_More than 200 Japanese soldiers alone were killed in a frenzied attack
in the sandspit where the Tenaru River flows into Ironbottom Sound
(Sealark Channel)._]
On the 9th, Whaling’s force, flanked by the 2d and then the 1st
Battalion, 7th Marines, crossed the Matanikau and then turned and
followed ridge lines to the sea. Puller’s battalion discovered a
number of Japanese in a ravine to his front, fired his mortars, and
called in artillery, while his men used rifles and machine guns to pick
off enemy troops trying to escape what proved to be a death trap. When
his mortar ammunition began to run short, Puller moved on toward the
beach, joining the rest of Whaling’s force, which had encountered no
opposition. The Marines then recrossed the Mantanikau, joined Edson’s
troops, and marched back to the perimeter, leaving a strong combat
outpost at the Matanikau, now cleared of Japanese. General Vandegrift,
apprised by intelligence sources that a major Japanese attack was
coming from the west, decided to consolidate his positions, leaving no
sizable Marine force more than a day’s march from the perimeter. The
Marine advance on 7-9 October had thwarted Japanese plans for an early
attack and cost the enemy more than 700 men. The Marines paid a price
too, 65 dead and 125 wounded.
There was another price that Guadalcanal was exacting from both sides.
Disease was beginning to fell men in numbers that equalled the battle
casualties. In addition to gastroenteritis, which greatly weakened
those who suffered its crippling stomach cramps, there were all kinds
of tropical fungus infections, collectively known as “jungle rot,”
which produced uncomfortable rashes on men’s feet, armpits, elbows,
and crotches, a product of seldom being dry. If it didn’t rain, sweat
provided the moisture. On top of this came hundreds of cases of
malaria. Atabrine tablets provided some relief, besides turning the
skin yellow, but they were not effective enough to stop the spread of
the mosquito-borne infection. Malaria attacks were so pervasive that
nothing short of complete prostration, becoming a litter case, could
earn a respite in the hospital. Naturally enough, all these diseases
affected most strongly the men who had been on the island the longest,
particularly those who experienced the early days of short rations.
Vandegrift had already argued with his superiors that when his men
eventually got relieved they should not be sent to another tropical
island hospital, but rather to a place where there was a real change
of atmosphere and climate. He asked that Auckland or Wellington, New
Zealand, be considered.
For the present, however, there was to be no relief for men starting
their third month on Guadalcanal. The Japanese would not abandon their
plan to seize back Guadalcanal and gave painful evidence of their
intentions near mid-October. General Hyakutake himself landed on
Guadalcanal on 7 October to oversee the coming offensive. Elements of
Major General Masao Maruyama’s _Sendai Division_, already a factor in
the fighting near the Matanikau, landed with him. More men were coming.
And the Japanese, taking advantage of the fact that Cactus flyers had
no night attack capability, planned to ensure that no planes at all
would rise from Guadalcanal to meet them.
[Illustration: _By October, malaria began to claim as many casualties
as Japanese artillery, bombs, and naval gunfire. Shown here are the
patients in the division hospital who are ministered to by physicians
and corpsmen working under minimal conditions._]
On 11 October, U.S. Navy surface ships took a hand in stopping
the “Tokyo Express,” the nickname that had been given to Admiral
Tanaka’s almost nightly reinforcement forays. A covering force of
five cruisers and five destroyers, located near Rennell Island and
commanded by Rear Admiral Norman Scott, got word that many ships were
approaching Guadalcanal. Scott’s mission was to protect an approaching
reinforcement convoy and he steamed toward Cactus at flank speed
eager to engage. He encountered more ships than he had expected, a
bombardment group of three heavy cruisers and two destroyers, as
well as six destroyers escorting two seaplane carrier transports.
Scott maneuvered between Savo Island and Cape Esperance, Guadalcanal’s
western tip, and ran head-on into the bombardment group.
Alerted by a scout plane from his flagship, _San Francisco_ (CA 38),
spottings later confirmed by radar contacts on the _Helena_ (CL 50),
the Americans opened fire before the Japanese, who had no radar,
knew of their presence. One enemy destroyer sank immediately, two
cruisers were badly damaged, one, the _Furutaka_, later foundered,
and the remaining cruiser and destroyer turned away from the inferno
of American fire. Scott’s own force was punished by enemy return fire
which damaged two cruisers and two destroyers, one of which, the
_Duncan_ (DD 485), sank the following day. On the 12th too, Cactus
flyers spotted two of the reinforcement destroyer escorts retiring
and sank them both. The Battle of Cape Esperance could be counted an
American naval victory, one sorely needed at the time.
[Illustration: _Maj Harold W. Bauer, VMF-212 commander, here a captain,
was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor after being lost during a
scramble with Japanese aircraft over Guadalcanal._
Department of Defense (USMC) Photo 410772
]
Its way cleared by Scott’s encounter with the Japanese, a really
welcome reinforcement convoy arrived at the island on 13 October when
the 164th Infantry of the Americal Division arrived. The soldiers,
members of a National Guard outfit originally from North Dakota, were
equipped with Garand M-1 rifles, a weapon of which most overseas
Marines had only heard. In rate of fire, the semiautomatic Garand could
easily outperform the single-shot, bolt-action Springfields the Marines
carried and the bolt-action rifles the Japanese carried, but most 1st
Division Marines of necessity touted the Springfield as inherently more
accurate and a better weapon. This did not prevent some light-fingered
Marines from acquiring Garands when the occasion presented itself. And
such an occasion did present itself while the soldiers were landing and
their supplies were being moved to dumps. Several flights of Japanese
bombers arrived over Henderson Field, relatively unscathed by the
defending fighters, and began dropping their bombs. The soldiers headed
for cover and alert Marines, inured to the bombing, used the interval
to “liberate” interesting cartons and crates. The news that the Army
had arrived spread across the island like wildfire, for it meant to all
Marines that they eventually would be relieved. There was hope.
[Illustration: