Welcome to Veterans Chronicles. I'm Greg Corumbus. Our guest in this edition is Royal Earl Junior, a US Marine Corps veteran of the Pacific Theater in World War Two. He served during the invasion of the Marshall Islands, Saipan, Timmian, and Ewojima. Royal Earl Junior was born one hundred years ago and was the oldest of three children, and as he points out, those children
were spaced out quite a bit. I was born in Montclair, New Jersey, and I was raised in a neighboring town of Bloomfield, New Jersey, which is between Newark and Patterson and North Jersey. I had two sisters. My mother used to hate me because the oldest and I have a sister. I was born in nineteen twenty four. She was born in nineteen thirty one. And then I had another sister born in nineteen thirty nine, which I
think was a mistake, but that's the way it was. And I always used to tell my mother, now, that's planned pearenthood, and she almost takes my head off. Unlike most World War Two veterans, Earl does not have vivid memories of where he was and how he heard the news of the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor on December seventh, nineteen forty one. What he does remember is heading down to the military recruiting office with a buddy to join
the Marine Corps, but their plan to sign up together got derailed. Believe it or not, I don't remember very much about it. I was shocked, along with the rest of the Americans. I was surprised, and as I began to think about it and think how old I was, and I guess I was going to be in it. That next summer, when I was talking with my friends and so on, we all decided we were going to be in service, whether we liked it or not, because we'd probably
be drafted. And my best friend and I decided we would go and enlist. I did not tell my folks, and we went down. We had to go to Newark to enlist, and we went down there, and we both decided we were going to do the Marines. So I walked down the hall to the recruiting office, and he was behind me, I thought,
and went down and I went into the recruiting office office. I didn't shut the door because I thought he was right behind it behind me, and I noticed that a sergeant got up and closed the door, but they had my attention in the front door. I talked to them and they enlisted me, and then they told me I would get a postcard that told me what day I was to report right here at the enlistment area. And when I turned around, it congratulate my buddy. He wasn't I said to the sergeant that
was saying, didn't a friend come in with me? And he said no. I said, wait a minute, and I went out and went down the hall and he's sitting in the Navy recruiting station. And I opened the door and went in and I said, hey, what are you doing here? You said you were going to join the Marines, And one of the sailors said yeah, but we saw him first, so he joined the Navy.
But why did he choose the US Marine Corps earl says it came down to finding the service that was most ready to take the fight to Japan. I know it sounds silly now at my age, I was only eighteen years old. I was so mad at the Japanese that I wanted to get back
at them. And from all I read and heard and everything. The only one that did in there the fighting were the Marines, and the Marines were fighting in the Pacific, and they had landed on Guadcanal by that time, and so I figured, my god, if you want to fight the Japs, because they're the Germans hadn't gotten wet into the Germans jet but we were involved with the Japanese. And I was pretty mad at the Japs for dropping the bombs and so on was found in German. I was going to look
back at them. That's why I joined the Marine Corps. As mister Earl mentioned, he was told that he would be notified about when to report for duty. He would be sworn in on the Marine Corps birthday in a ceremony that he would not soon forget. I was told to report the tention to
November back at the recruiting office. And when we got my dad took me down and dropped me off, and there was a bunch of guys I think there was around thirty of us. Finally got it and they took us over to New York City and there was a picture of this in the New York Daily News in the middle spread, and we all stood on the steps of the US Treasury Building in New York City, and that's where we were sworn in. And who do you think took part in the swearing in? Fiorella
La Guardia. Soon it was off to Marine Corps boot camp at Paris Island, South Carolina. Mister Earle says he was already physically fit before entering the Corps, so most of the physical demands were not too challenging, except for one obstacle on the course that was just too tall for him, so he relied on the brotherhood of his fellow Marines to get the job done. During the training, the only thing that I had trouble with was we had to
run all the time. That was no problem. And I went down the hill and here was a ten foot board and you ran down this little slope and you had to run down and run up there, grab the top, pull yourself up over in the town. I'm only five or six. I run down there and top it's up here. In my him would go pump, and I'd have to go back up there, and I'd run down there, boom, And I finally went around and the sergeant folded his arms. Get back there, get back there, now, get over the top.
