata organized delaying defenses

to include the southwest slopes of

Mount Barrigada, midway across the

island from Tumon Bay, and the little town of Barrigada itself, barely 20

houses. On all approaches to his final defensive positions near Mount

Santa Rosa, in the northwest corner

of the island, he organized roadblocks at trail and road junctions,

principally at Finegayan and Yigo,

and concealed troops in the jungle to

interdict the roads which were the

only practical approach routes to the

northern end of the island. The

Japanese commander felt sorely besieged, and as his notes later revealed:

"the enemy air force seeking our units

during daylight hours in the forest,

bombed and strafed even a single

soldier:' Perhaps even more damaging than the air attacks were artillery

and naval gunfire bombardments

brought down on men, guns,

III Corps's Geiger knew Obata's

probable route of retreat and drew up

a succession of objectives across the

island which would incrementally

seize all potential enemy strongpoints. Jump-off for the drive north

was 0630 31 July with the 3d Marine

Division on the left and the 77th Infantry Division on the right, dividing

the island down the middle. The Marine zone would include the island

capital of Agana, the Japanese airfield at Tiyan, Finegayan, and the

shores of Tumon Bay. The 77th

would have Mount Barrigada, Yigo,

and Mount Santa Rosa in its zone.

The 1st Marine Brigade relieved the

77th Division of the defense of the

southern portion of the FBHL and

would continue to patrol the

southern half of Guam. As the Corps

attack moved northward and the island widened, the brigade would

eventually take part in the drive to

the extreme north coast of the island.

Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 93468

Marines bypass two smoldering Japanese light tanks, knocked out of action by

Marine Sherman medium tanks on the road to Sumay on Orote Peninsula.

Marine artillerymen, members of Battery C, 7th 155mm (Long

Toms) Gun Battalion, III Amphibious Corps Artillery, take

advantage of a lull in fire missions to swab the bore of their

gun. Soon after, the gun was back in battery firing missions.

Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 91347

33

- j;-- 3

74;
'C

midriff of the island, the Agana-Pago

Road would prove critical in winning

the battle of Guam.

The 3d Division reached Ordot in

the center of its zone where Obata

had directed some of his survivors.

The 3d Battalion, 21st Marines, ran

into them and one of their pillboxes,

which the Marines thoroughly gutted. The Americans also accounted

for 15 infantrymen and two light

tanks which were the targets of M-ls

and bazookas.

The honor of liberating Agana fell

to the 3d Battalion, 3d Marines. The

riflemen entered the town's ruins

treading carefully, sizing up the stark,

dusty building walls for snipers. A

few enemy riflemen emerged from

behind concrete outcroppings then

dropped back into eternity. The

Japanese guards were stragglers, the

wounded, or a few foolish enough to

stay. In one house, a Marine opened

a closet to reveal a Japanese officer,

sword in hand. The Marine slammed

the door, riddled it with an automatic rifle, and didn't bother to look

again. The once-beautiful old Plaza

de Espana was in American hands 15

minutes after the town was entered.

By noon it was secured.

The 1st and 2d Battalions, 3d Marines,moved along to the critical

Agana-Pago Road. At 1350 the 21st

Marines was right up there with

them after the few engagements with

pillboxes, snipers, and tanks. By

1510, Colonel Craig's 9th Marines on

the division's right was partially

across the road and seized the remaining portion of that highway in

its sector on the next day. Hardsurfaced, with two lanes across the

Leaving Agana and its historic rescue of the capital, the 3d Battalion,

3d Marines, under Major Royal R.

Bastian, Jr., who had taken command when Lieutenant Colonel

Houser was wounded on 22 July,

moved on with relative ease. Before

dusk the battalion had seized 1,400

yards of other critical roads and trails

which led to strategic and defended

strongpoints of Finegayan and Barrigada.

General Turnage got well within

striking distance of the Tiyan airfield

and the little town of San Antonio,

on the 31st, but the next day, 1 August, his advance was seriously

slowed by mines. It took the cool skill

and slow and steady hands of the

bomb disposal specialists of the 25th

Naval Construction Battalion and the

19th Marines' engineers to reduce

those obstacles.

