Still the enemy landings at Guadalcanal go on. Bit by bit, they are building up their forces—even now, so soon after their second big attack to break through our lines and take the airport has failed. Last night the group of ships which came in and shelled us probably also landed their daily load of troops.
This afternoon we talked with some of the Raiders about the Battle of the Ridge, and heard some interesting stories about the Japs, how, for instance, they often ask to be killed when they are captured, but seem relieved when we do not oblige. Then they feel they have complied with their part of the death-before-dishonor formula, and make no further attempt to deprive themselves of life.
Several of the Jap prisoners captured on the ridge, it seems, said “Knife” when they were captured, and made hara-kiri motions in the region of the belly. But when no knife was forthcoming, they seemed relieved, and after that made no attempt to kill themselves.
Later this afternoon we heard that a large body of our troops is going out tomorrow to conduct a reconnaissance in force to the south of the airport, to try to find out how far the Japs have fallen back. Durdin, McCarthy, Dowling and I decided to go along.
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 20
Our reconnaissance started at about five o’clock this morning, and after that, for thirteen solid hours, we plowed through jungle and slipped and slid up and down the steepest ridges I have ever climbed. It was a lesson in the geography of Guadalcanal which I will not forget.
Much of the time we were hiking was spent in traversing the sides of ridges. The trails were muddy and slippery from rain which fell early this morning, and I found that a tripod posture, the three supports being formed by two legs and one arm, was the best way to stay on your feet.
We also spent considerable time in the thickest and most unpleasant jungles I have seen. We followed trails most of the time, but even these were covered with tangles of brambly vines, prickly leaves and tree branches protected by long spines.
But our group of troops, led by Col. Edson, at least did not run into any Japs. Other groups which joined in our reconnaissance found a few snipers. A group of our new reinforcements fired continuously, as we had done when we first came to Guadalcanal; they were as chary of shadows and as “trigger-happy” as we had been.
We found evidences that the Japs had moved away in a great hurry and in great disorganization. We found bivouac areas where they had left packs, shoes, flags behind. And I spotted a pile of canvas cases by the side of one trail and found they were filled with the parts of a serviceable 75 mm. pack howitzer. And others found rifles and ammunition. We found the shattered remains of a few Japs who had been hit by our artillery, and others who had evidently died of their wounds.
Today our dive-bombers and torpedo planes had gone out to bomb Rekata Bay, we found on getting back to camp. They had bombed and strafed the base, and uncovered a cruiser nearby and got a hit which damaged, but did not sink, it.
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21
The ships which brought us reinforcements, also brought supplies, including clothes. I went to the quartermaster depot this morning, got some clothes that smelled delightfully like the dry-goods department in a store, and went up to the Lunga and had a good bath before putting on the new things. Then to Juan Morrera’s mess, which the marines call the Book-Cadillac, and afterward felt like a new man.
We sat about at Col. Hunt’s CP and talked about the reason for the slackening in the Jap air raids. The optimists said the Japs had taken such a drubbing from our fighters that they had no planes left. The pessimists said the foe were simply consolidating their forces for another and bigger effort; perhaps they would send over more planes less frequently, instead of twenty-five or twenty-seven every day.
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22
At Kukum this afternoon, I saw Dick Mangrum (now a lieutenant colonel) and Lieut. Turner Caldwell, who led, respectively, the original marine and naval dive-bomber groups which came to this island to work out of Henderson Field. Both Turner’s and Dick’s original squadrons have been largely supplanted by new, fresh groups, but the two leaders continued to fly until recently.
They had both grown thin as scarecrows, since I last saw them, and their faces were haggard. They told me they were exhausted from the night-and-day stint of work they had been doing.
“When the medicos used to tell us about pilot fatigue,” said Turner, “I used to think they were old fuds. But now I know what they meant. There’s a point where you just get to be no good; you’re shot to the devil—and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
I heard tonight that both Turner and Dick are going to be sent out of Guadal soon for a rest in some peaceful region.
