USMC - as told by Robert Lincoln
Making a Marine
I went to Seattle for my physical examination to join the Marines on the 24th of September 1940. That night I boarded the train for San Diego, California. It took two days for the train to get there. My years of regimentation had come. It began the second I stepped off the train. A Marine gunnery sergeant took charge of us. We boarded a bus and were taken to the Recruit Depot, and was turned over to what was called a Drill Instructor (DI).
Things weren’t too bad the first day because it was quite late. The next morning at 0400, boot camp had started. Time went slow but we were drilled and run so much we really were too tired to pay much attention to time. In eleven weeks we were ready to go to the rifle range at La Jolla, California. I thought I knew where my muscles were, but after snapping in on the different shooting positions, I found I had many more aching muscles. The time at the rifle range lasted one week. I came back a marksman. It was much less than I had expected, because record day, I blew it.
It was at the rifle range that I found out how rough a DI could get. We lived in two-man tents in rows and a duck walk (row of boards used like a sidewalk) in between rows. One evening about nineteen hundred (7 PM), Sergeant Ballard fell us all out in front of our tents at attention. He walked down the duck walk in between the two rows of tents and asked each of us if we had washed our skivvies, which were our shorts and “T” shirts. Everyone said, “Yes,” except my bunkie (the other one who occupied the tent) and I. Sgt. Ballard sneered and said, “Why not?”
There was only one true answer, each one of us said, “Because we are wearing one pair, and we did wash the other two pairs.”
He said, “Strip off all your clothes, get your bucket and kiyi brush for scrubbing clothes, fill the bucket with cold water and report to my tent.” What could we do? That’s exactly what we done.
Now out at the rifle range in November it can get chilly, especially when you get used to the hot weather. We done as ordered and came up to his tent and knocked on the tent pole. The Sarg said, “Who is there?” I said, “Private Lincoln reporting as ordered sir.” My bunkie said the same thing. The sergeant said, “Come in.” He was sitting there and talking to another DI. They continued to talk and ignored us still standing at attention with our buckets and kiyi brushes in our hands.
In a situation like that a person feels pretty insignificant and unnecessary to say the least.
Finally Sgt. Ballard said to the other DI, “isn’t that the crumbiest SOB you ever seen?” The other sergeant agreed that we were. Then Sgt. Ballard took us about one hundred yards from the tents in the dark and poured about half of the water over our heads, then took sand and threw all over us, then poured the rest of the water over us and said, “Now take your brushes and scrub yourselves, then go to the bathhouse and take a cold shower.
We didn’t waste any time complying with his henhouse order. I’m sure he waited until after dark because no other DI or authority could see what he was doing. You can rest assured that both of us washed all three pairs of skivvies and wore one of them wet until we graduated from boot camp. We were the only one that told the truth and the only ones who got punished.
We returned to the Marine Corps base on a Saturday morning. Sunday we were marched to church at the base chapel, the first and only time we were made to go to church. The chaplain’s sermon was on the honorable profession of a soldier.
The next Monday we were placed on one of the regiments of the 2nd Brigade. I went to Headquarters and Service Company, 1st Battalion, 8th Marines. I was in an 81 millimeter mortar squad. It was hard work in the field but I liked it. In January of 1941 I again went to the rifle range at La Jolla. Again I only made marksman.
About February 1941 the 2nd Marines were reactivated which made the 2nd Brigade the 2nd Division. I was put in E Company, 2nd Battalion, 2nd Marines as a rifleman. Later I became squad leader of a sixty millimeter mortar squad because I had previous training with 81 millimeter mortars. This position I held until September 1942.
Pearl Harbor and Midway
I was on liberty in San Bernardino, California, when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Territory of Hawaii. A California state policeman got myself and my friend a free ride on a Greyhound bus back to San Diego. We were stationed at Camp Elliott at the time. A few days later I was advanced to corporal. I had been acting in that capacity for about four months.
It was a few days thereafter that the company I was in was changed to the 22nd Provisional Company and we boarded ship on January 9, 1942, on our way overseas somewhere. We were under sealed orders until after we passed Hawaii. Then we found out we were headed to Midway Island.
