In the harbor and on the beach were may bodies of the dead among which were both women and children. It’s hard to understand why they preferred death to capture but most of them did.
When we returned to the ship we resumed our ceaseless patrol around the island. All the time we were bombarding the beach ahead of our troops and making it as unpleasant as possible.
One day we were firing call fire for a Marine spotter. This is a special spotter who carries a two way phone set and advances ahead of our front lines. He calls the ship and gives them the position of the next target we are to knockout. One spotter who had spotted for us all morning was wounded and another relieved him in the afternoon. After we had been firing for a couple of hours he told us that he would not give us another target until we gave him the days baseball score. With the enemy only a few yards away believe me it took nerves of steel to do his job. These men are the fighting marines and too much cannot be said of them. They are brave and courageous fighters and have spearheaded every landing that we have made out here in the pacific.
Many of the enemy tried to leave the far end of the island in rafts and boats. By now the Marines had pushed all the Japanese back to one small corner of the island.
One night the Japanese made a counter attack and used women and children as well as men too hold to fight for shields. They pushed our lines back a short distance but we gained it back the next day. We were on the end of the island and could see the Japanese move around and at night you could see the tracers from the bullets as they continues the bloody conquest for the island.
The island of Saipan was officially secured on July 10th and Old Glory was hoisted up to unfurl here beauty in the sun. I only wish that all the brave men who died there could have seen here floating so proudly overhead and know that their sacrifice had not been in vain.
The next place was Tinian which was only about 8,000 yards away from Saipan and it was still in enemy hands. We started shelling the island and one of the most beautiful sights was the Marine artillery barrage delivered on Tinian from Saipan. 32 Heavy guns were mounted and all day they poured a deadly sheet of steel on the cornered Japanese on Tinian. The lanes continued strafing and dive bombing every day. The Marines used for the first time the tank and flame throwers as a combination. They really brought the rats out of their holes. We fired white phosphorus shells and they rally make a beautiful but deadly sight. They burst in air and streams of white phosphorus flares out in all directions. The Marines would advance and use the tanks to wipe out isolated outposts.
It was pretty easy to take Tinian because it seemed as though the Japanese had already seen the handwriting on the wall. But then who wouldn’t with the entire ocean covered with our warships and no hope for the Japanese except to wait for the end, and they all knew it would come soon. There was a large airfield on Tinian and it was quickly secured by our troops. The Japanese were pushed back to one small point. We steamed until after midnight and fired our main battery until almost four in the morning. Then we opened up with our automatic weapons and for almost an hour poured a steady stream of hot lead into the closely packed enemy. We fired between 1200 and 1400 rounds per gun. Our guns became red hot and steam poured from them in the early morning light. We later found out that the beach was littered with dead Japanese after we had finished our terrific bombardment. It was so intense until the cornered Japanese made a counter attack on the entrenched marines who finished the job.