[I came across some of my old writings recently and have decided to place them over the coming weeks and months here on Substack…]
This is a story about United States Marines who died too damn many wars ago, at a place called Makin Island, now known as Butaritari Island, on August 17th and 18th, 1942. In one of the first ground offensives in the Pacific Theater, “Carlson’s Raiders” made an amphibious assault on this Japanese-held island. Evans Carlson was a former US Army First Sergeant who was commissioned a 2nd Lt during WWI and who, after a short break re-enlisted, this time in the Marine Corps, where he was commissioned yet again a year later.
In August 1942 now-Lt. Col.Carlson, assisted by his 2nd-in-command, James Roosevelt (FDR’s eldest son,) led the battalion in the assault on Makin Island. After the battle ended and in the hasty evacuation that followed, 30 Marines were left behind, including Clyde Thomason, the first Marine to earn the Medal of Honor in WWII. 9 were captured by the Japanese and murdered. 2 were not found and their remains are still sought. During the rushed evacuation, there was no time to bury the other 19, so the Raiders asked the Butaritari people to bury them instead. Many years passed, many more men died, many battles were won or last. Butaritari was a long way away and only a small speck in the ocean.
But in keeping with General Logan’s request after the Civil War so many years ago, “Let no neglect, no ravages of time, testify to the present or to the coming generations that we have forgotten as a people the cost of a free and undivided republic,” the Band of Brothers known as the US Armed Forces never forget our fallen comrades. The Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, a joint-service command located in Hawaii, was able to determine that one of the old men on Butaritari had helped bury these 19 Marines more than 58 years prior. He led the recovery team to the burial site. The team found that each Marine was buried with the respect and honor due a warrior. Each man had his helmet affixed, his dog tags placed around his neck, and his M-1 cradled in his arms.
An honor guard of Marines, assisted, augmented, and supported by Airmen, Sailors, and Soldiers, brought those bodies home in flag-draped coffins, marching sonorously to the slow beat we accord those whom we honor. And we are told that old Butaritari man, who spoke no English, still remembered the words of a song from 58 years ago. As the Marines began to place their fallen comrades aboard the aircraft taking them for their final flight home and their officer saluted, the old man was reported to sing softly as they left, “From the Halls of Montezuma, To the Shores of Tripoli…”