thedrifter
04-16-07, 09:54 AM
Guadalcanal Marine is looking for a few good men
Contributed by: Jeff Thomas/YourHub.com on 4/16/2007
David Alter is looking for a few good men, Marines all.
They would have been good enough to survive the Battle of Guadalcanal, attached to the First Marine Division's Air Wing, or Air Group 12.
There they defended the Americans' hard-fought Henderson Field, an airfield that launched some of the most important air victories as the tide of the Pacific theater of action began to sway.
From there they would have had to survive the rest of the battles in the Pacific, not to mention the intervening 64 years, as well.
Because if there isn't at least one good man left from 64 First division Marines assigned to the Air Group that was defending the airfield on Aug. 26, 1943, Alter's quest to get a Purple Heart awarded may be as good as finished.
Alter, an 82-year-old retired journalist and public relations man now living in Longmont, notes he doesn't have much time to get an military award he has believed due to him for the last 64 years. A recent effort from the U.S. congressional office of Marilyn Musgrave, R-Longmont, hasn't turned up any records indicating his injuries occurred in combat.
"I really look at it as a quest," Alter said. "Why should I suffer because of their incompetence? Because it happened.
"I tried years ago. I contacted the Navy; I didn't get any response. I contacted the Marine and didn't get much of response. I'll be 83 in June, at this point, it's another combat mission. I want to battle it out with them."
At Henderson Field, which was the location of the initial Guadalcanal attack by the Marines in the fall of 1942 and possession of which was hotly contested by the Japanese, Alter said it was a matter of routine for the Air Group to be sent out on raids to attack remaining Japanese positions.
"They never told you before the mission what it was about," he said. "There was some talk that were were after a 'Big Bertha' gun that had been hammering the field. ... There was some talk that (Japanese Prime Minister Hideki) Tojo's son was manning that nest."
All Alter really remembers, however, is getting in the truck with seven other Marines and waking up in a make-do hospital tent perhaps as much as a week later.
"I don't recall how long we were traveling," he said. "I think they treated me on site, then pulled me into a tent next to this downed pilot. They said (later) it was three days later; I think it may have been a week."
But one of the men Alter was with on the mission Calvin Leon Greenberg of Brooklyn, N.Y., would visit him in the tent and, according to Alter, tell him, "'they knew we were coming.'"
Alter has never been able to run down Greenberg, although in 2002 he did contact another man who was on the mission, Claude Hambrick of Atlanta, Ga. Hambrick would tell Alter the truck was proceeding inland when a lone Japanese soldier with a rifle grenade shot and hit the truck.
Alter, Hambrick said, was sleeping when the truck was hit, but the other men were able to jump out of the truck. Alter was blown off the truck with his helmet landing 75 feet away, Hambrick told Alter.
Unfortunately, Alter said, Hambrick died in 2005 without giving the story to the Marines.
"It all comes down to witnesses and evidence," said Greg Burt, the constituent advocate who helped prompt a search from the National Archives and Records Administration. "That's what the military requires (for a Purple Heart): It's it's all dependent on finding someone to tell (the story) or finding written documentation.
The last notice Burt said he received from the national archives indicated the records probably don't exist, although many are not uncatalogued and some may have been lost in a fire.
"It's probably the most extensive search I've ever had conducted for anyone," Burt said.
What Alter quest is left with, is a medical record indicating his treatment for a head wound, which was signed by a Lieutenant that Alter said never tended him. Alter's discharge does indicate, however, that the injury was sustained during the "envelope" of time that included battle on Guadalcanal.
Alter questions how his injuries could have been attributed to a fall off a truck without any written report that questioned others on the mission and how no one from the mission was ever questioned for any report.
"I just can't believe I have to pay for their sloppiness," he said.
Ellie
Contributed by: Jeff Thomas/YourHub.com on 4/16/2007
David Alter is looking for a few good men, Marines all.
They would have been good enough to survive the Battle of Guadalcanal, attached to the First Marine Division's Air Wing, or Air Group 12.
There they defended the Americans' hard-fought Henderson Field, an airfield that launched some of the most important air victories as the tide of the Pacific theater of action began to sway.
From there they would have had to survive the rest of the battles in the Pacific, not to mention the intervening 64 years, as well.
Because if there isn't at least one good man left from 64 First division Marines assigned to the Air Group that was defending the airfield on Aug. 26, 1943, Alter's quest to get a Purple Heart awarded may be as good as finished.
Alter, an 82-year-old retired journalist and public relations man now living in Longmont, notes he doesn't have much time to get an military award he has believed due to him for the last 64 years. A recent effort from the U.S. congressional office of Marilyn Musgrave, R-Longmont, hasn't turned up any records indicating his injuries occurred in combat.
"I really look at it as a quest," Alter said. "Why should I suffer because of their incompetence? Because it happened.
"I tried years ago. I contacted the Navy; I didn't get any response. I contacted the Marine and didn't get much of response. I'll be 83 in June, at this point, it's another combat mission. I want to battle it out with them."
At Henderson Field, which was the location of the initial Guadalcanal attack by the Marines in the fall of 1942 and possession of which was hotly contested by the Japanese, Alter said it was a matter of routine for the Air Group to be sent out on raids to attack remaining Japanese positions.
"They never told you before the mission what it was about," he said. "There was some talk that were were after a 'Big Bertha' gun that had been hammering the field. ... There was some talk that (Japanese Prime Minister Hideki) Tojo's son was manning that nest."
All Alter really remembers, however, is getting in the truck with seven other Marines and waking up in a make-do hospital tent perhaps as much as a week later.
"I don't recall how long we were traveling," he said. "I think they treated me on site, then pulled me into a tent next to this downed pilot. They said (later) it was three days later; I think it may have been a week."
But one of the men Alter was with on the mission Calvin Leon Greenberg of Brooklyn, N.Y., would visit him in the tent and, according to Alter, tell him, "'they knew we were coming.'"
Alter has never been able to run down Greenberg, although in 2002 he did contact another man who was on the mission, Claude Hambrick of Atlanta, Ga. Hambrick would tell Alter the truck was proceeding inland when a lone Japanese soldier with a rifle grenade shot and hit the truck.
Alter, Hambrick said, was sleeping when the truck was hit, but the other men were able to jump out of the truck. Alter was blown off the truck with his helmet landing 75 feet away, Hambrick told Alter.
Unfortunately, Alter said, Hambrick died in 2005 without giving the story to the Marines.
"It all comes down to witnesses and evidence," said Greg Burt, the constituent advocate who helped prompt a search from the National Archives and Records Administration. "That's what the military requires (for a Purple Heart): It's it's all dependent on finding someone to tell (the story) or finding written documentation.
The last notice Burt said he received from the national archives indicated the records probably don't exist, although many are not uncatalogued and some may have been lost in a fire.
"It's probably the most extensive search I've ever had conducted for anyone," Burt said.
What Alter quest is left with, is a medical record indicating his treatment for a head wound, which was signed by a Lieutenant that Alter said never tended him. Alter's discharge does indicate, however, that the injury was sustained during the "envelope" of time that included battle on Guadalcanal.
Alter questions how his injuries could have been attributed to a fall off a truck without any written report that questioned others on the mission and how no one from the mission was ever questioned for any report.
"I just can't believe I have to pay for their sloppiness," he said.
Ellie