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Eddy, Jack_Z43_WAPA-246_WAPA 4170_OralHist_Audio_public.mp3

Eddy, Jack_Z43_WAPA-246_WAPA 4170_OralHist_Audio_transcript.pdf. Eddy currently lives in Yigo and works for an advertising agency on the island of Guam. He has been living on Guam for about 10 years now and travels back and forth to the States, but this is his home.

Eddy was the Platoon Leader of the Second Platoon of F Company Ninth Marines. He joined the Marine Corps on June 1, 1942 and landed in Guam on July 21, 1944. He was 23 years old.

When Eddy’s platoon, F Company, landed on the beaches of Guam back in World War II there was just a lot of smoke and fire because the Navy had been bombarding them with shellfire trying to clear the way for the Marines. Eddy arrived on an LCVP, or Higgins boat, and they landed on the beach on the right flank, which would have been called Blue Beach. The Ninth Marines landed in a column of battalions and the Third Battalion was the first ashore, followed by the Second Battalion and then followed by First Battalion. On Blue Beach there were probably 1,000 Marines who had landed prior to when Eddy’s unit landed. There was intense fire coming from Asan Point Ridge because a company of Marines was in there meeting very stiff resistance.

Eddy believes it was on the third day, which would be D plus two, the Second Battalion Ninth Marines was detached from the Ninth Marines and sent over to an area by Bundschu Ridge and put in Division Reserve. Eddy’s platoon spent the night there. The next morning, which would be D plus four, they replaced A Company Third Marines and the Second Battalion Ninth Marines and actually became a functional unit of the Third Marine Regiment. With Captain Lewis Wilson as the Commander, they attacked up the road that runs from Adelup up to Mount Tenjo. They occupied that road by 1:00 in the afternoon but continued the attack until about 3:00 or 3:30 in the afternoon all the way across Fonte Ridge.

The fighting on Fonte lasted for another three days. However, Eddy’s platoon had had the worst of it the evening of the 25th and was down to about eight men left in the platoon and very little ammo. Eddy was convinced that his small unit was due to be wiped out. It did give Eddy some feelings of anxiety, maybe even despair, but it didn’t temper his resolve to continue to hang in there. Eventually, the Japanese ran out of men before they ran out of ammo and this is why Eddy is here 42 years later talking about it. The Japanese were definitely strong opponents.

After the final beachhead line had been established, it was pretty obvious to everyone the Japanese were heading for the north end of the island to make one of their traditional last stands. Eddy’s unit ended up by Pati Point on the 10th of August and soon the island was declared officially secured, although there were probably as many as 5,000 Japanese troops scattered all over the island. The Ninth Regiment moved over to a camp between Ylig and Tocha Bay and from there Eddy’s platoon ran patrols up into now what is known as Windward Hills area and Baza Gardens area, as well as Talofofo. .

Before he knew it, Eddy was heading to Iwo Jima around the 15th or 16th of February, 1945, but was wounded so that was the end of that campaign for him. He ended up on an evacuation ship headed for San Francisco. From there, he was transferred to a ward at Great Lakes Navel Hospital and was a patient there until June of ’46.

What Eddy would like to see in Guam to commemorate the American soldiers would be a relief map showing the Asan, Adelup and Agat area plotting the American’s positions and the known positions of the Japanese, which would also depict the landing beaches.

Now American soldiers walk down the streets arm-in-arm with the Japanese and Eddy wonders why in the world was the war necessary. The Americans got back their land but lost many men. The Japanese own the majority of the businesses on the island, the Japanese are employed at most of these businesses and they are second in the world as far as gross national product. For all in tense and purposes, the Japanese won in Eddy’s eyes.

Eddy, Jack_Z43_WAPA-246_WAPA 4170_OralHist_Audio_transcript.pdf