Students of the battle and those

who were there consider the taking

of the cross-island Agana-Pago Road

as a major factor in guaranteeing the

success of the drive northward. Its

capture solved a host of logistic

Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 93543

Fleet Marine Force, Pacific commander LtGen Holland M. Smith, right, stands with

the leaders of the successful retaking of Orote Peninsula. From left to right, LtCol

Alan Shapley; BGen Lernuel C. Shepherd, Jr.; and Col Merlin F Schneider.

As the regimental field music sounds "To the Colors," Col Schneider and his 22d

Marines staff and command salute as the American flag is raised over Guam for

the first time since it was taken down by the Japanese invaders in December 1941.

34

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.9

• .., I l Vr .1 —. — : w. • We I — C 1• 4.. 4—

d. _1ialt :.__• '_

4

a

posed, the 77th by noon of 1 August

was across the Pago River. Residents

of the area said the Japanese had left

in a hurry for Barrigada, a destination where III Corps intelligence already anticipated the enemy would

hold up. The jungle-covered mountain there, 674 feet high, dominated

the area.

General Bruce assigned the capture

of Barrigada to the 307th. It was to

maintain contact with the 3d Marine

Division on the left and push

through the town, then continue

about a mile to seize Mount Barrigada. The 305th to the right of the

307th would attack in the same direction east of the town and Barrigada

mountain and protect to the coast.

The town was in a clearing fully

swept with defensive machine gun

fire. In the same clearing was a

much-desired well. Its capture meant

the world to the parched troops.

At 0630, 2 August General Bruce Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 93571

Troops of the 3d Battalion, 3d Marines, enter the wreckage of Agana in the trace dispatched a dozen tanks of the 706th

of retreating Japanese forces, who had planted land mines before they left. Tank Battalion on a reconnaissance.

As the "recon" armor turned into Barproblems, for the 77th particularly.

The Army division, for example, had Soldiers of the 77th Division reach the end of the road bulldozed by the 302d Enno roads heading north initially in its gineer Combat Battalion, and strike out cross country in the 31 July advance.

zone of advance and needed such a

road over which it could supply its

troops as they came down out of the

hills and cut their way through the

jungle. Frontline troops in the Army

zone were soon running low on supplies, especially water. General Bruce

promised his people a hot breakfast

as soon as they and the Marines

could give him the road. Trucks were

soon thick on the road even while

SeaBees and engineers were enlarging and repairing it.

The 77th had moved out on schedule just after daylight on 31 July, with

the 307th Infantry in the advance,

followed by the 305th. As was the situation facing the 3d Division, enemy

resistance to the Army advance was

negligible. Within two hours, both

Army regiments had secured the

cross-island road in their zones. The

307th rescued 2,000 Guamanians in

the detention camp at Asinan. Unop35

: t

T

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7
GUAM

On'y Aoo*e orm Unes 5'

PAT P OL

AREA

LAMLAM / 2000C F- r0 4000 6000 8000 r —r—----— - 1 YARDS

tasked the 1st Battalion, 22d Marines; the 7th Antiaircraft Artillery

Battalion; and the 9th Defense Battalion, all under Lieutenant Colonel

Archie E. O'Neil, who commanded

the 9th.

rigada town, the enemy opened up

with a torrent of fire. The determined

Japanese fiercely resisted the 307th

when it reached the town and were

equally determined to stop the 305th

on the right as that regiment's assault

companies tried to outflank the town.

Repeated tank attacks and heavy artillery support netted only a few

yards at a time, but the soldiers kept

advancing and by 4 August, the 77th

Division held the town, or what was

left of it, its precious well, and the

crest of the mountain.

Captured documents and interviews with prisoners again left little

doubt that the 77th Division's major

obstacle would be rugged, heavily

crevassed, and jungled Mount Santa

Rosa. It is six and a half miles northeast of Barrigada and a short distance

from the ocean on the east coast.

