Where in the World Have I Been?

Marine Second Lt. Robert 'Bob' Crowton's Navy Cross, awarded for heroism at Okinawa.

My former teacher Pete Benavage as a Marine Sergeant before heading to Iwo Jima.

Joseph Lajzer as he appeared after over three and a half years of Japanese captivity, including the Bataan Death March and slave labor in Japan.

Have been interviewing a gentleman who was on the Clark Field Baseball Team in Philippines before war broke out. He was on the Bataan Death March, then helped build the airfield at Palawan as slave labor, then took a Hell Ship to Japan and spent a long time "digging coal for the Emperor" at Hiroshima Omine and saw the A-bomb fall thirty miles away that fateful August day. He is in the photo above. (Name withheld)

This youthful gentleman was my Western Civilization teacher in high school. He is Major Pete Benavage, United States Marine Corps (Ret.). As a young sergeant of Marines, Pete helped lead a platoon on Iwo Jima. This is a photo capture from a Japanese TV program about Iwo Jima entitled 'Island of Death'.

Pete Benavage, teacher and friend.

Marine Second Lt. Robert Crowton's "Old Breed" First Marine Division patch that he wore on Okinawa, where he won the Navy Cross for heroism.

Marine Lt. Bob Crowton's lovely wife, Marge, admires his Navy Cross, awarded at a hospital in San Diego after he had undergone surgery to shrapnel damage to his face. (Bob Crowton collection)

Bob's Purple Heart and the box for his Navy Cross.

Bob awarded his Navy Cross in San Diego, CA.

William Morrison, who as a young Marine guarded a gun emplacement at the base of Mt. Suribachi and saw the flag go up.

Navy Corpsman William 'Bill' Lynne, who served with the First Marines at Peleliu and Okinawa. The corpsmen fought alongside the Marines, and saved many lives in battle. (Bill Lynne photo)

The wounded Corpsman in this famous press photo is Bill Lynne. (Bill Lynne collection)

Greetings to my faithful readers, all 26 of you. :)

Sorry I have not written on the blog much lately. I've been very busy working on my next book, and since it is not about WWII airmen, this page hasn't gotten the attention it did before

Right now, I am deeply involved in researching a book about the Pacific War. Lately, I've been working on two chapters in depth. The first involves the men who were on the Bataan Death March and the ensuing years as POWs. The second involves men who were at Iwo. These are but two chapters but I tend to immerse in just a few at a time. I've already put a lot of time into Pacific aviators and into Okinawa, the USS Indianapolis, and Navy Corpsmen. I have also been interviewing several Pearl Harbor survivors. This on top of the fact that I work sixty to seventy hours a week in the highly lucrative field of teaching high school.

I am putting a small sampling of photos of some of the guys I'm writing about at the moment, and who will all appear in the book when it comes out next year.

Stay tuned. I will be back.

Update

Readers, so sorry for the lag since the last entry. I have been very busy finishing up the 95th Bomb Group history (it is now done) and also working on my next book, about World War Two in the Pacific. I had an amazing interview yesterday with a man who was in the Big Red One on Okinawa and won the Navy Cross for heroism. Like most heroes, he doesn't accept the classification as such. When his story has been vetted and okayed by him, I will post it here. Suffice it to say it is amazing and literally brought me to tears writing it. I am blessed to know these great men who put their lives on the line so that the world could be free. I hope we never let these men down and forget their sacrifices.

A Letter from a Former Teacher, Marine Capt. Pete Benavage, Iwo Jima Veteran

A low-resolution photo taken from page 74 of my 1976 Herndon High School yearbook of my teacher, Peter Benavage. The caption says he taught Social Studies, World Studies, and World Geography. He was Chairman of the World Geography Department. He had a BA degree from George Washington University, an M.A. from Catholic University, and did course work at the University of Virginia, the University of North Carolina, and the College of William and Mary.

I got a big surprise today when I got home from work. There was a letter from my old high school history teacher, Mr. Benavage. I knew it was from him right away because the return address label had the famous image of the flag-raising at Iwo Jima on Mt. Suribachi on it. A month or so ago, I did a blog entry on my former teacher, remembering a story he told us about when he was a captain in the United States Marine Corps on Iwo Jima in 1945. Shortly thereafter, I heard from his grand daughter, and she put me back in touch. I sent him a copy of my book to salute his 'Untold Valor' but did not expect to hear from him. My teacher proved me wrong. He read my book, and he wrote back.