The ship we were on from San Diego to Pearl Harbor was the President Harrison. We had no escort. One of the crew of the ship was a friend of mine who went to high school with me. We were one day out of Pearl Harbor, when the aircraft carrier Yorktown came out from Pearl Harbor to escort us in. It got torpedoed and had to return. We got a torpedo fired at us. It crossed our wake about 30 feet astern. Late that evening we tied up at Pearl Harbor (Jan. 17, 1942), disembarked and stayed that night at the Marine Barracks, Pearl Harbor. We were under blackout conditions. It was quite a trick finding your way around in the dark in a place you had never been before.
We got settled down and some went over to Hickam Field and drank the Army’s beer. The debris at Hickam Field had not been cleaned up from the bombing yet. It was a mess.
Next morning we boarded the Marine transport, William Ward Burroughs, and headed out to sea again. This is when we found out we were going to Midway Island. I didn’t know where it was at that time.
I was on aircraft watch on the afterdeck. I was posted at 0800. I wasn’t relieved until midnight. I wouldn’t have been relieved then if I hadn’t been caught asleep by the Officer of the Deck. I don’t remember going to sleep, but I sure remember waking up! The Officer of the Deck kicked me in the ribs as I was laying on the deck. I was doing duty on a .50 caliber machine gun. I was threatened with a General Court Martial and being shot because we were at war. After they found out how long I had been on duty, he changed his mind and woke my company commander up and read him off. Nevertheless, I was scared.
On January 22, 1942, we arrived and tied up at the pier on Sand Island which is the largest atoll of Midway. We were a small detachment of Marines that was sent there to support the 6th defense battalion that was to defend Midway Island. We had no sooner tied up than a Jap sub surfaced. It had been following us. A Marine dive bomber was in the air at the time on patrol and spotted it. The sub was sunk by the dive bomber. Midway was to be my home until September 17, 1942.
It was a very dreary place to be. In February it rains a lot and the landscape was sand and scaveola brush that was about four feet high. There was a few ironwood trees on Frigate Point that was planted by the Pan American Airways in the 1930s. Sand Island which I was stationed on, was one mile long and three-quarters wide and shaped like a pork chop. It was easy to see it as something to eat because all we got was two meals a day.
The Clowns of Midway
In early February the gooney birds started to come in, at first a few each day, then by the hundreds. Black ones and white and black ones. The black gooney are black-footed albatross and the white and black ones are layman albatross. Both varieties are very graceful while in the air, but when they land, they come down by a belly landing, especially when they first come off the ocean. They had been flying for so long that their legs were weak, but they never really got over the habit of crash landing. They were very tame and a person could walk up to them and pick them up, but you were sure to get bitten. They had a long and strong bill and knew how to use it.
We got a kick out of playing tricks and pestering them. One time a Marine painted the rising sun on one of them and the stars and stripes on another. The one with the rising sun disappeared and was never seen again. The other one stayed around and the paint finally wore off.
The gooney would lay one egg. When it hatched the chick would stay in the nest which was only an indentation in the sand. They looked like a goose gosling with pin feathers all over their bodies. They would stand straight and looked like a little sentinel. It was great fun to put a lighted match under their bellies and watch the pin feathers burn off like a flash fire. It didn’t seem to hurt them. They fire would not burn their heads so they would look like a little buzzard standing in their nest. If the skipper would have seen us, it would have been a court martial; for even then, Midway was a bird sanctuary.
Our latrine consisted of a slit trench, one foot wide and two feet deep, and as long as was wanted, and also a two inch pipe driven in the sand with a funnel in the top. One of the men in my platoon was using the slit trench when a very inquisitive gooney bird wanted to investigate those buns hanging over the slit trench. They gooney came up behind and with his strong bill took a chunk out. Needless to say, Chick Williams couldn’t sit down properly for quite some time.
There was thousands of birds on Midway of many different species, gooney birds being only one of them. There were Sooty Terns, Moaning Birds, Kiwis that had been imported from New Zealand, Bosun Birds, Frigate Hawks, and many others. Moaning Birds burrowed in the sand, and when the tide was a little too high, many of them would drown.
