thedrifter
11-29-08, 07:18 AM
November 28, 2008
Former Marine may become last surviving member of WW2 division
By MICHAEL DEAK
Staff Writer
Lou Imfeld hopes he will not prove the Biblical adage that the last shall be the first.
If 86-year-old Imfeld, a former Bridgewater resident and prominent Somerset County attorney, becomes the last surviving member of the First Marine Division that saw horrific action in the Pacific during World War II, he will be the first to sip from a bottle of Cognac, more than a century old, kept safe and secure at the Marine Memorial Association in San Francisco.
It's a story that begins Dec. 8, 1941, when Imfeld, then a recent graduate of Union High School and taking classes at the Newark College of Engineering, joined the Marine Corps a day after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor.
About a month later he was shipped off for basic training with the First Marine Division at Parris Island in South Carolina. Then, he traveled across the country by Pullman car to San Francisco, where Imfeld boarded a ship that was to take him to New Zealand for additional training.
But the Japanese had other plans.
The Japanese started building an airfield on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands; if the Japanese were successful, the Allied supply lines from Australia would be cut.
After unloading its cargo in New Zealand, Imfeld's ship steamed north to Guadalcanal where on Aug. 8, 1942, the day after the first Marines landed on the island, Imfeld came ashore.
The Japanese sunk the ship that brought Imfeld to Guadalcanal and then sank four more ships, forcing the Navy to withdraw. That left the Marines on the island with dwindling supplies. The Marines' rations were cut to two meals a day.
Every day the Japanese bombed the American positions. And diseases such as malaria, dysentery and dengue fever became rampant among the American soldiers.
"It was tough," Imfeld recalled dryly. "It was not a pleasant experience."
Imfeld's company was not relieved on the island until more than four months after the battle began. The Marines were sent to Melbourne in Australia for rest and relaxation.
"We were in pretty poor shape," Imfeld remembered.
But the camaraderie that bound the Marines together on Guadalcanal and other battles in the Pacific endures until today. In 2002 Imfeld and five of his buddies visited Guadalcanal to mark the 60th anniversary of the battle, which was the longest in American military history. It ended Feb. 9, 1943.
The unbreakable brotherhood of the Marines prompted Guadalcanal veterans to organize the "Last of the First Club" in August 1944.
The club was formed to commemorate the heroic efforts of the First Marine Division throughout World War II. Former Marine Ralph McGill, who became the Pulitzer Prize-winning editor and publisher of the Atlanta Constitution, donated a bottle of Cognac, brought back from France after World War I, to be given to the last surving member of the club, "the last of the First."
There were 20,000 members of the First Marine Division eligible for membership when the club formed. But that number grew to 50,000 as another wave of Marines joined the division and fought on Peleliu (now known as the South Pacific nation of Palau) in 1944, and Okinawa, Japan, in 1945.
Imfeld has estimated that there may be close to 2,000 veterans, most in their 80s, who are eligible for the bottle of Cognac. The bottle, insured for $25,000, was removed from what Imfeld called a "steel foxhole" in Atlanta and flown under Marine guard to a Washington, D.C., airport where it was then taken in an armored car to near the northern Virginia executive offices of the Marine Memorial Association. When the association moved to San Francisco, the bottle, like the World War II Marines after basic training at Parris Island, made the trip to the West Coast.
Imfeld retired in 1992 from the Somerville law firm of Wharton, Stewart and Davis, and moved to Williamsburg, Va. He and his wife have two children and three grandchildren.
"I'm thankful I'm still around and able to enjoy my family," said Imfeld, who recently spent a week in the New Jersey and New York area.
At the last reunion of Imfeld's Marine company three months ago in Nashville, there were 10 members of Imfeld's band of brothers from Guadalcanal remaining. They agreed it would be appropriate for the winner of the bottle to bring it back to Guadalcanal to toast all those who fought in the battle that turned the tide of the war in the Pacific.
But they also agreed that by the time the last man is determined, he might be too old to make the trip and might have to drink alone. A friend of Imfeld said he should buy a bottle of Cognac and take it to Guadalcanal in case he can't make the trip if he becomes the sole survivor.
It would be Imfeld's third trip to the island.
