A Marine's courage saved flag at Guadalcanal
By Susan Nolan
snolan@seacoastonline.com
June 03, 2007 6:00 AM

The Marine Corps League, Seacoast detachment, recently honored a flag that has been in its keeping for nearly 30 years, telling its story for the first time.

It was the first American flag flown on the island of Guadalcanal when the Americans took the beachhead in the battle that turned the tide for the Allied forces in the Pacific theatre in World War II, said Frank Wisinski, the public information officer for the local Marine Corps League.

Its story had never been told until a recent Marine Corps League meeting, Wisinski said.

The 48-star flag had been saved from destruction when then-Marine Cpl. George Doore ran through enemy fire to save it from atop a beach hut during the Japanese counterattack on the beachhead, according to his friend, Paul Cushing, formerly of Kittery and now of Allagash, Maine.

Doore, who later moved to Kittery and worked at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard until his retirement, gave the flag to Cushing — then commandant of the Kittery detachment of the Marine Corps League — nearly 30 years ago.

Cushing had held on to it until a year ago, when he moved north to live with his children, and gave it to Wisinski, commandant of the Seacoast Marine Corps League Detachment.

Wisinski, in turn, wondered what to do with it to give it special meaning. The result was a special dedication of the flag at a meeting of the league last month.

"When the Japanese launched a ferocious counterattack, Marine Cpl. George Doore, not wanting our colors to fall into enemy hands, dodging hostile fire, climbed to the roof of the (beach master's) shed, and removed and saved our flag from seizure and humiliation at the hands of the enemy," Wisinski said.

It was a story that Doore's son Carl, a Dover resident, had never heard.

"I had heard of the flag, but I had no idea of the story behind the flag," Carl Doore said. "I'm very proud."

Like many combat veterans, George Doore didn't talk much about his war experiences. It was only in the last two years of Carl's father's life that he began to tell his son about them.

"But he talked to his buddies about what he had done," Carl said.

George Doore's widow, Avis, a York, Maine, resident, said her husband always generalized about his war experience.

"He didn't do any bragging," she said.

And that, Wisinski said, is typical.

George Doore, who served 23 years in the Marines and worked 14 years at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, died in 1994.

And, Wisinski said, it is time to tell the story of his valor.

"It's a very, very honorable situation ... the fact that he had the courage to do that and the patriotism to do that is very significant. And the fact that it was the first American flag hoisted at Guadalcanal is huge. I'm pretty sure that was our first victory in the South Pacific. ... "Because of the honor and the dignity and the patriotism of that flag, we wanted to honor it. We, as a Marine Corps League, just felt it was very, very special."

Ellie