With the Old Breed_ At Peleliu and Okinawa - E. B. Sledge [165]
I felt compassion for the officer. I'd been in the same forlorn frame of mind more than once, when horror piled on horror seemed too much to bear. The officer also carried a heavy responsibility, which I didn't have.
As I walked past, the officer blurted out in desperation, “What's the matter with those guys up on the ridge? Why the hell don't they move out faster and get this thing over with?”
Compassion aside, my own emotional and physical state was far from good by then. Completely forgetting my lowly rank, I walked right into the CP and said to the officer, “I'll tell you what's the matter with those guys on the ridge. They're gettin’ shot right and left, and they can't move any faster!”
He looked up with a dazed expression. Boyes turned around, probably expecting to see the battalion or regimental commander. When he saw me instead, he looked surprised. Then he glared at me the way he did the time I had too much to say to Shadow back on Half Moon. Coming quickly to my senses and remembering that a private's advice to first lieutenants and gunny sergeants wasn't considered standard operating procedure in the Marine Corps, I backed away quietly and got out of there.
Toward afternoon, several of us were resting among some rocks near the crest of the ridge. We had been passing ammo and water up to some men just below the crest. A Japanese machine gun still covered the crest there, and no one dared raise his head. Bullets snapped over the crest and ricochets whined off into the air after striking rocks. The man next to me was a rifleman and a fine Peleliu veteran whom I knew well. He had become unusually quiet and moody during the past hour, but I just assumed he was as tired and as weary with fear and fatigue as I was. Suddenly he began babbling incoherently, grabbed his rifle, and shouted, “Those slant-eyed yellow bastards, they've killed enougha my buddies. I'm goin’ after 'em.” He jumped up and started for the crest of the ridge.
“Stop!” I yelled and grabbed at his trouser leg. He pulled away.
A sergeant next to him yelled, “Stop, you fool!” The sergeant also grabbed for the frantic man's legs, but his hands slipped. He managed to clutch the toe of one boondocker, however, and gave a jerk. That threw the man off balance, and he sprawled on his back, sobbing like a baby. The front of his trousers was darkened where he had urinated when he lost control of himself. The sergeant and I tried to calm him but also made sure he couldn't get back onto his feet. “Take it easy, Cobber. We'll get you outa here,” the NCO said.
We called a corpsman who took the sobbing, trembling man out of the meat grinder to an aid station.
“He's a damn good Marine, Sledgehammer. I'll lower the boom on anybody says he ain't. But he's just had all he can take. That's it. He's just had all he can take.”
The sergeant's voice trailed away sadly. We had just seen a brave man crack up completely and lose all control of himself, even to the point of losing his desire to live.
“If you hadn't grabbed his foot and jerked him down before he got to the crest, he'd be dead now, for sure,” I said.
“Yeah, the poor guy woulda gotten hit by that goddamn machine gun; no doubt about it,” the sergeant said.
By the end of the day, Company K reached the eastern end of Kunishi Ridge and established contact with army units that had gained the high ground on Yuza-Dake and Yaeju-Dake. Mail came up to us along with rations, water, and ammo. Among my letters was one from a Mobile acquaintance of many years. He had joined the Marine Corps and was a member of some rear-echelon unit of service troops stationed on northern Okinawa. He insisted that I write him immediately about the location of my unit. He wrote that when he found out where I was, he would visit me at once. I read his words to some of my buddies, and they got a good laugh out of it.
“Don't that guy know there's a war on? What the hell does he think the First Marine Division