The first night I was on Midway, I thought someone was dying. We all kept hearing this moaning. We found out later that it was the Moaning Birds. In the evening the Sooty Terns would line up but the hundreds. We waited until after dark and then ran through them to watch them fly up from the ground and make such a racket. It seems childish now, but it was great fun then. After all, there was nothing else to do.
The gooney birds were a problem on the runway. Planes would take off down the runway and so would a gooney. The gooney birds would get in the propeller. There would be blood and feathers all over the plane. It was decided that in case of an emergency, that wouldn’t be so good.
Authorities decided to have the infantry troops organize into killing parties. We loaded into three PT boats and was taken over to Eastern Island where the airstrip was, all armed with our machetes. It was so easy to cut their heads off. They couldn’t fly away from us and then had a long neck. All one had to do was give a hard swing. One part of a day was enough because most of the men got sick to their stomachs. We had been trained to kill someone that could shoot back, but not helpless birds.
Life on Midway
We made all our own underwater obstacles, barbed wire entanglements, and anti-personnel mines. We would get terrible headaches from making land mines because of the nitroglycerin. We had to break dynamite open and pack the powder in a 4” by 4” box with an electric cap and battery. It was a touchy job. Maybe the reason we had to do it was so we would take our headaches out on the enemy.
In June 1942, the Japanese attacked Midway Island. The main attack force was destroyed before they could complete their plans. The US Navy aircraft (we didn’t know they were in the area) succeeded in sinking the Japanese aircraft carriers. We were heavily bombed and strafed. One oil tank was destroyed by fire as was the hospital by an incendiary bomb. I suppose it was set afire by the enemy to light up the beach for their infantry landing, but it didn’t occur because their ships were sunk. When the battle was over in three days, we had no Marine dive bombers left, just one fighter (land based) but we had beat the Japs. There was a few casualties among the ground troops. This battle turned out to be the decisive battle of the Pacific with Japan.
We buried all our dead at sea. They were put in a canvas bag with some scrap iron. We took the bodies about ten miles out to sea on a barge and slid them over the side into the water.
Every ship that came to Midway was covered with khaki uniforms, so it seemed, because of the rumors we were being relieved of duty there. When the ship docked, we found out there was no relief troops aboard.
It finally happened. We were relieved on September 17, 1942. The Marines who relieved us had all new 37mm and and 90mm guns to replace our .50 caliber and 3” guns which were originally from the cruiser Chicago.
The Japs never came back again. We were underway within two hours of our boarding the ship. I can’t remember the name of the ship. It was an uneventful trip to Pearl Harbor. We arrived at Mary’s Point at 10:19 AM on September 22, 1942. I missed the ‘anchor pool” by one minute. The anchor pool was an event where you guessed the exact minute the ship would dock at a port.
Bob also shared some further stories with his son, Roger. He says they were warned a couple of days in advance that the Japanese were coming. That was a scary prospect because the number of defenders on the two islands was probably between 800-1000. They had the might of the Japanese Navy and troops coming at them. If the Battle of Midway (mostly a sea battle) had not been won, the defenders of Midway could very likely have been wiped out.
Bob was stationed near the water tower. It was being used as an observation post. He was supposed to be going up to the top, but it was struck and fell over before he could climb it. He was under it when it fell over. He was not injured when it fell. In the original 1976 movie, this event is shown, but not in the 2019 movie. After watching the 1976 version he commented, “Hollywood got it right.”
The Japanese air attack on the island was low level. As one Japanese pilot strafed them, he was so low they could see his face. As he passed over them, he gave them the finger. They watched him pass over and make a long loop to make a second pass. When he came around for the second time, every rifle, automatic rifle, pistol, tommy gun and machine gun within range was waiting for him. His plane was shredded on the second pass and crashed into the ocean.
Sometime after the battle, the commanding officer of the Marines personally gave everyone in his command a silver dollar. That was over $400, a rather large sum in 1942. How he got that many silver dollars is a mystery. Sadly, Bob lost his some months later in a dice game. One of his regrets in life is that he let that happen instead of keeping it.
