The invasion force was indeed on its way to its targets, Guadalcanal,
Tulagi, and the tiny islets of Gavutu and Tanambogo close by Tulagi’s
shore. The landing force was composed of Marines; the covering force
and transport force were U.S. Navy with a reinforcement of Australian
warships. There was not much mystery to the selection of the 1st
Marine Division to make the landings. Five U.S. Army divisions were
located in the South and Southwest Pacific: three in Australia, the
37th Infantry in Fiji, and the Americal Division on New Caledonia.
None was amphibiously trained and all were considered vital parts of
defensive garrisons. The 1st Marine Division, minus one of its infantry
regiments, had begun arriving in New Zealand in mid-June when the
division headquarters and the 5th Marines reached Wellington. At that
time, the rest of the reinforced division’s major units were getting
ready to embark. The 1st Marines were at San Francisco, the 1st Raider
Battalion was on New Caledonia, and the 3d Defense Battalion was at
Pearl Harbor. The 2d Marines of the 2d Marine Division, a unit which
would replace the 1st Division’s 7th Marines stationed in British
Samoa, was loading out from San Diego. All three infantry regiments
of the landing force had battalions of artillery attached, from the
11th Marines, in the case of the 5th and 1st; the 2d Marines drew its
reinforcing 75mm howitzers from the 2d Division’s 10th Marines.
The news that his division would be the landing force for Watchtower
came as a surprise to Major General Alexander A. Vandegrift, who
had anticipated that the 1st Division would have six months of
training in the South Pacific before it saw action. The changeover
from administrative loading of the various units’ supplies to combat
loading, where first-needed equipment, weapons, ammunition, and rations
were positioned to come off ship first with the assault troops,
occasioned a never-to-be-forgotten scene on Wellington’s docks. The
combat troops took the place of civilian stevedores and unloaded and
reloaded the cargo and passenger vessels in an increasing round of
working parties, often during rainstorms which hampered the task, but
the job was done. Succeeding echelons of the division’s forces all got
their share of labor on the docks as various shipping groups arrived
and the time grew shorter. General Vandegrift was able to convince
Admiral Ghormley and the Joint Chiefs that he would not be able to meet
a proposed D-Day of 1 August, but the extended landing date, 7 August,
did little to improve the situation.
An amphibious operation is a vastly complicated affair, particularly
when the forces involved are assembled on short notice from all over
the Pacific. The pressure that Vandegrift felt was not unique to
the landing force commander. The U.S. Navy’s ships were the key to
success and they were scarce and invaluable. Although the Battles of
Coral Sea and Midway had badly damaged the Japanese fleet’s offensive
capabilities and crippled its carrier forces, enemy naval aircraft
could fight as well ashore as afloat and enemy warships were still
numerous and lethal. American losses at Pearl Harbor, Coral Sea, and
Midway were considerable, and Navy admirals were well aware that the
ships they commanded were in short supply. The day was coming when
America’s shipyards and factories would fill the seas with warships
of all types, but that day had not arrived in 1942. Calculated risk
was the name of the game where the Navy was concerned, and if the risk
seemed too great, the Watchtower landing force might be a casualty. As
it happened, the Navy never ceased to risk its ships in the waters of
the Solomons, but the naval lifeline to the troops ashore stretched
mighty thin at times.
Tactical command of the invasion force approaching Guadalcanal in early
August was vested in Vice Admiral Frank J. Fletcher as Expeditionary
Force Commander (Task Force 61). His force consisted of the amphibious
shipping carrying the 1st Marine Division, under Rear Admiral Richmond
K. Turner, and the Air Support Force led by Rear Admiral Leigh Noyes.
Admiral Ghormley contributed land-based air forces commanded by Rear
Admiral John S. McCain. Fletcher’s support force consisted of three
fleet carriers, the _Saratoga_ (CV 3), _Enterprise_ (CV 6), and _Wasp_
(CV 7); the battleship _North Carolina_ (BB 55), 6 cruisers, 16
destroyers, and 3 oilers. Admiral Turner’s covering force included five
cruisers and nine destroyers.