First to be addressed on the way

were well-armed outposts like

Finegayan and Yigo. Each promised

casualties, blood, and delay. General

Geiger employed the 77th to reduce

Yigo and take Santa Rosa, and left

the capture of Finegayan and the rest

of northern Guam principally to the

3d Marine Division. He brought up

General Shepherd's brigade to assist

in the final drive. To protect the Force

Beachhead Line, care for the Guamanians, and hunt down enemy stragglers in the south, General Geiger

36

Before moving on, the brigade had

aggressively sought out Japanese

holdouts, brought the fearful

Guamanians into friendly compounds, and provided security for

those who chose to remain in their

own homes and again work their

own ranches. As late as 2 August, 4th

Marines' patrols approaching Talof ofo Bay on the southeast coast, came

across some 2,000 natives, still apprehensive of the Japanese, who were

directed to a compound which

promised safety and at least minimum comforts. The Guamanian people in their own residential and farm

areas could, however, still readily call

upon the civil affairs sections for

food, protection, medicine, and

shelter. Such civil care was integral to

the American occupation and was

controlled by Marine General Larsen,

who would head the garrison force

as soon as the island was again under the American flag.

During the night of 2-3 August,

the 12th Marines delivered 777

rounds of harassing and interdictory

fire on the roads and trails the division would encounter around

Finegayan. At 0700 on 3 August, the

3d and 9th Marines moved in assault

well past the Tinyan airfield. Then,

about 0910 the 9th encountered a

block at the cross roads approaching

Finegayan village. The situation and

terrain favored the Japanese with excellent fields of fire. After the

Japanese position was finally overrun with tanks, Lieutenant Colonel

Carey Randall, commanding 1st Battalion, 9th Marines, said that these

defenses were the toughest he had

faced on Guam.

That contest for Finegayan was the

last major battle for the 3d Division

on Guam. The Japanese made it

something to remember. A 3d Divi-
ii

4* if

of a mortar barrage and it looked like

the beginning of a counterattack. Artillery stilled that Japanese effort.

The enemy tanks were driven off but

survived to reappear again another

day.

It was in one of those typical sudden enemy attacks around Finegayan

that Private First Class Frank P. Witek, with automatic rifle and

grenades, raced ahead of his own

tanks to destroy an eight-man

Japanese position which was holding

back elements of his 1st Battalion,

9th Marines. He succeeded, but was

killed. He was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor.

sion armored reconnaissance patrol

headed for Ritidian Point on the

northernmost point of the island ran

into Japanese defenses located on the

Finegayan trails bristling with antitank weapons and artillery pointed

in the direction of the patrol. The

Americans were surprised and

The Japanese were plenty feisty at

Finegayan, and in a telling thrust dispatched two medium tanks which

skirted the crossroads of the 9th Marines at Junction 177 and went up the

Finegayan-Mount Santa Rosa Road.

Impervious to Marine fire, the tanks

shot up the area and got away.

On 4 August, the new frontlines

and scheme of maneuver were being

set up to keep pressure on General

Obata and his holdouts, and make

a place for General Shepherd and his

brigade. During the afternoon, the

brigade reached its northern assembly area and General Shepherd set up

his CP near San Antonio. In the final advance north, the brigade would

be on the left with its inland flank

within a mile of the western beaches.

The 3d Division would be in the

center deploying its units on a threeregiment front which would swerve

to the east to take in the whole northern end of the island and as well supDepartment of Defense Photo (USMC) 92327

The Catholic cemetery of Anigua became the home of approximately 7,000 Guamanians liberated from Japanese rule. Here a family lives in a temporary shelter.

bruised, did the Japanese some harm, Another tank force of undetermined

but sensibly cancelled the mission. size then rumbled down under cover

37
port the 77th Division.

The Japanese now faced an overwhelming number of attack forces.

And there would be plenty of help

from the sea and from the air. General Bruce's soldiers made the principal

corps drive to destroy the remaining

Japanese and attacked Mount Santa

Rosa. Priority of fires of corps artillery, air support, and ships gunfire

was now given to the Army. These

new arrangements were to take effect

on 7 August.

Making new strides to end the

campaign, the 3d and 21st Marines

progressed handily but the 9th Marines kept running into dense jungle

that was such a tangled mess that

tanks passed each other 15 feet apart

without knowing the other was

there. The division accelerated its advance in battalion columns. On 6 August, it had progressed 5,000 yards

along the road to Ritidian Point, the

end of the island and the end of the

battle for Guam. As that evening fell,

the 3d Division was in visual contact

north of Guam. Here, a blinding flash from a Long Tom lights

up the dark Guam night as it joins other guns in the shelling.

Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 93340

During the night of 2-3 August, U.S. artillery delivered many

rounds of harassing and interdiction fire on the enemy in the

38
S it

Captured by 1st Brigade Marines, rebuilt by Marine engineers, Squadrons 217, 225, and 321, and Marine Night Fighter Squaand in full-scale operation, the Orote Peninsula airstrip is dron 534. Taxiing down the strip are Vought F4U Corsair fighthome to Marine Aircraft Group 21 and its Marine Fighter ers, while parked off the runway are Grumann F6F Heilcats.

Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 92396

39

PFC Witek's Medal of Honor Hailed 'Inspiring Acts'

rivate First Class Frank Peter d' Witek's Medal of Honor citation reads as follows: "For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at

the risk of his life above and beyond

the call of duty while serving with the

1st Battalion, 9th Marines, 3d Marine

Division, during the Battle of

Finegayen at Guam, Marianas Islands,

on 3 August 1944. When his rifle platoon was halted by heavy surprise fire

from well camouflaged enemy positions, Private First Class Witek daringly remained standing to fire a full

magazine from his [Browning] automatic [rifle] at point-blank range into

a depression housing Japanese troops,

killing eight of the enemy and enabling

the greater part of his platoon to take

cover. During his platoons withdrawal for consolidation of lines, he remained to safeguard a severely

wounded comrade, courageously

returning the enemy's fire until the arrival of stretcher bearers, and then

covering the evacuation by sustained

fire as he moved backward toward his

own lines. With his platoon again

pinned down by a hostile machine

gun, Private First Class Witek, on his

initiative, moved forward boldly to the

reinforcing tanks, and infantry, alternately throwing hand grenades and firing as he advanced to within 5 to 10

yards of the enemy position, and destroying the hostile machine-gun emplacement and an additional eight

Japanese before he himself was struck

down by an enemy rifleman. His valiant and inspiring action effectively

reduced the enemy's firepower, thereby enabling his platoon to attain its objective, and reflects the highest credit

upon Private First Class Witek and the

United States naval service. He gallantly gave his life for his country:'
.4

fresh regiment, the 306th, which had

come up from the south where it had

patrolled with the brigade. It was in

contact with the 9th Marines on the

division boundary. Colonel Douglas

C. McNair, 77th Division chief of

staff, was there, too, seeking a site for

a division CF and was killed by a

sniper. Colonel McNair's father,

Lieutenant General Leslie J. McNair,

was killed in France 12 days earlier

during an American bombing raid.

The attack on Mount Santa Rosa

began at noon, 7 August. Behind the

rumble of artillery and rattle of

tanks, answered in kind by the enemy, the 77th took Yigo, the door to

Santa Rosa, and continued General

Bruce's wheeling maneuver. Bulldozers blazed trails, and tanks and infantry overran machine gun

positions. The 77th was dug into positions on the night of 7-8 August

ready for the final attack on the

mountain. The expected big Japanese

counterattack still did not come. The

rapid advance of the Americans accompanied by heavy artillery support likely forestalled that forelorn

hope.

Two regiments, the 305th and

307th, proceeded rapidly on 8 August. By 1240, the northern half of

with the 77th Infantry Division, Sherman tanks of the Army 706th Tank Battalion pass through Agcina before takwherever the all-encompassing jun- ing the cross-island road to join the 77th Division prior to the Barrigada action.

gle allowed.

Meanwhile, heavy Seventh Air

Force bombing as well as artillery

and naval shelling of enemy areas

had been going on for days. Night

fighters were now assigned to support the advance, so even darkness

afforded the Japanese no protection.

By that same 6 August, the defense

line that General Obata had set

across Guam had been shattered and

overrun. Only isolated pockets now

existed before Santa Rosa.

No American commander could

say on 7 August when the fight for

Guam would be over. General Bruce

in his attack first to Yigo and then

Santa Rosa would have a relatively

40
Mount Santa Rosa was in American

hands, and the troops moved to secure the rest of the mountain. By

1440 the Army had reached the cliffs

by the sea and could look right down

to the ocean. The 306th infantry had

also completed an enveloping move

to take the northern slopes of Mount

Santa Rosa.

