Sometimes the conditions under which the Japanese met defeat were less tragic. A small landing craft idled along the southern coast one or two hundred yards from shore and, through a loudspeaker mounted on its deck, a "converted" prisoner of war shouted appeals for surrender to other Japanese soldiers who had retreated to the water's edge and now lurked among the boulders at the foot of the cliff or in caves in its face. The prisoner, a sergeant in the Japanese Army, was a persuasive speaker who was convinced of good treatment in the hands of Americans and tried to save his comrades from needless death. Sometimes he would order the soldiers to leave their hiding places, strip to their loin cloths, and follow the coast north to the American lines; as a sergeant, he was often obeyed.{543}
Interpreters or prisoners broadcast pleas of "cease resistance" over other portable loudspeakers set up in the southern tip of the island. The Japanese surrendered by twos or threes, apprehensive and hesitant and with curious expressions of hope and fear. Many prisoners offered to return to induce their comrades to surrender. Usually they were given cigarettes to take back to the caves as proof of American promises. Two such "bait-boys," known as "Murrymoto" and "Goto," brought back several hundred prisoners and were so faithful that their captors allowed them to carry weapons and live in the company perimeter during the night. In this manner 7,401 Japanese soldiers, including more than 200 commissioned officers and 3,339 unarmed laborers, surrendered to Tenth Army troops.{544}
Civilians became a nuisance to combat units after the assault on the final enemy lines began, and remained a burden until front lines no longer existed. More than 10,000 civilians stayed on Chinen Peninsula and were relatively unharmed by the battle. A much larger number, forced south by the advancing lines, hid in caves or stone huts until they were overtaken. Then they tried to pass through the machine-gun and shell fire to enter American lines or attempted the even more hazardous feat of slipping through the front lines during darkness. Infantrymen helped these unfortunate civilians as much as possible and often interrupted the fighting to collect and guide them through the front lines. During the last days of the fighting there were always groups of civilians sitting just behind the front lines, waiting for help, instructions, or, as many of them believed, death.{545}
Eighty thousand Okinawa civilians, between a third and a half of whom were wounded, crawled from caves at the south tip of the island during the last two weeks of June. These were either children, the very old, or women; there were few able-bodied men among them. In long columns they walked toward the rear. Most of the women carried babies on their backs and bundles of clothing, food, dishes, and kettles on their heads—all they owned. They chewed stalks of sugar cane when they could find them. The bodies of many thousands of other civilians lay scattered in the ditches, in the cane fields, and in the rubble of the villages, or were sealed in caves.{546}
As General Ushijima and his staff concluded the activities of the 32d Army in the system of caves within Hill 89, near Mabuni, the 32d Infantry attacked across the broad and flat top of the hill. One entrance to the cave was on top and near the center of the 500-yard-long hill; another entrance opened on the face of the 290-foot cliff facing the sea. It was about noon on 21 June when the front lines reached the first of these entrances. An officer prisoner had volunteered to deliver another offer of surrender to Ushijima but, when he and the infantrymen gathered near the opening, the Japanese closed the entrance by blasting it from the inside. Enemy resistance on top of Hill 89 was strong, and flame tanks used nearly 5,000 gallons of gasoline before the entire top was free of Japanese soldiers that evening.{547}
LAST JAPANESE COMMAND POST on Okinawa was Hill 89. The 32d Infantry, 7th Division, attacked up lower east end (left). Below appears the still smoldering reverse slope of Hill 89, where Generals Ushijima and Cho committed suicide.