I couldn't get home. But the guys that were with me saw what's happening. He said, come on, we'll give you a toe hold. And they made a thing with my with their hands and I put my foot in their and nation one, two three, and they put me up. I don't think I touched the top of that board. I went sailing up over and everything, and the sergeant is standing looking at me and on the board. He said, how did you do that? I said, I made it. I got up. After Paris Island Royal, Earl was off to
the West Coast for more training at Camp Pendleton. He was trained in communications as a switchboard operator and wireman. But what he remembers most at Camp Pendleton is a mystery involving personnel who vanished while on guard duty, and finding out what happened to them was just as shocking as their disappearances in the first place. We ended up in Pendleton and they put us an area of fourteen and we were there for a while, and then they moved us out the area
seventeen and that's right on the edge of the canyon Aslido. They had a guard every night walked around. It was at barracks, two floors. We were on the first floor. Now along about this time. All of a sudden, one night, while it was still dark anyhow, the corporal of the guard came to check him out. It was no guard. Oh. He went in and they told him back to that hit. The sack didn't went to the head, Nope, looked all around. I'll see if he
were sitting down in any place. He wasn't. He wasn't there. He said, well, he'll show up in the morning. He didn't. Then they said, ah, he probably went over the hill area seventeen is fifteen miles from the main gate. We didn't see him. He didn't show up. So maybe two days three days later and they've got another guard's missing. Wow. The corporal guard called the sergeant guard again. The sergeant guard called the od, well, we're gonna have to do something about that. The
od says, I got an idea. We're gonna send one this way, and we're gonna send one this way, and they're gonna pass each other twice, and we're not gonna have any more. Two days later, they're both missing. Boy, you should have seen that outfit. Some of the guys didn't wanna go the guard duty. They didn't know what was happening. What was happening. The raiders were in the canyon carl We found out it was Carlson's raiders and they were practicing their craft. And what do they do.
They go on these islands and they capture the jabs, They crapture the guards and so on, and they were practicing and they were picking off our guards. About a day or two later, up comes the first guy. He had a little stick with a white handkerchief. I don't know where he got it, because all of ours were Kaki got it. We was gonna come up. We ran over, Hey, what are you doing? Where were you? He says, I'll be right back. I have to go see
the captain. So he went then see the captain. What he had was a uh thing of if you want your men back, They said what we want? It was all food and they had a whole big list of food. And so this was fine. And the next day they laid their food out there at night. So we got it going and we had the guard going and everything. Then notice said we went to food, and if we don't get the food, we got four new raiders. So that they got the food and we got the raiders back. And you should hear the stories
they tell of their raiders training. That's the US Marine Corps veteran Royal Earl Junior. He served at the Marshall Islands, Saipan, Tinian and Iwo Jima. When we come back, it's off to the Pacific and service in the Marshall Islands and Saipan. I'm Greg Corumbus and this is Veterans Chronicles sixty Seconds of Service. This sixty Seconds of Service is presented by T Mobile. T Mobile offers exclusive discounts for veteran and military families and are proud supporters the National
Defense Network. Visit tmobile dot com to learn more about how they support our military community. At have Felt, Alabama, a new nonprofit in the Shoals is hoping to make a big change and impact a lot of people by providing veterans with a warm place to stay and other services. Many different members of the community have been looking to start a nonprofit for displaced veterans for a few years now. The nonprofit Community Unity three sixty is near the area and ready
to make an impact in the Shoals, starting with this house. One of the members. Wendy Snitzer said, there's been a big need for this. For several years. It was a lot of porch pickups operating out of the truck of your car off the front porch, just putting things together. She explained. Until we got organized, there was just a collective of good neighbors and good businesses trying to change the footprint and the blueprint that we leave in
our community. For more great Veterans stories, just go to nationaldefensenetwork dot com. This is Veterans Chronicles. I'm Greg Corumbas. Our guest in this edition is Royal Earl Junior, a Marine Corps veteran of World War Two and operations in the Marshall Islands, Saipan, Tinian and Iwo Jima. After nearly a year of training at Paris Island and Camp Pendleton, Earl and his Marine Corps unit were sent to the Pacific. He says they were a rarity in that
they were shipped straight from the US to service. In his case, the Marshall Islands it was about as gentle of an introduction to warfare as he could possibly want. And the Marshalls the two big islands were roy and the Moor Roy was with the airstrips, and the moor was where they stored all the stuff in the living quarters, et cetera. And then there were a bunch of islands that were smaller than those islands, but they still had jabs on
them. So they broke up. The twenty fifth in the first battalion addition, the second battalion addition and a third battalion AD one and I was in the third battalion. And we were right off the shore of Numu. We hit that island, A boy, we were ready. We covered that island. Or wasn't a Jap on the island living or dead? The boy were We surprised and that led to a lot of laughing and stuff, and we watched them. We were day ahead, so we watched land. The twenty
fourth landed on the moor and we watched the whole battle. After securing the Marshall Islands, Earl and his fellow marines next saw action at the Battle for Saipan in June nineteen forty four. Earl explains what that invasion was like for him and what his duties included. I was in an outfit called JASCO Joint Assault Signal Company. I was a wireman and switchboard operator, and so I
