Posted on 05/31/2021 11:49:07 AM PDT by ocrp1982
On a related note: A moving historical video of a turret gunner who was KIA by 40mm Jap anti aircraft fire over Manila Bay.
The pilot was was able to fly the plane for two hours back to a carrier where the badly mangled body of the gunner could not be removed and he was buried at sea when the plane was dumped off the fantail.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuNJ-8pACU0
What was the name of it? Wife is from Leyte, I’d like to read up on what went on. (Her grandfather was a guerilla fighter, and good cook. When the Americans left, they took him with them to Guam because of his cooking skills, and his “great skill at killing Japs”.)
That is the one, I have an autographed copy (May 11, 1985). She was a great person and a good friend.
Her maiden name was Denson, my family is intermarried with the Denson’s. She married an officer named Williams, he worked for CalTex Oil (Chevron and Texaco) before the war.
He was captured by the Japanese and was being taken to Japan by ship toward the end of the war, we bombed and sank the ship he was on. (no knowledge that POW’s were on it.)
Yes. Historians say a lot of things. They usually forget what the war was all about.
Damned right. And, those same “historians” very often give way to their own personal biases in their assessments.
Fairly sure it was in the third book of Toll’s trilogy:
Twilight of the Gods: War in the Western Pacific, 1944-1945
What a wonderful tribute from that young lady! My father also fought there aboard the USS Raymond (DE-341) as part of Taffy 3.
All I have is a King Neptune “certificate” for crossing the Equator that shows him on a ship...but I’m in midst of moving so don’t have access to the name right now. As I mentioned above he was 17, and he never spoke if it.
It’s easy for us because among other things, my youngest brother is named for the ship.
“The drama of Halsey.” He abandoned his assigned post to go chasing a fleet that had minimal capability. There were many that wanted him court martialed
Yep. Got off easy. They did not want to tarnish his Life Magazine persona. Tearing down Bull Halsey would not be good for War Bond sales.
Of course, that did not stop the Navy Dept from a kangaroo court for the Indianapolis’ skipper over the Navy’s mistake.
True. That poor captain carried guilt until he finally committed suicide a number of years later.
When the skipper of the Japanese sub that sank the Indianapolis joined the cause to clear the captain’s name, that says a lot.
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