Three-War Marine Hero

[thedrifter]

Ray Davis was already a World War II veteran when he received the Medal of Honor for bravery in Korea--and he still had one more war to go.

By Jon Guttman

The military career of Raymond Gilbert Davis epitomizes the professional development of an American officer. From his first assignment as a junior officer in the United States Marine Corps, he worked his way up the ranks to four-star general, finally serving as assistant commandant of the Corps from February 23, 1971, to his retirement on March 31, 1972. In the course of his career, Davis gained the sort of experience for which no training courses can substitute--combat in three wars. During Korea, his second war, Davis' outstanding leadership at the Chosin Reservoir earned him the Medal of Honor. In a recent interview with Military History editor Jon Guttman, Davis reflected on his long career with the Marines.

Military History: What was your background prior to joining the Marine Corps?

Davis: I was born in Fitzgerald, Georgia, on January 13, 1915. I moved to Atlanta at an early age, and later went to Georgia Tech, where I participated in Army ROTC [Reserve Officers' Training Corps]. Upon graduation in June 1938, I was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Army Reserve, then immediately transferred to the Marine Corps with a regular commission.

MH: You seem to have decided on a military career early in life.

Davis: Well, it was the Depression. Jobs were scarce. I had a teaching fellowship at the University of Tennessee, with the promise of a master's degree in 18 months, but the money was canceled somehow. I had to compete for a Marine job with a Navy ROTC candidate, but since Marine training is more related to Army land warfare than Navy training, I made it. I reported to the Charleston Navy Yard for a physical, then went to Basic school at Broad Street in Philadelphia for 10 months.

MH: What was your first duty upon graduating from that course?

Davis: In May 1939, I reported for sea duty as a junior officer for a 40-Marine detachment aboard the heavy cruiser Portland in the Pacific Ocean. We also manned the ship's 5-inch anti-aircraft [AA] battery. When we weren't in port at Long Beach, California, we were going on gunnery drills up the coast or taking part in maneuvers from Pearl Harbor.

MH: How long did that go on?

Davis: It was a one-year tour. In May 1940, I was sent to Quantico, Virginia. I became interested in gunnery and asked to attend the base defense weapons school, learning to man coastal batteries. Halfway through the course, though, I decided I didn't want to do that. Fortunately, I was transferred out by the commander, Major Lewis B. "Chesty" Puller.

MH: Where did you go next?

Davis: I served with the 1st Marine Division at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, as an anti-aircraft officer. Later I moved back to Quantico, then to Parris Island, South Carolina. I next helped open up Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, where I was when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.

MH: How did you react to that news?

Davis: We were up all night listening to the radio, then we were briefed on our general mission, getting our equipment, being trained to defend the coast. Amid all that, I was promoted to captain in February 1942, and a short time later I married Willa Knox Heafner, a schoolteacher from Washington, North Carolina, with whom I had fallen in love while I was at Camp Lejeune. We didn't get all our guns until June, when we were shipped out by train to San Francisco. From there, we got on the converted passenger liner Ericsson and were escorted by destroyers and a cruiser to Wellington, New Zealand, arriving on July 11.

MH: What mission did they have in mind for you?

Davis: We learned that the Japanese were building an airfield in the Solomon Islands that would have endangered U.S. shipping routes. We transferred aboard Navy transports, and on August 7 we landed at our objective--the island of Guadalcanal.

MH: What was your role there?

Davis: Our assignment was to protect the airstrip once we seized it. We had 40mm Bofors anti-aircraft guns, and 20mm guns were still arriving from Camp Lejeune when we were setting up.

MH: How effectively were you able to defend Henderson Field, as the captured strip was named by the Marines?

Davis: We had a mechanical fire-control computer for the 40s. We also had 20mm and .50-caliber guns. For anything above 4,000 feet, however, we had no accuracy. Three weeks later, the 3rd Defense Battalion came in with 90mm guns, and we were subordinated to them. Fortunately, we had some Marine fighter squadrons [VMFs] to deal with the [Mitsubishi G4M] Betty bombers.

MH: Did you have to deal with strafing attacks by enemy fighters?

Davis: Once, four or five [Mitsubishi A6M2] Zeros came in to sweep the airfield, and all of them were shot down. We claimed them, but between the 3rd Defense Battalion and every Marine with a rifle, who knows who really got them?

MH: How did you stay ready for the enemy planes without radar?

Davis: Coastwatchers would tell us when they were coming. Japanese planes came over about every day. When Major John Lucien Smith's [Grumman F4F-4] Wildcats of VMF-223 attacked the bombers, they would always attack the guy on the left flank. Sometimes they would shoot him down, but even if they didn't, he would get rattled, maneuver to evade their fire and throw off the whole formation.