was designated in the next few battles as a switchboard operator. Wasn't my buddy, And so we landed on Saipan on the fifteenth June, and actually it really wasn't much because they shall I was in the second wave and the fourth wave on Saipan, and it's five minutes between waves. So they the first wave landed at nine and I landed nine fifteen. But we went right in and everything and we set up. Our job was to set up a switchboard and attach all the units to it so that they all had command of their
area. And the the guys had handled the dump. I can't think of his name right of him, uh like the medival supplies food mo et cetera, was given a wire so that he could call if he needed any And then there was a short party commander. He was Navy. He knew what was in all the cargo ships out there. He evidently had a book or something. And if the uh, the beachmaster needed supplies, he would call the short party commander and say, we're running out of Mortner ammunition. You
better get them in. The more you get short party Commander knew what cargo ship it was on. He'd call him tell them, Hey, we need forty millimeter or sixty millimeters or whatever it was. Uh m, Mortal Ramo, better send it in. And then he told him what beach to bring it into. And that's what we did for the first few days. And after that, oh, i'd say maybe three days, four days, all
the companies took over their own communications. We were just set up to get them started, and so we went in with these soul waves in each one. Sipan would also provide mister Earl's most terrifying moments of the entire war. He experienced the serious threat posed by the Japanese and the ferocious firepower of his
fellow marines. Well, we were up a ways and all of a sudden we ran into some fields where they were growing stuff, and there were railroad tracks and it was a little small railroad, I don't know what you call them, like the miniature railroad, but there were tracks there. It went lan over here and there was a big cave there, and we went up the tracks. That night when we stopped, Fourth Division always stopped at four o'clock. Four o'clock. It didn't get dark until nine I gave it was
five hours to set up our defenses. And boy did we set them up. And do you know that, at no time in any battle that I was in right through a regima. As many times as we were attacked singlely, doubly or bonzai attacked, they never broke or broke through. And we had fifties on the side, thirty machine guns and thirties in the middle, and bars along the sides here and then in between were riflemen, and right and back of them we your sixty millimium mortars. And boy, I'll tell
you, when the DAPs hit, we let him have it. Oh we put barboys out there, and when we had them, we hooked plates, tin plates or anything to make noise on the wires. And when in the night when Japs hit the wires, we call out to the destroyer and they started putting the flares out, and boy, that was just like daylight up there. And of course the Japs wide open there and our machine guns just
opened up. That's Royal Earl Junior. He's a US Marine Corps veteran of World War Two and the battles of the Marshall Islands, Saipan Tinian and Ewojima. When we come back, mister Earl takes us with him to and through the Battle of Ewojima. I'm Greg Corumbus, and this is Veterans Chronicles. This is Veterans Chronicles. I'm Greg Corumbus. Our guest today is Royal Earl Junior, a veteran of World War Two and the battles for the Marshall Islands
Saipan, Tinian and Ewogima. In February nineteen forty five, it was time for the Marines to invade Ewojima, a critical location in the Allied island hopping campaign. The island also contained an airfield that would provide the US a significant strategic position to attack mainland Japan. As we mentioned earlier, mister Earle served
as a switchboard operator and wireman to facilitate communications during combat. So when it was time to come ashore at Ewojima, mister Earle had some very important cargo that turned into a makeshift shield. Oh lordy day. That was something that just proved why I was a private first class right. I had the switchboard and they had a candle on eachside and weighed seventy five pounds. I'm a little guy. All right, I put that down to start to run up
the beach. You don't run walking rapidly, and my knees kept hitting it. Er, that's crazy. What do you think I did? I took it and put it up on top of my helmet because it would ride very easy on my head, and I ran up to me. Can you imagine me landing on the beach with the switchboard on my head and the Japs looking and saying, what's that? That looks important? Boom, They're going to shoot me. Never got a thing. I never got shot, I never
got even missed. Nothing came close. And so we went right in, found a spot, set up the switchboard, and we were all set to go. The American sacrifices on the beaches of Iwo Jima were immense for those who survived. The black Sands were yet another challenge to navigate while under withering
fire from the Japanese. Mister Earle says he did not personally get slowed down by the black sands as he ran with the switchboard on his head, but he saw plenty of others who did have trouble, including men in his own unit. We didn't, but everything else coming into us did and all vehicles did. My lord, yes, they ran into trouble and he we had
a jeep with us. We couldn't get it. They got off the ramp and sk right into the hub cap and then he couldn't go and we left the jeep down on the beach because we couldn't get it out and we couldn't spend time with it, so we had to go and do it otherwise. From the beach, Royal Earl and the other members of the switchboard crews moved out to set up their communications and get the different units connected. For the most part, he was able to advance unscathed, but as he soon learned,
many others on the wire team were not so fortunate. Well, I had to switch for as I say, and so my buddy and I the other guy that was the operator, we went up. There were five levels of the beach, and we went up the first one, and so we went up the second one and there's a big shell holder. It must have been from a battleship or something, and we said, this is it.
