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Hofvendahl, Russell_WAPA-246_WAPA 4170_OralHist_transcript.pdf

Lieutenant Russel L. Hofvendahl was born in San Francisco on December 5th, 1921. The father of four, grandfather of thirteen, and great-grandfather of fifteen attended San Jose State University as a police major and it was there that he heard about the bombing of Pearl Harbor. After graduating from college in 1942, Hofvendahl signed up for the Marine Officer Candidates Class in Quantico, Virginia, and ten weeks later graduated a commissioned 2nd Lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps. His experience in basic training drove Hofvendahl to spend another ten weeks in the Reserve Officer’s Class (ROC) and three months at the Marine’s artillery school. He left Quantico a Skilled Artillery Officer, 2nd Lieutenant, and went to San Diego to await his orders from the Fleet Marine Force, Pacific. He shipped out with the 2nd Marine Division on the ‘USS Copahee’ to Noumea, Caledonia, one week before his first wedding anniversary. With the 2nd Marine Division, Hofvendahl traveled to Wellington, Paikakariki, and Hawk’s Bay, New Zealand, completing various training exercises along the way. Hofvendahl’s first combat experience was the Battle of Tarawa. He went ashore with the 2nd Battalion, 6th Marines, avoiding fire from Japanese machine gun nests. After the Battle of Tarawa, Hofvendahl and the 2nd Division completed a training exercise in Efate in the New Hebrides, and several more among the islands of Hawaii to prepare for the Battle of Saipan. On D Morning of the Battle of Saipan, June 15, 1943, Hofvendahl described the island as “very forbidding,” and “ominous as hell.” Despite the efforts of a particular Japanese artillery team, he made it unscathed onto the beach with the 2nd Battalion, 8th Marines, and was “right there with them” when the 1st Battalion, 29th Marines took the summit of Mount Tapochau. Surviving Japanese counter-attacks , a friendly-fire artillery attack from the 14th Marines, and several bouts of crippling illness, Hofvendahl also made it unscathed through the taking of the city of Garapan on Tanapag Harbor. After the Battle of Saipan, Hofvendahl was assigned to the Marine’s 4th Division for the invasion of Tinian, in his opinion, the “best conceived and executed island operation in the Pacific,” which earned the Division a Presidential Unit Citation. One night, during a dengue fever, Hofvendahl decided to forego having his men “dig-in” for the evening, only to have the Japanese counter-attach in the early hours of the morning. His most vivid memory of the invasion of Tinian is the face of his friend, Larry Schork, lit up by Japanese mortar rounds. After taking Tinian, Hofvendahl and the 8th Marines returned to Saipan and spent several weeks camped there before shoving off for the invasion of Okinawa. Fortunately, the atomic bombs were dropped before the soldiers arrived, making D-Day at Okinawa the only unopposed landing in the entire Pacific theater. Some Japanese cities resisted occupation, such as Naha, and Hofvendahl recalls driving in a Jeep, searching for a friend, and being stuck behind trucks loaded with dead Marines. Hofvendahl spent six weeks with the Marines in Japan, in Okinawa, Nagasaki, and Isahaya. He recounts experiences with “Japanese stragglers” and a certain Mr. Suzuki, who assured him that if the Emperor Hirohito had not ordered surrender, they “would still be fighting.” On the other side of the coin, Hofvendahl also recalls Japanese citizens lining the sides of the road while Marines drove by and threw out cigarettes and C-Rations, looking like newsreel footage of the liberation of Paris or Rome. Hofvendahl made it home in November of 1945, twenty-seven months after saying goodbye to his wife, and began earning his law degree from Stanford in January of 1946. He is also the author of ‘Hard on the Wind,’ an account of his five months of working on a cod fishing schooner between San Francisco and the Bering Sea when he was fifteen years old.

U.S. National Park Service, War in the Pacific National Historical Park

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War in the Pacific National Historical Park, Code: WAPA

Guam , Guam
War in the Pacific National Historical Park, Guam , Guam
Latitude: 13.3905000686646, Longitude: 144.654006958008

ICMS (Interior Collection Managment System) : WAPA-00246
NPS Museum Number Catalog : WAPA 4170

War in the Pacific Oral Histories

2025/03/07

T. Stell Newman Visitor Center, Collections room, Safe and Shelf SLF D-01

Public Can View

Rose Manibusan, Jennifer Craig

Organization: American Memorial Park
Role: Chief Interpretation
Address: Micro Beach Road, Garapan, Mp 96950
Email: wapa_interpretation@nps.gov

Saturday, April 5, 2025 2:53:21 PM

Saturday, April 5, 2025 2:53:21 PM

Hofvendahl, Russell_WAPA-246_WAPA 4170_OralHist_transcript.pdf

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