_1stLt Arthur A. Poindexter (seen here in a post-war photograph),
commander of the mobile reserve on Wake, provided such evidence of
“exemplary conduct and ability to lead troops ... with utter disregard
for his own safety” that he was ultimately awarded the Bronze Star._]
McAlister ordered Platoon Sergeant Henry A. Bedell to detail two men
to hurl grenades into the enemy craft. The veteran non-commissioned
officer, accompanied only by Private First Class William F. Buehler,
gamely tackled the task, but Japanese gunfire killed Bedell and wounded
Buehler before either had been able to work their way close enough to
lob grenades into the boats.
McKinstry’s men, meanwhile, manned the 3-inchers of Battery F, but
the guns could not be depressed enough to fire onto the beach. The
Marines held their position until the men from the _Takano Unit_ of
the _Special Naval Landing Force_ approached closely enough to begin
lobbing grenades. Marines and Japanese grappled in the darkness,
hand-to-hand, before McKinstry’s men, after removing the firing locks
from the guns, pulled back to take up infantry positions. Their
concentrated fires kept most of the Japanese at bay near the 3-inch gun
position.
Other _Special Naval Landing Force_ troops, however, probed westward,
toward the 5-inch guns that had so humbled Kajioka’s force on the 11th.
They ran into heavy fire from gun no. 9, a well-camouflaged .50-caliber
Browning, handled skillfully by 20-year old Private First Class
Sanford K. Ray and situated some 75 yards west of where the _Takano
Unit_ had first swarmed ashore. Ray’s fire prevented the enemy from
advancing closer than 40 or 50 yards from his sand-bagged position,
and his proximity to the beach allowed him not only to harass the
enemy but also to report enemy movements. Although Japanese troops had
severed most wire communication lines, Platt remained in touch with
developments at the shoreline by reports from Ray.
Reports from observers along the beach soon began to deluge Devereux’s
command post, where he and his executive officer, Major Potter,
attempted to keep abreast of events. Gunner Hamas relayed the
information to Cunningham, at his command post. On the basis of those
reports, the island commander, at 0250, radioed the Commandant of the
14th Naval District: “Island under gunfire. Enemy apparently landing.”
At that point, Devereux directed Poindexter to move the mobile reserve
into the area between Camp 1 and the west end of the airfield. Since
the eight Marines had remained in the truck with the four machine
guns, only 15 minutes elapsed before they set up both gun sections in
a position commanding the road that ran along the south shore and also
covering a critical section of beach. Within moments, Poindexter’s
Brownings chattered and spat into the dim shape of the grounded
_Patrol Boat No. 32_, most of the bullets striking the after part of
the ship. _Special Naval Landing Force_ troops who disclosed their
positions by igniting flares soon came under fire. At Camp 1, just up
the coast, men from Battery I and the sailors who had been serving as
lookouts manned the four .30-caliber machine guns set up there. From
Poindexter’s vantage point, the enemy troops appeared confused and
disoriented, shouting and discharging a number of flares, perhaps for
“control and coordination.”
Having received a report of Japanese destroyers standing toward Wake’s
south shore (and well inside the range of the 5-inch batteries that
had so vexed the enemy on 11 December), Second Lieutenant Robert M.
Hanna, who commanded the machine guns emplaced at the airstrip, clearly
perceived the threat. Accompanied by Corporal Ralph J. Holewinski and
three civilians, Paul Gay, Eric Lehtola, and Bob Bryan, Hanna set off
at a dead run for the 3-inch gun that had been emplaced on the landward
side of the beach road, on a slight rise between the beach road and
the oiled tie-down area at the airstrip. Up to that point, Major
Putnam’s grounded airmen, their ground support unit, and the volunteer
civilians, had been awaiting further orders. As Hanna and his scratch
3-inch crew sprinted to the then-unmanned gun, Devereux ordered Putnam
to support the lieutenant.
Putnam assigned Second Lieutenant Kliewer to a post on the west end
of the airfield, along with Staff Sergeant John F. Blandy, Sergeant
Robert E. Bourquin, Jr., and Corporal Carroll E. Trego. They were
to set off the mines on the field if the enemy attempted to use it.
Two .50-caliber guns situated just north of the airstrip covered
Kliewer’s position. At the eastern end of the strip lay the guns manned
by Corporal Winford J. McAnally, along with six Marines and three
civilians and supported by a small group of riflemen. The gunners
enjoyed a perfect, unobstructed field of fire--the airstrip itself.
About 0300, just at a time when events began to develop with startling
rapidity as the Japanese pushed ashore on Wilkes and Wake, Major
Devereux lost touch with Camp 1, Putnam’s platoon, Hanna’s command
post near the airstrip, and Barninger’s Battery A. Advancing Japanese
troops probably had found the communication lines--the exigencies of
war had prevented them from being buried--and cut them. Devereux’s
last situation reports from those units painted a bleak picture. If
Cunningham received less-than-encouraging reports from the defense
battalion commander, he received equally grim news from CinCPac when,
at 0319 Wake time, Pearl Harbor radioed to Wake that the _Triton_ and
_Tambor_ were returning to Hawaiian waters. “No friendly vessels should
be in your vicinity today,” the message stated, “Keep me informed.”
[Illustration: _Painting by artist Albin Henning shows Marines firing
a .30-caliber Browning machine gun as Japanese landing force sailors
splash ashore. While inaccurate in details (barbed wire, for example,
is an artist’s invention because no such obstruction existed at Wake
Island, since the coral reef surrounding the atoll was bare of any
holding ground for the stakes or anchors necessary to keep them in
place), it does capture the desperate nature of the Marines’ final
day’s fighting._
Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 307142
]
Hanna and his men, meanwhile, reached the 3-inch gun and set to work.
Anxious hands fumbled in the darkness for ammunition while Hanna--since
the gun lacked sights--peered down the bore to draw a bead on the
beached and stationary _Patrol Boat No. 33_ that lay less than 500
yards away. The first round tore into the ship’s bridge, seriously
wounding both the captain and navigator, killing two seamen, and
wounding five. Hanna’s gun hurled 14 more rounds on target. Some of his
projectiles evidently touched off a magazine, and the beached warship
began to burn. The illumination provided by the burning ship revealed
her sistership, which Hanna and his hard-working gunners bombarded, as
well. A short time later three _Special Naval Landing Force_ sailors
attacked Hanna’s exposed position. In the ensuing fight, Hanna cooly
shot and killed all three enemy sailors with his pistol and resumed the
operation of his 3-incher.
[Illustration: MAP 3