MH: Were you involved in any land fighting?

Davis: Some of my units were farmed out to infantry regiments, forming special weapons units--conglomerate anti-aircraft and anti-tank units. One of our units used towed 37mm guns with anti-personnel shells during the Battle of the Tenaru River, where a 700-man Japanese battalion was annihilated on August 24. I was there the next day, with my people. We took one or two wounded Japanese prisoners; almost all of the rest were killed. I also had a unit near the airfield during the Battle of Bloody Ridge on September 18.

MH: How were the Marines able to hold out against the Japanese onslaughts?

Davis: The Australians, who had occupied the islands before the Japanese, had trained native scouts to track the Japanese, and the intelligence the scouts gathered helped us pinpoint enemy attacks and concentrate our defenses.

MH: Was that the daily routine for the next several months?

Davis: We were bombarded almost every night by the Japanese fleet and bombed from the air by day. We lost few men, though, since we took cover in two-man slit trenches that limited how many would fall victim to each bomb or shell that hit. It got so you would hear the click of the bomb release or see the flash of the guns at sea and you would get in your hole. At first, we had our own 500-pound bombs scattered around, and we would have to put out fires that the Japanese hits set in the grass. On two occasions, I was standing on a 500-pound bomb, beating out the fire around it.

MH: What was the worst month for you on Guadalcanal?

Davis: October, when Puller went north to Matanikau. At that point there was no food, and we had to eat captured rice. The cook said that the black spots in the rice were weevils, but some of us ate them, too, as a source of protein. The cook put in a few raisins to camouflage them. Fishing boats came in from the West Coast with food. We were sick with dengue, malaria and dysentery. Our medical supplies were lost. Vice Admiral Robert L. Ghormley said he had to withdraw the fleet and that we had his permission to surrender if we needed to. The Marine commander, Maj. Gen. Alexander A. Vandegrift, refused.

MH: When did things finally take a turn for the better?

Davis: In November we got a squadron of Boeing B-17s, which was encouraging. Then there were the pivotal naval battles of November 13*15. I was on the beach when the light cruiser Atlanta was lost on the night of November 13. My men cheered, thinking it was Japanese--until the next morning, when she drifted in and her sailors were coming ashore. Despite the Navy's losses, though, they turned the campaign around. Even the air attacks slowed down. We were getting new ships and airplanes. Admiral William F. Halsey used the fleet to seek out and destroy the Japanese.

MH: Were you there for the final Japanese evacuation on February 7, 1943?

Davis: No. I was pulled out in January 1943, just as the Army units were coming in, and I was subsequently promoted to major. The 1st Marine Division was shipped to Australia to get replacements and equipment. We were out of action for eight to nine months--about 5,000 or 6,000 Marines were down with malaria. Guadalcanal changed a lot of minds, though--it proved that our guys could defeat the Japanese.

MH: When did you return to combat?

Davis: They moved us to Goodenough Island, off eastern Papua, where we spent time ashore for a few days. Then they reloaded us for Port Moresby, New Guinea, then off to Cape Gloucester. My AA platoons were farmed out to new regiments. I was left behind, to take command of a special weapons battalion. Chesty Puller was in charge of loading ships, and I told him that my units were being shipped out and that I needed to take care of them. He stroked his chin and said: "I agree with you. I'll tell you, Old Man, you get on that ship over there, and tell them I said to take you along to Cape Gloucester." So I took my staff aboard--those were my orders.

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MH: What was Cape Gloucester like?

Davis: There were a lot of knobs of ground off the beach for us to set up our AA guns, but we only had three airstrikes. After that, I was moved to the 1st Marine Regiment as the 1st Battalion commander, serving under Puller from the end of December 1943 to January 16, 1944. The 1st Division was then pulled back to Pavuvu, in the Solomons, to prepare to go to the Palau Islands.

MH: The Palaus--meaning Peleliu Island?

Davis: Yes. I landed at H-plus-1 hour--September 16, 1944--in the regimental reserve, transferring from boats to amphibious tractors. We lost a lot of tractors because the Japanese were shelling the beach and the water. I jumped off my tractor on the beach and got a mortar sliver through my left knee. It wasn't serious--I just put tape over it and got to work.

MH: What had to be done?