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23
“Signs of civilization are coming to Guadalcanal,” said Gen. Vandegrift this morning. He told me how an engineer had come into his quarters and asked where he wanted the light. The general said he was surprised to find that the engineer was actually towing an electric wire behind him. The Jap power house which we had captured was in working order, and they had extended a line to the general’s camp.
The general said that he felt our situation on Guadalcanal was brightening a bit. The reinforcements had been a great help, he said, and he seemed assured that the naval protection of our shores would improve. I found out later in the day that a group of motor torpedo boats are on their way to help protect our coastline from the continued Japanese landings.
There is much “scuttlebutt” about more reinforcements coming into Guadalcanal. But the general feeling seems to be that if Army troops are brought in, they will only reinforce, not supplant, the marines, at least for the time being. The old dream of being home for Christmas is fading.
Many of our officers, however, are being sent home, to rest, and to train new groups of troops. That is another sign that we have reached at least a “breather.” And the Japs have confirmed the impression by abstaining from air-raiding us for another day, and failing even to send in the usual landing force of troop-carrying warships this evening.
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 24
We went to the Raiders’ CP for breakfast this morning, and had a good time yarning over pancakes. We talked about some of the close escapes we have had during this campaign, and Maj. Ken Bailey, one of the heroes of Tulagi and the battle on the ridge, said something touching about taking chances.
“You get to know these kids so well when you’re working with ’em,” he said, “and they’re such swell kids that when it comes to a job that’s pretty rugged, you’d rather go yourself than send them.”
(Maj. Bailey was killed three days later during a patrol action.)
VIII
BOMBER TO BOUGAINVILLE
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 25
We went to air operations this morning to get the results of last night’s attack on the Jap ships. The story was that they had been discovered yesterday afternoon, at a distance of about 100 miles from Cape Esperance. Our attack groups had gone out and dropped bombs, but the Japs had kept coming. Again, weather conditions and probably bad luck had hindered our marksmanship, and we had scored no hits. But after we had attacked four times, and the Japs had reached a point eight miles from the cape, they finally turned and retreated. Our pilots noticed that they were towing groups of landing boats.
I asked the general for permission to leave the island, and he told me with a chuckle that I had picked a good time. “They’re putting in a shower for me in a few days,” he said. “And when such luxuries come, the correspondent should go.”
One reason for my leaving Guadalcanal is that I have worn out my last pair of serviceable shoes—and unfortunately there are no replacements available for outsizes. I am wearing rubber-soled tennis shoes now—and they are hardly the thing for hiking through the jungle. I went to the quartermaster camp today to try to get a pair my size—which is fourteen—and the good quartermaster held up his hands in horror.
A B-17 came in today, and I asked the pilot, a very calm, very steady man n
amed Capt. Paul Payne (of Des Moines, Iowa), if he would give me transportation from Guadalcanal to a certain point to the south, whence I could make my way back to Honolulu.
Payne said, “Certainly, if you don’t mind going by way of Bougainville.”
That sounded dangerous. Bougainville is the northernmost island of the Solomons, and the largest. It is within easy striking distance of Rabaul, a great Jap air and naval base. And there is a Jap airfield, well protected by Zeros, on Buka Island at Bougainville’s northern tip.
The B-17, said Capt. Payne, will be on a reconnaissance mission. Would I want to go? I said I certainly would.
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 26
It was dawn when we climbed into the plane. The captain offered me a chocolate bar. “Our usual breakfast,” he said. Then they wound the props, and the starters squealed, and our motors were warming up.
We bounced along the runway, lifted and swung up and over Tulagi Bay. My post was in the cramped nose of the plane; I squatted next to the little desk where the navigator worked. Through the transparent plexiglas we watched the marvelous vista of blue water and sky rolling by. I was given a pair of headphones so that I could listen to the conversations on the communication circuit.
The sun came in the overhead window and was warm. The navigator, a slim young lieutenant named Clint Benjamin (Clinton W. Benjamin of Noxan, Pa.), took off his shirt. He had already acquired quite a tan, apparently from just such trips as this.
