WITH SO MUCH of the Imperial Japanese Navy about, I did not relish another trip in an open boat, but orders were orders. During the night I got the team together, and after a lot of barefaced scrounging, we got away just after 1600 on 26 October. I had Wendling, Koepplinger, Banco, and Burnham from D-2; Beato and Allen from the scouts; and Michael, whom I had more or less sneaked from the hospital, feeling a trip to Aola would probably do him good. The technical experts consisted of Captain Longley, from the 1st Marine Air Wing; Lieutenant Pratt, a Navy engineer; and Lieutenant James and Chief Petty Officer Fortune, the landing and anchorage experts from Commander Dexter’s headquarters. Longley looked like a Victorian Englishman, with his pink cheeks and large black mustache verging on a handlebar. Pratt, a tall, husky “character from Utah,” told us all about Salt Lake City. He was a breezy, independent type—he may have been in the U.S. Navy, and on Guadalcanal, but he continued to wear his cone-heeled Texas riding boots. James was a fresh-faced reserve officer, and “the Chief” had served in destroyers in World War I.
Our job was to survey locations for landing points and an airstrip. Although I had not been briefed on the overall mission, it appeared we were looking to establish a second line of defense in case we lost the battle for the Lunga perimeter. As I later learned, however, we were the point men in what one historian aptly termed “the singularly ill-considered effort” to create a second perimeter and airfield.1 This plan, which was opposed by Generals Vandegrift and Geiger and by senior naval aviators in the South Pacific, was the child of the amphibious force commander, Admiral Turner,2 who persisted in the belief that defense required dispersal of ground forces along the coast to deal with the Japanese. Turner’s harebrained scheme would divert critically needed manpower and materiel from Lunga in the weeks ahead.
It was a clear, moonlit night, so when at 1945 we arrived at Aola I sent Beato and Michael swimming in to let Andrew and his lads know who we were. Recognition was quickly established, and in no time we had settled ourselves in the cadet’s house and laid out an all-round defense. Andrew reported no enemy troops in the immediate vicinity; although it was already dark, I sent him off to alert all his scouts to scour the area for ten miles around and report it clear. Daniel Pule came in at 2000 with the news that there were about thirty Japanese at Paripao and more at Gegende, where some of those that Colonel Hill had driven into the swamp were still surviving. The local headmen were sent for, to bring in carriers and summon the bosuns of the vessels hidden at Marau.3
Early the next morning Lieutenant James left for Marau in the Higgins boat with his party and the bosuns, to pick up any schooners found to be serviceable. The rest of us spent the day doing reconnaissances, from Aola to Kombito plantation and from Kombito to Luvenibuli; every hour the scouts reported that all sides were clear. At 2230 a vessel was heard outside Aola Bay, but there was no light. An hour later another vessel passed and then, in response to our signal from the beach, came into the bay from the direction of Bara Island. Captain Longley exchanged flashlight signals with it for some time. We had been given Navy code, but could not interpret the one they were using; it was, however, fairly obvious that they were friendly.
After this exchange, the vessel buzzed off and brought in a second. We signaled them where to land the party, but it cheerfully replied, “We have no boat.” Longley, weary by now of dotting and dashing, was about to signal, “For God’s sake, go to bed, we haven’t got one either.” I stopped him just in time. There was not much swell, so I peeled off my clothes and swam out a thousand yards to the beastly thing. It was one of our newly arrived patrol torpedo boats; worse, it had overhanging sides.
At first it looked as though I would be shot out of hand, but before I got sucked under the propellers they handed me a boat hook and hauled me to the deck. Standing there, stark naked and dripping wet, I had to explain to the skipper, Lieutenant Taylor, what everything was about. He said they had been told there was a wharf where he could land the Marines. With bitter laughter, I replied, “There are the remains of one, at Aola plantation.”
Fifty-nine Marines, led by Lt. Stephen Sekowski, transferred from the other vessel, a YP, to the deck of the PT boat. Clad only in a towel, I somehow got it maneuvered close enough to the end of the old wharf to let them jump from the bow onto the four-inch beams (I had previously removed the planking). We managed to get them off—even at low tide, I remembered, Palmer’s wharf used to have two fathoms of water fifteen feet from the end—and they were shepherded back to the government station for bivouacking.