"But who's counting?" he said.
Ellie
Former Marine may become last surviving member of WW2 division
By MICHAEL DEAK
Staff Writer
Lou Imfeld hopes he will not prove the Biblical adage that the last shall be the first.
If 86-year-old Imfeld, a former Bridgewater resident and prominent Somerset County attorney, becomes the last surviving member of the First Marine Division that saw horrific action in the Pacific during World War II, he will be the first to sip from a bottle of Cognac, more than a century old, kept safe and secure at the Marine Memorial Association in San Francisco.
It's a story that begins Dec. 8, 1941, when Imfeld, then a recent graduate of Union High School and taking classes at the Newark College of Engineering, joined the Marine Corps a day after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor.
About a month later he was shipped off for basic training with the First Marine Division at Parris Island in South Carolina. Then, he traveled across the country by Pullman car to San Francisco, where Imfeld boarded a ship that was to take him to New Zealand for additional training.
But the Japanese had other plans.
The Japanese started building an airfield on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands; if the Japanese were successful, the Allied supply lines from Australia would be cut.
After unloading its cargo in New Zealand, Imfeld's ship steamed north to Guadalcanal where on Aug. 8, 1942, the day after the first Marines landed on the island, Imfeld came ashore.
The Japanese sunk the ship that brought Imfeld to Guadalcanal and then sank four more ships, forcing the Navy to withdraw. That left the Marines on the island with dwindling supplies. The Marines' rations were cut to two meals a day.
Every day the Japanese bombed the American positions. And diseases such as malaria, dysentery and dengue fever became rampant among the American soldiers.
"It was tough," Imfeld recalled dryly. "It was not a pleasant experience."
Imfeld's company was not relieved on the island until more than four months after the battle began. The Marines were sent to Melbourne in Australia for rest and relaxation.
"We were in pretty poor shape," Imfeld remembered.
But the camaraderie that bound the Marines together on Guadalcanal and other battles in the Pacific endures until today. In 2002 Imfeld and five of his buddies visited Guadalcanal to mark the 60th anniversary of the battle, which was the longest in American military history. It ended Feb. 9, 1943.
The unbreakable brotherhood of the Marines prompted Guadalcanal veterans to organize the "Last of the First Club" in August 1944.
The club was formed to commemorate the heroic efforts of the First Marine Division throughout World War II. Former Marine Ralph McGill, who became the Pulitzer Prize-winning editor and publisher of the Atlanta Constitution, donated a bottle of Cognac, brought back from France after World War I, to be given to the last surving member of the club, "the last of the First."
There were 20,000 members of the First Marine Division eligible for membership when the club formed. But that number grew to 50,000 as another wave of Marines joined the division and fought on Peleliu (now known as the South Pacific nation of Palau) in 1944, and Okinawa, Japan, in 1945.
Imfeld has estimated that there may be close to 2,000 veterans, most in their 80s, who are eligible for the bottle of Cognac. The bottle, insured for $25,000, was removed from what Imfeld called a "steel foxhole" in Atlanta and flown under Marine guard to a Washington, D.C., airport where it was then taken in an armored car to near the northern Virginia executive offices of the Marine Memorial Association. When the association moved to San Francisco, the bottle, like the World War II Marines after basic training at Parris Island, made the trip to the West Coast.
Imfeld retired in 1992 from the Somerville law firm of Wharton, Stewart and Davis, and moved to Williamsburg, Va. He and his wife have two children and three grandchildren.
"I'm thankful I'm still around and able to enjoy my family," said Imfeld, who recently spent a week in the New Jersey and New York area.
At the last reunion of Imfeld's Marine company three months ago in Nashville, there were 10 members of Imfeld's band of brothers from Guadalcanal remaining. They agreed it would be appropriate for the winner of the bottle to bring it back to Guadalcanal to toast all those who fought in the battle that turned the tide of the war in the Pacific.
But they also agreed that by the time the last man is determined, he might be too old to make the trip and might have to drink alone. A friend of Imfeld said he should buy a bottle of Cognac and take it to Guadalcanal in case he can't make the trip if he becomes the sole survivor.
It would be Imfeld's third trip to the island.
"But who's counting?" he said.
Ellie