[Sidebar (page 3): General Alexander A. Vandegrift
[Illustration]
A distinguished military analyst once noted that if titles were awarded
in America as they are in England, the commanding general of Marine
Corps forces at Guadalcanal would be known simply as “Vandegrift of
Guadalcanal.” But America does not bestow aristocratic titles, and
besides, such a formality would not be in keeping with the soft-spoken,
modest demeanor of Alexander A. Vandegrift.
The man destined to lead the 1st Marine Division in America’s
first ground offensive operation of World War II was born in 1887
in Charlottesville, Virginia, where he grew up fascinated by his
grandfather’s stories of life in the Confederate Army during the Civil
War. It was axiomatic that young Alexander would settle on a military
career. Commissioned a Marine lieutenant in 1909, Vandegrift received
an early baptism of fire in 1912 during the bombardment, assault, and
capture of Coyotepe in Nicaragua. Two years later he participated in
the capture and occupation of Vera Cruz. Vandegrift would spend the
greater part of the next decade in Haiti, where he fought Caco bandits,
and served as an inspector of constabulary with the Gendarmerie
d’Haiti. It was in Haiti that he met and was befriended by Marine
Colonel Smedley D. Butler, who called him “Sunny Jim.” The lessons of
these formative years fighting an elusive enemy in a hostile jungle
environment were not lost upon the young Marine officer.
He spent the next 18 years in various posts and stations in the United
States, along with two tours of China duty at Peiping and Tientsin.
Prior to Pearl Harbor, Vandegrift was appointed assistant to the
Major General Commandant, and in April 1940 received the single star
of a brigadier general. He was detached to the 1st Marine Division
in November 1941, and in May 1942 sailed for the South Pacific as
commanding general of the first Marine division ever to leave the
United States. On 7 August 1942, after exhorting his Marines with the
reminder that “God favors the bold and strong of heart,” he led the 1st
Marine Division ashore in the Solomon Islands in the first large-scale
offensive action against the Japanese.
His triumph at Guadalcanal earned General Vandegrift the Medal of
Honor, the Navy Cross, and the praise of a grateful nation. In July
1943 he took command of I Marine Amphibious Corps and planned the
landing at Empress Augusta Bay, Bougainville, Northern Solomons, on
1 November 1943. He then was recalled to Washington, to become the
Eighteenth Commandant of the Marine Corps.
On 1 January 1944, as a lieutenant general, Vandegrift was sworn in as
Commandant. On 4 April 1945 he was promoted to general, and thus became
the first Marine officer on active duty to attain four-star rank.
In the final stages of the war, General Vandegrift directed an elite
force approaching half-a-million men and women, with its own aviation
force. Comparing his Marines with the Japanese, he noted that the
Japanese soldier “was trained to go to a place, stay there, fight and
die. We train our men to go to a place, fight to win, and to live. I
can assure you, it is a better theory.”
After the war, Vandegrift fought another battle, this time in the halls
of Congress, with the stakes being the survival of the Marine Corps.
His counter-testimony during Congressional hearings of the spring
of 1946 was instrumental in defeating initial attempts to merge or
“unify” the U.S. Armed Forces. Although his term as Commandant ended
on 31 December 1947, General Vandegrift would live to see passage of
Public Law 416, which preserved the Corps and its historic mission. His
official retirement date of 1 April 1949 ended just over 40 years of
service.
General Vandegrift outlived both his wife Mildred and their only son,
Colonel Alexander A. Vandegrift, Jr., who fought in World War II and
Korea. He spent most of his final years in Delray, Florida. He died on
8 May 1973.--_Robert V. Aquilina_
]
_The Landing and August Battles_
On board the transports approaching the Solomons, the Marines were
looking for a tough fight. They knew little about the targets, even
less about their opponents. Those maps that were available were poor,
constructions based upon outdated hydrographic charts and information
provided by former island residents. While maps based on aerial
photographs had been prepared they were misplaced by the Navy in
Auckland, New Zealand, and never got to the Marines at Wellington.
On 17 July, a couple of division staff officers, Lieutenant Colonel
Merrill B. Twining and Major William McKean, had been able to join the
crew of a B-17 flying from Port Moresby on a reconnaissance mission
over Guadalcanal. They reported what they had seen, and their analysis,
coupled with aerial photographs, indicated no extensive defenses along
the beaches of Guadalcanal’s north shore.
[Illustration: GUADALCANAL