Davis: The lead battalion had been badly hit. Our mission the next morning was to pass through it to seize the regimental objective--some coral ridges. There was also a giant building--I was told that it was an engine repair shop--which had walls 3 feet thick and had not been touched by our naval bombardment. I took 25 casualties, including three dead, trying to take that objective, then I called the battleship Mississippi to put a few holes in it with her 14-inch guns. We then went in to take the ridges, but found ourselves being shot at from three directions. We found one enemy machine gun in a cave, 40 feet behind us, firing. Overall, the division was losing about 1,000 men a day for the first six days. I lost all my platoon leaders, and our casualties amounted to about 70 percent in 10 days. We went forward about 400 yards and held the ground we gained, with the help of naval and air support, until we were relieved by another battalion. We were then given another mission--to sweep the east side of the island, in order to protect the flank of our forces on the ridgeline. It was low ground, and there were few enemy soldiers there.

MH: Apparently the Japanese had selected only the best places to concentrate their defenses on Peleliu.

Davis: Yes, they did a good job of preparing for us. We found five levels of caves in that ridge--heavy in-depth defenses that we had not heard about. In retrospect, we could have saved a lot of lives by not trying to take the whole island. After we secured the airfield, we should have pulled back, got into a siege stage, got our guns up and just pounded the place.

MH: How long were you on Peleliu?

Davis: After less than 20 days, they shipped the remnants of my battalion to Pavuvu. Of 900 Marines, 72 percent were casualties. Promoted to lieutenant colonel, I came home after that and went directly to Quantico, where I served in the Marine Corps School and as an infantry instructor in the Marine Air Infantry School, consolidating ground and air forces for lieutenants and captains.

MH: Where were you when the war ended?

Davis: I was at Quantico from 1944 to 1947, when I went to Guam with the 1st Marine Brigade--until a typhoon blew the camp away. I went to Washington in 1948, then to Chicago to train the 9th Infantry Battalion, U.S. Marine Corps Reserve. In 1950, I got orders to go to the West Coast, form a new battalion in four days, then take a ship to Inchon, Korea. The 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, was 60 percent reservists. They practiced marksmanship by firing their weapons off the fantail at boxes the Navy men threw overboard.

MH: What was your first mission in Korea?

Davis: After we landed at Inchon on September 21, 1950, the 7th Regiment's mission was to go to the northern part of Seoul to protect our forces there from attack from the north. We guarded the Seoul*Pyongyang road, then moved north to Uijonbu. The NKPA [North Korean People's Army] was on the run--there were just enough skirmishes there to get my men well-trained. After Seoul was liberated, we were pulled out, loaded onto ships and sent to the east coast--only to find our objective, Wonsan, mined. It took five days to clear Wonsan Harbor--Bob Hope arrived there before we did!

MH: Where did you go after that?

Davis: In October, we went to Hamhung, where we moved into the mountains. We were to relieve an ROK [Republic of Korea] battalion near the Changjin hydroelectric plant in the mountains northeast of Chosin. When we got there, I took a jeep on a reconnaissance mission, with an ROK lieutenant as an interpreter and adviser. He kept telling me of the Chinese presence and even showed us 20 Chinese prisoners his men had captured.

MH: Was anyone concerned about the Chinese presence in Korea?

Davis: The South Koreans were. Our commander in chief, General Douglas MacArthur, was not. Meanwhile, during the last week in October, we got orders to seize the village of Sudong. As we prepared to jump off, we had our first fight with a Chinese regiment. We were well-positioned on high ground and beat them off. Then a Chinese battalion came down a railroad tunnel and attacked us. That night, a North Korean tank, with sandbags on its turret, rolled into my command post, turned on its lights and started shooting. My recoilless rifle crews fired back, and although we failed to knock it out, it withdrew and headed back north. We fought off the infantry assault with grenades and recoilless rifles, aided from the air by Marine [Vought F4U] Corsairs. In the morning, the enemy came in range of our heavy machine guns, and we mowed them down. We killed about 600 of them. Later, we also found four more abandoned, camouflaged NKPA tanks near their lines.

MH: Wasn't that enough to catch MacArthur's attention?

Davis: MacArthur sent some of his staff over, but he still couldn't believe that it was more than a few "volunteer units."

MH: When did the "Chinese Phase" of the war begin in earnest?

Davis: Well, on November 10, we celebrated the Marine Corps' birthday by swimming in the river near the hydroelectric plant. It was that warm. But then, on November 16, the Siberian wind shifted. The temperature dropped to 16 degrees below zero in one night. On November 25, during Thanksgiving dinner, we were fired at, but it was inaccurate. Then, on November 26 and 27, our patrols reported that they were finding increasing resistance--and then the Chinese offensive began.

MH: What was your situation amid the general chaos?