“There’s plenty of times when you do nothing but sit for hours,” he shouted above the drone of the engines. And that was what we did, until we hit Bougainville.
We passed “up the slot” (along the passages of water between the island rows of the Solomons), looking down at the myriad rugged, jungly islands that slipped under our wings. Time dragged.
We worked our way up amidst the towering banks of cumulus clouds. And finally Capt. Payne’s voice cracked into my earphones: “Navigator, bearing on Bougainville.”
The navigator replied with the bearing. The plane swung in a gentle turn. And ahead of us we saw a black, irregular island mass lying under the clouds.
Then we saw our first enemy plane. “Plane bearing 25,” a voice sang out into the earphones.
Payne’s calm voice said: “Two five or three five?”
“Two five,” came the answer. And then we saw the plane, moving in a direction directly opposite to ours, and about 2,000 overhead and to the right. He was well out of range. I got a glimpse of him; then he was gone to the rear, out of our vision.
“He’ll probably come over in a dive,” said Capt. Payne. But the plane did not come back. The gunners, however, stayed at their stations. We were apt to run into a horde of Japs any time now.
The navigator said: “Pilot, there should be ships in the harbor at the southern tip of Bougainville.”
“Is that Bougainville ahead?” asked Capt. Payne.
“Yes.”
Then a strange voice shouted on the communication system: “There’s two Zeros coming up behind us!” It was the voice of the tail gunner.
From then on we had action.
“They’re coming in,” said the tail gunner. And after a few seconds, “They’ve turned off.” Zeros are chary of the formidable B-17, but in such a moment as this, one thought swiftly of our aloneness over enemy territory and the swarms of enemy planes which must be around.
Ahead of us we saw a ship moving, as small as a toy in the distance.
“What kind of a vessel is it?” asked the pilot.
“I’d say it was a cargo vessel,” said the navigator.
“Gunners, stand by your guns,” said Capt. Payne.
We were moving over the enemy vessel now, and she was putting on knots. We could see the streamers of white foam at her flanks as she plowed at top speed. She was swinging in a circle, trying to dodge the bombs she thought we would rain on her. I imagined the chaos and scurrying on her decks, having myself been on the decks of ships during bombing attacks. But we were only conducting a reconnaissance, not bombing.
A gunner reported: “Two planes coming up from below, fast. They’re 2,000 yards away.” And then: “They’re turning off.”
I saw a plane over on our left. It was a seaplane with a single wing—a Zero float. He was flying the same course as we. One of our nose gunners began to fire. The zips of the tracer bullets arched around the enemy plane, came closer. The empty shells rattled to the floor of our bomber.
Now the Zero’s wing dipped and he swung in a sharp turn toward us. Here he comes! I thought, and I saw the plane sweeping in on us, saw its tracers leaping out. In that instant I thought what I always think in such moments: that I was a damned fool to get myself into such a spot as this.
Our plane shook as our other guns along the flank took up the firing. The streams of tracers crossed in front of the Jap, then behind him. He turned away and disappeared to the rear. (We hit him. The rear gunner said the Jap had gone down with a dead stick, made a forced landing on the water.)
Other ships were appearing one by one on the water below us. The navigator was trying to count them. I saw the long, bristling shape of a cruiser to the right. And there were other ships.
“Anti-aircraft fire to the right!” somebody shouted. And we heard the fragments thwack against the bottom of the fuselage.
“It looks as if our right aileron’s hit,” somebody said.
Then the anti-aircraft halted, and another Zero appeared ahead of us, flying close in. He turned toward us, and came sweeping in with his tracers reaching out toward our fuselage. For long seconds he seemed to be heading directly toward our nose, and the bow gunner fired long bursts. The nose filled with smoke.
“You’re leading him too much,” said Capt. Payne, calmly.
Then the Zero was gone astern.
“Anybody hit?” asked the captain. Nobody answered. The Zeros were poor gunners, and cautious. They did not come back again.
By this time we were well past the ships which had appeared below us off the southern tip of Bougainville.
