Lore of the Corps
Dogs first began working beside Marines in WWII
By Philip Ewing - pewing@militarytimes.com
Posted : October 22, 2007

Hummer, the bulldog mascot at Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island, S.C., is a crowd favorite at graduation ceremonies for new Marines, where he is dressed in a Marine uniform and wears the rank of a private first class.

But most Marine dogs don’t wear uniforms and certainly aren’t cuddly: The dogs that fight with leathernecks are just as tough as their fellow Marines.

Dogs can run faster than humans, are nimbler in battle-blasted terrain, terrorize enemies and use their superior senses to detect hidden foes. Those qualities made dogs a natural addition to the Marine forces battling across the Pacific in 1942.

That year, the Corps swore in its initial force of 62 dogs, 42 of them from the Army and the rest from dog clubs and private donations.

Commanders found that the best “leatherdog” breeds were German shepherds, Belgian sheepdogs and Doberman pinschers, and required the animals to weigh at least 50 pounds.

Dogs were used as scouts and messengers. Scout dogs looked for interlopers and, if necessary, chased and attacked them. Messenger dogs wore collars with compartments that carried written notes, and ran between positions carrying their messages.

According to the Marine Corps History Division, commanders fielded the dogs in platoons that were attached to Marine infantry regiments.

Soon after their addition to the Corps, Marine dogs gained a reputation for ferocity and gallantry on the battlefield. According to after-action reports from the Bougainville campaign, a German shepherd named Caesar was the only way for Marines on part of the island to communicate when telephone lines were cut. The dog ran messages back and forth even after being shot, until he was evacuated on a stretcher.

A few nights later, a Doberman pinscher named Jack detected a Japanese sniper in a tree close to the U.S. command post, and a Marine was able to use his Browning Automatic Rifle to kill the sniper before he did any damage.

Dogs went on to fight in other Pacific battles, but they weren’t spared from the war’s carnage — 25 Marine dogs were killed in the battle for Guam, retired Capt. William Putney wrote in his book “Always Faithful: A Memoir of the Marine Dogs of WWII.”

“The first Marine War Dog Platoon was admittedly an experimental unit. ... But the latent possibilities of combat dog units [were] proved ... beyond any doubt,” according to a report by the commanding officer of the 2nd Marine Raider Regiment after the Bougainville operation.

Philip Ewing is deputy news editor of Navy Times.

Ellie