Articles
Simulations
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ArticlesSimulations |
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But the soul of the defense this night was Merritt Edson. A scant 10
or 20 yards behind the firing line -- his clothes were pierced at the
collar and waist by bullets -- he controlled the battle with his rasping
voice, exhorting the steadfast and excoriating those few who wavered:
"Go back where you came from. The only thing they've got that you
haven't is guts." - Guadalcanal, by Richard B. Frank |
| For January 13, Mitchell drafted a new plan of attack. Company F
would pull back off Sim’s Ridge and swing wide right to approach the
Horse’s Head through the cover of the jungle to the north and east.
Company E would press down Sim’s Ridge and meet Company F at Hill 53,
the Horse’s Head. While Company F began its maneuver, Company E was checked on Sim’s Ridge. With the plan threatening to miscarry, the executive officer of the battalion, Captain Charles W. Davis, volunteered to lead four other men against a knoll at the south end of the ridge that housed machineguns and mortars and was the fulcrum of Japanese resistance. Crawling on their bellies, Davis and his party crept to within 10 yards of the enemy emplacements. Two Japanese grenades came sailing out into their midst but failed to explode. In reply the American party hurled a salvo of eight grenades into the Japanese position. Davis leaped to his feet and fired one shot, whereupon his rifle jammed. With his right hand he drew his pistol and fired at the enemy while with his left he waved the others on with his rifle. This sequence of gestures took place in full view of the Japanese and his own battalion, for the sky perfectly silhouetted Davis on the ridgetop. Collins, who observed the entire action from Hill 52, stated that Davis’s bold conduct had "an electrifying effect on the battalion." Company E "came to life" and promptly cleared Sim's Ridge before surging down the Galloping Horse to join Company F at the head. By noon the 27th Infantry held its objective. - Guadalcanal, by Richard B. Frank |
 A
machinegun section under Platoon Sergeant Mitchell Paige exacted a heavy
toll, but gradually all of Paige's men became casualties, so he fired
the guns alternately by himself. When one of these weapons was knocked
out, Paige dashed through fire to bring up another. ... Paige's heroism
... won him the Meal of Honor...- Guadalcanal, by Richard B. Frank |
| He had been in the o.p. with Wells, and when Jap arrived they had
cut out for the wire.
Stanley had made it into the perimeter, only to find that there was no
sign of Wells. So he had slipped out again, without a word to anyone,
when the fighting was at its height, into the Jap-infested dark, to look
for him. By sheer luck he found him, near the o.p., dying of bayonet
wounds; there was no way of helping him, but Stanley had stayed with
him; he could have sought cover for himself, but he didn't. But whenever I heard the word 'hero' loosely used, as it so often is of professional athletes and media celebrities and people who may have done no more than wear uniform for a while, I think of Stanley going back into the dark. - Quartered Safe Out Here, by George MacDonald Fraser |
 "Listen
to me, and follow my orders, and I'll try to bring all of you back
safely to your mothers.""Dad, there's a war going on out there. Young boys are fighting that war. And they need my help." - Sergeant Mike Strank, from Flags of Our Fathers, by James Bradley |
| After driving for some twenty minutes in silence, von Straube’s aide
tapped Roberts on the shoulder and said that his commander wished to
know what the brigadier had done before the war: "Were you a
professional soldier?" Roberts was momentarily bemused by the question. He had been a soldier for so long that his other life seemed impossibly remote. Then he realized that the German was seeking some crumb of solace for his defeat. He answered von Straube: "No, I wasn’t a regular soldier. Very few Canadians were. In civilian life I made ice cream." - Armageddon: The Battle for Germany, by Max Hastings |
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