Only 600 enemy bodies were

found after the two-day fight for

Yigo and Santa Rosa. Yet, estimates

of the enemy personnel at Santa Rosa

had been as high as 5,000. So this

meant that enemy troops in significant number now infested the jungled

terrain everywhere on Guam. Worse,

some enemy tanks were also unaccounted for. Enemy survivors of the

Mount Santa Rosa battle kept drifting into the 9th Marines lines on the

Army flank, slowing the regiment's

advance. Sharp-eyed Marines noted

more than a smattering of enemy

movement near a particular hill in

the Army zone. This was believed to

be the command post area of General

Obata.

The 3d Marines on the left of the

division's zone had progressed with

the same occasional enemy opposition. A 19-man roadblock held up

the Marines, but was taken out

quickly. Searching a corridor between the 3d and the 9th Marines,

the 21st Marines came upon the bodies of 30 Guamanians near Chaguian. They had been beheaded.

The brigade had it a little easier on

the far west, for it found negligible

resistance as it advanced along fairly good trails. On 8 August, a patrol

of the 22d Marines reached Ritidian

Point, the northernmost point of the

island. Moving along a twisting cliff

trail to the beach, the Marines encountered less-than-aggressive

Japanese defenses which they quickly

overcame. General Shepherd's 1st

Provisional Marine Brigade had the

distinction of being first to reach both

the southernmost point of the island

in the early days of the campaign and

the northernmost section of Guam at

Ritidian Point at this time.

General Shepherd's Marines began

vigorously patrolling the area it they

occupied, but found few Japanese.

As a result, General Geiger reduced

the amount of naval gunfire placed

on the area, while Saipan-based

Seventh Air Force P-47's made their

last bombing and strafing runs on

Ritidian Point. The 22d Marines was

down below the cliffs at Ritidian,

scouring along the beaches where

there are many caves. The 4th Marines was on the north coast at Mengagan Point and tied by patrols to the

22d Marines. At 1800, 9 August,

41

General Shepherd declared organized

resistance had ceased in his zone.

It was not so easy for the 3d Marines. On the night of 8-9 August

near Tarague, the regiment was hit

by a last-resort Japanese mortar and

tank attack. Marine antitank

grenades and bazooka rockets were

wet and ineffective and the Japanese

blazed away with impunity and then

ducked back into the woods. Amazingly, when Major William A. Cu!-

pepper, commanding the 2d

Battalion (Lieutenant Colonel de

Zayas had been killed on 26 July),

counted heads, he found that he had

suffered not a single casualty.

Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 94395

MajGen Henry L. Larsen, left, designated island commander, meets with BGen

Lemuel C. Shepherd, Jr., commanding general of the 1st Provisional Marine Brigade,

and Col Robert Blake, Gen Larsen's chief of staff. With them are three Guamanians who enlisted in the Navy before the war and are now visiting their homes.
Patrols of the 9th Marines advanced to Pati Point, the northeast

projection of the island. Intelligence

sources then reported to Colonel

Craig that a mass of Japanese (maybe

2,000) troops were holed up at

Savana Grand, a wild tract of jungle, coconut trees, and high grasses

near the coast. Colonel Craig did not

want to risk casualties so close to the

end of the campaign, so the artillery

supporting the 9th Marines fired a total of 2,280 rounds. The few Japanese

survivors were either killed or became prisoners. The final American

positions formed along the coast. By

nightfall of 8 August, Colonel Craig's

Marines could wave to the soldiers of

the 306th patrolling to their south.

General Geiger was not ready to

declare Guam secure until a pocket

of tanks still existing in the 3d Division zone was wiped out. That had

to be done by the 10th, for that was

the day Admiral Nimitz was scheduled to arrive on a visit. There were

tanks indeed and the task of finding

and eliminating them was given to

Major Culpepper's 2d Battalion, 3d

Marines. Advancing at 0730, the battalion and a platoon of American

Sherman tanks soon found two enemy mediums firing, only 400 yards

up the trail the Marines were following. The Shermans left their counterparts black and burning. Seven more

enemy mediums were abandoned. A

Japanese infantry platoon withdrew

to the coastal cliffs and was killed

there.

On that day, 10 August, at 1131

as he learned that the last Japanese

tanks still in action had been destroyed, General Geiger declared all

organized resistance on Guam had

ended. It was a great day for the

Guamanians. The island was theirs

again.