Two letters included with Robert’s papers:
THE SECRETARY OF THE NAVY
WASHINGTON
The Secretary of the Navy takes pleasure in commending the SIXTH DEFENSE BATTALION, FLEET MARINE FORCE, REINFORCED, for service as follows:
“For outstanding heroism in support of military operations prior to and during the Battle of Midway, June 1942. Assuming a tremendous operational and service load in preparing defenses of Midway against anticipated Japanese attack, the officers and men of the SIXTH Defense Battalion: carried on intensive night battle training, completed and installed underwater obstacles, unloaded and distributed supplies, emplaced guns and constructed facilities for stowing ammunition and for protecting personnel. Alert and ready for combat when enemy planes came in to launch high and dive-bombing attacks and low-level strafing attacks on June 4, they promptly opened and maintained fire against the hostile targets, promptly opened and maintained fire against the hostile targets, downing 10 planes during the furious 17-minute action which resulted in the destruction of the Marine galley and mess-hall, equipment, supplies and communications facilities. Working as an effective team for long periods without relief, this Battalion cleared the debris from the bomb-wrecked galley, reestablished disrupted communications, and serviced planes, thereby contributing greatly to the success of operations conducted from this base. The high standards of courage and service maintained by the SIXTH Defense Battalion reflect the highest credit upon the United States Naval Service”
All personnel attached to and serving with the SIXTH Defense Battalion, Fleet Marine Force, Reinforced, consisting of the SIXTH Defense Battalion, 22nd and 23rd Provisional Marine Companies and “C” and “D” Companies of the Second Raider Battalion are authorized to wear the NAVY UNIT COMMENDATION RIBBON.
-/S/ JOHN L. SULLIVAN
Secretary of the Navy
HEADQUARTERS
SIXTH DEFENSE BATTALION
FLEET MARINE FORCE
30 May, 1942
BATTALION INSTRUCTION MEMORANDUM
NUMBER 3—1942
IMPENDING ATTACK BY JAPANESE FORCES
Information available indicates that the Japanese plan an all-out-attack on Midway with a view to its capture. This attack may start any hour now.
Our job is to hold Midway. We are to have assistance of other forces to help us do our job. Our aviation forces have been strongly reenforced. Daily long range patrols are made to locate hostile forces and track them to within striking distance of our air force. One of our most important jobs, therefore, is to protect our aircraft on the ground and in the water against hostile attack. As long as we keep our aircraft flying they can work on hostile carriers, transports and other surface craft. We must not let our aircraft be attacked while on the ground, taking off or being serviced. We must also be careful not to fire on our own planes. Keep cool, calm and collected; make your bullets count.
Once the air attack starts, it is likely that the Japs will try to make it a succession of bombing and strafing attacks in order that our planes will have difficulty refueling. It is our job to make these attacks as costly as possible by accurate fire and destruction of hostile planes. At night we will probably be bombarded. Our torpedo boats will help attack hostile ships.
After the Japs figure that our air force is out and that defensive installations have been sufficiently weakened, they will attempt a landing.
This is the first time the Japs have attempted to take an American fortified place so far from their bases. This time they are coming to us and we have the opportunity of a lifetime to reflect glory on our Corps and ourselves by not only accomplishing our mission but also by the damage and destruction we can inflict on the enemy. The better we do our job, the sooner the war will be over.
Be alert and on your toes. Don’t unnecessarily expose yourself or fire prematurely. Keep cool. There will be a lot of banging and booming but don’t let this confuse you. In a battle the odds may seem to be against you for a time and things may appear to be going badly for our side, but always remember that the enemy is in a worse fix than you are. A torpedo, bomb or shellfire may sink a ship of boat but our islands will still be here when it’s all over. It is the tenaciousness on the part of the individual soldier and the will to win, coupled with cool and deliberate action and shooting that wins battles. Don’t fire land mines prematurely. Much of the effect of land mines depends on the firer keeping his head and firing the right string at the right time. We must also be alert against parachute troops and troops endeavoring to infiltrate by boat.
Our President, our Country, our Corps and the Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific Fleet are depending on us and we will not let them down.
H.D. SHANNON
Colonel, U.S. Marine Corps,
Commanding
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