To hell and back

Lester Smith, 89, of Kalispell, has a vial of coarse black volcanic sand that he picked up from Iwo Jima in 1995 at a reunion 50 years after landing on the island as a Marine in World War II.

During his first visit, he had little interest in souvenirs of fighting with Regimental Weapons, 24th Marines, 4th Marine Division in one of the most famous and fierce battles of the war.

“It was a living hell,” Smith said.

On Veterans Day 2009, he represents one of a dwindling few for whom the famed American flag-raising on Iwo Jima represents so much more than an iconic image from World War II. His eyes still cloud with emotion, remembering the moment he saw Old Glory flapping on Mount Suribachi.

“Morale went up 100 percent,” Smith said. “Things just changed.”

He returned from the island with medals including Navy and Presidential Unit Citations after enduring and surviving what so many had not. Smith said his group was supposed to be on Iwo Jima for a week or less. Instead, he spent 36 days running wire between fox holes expecting to die any minute as the battle raged on.

“Your life is in danger all the time,” he said. “You have a feeling ... you know you’re going to get it, you just don’t know how bad.”

Of 220 original men in his unit, Smith was one of about 40 or 50 who returned after fighting the Japanese on Saipan, Tinian and Iwo Jima. As men fell, the Marines sent replacements.

“It was a situation where I knew all the men when we left,” Smith said. “When I got back, I didn’t know many.”

But the ones who survived became more than friends — brothers — for life who still get together for reunions. Smith said an amazing relationship evolves from depending on each other to survive as bullets fly and the enemy creeps through the night toward your foxhole.

“It’s a bond you can’t describe,” he said.

By the time Smith, who grew up in Nebraska, stood on board a ship headed for Iwo Jima, he was battle-hardened and aware of the bloodshed ahead. He remembered standing with two 18-year-old recruits, elated and excited at the prospect of going into their first action.

“They couldn’t wait to go,” he said. “I often wonder if they made it.”

Smith, at the time a patriotic young man of 21, was just as eager. He remembers like it was yesterday hearing about the bombing of Pearl Harbor while cleaning up after a train wreck.

“I was working on the railroad as a brakeman,” he said. “I was flagging and the conductor went to coffee. He came back and said ‘The Japs struck Pearl Harbor.’ That was the 7th.”

Instantly, Smith was ready to fight. The next day, he turned in his keys to the railroad and by the end of December in 1941, he was headed to Denver, intending to join the Navy.

He ended up signing up with the Marines.

 “I saw this guy in a blue coat and white trousers,” he said with a laugh. “He said ‘I want you’ and he got me.”

Smith arrived in San Diego for boot camp on New Year’s Eve. After training, he was among the first troops to arrive in Pearl Harbor after the attack. Buildings were still bombed-out craters.

“They were working on raising the ships,” he recalled.

After a week, Smith was transferred from a guard battalion to communications work, repairing telephones and switchboards. He did the same work on Midway islands following the historic Naval battle.

After just two to three weeks on Sand and Eastern Islands, Smith was sent back to the states for telecommunications schooling through the end of 1942. He trained to lead 12 to 14 men who established and maintained communications between the command post and the front lines in various battles of the Pacific Campaign.

He pointed to a painting on a wall in his house of a Marine racing up a hill with a reel of wire on his back during a raging battle.

“That was me,” Smith said. “I ran many a track meet — I learned to pick them up and put them down.”

The highlight of 1943 was meeting and marrying Dorothy, a nursing student, on Dec. 14. They had four children together and moved to Kalispell after he retired from teaching in Wyoming.

“We got married on a Saturday and spent one weekend together then she went back to nurses training in Kansas City,” Smith said.

He shipped out for the Marshall Islands in February of 1944. Smith said he always had fun telling people that he and his late wife “had 19 months where we didn’t have a word pass between us,” only letting on later that it was the war that separated them.

“We were married 57 and a half years,” he said.

After the Marshall Islands, Smith and his unit headed for Saipan just as the Allies launched the Normandy invasion. They secured the island in about a week then moved on to Tinian where they outfoxed the enemy by sending landing craft to the south end but actually invaded from the north.

In January of 1945, Smith boarded the ship heading for Iwo Jima. When his ship sailed near in February, he recalls watching awe-struck as bombs dropped and all manner of fire power hit the island.

“They bombarded Iwo Jima for days and days,” he said. “I don’t know why they didn’t sink that island.”

With all the ordnance dropped to soften up the enemy, battle planners expected to take the island in about a week. They hadn’t counted on the heavy fortifications, including a network of underground tunnels, pill boxes, block houses, hidden artillery and bunkers built by the Japanese as a desperate last stand against invasion of their homeland.

Finally, the order came for the Marines to board landing craft on Feb. 19. Smith said the landings were done in waves of vessels with high sides carrying about 30 men. He said he couldn’t see out until the ramp dropped on shore.

“The first wave went in and we were in the second wave,” he said. “The Japs waited until a bunch of us were in and then they opened up. It was a living hell.”

Mortar shells dropped all around them as they advanced toward an airfield. Smith pointed out on a battle map the location of Mount Suribachi, an inactive volcano on the southeast tip of the island.

 “We went in here at the East Boat Basin,” he said, pointing to a beach northwest of Suribachi.

He described the area where he dug in as hilly with lots of gullies. A Japanese block house with three entrances gave the enemy a distinct firing advantage.

Morale was at rock bottom as they realized that they wouldn’t sail on to Okinawa inside of a week as planned.

“I tell you there were three days there we were tied down and couldn’t move or anything,” he said. “We got to the point where we didn’t know if we would make it or not.”

Then everything changed on Feb. 23, 1945. Smith so clearly recalls a captain pointing toward Suribachi.

 “When that flag went up, you could hear shouting all over that island,” he said.

The iconic photo of five Marines and a navy corpsman raising the flag was taken by Joe Rosenthal, who won the Pulitzer prize for his efforts.

Smith said that the photographer, who has since died, planned to attend the 1995 reunion but didn’t make it. Smith’s son Rich, who attended with his father, sent Rosenthal a videotape of the battle area and ceremonies held 50 years later.

He responded with a  very moving letter.

“Your tape has so much detail that, in spite of so much erosion from time and weather, the varied bleakness and ruggedness come through to jolt memory picturing the challenges that were faced.

“So much different, and so much the same. Lots of heavy black volcanic ash covering the blood of heroes. And the battered blockhouses and defense positions, now fully exposed to speak of the battle’s fury.”

Rosenthal thanked Rich Smith for recording “the ceremonies of mutual respect; and the words for peace, especially those from the now frail but proud General’s widow.” His next words apply as well to each Veterans Day.

 “It was a time in deed, not for chest-thumping or chauvinism, but for recognition and honor.”

Smith said the trip back to Iwo Jima was very emotional, bringing back so many memories. He still feels blessed to have lived to enjoy the freedom he helped secure and pass it on to his children.

“Two out of every three men died on Iwo Jima — I was the lucky third man,” he said. “Like six million others, I served to benefit myself and my children.”

Reporter Candace Chase may be reached at 758-4436 or by e-mail at cchase@dailyinterlake.com.