Once They Were Eagles (19 page)

Waiting for action on the letter, we spent our time swimming and catching up on our mail; we were so sure of success that we discussed possibilities for our next combat tour.

We knew the Black Sheep had done their share in turning the war around and putting the Japanese on the defensive. Although much hard fighting remained, the result was clearly in sight. The Japanese had used up their skilled pilots and most of their aircraft. What was left were desperation efforts such as the ill-fated Kamikaze attacks.

As Robert Sherrod reports in his
History of Marine Corps Aviation in WW II,
“The attrition of the Solomons was telling fatally on the Emperor's stock of Wild Eagles.”

By February 1944, only token Japenese aerial resistance was put up. Like a broken log jam, the drive toward Tokyo accelerated.

Unfortunately, General Moore was transferred to another command, and we learned our fate from a news broadcast by the Associated Press in a story datelined “20 March 1944, An Advanced South Pacific Base”:

Our squadron number went back to the States, and the new pilots assigned to it proudly adopted the famous Black Sheep name. But for us in the original Black Sheep Squadron, there were only 51 Black Sheep, the ones who lived and fought together—and died—during those 84 hectic days in the Solomons.

The Black Sheep scattered. Some, having completed the required three combat tours, returned to the United States for new assignments; others were sent to Bougainville or Green Island.

Quick to recognize good public relations when they had it, the Marine Corps made “Black Sheep” the permanent designation of VMF 214, a name already become almost as much a legend in Marine Corps history as “The Halls of Montezuma.”

Boyington's name remained prominent as well. On 29 January 1944, in an impressive ceremony, the officers and men of Marine Air Group 14 dedicated an amusement park on Ondonga (an island near Munda, in the New Georgia group) to Boyington. The plaque they erected read: “To the outstanding heroism; to the excellent record-surpassing accomplishment achieved in aerial combat against the Japanese by Major Gregory Boyington, a member of this Group, this amusement area is respectfully dedicated by the officers and men of MAG 14 and is hereafter to be known as BOYINGTON PARK.”

And throughout the length and breadth of the Solomons, on carriers, back in the States—everywhere combat fliers gathered—the questions were always raised:

“What do you suppose happened to Pappy?”

“Do you think he had a chance of getting out alive?”

“Did he get shot down?”

“Did he and Ashmun collide?”

“Did he get hit by an AA burst?”

“Did he get captured?”

“If so, is he still a prisoner? or did they kill him?”

“Could he be hiding out in the New Britain jungles?”

“Will he keep that date in San Diego?”

“They can't kill that guy. He'll turn up, sure as God made green apples.”

“Not a chance. After all, the man was human—even he could only take so much.”

Then the rumors began. Boyington had been picked up by a submarine and was already back in the States. He was hiding in the jungle waiting for a chance to get out. He was one of several pilots hiding along the coast of New Ireland, and a PT boat was going to pick them all up. His Mae West life jacket had been found, full of holes. He was working his way along the New Britain coast, trying to make it to our forces at Cape Gloucester.

In my capacity as Intelligence Officer, I saw top secret messages, and I knew that none of these rumors was true.

It
was
true, however, that Boyington had been awarded the nation's highest military decoration. The press release came in the mail, dated 12 April 1944:

But one day, I felt a wave of excitement as I thumbed through the Top Secret file. I read the message again: Marines who'd captured Saipan had picked up a document which said that Boyington had passed through Saipan on his way to Tokyo. Thrilled, I read it again. And again.

And then soberer thoughts came. If the Japanese knew who he was, they'd probably have killed him. They'd killed a lot of captured allied troops. All that could be done was watch the message traffic and hope.

I completed a 16-month tour overseas, returned to the States, and was assigned as assistant chief of staff for intelligence at the Marine Fleet Air West Coast Headquarters in San Diego. Nearly a year went by.

Then one morning, it was there! “Pappy Boyington rescued from Japanese prison camp.”

Checking by telephone and dispatch, our public information officer found that Pappy was being flown to San Francisco.

We spread the word to the 21 Black Sheep on the west coast. All were there to greet him when the big Navy transport plane slid down through the fog over Oakland before dawn on 12 September 1945.

We picked him off the plane; carried him on our shoulders into the waiting room; watched as he told his story to a battery of half a hundred newspaper reporters, to the accompaniment of flashing photographers' bulbs. Then we took him to our hotel in San Francisco.

That night at the St. Francis Hotel we had the Black Sheep party Pappy had always said he'd attend “even if I go down with 30 Zeros on my tail.”

The Marine Corps assigned me to accompany Boyington on a several weeks' tour of the country selling war bonds. Included were a homecoming to a stupendous welcome for him in Seattle and a stop in Washington, D.C., where we met the rest of the Black Sheep. We all watched as Boyington received his Medal of Honor from President Truman.

It was a fitting conclusion to the Black Sheep story.

TWO

War talk by men who have been in a war is always interesting; whereas moon talk by a poet who has not been in the moon is likely to be dull.

Mark Twain

Following the Black Sheep reunion in Washington in 1980 on the occasion of the Corsair induction ceremony at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum, it took me another two years to meet and talk with each of the Black Sheep (I criss-crossed the country twice from Maine to California and from Washington to Florida); to have some 60 hours of tapes transcribed; to do additional research; to get the material assembled.

They were nostalgic years, journeying back 40 years to those stirring, eventful days and filling the gaps in the participants' lives between then and now. I'll start with myself.

After the Black Sheep broke up, I went to Guadalcanal to become Air Command Intelligence Officer for what was planned as an assault on Kavieng—a Japanese stronghold some 180 miles northwest of Rabaul—but turned out to be a less bloody landing at Emirau, a tiny island some 70 miles farther north. The Japanese had been driven out of Guadalcanal, bottled up on Bougainville, and bypassed in the Bismarck Archipelago; at Emirau we were effectively interdicting their efforts to supply their bases.

Nevertheless, one of the highlights of my tour of duty on Emirau was a chance to be a temporary commando. Among the bravest and least recognized of those who fought the war in the South Pacific were the Coast Watchers, a number of Australians and New Zealanders who lived among the natives in those jungle islands and radioed Allied forces when Japanese air raids were headed their way.

One of these, an Australian who had been operating on Tabar Island, had been betrayed by a German national, captured by the Japanese, and beheaded. His brother suggested that we mount a small raid to Tabar, try to capture the German, and see what intelligence material we might pick up.

We made the 150-mile trip by PT boat at night, and pink streaks of dawn stretched across the sky as we approached Tabar. By the time we'd paddled a rubber boat to shore, about a hundred fuzzy-haired natives—tall, muscular, blue-black, and armed with spears—had assembled on the beach. Some of them had bones in their noses. Many had boars' tusk bracelets and necklaces. They wore nothing but basic G-strings. None was smiling. Not even Lloyd's of London would have quoted odds on our lives.