Fortified by some much-needed coffee, Sekowski and I got down to work straightaway, preparing maps and plans and arranging rendezvous, carriers, and guides. Andrew and Daniel, who now knew the form on this sort of operation, did most of the work like seasoned campaigners. (As Andrew would say with a smile, “Me savvy do ’im.”) The idea was to have another shot at cleaning up enemy stragglers and then patrol back to Lunga along the coast. As the day wore on, all the headmen turned up with their carrier parties and were briefed as to their jobs. Different sections would carry ammunition boxes and rations, and act as stretcher bearers if need be. The latest reports placed the Japanese remnants at two parties of thirty or forty, but I could not believe there were so many, unless they had made their way down from Tasimboko. Still, it was better to be safe than sorry.
At dusk I was greatly relieved to see Lieutenant James return with the Rob Roy in tow, and the news that two other schooners would arrive shortly under their own steam. It had taken longer than expected to get the vessels dragged out of the mangroves and put in working order. They would proceed to Tulagi with their crews for refitting. All was serene at Marau, but our anxiety as to how our friends were faring at Lunga was not alleviated by the thuds and cracks that came all night from that direction.
The delay meant that we should have to spend another day, so James could complete his part of the reconnaissance at Aola, but they had already signaled this through Adams at Marau. He and Eroni were getting on famously. When I sent Harry Adams supplies I got profuse notes of thanks signed “Respectively yours.”
It took us an hour or so in the morning to brief the carriers and scouts in detail and pair them with the right section of Marines, but they all set off in good time, with Sergeant Andrew and the cream of the Aola detachment in the van and the headmen themselves bringing up the rear with the ration parties. In the afternoon we sped down to Rere Point, which had been mentioned as a possible location for a landing place and secondary airfield; the swampy ground, however, made it impossible. The highlight of the trip was finding one of the Java sheep. It was promptly requisitioned, and that evening we had a colossal repast of roast mutton, our first fresh meat since May. All was peaceful again at night—what a contrast to Lunga—and I had a lovely sleep.
The next morning, 30 October, was beautiful and quiet, broken only by the passing of B-17s and of a cruiser and a destroyer that we “hoped” were ours. At midday Evans took us up the coast to meet Sekowski on the beach near Koilotumuria. He had got into position at dawn, but his show was a bit of a farce, since, when they were about to attack, one of his men said, “Hold your fire, there’s a European.” This gave the alarm, and the Japanese dispersed very smartly. Most of them were in their underwear.
The Marines killed one and wounded three, but the rest disappeared again into Colonel Hill’s bottomless swamp. (Wimpy, who was there, reported that one of them had blond hair, was six feet tall and of solid build, and looked like a Dutchman. They had held their fire because they thought he might be a prisoner of war.) The Japs had no proper defenses, and no trace of food other than two small bags of rice. Four rifles, three swords, and two pairs of binoculars were all their equipment; they were probably in a pretty poor way. From their huts, Wimpy reckoned there had been ten to fourteen men. An antiaircraft gun, found by Colonel Hill’s party but not put out of action, was destroyed; two cases of ammunition were brought back for identification, and another twenty-one cast into the sea. Wishing Lieutenant Sekowski the best of luck on his patrol, we returned to Aola that afternoon, taking four of his men who were down with malarial fever. Wimpy’s report quite rightly advised that, as the range was seldom more than ten yards, machine guns had no place on such an operation.
As we left for Lunga at daybreak on 31 October, I remember thinking that I could do with a clean undershirt and some new socks. The main thing on my mind, however, was what had happened at Lunga and whether we would find it occupied by the enemy. In the event, however, we got back safely. On the way we noticed at least forty oil drums on the beach at Volonavua. It might have been fuel or Japanese rice, but we did not waste time finding out.
In the five days we were away, more than twenty-five hundred Japanese were reported killed to the south and in the battle for “Fighter One,” the new airfield. Fighter One was still ours, but early that morning a sailor—luckily armed—who was trying to iron out some shell holes with a bulldozer captured two enemy soldiers quietly sitting at the end of the runway. During interrogation they told Captain Moran that they had orders to go for the gap and rendezvous at the airfield, which they had done! On the bright side, we had at last crossed the river and taken Matanikau; there was no news concerning the Japanese invasion force, but Trench had been out with the cruiser San Juan and several destroyers, and they had shelled enemy positions without opposition.
