E. B. Sledge
Book report by
Robert Tigner
Eugene Sledge was a United States Marine (USMC) during World War II
Georgia Tech.1 He and many of his class mates flunked out in order to be
sent as an enlisted man to Marine Corps Recruit Depot (MCRD) San Diego for
boot camp and Camp Elliot for advanced infantry training. He eventually
served with the 1st Marine Division, King Company, 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines
(K/3/5) as a 60mm mortar man. All marines are a rifleman first and so at
times Sledge also did duty as a rifleman and stretcher bearer. Eventually
Sledge reached the rank of Corporal. Sledge never comments in his book on
32 years after his. At my time in boot camp, MCRD and the US Navy boot
camps were separated by a fence. We could see the beach and bay where
Sledge ran for conditioning training. I began to realize, as he did too, just
what the Marine training was about, conditioning, rapid response, following
orders and physical endurance. His description of serving in the rifle range
target butt pits was one of the ways the Marines got recruits used to the
sound of incoming rounds.2 It also taught them that there really was a
Sledge describes the weeks and months long training and near boredom that
preceded his first battle, Peleliu. He often did not understand the training
workup until he made his first amphibious landing. He also described some of
the characters that would play parts in the coming campaigns. Gunnery
Sergeant Hanley was one of those. Haney was an older Marine, early 50s
and a WWI combat veteran, whos whole life was the Corps. He would clean
his M1 three times per day and practice bayonet drills after. Haney was one
of those enlisted Marines whose authority came from his experience and
previous combat.3
Monotonous work parties and weeks of training are all part of the military
experience. Trainees often had no real understanding of why they were doing
the evolutions because they did not been in combat nor did they know where
they were going. But Sledge learned what that purpose was as he boarded
USS LST-661, landing ship tank. These LST-542 class ships were unnamed in
WWII as over 1000 were built during WWII.4 The Peleliu landing was Sledges
first combat experience and he saw his first dead Japanese, a medic. He was
horrified at the sight but was surprised at the nonchalance that other
Marines showed as they picked through the bodies for souveniers.5 As the
operation wore on, Sledge describes his feelings of rage, fear, a desire to cry
and other emotions which came during shellings. His emotions often
stemmed from an inability to respond and could only imagine the death that
was coming. Sledge talks about death, maiming and wounding frequently but
never uses those terms. He and other Marines said that someone got hit.
Sledges stories of Marines joking about how close a thing was when a bullet,
grenade or shell miss was when missed seem strange to anyone who has not
darker in his Okinawa campaign description. Not until D+12 when Sledge
experience from his description but also confused and deadly close. He
describes killing Japanese with his carbine and the feelings of remorse and
then chides himself for feeling so for a foe trying to throw grenades at him
During the first few days of the Peleliu campaign Sledge does not describe
seeing a live Japanese soldier. That also occurred during most of the Okinawa
campaign. Not until late in the Okinawa campaign did the Marines see many
Japanese. Often it was only 1 or 2 at a time until they had reduced a strong
point. Then the Marines could see the dead Japanese. As Sledges Peleliu
description moved on, one saw how the Marines were learning how to deal
with the Japanese soldiers and their tactics and how the Marines were
learning to stay alive. But the Japanese were also learning. Sledge describes
how tactically minded the Japanese had become, firing artillery and mortars
when they could do the most destruction. The Japanese were designing a
defense in depth that was a reaction to the lack of success they had in
Okinawa wrings show that the Japanese followed the defense in depth
As the Peleliu battle wore on, Sledge describes a tiredness, exhaustion and
despair that crept in on him from enduring constant battle and from the
wariness that he had to have during the nights. He also describes the stench
comments many times about the useless waste, materiel and human futures,
that war is. Human waste and rotting rations also caused a fly explosion that
was treated with DDT. The living conditions for Marines just kept getting
worse and were beyond wretched at the Umbrogol Pocket. Sledge also
describes how wretched the water was that was brought to them during the
early battle. They had cleaned 50 gallon oil barrels at Pavavu and now they
realized how the water reached them and why it had an oily sheen and taste.
both campaigns. Peleliu was extremely hat and there never seemed to be
enough water while at Okinawa water could not reach the Marines in large
enough quantity in the later part of the campaign due to mud and poor
weather.
Sledge calls war a disease. He describes one officer, Mac, who once tried to
shoot off the penis of a dead Japanese soldier, urinating in the mouth of a
Sledge writes that as civilized men, we were duty bound to return soon to
return to the chaotic nether world of shells and bullets and suffering and
death.6
as he moved south towards the Shuri line in Okinawa. Even though he and
other Marines felt fear, everyone did their duty and said no one gave into
Sledge writes about the drudgery and hard physical work that occurs in war.
He remarks about how often war narratives and histories neglect this aspect
of war. Often because of the natural topography which the Japanese used for
combat. Bad weather, heat cold rain mud, often accelerated the breakdown.
But the weather also added to the physical discomfort of living on the front
line and just behind it. The rear echelon Marines would sometimes show up
at the front clean shaven well fed and in clean dungarees reminding the front
line Marines how miserable they were. Sledge also describes a constant
headache that he had because of the constant large caliber shelling that
occurred on Okinawa. I can only imagine how much hearing loss Sledge had
The mud, dead Japanese, maggots, inability to move dead Marines. Sledge
describes his impression of a dead Marine at Half Moon Hill that could not be
moved. He felt the Marine was mocking him because Sledge still had to
endure the struggle and to survive while the dead Marines struggle was
over. He writes that even many years after the war he could remember the
scene.7 The living conditions were so degrading and horrible that Sledge
I have read a few stories of 20th century combat as well as combat narratives
of the recent Iraq war. I cannot recall reading as much about the lousy
how bad those conditions can be for them. Sledge also describes emotions
that I had not read about as well. His description of combat adds much to my
2. Sledge, E B, With the Old Breed. Presidio Press Paperback Edition 2010, p.
12
3. Ibid p. 38.
6. Sledge. p. 200
7. Sledge p. 270.