And we went right down to the bottom and we set up our switchboard and said to the guys, okay, send us the wires, and that's what they did, and we eventually hooked up all the wires, and we had to hook with our left flank, which was the twenty sixth Marines because we were the end unit. And then at the end of the day and everything, we got a report that we were the third battalion next to us, we were Yellow Beach one, Yellow Beach two of the second battalion, and
they hadn't heard from him. And so my buddy now is the switchboard operator. And it sounds like I was some hotshot or I wasn't. But I wasn't scared because I had no clothes, course or anything. And so I said I'll go, and I did, and I just walked down to where they're supposed to be and I got into this opening a field area, and his body's all over the place. And I see a guy in the foxhole very close by, and I said, hey, where's a wire team.
He says, you're looking at them. They had cap come off the LCBB and the shell in it right in the killed them all, so they lost their whole wire team. So I said, well, where did the switchboard go? And he says, I don't know. I have to look around. He said, probably over now, Sectioneer, and I did look around. I found it and again put it up on my head and walked back, and I said, look, when somebody comes down to find out what's
happened in communication, tell them that the third battalion had her switchboard. And we began to give it back. But in the meantime, bring your wires in them we'll set up your program. And they did, and then pretty soon they came and got it. As Earl explained earlier, the most harrowing moments of the war for him came on Sipan, but there is one brief
moment of sheer terror that he remembers vividly on Ewojima. It all started with the need for a wire repair, continued with one of the biggest shocks of his life, and ended quite unexpectedly. I went out, I finally found it and I spliced. This is mid night. This is why we practiced in the dark. But I had to make this splice. So I had a pair of splicing and I took the extra wire with me when I went, and I spliced it in and I got the wire and he didn't bring
enough. And so I got there and I saw where he was, and but I had quite a bit of wire I was missing. And I went over and I said, you know, you didn't bring enough wires, and he just looked at me and he said, okay, okay, I'll go get it, and he did and came back. Well, now I'm there on my haunches right. All of a sudden, it was just the light and boom, and it was practically took me off the ground. And boy, I went down real quickly. Didn't near me and nothing hit me.
But I went down there and my years were ringing, I'll tell you, and uh, I don't what the heck is going on. I laid there a minute. Nothing else happened. I went through the bit of your tryed toes, your ankles, your feet, your knees, your fingers, et
cetera. Okay, I was fine. I get back up on my hunches to start trying to find where I was, and I could hear laughing, and I thought, oh boy, this really must gunt me laughing out in the middle of a battlefield, and about ten feet away or so, I through the night, I could see this wall and then I just stared at it for a while, and all I could see it's at the top of the wall, these arms. There's a whole bunch of guys there watching me,
and they're laughing. I was sitting right under the muzzle of a one oh five or three repeats and we fired. It was outgoing, not incoming. Royal Earl knows he is fortunate to have survived multiple invasions in the Pacific theater during World War II. He is proud to have served in the Marine
Corps and extremely honored to serve his country in uniform. It's a devotion to duty that he remembers rushing back to his mind and heart as he attended the opening of the Marine Corps Museum in Quantico, Virginia, back in two thousand and six. It's an emotional event that he says is impossible to forget.
When I was here for dedication of the museum, and without going through the whole story of why we were there, it was a dozen of us there, and the dedication night we were there before, but the dedication night we were lined up against the wall and a commandant was speaking, and while he was speaking, but they opened all the doors and anything, And don't forget in those days there was nothing in the whole area there, And when he finished, it was just like his last word was bumped and the drum and
bugle chorus started playing the Marines hymn and came right inside the museum. Oh my god, imagine all that brass inside. It just shook you. And that the twelve of us. Honestly, God, we just snapped to attention cause they were playing the Marines him right, and we watched and I just looked down. Would you believe everyone that I could see tears were running right down his cheeks. Mine too. We were just so damn proud to be
Marines. Oh, I'll tell you I never forgot the That's US Marine Corps Veteran Royal Earl Junior, a veteran of World War Two who served in the Marshall Islands, Saipan, Tinian and Ewojima. I'm Greg Corumbus and this is Veterans Chronicles. Hi, this is Greg Corumbus, and thanks for listening to Veterans Chronicles, a presentation of the American Veterans Center. For more information, please visit American Veteranscenter dot org. You can also follow the American Veterans Center
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