We returned to Saipan in a few days and continued screening the large fleet of fat supply ships who were by now anchored near the island and unloading vast quantities of ammunition and supplies.
At night we would go out on patrol about 15 miles away from the island. Our job was to keep enemy planes away from the island we never had a dull moment, and we nicknamed our special patrol station "Bogie Patrol No3", bogie meaning enemy planes or unidentified planes. They came over nearly every night and we increased out total to three as we shot one more down while on patrol. One night a medium bomber dropped flares on us and made a bombing run. We were lucky and all the bombs missed us.
One night I saw a plane unload its bombs over enemy held territory and you could see a long string of big explosions as the bombs landed. Then the plane was hit and it curved around overhead with flames flying all around it and crashed.
It wasn’t but a couple of weeks until they had set up a post office on the beach and I was fortunate enough to go ashore as the Gig Coxswain. The post office was in Tenepang Harbor and on the way in you could see the remains of several Japanese merchant ships lying on the bottom were we had sunk them as they tried to escape. There was a large merchant ship loaded with lumber and salvage operations were underway. There were several small craft also sitting on the bottom. Among these was a net tender that the Japanese had captured probably in the Philippines.
The entire island was one great mass of wreckage. For the first time I was able to really see the damage done by shore bombardment. It really was inspiring to see the terrible damage our navel pounding had done.
I remember one place in particular a large sugar mill was a particular target because even after our troops had advanced past it still contained a Japanese outpost and when we were through sending slugs through it there wasn’t enough left to tell. Sugar was ankle deep all around and the entire towns very few buildings were left and even those had holes through them.
The post office had been moved from an LST to an ex-geisha house which was in fairly good shape except for a few holes in the side and most of the top blown off. Already the mail was coming in and the Marines on the island were some of the first to receive it. We without mail for over a month and were really glad to get ours.
The second trip I made ashore I had 5 hours in which to explore the island. The only requirements were, you had to be armed and you could go anywhere behind the front lines. Anyone from the fleet who was caught off the landing without sidearm or a rifle was put on a burial detail. There were dead bodies of the enemy every where and plenty of work. They were well riddled and the rising sun had set for good. As we went passed the airfield it looked good to see our planes all over the strip. They were burying them in mass graves and covering them with bulldozers. There were many such graves around the island.