It was also the next to the last day

for General Obata. His Mount

Mataguac position was strongly

defended, so much so that when the

306th had tried to force it earlier it

failed. On the morning of 11 August

1944, when the general knew his

headquarters had been discovered

and that his enemy was coming for

him, Obata signalled to his emperor:

We are continuing a

42

THE FINAL DRIVE- 7-JO AUGUST

SHOWING NIGHT DEFENSIVE POSITIONS OF &SSAIJLT BATTALIONS - =
I'

'1 p

I. •7

'U

r

k

;-.- ..eJ\ .rt

Prisoners of war in the Guam stockade stand with bowed heads as they are read the August 1945 surrender announcement.

desperate battle. We have only

our bare hands to fight with.

The holding of Guam has become hopeless. Our souls will

defend the island to the very

end. I am overwhelmed with

sorrow for the families of the

many officers and men. I pray

for the prosperity of the

Empire.

The 306th made the last assault

supported by tanks and demolition

squads. The enemy defenders killed

seven Americans and wounded 17

before they went down to defeat, buried in the rubble of blown caves and

emplacements. General Obata took

his own life or was killed sometime

during those last hours of the battle

of Guam.

Major General Henry L. Larsen as-

• sumed command of the Guam Island

Command at 1200, 15 August. Under him, and largely with the forces

of the 3d Marine Division, the mopping up continued.

Part of Japan's terrible cost on

Guam was the 10,971 bodies already

counted. Yet there were some 10,000

Enemy holdouts accompanied by their

mascot are brought in to surrender after

intensive preparations by the Island

Command Psychological Warfare Unit.

43

Japanese still on the island. At first

some of these men fought and staged

ambushes, and a few sniped at the

Americans, but soon the remaining

Japanese sought only one thing—

food! Most of the others fled when

encountered. The Japanese now had

no central command. They starved,

died of dysentery, became too weak

to flee, and then blew themselves up

with the one precious grenade which

they saved to take their own lives.

Aggressive American patrols were

soon killing or capturing 80 Japanese

soldiers and sailors a day. A daring

few stole into Marine food storage

areas at night. One soldier scribbled:

"All around me are enemy only. It

takes a brave man indeed to go in

search of food:'

In addition to the battlefield

casualties, more than 8,500 Japanese

were killed or captured on Guam between August 1944 and the end of
-

-- \

\

the war in August 1945.

In the 21 days of the Guam campaign ending 10 August, Marine

units of the III Amphibious Corps

reported 1,190 men killed in action,

377 dead of wounds, and 5,308

wounded. The 77th Division's casualties were 177 soldiers killed and 662

wounded. The Army and the Marines were a closely knit team in the

recapture of Guam. It is reputed that

General Holland Smith was the first

to refer to General Bruce's troops as

the "77th Marines." Major Aplington,

a battalion commander in the 3d Marines, commented on the soldiers:

In their fatigues so different

from our herringbone utilities

and their olive drab ponchos

(ours were camouflaged) so

different from us . . . there was

no doubt in our minds that the

77th were good people to have

alongside in a fight and as a

result we referred to them as

"The 77th Marine Division:'

On the same busy day, 10 August,

only hours after Major Culpepper's

battalion had knocked out the last of

the Japanese tanks, the Indianapolis

(CA 35) steamed into Apra Harbor

with Marine Corps Commandant

Lieutenant General Alexander A.

Vandegrift on board, accompanying

Admiral Nimitz. On 15 August, Admiral Nimitz directed that his forward CinCPac-CinCPOA headquarters be established on Guam, and

from here, he directed the rest of the

Pacific War. Soon after, from airfields on Guam, as well as those on

Tinian, B-29s were blasting the

Japanese home islands. Hard fighting was yet to be experienced by Marine divisions on Peleliu, Iwo Jima,

and Okinawa. But whether they

knew it or not, the end of the war

was less than a year away.

Spruance to the island. From left are MajGen Roy S. Geiger,

Commanding General, III Amphibious Corps; Adm Spruance;

LtGen Holland M. Smith, Commanding General, Fleet Marine Force, Pacific; Adrn Nimitz; and Gen Vandegrift. While

together they discussed the future course of the Pacific War.

Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 92087

The architects of victory in the Pacific met together on Guam

on 10 August 1944, when Indianapolis (CA 35) brought Commandant of the Marine Corps LtGen Alexander A. Vandegrift

together with Commander in Chief, Pacific Fleet, Adm Chester

W Nimitz and Fifth Fleet Commander Adm Raymond L.

44
In addition to the official Marine

Corps histories of the Guam campaign, Major 0. Robert Lodge's The

Recapture of Guam (Washington,

1954), and Henry I. Shaw, Jr., Bernard C. Nalty, and Edwin H. Turnbladh's Central Pacific Drive, vol

III, History of U.S. Marine Corps

Operations in World War II

(Washington 1966), the author consulted the Army's official history,

Philip A. Crowl's Campaign in the

Marianas (Washington, 1960). Of

value also were the 3d Division's

history by Robert A. Aurthur and

Kenneth Cohimia, The Third Marine Division (Washington, 1948),

the classic U.S. Marines and Amphibious War by Jeter A. Iseley and

Philip A. Crowl (Princeton, 1951),

RAdm Samuel Eliot Morison's The

Two Ocean War (Boston, 1976),

The Fall of Japan by William A.

Craig (New York, 1967), and LtGen

Victor H. Krulak's First to Fight

(Annapolis, 1984).

Historians at all the Services'

Washington historical offices were

universally helpful, but I would

particularly like to thank Dr. Terrence J. Gough of the Army's

Center of Military History and Dr.

Robert Browning, the Coast Guard

historian for their assistance. Conversations and correspondence, and

oral history interviews, with the

following were helpful: Jack Kerrins; MajGen Charles L. Davis,

AUS (Ret); BGen Vincente (Ben)

Blaz, USMC (Ret); Col Martin I.

"Stormy" Sexton, USMC (Ret); Col

Fraser E. West, USMC (Ret); LtCol

Wilcie A. O'Bannon, USMC (Ret);

Col Henry Aplington II, USMC

(Ret); Dr. William H. Putney; Dale

M. Quillan; William L. Dunlap;

Paul Ulrich; and Alfred G. Don.

Even if their words were not used,

their thoughts and observations

were carefully considered. The

author's own experiences on Guam

as a Marine combat correspondent

pervaded his whole account.

C

yril J. O'Brien served in a line company with

the 3d Marines, 3d Marine Division,

on Bougainville, and then as a Combat Correspondent in the battles for Guam and Iwo Jima.

Following World War II, he covered Capitol Hill

as a Washington correspondent, then joined the

staff of the John Hopkins University Applied

Physics Laboratory where he was a science writer

and supervisor of media relations. He attended

St. Joseph's University, Philadelphia, and the

American University, Washington, D.C. He lives

in Silver Spring, Maryland.

An editing error appears in the 1994 History and Museums Division pamphlet,

A Different War: Marines in Europe and North Africa, by Lieutenant Colonel Harry

W. Edwards, USMC (Ret), from the "World War II Commemorative Series." On

page 8, the photo caption which begins "Then-Col Julian C. Smith, left , should

read "Then-Col Julian C. Smith, below

94 i9

WORLD WAR II

THIS PAMPHLET HISTORY, one in a series devoted to U.S. Marines in the

World War II era, is published for the education and training of Marines by

the History and Museums Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps,

Washington, D.C., as a part of the U.S. Department of Defense observance

of the 50th anniversary of victory in that war.

Editorial costs of preparing this pamphlet have been defrayed in part by

a bequest from the estate of Emilie H. Watts, in memory of her late husband,

Thomas M. Watts, who served as a Marine and was the recipient of a Purple

Heart.

WORLD WAR II COMMEMORATIVE SERIES

DIRECTOR OF MARINE CORPS HISTORY AND MUSEUMS

Brigadier General Edwin H. Simmons, USMC (Ret)

GENERAL EDITOR,

WORLD WAR II COMMEMORATIVE SERIES

Benis M. Frank

CARTOGRAPHIC CONSULTANT

George C. MacGillivray

EDITING AND DESIGN SECTION, HISTORY AND MUSEUMS DIVISION

Robert E. Struder, Senior Editor; W. Stephen Hill, Visual Information

Specialist; Catherine A. Kerns, Composition Services Technician

Marine Corps Historical Center

Building 58, Washington Navy Yard

Washington, D.C. 20374-5040

1994

PCN 190 003126 00