During the night, we received instruction about our coordinates for the following morning, but I kept hearing a racket. My unit was already on edge. Too many enemy infiltrations were coming from too many angles. The idea that a Japanese might drop in your foxhole with a gendaitō sword aimed at your skull didn’t exactly give soldiers the best dreams. Of course, we had sentries posted, but the Japanese developed a clever way of cutting throats before an alarm could be sounded.
Somewhere out there in the dark, I could hear what sounded like a man crying. I cautiously cocked my pistol and crept forward. The closer I got to the edge of the encampment, the louder the sound became. I realized the noise was coming from a foxhole.
Swinging Bill Arnold lay down there huddled up in a ball weeping.
“What’s going on?” I asked. Never had I seen a soldier cry like a baby.
Swinging Bill didn’t move.
“Bill? What’s happened?”
He peered up at me with bloodshot eyes. Obviously, he’d found a bottle somewhere. He said nothing.
He barely whispered, “I’m scared.”
I watched him for a moment, trying to decide whether to call a guard and ship him off to the brig or be a good guy and listen to a drunk tell me a story. His watery red eyes seemed to signal throbbing anxiety.
“What are you afraid of?” It was a silly question because there were about a thousand and one things to be anxious about out here where strong men died about one a minute.
Bill kept shaking his head. “Been this way for years,” he said. “Was so before I got out here in this godforsaken wilderness. Only thing that helps is a little booze. Tonight, that ain’t even workin’.”
“Where’d it start?”
He covered his head. “My ma . . . my ma . . . was lighting a stove. She’d been using kerosene or gasoline, something like that. Guess when she struck a match . . . the whole business exploded.” His whimpering got louder. “I saw her run out the back door trying to stop the flames . . . They covered her . . . her hair smokin’.” Bill stopped for several moments. “I saw her burn up,” he barely whispered.
I took a deep breath. I couldn’t imagine a worse story.
“That’s what comes rushin’ up inside me at night,” Bill said. “Terrifies me.”
For the first time, his habitual drinking made sense. What could I say?
Quiet fell between us. “She’s gone,” I finally ventured. “We’re in Okinawa. Your mother will never come over here. She’s gone. You can go to sleep.”
He looked up at me and blinked several times. Finally, Bill said, “I guess that’s right. Sure. It is.” He pulled his helmet over his face and became quiet. “Sure.”
Ten minutes later, Swinging Bill hadn’t made a sound. I went back to my foxhole.
For the first time, I had an idea about what made him a drunk. I’d let it go.
* * *
The 361st started firing early. I figured we were the first go at softening up the enemy’s hold on the Cactus Hill area. Swinging Bill turned up at his position beside one of the cannons like nothing had happened the night before. He looked surprisingly good, although his eyes were still red. He said nothing; I said nothing.
Command called in. “There’s an open stretch between Cactus Ridge and Hill,” the voice said. “E Company got slowed to a stop at the edge of this exposed area. Looks pretty rough. Write these coordinates down. Want you to fire beyond the enemy. Be careful you don’t get too close to E Company. They’re only a few yards away from the enemy.”
I scribbled as quickly as I could. The line went dead.
I called to Sergeant McQuiston. “Here’s where we should be shooting.” I handed him the paper. “I need to do some reconnaissance to make sure we don’t hit too close to E Company. Sounds like they’re in trouble.”
McQuiston nodded. “Be careful.”
I grabbed my rifle and took off with binoculars bouncing at my side. When I reached a ridge near the front line, I could see G Company had also ended up in a fix. Following their own tanks, they’d gotten halfway across the open field when a holy mess exploded. The tanks got hit. One of those Big Boys had gone over a mine that disabled it. Another tank looked like it had just been left when the crew ran for cover. Probably 47mm fire had rained down on them: that would have been destruction on wheels. You didn’t need hearing aids to understand that rifle fire and mortars were flying in from every direction. Men were hitting the dirt and looking for shelter anywhere they could find it.
The bombardment didn’t stop. Through the afternoon, the reign of terror continued relentlessly. I didn’t know how our soldiers endured. From my observation perch, I could see the Japanese were bringing in trucks and their own tanks. A counterattack had to be imminent. I felt certain Command had already been informed of the situation. I only wished that I’d had some way to describe to them what I was seeing. Surely, both G and E had signaled the danger.
A roar came from behind me. I looked up and recognized a host of our airplanes descending on the Japanese. Before it was over, I counted sixteen Curtiss SB2C Helldiver airplanes blowing a hole as big as Chicago in their counterattack. The next roar nearly knocked me off my perch. The blast had to have come from three of our navy destroyers parked off the coast. So much for whatever it was that the Japanese had in mind.
I crawled back through the trees.
* * *
The next day, April 6, the report came in that the frontal attack on Cactus Hill had proved to be costly for us. Command concluded we needed to attempt a different approach. Consequently, Major Clark sent F Company out on an alternative attack coming in from the west. Eventually, the company took Cactus Hill, but the Japanese weren’t finished.
Our doughboys spent the night on the hill, but at ten the next morning a crazy Japanese soldier came tearing through the perimeter surrounding their camp. Screaming like a wounded tiger, he started shooting in all directions. Soldiers leaped into foxholes or any other place where they could hide. The wacko kept firing while our men threw hand grenades at him. After a dozen grenades, the nutcase finally fell backward.
The issue was not settled yet. A 150mm artillery shell hit the company’s location. During the confusion and death, E Company discovered a number of enemy were gathering on the eastern end of the hill. They concluded that a counterattack must be assembling to come roaring at us. I watched to see what would follow.
Sergeant Virgil Purtlebaugh watched for a while and then turned back to the men around him. “I think we ought to banzai them before they have a chance to get their act together.”
The men mumbled their approval.
“Okay!” the sergeant said. “Let’s blast those sonofabitches all the way back to the nearest cemetery.”
Leading the charge, Virgil came out shooting like John Wayne in a cowboy movie. The Japanese began to fall left and right.
Sergeant Joe O’Donnell called for mortar fire twenty-five yards ahead of our men, aiming at where the Japanese were congregated.
“Heads up!” O’Donnell shouted. “Here they come!”
Explosions erupted all along the engagement line. The Japanese scattered like frightened rabbits. O’Donnell counted the enemy falling. Looked like one mortar had taken out at least a dozen of them.
When the skirmish was over, Purtlebaugh had personally killed eighteen bad guys. The final count revealed fifty-eight Japanese down. Needless to say, their counterattack was history. Cactus Hill had fallen.
When McQuiston got the last call from Command telling us to hold up firing, he shared the story of what had happened with our men. Most just nodded a silent acceptance. A couple of guys clapped. Swinging Bill said nothing.