Seems Captain Benavage ended up a Major in the USMC. He retired from teaching at Herndon High School in 1984 and moved to a locale that did not have the traffic and population hassles of suburban Washington, DC.

It was great to hear from Mr. Benavage. He was a real hero of mine when I was in high school. He was one of the first World War Two veterans that I knew personally, and I was already very interested in the history of WWII at the time I met him.

Once again, this blog has reunited old friends. What a blessing.

We honor men such as you, Pete Benavage, for fighting to keep us free.

We'll never forget.

Right: The front of my 1976 Herndon High School Yearbook.

Lest We Forget... A New Year's Photo

As we begin a new year, may our prayers be for peace around the world. The photo below is a poignant reminder that some give all. My friend Frank Irgang, who as a young infantryman landed at Normandy on D-Day and fought his way across Europe, sent me this email, and it is worth sharing with everyone.

Photo by Todd Heisler

The Rocky Mountain News

When 2nd Lt. James Cathey's body arrived at the Reno Airport, Marines climbed into the cargo hold of the plane and draped the flag over his casket as passengers watched the family gather on the tarmac.

During the arrival of another Marine's casket last year at Denver International Airport, Major Steve Beck described the scene as one of the most powerful in the process: "See the people in the windows? They'll sit right there in the plane, watching those Marines. You gotta wonder what's going through their minds, knowing that they're on the plane that brought him home," he said.

"They're going to remember being on that plane for the rest of their lives. They're going to remember bringing that Marine home. And they should."

Amen.

Give Pappy Boyington His Statue

University of Washington students recently protested against having a statue of UW graduate Gregory 'Pappy' Boyington erected on the campus in Seattle, claiming he was a "poor example" to current UW students. The statue was narrowly rejected by the university administration, and this was seen as a huge victory by the progressive minds on the campus and across the nation.

What did Boyington do that made him a bad example? He shot down 28 enemy planes. A statue honoring Boyington, according to the protesters, would glorify killing.

In their scamper to be politically correct, they overlooked the fact that had Pappy Boyington and other WWII airmen not shot down the enemy, UW might be a Japanese institution. Would the Japanese have treated the people of Seattle better than they treated the conquered people in China and Southeast Asia? Would Seattle have been treated as well as Nanking, China?

Is our communal memory of WWII so short that we now refuse to honor those who turned the tide of war and kept the world free because they had to kill the enemy to do so?

Boyington was born in Coeur D'Alene, Idaho, to humble beginnings. He worked hard and had an ROTC scholarship to put himself through college at the University of Washigton in Seattle. When war broke out, Pappy had already been a Marine aviator for years. That's how he got his nickname. At age 30, he was considered an ancient by his fresh-faced young pilots.

For three months, in 1943 and 1944, he led the Marine Fighting Squadron #214, the so-called 'Black Sheep Squadron'. The Black Sheep were thus named because many of them were misfits and rejects from other squadrons, but most were also excellent fighter pilots. The Black Sheep Squadron flew out of the Solomon Islands, and was credited with downing 97 Japanese aircraft during Boyington's tenure. Boyington himself is credited with 28 enemy aircraft shot down, making him one of the war's top aces.

In January 1944 Boyington was shot down and captured by the Japanese and spent the rest of the war as a prisoner. He was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously, because the Marine Corps thought he was dead.

But he wasn't. Despite miserable prison conditions that included beatings and torture, Boyington rose like the Phoenix from the proverbial ashes at the end of the war, alive and well.

Boyington's autobiography, titled Baa Baa Black Sheep, was a bestseller in 1958. In the 1970s a television series by the same name ran for two seasons on the NBC network, with actor Robert Conrad in the role of Boyington, the tough, hard-drinking but dedicated mentor to a squadron up of misfits and rejects.



Actor Robert Conrad as Gregory 'Pappy' Boyington, during filming of the hit TV series.


He became a well-known American after his book came out, and the TV series in the 70's introduced millions to the valor of the Marine Corps aviators in the Pacific theater in World War Two.

Boyington died on Jan. 11, 1988, and is buried in Arlington National Cemetery. In summing up his own life, he wrote at the end of his memoir, "If this story were to have a moral, then I would say, 'Just name a hero and I'll prove he's a bum.'" Boyington knew he was not a perfect person, and like most World War Two veterans, he tended to play down his war service to his country.

It's up to those who remember to keep his memory alive and make sure he gets the respect and recognition he so rightly deserves.

Pappy, until you get your statue, I guess people will just have to pay a visit to this stone memorial in Arlington National Cemetery. I remain hopeful that one day it will be politically correct to honor you at your alma mater.