With more than nineteen hundred Marines down with malaria during the month, they’d had to throw in an Army outfit, whose commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Timboe,4 had been a newspaper editor in Devil’s Lake, North Dakota, in peacetime. I heard later that he arrived at Lieutenant Colonel Puller’s command post in the dark, to find Puller firing away with the rest. Asked where the gap was, Puller supposedly replied, “I’ve got about seventy men there and another seventy there, and all the rest’s ‘gap.’ Now get cracking!” Puller, who was usually referred to as “Chesty,” was a redoubtable warrior with a chin like a bulldozer blade, who puffed away at a little black pipe. Timboe told me afterward that though he came from Devil’s Lake, that night he thought he’d found the devil’s cookpot!
I reported in at 0930, just in time to meet the first wave of my labor and carrier force. A hundred and eighty men had been shepherded in; they were all quite cheerful and prepared to work. I was more than busy all day getting them signed on and settled in their bivouacs. I was very tired, and disappointed that Trench had suddenly been grabbed for another coastwatcher job. It was a mercy that our fighters prevented the Japanese bombers from reaching us that day, or I would never have got the work done. Finally I returned to D-2 at dusk, only to have them telephone from the perimeter that another eighty volunteers had arrived. It was a nasty business going down in the dark, past trigger-happy sentries. All we could do was mark out foxholes for the men and start the digging right away; they needed no urging! At 2030 I got back to D-2 absolutely fagged out, having been challenged six times and nearly drowned in a huge bomb hole full of rainwater.
Although the intention was still to use the carriers to evacuate casualties and haul ammunition to the front line, a new problem had arisen. The small number of Marines who were held in reserve had been unloading ships, but they were now kept in the line so long that when they came out they were falling asleep standing. In any case the number of our reserves continued to shrink. It was essential to get the ships unloaded quickly, and that job was ideal for the Solomon Islanders. I spent most of the next day doing what I could to arrange rations for the carriers. The chief problem was the lack of rice, on which employed islanders normally fed. There were no suitable alternatives.
The other difficulties I foresaw were making the locals understand what required doing, and explaining to each and every Marine who would be dealing with them that they were independent bushmen who had simply no idea about American methods and efficiency. Another problem was that all Americans, however busy, loved souvenirs. The islanders brought things in, and they would probably want to take other things out. It was a case of “needs must when the Devil drives,” however, and everyone would have to manage somehow; there was no time for training.
On my return from the new camp area, I heard that Sekowski had run into some Japs near Koli Point, and that a boat had been sent to Suagi to pick up two wounded, one a Marine and the other young Dovu, who had taken a bullet through his shoulder. There was also a huge pile of letters containing moans from Hay and the other civilians. I was so tired when I first read them through that I felt quite angry. Three days later, however, the resident commissioner sent a firmly worded signal to Gold Ridge: “Please advise Hay Campbell Andresen Freshwater U.S. Forces regret they are unable maintain them in supplies. If they wish to be evacuated arrangements will be made for this. They should get in touch with Clemens for this purpose.”
Hay, of course, had been signed on as a coastwatcher, and he was entitled to rations. The main difficulty was sending the stuff out regularly, as usually the only people going out were scouts on reconnaissance. Ken was doing the decent thing and letting the others have their share, but he was also busy getting native laborers together to send down to us, and they also expected something to eat. He was quite right, but it was hard to explain that it took the best part of a day to tell the quartermaster people what it was all about, in order to justify the issue of rations. Then the rations had to be packed up in loads, and carriers got down to the perimeter; with Trench away and me dashing off to Aola, there was no one who could spare the time to do it all. As regards the others, their demands were quite reasonable when looked at objectively, but they could not realize—indeed, they couldn’t be expected to—how hard won our rations were, and what a job it was even to get the stuff landed. We were only just hanging on at Lunga, and there wasn’t very much we could have done for them even if we had had the time.
All the missionaries remaining on the island had been warned to collect at Marau for evacuation, but the miners hadn’t yet made up their minds. To put it quite brutally, either they would have to come down to Lunga and work, or they would have to be evacuated somewhere where they would not be a ration liability.
The results of our reconnaissance had been quickly appraised, and at 1700 Colonel Thomas called me in again. “Good show,” he said. “How soon can you go back to Aola and prepare to make arrangements for a landing?” I had been half expecting this, but to actually get the instructions nevertheless made me feel quite numb. I told him I would get away first thing in the morning, though I knew that it would be a miracle if during the night, when everyone was defending himself, I managed to collect the party, the rations, and the ammunition. There was no doubt about the set of the colonel’s jaw, however, and I could not let him down. It meant another sleepless night.