Davis: Two rifle companies of the 7th Marines--Dog and Easy companies--were hit very hard. All I could do was tell them over the radio that I would send my S-3 [operations officer] with a jeep load of ammunition to them--there were no reinforcements. They held; the regiment finally sent another com-pany to reinforce them, and that worked out. But it was a very heavy assault on the two positions, and they had taken heavy casualties. The Chinese came in waves and the Marines slaughtered them. I had artillery firing just in front of the defenders. At the same time, Baker Company had sent out a long-range patrol that got ambushed. The company commander was hit in the face. I took Able and Charlie companies down the road to Turkey Hill--the place where we had had Thanksgiving dinner just days before--got B Company's casualties on trucks and sent them down the road to Hagaru-ri. The regiment told me to leave a company there, because there was a block in the road. I left C Company, but soon after I went back to our perimeter with A and B companies, C Company came under attack. We got artillery support to them. I was considering going back in the dark, but C Company's commander said his men could hold, so I waited until morning. They took at least 30 casualties--they had been hit hard, since a reinforced rifle company had 200 troops.

MH: It sounds like the situation was becoming untenable.

Davis: We had to fight our way back--the Chinese were starting to press us from all sides. The 5th and 7th Marines had orders to withdraw eastward to rejoin the division at Hagaru-ri. It was very foggy at that time, so I mounted a boulder about 3 feet high and started directing traffic from three directions. I later learned that while I was doing that, a truck driver named Louis Tragas turned on his lights, saw me in the fog and asked a sergeant, "Who's that man?" The sergeant replied, "That's Colonel Davis," and Tragas exclaimed to him, "Look, he's got a halo--we're all going to get out of here!"

MH: Another legend born of the fog of war! But didn't one of your rear-guard companies still need to be extricated?

Davis: Yes. About that time, the 7th Marines' headquarters had moved back to Hagaru-ri. Colonel Homer L. Litzenberg, the regimental commander, described the situation. Fox Company, which had served as our rear guard, had been cut off. Three or four attempts to reach them had failed, but they were holding. Litzenberg told me, "Be back in 20 minutes with a plan." The plan I came up with was to go around the mountains to the north--about an eight-mile trek--then go in and rescue them. The unit I led was streamlined by leaving half the heavy machine guns, heavy mortars, all vehicles and all casualties behind with the regimental train. However, we doubled up on ammunition--extra mortar rounds, rocket rounds, machine-gun belts--as well as three days' rations, so the troops were still overloaded.

MH: What was the mission's progress?

Davis: On November 30, we fought our way out of the perimeter just as darkness was falling. Up where we had driven off the Chinese, I plotted a course through the mountains. It was too cold to think--our artillery reported that it was 24 degrees below zero in the valley and an estimated 75 degrees below zero wind chill in the mountains--so I went in with the S-3 to get an azimuth. I simply said, "Toward that star," and everyone thought that the star picked to guide us doubled in brightness. We headed out single file. There was no security ahead or in the flanks.
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[thedrifter]

MH: How did you contact F Company?

Davis: Finally, when we were 1,500 yards from Fox Company, I called a halt and put my men into a perimeter. I had a hand-cranked radio, with which I called the regiment and had it relay the news to Fox Company and tell them that we would come in at daylight. I then got in my sleeping bag and zipped up with my hood overhead. As I was getting settled, I saw one Marine sitting on a rock 20 feet away. I sat up to tell him to get down, and just then a bullet tore through my hood and skinned my forehead.

MH: What happened the next day?

Davis: At daylight on December 2, we moved up until we saw Fox Company's position. Our radio got the F Company commander, Captain Bill Barber, and I got all choked up as he said, "Well, I'll send a patrol out to show you the way in." The news media later misquoted him as saying, "I'll send a patrol out to rescue you." Barber had air and artillery support on station, and they swept the area where we were to come in. We joined forces, reinforced Barber's lines and made use of his radios--thanks to an airdrop, he had fresh batteries.

MH: How did you break out?

Davis: The second part of our mission was to clear the passes. I formed two task forces. My operations officer, Major Tom Tighe, took one force to clear the southern passes, and I took the other to clear the northern passes. At the same time, I moved my people toward Hagaru-ri to get a head start. I also had the troops build fires around the area to draw the Chinese out. A company of Chinese advanced between Tighe's main force and its flank protection; they cleaned the enemy out in a cross-fire. We, in turn, came under sniper fire, which killed the company surgeon, who had volunteered to come along. Barber was hit and was helped onto a stretcher, but he was still commanding.

MH: What happened at that point?

