Results tagged “United States Marine Corps” from Yucaipa Now

Gunnery Sergeant, Robert L. Sproul, a Marine's Marine

YUCAIPA - Every so often I reach up to the top shelf of my bookcase and pull out my graduation book. There were 72 of us in Platoon 1061 of the First Battalion. The pages are filled with pictures of smoothed faced men - boys really, ages 18, 19, 20 some as old as 23.

The pages show pictures of us climbing ropes, jumping across water ponds suspended in midair with our M16 rifles thrust out in front of us, on the parade deck marching to the deep-throated commands of a drill instructor, standing at attention during inspection, and on Sunday afternoon's off, writing letters home to our moms.

Platoon 1061 was all gung ho in boot camp at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot, San Diego in the summer of 1967. We felt destined to go to "Nam" and win the war against communism.

And we wanted Gunnery Sergeant Robert L. Sproul to lead us.

Readers, pour yourself a cup of coffee, sit back and relax and enjoy this inspiring story of one of the United States Marine Corps most heroic and decorated Marines - Bob Otto, Yucaipa Now

Written By Dan A. D'Amelio
Author, educator, journalist, and distinguished poet

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, was soon followed by the invasion and control of a large number of strategic territories in the Pacific, including Guam, Burma, Singapore, Hong Kong and the Philippines.

In May, 1942, there was more grim news for the Allies. The Japanese were building an airstrip on one of the larger islands in the Solomons chain, called Guadacanal. From the airstrip, the Japanese could readily bomb convoys of Allied ships and eventually gain control of the entire South Pacific.

The Allies decided, therefore, that the island had to be taken, and quickly before the Japanese could complete the airfield.

On August 7, 1942, eleven thousand Marines of the 1st Division landed on the beaches of Guadacanal. They soon learned that there were other enemies to contend with on that island besides the Japanese.

There was the drenching rains that kept the ground and undergrowth in perpetual sogginess. There were long stretches of grass taller than a man called kunai that had edges as sharp as a razor. There was the stench of the rotting vegetation and scummy swamps--the swamps home to giant crocodiles.

Advancing further into the jungle, the Marines had to push aside nets of spider webs spun by poisonous spiders the size of a man's fist. On the ground crawled scorpions and centipedes, the centipedes scurrying along human flesh and leaving tracks of inflamed skin.

And there was the mosquito-filled nights--mosquitoes that would bring down many Marines with malaria; and during the day, flies that swarmed on food and in numbers so thick that, despite efforts to swath them away, they became part of the Marines' diet.