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thedrifter
09-26-06, 03:12 PM
October 02, 2006
The lore of the Corps
Pacific war heroes rest at Punchbowl

By Charles A. Jones
Special to the Times

High above Honolulu is the “Punchbowl,” an extinct volcano that serves as the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.

After World War II, a permanent cemetery was needed for the thousands of Americans killed in the Pacific and buried in temporary cemeteries. Construction began on the Punchbowl in 1948, and the first private burials took place Jan. 4, 1949.

The cemetery opened to the public July 19, 1949, with the first public burials for five Americans killed in action: one unknown service member, two Marines, an Army lieutenant and war correspondent Ernie Pyle, who was killed by Japanese fire in 1945 on the island of Ie Shima. The cemetery was dedicated Sept. 2, 1949, and was closed to burials in 1991.

The Punchbowl is one of two American cemeteries in the Pacific for casualties of Pacific wars. Burials in the Punchbowl include casualties from Guam, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, Burma, Saipan and Japanese prisoner-of-war camps. The dead and missing from the Southwest Pacific are in the Manila American Cemetery and Memorial in the Philippines.

The Punchbowl has graves or missing-in-action memorials for Americans killed and missing from the Korean and Vietnam wars, as well as World War II.

It includes two sites: One is the cemetery, operated by the Department of Veterans Affairs. The other is the “Honolulu Memorial,” erected by the American Battle Monuments Commission, whose Courts of the Missing bear the names of the missing from World War II, Korea and Vietnam.

Recovered bodies are buried in the cemetery with flat tombstones marking the graves. A name is inscribed in stone in the Courts of the Missing if the body was not recovered or was buried at sea, cremated with ashes scattered, or donated to science. The names of the missing are grouped by war and service. The names of Medal of Honor recipients, whether on tombstones or on the Courts of the Missing, are gilded and have Medal of Honor emblems.

Several famous Marines are buried at the Punchbowl or found listed on the Courts of the Missing.

Howard “Smiley” Johnson, who, before the war, played football for the Green Bay Packers, was a Marine lieutenant killed on Iwo Jima during the first day of fighting.

First Lt. William Hawkins was killed on Tarawa in 1943 and received a Medal of Honor posthumously, one of four Marines who received the Medal of Honor for the battle on the island.

Among the Courts of the Missing are Marines such as 1st Lt. Alexander Bonnyman, who also died on Tarawa and received a posthumous Medal of Honor, and Capt. Richard Fleming, an aviator who received a posthumous Medal of Honor for his attack on a Japanese cruiser in 1942 during the Battle of Midway, resulting in his loss at sea. Fleming was the sole Medal of Honor recipient for the crucial Midway battle.

The writer is a lawyer and Marine Corps Reserve colonel in Norfolk, Va.

Ellie