Davis: I got into a three-way radio conversation with Litzenberg and Colonel Ray Murray, commander of the 5th Regiment, who wanted me to relieve pressure on him. Litzenberg, however, decided that things were too complicated as they were, so he kept me where I was. Four or five hours later, we were able to join forces and got one tank up through the pass. I met Lt. Col. Bob Taplett, battalion commander of the leading wave from the 5th Marines, and we discussed the situation. Litzenberg then ordered me to lead the way to Hagaru-ri, and we headed out. We went very rapidly down the hills, until Lt. Col. Fred Dowsett, the executive commander of the 7th Marines, came up and said: "God, you're in a hurry. I had a hell of a time catching up with you." He had me establish an outpost on a key hill that posed a danger to the column. I put Charlie Company on the knob. That turned out to be tragic--they had no radio, only orders to rejoin the tail of the column. Instead, they joined a break in the column. As a result, our artillery got ambushed and lost three 105mm towed pieces. The rest of the retreat was uneventful, though.

MH: You managed to win your race with the oncoming Chinese. What was it like to finally reach Hagaru-ri?

Davis: The British 41st Commando sent out a patrol to meet us. As we approached the perimeter, Dowsett and I decided, "Let's go in like Marines." We had the men spruce up and march in with heads high. Sure enough, the press people got that and reported it.

MH: Where did you go after that?

Davis: We participated in a rescue effort for Army units before joining Puller at Koto-ri. We had to screen the high ground west of the road between Hagaru-ri and Koto-ri--a high ridge. Ammunition distribution was delayed, resulting in a late jump-off. We arrived at daylight. The lead company found a Chinese outpost--all asleep--and killed them all. The outfit down on the road was faced with Chinese elements in a ravine. I saw them, got on the radio and called for 81mm mortars, which registered a hit on the ditch. I called, "Fire for effect." After 10 rounds, the mortar base plate started moving on the ice, but at least we got the Chinese to move out of there. Halfway to Koto-ri, Litzenberg called me down from the hills. My battalion went down the face of the mountain in deep snow and came under machine-gun fire from one of our own tanks, which also sent five high-explosive rounds our way. My radio operator got on the tactical net and got them to cease fire. Not one man was hit--Providence again!

MH: What other hazards attended the withdrawal?

Davis: In one place, we faced a vertical drop of 10 to 12 feet, but fortunately we found a couple of old tires to cushion the fall. I took another bullet through my clothing from a rifleman; it scraped my side. Then one of my men yelled, "Friendlies!" At Koto-ri, I saw my old friend Chesty Puller. Then I lost my battalion. Dowsett got hit--a leg wound--and Litzenberg pulled me back to serve as his executive officer.

MH: What did you do in that capacity?

Davis: As exec, my task was to keep the column moving. We moved a Bailey bridge on a mountain road to replace a span blown by the Chinese. I had to post Marines to avoid a water hole--three trucks broke their axles in it, and we had to push them over a cliff. At Chihung-ni, a little Korean railroad station, I took charge of shuttling foot troops. I found a dozen frozen Marines, put one on each car and worked them until an Army sergeant came out of a tent and yelled, "Anybody want any candy?" About 800 starved Marines stuffed their pockets with 5-inch Tootsie Rolls. I took more Marines, cut open the back of a supply tent, loaded more Tootsie Rolls on the train and, by telling them, "Anybody who wants candy get on the train," got them aboard and off to Hamhung. There, we loaded the troops onto ships, along with 100,000 civilians, and took off for Masan. For my actions during the relief of Fox Company, a board suggested that I be recommended for the Medal of Honor, which was later awarded to me. Meanwhile, we reached Masan and spent some weeks getting refurbished. Then it was back to the central front--Wonju and Chunchon.

MH: What was your role in the fighting in 1951?

Davis: In early March 1951, I participated in maneuvering the regiment next to an ROK division. The Chinese would gang up on the ROK troops and break through, and they would pull us all back. Then we would attack and retake the high ground--the Chinese under our attack usually withdrew quickly, whereas vigorous assaults were necessary to dislodge the North Koreans. I called it Operation Yo-Yo, because this happened two or three times. Then we went into a mass-fire phase. The U.N. command would put tanks on ramps and give the artillery a quota of ammunition to fire each day. They were firing 70 truckloads of ammunition a day; after a few days, they sent out patrols, only to find that there was nobody there. We started moving forward again in April; then I was relieved and was pulled out of Korea.


President Harry S. Truman awards the Medal of Honor to Lt. Col. Raymond G. Davis on November 24, 1952, while Davis' wife, Willa, and their three children look on. Credit: U.S. Marine Corps via Raymond G. Davis


Sempers,

Roger