“How many ships were there?” asked the pilot.
“There were twenty-seven,” said the navigator.
He had been the only one not occupied with shooting at Zeros; he had taken time to look. The rest had been too busy.
“Was that a boat or shore installation shooting anti-aircraft?” asked the pilot.
“Boat,” said the bombardier, laconically.
We conducted the rest of our reconnaissance peacefully and ran into no more enemy aircraft or ships. The overcast weather was on our side.
It was hours later that we landed at an American base which is removed from the Solomon Islands zone and a goodly step toward more peaceful regions.
I had kicked myself, when the Zeros attacked us today, for exposing myself to the danger. Now I was glad I had done it. To have left Guadalcanal on a B-17, by way of Bougainville, seemed highly appropriate, when, as the marines would say, you considered how rugged our life had been on that f– – – – –island.
POSTSCRIPT
by the Editors of International News Service
When Dick Tregaskis left that Unmentionable Island—anyone who has ever known a United States marine will recognize the prohibited expletive instantly—the battle for Guadalcanal had not ended.
But the tide already had turned. The first reinforcements had come and others were on the way. The friendly roar of Grumman Wildcats and PBY’s was no longer a rare occasion for wild rejoicing. In the making were at least two major naval battles. In the second one, the Japanese in the three days between November 13 and 16, 1942, lost at least thirty warships and transports sunk or damaged.
The moment that battle began Tregaskis closed up his portable at Pearl Harbor and finished translating into trenchant English his “satchelful of notes.” He returned at once by plane to the Southwestern Pacific to rejoin the heroes whose story he has told here.
His weeks, the weeks he describes from July 26th to Septemb
er 26th, were the worst weeks, the almost hopeless weeks. They were—the comparison is inescapable—the Gethsemane of Guadalcanal. But from then on the picture changed. American ships streamed toward the island and American Army troops landed. American fighting and bombing planes made of Henderson Airport an offensive base, destined to play a major role in pushing the Japs right back where they came from.
For a period, at least, the waters around Guadalcanal were cleared of Japanese fighting ships. In the words of Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, the enemy soon would be left “without beans and bullets” and those sorely tried marines who fought so valiantly in the difficult early days were able, with numerical superiority and control of the air, to proceed with the grim but obviously pleasant business of mopping up the enemy one by one.
NEW YORK, AFTER SEPTEMBER 26
This is what happened to Tregaskis after the last entry in his Diary, dated September 26th.
“I had no word from anybody while I was on Guadalcanal,” he wrote, in a letter home, “even though I had sent out two radio messages from there, saying that I was planning to leave and asking that relief be sent. But no answer came. I had been on Guadalcanal for seven weeks by that time; so I took the chance to get away.”
As a matter of fact, relief and money were on their way to Tregaskis, but he didn’t know it. Communications in the Pacific war area, to use Dick’s own words, are frequently by turtleback express.
“I went to a place,” he wrote, “which I may identify only by the name of Amadvu.” (This was Dick’s trip on the Fortress, B-17.) “I waited for a couple of weeks at Amadvu. No mail, no radios came and soon my funds were approaching rock bottom and I saw myself becoming a beachcomber and being devoured by cannibals.”
Tregaskis is the last man you would want to see in such circumstances. He is six feet, seven inches tall and big in proportion—a lot of man. And a man like that requires a lot of food. When he drew the Pacific assignment, he was kidded—“You’ll be some target for the Japs, Dick”—“They’ll capture you for an observation post if they don’t pot you first”—and so on. Tregaskis took it good-naturedly, though he is sensitive about his size. The day before he left he went to the cashier. “I want a small part of my salary sent to me every week.” But why, the cashier wanted to know. It was his experience with war correspondents that they never spend their own. They bank their salaries and live strictly off expense money. “Well,” said Dick, “I’m kind of big and I eat more than some people. I would honestly hate to charge the office for two steaks instead of one and, between you and me, I always eat two steaks.” That was Tregaskis for you—a lot of man any way you take him.
Guadalcanal Diary Page 23